Archive of Our Own ^beta

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“Welcome to Bizarre Yet Bonafide, the podcast of the paranormal. Hello and welcome to the latest episode, I’m Grace and this is Anton! Today we’re going to be discussing the recent tragic and yet bizarre, Hackett Family Massacre. Now picture this, you’re a camp counsellor on your last day of summer camp, all the kids are gone and you’re ready to go home to spend the rest of your summer away from all the mosquitoes and bears that you’ve had to fend off in those dangerous and mysterious woods. However, just as you’re about to go, your van breaks down and you unwittingly become trapped in the same woods as a man on a murder spree! Well there’s no need to imagine my dear listeners, as nearly a month ago, this very situation befell seven camp counsellors at the Hackett Quarry Summer Camp. On this night, the patriarch of the Hackett family, Jedediah, set out to murder his wife, three sons and two grandchildren for reasons still unknown, unaware that the counsellors of the camp had not left that day. Now, I know you’re wondering, where’s the bizarre? This is a podcast of the paranormal of course. Well here it is! There have been rumours, particularly creditable rumours if you ask me, that the reason Jedediah massacred his family is because he was in fact possessed by a ghost! And none other than the ghost that has been discussed on this very podcast before, so drum roll please! Thank you Anton. A ghost that is none other than the Hag of Hackett’s Quarry! Or maybe her long lost son Silas? Why are these rumours credible? Well I’m glad you asked because-“

Ryan yanks the earbuds out and lets them fall, a quiet clicking noise filling the otherwise silent room as they knock together against his chest. He hits the pause button perhaps a little too roughly and resists the urge to toss his phone across the room. He really shouldn’t be surprised that Bizarre Yet Bonafide are covering the “Hackett Family Massacre” but still, it wasn’t what he was expecting to hear when he mindlessly clicked on the podcast.

He immediately tries to forget the words he just heard, trying to wash them out of his mind alongside the sudden bitter taste in his mouth. But memories have already begun flooding back, the simple mention of the Hackett name instantly drawing him back to that night, with all the deep seated fear and nausea that comes with it. 

Images of blood, so much blood, and torn open skin flash behind his eyes. His hand protectively and instinctively clasps around his wrist where Silas bit him outside the radio shack. He swallows back the bile that creeps up his throat, like the lies he has had to tell since that summer night. 

‘They don’t know. They don’t know the truth.’ He reassures himself over and over again, to little avail. It feels like their collective secret will be found out at any moment and that it’s only a matter of time. 

They’ve all put their faith in Travis and the story he had them spin to his fellow police officers to keep them safe. Ryan has to believe it will hold up as the investigation wraps up. The other possibility is far too much to even comprehend thinking about. Laura has repeatedly reassured him that it is a believable story and he tries to recall her words to reassure him once more. What other explanations would there be? That the Hacketts had been sheltering werewolves, which just so happen to be real, and those very real werewolves attacked them that night and the family was killed in an attempt to dispel the werewolf curse? Yeah, she really doubts the police would even entertain the idea and Ryan, despite his anxieties, logically agrees with her. The Hacketts had always been a strange, isolated family, so it isn’t such a leap that someone like Jedediah could do something so terrible. Even if he didn’t. 

The counsellors weren’t particularly suspicious either, he supposes. They had washed and changed their clothes well before the police came and their story of the night was cohesive amongst them. Travis was trusted by his fellow policemen. He had no reason to lie, nor did seven random camp counsellors taken to be questioned individually. They were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. Their van broke down, they went to the beach to play truth or dare when they were attacked by a bear and ran to the radio shack to call for help. When Travis arrived they found Kaylee’s body in the pool and sheltered in the lodge while Travis went to his family home, having to unfortunately shoot his father to put an end to the massacre. He then of course immediately called the station, with no delay to hide any proof of their involvement or guilt. Any evidence of the counsellors being anywhere else that night could be attributed to spending the summer there and any other strange findings, such as explosions of blood dotted around the forest, could be blamed on the Hackett patriarch. 

They’d been sent home and straight into therapy before the end of the week, with stern instructions not to leave the state and carrying with them the weight of the lies they could never expose, the memory of horrors well beyond what any other person will ever have to experience fresh in their minds and a burden in their blood thicker than tar. 

Ryan has felt it grow thicker this past week. 

As he sits inside his room, stewing over his guilt and anxiety, he can smell the pie that his neighbour in the apartment beside him had pulled from the oven a few hours ago. He can hear the conversation that the man waiting in traffic on the street below holds over the phone as if he were here in the room with him. The lamp on his bedside table behind him feels just a little too bright, despite having his back turned to it. Despite spending practically half of his earnings on food, his stomach rolls with an insatiable hunger. And today, his teeth had nashed together as he held himself back from growling at an irate customer.

He doesn’t remember noticing any signs of Chris or his two children dealing with what Ryan is having to deal with now. Yes Chris has been extremely anxious that day, yet now knowing what would happen that night, it was a completely reasonable reaction. Other than that however, he hadn’t noticed anything to indicate that Chris was anything other than an ordinary man. Perhaps he had learned to hide it after the six years of infection. Perhaps it no longer affected him as strongly as it does to Ryan now, after all that time. There’s no way to know now.

The only thing that keeps Ryan from plunging into despair or panic is the knowledge that he is not alone with this. As guilty as the thought makes him, he is secretly glad that each of his former coworkers turned friends also share in this curse. Whenever he wants to complain about his suddenly delicate sense of smell, Abi beats him to it, lamenting about how the liles her mother keeps in the foyer now give her splitting headaches, when she used to love their strong scent. When he bemoans his now sensitive hearing, Kaitlyn chimes in to give the groupchat a total rundown of all her neighbours drama that she heard clearly through the walls. When he begins feeling fearful of himself due to the increasing irritability, he checks his phone and finds another recount of Emma only narrowly avoiding slapping someone again- though in all fairness, that may just be an Emma issue.

So it’s not just him going through this. All of his friends are suffering from similar symptoms, though some worse and some better. Though there is one symptom he hasn’t mentioned to them, simply because he isn’t sure it is a symptom at all. There has been a pit in his stomach since that night.

At first he thought it was residual fear. Then he assumed it was just anxiety from the trauma. Now he isn’t so sure what it is, but it feels as if it is getting stronger, deeper. It doesn’t feel like fear or anxiety. It doesn’t feel like numbness or depression. It’s simply a hole in his stomach, like something is missing. A few times when he really focuses on it, he’s felt it is almost like a deep seated loneliness. But he knows what loneliness feels like, he knows it well. Loneliness is a feeling that sits within the chest and feels so thick, like his lungs are filled with water. This isn’t just loneliness. Besides, he has no reason to feel lonely. He visits his grandparents and little sister Sarah every weekend, and he has more friends than ever before, even if he can only interact with them through a screen. Whatever it is, these past days it has grown and it now feels as if he’ll fall into it, like a black hole pulling in and consuming everything that ventures near.

A loud Bzzrt! yanks his eyes down to his phone and snaps him out of thoughts. He pulls his jaw to the side as if it could clear his ear of the grating sound that felt as if it stabbed his eardrums, despite his phone being on the lowest notification setting possible. Any day before that night he would have ignored his phone in favour of returning to his musing but now Ryan instantly flips his phone over and clicks on the message. Even if it is just a random meme sent by Jacob to the group chat, he’d rather be safe than sorry and poteinely miss a cry for help or worse.

Laura

Hey, all packed up and sorted with Emma?

His thumbs tap out his message with the quick and practised ease of someone who spends entirely too much time online. 

Ryan

Yeah all set and ready. Hbu, you and Max got the car sorted? 

Her response is quick, a simple yes before three dots bouncing pop up on the corner of his screen, indicating either a long message is coming or she is struggling to word her next message right. Ryan places his phone down on his desk and looks out his window as he waits, sweeping his eyes up and down the street and the buildings that line it. He doesn’t know how he feels about still being in this town. When he asked Chris about animation school, he’d been looking for reassurance, for that final push over the edge to get him to apply. That push never came and the choice has been taken away from him now anyway. Going to college with a backpack full of trauma and veins full of a supernatural curse slash disease slash whatever being a goddamn werewolf is- well to put it simply, he didn’t think he’d get many ‘A’s’. 

Instead he’s in the smallest, dingiest apartment in town and working for his grandfather. Technically his contract hasn’t been drawn up yet, so it’s all under the table for now. But it’s enough to afford this place, so Ryan makes do. He just didn’t feel comfortable living with his grandparents and little sister anymore. The first thing he did when he came home, after giving many tearful explanations and being forced to endure back breaking hugs, was begin organising to move out. He didn’t know how the ‘disease’ would affect him and now that he does, he’s glad that he had the urgency that he did. On top of that, being alone means he’s not disturbing or waking anyone as he potters around at night.

It seems that most of his new friends have had the same idea of taking at least a year off before broaching the idea of further schooling as well. If he recalls correctly, only he and Jacob have begun working so soon after that night, and only out of necessity, not mental security. Though Laura has mentioned that she still intends to pursue veterinary school. 

As if summoned by the thought of her, his phone buzzes once more. He swipes up into his texts and squints his eyes as the screen blares a bright light before it adjusts itself down to a more tolerable brightness. 

Laura

Yep, it’s good to go, though Max got an earful from his mum about the state of it. We’ll pick up Nick first, then swing round and grab Jacob and Kaitlyn. Sorry that we couldn’t pick you up too, but we’re completely out of room. At least you’re not going to be stuck in a car having to listen to Nick and Jacob’s bickering the whole way.

Her next message pops onto his screen before he can reply to the first, arriving so quickly that Ryan assumes she’s copied and pasted it.

Laura

But anyway, how are you managing? How are your ‘symptoms’? I hope it isn’t too bad for you, like it isn’t for Max. He’s got symptoms, with the hearing and smell and stuff but he says it’s all really mild- I don’t feel like it’s mild lol. I think he’s just trying to make sure I don’t worry.

Ryan

I’m managing. But yeah, I’m with you, I wouldn’t say any of this feels ‘mild’ to me. I don’t know how I’m gonna adjust to this tbh.

Laura

We’ll find a way. We’ll stick together and we’ll work it out. I actually thought tomorrow, when we’re all together again, we make a go at listing down everything we know about our new ‘condition’. Symptoms, things that help, changes and just everything we know about it. 

Ryan

Sure, sounds like a good idea. Be good to organise out everything we know.

Laura

Yeah. Plus I thought it might be a good distraction once we’re settled in. Don’t know how people will react to being forced back.

Ryan breathes in a deep breath, raising his eyebrows to himself in silent agreement. There’s no way around it, even if they all manage to hold it together, returning to the Hackett camp will be incredibly tough on them all. Especially having to return so extremely soon after that night. The place where they saw horrors worse than could be imagined, where good people died for nothing and where a monstrosity still roams, with them soon to join it. It’s a nauseating idea to turn, but as they’ve quickly learned, they don’t have as many choices in life as they’d once thought.

His phone dings again and a goodnight message from Laura pops onto the screen, expressing how she hadn’t realised how late it’s gotten. He taps a goodnight back and flicks his eyes to the corner of his phone to see how late is too late for her. It’s just past midnight. He sighs, tapping the power button on his computer and pulling over his graphics tablet that he got for a birthday a few years back. He picks off a small shaving from the tip of the stylus nib with his nail as he waits for his clunky computer to boot up. He might as well continue on with his current work in process, as Ryan’s well aware he won’t be sleeping for a good few more hours, as much as the dark circles under his eyes beg him too. As much as he wants to. 

Ryan honestly considers himself lucky with the insomnia. He could be having panic attacks every hour or be one bad memory away from stringing himself up. As painful, scary and depressing as it all is, he thinks he’s coping okay. Just focusing on what he needs to do, pushing back every reminder of that night and stuffing down any emotion too large to deal with. He’s doing good. 

His hand slides across the tablet, thick black lines mirroring his movements across the screen. His mind finally falls quiet as he sinks himself into the project, drawing away, frame by frame, into the early hours of the morning until his head grows heavy and eyes go blurry. When he drops heavily down onto his bed shoved into the corner of the tiny room, he’s asleep before he can even tug the blanket over him.

Chapter Text

Ryan taps the can with his finger in an attempt to get the last few drops out to no avail. With a sigh he crushes it in his hand and tosses it into his small trash can, feeling mildly proud of himself as it bounces on the rim but still falls inside the plastic bag. He looks around his room, scanning his eyes over his desk, floor and finally his bed where he’s placed his bags. He doesn’t think he’s forgotten anything and even if he has, it’s not like summer camp where if you forget something you’re stuck without it. They’re only going to be away for a few days, not two months. 

Enough time to settle into the lodge, workout what they’re going to do, survive the full moon, recover the next day and then return home. Perhaps a little overkill, but the group agreed as a whole that they would not be as negligent as Chris had been, letting them leave the night of the full moon. No car breaking down, closed road or asteroid hitting earth will stop them from getting to Hacketts Quarry before they turn. 

They should be picking him up any minute and he’s already getting antsy. He doubts that’s because of the moon though, it’s just how he’s always been. Getting ready far too early and then being unable to do anything but stress before it’s actually time to do whatever hits. Today there is of course an extra few layers to his stress, though the one with a particularly sharp edge isn’t the one he would have expected. 

He’s more worried about seeing his friends again then he is returning to Hacketts Quarry, though that will certainly be a feat in and of itself. He hasn’t seen any of the other counsellors since they were permitted to go home, due to them being all spread throughout the state. They have to remain within the state while everything on the legal and evidence side wraps up, despite it being in the laws eyes, pretty much an open and shut case. He doesn't know how long they're all stuck here, not that it's an issue for Ryan himself, but he knows some of the others are having to stay with family or hop on short leases in the meantime. Laura, Max, Jacob, Kaitlyn and Nick have ended up the furtherest away, scattered around the thinner outskirts of New York City. Emma and Abi are in Albany, and will be picking up Dylan halfway through their nearly three hour drive. By the time they come and grab Ryan, it’s still another hours drive through old roads in the woods before they reach the camp and the tiny, almost forgotten town of North Kill nearby. 

He’s missed them. Even before that night, after spending so long hanging out together and growing close with all of them, especially some of them in particular, it’s been odd returning to his mostly solitary life at home. One step above that, they went through something completely horrific and traumatising together and they all share this terrifying affliction. Now they’ve even got this big group chat that they’re all in and it is regularly filled with updates, photos and spam despite being only a few weeks old. From a few specific people, Ryan receives and sends goodnight messages every day.

Yet despite all of that, Ryan still feels incredibly anxious to see them again. Maybe it’s the fear of seeing how much that night has changed them, seeing the difference between before and after. Maybe it’s the fear that they will have all moved on already and he’s just stuck in the past, or even worse than that, they’re all struggling so much more than him that he looks like some psychopath for just trudging forward. Maybe it’s the fear of rejection, that in those few short weeks they’ve all gotten closer to each other without him and they don’t even want him there.

That particular thought is just absurd enough to snap him out of his head and cause him to blow a breath of a laugh out through his nose. As if returning to Hackett’s Quarry is just a fun little outing for the friend group and not borne out of necessity due to the moon causing them to explode into terrifying beastly monsters. As if they could uninvite him like a bunch of mean middle schoolers. Anxiety isn’t known for being rational, but still his thoughts sometimes surprise him with how skewed they get while yet how totally reasonable they may seem.

Restless to do something to distract himself from his thoughts, Ryan checks his phone, tapping into his messages and scrolling through the contacts. His finger hovers to a stop over the name ‘ Dylan <3’ and after a second's hesitation, he clicks into the messages. Slowly he scrolls up through their conversations, the photos and countless goodnights whizzing by. He can’t help but react to the messages as if it’s the first time reading them as he goes through them once more, letting out quiet scoffs, short breaths of laughter and more than a handful of eyerolls. Despite the contact only being a few weeks old, it takes a good while for Ryan to hit the top. He only notices that his brain has gone peacefully quiet when he looks up from his phone and doesn’t feel that tangle of anxiety in his mind. 

He and Dylan have talked everyday since they parted ways and returned to their respective homes. Their respective towns. Ryan isn’t a partially sociable person and in the past the amount of incoming messages from one person would have his finger stretching towards the block button. Now they bring a well needed warmth into his day. 

Their conversations have been almost completely light hearted. There has been practically no mention of that night past small references here and there. Ryan’s not sure if that’s been a conscious decision on either end. There has also been no mention of the romantic aspect of their relationship, from either of them. 

Though Ryan still wasn’t entirely convinced if Dylan did have a crush on him at camp, as jokes, sarcasm and unsaid but implied notions in conversation sometimes go over Ryan’s head, he had begun to consider the idea towards the end. He didn’t pick it up from Dylan himself, as to Ryan he just seemed friendly, but the other camp counsellors loved to jeer and point it out. It always caused Dylan to flush red in what Ryan assumes was embarrassment from being the butt of a joke but he never seemed upset or to take it seriously, so Ryan was certain it wasn’t because there was truthfulness to it at all. He even made his own jokes, which just convinced Ryan further it wasn’t anything more than just that- jokes. 

What made him even contemplate reconsidering was when one of the campers themselves, a somewhat bolshy seven year old, teased them both when they stopped to talk as Dylan passed by between activities. He thought when even the kids start pointing it out, there may be some hint of truth within all their words, though even that was a tentative thought. What Ryan also wasn’t certain of however, was if they all knew that he most definitely had feelings for Dylan. 

Now he wished he’d said something before- well before everything went to shit. He was quiet in his affections, he would be even without the uncertainty of if his feelings were returned. But nonetheless he wished he’d just taken Dylan seriously when he joked about Ryan giving him his number, instead of playing it off. At the time he just wanted the chance to tease Dylan back for once, leave him hanging for just a bit to see him get all frustrated and flustered. After working up his courage, he was planning on giving him his number when they were in the van, sharing headphones, listening to music. Instead, they went through a night of horror and only got each other’s numbers through the group chat that spawned out of it.

Now, still uncertain if he ever had at all, he very much so doubts Dylan would have any interest in him anymore. He hasn’t said anything about it or even acknowledged it. Not that Ryan has either, if he’s being fair. It cements in Ryan’s mind that it was all just people exaggerating friendliness for their own amusement. Even if it wasn’t, now that he’s undoubtedly going through an abundance of trauma, Dylan’s fleeting crush on Ryan is probably the last thing on his mind.

It isn’t the first thing on Ryan’s, but it’s certainly there. The longer he’s spent away from Dylan, the more he’s missed his presence. The jokes, his smile, the rare but lingering touches, the quick glances and quiet moments. Messaging is nice but he misses being around Dylan in person. He misses being around all of the counsellors in person. Even so, as he begins thinking about them again, the momentary calm after reading through his messages fades and the anxiety begins crawling back.

Thankfully, or unfortunately, Ryan has no chance to dwell on it. His newly keen hearing catches the rumble of a motor running down the street. He pushes himself off of his bed and leans over his desk until he catches sight of the van slowing to a stop outside. His phone buzzes in his pocket as he scoops up his bags and walks towards his door.

As he steps out onto the sidewalk and makes his way towards the van, its back door slides open and a potent smell fills his sinuses, wafting past him as it’s carried along by the cool breeze. It’s a strong scent, though light and almost sweet- in a very natural, organic way, like that of a freshly sliced fruit or freshly harvested honey. It doesn’t hold that sharp, chemical edge that burns his nose that he finds in all perfumes and artificial aroma’s now. He can’t help but take a deep breath to fill his lungs with the scent, inhaling as much of that irresistible smell as he can.

His footsteps falter as Dylan steps onto the sidewalk from the backseat of the van. Ryan’s eyes flick over his figure, eyebrows twitching downward in a small expression of concern. His hands have a slight shake, blood and pus caught between the skin and plate of his nails from biting them down to nearly the cuticle. His already pale skin has begun to grow pallid, as if this is his first time leaving the house and standing in the sun since he returned home, and he shivers in the wind, causing his shoulders to lift up towards his ears. He looks completely worn out.

Dylan takes a step towards him before he hesitates and falls to a stop once more, swallowing nervously. “You know, I don’t know if we can fit those bags in the van, Ryan.” He says in a light tone, a tone that Ryan knows it means that Blasé Dylan is talking.

He looks down at the small backpack he's looped the straps over the larger duffle bag he carries with his right hand. They could easily fit in the footwell or backseat, if not then his lap. He looks back to Dylan with his head tilted back and eyes slightly squinted. “Pretty sure they’ll fit. How much shit have you guys got in there?”

“I wasn’t talking about those bags.” Dylan says, bringing a finger up to tap just below his eye. There’s a moment of stillness before he breaks out into a wide smile that causes his cheeks to crease into his two uneven dimples. Despite the slight against him, Ryan can’t help but return the smile back.

He doesn’t have a chance to think of a reply as a body thuds against his chest and his arms are suddenly tangled up against Dylan’s. He slowly pulls them free and raises them up as Dylan wraps his own around Ryan’s neck, burying his face in alongside them. After a moment of uncertainty, Ryan returns the hug full force, holding Dylan tightly against him and dropping his face down onto his shoulder. He breathes in deeply and finds that thick, slightly sweet smell filling his head, bringing with it a very slight dizziness and a warmth that spreads in branches out from his chest. 

They hold each other until seconds turn into minutes, neither of them seemingly ready to let go. It’s only when he hears a sharp cough from behind Dylan that he realises how long they’re been standing there, totally ignoring their two other friends. Still, he is reluctant to let go, giving Dylan one last tight squeeze before letting his arms fall.

“Were you two planning on cuddling on the side of the road forever or did you just forget that we’re here too?” 

Ryan rolls his eyes with a smile, looking over to where Emma and Abi have gotten out of the van and stand a few feet away. Emma has her hands on her hips and a single brow raised, looking less than impressed with their drawn out reunion. 

“Yeah, it’s good to see you too, Emma.” He says, walking over to give her a short hug. She utters a small, irritated huff before abandoning the performance and returning the hug with her trademark stunning smile.

As he pulls back, a new scent fills his nose. It’s somewhat fainter and reminds him more of the smell you’d catch on a warm summer's breeze, than that of the scent that seemed to be aromanating off of Dylan. He forces himself not to take a purposeful sniff, well aware of how quickly Emma would call him out for how creepy and weird that would be. 

Instead he steps to the side, leaning down and scooping Abi into her own greeting hug. As he leans down he catches her nose crunching up in the corner of his eye and self consciously tucks his arms against his sides, trying to recall when he last showered.

“Hey Ryan.” She says happily, standing up on her toes to fully hug him back. Her hair tickles his nose and as he sniffs to prevent the oncoming sneeze, he inhales another lungful of powerful smell. This scent is almost sickly sweet, like that of a heavily fragrance flower. The urge to sneeze comes back twice as strongly. He lets go quickly, giving Abi’s arm an awkward pat as he backs away to pick up his bags. 

“So,” He says, drawing out the word, “How’s the drive been so far?”

Emma gives him another unimpressed look, her hand returning to her hip as she stands favouring one leg. “How do you think? We’ve been stuck listening to Dylan’s music for the last hour and a half and we’ve still got a whole ‘nother more to go.”

Ryan looks between Dylan’s affronted expression, Abi’s poorly hidden smile and Emma’s guise of exasperation. That hole inside his stomach shrinks, not completely gone but growing smaller and much less dark. He couldn’t wipe the grin off his face if he tried.

“You’re just saying that, we all know Dylan’s music is a culmination of everything, you can’t find it all bad.” He light heartedly defends, throwing his bags into the footwell in the backseat. 

“Yeah, I am.” Emma admits. “The drive’s been fine, I can’t just imagine having to do it every month.”

“We’re really going to have to adapt our entire lives around this, aren’t we?” Abi asks quietly.

No one answers her. There is no lie that could be said to conceal the truth and there is nothing truthful to say that could provide the comfort of a lie. After a moment of weighty silence, Emma breaks it, turning on her faux unconcerned and upbeat demeanor. “Alright, we should probably get going, right? Schedule to keep and all that. Ryan you’re stuck in the back with Dylan sorry, it’s ladies only up front.”

“She’s just worried you’ll hang your head out the window like a dog if she lets you sit beside an openable window.” Dylan says, folding his arms across his chest. 

“Is that what she told you?” He asks, holding the side of the sliding door and gesturing for Dylan to climb inside.

“Only after Dylan threatened to do exactly that immediately after seeing the van.” Abi laughs. 

She climbs in after Dylan, clambering over the console instead of simply walking around the hood and opening the door. Ryan slides the door shut behind him, sitting down beside Dylan and looking over his shoulder to the very back seat. He can’t count the amount of bags that have been shoved back there. He can spot Dylan and Abi’s, squished in among plastic bags and coolers filled with food and at least four of Emma’s that he can see in the jumbled pile.

“It wasn’t a threat, Abi. Jeez, what do you think of me?”

“I think you would definitely commit to a stupid joke like sticking you head out the window if you thought it might get you a laugh.” 

Ryan quirks an eyebrow at that comment as he clicks his seatbelt closed and spares a brief glance out the window, the van pulling out into the road and his new home disappearing behind them. 

“That was mean. That was totally a mean thing to say, where did that even come from?” Dylan asks, sounding insulted but not necessarily hurt.

Abi seems slightly panicked when she responds. “I wasn’t being mean! I’m just saying that, well, I don’t know, you-“

“Alright, chill out guys, let’s not argue before we even get to the camp.” Ryan cuts in, hoping to nip any awkward tension in the bud, even if it was unintended.

“You think we’re going to argue at the camp?”

“Cut it out? But I didn’t do anything, she insulted me for no reason!”

Ryan catches Emma’s eyes in the rearview mirror and she sends him an amused expression. He runs a hand over the back of his neck and looks between Abi and Dylan. To his surprise they both look back expectantly, waiting for what he has to say next. It gives him a pause. He had assumed they would ignore him and continue on bickering. He’s kind of taken aback and confused as to why those offhanded words seem to hold so much sway.

“We know how we might get- uh, edgy, before the moon. I think if we all just try to be as mindful of that as possible, then this will go a lot more smoothly, right? So let’s all just stay chill and stuff, I don’t know.” Ryan says, picking his words carefully but still running out of steam by the end.

Abi turns back to the front, sitting her chin on her hand and looking out the window. Dylan folds his arms again, leaning back against his seat. He tried to appease them both while remaining fair but now Ryan can’t tell if his little speech worked or if he was too neutral and just managed to piss them both off.

A moment later Abi sighs and turns to the back seat again. “I wasn’t trying to be mean, I’m sorry Dylan.” 

Dylan waves a limp hand in front of his face. “I wasn’t offended.” He says with a shrug.

From the front Emma scoffs. “Then why were you making such a big deal about it?”

He shrugs again. “Abi never disses anyone, I don’t want to become her easy pickings if she’s planning on starting now.”

That earns him a collective eye roll, but any hint of tension, feigned up by Dylan or not, is completely gone. Abi even gives a short laugh, her tone light as she says, “Okay, lesson learned. I’ll make sure any future dissing will be safely directed at a fairer game.” 

“At Kaitlyn.” Dylan offers.

“Or Jacob.” Emma adds.

Ryan’s sighs, though he’d be lying if he tried to pretend it wasn’t funny. Still, someone has to be the rational one of the group. “Isn’t that what I just advised against?”

Emma hums, as if thinking it over. “Yeah I think we’ve decided to ignore your advice.”

“And we all know how that went last time.” He mutters. Beside him he hears a snort. It causes his lips to twitch up, a warm feeling settling within his chest. 

“Whoa, dark dude.” Dylan laughs, glancing at him sideways. 

Ryan leans against the window, angling his body so he can continue to face towards Dylan. “Just saying, not following my advice has a pretty poor track record at this point.” 

Dylan slightly tilts his head sideways, his eyes following the movement in a half roll, as if he agrees but doesn’t want to. “Don’t let it get to your head.” 

“Well I can’t promise that.” He says, his mind rewinding back to when Dylan said those same words to him in Chris Hacketts office. 

The small offshoot of the group settles into a comfortable silence after that, intercut with the occasional conversation, joke or comment on the passing scenery. Throughout the trip, Dylan flicks through countless playlists on his phone, picking out odd songs from them and adding them to the long queue, shuffling it around when he finds one he particularly wants to play. Ryan can’t help but notice quite a few of the songs that play are favourites of his that he’d recommended to Dylan over the summer.

Ryan slinks down in his seat as they drive, the cool glass of the window and soft cushion of the seat supporting his head. He feels slightly hazy, the enclosed space of the van filled with the bizarre, strong scents. One in particular overpowers his senses, filling his sinuses and throat. It leaves his mouth dry and his body warm, in a slightly uncomfortable and stifling way. He’s silently thankful when both Abi and Emma open their windows, everyone breathing the fresh air in deeply. It doesn’t wash away the scent completely but it’s enough to clear his head enough to settle his pulse.

When they finally pull off of the main road and begin driving down the roads encompassed within Hackett property, they all rouse themselves, preparing for the reunion of the entire group. There is a nervous energy amongst them, so thick in the air he can almost smell it. Dylan seems especially agitated, his jokes increasing in frequency the closer they approach the lodge, until they flow together into an incessant chatter. His leg shakes a mile per minute and his fingers twist together, the sound of popping joints filling the short quiet after each sentence. 

Ryan wants to say something, do something. It doesn’t feel right, sitting there silently while Dylan’s mind and mouth run full speed ahead in complete opposite directions. But he doesn’t know what he can do, without overstepping or just making it worse. Not to mention, his newly incredibly sensitive nose has slowly picked up a new smell that makes him want to screw up his face and use his tshirt to block the stench out. It’s grown stronger than any other smell he’s had to swallow down since his infection, overpowering the sweet smell that’s filled his head and chest with warmth since the beginning of their drive. It’s bitter, acidic and harsh enough that it feels as if it’s burning through his nasal cavity. 

He looks around the van, trying to find the source of the sudden overwhelming smell. He leans to the side, attempting to see if Emma or Abi have opened up a bottle of something foul. He only finds them wrinkling their noses and winding the windows down as far as they can go. He’s not imagining it, at the very least. He sits back against his seat, assuming they’ve driven past something that curled its way inside the van through the windows and praying that it’s washed out soon enough.

It follows them all the way up to the driveway of the lodge, growing stronger if anything. However, below the smell, there develops new layers of sourness, Ryan picking out a sharper smell and a more acidic stench underneath the powerfully bitter smell that had already clouded the van. Despite the anxiety of returning, he’s glad to get outside if it means he can get away from these strange and strong scents that put him on edge. 

As they roll down the driveway, the lodge grows to loom over them and the smell fades from the forefront of his mind, his eyes and mind captured by the sight of the building. What was once the warm, welcoming central hub of the camp, now holds an ominous atmosphere. Other than the police trekking in and out, no one has stepped onto these grounds since that night in August. It looks strange, being abandoned and forgotten, when it was once bustling with life and laughter. 

Emma pulls to a stop outside the lodge, the dirt and gravel crunching underneath the tires. The others haven’t seemed to arrive yet and there’s no sign of Travis being around. That eases Ryan’s nerves a tad and despite the residual anxiety curling through his intestines, he pops his seatbelt, draws open the van door and immediately drops down onto the ground. Ryan has never been more thankful to step outside a vehicle, stretching his legs and breathing in the fresh air and finally clearing his lungs. 

He looks around, at the scuff marks in the dirt, the claw marks on the side of the lodge, the crack in the windowpane. It would need some serious TLC if it were to ever be used for a camp again. Which Ryan seriously doubts. Chris is gone and if he remembers right, every inch of Hackett property belongs to Travis now, the sole survivor of his family left to inherit anything. Who knows what he’ll do with it all. He has had no contact with Travis since that night, though he knows Laura has. Maybe she knows.

He turns as he hears the van slide closed, Dylan walking up to stand beside him. “We’re really back, huh?”

“Yeah, who would’ve thought, after the night we had.” Ryan agrees with him, attempting to sniffle subtly. He’s surprised he doesn’t feel a headache oncoming with all the strong smells he’s had to choke down today. He’s still not certain of the cause but doesn’t want to bring it up and potentially be insulting, especially if it is just from a plant tangled in the wheels, something from within the woods or maybe even a new body wash or the like.

“Alright are the big strong boys going to help with all these bags or are you leaving it to the girls?” Emma says mockingly as she hops out of the van.

Dylan lazily looks back, an easy smile on his face despite the fiddling of his hands with the hem of his shirt and bouncing heel. “Big strong boys? I’ll sit this one out then.”

“Oh come on, be a gentleman.”

“Because you're such a lady, Emma?”

She smirks, elbowing him in the side as they walk back to the van. “What are you implying, that I don’t look like a lady?”

“Oh no, no one said anything about looks. Acting like a lady though, hm hah.” 

Their playful chatter fades into the background behind him as Ryan stares down the lodge for one more minute. He isn’t sure how he feels being back, how he feels looking at it. He can remember it all, though it blurs together into one long muddy movie in his mind. He could point out exactly where each of them stood before and after the night and exactly where the cop cars pulled up. He can see the bloodstains from where Dylan and Kaitlyn turned in the lodge, while he was off running around somewhere in the woods after transforming in the Manor and Travis was off hunting down Silas, to no avail. The first explosion of blood is splattered against the inside of a window in the mess hall, another stain on the windows in the kitchen. Travis clearly hasn’t hired any crime scene cleaners yet- Ryan wonders if he plans to at all.

“Ryan, we’d appreciate some help.” Abi's voice comes from behind him, her tone soft. He tears his eyes away from the building, away from the crumbling bloodstains and follows her to the van to unpack.

Chapter Text

They’ve sat down on the steps in front of the lodge, letting the sun settle over their skin and the cool air breeze past them. With the fresh air rushing those strong scents past them, Ryan feels like his head and sinuses are finally clear for the first time since he walked up to the van. He can still smell it, can still tell each layer apart but it doesn’t swirl around his lungs and clog up his bloodstream anymore. They’d left the bags safely stacked inside the foyer after some discussion of where they’ll end up sleeping over the waning and waxing nights of their stay, though it ultimately ended unresolved without the input of the entire group. Now, almost half an hour later, Ryan pauses mid sentence at the low sound of gravel being crushed underneath tires. 

“I think they’re here.” He states simply, causing his small offset of the group to fall quiet and look towards him.

“How do you know that?” Abi asks.

“Uh, can’t you hear it? There’s a car at the end of the driveway, you can hear the gravel crunching.”

Emma looks at him inquisitively, her eyebrows raised. “No, we can’t hear that. You can? How sensitive is your hearing now?”

Ryan rubs a hand over the back of his neck, feeling awkward under the curious gazes. “Yeah, I mean, pretty clearly. You really can’t hear that?” He watches as the three of them strain to try and hear the car. 

“Yeah I think I hear it? Like that grating sound?”

“I can kinda hear an engine hum, if I really try.” 

Emma’s face screws up and she scoffs, leaning back from where she had tipped forward to try and struggle to hear what Ryan can hear quite clearly. “Seriously guys? You’re bullshitting right, because I seriously can’t hear anything.” 

“No I can sorta hear it, I mean, pretty faintly but it’s definitely there.” Dylan says with Abi nodding along. She abruptly stops nodding when he adds on with a shrug, “Guess you’re just a shit werewolf.”

“Dylan.” Ryan sighs with a half heartedly disappointed tone. Emma gives him the finger in response and Abi wraps her hands around her arms. 

She’s about to say something when they catch sight of Max’s car rumbling down the driveway. Emma throws her hands up in the air before she stands, turning to look at them with her hands on her hips. “So you weren’t bullshitting and I am just a shitty werewolf. Whatever, you guys can enjoy your headaches while I enjoy my normal person hearing, thank you very much.”

A small chorus of scoffs and huffs answer her as they all stand up, watching the car as it pulls to a slow halt beside the van. Dylan gives a small wave as seatbelts are clicked undone and the doors swing open. They walk down the steps as the other half of the group hop out of the car, meeting them by the hood. Ryan takes a long look at each of them as they approach. They each look tired and a little worn out. Jacob’s hoodie has a couple of rips in it, Nick looks ever so slightly gaunt, Laura’s hair is a tangled unbrushed mess, Max keeps shuffling his feet and Kaitlyn is in the strangest collection of put together clothes he's ever seen, as if she just scooped up and put on whatever she could find from her bedroom floor. 

There’s a beat of cautious staring before the group collides. Dylan wraps his arms around Kaitlyn’s neck as she squeezes her arms around his waist. Abi hesitantly looks up at Nick before gently wrapping him in a hug, which is very timidly and softly returned. Emma looks at Jacob dubiously before they share an awkward side hug that lasts all of two seconds. Ryan himself gets a bear hug from Laura. 

Eventually they all release eachother and the next ten minutes are spent playing musical chairs between themselves, swapping around the matchups for the hugs and quiet greetings to continue. Though the vast majority of them are directed towards Dylan. Kaitlyn and Abi also get their fair share, while Laura and Max step back and let the group reunite. When everyone finally pulls back, there’s a mix of smiles and uncertain expressions across the group's faces.

It isn’t this dramatic reunion that Ryan worried it may be, with excited chattering or laughing. There is of course care and affection in seeing eachother again but it is heavily blanketed under an air of sombreness. Everyone is well aware why they are here again and that knowledge hangs heavily on their shoulders. 

Now that all individual greetings have passed, the group stands for a tentative pause, unsure what to say or how to begin. The wind is having a tough time blowing away all of the strong scents that have culminated together with their closeness. It’s now a many layered and thick cloud around them, consisting of a range of smells from bitter to airy to smokey. With the quiet pause, Ryan takes the moment to focus on it. He can vaguely discern the direction of where each scent stems- from around the circle, a single scent coming from each of his friends. Eventually Ryan has to tilt his head slightly to breathe in where the wind batters his back, rubbing his nose with his hand from the overstimulation. He wonders once more if it is simply just their deodorant or conditioner that gives them all this strong and unique smell. Maybe they’ll have to start showering with nothing but water.

Laura, who has gotten visibly more impatient as the moment dragged on, breaks the silence. “Well we’re here. The lodge looks like shit, you guys certainly did a number on it.” 

The new arrivals all jump on the opportunity to do something other than awkwardly standing there, looking up to the building towering behind the rest of them and scanning their eyes over the damage and the general disrepair that it has so suddenly fallen into. Jacob and Nick both make a face and Kaitlyn’s eyes catch on the dried up bloodstain in the window.

“I mean we’re definitely going to have to clean it up at least, if we’re going to be coming here every month. I bet it’s freezing in there too.” Jacob says, sounding put out.

“It really is.” Emma responds before realising who she replied to, folding her arms and lifting her chin half an inch higher. Ryan wonders how their interactions are going to play out over this “trip” for lack of a better word- really he wonders how goddamn awkward they’re going to make this for the rest of them. They didn’t exactly leave on the best of terms and from what Ryan has seen, they avoid talking to each other in the group chat. 

“It’s weird to be back right?” Max says, leaning against the hood of the car.

“Can’t say I’d be here if it wasn't necessary.” Jacob says flatly. Ryan is inclined to agree.

The group lapses into another wavering silence, though it lasts all of two seconds before Kaitlyn cuts through it, clearly unwilling to let it draw out long enough to reach that awkward length again. “Okay so are we going to talk about the fact that we all reek, or are we ignoring that? Just so I know.” 

A collective look is shared amongst them before some light laughs bubble up from a few of their chests, Ryan included. “I wasn’t going to say anything.” 

“I didn’t want to insult anyone’s perfume or cologne but it’s so strong.” Abi also admits.

“I haven’t used anything scented since that night, it just gives me an instant headache. I should have shared that memo with you guys.” Dylan complains, his nose scrunched and head reeled back slightly. It causes the slight indents of his dimples to appear in his cheeks. It’s objectively cute, that’s not even just Ryan’s opinion, he reasons with himself.

“I’m the same, I’m not wearing anything scented.” Abi defends, rousing up a chorus of agreements.

“So what, have none of us have showered, or?”

Jacob shrugs, cutting Kaitlyn off. “Honestly I don’t really notice it.”

She gives him the flattest, most unimpressed look that she can manage- which for Kaitlyn, is fairly scalding. “Jacob the second I walked over to the car, I literally watched you huff at the air. You were smelling me, which, gross dude.”

Emma turns away their bickering, clearly over their involvement in the conversation and levels a thoughtful stare at Dylan. “You haven’t used anything scented, like, at all? Because Dylan, and I love you, I mean this in the kindest way possible, you smell absolutely horrific. Like bitter. It’s seriously burning my nose.”

Dylan gives her an affronted look, picking up his tshirt and giving it a sniff before lifting up his arm and giving another. “No, I don’t? I showered this morning, I don’t know what more you want from me.”

“It’s strong dude.” She rebuts, wearing that classic judgemental Emma look.

Dylan looks at Ryan and Abi for some back up but they both betray him.

“I’m sorry Dylan, I didn’t think it was you at first but it definitely is. I’m just confused because when we first picked you up, you actually smelt really nice? Like, almost sweet, kinda.” Abi says, slowly and as tactfully as she can.

Ryan just shrugs. “Sorry dude. I didn’t realise it was you but,” he leans to the side, breathing in deeply and his nostrils fill with that acidic, burning scent, “It definitely is. To be fair, we all smell, it’s just that bitter smell is pretty overpowering.”

As if from just mentioning it, the smell grows stronger and Ryan actually takes half a step back. All of them are looking at Dylan now, not so subtly sniffing the air. He fixes them all with an unimpressed look, his hands on his hips.

“You guys are just being arseholes now.”

“Urgh no, it literally just got stronger. What is that?” Emma groans, pinching her nose shut with her fingers.

Laura has a contemplative look. “None of us are wearing anything scented, yet we all stink and Dylan just started smelling worse when we pointed it out. You don’t think?”

“Think what?”

A sudden realisation settles over Max’s face. “It’s a werewolf thing.” A spike of a sharp scent flares up, though it is separate from what has concluded to be the bitter smell coming off of Dylan. “You think it’s like, our scent? Is that a thing?”

Laura shrugs. “Maybe. I mean, it kind of makes sense? Who knows what other weird stuff this curse comes with, we don’t exactly have a handbook guide.”

“Yeah that poem doesn’t really cut it, does it? Especially considering the fact it lied to us too.”

“Lied to us or were we just too dumb to interpret it correctly?” 

“That one is on you two.” Dylan points out to them, a hint of tension held in his voice from just being ganged up on as the example of their scent.

Kaitlyn, always the one to get them back on track, jumps in again before they can respond. “Okay can we rewind a little bit. So you’re saying that we all have scents and we’ve been sniffing at each other like dogs?” 

“You think we’ve always smelt like this and just didn’t have a strong enough nose to smell it or do you think it came free with the whole werewolf thing?” Jacob says, tacking his own question onto the end of hers.

Laura lightly throws her hands up. “I don’t know, I’m just making guesses here.”

“I think you might be right.” Ryan agrees with her, drawing everyone’s expectant gazes and causing him to elaborate. “Well I mean, these ‘scents’ aren’t exactly specific smells are they? Like they vaguely smell of things but that isn’t what’s overpowering, it’s the scent itself. They’re all extremely unique but quite, I don’t know, ambiguous? It doesn’t smell chemical or artificial. It’s I guess, pretty natural smelling? It’s hard to explain and I feel like I’m doing it badly but you guys know what I mean, right?”

They seem to consider it for a moment before a few agreements are thrown out, Kaitlyn nodding her head as she says “No, I understand what you’re saying.”

“I actually agree with you. There’s different types of smells between us? Like, I personally think Emma and Nick, you kinda smell similar while still clearly very different.” Abi says quietly. 

“So why does Dylan smell like shit now when he smelt really good in the car?” Emma asks.

Dylan looks so offended that Ryan feels the need to quickly shut the focus on him down so they can move on. “Lay off Emma. If our theory’s right, well dogs can smell emotions can’t they? I don’t know, maybe the same thing applies here or something. If we’ve got the same kind of thing, you’re probably not helping. It’s not like any of us exactly smell like roses right now anyway.”

He has no clue if he’s anywhere close to right, he was just throwing an idea out there to get them to move on from pointing out Dylan specifically. He considers it a success as Emma raises her hands in surrender- though the placating gesture is severely undercut by the over exaggerated eye roll that follows it. “Alright, so we’re all stressed and smell terrible. I wasn’t trying to, you know..”

Ryan just nods at her and looks to the rest of the group, standing around awkwardly. He sighs. “Let’s get your bags inside and then we can work out how to clean up the lodge a bit to make it habitable. Yeah?” He doesn’t want to have to clean up the lodge, but he doubts any of them want to exist in that space right now with the blood splatters on the walls and furniture left in disarray. Unless Travis has crime scene cleaners booked for ten minutes from now, the group is just going to have to bite the bullet and do it themselves.

To his surprise no one objects. As if everyone suddenly remembers the wind and chill or perhaps jumping on the opportunity to escape the increasingly uncomfortable conversation, the group all nod and they begin opening up the car. Between the car and the van, they have brought plenty of food for their stay and everyone has enough bags that anything forgotten will be easily replaced by someone else. They haul everything into the foyer of the lodge before looking around at the mess. It is in disarray but certainly not unfixable. 

The power is still on, thank god, and the water still runs after a quick check of the taps. As it has been forever, there’s no signal but at least their phones won’t die. It could be worse, Ryan supposes. The whole lodge could’ve been blown up in a gas explosion or something just as crazy- then they’d really have nowhere to go.

After a quick game plan, they waste no time in getting to work, moving around the heavy furniture, picking up items that had been broken and moving them to the side, sweeping up the glass and wiping down the bloodstains. They split off into little groups as they go, working in duos and trios to get the job done faster. For some of them they chatter and for some they work unspeaking. Ryan’s noticed that Nick in particular hasn’t spoken much, if at all. 

Ryan split off with Dylan to clean up the bloodstains that tint a few of the windows red. They found a bucket and some cloths in the kitchen that they filled with soapy water, repeatedly dragging them over the glass and harshly wiping to scrape off the clotted chunks. Dylan seems focused, only interjecting the occasional comment as they clean, mostly about his arms hurting from the repetitive motion. Though extremely slowly, that bitter smell does begin to fade, as if it were being washed away alongside the blood. 

Ryan wishes they didn’t have to do this themselves, that Travis could have hired professionals to do the job correctly. But if he remembers right, someone did say that the Hacketts hadn’t been doing great financially. And perhaps there is something therapeutic about cleaning up the scene of your trauma, taking back some control. It doesn’t feel therapeutic, but you know, it could be. 

It ends up taking the group hours to put the lodge back into a somewhat sanitary and tidy state. That’s just the main room too. There’s also still an excess of large tables, benches and chairs that have nowhere to go, most of them pushed into a large pile against the walls. But at least it no longer feels like an active crime scene anymore by the time they're done.

It’s beginning to grow somewhat dark outside, the large amount of shade from the trees swelling up and over the walls of the lodge. They collapse down around the couple of tables they’d left arranged in the room, catching their breath and resting their feet. 

After some time, Emma buries her face in her hands and groans, “All of that and we still haven’t worked out where we’re sleeping.” 

“Well we either go to the cabins or make use of the couches in the rec room.” Laura states, straight to the point as always.

“There’s plenty of sleeping bags in storage either way.” Jacob supplies, cracking his neck which must be sore after being the heavy lifter for all the furniture. 

“Maybe we should stay in the lodge, just for tonight at least? Just, better to stick as a group and all the food is here and uh, stuff.” Abi says uncertainty.

Dylan nods his head along with her words. “Yeah I’m not really keen on walking all the way out to the cabins now. There’s also the bed in Mr-“ He gives a side glance to Ryan, “-In the office.”

“Me and Laura could take that” Max offers and Dylan rolls his eyes.

“Oh how generous of you, offering to take the only bed.” He says sarcastically. Max sends him a cheeky grin and they share a quiet huff of a laugh.

“Are there enough couches for the rest of us though?” Jacob asks.

Kaitlyn counts them out on her fingers. “There’s four in the rec room plus another recliner and two in the attic. I think that’s all of them?”

“Dibs on the rec room.” Jacob immediately says. 

That prompts a spew of more dibs which overlap into a buzzing sound that grates on his ears and eventually Ryan just groans out to make them stop. “I’ll take the attic, just stop bickering.”

After a moment of everyone waiting for someone else to make the sacrifice, Kaitlyn also volunteers. “I’ll join you.”

At the end of her words, there’s a short, small noise that cuts off before it really begins. Like a low rumble from- Ryan looks to where the sound came from and only finds Dylan sitting beside him, his hand pressed against his mouth- it came from Dylan’s chest he realises. 

“What was that-“ Ryan begins to ask but he’s cut off by Kaitlyn, sounding indignant and confused. 

“Did you just growl at me?”

Dylan’s head pulls back and he wears a matching look of confusion to her own. “No? It- it was a sneeze.”

“A sneeze.”

“Um, yeah?” Considering Dylan doesn’t even sound convinced of himself, he fails to persuade Kaitlyn.

“Uh huh. A sneeze. You can sleep in the attic Dylan, be my guest.”

“I don’t want to! It smells like mothballs and dust up there.”

“Then don’t growl at me about it!”

“It wasn’t a growl!”

“Alright, alright!” Ryan interrupts. “What time is it? Maybe we should get started on dinner or something.”

He doesn’t even know if it’s the right time for dinner but Ryan feels like they have to keep going, keep their hands and minds busy. He doesn’t want to let them sit around and talk, a feeling he feels guilty for having. Each time the group pauses to talk he can feel their awkward silences and uncomfortableness in his bones. He hates knowing that they’re all thinking things but he doesn’t know what. He has absolutely no idea what they’re thinking and it stresses him out. It could be anything, anything could be running through their minds. It’d just be better if they were so preoccupied that there wasn’t any time for thoughts, whatever they may be.  

Still, the bickering is even worse. That was something he begrudgingly loved during camp, the constant back and forth. Right now, today? It just makes him anxious. He knows, logically, that Dylan and Kaitlyn’s squabbling is completely good natured- those two have grown into the closest of friends and he knows they really care about each other. They’re not going to suddenly start an actual fight over an oddly sounding sneeze. But it was setting his teeth on edge. He doesn’t want any tension between them, not now, with the moon growing bigger and brighter each night.

He can feel himself stressing himself out, the anxiety he felt about seeing his friends coming back despite them sitting right there beside him. His thoughts are quickly beginning to spiral when a voice gently brings them to a slow.

“You know what, I am actually starving. We should definitely get started on dinner before I go feral and start taking chunks out of you guys. Nick, think you can make something edible out of all the stuff we brought?” Dylan says, his tone suddenly switched from the defensive intonation that it just held and into such a light tone that Ryan is almost certain that it isn’t genuine. 

It seems to have done the trick however as Nick nods and Ryan hears him speak for the first time since he arrived. “Uh yeah I can sort something out, with some help.” He speaks softly and his voice almost has a very slight, easily missable shake to it. Ryan has never heard him sound so small before. 

While the rest of the group begins volunteering for different jobs and different ideas related to dinner, a hand gently touches Ryan’s arm. “Are you okay?” Dylan asks him quietly.

Ryan looks at him, his eyes running over Dylan’s face and the concerned expression held there. “Yeah, yeah I’m alright.”

“It wasn’t me uhh. Um. It wasn’t because, well, I, you know-“ Dylan looks incredibly guilty as he struggles to find the right words and it quickly becomes painful enough that Ryan does him the mercy of cutting him off.

“No, it wasn’t that. But how did you..?”

Dylan’s face relaxes in a sign of relief and smiles softly. “Despite the wild accusations, you were right. I’m not the only one who stinks.” 

“Sorry. I didn’t realise- I started smelling?”

“Uh, yeah. I mean you’ve smelt all day, but-“ Dylan seems to realise what he’s said and quickly backtracks, “Not like smell, like I’ve been able to smell you but it’s a good smell and then it just changed- not super strongly but I- I noticed and you know I thought about our conversation earlier and thought like, oh he might be… not… feeling good?” 

Despite his awkward trailing off at the end, Ryan gets what he’s trying to say. Their theory has to be correct because Ryan was definitely not ‘feeling good’. Somehow Dylan picked that up just because of a small change in how he smells. Which is frankly insane, but Ryan guesses nothing is off the table anymore. “I was actually feeling… not good. I’m okay though, it’s just- you know, strange.”

“The whole being back here thing or the werewolf thing?”

“Well, both. It’s just that and everything. It’s a lot, but you know that, you’re going through it too. I just-” Ryan pauses to take a deep breath in to pull himself together and suddenly his head goes peacefully empty and light. That sweet smell fills his lungs and runs through his blood, warming him up from the inside. It’s calming, incredibly calming, as he’d inhaled an entire vial of one of those aromatherapy bottles. He completely forgets what he was saying and just takes another deep breath to chase that tantalising scent.

He’s not exactly sure why it suddenly became so strong right now but it hits him like the laughing gas from the mask they’d slapped on his face when he was eleven and broke a few of his fingers. One minute he’s breathing in the cocktail of gases that make up the plain old air and the next he’s lightheaded and his chest is warm from just the slightest sniff of what apparently is nothing more than just a smell. 

This might be a problem, Ryan thinks distantly. Not a right now problem, since he feels more than fine right now, but a problem that grows until it becomes unbearable. Because Ryan thinks he might get addicted to this smell- to Dylan’s smell he reminds himself, which is a thought that nearly makes him cringe. He wants to plant his face in the source and get high off of huffing the stuff all day, which isn’t something he can do nor should he want to do, cause jeez, a little bit creepy Ryan. 

“Hey Ryan? Still in there?” Dylan says, removing his hand from Ryan’s arm to wave it in front of his face, making him realise that he had suddenly stopped speaking. “Yoohoo?”

“Sorry I just,” He clears his throat and tries to breathe through his mouth. “I feel better now, so thank you.”

“You definitely smell better.” Dylan smiles. “Though do you think we need to invest in some nose plugs?”

Ryan gives a small laugh. “Yeah, that might be wise.” He looks up to see what the rest of the group have decided on doing, only to find the table empty. He hadn’t even noticed they’d left. He turns back to Dylan and gestures at the empty table.

He gets a puzzled smile in return. “You were really zoned out huh? They got up and left to get dinner ready. Well, Nick would only let a few of them in the kitchen with him, safety hazards and all that. The rest of them are making sure our sleeping arrangements are actually tolerable.”

“So we got off scott free?”

“Mm not quite. You are chopping us some firewood.”

Ryan scoffs. “And you?”

“Supervising.”

“Supervising?”

Dylan tilts his head side to side. “Yeah, supervising. Duh. I watch you chop the wood and make sure you don’t cut off any fingers. Then I watch you haul it inside and stock the fireplace. Then, if I’m really nice and want to go above and beyond for my job, I might even help you light it.”

“Who- who gave you that job? Or is it self appointed? Because I think I would actually like the job of supervising.”

“Mmh no, sorry, it was actually a group vote that I’m supervisor. And actually, oh yeah I just remembered, the group explicitly voted that you, under no circumstances, should be allowed to supervise.”

“And why was that decided?”

Dylan has to pause to think which makes Ryan give a heartfelt laugh at him. “Well, you see, it was because, um-“

Ryan stands up and steps over the bench, placing his hands on his hips and leaning back to try and crack his spine. He definitely hasn’t missed these tables and benches that somehow always manage to leave you with aches. He watches as Dylan spins around and throws one leg over before he offers a hand and pulls him up. 

Ryan squeezes his hand before he lets go. “Alright then Mr Supervisor Sir, let’s go.”

With Dylan in tow, Ryan treks out to behind the lodge and finds the wood stump and axe. True to his word, Dylan does literally nothing to help and just stands around watching. He finally admits it’s because his arms already hurt from the cleaning, which Ryan will concede was pretty strenuous. Yet, his own arms don’t hurt in the slightest, even as he continues to ram the axe through thick pieces of wood over and over again. 

He isn’t calling Dylan weak- well, only in the raw brawn sense of the word. Ryan is definitely physically stronger than Dylan, but that still isn’t necessarily saying much- he isn’t the Jacob type, he doesn’t spend every day working out. He is strong enough, he supposes, enough to nearly make captain of his high school sailing team and enough to be instructor of it at camp. Still, he thinks his arms should definitely hurt. They don’t.

Once he’s finally chopped enough firewood to stock the fireplace for at least tonight, they head back to the lodge, bringing it all back with them. Setting it down by the fireplace, Ryan sets to work fitting in some of the wood as Dylan hands him scrunched up pieces of newspaper that he’d been smart enough to bring. The fire has not long settled into a stable billow when dinner is brought out in bowls and spread out across the table. 

“Should we say grace?” Dylan asks as they serve themselves up, each of them piling their plates higher than what would be considered necessarily polite. 

Despite the anxiety that had plagued him before he was picked up and that hit him only just earlier, dinner lacks the awkwardness and uncomfortableness that the group has held amongst themselves since they arrived. Sure, there are awkward pauses between conversations and some topics are picked up before being tensely dropped when someone shows discomfort, leaving them to only really talk about impersonal and light things. Certainly nothing werewolf, camp or August related. Yet despite that, all and all, it’s actually nice. At the very least, it isn’t bad or anxiety inducing. Ryan is fairly certain the rest of the group feels the same too, considering that apart from a few spikes, it smells great and that isn’t just the food.

The sweet smell has thankfully settled enough for Ryan to mostly manage to ignore it. He’d be lying if he said he could completely push it from his mind however. He’s not sure how he’s going to deal with the spikes of Dylan’s scent, in either direction, the bitterness or the extra strong sweetness, at least not with his dignity intact. The longer he sits with the group, the more the mingling of scents becomes normal. He can still pick out each one but they are slowly no longer overpowering his senses, which is a small wave of relief in a sea of anxieties. 

By the time they finish their meals and clean up, it has grown black outside and they all agree to an early bed. In a rather abrupt manner, they carry their bags upstairs and say short goodnights before finding their respective couches. Ryan thinks that it’s because no one wants to accidentally spoil the lighter mood. Which is fair and honestly it’s appreciated. He knows Laura wants them to go over all their symptoms at some point and he thinks that it’s better they don’t do it tonight, to give themselves just a little time to settle in. Everyone is tense and uneasy being back as it is, having a frank discussion about how much this curse/diesease/whatever the fuck it is, has fucked up their lives so far- well, Ryan honestly doesn’t know how it will go. It could be fine. It could be horrible. 

With a sigh he unzips the sleeping bag Jacob had passed to him and throws it over the moth bitten and dust covered couch. He wants to regret volunteering to sleep up here but he doesn’t. It’s a small sacrifice to make in exchange for less bickering and complaining. And it’s not like Ryan does a lot of sleeping nowadays anyway, though tonight he’s going to try and make a solid effort. He throws down a spare pillow and collapses into the makeshift ‘bed’.

He adamantly looks out of the curtainless window as Kaitlyn changes in the corner of the room, his eyes drawn to the nearly full moon. It used to be a sight he felt awe and slight wonder seeing. Now it just feels ominous.

He hears Kaitlyn flop down onto her own couch that has been haphazardly placed and left to rot on the other side room. He deems it safe to look over, rolling his head to the side and finding her already looking back. He raises an eyebrow and she shrugs. 

“Comfy?” She asks, the sarcasm dripping from her tone.

He scoffs. “Yeah, definitely. You?”

She drops her head onto her arm and snorts. “As if. We really took the raw end of the deal.”

“Then why’d you volunteer? If you waited it out I’m sure Jacob or Nick would’ve caved and done the gentlemanly thing.”

“Jacob giving up sleeping in the rec room for here?” She laughs loudly. “I doubt it. I volunteered because Dylan looked like he was about to have an aneurysm.”

Ryan feels his eyebrows tilt downwards and his eyes squint as he makes a confused expression. “What?” 

“Glad to see your still normal old obvious Ryan underneath the new smell and aura. Never change dude.”

“Okay what does that mean?” He asks, feeling far more lost than he had been before her answer. 

She ignores his bewildered question, instead tugging her sleeping bag up over her shoulders and lifting her knees to her stomach, curling up in a ball in an attempt to preserve as much warmth as possible. After a few more attempts at getting her to answer, he gives up. He thinks she might be half asleep already anyway.

Ryan rolls onto his back again, staring up at the ceiling. The support beams are covered in old stains and dust, spider webs connecting them all together. White light pours in through the window pane, catching on the webs and causing them to glow a slight silver. The lodge is an old building, creaking and groaning every so often, as if it were speaking to him. He keeps closing his eyes and then before he even realises it, he’s back to tracing every chip, dent, blemish, stain and flaw in the cold, dark attic. Try as he might, Ryan is unable to sleep. 

Chapter Text

He gives up on trying to sleep after the sixth time he checks his phone only to find it still telling him it’s nearly three am. Everyone else in the lodge has probably gotten a good six hours sleep at this point. But not Ryan, who has lain here on this dusty, lumpy, horribly uncomfortable couch, staring up at the ceiling that has dissolved into a void of static filled black. 

At first he tried to keep his mind clear, tried to invoke that lightheaded clearness that he’d felt at the table with Dylan by his side, hand on his arm, in an attempt to let sleep pull him under. Apparently without his own personal aromatherapy sugar scent diffuser next to him, it’s just not possible. Ryan immediately slaps his hand on his face, painfully wacking his nose and groaning at the weird and borderline cringe inducing thought. He’s embarrassing himself, in his own mind . That’s a new low for Ryan. 

Clearly, his earlier idea of blocking out any semblance of thought didn’t work. And with sleep masterfully evading him, trapped in this attic under a canopy of spiderwebs, he cannot escape his own mind. His own mind that keeps betraying him with weird thoughts about how his friend smells.

He’s managed to avoid falling into the downward spiral that is memories and regrets from that August night. However he’s not sure whether or not that might actually be better than whatever is going on with his brain right now. It’s like that scent has been drawn up through his nose and swirled around his lungs, diffused into his bloodstream and carried to his brain, where now he can no longer stop thinking about it. It’s just a smell . But much like the wolf curse in his veins, it has infected and infested him. 

He doesn’t know what specifically about it is so captivating. It barely ‘smells’ like anything, only a very subtle hint of fruity sweetness and so that’s the easiest way to refer to it. Yet at the same time, it was so strong and overwhelming- Ryan’s never experienced anything like it, such a contradictory experience on his senses. He doesn’t feel the same way about the other’s scents either. He could pick them apart and some of them were almost as strong as Dylan’s. But they were hardly as prominent to him and nowhere near as enthralling. He could barely find a solid resemblance in smell for many of them, though it’s not like he took the time to stand there and sniff at them until he worked out what their strange, specifically unspecific scents might remind him of. 

The others did point out Dylan in particular for his scent however. They also identified it as strong and noticeable. Yeah actually, yeah, this isn’t a Ryan issue, this is a hundred percent a Dylan one. Of course Dylan would be the one with an overpowering yet still entrancing scent, while the rest of them just smell kind of unique and pleasant at best. It’s such a Dylan thing to happen that Ryan suddenly feels completely assured in the fact that it’s not going to be a problem. Mostly. If he thoroughly ignores it. Maybe. 

He just has to be normal about it, which if everyone else can do, so can he. He can be totally normal about it. He can be normal with Dylan. He’s been normal so far, despite the warm feeling under his ribs and tight feeling in his chest when he looks at him. Despite how much the urge to reach out and touch him tingles at the tips of his fingers and the way he can’t help but let his eyes wander to his lips. He can push that down, just like the memories. He can smile, laugh and talk with Dylan, ignoring the fact that he missed his chance and he can’t think of a single thing he regrets more. That’s alright, he can cope with that. This smell, this scent, it’s just another thing to ignore. He can be normal.

Ryan’s placating himself, he knows that. There’s not much else he can do at this point however. Laying here stressing about it isn’t going to help and he’d take his own unconvincing reassurance over that anxious tangle of thoughts any day. Still, his placating isn’t foolproof. He can’t help himself but want to casually and offhandedly check in with one of the others to see if it’s affecting them too, see if it’s sticking around in their head like it is in his- of course not in those words. He’s not sure who he’d ask without immediately getting made fun of or getting suspicion for asking. That, he’ll have to work out but he’ll see what opportunities present themselves.

With that thought settled in his mind, he twists onto his side for the hundredth time that night, tucking his hand under his face and pulling the opened sleeping bag higher up over his shoulder, until the zipper scratches his jaw. He breathes in deeply, a smoggy smell reaching his nose from across the room. Over the last few hours of laying here, Ryan’s decided that Kaitlyn's scent reminds him of burning wood or ash. It was one of the stronger scents he’d picked out when the group first gathered, a heavy and thick smell that’s hard to ignore. Though it isn’t bad, it isn’t alluring like the sweet scent is either, instead rather stifling in the same way smoke is.

As has become routine when he’s trying to sleep, Ryan tosses himself right back onto his back and lays a hand on his stomach. Where the pit lies. His eyebrows quirk and he presses his hand firmer. The void in his stomach is something he can almost physically feel, a cold, empty sensation. But right now it is no more than a hint of an emotion. He barely noticed it fade over the day, but now that he has, a confusing mess of emotions well up inside of him.

Ryan isn’t what he could consider an intellectual but he thinks he’s fairly quick and definitely logical. It would be insincere and ignorant of him to pretend like there isn’t a connection between coming back and the hole in his stomach beginning to close over. He thought coming back to the camp would fill him with dread and possibly even flash him back into vivid memories of that night. Instead he only feels a manageable sombreness and anxiety, while that gaping dark void in his stomach begins to fade. 

It scared him, when it appeared and began to grow after he returned home. He’d thought to himself “I’m going to feel this for the rest of my life”. And that terrified him because it’s a terrifying feeling . That emptiness and nothingness that he can physically feel gaping inside his stomach, that feels as if he may fall into it and be trapped within that void forever. 

And now, back at the scene of the worse, most traumatising night of his life and it’s closing over. Fading away. Relief washes over him at the thought that it may disappear completely. The relief is quickly replaced by self doubt. Maybe he is really messed up in the head, if returning here seems to comfort and heal that black hole. To take solace in a place like this. Maybe he should have kept seeing that therapist that he ditched after only one session.

The sudden stops and starts and abrupt twists and turns of both thoughts and emotions are exhausting. Ryan feels incredibly overwhelmed. Everything around him and inside him feels ramped up to the highest degree, from the sounds of the leaves blowing in the wind, the feeling of the scratchy couch on his hands, the vague outline of the ceilings support beams which should be totally obscured by the darkness, the oppressive scents that he’s choked on all day and the constant battering of thoughts against his skull. His body feels tense despite trying to relax down onto the cushions, as if he were coiled to attack. It’s all just too much.   

With a self pitying groan he reaches up over his head and flips his phone over again for possibly the hundredth time. The light burns his eyes and he has to catch the time through quickly blinking eyelids. Twenty past three. He has a bone deep exhaustion but he doesn’t feel sleep anywhere near, nor does he believe it will be coming anytime soon. With sudden decisiveness, Ryan throws the sleeping bag off of himself and pulls himself upright. He tugs on his shoes, tying them in the dark leaving them ending up in knots and blindly reaches around for where he threw his black denim jacket. He doesn’t know where he plans on going, maybe just to stand outside and breathe in some fresh air, but he can’t keep lying here, his thoughts running away from him. He made a solid effort to sleep, he reckons. Still, there’s no use in continuing to try when it clearly isn’t working.

He tries to sneak as silently as he can towards the stairs, the floorboards creaking and groaning under his feet. Kaitlyn is fast asleep though and doesn’t even stir as he begins to descend to the second floor. The lodge is in complete darkness but after six hours and perhaps a little help from the whole werewolf thing, Ryan has no trouble in seeing where he’s going. He’s glad to find that his heart remains in a steady, even beat and his breaths are slow and deep. He feels no fear being in the lodge in the pitch black, no worries that something will jump out of the dark and consume him. They are the threat now, which isn't that such a painful thought to have. 

He walks past the rec room, the door half open letting the blend of scents flow out and merge with the stale air of the hallway. His steps slow as he passes, trying to minimise any noise in case he wakes someone. When he reaches the stairs he takes them one at a time, glancing back at the hallway rising above him, listening for any sign of someone waking. On the last step of the staircase, he falters and comes to a complete stop.

It’s the smell of burnt sugar or sweet, rotten fruit. The same smell as earlier but now so faint that Ryan wouldn’t have picked up on it had it not already filled his airways for half the day. He takes the final step down onto the first floor and despite it going against any sense of dignity that he has, Ryan tilts his head up and scents the air. He looks behind him, up the stairs towards the rec room but even that slight head turn is enough to stop the smell from reaching his nose. He turns back to the room in front of him, completely immersed in darkness, with no sign that any life has passed through since they all went to bed. 

Though he tells himself that it is probably just residual smell from earlier, he can’t help but follow his nose forward. True to his instinct, it does grow stronger the further through the room he passes. He abruptly stops in front of the fireplace, staring down into the embers and placing a hand over his chest.

He has suddenly begun to feel anxious, his heartbeat and breathing swelling alongside the smell as it grows more potent, assumedly from Ryan drawing nearer to the source. But he’s confused. He had just thought to himself about how he doesn't fear being in the lodge, nor does finding the smell itself scare him- he knows what he’ll find when he reaches the source. 

He watches the embers glow and flicker, slowly dying out as their fuel turns to cold ash. He breathes in deep lungfuls of the scent, almost drinking it in until he finally realises that he can actually taste fear on his tongue. When the realisation hits him, it’s like the whole smell transforms with it. It’s not just some bad stench that lingers in the air and can be chased away with a few puffs of perfume. No, it’s a scent that reeks of fear, bitter and acidic enough to burn his nose. 

When he’d suggested that they were like dogs and could sense emotions, he’d only been spitballing to get the others off of Dylan’s back. And then when Dylan mentioned his smell changed before dinner, he didn’t think that he’d actually been able to smell that Ryan was tense- just that the scent changed. Now, tangibly smelling the fear through the scent, Ryan realises just how unbelievable and insane this whole scent thing is.

He always thought of emotions as illusionary- or at least that was how he was taught to view them when he was a child with emotions far too big for his body. That they aren’t really real, merely simple sensations, simple illusions, conjured up by the brain. That they are completely controllable and better off to be contained, swallowed down so no one else has to be affected by them. Being able to tangibly smell and taste someone else’s emotion makes Ryan question if he was taught truthfully. 

His own body had begun to stream adrenaline into his veins at the heavy scent of distress, despite his mind remaining calm and unafraid. He’s sure that isn’t from his own emotions, rather a reaction to the palpable sensation of someone else’s. It’s easy with that knowledge, to slow his heart back to a steady beat. It’s harder to take a step forward towards the scent, knowing what it means.

He’s led to the door of the library, left open just a crack, letting warm light reach out and meld into the darkness of the main room. Ryan hesitates outside the door, unsure if he should enter and possibly disturb, when this is clearly a safe haven to get away from the others. He makes up his mind quickly- better to check in and be asked to go away, then to leave him completely alone when he may appreciate some company. Quietly, so as not to give him a fright, Ryan pushes the door open and takes a step into the room.

His breath catches. Just as he knew he would be, Dylan sits alone in the library. He didn’t however know that the moonlight would wash down over him, catching on his hair and lashes, gleaming off of them in a pale shine. His chin rests in his palm, the sleeve of his baggy tshirt hanging from his elbow and grazing his bare knee. His thick grey woollen socks have been pulled up unevenly, the left yanked up over his calf and the right bunched around his ankle, revealing how his leg hair has been mussed up into laying every direction from constantly tugging the sock up. Ryan’s eyes trail up his long leg, past his knee and to a pale thigh that only ends where his oversized tshirt drapes down and the barest hint of a hem from a pair of shorts peeks out from under it. Ryan forces himself to look away, internally scolding himself. 

He steps forward, placing his foot down firmly, as to not accidentally sneak up on him. He’s about to clear his throat to catch his attention when Dylan takes in a sharp breath and whips his head around to the door. He only looks alarmed for a second before his expression drops to a more neutral appearance. He returns his chin to his hand, looking out the window into the gloom of night once more. 

“I didn’t wake you, did I?” He asks, his tone flat.

“No, no. I uh, haven’t exactly been sleeping. Decided to go for a walk when-“ He recalls the deepening of his scent when it was pointed out earlier. “-I uh, saw the light. Thought I’d check in.”

Dylan snorts, though Ryan is fairly certain it isn’t out of humour. “One thing we have in common, Ryan, is the inability to convincingly lie. You can say it, you followed the stink.” 

He isn’t sure how honest he should be. If he should mention that he could smell the fear, the thickness of it or that for a moment he could feel it too. He settles on a simple, “I thought you might like some company.” Then he quickly tacks on at the end, “I can piss off if you want though, I’m not trying to intrude.”

Dylan’s face slips down his hand until he’s cradling his own cheek and looking at Ryan with a raised brow. With his free hand he gestures to the space on the couch beside him, tucking his knees closer to his body to free up the other cushion. Ryan doesn’t hesitate before walking over and dropping down beside him, his head falling back against the window. From where Dylan sits horizontally on the couch, his spine bent against the arm, his toes brush against Ryan’s thigh. He tries not to think about it. 

The small lamp on the corner table beside him basks them in a warm glow, pressing against the cold windowpane but unable to pierce through into the dark of the night outside. It isn’t cold in the library, surprisingly. It is still summer after all, though the wind held a chill earlier that made Ryan think it may be a cool night. 

He knows he’s stalling, observing the goddamn lamp instead of saying something, saying anything. Burnt sugar fills the room and he parts his lips slightly to avoid breathing through his nose. It just fills his mouth instead, settling onto his tongue and in between the cracks of his teeth, stinging his gums and singeing his taste buds. 

He just doesn’t know exactly what to say, so instead as he often does, he elects to stay silent until he can write the perfect script in his head of what to say that he can stick to. He doesn’t want to put Dylan on the spot, force him to talk about something he doesn’t want to. Nor does he want to ignore it completely and be disingenuous. With his indecision that has grown into a lengthy pause, Dylan bites the bullet and beats him to saying something. 

“I’ve had a nightmare every single time I’ve slept since August.” He offers, his voice so quiet that Ryan almost misses it under the imaginary sound of his own loud thoughts. 

He glances over to Dylan and his eyes catch. He’s tucked the lower half of his face behind his arms, which are folded over his knees. Where his eyes peek out over his forearm, they resolutely point down and do not budge from where his fingers play with a loose thread at the bottom of his tshirt. There is no sign of Blasé Dylan at this moment. The mask has slipped off and Ryan can only see Dylan Dylan, all of his fear and uncertainty exposed. 

“What happens?” Ryan asks, just as quietly. Without meaning to, he has slipped into the same tone he uses when his sister is sobbing and hitting her head with balled up fists from emotions that feel so overpowering that they may consume you. The same tone he had craved when the same exact thing would happen to him as a child. 

Dylan takes a deep breath in and Ryan doesn’t miss how his shoulders slightly shake with it. “Well, it changes. Sometimes I’m mauled, sometimes you guys are. Sometimes it’s changing into- into. With my bones cracking and my skin shredding. Sometimes it’s the Hacketts hunting me, running for hours until I’m shot and I choke on my own blood. Sometimes it’s seeing their bodies wheeled away on gurneys again. Sometimes- sometimes it’s other things.” His eyes dart upwards before quickly returning to the thread. 

Ryan doesn’t push it. “That sounds horrific.” He sympathises, voice genuine and still soft and kind, a far cry from his usual somewhat monotone timber.

Dylan’s nails dig into his arms, his other hand wrapping the thread that has been pulled out to a significant length around his palm, leaving white lines surrounded by a flushed red. “It just- it just always seems so real? I didn’t dream until I was like ten, I can remember my first dream so vividly. But I knew it was a dream, I always did. These- I-I think that they’re real until I wake up. They’re not, obviously, but when they’re happening I feel the pain and the terror and it’s just.” The words are pushed out through a single breath, ending weakly as he runs out of air in his lungs. 

He sucks in another through his teeth to continue. “I woke up and I could actually smell myself, like a bitter or- or acidic smell. I didn’t want to wake anyone up so I came down here.”

“You smell scared.” Ryan says carefully. 

“You can smell that? Well. I am.” Dylan reluctantly admits. “Or at least I was. But it’ll go away, when my brain catches up that it wasn’t real.” 

Ryan feels a wave of tenderness and sympathy for Dylan well up inside him. Not being able to sleep sucks but he can’t imagine his own mind turning against him in the way it does to Dylan. Being transported back to that night, feeling those sharp teeth sink into your flesh again. Dreaming of yourself torn open and devoured and it seeming so real that you wake in terror, believing your back in that moment. He’s never felt an urge as strong as to reach out and grasp Dylan’s hand in his own, to squeeze it tightly and run his thumb over his knuckles until the knowledge that he’s here right now, that that night is past and he will never have to live it again is known to be the truth within Dylan’s mind.

His eyes have not left Dylan since he’s sat down, even though they haven’t been returned once. He watches as Dylan’s own flutter closed, his nostrils flaring and chest filling. The subtle shake in his shoulders falls still, his nails lessen the pressure on his arm revealing deep, painful looking crescents and the thread wrapped around his palm is released, dropping to lay against the sparse hair on his thigh. 

The strong scent that had filled the room has begun to weaken, fading until it no longer burns Ryan’s throat so harshly. He waits a moment, not wanting to say something that could cause it to spike again but curiosity gets the better of him and he can’t help but ask, “Earlier, when you asked if I was okay, you said you knew because of how I smelt. What did you smell?” 

Dylan hums slightly, his eyes still closed. “It changed, grew thicker. It wasn’t like, super noticeable, but I noticed. I said something because I could almost sense or-or physically smell the anxiety in it. Or something like that. I don’t know, that probably doesn’t make sense.”

Ryan nods along to his words even though Dylan can’t see it. So it’s not just Dylan’s smell that carries emotion in it. “It does make sense. I could also physically smell it in yours. It’s- it’s a strange feeling, to tangibly sense an emotion like that. I came through to see if you were okay.” He honestly cannot help how his tone falls even softer than before in his last sentence. If he could have, he wouldn’t have let it.

Dylan sucks in another deep breath, letting his head fall forward just an inch. “I am, I am okay. I just- how are you doing that?”

Ryan draws his head back a bit, suddenly feeling a little self conscious. He glances down at his hands just to confirm he didn’t unconsciously give into the urge and that they do still remain motionless in his lap. “Doing what?” He asks once he runs out of other ideas of what he may be doing to make Dylan uncomfortable. 

“Your smell it’s like… I don’t know. I’m probably just being weird. You’re not doing anything.” 

Ryan wants to push but the sudden flare of bitterness holds him back. If it’s even possible it seems as if Dylan curls into himself further. This is Dylan without the mask, not hiding behind a wall of jokes and faux nonchalance. This is a level of vulnerability and honesty that Ryan didn’t even see on that night in August and that he truthfully didn’t ever expect to see. It causes the tenderness and concern in his chest to grow stronger and he picks at his nail to keep his hands safely in his lap. He looks at Dylan with an embarrassingly soft expression, thankful that Dylan’s eyes remain closed and oblivious to how Ryan has to hold himself back from reaching out. 

Half of his mind, the self doubting and cruel side, suggests that Dylan is just in a vulnerable state as it is and he just so happened to be here for it. Except Ryan knows that Dylan wouldn’t be without his mask around just anyone. The level of trust that must take for him is more than Ryan can believe he is worthy of. This is Dylan Dylan, in his rawest form and it makes Ryan’s chest ache to see that he is truthfully a mess under all that Blasé. 

Dylan sighs, his hands slapping onto his face and pulling his cheeks down, his lower eyelids dragged down with them. It’s a terrible, slightly disturbing look. Yet it makes Ryan smile all the same, a smile that’s dripping with fondness. 

“I’m sorry, you’re probably sitting here suffocating. You don’t have to stay, I’m not trying to hold you captive.” Dylan says suddenly, guilt lacing between his words. “I came down here so I wouldn’t burn anyones nerves off.” 

“I’m not suffocating and you’re not holding me captive.” Ryan reassures, surprising even himself to find that it's an honest statement. The fearful scent has almost completely faded now, the mellowed sweetness taking its place. “It’ll take a bit more than the smell of burnt sugar to chase me away I’m afraid. I’ve actually gotten quite used to it after my sister became obsessed with baking last year.”

Dylan’s eyes finally open, flicking up to Ryan’s face from behind his arm. They still don’t quite reach Ryan’s own. “Not her strong suit?” He says unsurely and Ryan gets the sense that it wasn’t what he wanted to ask.

He goes along with it though, answering with a thick tenderness in his voice as he thinks back on the memory. “Let’s just say that when she handed me her latest creation at the time, I suddenly got very clumsy. Those were probably the best few months of my grandparents dog's life though.” 

He feels a strong sense of pride as Dylan cracks a smile, seen by Ryan only because of the small crinkles around his eyes and slight shadows of dimples behind his arm.

“You probably poisoned that poor dog. Should I be calling the SPCA? I’ve got my phone right here.”

Ryan sucks on his teeth before releasing them with a pop. “Might be a bit late for that. They were the best and last months of that dog’s life.”

“You’re a monster.” Dylan says, trying to hide the humour from his tone and failing miserably.

“Listen, he was nearly older than me and had been spoiled his entire life. If I could have swapped places with that dog, I one hundred percent would have- poisoned baking and all.” 

Dylan breathes out a small laugh that quickly morphs into a drawn out yawn. He finally pulls up from his cradled position, resting his arm against the back of the couch and leaning his head against it. His legs stretch out slightly from their tight bend, the balls of his feet pressing flat against Ryan’s thigh. “I hope he haunts you.” He says, giving a small push to Ryan’s leg.

“With everything that has happened, there is not a single doubt in my mind that he is standing there right now glaring at me.” Ryan’s eyes trace the smile on Dylan’s lips, finally uncovered. He watches it fade as he suddenly switches track and says with deep conviction, “You know you don’t have to leave and hide away because of your scent, right? We all have these new scents and you don’t have to accomodate everyone else when it comes to your own.” 

“I don’t know man, it was really strong. I could smell it myself, I didn’t want to wake everyone in the room up because of it.” 

Ryan nods, not fully agreeing with his response but accepting it. “Well at least you managed to find the only other couch in the building. Or did you know this was down here?”

“I may have remembered it when Kaitlyn was counting them out.” Dylan sheepishly admits.

Ryan scoffs and places a hand against his chest. “And you still let me sleep in the attic?” 

Dylan shrugs, his head lifting with the raise in his upper arm and gives a slightly snarky smile. “I thought I might need to use it and I was not going to sleep in the attic. You shouldn’t have volunteered.” 

Ryan isn’t truly offended. If Dylan knew he was going to have nightmares then it was actually really good planning on his end to think of the library as an alternative sleeping option away from the others. He’s not sure he’d even pick the library over the attic anyway, as it is an incredibly small couch, though only length wise. Being a similar height, he thinks their feet might hang off the end if they did try to sleep in here. It’d be suitable for Kaitlyn though, he’s surprised she didn’t remember it when tallying the possible options earlier. He supposes it’s lucky that she didn’t. 

He thinks about having Dylan on but decides instead to reassure him. He doesn’t want to poke fun at him and bring Blasé Dylan back after such an open moment. “That was probably a good idea, I don’t- I haven’t been sleeping tonight anyway.”

“Just tonight?” Dylan asks softly.

Ryan fully looks away from him for the first time since he entered the room. He doesn’t really want to talk about it but it’d be wrong to lie after Dylan was just so open about his own sleeping problems. “No. I haven’t really been sleeping at all, not until the real early hours of the morning when I just end up passing out. But you know, it’s- it’s not that bad. I mean it could be worse.” He pointedly looks at Dylan.

“You shouldn’t compare like that dude, they’re both bad. Every one of us are probably pretty messed up now, I mean fuck, Nick has barely spoken since we got here.” 

Ryan disagrees with his first statement but he doesn’t voice that. He appreciates the concern in Dylan’s voice, looking back and offering him a small smile. “It can always be worse, can’t it.”

Dylan drops his forehead down onto his arm, scoffing loudly as his eyes fall closed again. “Yeah and thank fuck it isn’t. I don’t know how much ‘worse’ I could do.”

Ryan hums in agreement and for a moment they fall into a comfortable silence. With Dylan’s eyes closed, Ryan takes the opportunity to really observe him, chastising himself for it but running his eyes over every one of his features all the same. Over the few strands of hair that fall over his forehead, over his brows, the lashes that line his slightly droopy eyes, the round tip of his nose, the two points on his cheeks that Ryan’s has memorised as where his dimples take shape when he smiles, the small dark spots at the corner of his lips, the very slight shadow of a shaved moustache, the sole freckle on his chin. 

Despite himself, his gaze returns to Dylan’s lips. It’s no wonder Ryan is fixated on them, he reasons. Those lips spew out the stupid jokes that never fail to make him react, they bend into the the most endearing smile and hold back the warmest laugh. They are the most Dylan part of Dylan. 

Ryan’s stomach drops as if he’d jumped from a New York City skyscraper. Because it is from this lovesick observation that Ryan’s mind is made up. He will never expose his true feelings to Dylan, no matter how much he wants to. He can’t betray the trust that has been put in him. He can’t ruin their friendship that they both so desperately need right now. Over the summer and then over that horrific night, Ryan has grown to care about Dylan immensely. He wouldn’t throw their friendship away for anything, much less over unreturned feelings. He can be normal, he assures himself once again. 

He forces himself to look away, his heavy eyelids falling shut. It is cruel to himself, to rake his eyes over him in that way. If he’s to make his peace with their friendship, then torturing himself with longing glances does nothing to sustain that. He’d been doing so well too. His placating earlier didn’t account for how enamoured Ryan feels when Dylan is around. Being a normal friend shouldn’t be so hard and Ryan feels ashamed of himself for his yearning, aching thoughts. He’d never thought of himself as someone who couldn’t accept someone else moving on and he hates that this is a part of him. Like with every other emotion since he was a child, he should be able to contain it, swallow it down and forget it exists. He doesn’t know why that’s suddenly so hard.

Maybe it’s the fact that even with his eyes closed, head facing up towards the ceiling, through Dylan’s scent his presence is so strong in the room. That it makes his chest feel warm and head feel dizzy in a way that he’s never felt before. Or maybe it’s the fact that his scent seems to have infected him as he’d thought earlier, trapped in his mind even when he isn’t in the room. Maybe the scent only affects him like this because it’s Dylan’s scent. Maybe Ryan’s completely and utterly fucked. 

If he’s resigned himself to friendship, which is the right thing to do, then he can’t keep going over his feelings towards Dylan, picking them apart and examining them like this. And that includes his scent. He can’t keep looking at him and feeling that ache in his chest, that urge to reach out and that selfish, overpowering feeling of regret. For his own and for Dylan’s sake. He doesn’t know how he will stop it but the second he does, he will be sure to. Beginning with asking someone about how the scents affect them, to see where he stands. After that, well, he’ll just go from there.

Pulling himself from his melancholic musings, he finally looks back to Dylan to speak, only to find that his breathing has evened out with sleep. He didn’t mean to get lost in his own head, intending only for a quiet moment before speaking up again but as usual his mind ran away from him and he missed his chance. 

He keeps seeming to do that, when it comes to Dylan. Maybe it’s because they run in different paces. Ryan’s always needed time to digest things, to think things over, even when in the middle of a conversation. Dylan on the other hand, seems to purposely avoid thinking things through, going wherever his newest whim takes him. Maybe Ryan’s reading far too deeply into Dylan falling asleep when he’s just clearly exhausted. It’s definitely the latter.

Ryan should get up, go on that walk to clear his head or return to the stuffy, dust filled attic. However he can’t bring himself to stand. The room is filled with that heady scent and it’s warm enough to be pleasant despite the dark of night. His muscles, which have been strung taunt and coiled since that night, have grown lax and heavy. His head holds a slight buzz or a daze, feeling as if it is weighed down, causing him to drop it back against the couch, his eyes falling shut with it.     

He can’t feel too disappointed that their conversation ended short. He had more to say, there are so many things that they could talk about- that Ryan needs to talk about, but they’ve purposely avoided. However what they did say was enough. Seeing Dylan without the mask has left Ryan with muddled emotions- feeling privileged, worried and reverent standing out amongst them. ‘Good’ isn't exactly the right word for how the conversation went, considering the topic, but it was comforting. For himself but also he hopes for Dylan too. There is just something reassuring in knowing that you are not alone in your experiences.  

In fact, all of today could have gone far worse, he thinks to himself. The ramped up anxiety that has been plaguing him for days and that hit him especially hard before getting picked up may have been unnecessary- not the fear of turning into a terrifying beast, as he reasons that’s a pretty fair worry to have, but the anxiety he held about seeing his friends. Despite the unease that builds at each awkward silence and moment of tension, they all seem to be pretty considerate of the situation and of each other. They’re all friends, bonded together by a night of horror and an affliction that only they may share. They can be there for eachother, help each other get through this. Anything that comes along, from strange scents to heightened senses to working out where they’ll lock themselves up, they’ll work it out together.

As he thinks, his hand reflexively makes its way to his stomach. In this moment, he can barely feel the hole that has sat there since that night. It has faded even more than it had when he last focused on it in the attic. With every swell of his lungs, warmth fizzles away the edges of the cold pit. Because of the sluggishness that has overtaken him, he can’t bring himself to worry about it as he had earlier. Now he only takes relief that the terrifying void seems to be dissolving. To the sound of Dylan’s breathing and even the ever so faint beat of his heart, his own follows and that thick quietness envelopes his mind as sleep pulls him under.

Chapter Text

Ryan wakes slowly, as he always does, the awareness in his body gradually returning to him with his mind following just behind. He feels warmth in every inch of his being, in the foggy blanket that sleep has left over his brain, in every molecule of breath in his lungs, deep within his stomach and radiating into each of his limbs. It’s such a comforting feeling that it is easy to ignore how the buttons of his jacket dig into his ribs, the static feeling in his feet from his tightly knotted shoes cutting off circulation and the bony thing stabbing into his waist. 

That last observation gives his hazy mind pause and a dawning sense of clarity begins to clear the fog from his head. Memories of leaving the attic, sneaking downstairs, finding Dylan and their conversation flood in. No memory of getting up and leaving follows. 

With a start his eyes shoot open and he presses his hand into what slim space he can find to push himself up slightly. Right. Shit. He definitely hadn’t returned to the attic considering the fact that Dylan is currently crushed beneath him, the warmth that had been diffusing into his arms and the skin on his chest fading as he draws his torso up. Their legs are tangled together, feet hanging off the edge of the cushion. He’s not quite sure how he’s going to untwist himself without shattering Dylan’s hip bone- the same bone that has nearly pierced through his waist. 

“Uh, guys?” 

Ryan closes his eyes for a short moment to stop himself from spewing out words that would have his grandmother washing his mouth out with soap. It takes him a good few seconds before he can bring himself to turn and look at Jacob, well aware of how guarded his demeanor just became. Jacob stands beside the bookshelf that the couch is tucked behind, wearing a look of honest surprise and confusion- a look that is often plastered across his face. He clearly hasn’t shaved in the last couple of days and he scratches at the stubble on his chin as his eyebrows quirk upwards at Ryan.

Ryan ignores him to glance down at Dylan, finding his eyes still shut and breath still even. The sun streaming in through the window shines down over his face, gleaning off of his skin. The bright glow makes him look a little less pallid, in sleep his hands remain still and despite the interruption of a nightmare during the night he looks a little less exhausted then the day before. As carefully as he can as to not wake him, Ryan pushes himself up further and slowly pulls his leg from where it is tangled with Dylan’s, placing his foot firmly on the ground before he frees his other leg. He has to twist his body awkwardly and uncomfortably bend his spine to free himself but he manages to do so without crushing Dylan further or breaking either of their bones. 

Only when he’s safely free and standing on solid ground does he look back at Jacob. He’s lent against the bookshelf and has adopted that smug look that Ryan really isn’t in the mood for. “Maybe you two should’ve taken Mr H’s office if you were just going to sneak off together anyway.”

Ryan doesn’t want to have to defend himself to Jacob of all people but all the same his hackles rise. He has an odd feeling of defensiveness, like he has something to prove, something to guard. He tries to push it down but he cannot stop his shoulders from squaring and his feet from planting wide. “We didn’t sneak off together, I went for a walk last night and he was already down here.” 

“So you just ended up snuggling by coincidence?” Jacob snarks. 

“We- we weren’t snuggling , we just accidentally fell asleep. It was late and-“ Ryan cuts himself off to stare at Jacob, stunned quiet by the sight in front of him.

Jacob has lifted his nose up into the air, audibly snuffling as he scents the air. It is such an unabashed display of their affliction- he looks exactly like a dog that just caught a mouthwatering scent. Ryan isn’t sure which part of it or even exactly why it does, but he finds the action rage inducing, a sizzling tendril of fire burning its way through his chest. His hands curl at his sides and he subconsciously takes a step sideways to block Jacob’s view of the couch. 

“What are you doing?” He snaps at Jacob, who stops huffing at the air far too late for Ryan to feel anywhere near subdued. 

“I-I don’t know. You guys stunk out the room, but there’s like- I can like smell.” He gives a frustrated humph sound as he tries to find the right words, his nose twitching. “It’s almost like I can smell… something in it. I’m not sure what it is.”

Ryan is instantly sure he knows what Jacob is picking up under the guise of a simple smell and he is even more sure that he has no interest in hearing what Jacob thinks it is. 

He’s struggling to keep his irrational and out of place anger in check, having to grit his teeth to keep his words coming as what he intends them to be. “What do you want Jacob? Or did you just come in here to huff at the air like a mutt?” Okay, so he didn’t intend to say that last part out loud. Whatever.

Jacob’s nostrils flare and he shifts to stand straight, drawing himself to his full height. His voice has grown a heated tone as he says, “Everyone is worried about you two, there was no sign of where you’d gone in the night. Kaitlyn was about to put out an amber alert. I managed to get her to settle for just me as a search party.”

Barely aware that he’s doing it, on instinct Ryan mimics the posture, his lips curling to bare his teeth and answering back in a cutting tone that he hasn’t heard himself speak in for many, many years. “So you just do whatever she says now? No need to find you a collar, she’s already got you on a leash.” Ryan swallows thickly after he speaks, his gums burning with the sharp scent that has filled his mouth. 

He doesn’t know why he’s being so antagonistic, why he’s going against his own advice of keeping the peace or why Jacob doesn’t call him out for it and instead answers in tow. As they stand there posturing at each other, Ryan feels a strain in his throat. It’s a similar sensation to when his spine has been held a certain way for too long and he has the urge to bend it and crack the joints in his neck. He can’t help but follow the urge, tightening his jaw and tensing his throat, in an attempt to chase that same relief after a popped joint. He doesn’t get it, finding only an acrid scent growing to oppress over the sooty smell that rolls off of Jacob in waves. 

Jacob’s jaw works side to side and with his heightened senses, Ryan can clearly hear his teeth grinding together. There’s a low hum coming from his chest and it takes Ryan a few seconds to work out that it's a growl. He’s being growled at. Despite the fact that it does sound intimidating, a deep rumble that comes from deep within Jacob’s lungs, he doesn’t find it anything other than amusing. He chuckles at the sound and it deepens in intensity. Jacob’s mouth opens, his lips twisted into an unappealing scowl, when a sleep laden voice snaps it back shut.

“Jesus Christ, someone get me a gas mask.” 

They both whip around to look at the couch, where Dylan has pulled himself upright, having woken without them realising. He looks back at them with furrowed brows and squinted eyes. Ryan feels sheepish and more than a little chastened as he suddenly looks at the situation from an outside perspective- an outside perspective that’s definitely judging them right now. Jacob has abruptly fallen silent, the motorised hum in his chest stalling to a stop. 

Dylan brings up a hand to pinch his nose shut, raising a brow and slightly shaking his head as his chin sticks out at them in a brusquely questioning gesture. “Is there really a need to compare dick sizes this early in the morning? Or at all?” 

Ryan turns back to Jacob, staring him down. There’s a pause where they both wait for the other to speak and eventually Jacob breaks, taking a step back, his posture loosening and jaw stopping its agitated grinding. Ryan’s own posture doesn’t change even as Jacob concedes, his eyes remaining narrowed and following Jacob’s every movement.

“It’s almost eleven Dylan, it isn’t early. But Nick and Abi made brunch, you guys can come along if you want some. Or not, it’s not like I care.” The mild tone he speaks to Dylan with is instantly lost when he turns back and directs the last sentence to Ryan. 

He looks put out and slightly pissed off but the aggressive demeanour has completely faded. Ryan doesn’t know why but he’s sure that their strange standoff had stakes, though whatever they may have been Ryan has no clue. He knows he’s won, feeling a sense of control while he’s certain Jacob feels a sense of loss. Considering that Jacob’s always been a sore loser, something Ryan sees in full force now, a small scowl makes its way onto his face before he turns and strides out of the room. Ryan thinks that he looks like a dog with its tail tucked between its legs as he goes. Only when the door closes behind him does his posture relax, that ache in his throat relieved at last.

When he finally turns to face Dylan fully, he’s already being watched. The hand has dropped from his nose, though it still holds a slight scrunch. His hair has fallen over his forehead, softly brushing over his eyes, a single longer piece grazing the bridge of his nose. With a sharp jab to his chest, Ryan is reminded of that night, when it had been plastered to his skin in a similar style by blood and sweat. That is the only resemblance to that night that Ryan can see though, as otherwise Dylan looks well rested and still sluggish from a good sleep. He’s relieved to see him looking just a tiny bit healthier and better than when he’d first seen him at the van. 

“Ryan? What was that about?” Dylan asks. 

He sheepishly scratches the back of his neck. “Uh, well, you heard him. Brunch is ready.” Dylan laughs at him before remembering himself and schooling his expression back to being unimpressed. Ryan hates to hear him cut it off. It’s a good sound, it’s always been a good sound- one that Ryan has chased after just to hear one more time, ever since he met Dylan on that first day of camp.

“Okay so you’re telling me you two were having your little stand off and started gassing up the entire first floor… over brunch? How much do you hate brunch? I mean, I kinda get it, it’s like when is it too late to be breakfast and too early to be lunch to be brunch right? Like how set are those times?” He takes a deep breath and shakes his head. “I’m getting off track. That was intense. Did- did something happen between you guys or something? Why are you beefing?”

“We’re not ‘beefing’. Nothing happened, honestly, I don’t know what that was about. He really just came to find us to say that brunch was ready.”

“So what, you were arguing about brunch without arguing about brunch?”

“We weren’t arguing about brunch!” Ryan defends himself indignantly. He doesn’t want to explain how on edge he got the second he realised it was Jacob in the room with them, or how the whole interaction felt like a challenge. Instead he goes for a more neutral but still honest approach. “It was probably because we’re just agitated, you know, full moon tomorrow and all that.”

Dylan looks unconvinced at his vague hand wave towards the sky but he doesn’t argue, simply giving a tight lipped smile and nod. “Yeah alright. Maybe stick to your guns a little and don't do whatever that was again.” 

“Sticking to them like glue.” Ryan affirms and it earns him a genuine, though playfully exasperated smile.

Dylan hums, moving onto the next question in what has begun to feel like a softly spoken interrogation. “You slept in here last night then?”

Ryan clamps his jaw shut for a solid second before he answers so he doesn’t splutter out an answer that reveals his guilt. “I wasn’t planning on it but I must’ve fallen asleep- on… on the other side of the couch though.” 

“You slept upright? Shit, I’m sorry, your back must be killing you. Mine feels like it’s been crushed out of shape.” Dylan says, looking at the short couch with an abashed expression. The heavy guilt Ryan feels is still nowhere near strong enough to get him to tell the truth. 

“It’s not too bad. I’ve fallen asleep at my desk enough times to get used to it.” The guilt is strong enough to get him to desperately want to change the subject however. “You want to go get some brunch? I don’t trust the others to leave us any if we wait too long.”

“Yeah, yeah brunch sounds good. Let me just-“ Dylan opens his mouth up in a loud yawn and brings his hands up to slap at his cheeks. When it cuts out he finally finishes his sentence. “-Wake up a little.”

Sluggishly, Dylan tugs his socks up over his calves in a rather endearingly nerdy way and slides his baggy tshirt up at the sides to pull the elastic band of his shorts an inch down his hips, after they’d ridden up while he slept. Ryan quickly flicks his eyes away from the exposed pale skin of his waist, purposely absentmindedly skimming over the names on the spines of the books that line the nearest shelf. When he deems it safe to look back, Dylan is stretched up in another full body yawn, his arms above his head and his spine arched. Despite their wolfy traits, in this moment he has a striking resemblance to a cat stretching out after a long nap in a patch of sunlight. Ryan’s fingers itch to reach for his phone in his pocket, blinking his eyes down firmly as if to take a picture, preserving the image in his memory. 

With what looks like great effort, Dylan heaves himself to his feet. With a shooing gesture he pushes Ryan towards the door and together they enter the mess hall. 

Majority of the group, though with a few absences, sit around the table in front of the fireplace where they’d eaten dinner last night. It is piled high with dishes filled with scrambled eggs, toast, bacon and sausages. Ryan’s mouth waters as they approach, the thick greasy smell of an all American breakfast filling his lungs. His stomach suddenly cramps painfully with hunger and his steps embarrassingly quicken their pace, nearly leaving Dylan behind in his rush towards food. It looks so much more appetising then the simple oatmeal, cereal or toast that they had during camp- and much more appetising then the whole lot of nothing he has for breakfast at home.

He steals the nearest empty spot, sitting down at the end of the bench beside Abi. Dylan has to round the table, settling down across from him. Greetings and good mornings are thrown back and forth to them across the table, though Jacob remains grudgingly silent in his corner of the bench. Ryan’s glad the seat he chose just so happened to be on the exact opposite end from him, putting as much distance between them as possible. 

As the discussion of how everyone slept ramps back up after the small interruption that their joining caused, Ryan counts heads until he works out that it’s Kaitlyn and Nick that are missing. Everyone else that is present seems to be in a good enough mood, though he finds quickly enough that the general consensus is that they’re all starving, very reluctantly waiting for the group to be whole before they dig in out of a forced sense of politeness.

When the conversation of sleep shifts over to Abi and she begins recounting the dream she had last night, a confusing story involving squirrels and stolen blankets, Ryan subtlety glances over at Dylan. There is no twitch in his expression or closing off of his body language to suggest anything about what haunts his own sleep. He actually appears barely interested in the story, staring down at the platters of food in front of him. Ryan doesn’t doubt that his mind has fallen deep into the memories of his own dream, once more seeing whatever it was he saw then.

Ryan isn’t great at reading people- never has been. With time and dedicated interest however, he’s learning to gauge what might be running through Dylan’s head. That is no simple task when it comes to Dylan either. 

The ‘mask’ that Dylan wears is a complicated facade. Ryan wouldn’t presume to believe he knows all its layers. From their conversation that night and what he has observed though, he knows it is a complex merging of his own personality and acting. It is just enough of his true personality to come across as authentic while being too much of a performance to be considered himself. 

Emma, who has turned out to be probably the most open about herself and how that night has affected her, told them a little about how she has been feeling since camp, in the group's one conversation about the subject. That was the only conversation as since only she actually shared, the subject as a whole was elected to be avoided. What she had explained though, was how she ramps up the positive aspects of her personality around others- or rather how she had, as the reason why she told them that was to confess how she found herself unable to do it anymore. 

Ryan doesn’t think Dylan does the same thing. It may be a similar concept but the motivations, execution and depth are two very different things. One Ryan would consider a very by the books following of the old saying “Fake it till you make it”. The other Ryan thinks may be a survival strategy. 

It is nearly impossible to see that Dylan is wearing a mask until it slips. There were no cracks until that night and Ryan couldn't say with confidence if even now the others know that it exists at all. He doesn’t believe for a second that it was just conjured up when he first came to camp, an unintended exaggeration of his lighthearted qualities that morphed into a summer long act, as Dylan had assured it was that night. Without a significant amount of practice or a couple of Emmys under the belt, commiting to that act without a single crack or any sign at all of the truth beneath it, is a feat that not many could pull off. No, Dylan wears this mask like a second skin, hiding beneath it as if his own skin is marred and poisonous to the touch. 

He has hidden himself beneath it now, the vulnerability and openness that Ryan had seen last night once again covered up with the invisible mask. There isn’t a tone to his voice or holding of his posture that gives it away. He can express any emotion, happiness to sadness, with it remaining on. It’s just as if the air around him changes, from free, to behind a veil. Ryan can only see it now that he was shown beneath the mask. He doesn’t believe that the Dylan sitting in front of him right now is all just an act or a fake version of himself however. It is Dylan , just a different construction and heavily dissolved depiction of himself.

If Ryan wasn’t Ryan perhaps he would feel deceived. Realising that the person you have grown close to has actually been a watered down and almost fictitious version of themselves could feel beguiling to others. He doesn’t feel that way however. Whatever the difference between Blasé Dylan and Dylan Dylan is, it isn’t malicious. Nor does he believe it’s for their sake either.

Of course, this is just Ryan’s observations of him and going off what he was told under the duress of being butchered, he reminds himself. It’s an extremely complicated matter of identity and psyche, and Ryan is definitely no psychologist. Without asking Dylan himself, he shouldn’t make too many assumptions- though even then, some people are the most oblivious about themselves out of everyone. Perhaps Dylan isn’t even aware of how deep it goes himself, let alone what that means for his interactions and relationships with others.

Dylan’s eyebrow twitches as Abi ends the description of her dream, a lighthearted if not a little confusing recount. Ryan’s sure that if Dylan did his own little story time about what he sees at night, they would not be smiling and laughing as they do with Abi. It makes him wonder what the rest of them are hiding away- because Dylan’s right, they’ve all got to be a little fucked up after what they went through.

At the sound of an opening door all their heads lift in unison, like hounds hearing the beat of a rabbit's foot. Nick has wandered out of the kitchen, his hands laden with an array of plates and cutlery.

“Hey Nick, could you bring the maple syrup with you? Don’t give me that look, it’s actually really good-“ Dylan is cut off by the sudden appearance of Kaitlyn, popping out from behind Nick with a face so serious it stuns him silent.

She begins walking towards them with her feet falling in heavy stomps, her face set in a harsh expression. “Where were you two? I was worried sick, I thought you wandered out into the woods last night and froze to death! Or-or that you’d turned early or-or something, I don’t know!” She bursts out in a harsh tone.

She stops at the end of the table, folding her arms across her chest and looking down at them. Being seated, for once she actually does have the height advantage and suddenly Ryan is so thankful that Kaitlyn has the shortest stature he’s ever seen- because having her tower over him with a look of worried anger and disappointment on her face is just a little terrifying. 

“You would think after what we went through that you two could have used your single, shared brain cell to realise disappearing in the middle of the night is a terrible idea!” 

The smell of thick, acidic smoke bellows off of her and clogs up Ryan’s nose. That feeling of an ache in his throat begins to rise but this time he coughs it down. It must be being so close to the full moon that makes him want to stand up and puff up until she backs down, just as he had with Jacob. He ignores the instinct, tilting his head up to hear her out.

“We need to stick together. We don’t know how,” she waves her hands around vaguely, “all of this affects us. We can’t have you running off and something going wrong- especially not in the middle of the night.”

“You’re right, we’re sorry. We didn’t like, plan to run away, I just- I had- I wanted to sleep down in the library and I must’ve made too much noise because Ryan came down to see if I was okay. I didn’t want to disturb you.”

Ryan’s glad Dylan spoke before he could because that is not what he would have gone with- probably something a lot closer to ‘it’s just downstairs and you’re not our mom so chill out’. As he watches her closely with subconsciously narrowed eyes, Ryan notices how when she speaks, her harsh tone is directed towards him while the soft, concerned look in her eyes is entirely pointed towards Dylan. She wasn’t worried about both of them, Ryan realises. She was only worried about Dylan.

His jaw tightens and his throat tenses before he has a chance to realise what he’s doing and stop it. He’s not offended that Kaitlyn was only concerned about Dylan, he actually rather understands the feeling. Something about that realisation though makes the urge to challenge and posture threateningly at her so much stronger. Her head snaps towards him, losing the soft, caring expression that she looked at Dylan with and staring him down with a cold gaze. He tries to fight it, refusing to let instinct rule him, but still he levels his own dangerous glare back at her, his throat and jaw beginning to strain. 

She doesn’t look away as she speaks. “That’s okay Dylan.” The unspoken exclusion of Ryan is heard loud and clear. “Just let us know if you’re gonna go off somewhere else like that in the future. That follows for everyone too, no splitting off without telling the rest of us.”

“Yeah, that makes sense.” Dylan says, before pausing. He nods slowly, looking between Ryan and Kaitlyn. “Okay sooo… that’s settled then?”

Kaitlyn doesn’t look away so neither does Ryan. Her shoulders are squared and her arms are crossed so tightly he thinks she might start cutting off circulation in her hands. Ryan remembers the promise he made Dylan just before but he can’t bring himself to back down. Doing so would be a monumental loss, though of what he isn’t sure. Kaitlyn has to submit first or else he is giving up something- something important. 

A loud bang breaks the moment apart and they both whip their heads to the rest of the table. Every single one of their friends stare back at them, their expressions ranging from confused to concerned to judging to a mix of all three. Ryan’s eyes flick down to the pile of plates that Nick roughly dropped onto the table that had startled them out of their stare down. The tips of his ears heat in embarrassment. Beside him Kaitlyn has also lost all of her fire, shame bringing out a touch of red in her cheeks. They both clear their throats.

Snapped out of their little standoff, Ryan realises how sharp the air around them has grown to smell. It’s enough to nearly make his eyes water, an acrid and acidic smog laying thick in the air around them. He runs a hand over his throat, his eyebrows pitching down as he puts together the pieces of that ache in his throat and the appearance of his own foul scent. 

On the other side of the table, Kaitlyn nudges Dylan to shuffle over, awkwardly sitting down across from Ryan as the rest of the group remains in an uncomfortable silence. No one seems to know what to say. After the minutes begin ticking away, Laura is the one to finally speak up.

“I think tonight we should discuss some of the changes and symptoms we’ve experienced since becoming infected. Write them down, make a list that we can add to and adjust. I think it would really help us make some sense of how this is going to affect us.” She speaks slowly and as she looks between Ryan and Kaitlyn, he can imagine the wheels spinning in her mind. “There is some… interesting behaviour being displayed and I think it’s in our best interests to work out why and what it means.”

No one disagrees with her- though to be fair, no one agrees with her either. It’s as if the group has been stunned into complete silence. Ryan feels incredibly self conscious. In the moment, it didn’t feel weird at all, rather he was following strong instincts that felt entirely natural. But now seeing everyone gape at him and Kaitlyn, he feels as if he’d stabbed someone right in front of them and they aren’t quite sure how to process it.

Kaitlyn splutters. “I-I’m sorry I don’t know why I just- what that was.” She side eyes Ryan, looking at him suspiciously.

Though he had remained silent with the rest of them, Jacob doesn’t share the shell shocked expression. He instead holds a knowing look in his eye. His nostrils flare and his chest puffs out and a small smirk makes its way onto his lips. “Don’t worry Kaitlyn, Ryan’s just trying to prove he’s top dog. Did the same thing to me in the library.”

“Fuck you dude, you were being weird!” Ryan snaps, twisting around and leaning forward to glare down the table at him.

“Oh weird as in trying to work out what that weird fucking smell was that you two filled the library with? If I didn’t know better I would probably assume it was the smell of-“

Ryan cuts him off, his teeth gritted. “No, weird as in, you were standing there with your nose up huffing at the air like a literal dog.”

“I was trying to work out what it was, dickhead!”

“Obviously it was the scents that we’ve pretty well established we all have! Are you seriously that thick that you’re still working that out?”

Kaitlyn slaps her hand down against the table top, harshly making a ‘zip it’ motion with her free hand. “Since you’re both acting like dicks right now, why don’t we let Dylan tell us what actually happened, since he was there and I actually trust his opinion on the matter.”

Ryan ignores the muttered “Unreliable source.” from Jacob, finally looking over to Dylan, after avoiding his eyes out of guilt for breaking his promise that he’d made only moments prior.

Dylan looks like he’s genuinely going to vomit. His nose is scrunched and his lips are pressed tightly shut together. Ryan doesn’t think he’s imagining the ever so slight green tinge in his paper white cheeks. Concern leaps up his throat at the sight, the argument he’s in with Jacob immediately forgotten as a million worried thoughts run through his mind trying to work out why Dylan suddenly looks so sick.

Dylan coughs, as if he were choking on smoke. He waves his hand limply at them, his other clutching loosely at his stomach. “God, don’t bring me into this. It’s you three that are having your standoffs and making the air toxic today, not me.”

Ryan guiltily looks at the others sitting around the table. Each of them have a look of discomfit, their noses slightly screwed up. However only Abi seems to be affected as much as Dylan is, looking equally queasy and almost a little frozen in an emotion that Ryan can’t discern from her face. 

“Why don’t we discuss this later like Laura suggested, when everyone’s chilled off a little bit? We’re letting Nick’s amazing looking brunch go cold.” Max suggests carefully, looking to Laura for approval. She only gives him a slight nod of acknowledgment, her eyes trained firmly onto the three accused with a clinical, contemplative stare. 

The rest of the group jump on the idea, singing their praises to Nick as they pile food on their plates. The three of them who were arguing all level eachother hard looks for a few minutes until the frankly ravenous hunger wins out and they scoop as much meat and egg onto their plates as possible. From the corner of his eye he sees Dylan and Abi stare wistfully at the meal in front of them, absentmindedly drawing their forks back and forth over their plate as they wait a moment. He thinks of the green tinge in Dylan’s cheeks and even as he guilty begins eating, unable to hold off any longer, it takes both of them a minute or so longer until they also dig in.

As they eat, not much conversation is shared, perhaps due to the uncomfortable tension left by the strange standoff and argument, or more likely because of how quickly food is stuffed into their mouths, there is no room for speaking. Even as they settle into silence and he fills his stomach, Ryan cannot shake either the sheepish feeling or the defensive feeling. 

He feels incredibly guilty for making the others uncomfortable with his scent. It’s hard to remember that it’s there at all, let alone that it can get strong and foul enough to make them feel sick. If he actively tries to pick it out he can smell it himself, but majority of the time he doesn’t even realise it’s there. It will take some adjustment, to get used to having an individual scent that gives away what emotions you’re feeling and can be powerful enough to physically affect others. Hopefully, Ryan silently prays, that it’s something that only affects this group and that they don’t work out the whole tangible emotion part of it for a good while. 

And yet, despite the guilt, he hasn’t managed to shake the defensive feeling either. With Kaitlyn and Jacob so close by, all he can smell is their strong scents and almost feel their… presence? He’s not quite sure what that sense is, but it leaves him feeling like he has to keep his guard up, like he might be challenged at any time and he can’t afford to lose it if he is. Ryan feels so frustrated with himself for feeling this way, trying to shrug it off or stuff it down as he has become so accustomed to doing with all other emotions. He just can’t this time.

He’s already drowning in guilt, Ryan thinks to himself, so he might as well add just a spoonful more. As he brings the fork up to his nose, he switches his attention away from the smokey smell radiating off of Kaitlyn, away from the thick coal scent of Jacob, away from the tantalising aroma of brunch and the other various weaker scents of his friends. He focuses on that slightly fruity, slightly sweet smell that he has already grown used to associating with Dylan. Right now it is almost too sweet, almost a little bit sickly, reminding him of rotten fruit. But despite that, as he fixates on it, his hunched shoulders drop an inch and the air flows easier into his lungs. Even as a bucket full of guilt is added to the sea of it within him, the results are immediate. 

Brunch is finished disrespectfully quick. Ryan hopes Nick takes it as a compliment that they all shovelled it so quickly into their stomachs that they forgot to taste it along the way. Grocery bills may grow to be a problem if their hunger stays at this level before the moon. Most of their plates have been polished clean, though scraps have been left on both Dylan's and Abi’s plates, from what Ryan assumes is the residual queasiness. The goddamn werewolf curse in his veins has nothing on the guilt that is slowly eating him alive.

Thanks are thrown at Nick so feverishly that Ryan’s worried he might pass out from all the blood going to his head, pooling in his cheeks. As they stack all the plates and dishes up, Emma clears his throat. 

“So what do we do now?”

Chapter Text

Ryan accepts the mug Nick hands him gratefully, warming his hands on the hot ceramic. The fire was just lit, so it has yet to billow into flames that fan warmth out over the room, leaving the cold tinge that has grown over the day to remain for now. Tonight doesn’t hold the same mellowness as the night before, a cold wind battering against the window panes. 

They’re gathered around the fireplace on camping chairs that were pulled out of the camp storage and what he thinks is the last forgotten couch that was, with great effort, brought down from that large empty space in front of the rec room. They’re waiting for Laura to return after leaving to take a phone call, using the old landline in the office, and talking casually among themselves as they do.

It’s been a good, if not a little boring, day. After brunch they ended up splitting up throughout the lodge, halfheartedly scanning it over for any other signs of damage or disrepair. They only really found that the chimney of the fireplace definitely needs looking at, but that’s far beyond the scope of what they were checking for. They’d done a good job of cleaning everything up yesterday. Now that it isn’t bustling with screaming children, Ryan can appreciate just how truely large the lodge is, despite how few rooms it has for its size and as weirdly laid out as it is. It feels strange, having only nine of them exist within this colossal building that was once buzzing with life and laughter everyday. He wonders if it felt this desolate for Chris in the off seasons.

He feels a stab of pain to his chest as he even just thinks of his name. He trails his eyes up the chimney, focusing in on every groove and chip in the stone to ignore the wave of emotions and thoughts that rise with the thought of his former mentor. He has far too much on his shoulders right now to even consider broaching the complicated tangle of how he feels about Chris Hackett right now. 

Ryan pushes that train of thought from his mind, shoving it away into the far reaches of his mind and instead letting his thoughts return to the peacefully shallow recap of his day. It’s easy to do so, the soft hum of his friends chatting around him and the hazy blending of pleasant scents creating a soothing atmosphere. 

Once the lodge had been checked over, then checked over again going backwards that time, some of them converged in the rec room, cleaning it up a little bit and tucking blankets over the couches to make their temporary beds a little more comfortable. Ryan had just sat around with Kaitlyn joining him, as they let Dylan, Jacob and Nick do all the work. He’s not sure what the others were up to as they threw blankets at each other and bullied Jacob for his inability to fold anything all afternoon, but he knows they wouldn’t have been far off. No one seemed comfortable leaving the safety of the lodge- the furthest any of them have ventured is just out to the camp storage. 

Though it wasn’t explicitly stated, today their unspoken agreement of not acknowledging that night was put into full force. They pretended that nothing had changed or happened at all, boredly roaming the lodge and keeping all conversations and jokes strictly about irrelevant and trivial things. It actually worked- ignoring the scents, increased senses and the remaining tension between Ryan, Kaitlyn and Jacob that they can’t seem to shake off. It really felt like the last day of camp again, just cleaning up and goofing around. Well, as much as it could have. There is a heavy weight hanging on all their shoulders, a weight you can see in their faces and eyes. It has changed them, and Ryan doesn’t know if they will ever heal enough to be as unburdened and blissfully ignorant as they had been before. 

Ryan doesn’t know if they’ve been doing the right thing, pretending that nothing happened. On one hand, ignoring that they’ve been irreparably changed and traumatised lets them pretend to themselves that they’re still just stupid kids without a care or worry in the world. On the other, they’re very plainly just lying to themselves. Ignoring it won’t make it all go away. That night still happened and there’s still a curse in their veins. Not acknowledging that creates a fake atmosphere, where everyone is lying and they’re all just playing along. As if they’re small children again, playing make believe. Except in this imaginary game there’s no mum or dad, no fairies or dragons. Only traumatised teenagers pretending that everything’s okay. 

It has created distance between them too. It’s almost like they’re all strangers to each other again, being amicable but superficial. Ryan’s never been great at small talk, but that’s as far as their conversations go now. There’s no more mention of their lives before camp, of camp at all, of their futures or how they’re feeling. It’s all just surface things now. In fact, at one point today, to break an awkward silence after they’d run out of pointless observations or jokes to make, Nick actually brought up the weather . Though Ryan was glad to hear him speak more today, if that’s all they’ve got to talk about now, maybe total silence was actually the better option. 

Ryan hates to see the group that had grown close friendships amongst it over camp, turn into a shallow group of acquaintances, only together due to their circumstances. The falsities and mock normality is almost painful. There’s nothing he can do about it however- unless he decides to go person to person, encouraging them to open up and accept their new reality, which he very much doesn’t plan to do. He can’t force the group to be friends, as much as he wants to. As much as that hole in his stomach grows once more, ripping through the mends and tearing apart any healing that had begun last night.

His largest worry about it all however, is that he thinks their total refusal to acknowledge that night and anything about what follows it, will make the conversation that is about to take place a million times harder. They’ve all been struggling silently and now they’re about to drop the act and put it all out there. No more pretend normality, no more hiding the fact that it really happened, that this is indeed real. Their first honest conversation since that night.

“Ryan will back me on this, right Ryan?”

With a slight start he snaps his eyes away from where he’d been staring off into space at the chimney and towards where Nick looks at him expectantly. “What?”

“He wasn’t even listening.” Jacob scoffs and Ryan makes a face at him.

“That doesn’t matter. You agree that Disney songs are bangers right?” Nick says, the expectancy on his face and in his tone bordering on desperate. 

He’s glad to see him a little more alive and engaged than the day before, where his eyes wouldn’t meet theirs and his head was permanently downcast. Still, as much as he hates to ever admit Jacob could be right, he wasn’t listening and he really has no stakes in what appears to be an intense, albeit playful argument. 

“Why are you asking me?” He asks, trying to gauge who's involved in this debate.

Nick counts his reasons out on his fingers. “Because you have a good music taste, you have a little sister so you’ve definitely watched some Disney movies recently and I’m banking on the fact that you can appreciate quality content.”

Ryan sighs and can’t help the small smile that makes its way onto his face. “Fine, okay yeah. Old school Disney had good songs, definitely.” At his words Nick gives a pointed, slightly smug look that’s directed towards Jacob and Emma. 

“Why do we even care what Ryan thinks? It’s not like he’s always right or whatever.” Jacob grumbles.

Emma picks an invisible piece of lint off of her shoulder with manicured nails and rolls her eyes. “We don’t. He’s wrong anyway, Disney songs are annoying.”

“Old school Disney.” Ryan reminds her. “Anyway, what is this argument even about?” 

“We were talking about music and Nick said his favourite song was a Disney one. And now here we are.” Abi explains for him, looking lightheartedly exasperated.

“Dylan, thoughts?” Nick says, totally ignoring the explanation and pushing on. 

Dylan raises his hands in a surrendering motion. “I was more of a Pixar kid.” 

“Cop out.” Kaitlyn says, nudging his arm with her elbow. Ryan’s arms cross over his chest on their own accord.

“So that’s four votes for Disney songs being good, one cop out and two absolutely terrible, incorrect opinions. I think it’s settled.” Nick leans back in his camping chair until it titters dangerously on its back legs. He looks so much more relaxed than he has since he’d arrived. Ryan worries they’ve all lulled themselves into a false sense of security. 

“I’m sorry they’re just not good, I mean come on, they’re kid songs!” Emma argues.

“Yeah and don’t they give you that nostalgic feeling when you listen to them?” Kaitlyn counters back. 

“No, I didn’t watch those movies as a kid. I’ve never watched any cartoons.” 

“What did you watch then?” Kaitlyn asks with a hint of disbelief. Her arm pulls up to rest against the back of the couch, her fingers narrowly avoiding scraping Dylan’s shoulder. Knowing how ridiculous they are, Ryan stuffs down every thought and feeling that sight brings out in him. 

Emma inspects her nails as she speaks. “Just whatever Mom had on. Reality tv, dating shows, weight watchers, keeping up with whoever was famous at the time.” 

The group baulks at that and Dylan holds up a hand. “Hold on, you were watching that shit as a little, little kid? Instead of cartoons? Wait, how little are we talking?” 

Emma shrugs, her interest in her nails growing even stronger. “I don’t know, it’s all I remember watching. Mom said I loved it so…” She shrugs again. “I got my own tv when I was nine and I started watching like, vampire diaries and glee and stuff.”

The group looks at her with an almost aghast expression, though they manage to mostly hide the judgement from showing on their faces. Nick hums somewhat uncouthly, turning to Jacob. “Alright, so Emma has a reasonable excuse. What’s yours?” 

“I didn’t have a tv.” He says simply.

“You didn’t a tv?” Nick repeats back to him slowly.

Jacob suddenly looks extremely uncomfortable and Kaitlyn rushes to his rescue. “We watched more shows than movies when we were kids, didn’t we? And when we were eleven, we stole my older brother's copy of gta and religiously played that for literal months straight.” 

“Now that is good taste.” Max says, reminding Ryan of his presence. He sits in a camping chair, slightly pushed back from the circle, making it easy to skip your eyes over him. 

Jacob gives a short laugh, quickly recovering. “Yeah, what Kaitlyn leaves out though is that whenever I handed the controller over to her, she’d just drive around, stopping at red lights and obeying all the traffic laws. It wasn’t exactly exciting game play.”

“I also hopped out and shot hookers sometimes.” She defends.

Dylan tilts his head back and forth slightly and makes a face. “Mm, not sure you’re supposed to call them that anymore.”

“They’re not real Dylan.”

The creaking and shutting of a door causes them to turn and look over their shoulders. Laura walks over with a book in hand and a pen in another. She drops down in the chair beside Max, stretching out her legs and crossing her ankles. “I’m not interrupting an important conversation am I?” 

Max looks for confirmation from the group but answers for them anyway. “Not at all. What’s this?” 

She holds up the book, which on closer inspection is one of those old red covered and blue lined exercise books for school. It’s slightly faded and looks a little thin. “To write down what we discuss. Anyone keen to take notes?”

“Yeah, pass it over.” Kaitlyn offers, catching it and the pen mid air as they’re thrown in her direction.

With Laura’s hands now free, Ryan sees Max slip his own into hers, running his thumb back and forth over his knuckles. She settles down into her chair and sweeps her eyes over each of them. “So I just called Travis. He’s going to come over tomorrow, talk to us about where we’re going to spend the night. He’ll be here the entire night, making sure nothing goes wrong. And he will talk to us the next morning too, he says the day after can be rough.”

The group instantly falls into a solemn silence, their day of pretending and playful banter done. They nod at her words, showing that they’re following along without having to actually contribute. 

“So, we should talk about the symptoms we’ve experienced, what’s changed. Where should we start?”

No one offers any ideas. No one says anything. Their faces have lowered, chins tucked so low they nearly touch their collarbones and their eyes fiercely avoiding contact with anyone else’s, darting around the room or remaining fixed to the floor. Someone awkwardly clears their throat and someone else sniffs. Even Max beside her doesn’t try to help his girlfriend out, looking terribly uncomfortable and unsure. The room has taken on a bitter smell, but it’s so mixed that Ryan doesn’t think there is a singular culprit to blame. Only Ryan and Laura keep their eyes up, looking at the group's sudden apprehensive reaction. She gives him an impatient and helpless look, jerking her chin at the rest of them in a clear gesture that tells him to ‘say something!’.

Ryan sighs. He doesn’t know what she expects him to do to get the group to open up, or why that responsibility should even be on him at all. But no one else is going to and Laura doesn’t know the others like he does, she has no sway over them. He might as well try. He lets himself think for a few moments, writing up a small script in his mind to run through so he isn’t just pulling words out of his ass.

“Guys we really do need to talk about this. We’re all going through this together, we should take advantage of that and try to work out as much about it as we can. To make things a little less confusing and unknown, right? It could make things a bit easier.” No one looks convinced so he forges forward. “This is crazy and horrible and we might be the only people in the world experiencing it. Not talking about it doesn’t help anything other than to preserve whatever semblance of dignity we have left. But we don’t need dignity right now, we need to try and work out as much as we can about this to make our lives and future experiences a little more understandable. Whatever symptoms you’ve got, someone else can probably relate and it’ll probably feel pretty relieving to know that you’re not alone in what you’re going through.”

He sees some heads rise, looking very reluctant, but persuaded nonetheless. A couple of them, Abi and Nick in particular, do not lose their closed off posture and nor do they look up at his words. That’s fine, he just needs the majority of the group to speak for it to be a proper discussion. 

From where his chin is still tucked down towards his chest and his arms are crossed over his chest, Jacob snorts. “Nice pep talk Ryan.” He says sarcastically. 

“As monologue-y as that was, he’s right, we can’t avoid talking about it forever. The full moon is tomorrow night, there’s no avoiding it.” Kaitlyn defends, flipping open the cover of the work book and picking away the pieces of paper that hadn’t torn off where Laura had clearly ripped out the used pages. 

Laura shoots Ryan a thankful look, relaxing back into her seat. “He’s also right about the whole ‘if it affects you it probably affects someone else similarly’.” She pauses for a beat, tightening her grip on Max’s hand in her lap. “However I don’t think we will all share the exact same uh, experiences or symptoms or whatever you want to call it. Me and Max have talked about it and we don’t feel the same way about everything.”

“I’ll make sure to clarify who's affected as I take notes then.” Kaitlyn reassures. 

“Why don’t we start there then?” Max suggests. “We had talked about how our senses felt. It’d be good to hear how much everyone’s senses have changed too.”

“Are we going round in a circle or what?” Emma asks, crossing her legs and inspecting her nails.

“Might be easier if someone tells us how they feel about something and anyone who relates can add their thoughts. Then anyone who has different experiences can bounce off of that.” Ryan says. 

They all look over to Laura and Max to kick the discussion off. The couple looks at each other thoughtfully, silently debating where to start until Laura turns back to the group. “Well as we’ve all kind of touched on, our senses are definitely stronger.”

“Smell, hearing, sight, taste and touch.” Max adds, counting them out on his fingers. It’s not exactly a needed addition to the discussion considering the fact that Ryan’s pretty sure they all passed kindergarten, but Laura nods as if she appreciated the input.

“I haven’t gotten used to it yet, everything seems just a little too loud and bright. It’s definitely manageable but it’s still a big adjustment.” She tilts her head towards her boyfriend. “Max however doesn’t really find it a problem, right?”

“Yeah, I mean they’re definitely stronger but it’s nothing I can’t deal with. I kinda feel the same way but it doesn’t exactly bother me or anything.” Max expands.

They look out to the rest of the group to get their input and Ryan assumes he will have to be the one to go first, opening his mouth to speak when Emma chimes in. “I’m with Max. My senses are sharper but not in a way that really affects me at all.”

With a voice so quiet that without his newly keen hearing Ryan would have missed it, Nick agrees. “Me too.”

Glancing down at the quick scribbling of the pen in the notebook beside him, Dylan speaks up next. “I’m more with Laura. They’ve gotten strong enough that it catches me out sometimes, like being able to hear the car yesterday was really weird or hearing what my Mom’s saying from downstairs. But it’s the smells that really get me. It’s like my nose has suddenly been unblocked for the first time in eighteen years.” 

“That’s me too.” Abi agrees. “I can smell things I never would have been able to before really, really strongly. Same with my other senses but it mostly smells.” Dylan nods his agreement.

“Oh. I actually can’t really relate to that.” Laura shakes her head and gives a little bit of a sheepish smile. “For me it feels like the things I could already sense are just clearer, but I can’t sense things I wouldn’t have been able to before. It’s just weird to get used to but it doesn’t like, actually change anything for me, I guess.” She amends.

“When you were telling me about how it affects you Laura I felt pretty similar.” Max tells her, giving her hand a tight squeeze in unity. She gives him a slightly exasperated look and Ryan thinks she may have hit the nail on the head in their text messages when she told him that she thinks he was just trying to make sure she doesn’t worry about him. 

“You said it was mild, that’s mild to you? Max, you need to stop down playing things for my benefit. I’m allowed to worry about you.” She tells him, her voice dropping in volume to create an illusion of privacy. 

“It is mild, it just is also a bit weird. I didn’t want to minimise what you were feeling or tell you that I knew exactly how you were feeling if it was upsetting you.” He tells her in the same quiet tone, giving her a small half smile and squeezing her hand again.

“You’re allergic to honesty, Max.” She scolds, but despite her chastising, she looks relieved to hear that she doesn’t have it worse than anyone else and her senses seem to fit within the ‘normal’ experience of most of the group. Ryan doesn’t feel the same relief. The group turns to look at the remaining three who haven’t spoken yet and he decides to go first to get it over with.

“Hearing you guys talk about it I feel like maybe I’m also just being dramatic now, but it’s been actually really hard to adjust to it for me. I feel like my senses have been ramped up to a hundred, I can hear, smell and see shit I definitely shouldn’t be able to and it gets pretty overwhelming at times.” 

“If you’re being dramatic Ryan then I definitely am too because I’m totally with you. I can’t watch tv at night anymore because it burns my eyes and I know everything that goes on in my neighbours lives because I can hear through multiple sets of walls.” Kaitlyn says earnestly and Ryan feels a small sense of consolation in knowing that someone else feels the same. 

“Yeah, that’s how it feels for me too.” Jacob agrees.

“So there’s like, different levels of how strong our senses are then or something then. Because you’re not being dramatic, yesterday you guys could hear the car but I couldn’t at all.” Emma says to him in an uncharacteristic example of genuinely sweet reassurance. 

“Alright well, that's really interesting.” Laura says thoughtfully. 

A beat passes and Ryan wonders if that’s as far as their discussion is going to go when Jacob suddenly blurts out, “I broke a glass. I just picked it up normally and it shattered in my hand”

“Okay… has anyone else had something like that happen?”

Ryan is about to look around the group to see their responses when he remembers how he actually damaged a car door at his grandfather's garage on the first day he started working there when he got back home after camp. That spirals into a few other memories of items he’s broken since returning home that he didn’t think much of at the time. He does a small wave with two fingers and Kaitlyn scoffs as she jots down another note.

“Yeah me too.” She says and Ryan stretches his back to look over at the book on her lap, seeing her write their initials down beside a neat scrawl of ‘increased strength’.

With that, the floodgates are opened and random experiences and symptoms are thrown out from around the group. Kaitlyn jots them all down in a growing thread of bullet points. For each experience shared, someone chimes in with a similar example. There’s an almost humorous air as they go back and forth, their experiences strange but not neither positive nor negative. Just odd and slightly ridiculous knowing the context.

“I burnt my hand really badly making noodles and I was seriously considering calling an ambulance. But, after putting it under water for ten minutes, it was completely fine.” Emma offers up, playfully daintily showing off her hand to show the unmarred skin. 

“I’ve been eating my mom out of house and home this past week. She says if I keep it up I’m going to have to contribute to grocery costs.” Nick sheepishly admits.

“I took a photo of myself with the flash on and my eyes were white. Mom freaked out, said it was a sign of cancer. I managed to avoid having her rushing me off to the hospital.” Max laughs. 

“My neighbor's dogs no longer bark at me when I walk past. They actually run up to the fence to sniff at me now.” Abi says with a level of uncertainty, as if she’s unsure if she should contribute that experience or not.

“My cat’s scared of me.” Dylan says next, his voice somber and low. “And there’s been this… gaping hole in my stomach since I returned home. It’s been fading since yesterday though but I’m terrified it’s going to come back.” 

The room goes silent, only the cracking and popping of the wood in the fireplace and the group's breathing making any sound. Every word on their tongues is immediately swallowed, any semblance of humour or lightheartedness instantly dissolved at Dylan’s solemn tone. The total tone shift makes him panic, trying to backtrack with a hurried, “I-I’m sorry, that’s probably not even relevant. I shouldn’t have-“

“No, I’ve felt the exact same thing.” Ryan says, stopping him in his tracks. “It’s like this empty pit, right below my ribs.”

They all share a look, a look that speaks volumes. Everyone feels the same way. Still, everyone murmurs a verbal acknowledgment, agreeing that they’ve experienced that specific feeling.

“I never wanted to return here ever again, only coming back because I was forced to. But that feeling has faded since returning and- it almost makes me not want to leave, if it means never feeling that again.” Abi admits, grasping her upper arms with her hands in a loosely held self hug.

“I thought it was just depression, you know, because of everything that happened that night. Mom even threatened to ship me off to the psych ward.” Kaitlyn confesses. Ryan watches Dylan’s hand itch over to subtlety rest gently against her forearm. 

“You think that’s a werewolf thing?” Emma asks.

Laura shrugs. “I think it might be, if we’re all feeling the exact same sensation. I wouldn’t rule out trauma as the cause, but generally people react differently to that don’t they? All of us having that exact feeling seems more like a werewolf thing.”

Abi groans loudly, stuffing her face in her arms. She mumbles something and when she only receives confused ‘huhs?’ about what she said, she lifts her head again with a face of discomfort. “Do we really have to call it that?”

“What, werewolves?” Laura pauses, looking unsure and Abi’s visible cringe confirms that was what she meant. “Uh, what else would we call it? It’s the only thing I’ve heard it called and I can’t exactly think of a better name.”

“Horrifically upsetting, monstrously painful, scary disease?” Dylan suggests with a suddenly teasing tone that is a far cry from the somber tone he had last spoken with. “We can call it Humps disease for short.”

The terrible, barely even funny joke earns him a collective snort from around the group at its stupidness and even draws a reluctant smile from Abi. Ryan’s not sure if that was a planned joke that he’d been waiting to use or if it was his quick wit working to save the mood he’d dropped, but either way Ryan feels even more intrigued and impressed with the way Dylan’s mind operates. To slingshot from doleful to attempting to cheer up everyone else, and to do it so easily and smoothly, is clearly something Dylan is experienced with. No one else bats an eye or even notices the sudden shift in his demeanour. If Ryan was to feel protective of him, which he doesn’t , he would think that they take Dylan’s mask for granted- embracing and utilising his lightheartedness and jokes to lift their own moods, all while being totally oblivious to how Dylan truly feels behind the jokes. 

“Someone remind me that Dylan is never allowed to name anything ever again.” Emma says with a slight smile. “But I get what you mean Abi. It’s weird to call it that and sends me into a spiral if I think about it too much, but we’re working with what we’ve got. Our understanding of it is that and unless we work out that we actually just have some rare type of std that turns us into monsters on the full moon, then there’s no point in being anything other than honest.”

Though her words are as blunt as usual, Emma’s tone is incredibly soft and understanding. Ryan’s not sure he’s ever heard her sound like that before, or at least she’s never spoken to any of the others in that way before. Abi searches her face for a moment before she sighs and nods, the death grip on her arms loosening slightly. 

The mood is lifted with that, saved from the grim pit that they had begun falling into. It doesn’t hold the same humorous feeling as before, but at least the air isn’t fogged up with a depressing, sour scent anymore.

“So, next on the list is the obvious right? The scents are a pretty big change.” Kaitlyn asserts, moving the conversation along. 

“Yeah that’s gonna take some adjusting to get used to, isn’t it?” Nick says quietly. 

“They’re weird aren’t they? They’re all different but I’ve noticed that some of you have a similar… urgh style isn’t the right word but similar, theme? That’s not right either.” Abi speaks up, sounding keen to get into the subject before getting tangled up in her words.

“I also noticed that actually.” Laura assures her. “Like the level of thickness or the way it smells or- you’re right, there’s no good words to explain it.” 

“Wait, elaborate?” Emma asks, looking right past Laura and over to Abi.

“Well I mean like, you, Nick, Laura and Max all smell very… light? Kind of like air but in different ways.” She begins but trails off as she continues to struggle finding the right words.

“Like from different seasons.” Dylan supplies.

“Yes exactly! While Ryan, Kaitlyn and Jacob all smell very thick and… deep? Like very heavy scents. And Dylan you smell sweet, like fruit or berries.” She explains, engrossed in her explanation. Ryan gets the feeling that she feels very confident about this topic, lacking any of the uncertainty or timidness that usually leaks through her tone. 

“Well you also smell very nice Abi. Like flowers.” 

As Emma smiles at her, the timidness returns to Abi’s voice. “Oh! Uh, thank you.” 

Kaitlyn furiously jots their statements down, her hand almost moving in a blur with how quickly she writes. Dylan spares a long glance at the page nearly completely filled with blue ink and wrings his hands together.

“There’s another thing that I noticed- about the scents I mean. You can, well, I can, and I mean Ryan can too,” He looks momentarily panicked from how badly he’s fumbling his words and takes a deep breath as Ryan offers him a reassuring smile. “Okay that was a mess. What I mean is that, I’ve noticed you can smell emotions in the scents- really clearly.”

Ryan was expecting everyone to agree, saying that they picked up on that too despite his earlier praying that they wouldn’t have noticed it at all. However instead, Dylan is given disbelieving stares, confusion and scepticism mixed in with equal parts. He elaborates, trying to clarify it as if they’ll suddenly understand and agree.

“I noticed it the second I was picked up and the scents hit me. Abi was anxious, but I assumed I knew that because well, I mean it made sense. At first I thought I was just picking up the obvious or being one of those self proclaimed ‘empaths’ or something.” He says, using his fingers to make quotation marks and rolling his eyes. “But then over the past night I was picking up on like, really small emotions too and I realised it was through the scents. I think? Yeah, no, has to be.”

“What do you mean, you like, notice when the scents change or what?” Emma asks.

“Well yeah but it’s more like I can feel the emotion in it or like- like even taste it almost? It’s like physically there in the air. You don’t know what I’m talking about?”

Emma gives a short, disbelieving laugh. “Um, no? I notice when the scents go sour and horrible obviously, but it is just a bad smell.”

Half the group seems to agree with her, while the other half have a thoughtful expression. Laura has adopted that clinical look and Abi opens her mouth to speak before closing it again. 

Ryan speaks up to share his own experience to back up Dylan’s claims. “I can’t say I noticed it immediately like Dylan, but when the scent gets really strong and uh, bad, I could tangibly feel the emotion in it.” 

“So you can feel negative emotions through the scents?” Nick asks for clarity.

“Not just negative emotions.” Abi says suddenly. “Positive too. Everything from relaxed, anxious, giddy, annoyed. I can feel it too.”

“When you say you can feel the emotions, what do you mean?” Laura asks, looking between the three of them who have shared the phenomenon.

“It’s like the emotion, the feeling of the emotion, is in the air through the scent. You can smell it, if you open your mouth you can taste it and you can even begin to feel it too. It’s like, physically there, it’s not just a- a vibe or whatever. It’s kinda hard to explain I guess.” Dylan says. 

“I actually understand what you mean, I think. I got that sensation when we reunited and I could feel that you were kind of freaking out.” Kaitlyn says, giving a slightly guilty look to Dylan beside her.

“Wait, that’s what that was this morning?” Jacob exclaims, as if a lightbulb just flipped on in his head. Ryan immediately sends him a withering glare, silently warning him against saying anything more, worried about what he may know or reveal. Knowing Jacob’s emotional intelligence, it’s probably nothing, but Ryan isn’t taking any chances. Jacob’s eyes narrow and his shoulders square for a moment but thankfully his mouth snaps shut.

“Hands up for sensing emotions through scent.” Kaitlyn orders, before jotting down the initials DL, RE, AB, JC and finally KK. 

“You two just did it again.” Laura states as she writes, that clinical look staring Ryan down.

“What?”

“I saw it, the glare you just gave Jacob. Your demeanors changed. What’s going on?”

Ryan doesn’t want to admit why exactly he just glared at Jacob, as that would defeat the whole purpose of doing it in the first place. Nor does he really want to explain how he feels in these moments, since he doesn’t even know himself. He didn’t even realise that was one of those moments, he hadn’t noticed his posture changing. Clearly it had, since he was just called out for it. 

“I don’t know, I was just- I don’t know.” Ryan says dumbly.

“I smelt it.” Dylan admits, sounding guilty to side with Laura against him. Ryan reluctantly supposes he shouldn’t have to feel guilty- he had promised to cool it and yet evidently he’s unable to fulfil that promise. 

“What’s it smell like?” Laura probes, leaning forward in her seat. 

Dylan looks uncomfortable, shifting side to side. “Um. I don’t know the right word. Territorial?”

Ryan splutters. “I- I don’t feel territorial! What would I be territorial over?” Please don’t answer that, please don’t answer that, please don’t answer that.

“I don’t know, they’re your emotions dude!” 

Laura sighs and rolls her eyes. “Fine, what happened earlier in the library? You guys never said.” 

“Ryan was being a dick!”

“What? No dude, you were!”

“Dylan? Please.” Laura says, cutting them both off.

“I woke up because of the smell, I don’t know what they were arguing about. But you guys looked like, okay well you know how those wrestlers or boxers look when they square up for photos before a match? It kinda looked like that.” Dylan explains, his leg bouncing up and down on the spot. A bitter tinge has started to burn the sweet scent that fills the room.

Abi snorts and Emma chokes down a mean giggle. Ryan sinks down his chair in embarrassment and across the room Jacob covers his eyes with a hand on his forehead. ‘Traitor’ he mentally accuses Dylan, though he can’t find it in himself to be actually upset.

“What were you arguing about then?” Laura continues her interrogation, sounding far too curious in that odd clinical way for Ryan’s comfort.

“I don’t even remember! It wasn’t a big deal, can we just move on?” Jacob blurts out in an uneasy rush.

Surprisingly she doesn’t push any further, visibly biting her tongue to curb her burning questions from spilling out. Another awkward pause begins to stretch out, the sound of clearing throats and the scratching of a pen magnified by their silence. Ryan picks at a hangnail, peeling it backwards until a bead of blood bubbles up against his cuticle, growing in volume until the bead pops and trickles down to pool beneath the trimmed white of the top of his nail. He pops the tip of his finger in his mouth, worrying the nail with his front teeth to distract himself from the awkwardness.

Once more it is up to Dylan to salvage the mood, sniffing loudly before he says in a flippant tone, “Well has anyone else suddenly got the uncontrollable urge to play fetch?” 

That earns him a few genuine chuckles and Kaitlyn nudges his side. “You really want me to write that down with only your initials next to it?”

“Mm, maybe leave that one out.” Dylan grins.

The next pause where they wait for someone to speak up has lost the uncomfortable atmosphere, but it comes immediately right back when Jacob speaks up in a nervous tone. “Okay, so this is kind of a weird one, but uhh, um.”

“Spit it out Jacob.” Kaitlyn says exasperatedly. 

“Has anyone else’s uh, dick, like… um, kinda, changed? I dunno, like- guess almost, inflated at the base? When they’re… y’know…”

There’s a beat of dumbfounded silence before the room explodes with disbelieving and disgusted voices.

“Gross dude!”

“Jacob what the fuck?”

“Excuse me?”

Emma buries her face in her hands. “I fucking told you, it’s a goddamn super std.”

A few of them laugh in shock but they’re right back to stunned silence when Kaitlyn speaks up, sounding incredibly hesitant and uncomfortable. “No, I um, actually know what you’re talking about.”

“Thank you!” Jacob exclaims. Then her words seem to actually register in his brain and he rears his head back. “Wait, how do you know about that?”

His eyes widen and he looks around at the other guys in the room before they stop on Ryan and narrow into a glare. Then they widen again and he flicks his gaze over to Dylan, his eyebrows quivering and lips turning downward. Ryan realises he’s betrayed on Dylan’s behalf- well, too late. Ryan doubts Dylan would care at all anymore, even if Jacob was correct in his astoundingly incorrect assumption.

Kaitlyn must also pick up on what Jacob’s quickly changing expressions mean and hurriedly balks out, “God Jacob, no! Not him! Actually, um. God this is humiliating. I was talking about myself.”

“What?” Jacob and Ryan say in unison.

“Well I’m not explaining it! I’m just saying it happened to me too, that’s all.” 

“This is not at all where I thought this conversation would go.” Nick says, sounding a little bit amazed in a particularly morbid way.

Ryan tries to avoid everyone’s eyes, well aware of the shocked and disturbed look that would be staring back at him. He does however catch the look on Laura’s face- a look that has been on her face so often over the past day, that appears whenever they actually open up and talk about their affliction or whenever anyone displays any sign of it. A curious look, like she wants to pull out a book and begin studying them, or open up a lab and enroll them all as her test subjects. He shifts his gaze down firmly to his lap.

Kaitlyn coughs awkwardly and embarrassment is clear in her tone when she says, “Alright alright, we all know the drill by now. If your junk has changed or gotten weird since becoming a werewolf, raise your hand.”

Jacob’s arm shoots up to the sky and Kaitlyn also lifts two of her fingers where she cradles the work book. Ryan debates with himself for a long drawn out moment, almost too long, as he only slowly and reluctantly raises his own hand to shoulder height as Jacob begins lowering his own. He can’t bring himself to look up as he does- he doesn’t want to see the others expressions. He’s utterly humiliated but standing by his statement that they should be honest in this conversation. 

“And on that note, I am now suddenly really tired and want to leave this conversation.” Nick jokes, though it falls flat as Ryan suspects the others just genuinely agree.

“Yeah, Jacob ruined it. I’m ready for bed now.” Emma states, confirming Ryan’s suspicion.

“Alright, well I guess that everything for now anyway? Anything else that comes up though we should definitely still write down and discuss.” Laura says and leans forward in her seat, holding her hand out for the work book. “How’d those notes turn out Kaitlyn?” 

“Good, I’m an excellent note taker. I did notice as well that most of the initials are paired up together a lot more than they are with others. Look at that.” She says, handing it over.

Laura hums. “This might be really helpful. Mind if I take it with me when we go home?” 

The group all gives their agreements and Ryan thinks that they couldn’t care less if it means they can leave this suddenly incredibly awkward conversation. She runs her finger down the page as her eyes skim over the lines and Ryan can see how engrossed in the notes she immediately becomes. Even if they’d wanted to continue talking, his presence in this conversation is well and truly done. He stands, turning back to pick up his mug and when he looks back at the group they have all jumped on the unspoken permission of his rising to escape themselves, standing up and milling around as they prepare to get ready for bed.

Despite how up and down the discussion was, Ryan thinks it could have gone far, far worse. They talked about everything they needed to, no one got too upset and the group was actually honest. Nevermind his bruised ego, they actually opened up and talked about what’s happening to them for the first time and it didn't go down in flames or tears. Ryan counts that as an absolute win. 

Much like the night before, their goodnights are abrupt as they all flee upstairs to their makeshift beds, where they will be safe from the social awkwardness of the mess hall. As he walks up the stairs to the attic though, Ryan turns back and looks over his shoulder, catching Dylan’s eyes just before he enters the rec room. His face softens and he gives him a half smile and nod, hoping that he heard the unspoken words ‘I hope you sleep easy tonight’. He gets a smile back that doesn’t quite reach Dylan’s eyes. 

Ryan looks back to the attic, suddenly having to force his feet to continue upwards towards the dusty, web covered space. He intends to sleep early, but if he also has a fail safe of going on another walk tonight, well then that’s just good planning.

Chapter Text

Ryan woke this morning with an itch just beneath his skin. It’s a burning, slightly electrical sensation that crawls along through his nerves. No amount of dragging his nails down his arms, until he’s left long red lines, manages to relieve it. The only momentarily relief he has found from it since he’s woken up was at breakfast, when he piled bacon, sausages and ham onto his plate, completely skipping past the eggs and toast, and stuffing it into his mouth until the only thing he could feel was his teeth ripping apart the meat. It took him longer to fill his plate than it did to clear it and as soon as it was polished clean, the itching was right back to the forefront of his mind. Even worse was that he was still hungry too.

Everything seems harsher today. The cawing of crows outside feels like a nail being batted into his ears. The taste of meat remains on his tongue from hours ago. His clothes rub almost painfully against his skin, feeling rough and restrictive. The static film that he has seen through for as long as he can remember has disappeared, making the world look as if it’s had a clear filter put over it. Then there’s the scents. 

If he thought they were strong yesterday or when he first returned, then he had no idea how powerful they could get. It’s no longer a muddied cloud where he can vaguely make out who each scent comes from. No, now they’re each clearly defined and strongly stand out from amongst the others, causing him to smell eight separate scents individually and all at once. The reason he’s fled up here into the attic instead of staying downstairs where the others are spread out, is because of Dylan’s scent in particular. It’s not bad, rather it was so intoxicating that it made him so dizzy and warm and his thoughts so weird that it felt like he might be a little bit drunk. Ryan was finding it hard to ‘ be normal’ downstairs. At least up here there’s only the smell of dust and old fabric. Honestly he’d spend every cent he possesses and then some on an oxygen tank to wheel around behind him for today. 

The sensory overload alone would put him into a foul mood. But he already woke up with a bone to pick with existence itself this morning anyway. Each word Jacob or Kaitlyn speaks has him wanting to turn around, get into their personal space, size them up and stand them down. Any joke from the others about doing something dumb, like this being the perfect day to drive back home and go to the movies or something equally as stupid, makes him snap out harsh reminders of what happens on the fullmoon. 

The only reason he isn’t sinking down into a pit of self hatred and guilt for his irate attitude, is the fact that most of the others are acting the exact same way. Kaitlyn and Jacob hold the same challenging look in their eyes whenever they acknowledge Ryan or each other. Emma, Laura and Max are all being the most irritable arseholes, snapping at each other for the smallest things. Only Nick, Dylan and Abi seem to have control over their temperament, though that may be because they have opted for staying nearly completely silent. 

Ryan sighs to himself. He’s had such quickly adjusting mindsets about the group that he doesn’t know which one is the most realistic anymore. From being so incredibly anxious to see them, to drowning in awkwardness, to optimistically hopeful that they’ll band together to get through this, to feeling like strangers, back to drowning in awkwardness and now to feeling like they’re going to rip each other apart. Fuck this whole thing sucks.

Ryan was under no false belief that things would be easy. He could feel it, as that August night went by and especially during the morning after as he showered off the blood and gore and rehearsed his story for the police. He could feel it when he walked out of the police station, when he squeezed his sister into the tightest hug possible knowing that he narrowly avoiding never having the chance to do so again, when he found his name in the newspaper that his grandmother had tried to chuck out so he wouldn’t see it, when he walked out of that therapists office after telling nothing but lies, when he moved into his cold apartment with barely enough furniture to fill the already tiny space, when his newly powerful senses sent him into sensory overload nearly everyday, when he heard that butchered fabricated retelling of that night on the podcast, when he had to organise being picked up to return to the camp he had only just escaped, when he first caught a whiff of that tantalising scent on the side of the road and when he stood in front of the lodge once more, seeing the damage and blood stains. The feeling that his life was completely and irreparably changed.

He had, however, been in the dark about just how horrible today would be. He doesn’t know how they’re going to survive this, coming here and going through this day and night, every single goddamn month for the rest of their lives. He doesn’t know how the Hackett’s held it together, how they kept this secret, for what must have been an excruciatingly hard and long six years.  

He can feel it under his skin. Waiting for the sun to set, the day to fade, the night to emerge and the full moon to rise. He can feel the animalistic instincts grow and the pressure of a different form pressing against the inside of his skin. A lifetime of this, what could be nearly a thousand days of this, is an incredibly cruel curse. 

He rakes his nails down his arm for what is possibly the millionth time today. It’s an absentminded, self soothing motion at this point as he knows it will bring no relief from the persistent itching. However this time he pulls his hand away with a start as he feels the keratin rip through the top layers of his skin and the warm rush of blood beading. He looks down in shock at the five long tears that run down his arm, too deep to be considered scratches and too shallow to be considered cuts. 

He narrows his eyes, switching his gaze over to his hand and curing his fingers inward to inspect his nails as if he’d just gotten acrylics done at the salon. Without him noticing, they’ve grown thicker and longer, into sharpened points. The skin around them looks as if it’s pulled taunt, in an ugly wrinkled way and his cuticles have all but disappeared. The tips aren’t the usual white, instead stained brown with his own blood collected beneath them. He squeezes his left hand shut, feeling the equally pointy nails of that hand digging into his palm. No pain comes alongside it, despite the flexing of the muscles in his arm. 

He looks back down to where it rests on the side of the couch and his eyes widen once more. Blood has followed the pattern of his arm hair, having rolled down the curve of his arm to the inside of his wrist. There the trails have run out of enough volume to be affected by gravity to continue their flow downward and they stop just half an inch away from staining the couch. However the blood has no source. Where he had seen five closely spaced tears running down the entirety of his forearm only half a minute prior, is now smooth and completely unmarred skin. 

He lifts his arm, rotating it back and forth before doing the same to his hand to look at his nails- or rather, his claws. He drops both his hands onto his lap with a sigh. The urge to rub at his temples is strong, the urge to continue scratching his arm even stronger. He ignores both, wary of doing any more damage, even if it does apparently instantly heal. 

Ryan doesn’t think he’s freaked out enough at how downright goddamn insane all of this is. Werewolves ? The things from teen romance novels and Scottish myths where they leave fish on windowsills? Those werewolves? It’s unbelievable. What else has he thought of as myth but is also actually true? How has he just accepted that this is real and his new reality?

Well the simple answer is that he hasn’t, despite having the proof right there in his hands. He’s been trudging along, aware that everything’s changed but going through the motions as if it hasn’t. Even during their conversation last night, a raw discussion of their new reality, he listened and shared with a slight feeling of disconnect. Like they were talking about a war in another country- you know it’s happening, you can even feel the impact at home, but it doesn’t really seem real in a way. He reasons it’s not denial if he acknowledges that it’s happening, it’s just… residual shock and a fierce refusal to think long term. Maybe a little bit of denial too. 

He knows he’s not the only one who hasn’t come to grips with the fact that it’s all real and actually happening to them just yet. In fact he’d be surprised if any of them have managed to get past that particular mindfuck in only a month. It’s clear in the way they avoid the topic like the plague, in the false front of normality that they put up. Sure, they let it drop last night and were honest for the first time, but Ryan noted as they talked that there was still no mention of that night, no mention of their future or the sustainability of it all. Just listing out the simple, easy facts that are their symptoms. It’s a big first step, but they still have the rest of the mountain to climb. 

His head tilts as a small creak below him is amplified to a clear resonating sound in his ears. There’s another, closer this time. And another, louder this time. They give way to light footsteps that sound booming on the wooden walkways of the second floor. By the time Kaitlyn appears at the top of the stairs, Ryan was already looking for her. 

“Smell gave me away?” She asks, keeping a good amount of distance between them as she leans against the bannister and looks over to him from across the attic. 

“Sound of you walking actually. But yeah, the scent meant I knew it would be you.” He says, resting his right arm against the back of the couch.

“Hmh, should’ve guessed. You’ve been eavesdropping all afternoon then?”

Ryan gives a half scoff, half laugh. “On what? The bickering? I’ve been trying to tune it out.”

“You might’ve heard something interesting?” She glances down the stairs. “From three stories up.”

“All I’ve heard is you and Jacob growling to back up when you walk past each other in the mess hall and Laura describing in various, disturbingly creative ways how she’s going to kill Max if he doesn’t shut up and let her think. So yeah, I tried to tune it out.” 

She gives a laugh, but it is a clearly contained expression of humour. “Yeah, it’s a bit toxic down there. Everyone’s avoiding each other. Still, why’d you run away all the way up here?”

He flicks his eyes over her face as he thinks of a reply. She looks tired and almost a little bit frazzled. Her usually dark brown, almost black eyes have a slight twinge of colour but he’s too far back to see exactly what it is. He can make an educated guess. Though she looks guarded, there isn’t that aggressive, challenging look in her eye and her posture is mostly relaxed, for now at least. He thinks about how truthfully he should answer when he remembers how he wanted to ask someone about Dylan’s scent anyway- he might as well kill two birds with one stone while he has the chance. 

“The scents were pretty strong, I felt kinda weird.” He says honestly. “Does- does um, any of the other’s scents make you feel really… odd?” 

“Odd?”

“Yeah you know like. Warm. A little bit dizzy. Like you can smell the other scents but this one really sticks out to you and you- you can’t get it out of your head. Like you can’t stop thinking about it because it was really… nice… yeah.” He explains, trailing off as he sees her expression change and he realises how much he’s let his mouth run. 

“Whose scent does that to you? Wait, don't tell me, I think I can guess.” She says with a slight smirk.

“I didn’t say that it was uh, happening to me.” He tries to salvage his over-explanation but it doesn’t even sound convincing to himself. 

She ignores him, putting a finger against her chin and a hand on her hip. “Let me think, does it start with an L?” He gives her a dark glare, crossing his arms over his chest. She nods thoughtfully, her finger tapping. “Oh okay. Or not. Interesting. Hmm, perhaps a D then?”

His hand flexes and his jaw twists to the side, one of his slightly too sharp canines piercing into his lip. He shouldn’t of brought it up with Kaitlyn of all people, that was an incredibly dumb decision to make. He should’ve seen this coming. God he’s a fucking idiot.

“Oh wow, jackpot. You know you just started smelling so foul, right?” She sniffs obnoxiously. “Mmm the stench of defensiveness.”

“Maybe I smell because you’re being a dick and I want you to piss off.”

“Huh! Sure, I don’t doubt it. But I’m a dick who's right on the money, aren’t I?”

He shakes his head, looking out the window so he doesn’t have to keep looking at her smug face anymore. He really, really shouldn’t have brought this up today, when everyone seems to be just itching for a fight. 

“You know it makes sense, I really should’ve worked this out earlier. I get why you wouldn’t bring this up last night though.” She makes a small hissing sound as she sucks in air through her teeth. “That would’ve been a little bit embarrassing.”

“Why?” He asks begrudgingly, just wanting to be left alone again but too curious for her input for his own good.

“Why? ‘Uh does anyone else have like, a um, scent that they can’t stop thinking about because it makes them love drunk and they’re got a massive crush?’” She says in a mockingly deep voice that despite being a fair attempt at an impression, sounds nothing at all like him. She gives a short laugh that is definitely at him, not with him. “Because the answer is no, at least not for me. Certain ones stand out more to me but none of them make me feel like that.”

Ryan’s glad to get a straight answer but he really wishes he hadn’t had to go through the stupid teasing beforehand to get to it. “I don’t have a massive crush.” He still says, unable to help himself but narrow in on the first part of what she was saying. 

“What you're describing is a crush, Ryan, literally. Just with the extra layer of werewolf bullshit on top of it.” She says, rolling her eyes. “Honestly I can’t believe I didn’t see this before. I thought you didn’t return his interest but now looking back, you always laughed at his jokes no matter how dumb they were and he can make you smile like no one else. It’s obvious.”

Ryan’s brows twitch down in a subtle expression as he listens to her talk, picking up on the ever so slight flatness behind her humorous tone and the way she looks away from him. He curls his fingers into his hand to keep them from reaching for his arms. 

“It’s not a crush, we’re just friends. Even if I was, you know, interested, he isn’t anymore. Which is fine, it’s good, because I’m not either.” He asserts.

She looks back at him like she’s weighing up options in her mind. Trying to work out what path to take this conversation while staring him down. He doesn’t know what decisions she’s deciding to make or how many there are. Despite the cagey feeling that has flooded his limbs, he waits patiently until she breathes in sharply and nods her head thoughtfully.

“Well he did say on the way to the scrapyard that he needs some time to himself. I’m glad to hear there’s no unrequited feelings on either end.”

Ryan nods with a tight lipped smile, swallowing around the sudden lump in his throat. The tone of her voice is so factual that he knows almost certainly that she’s telling the truth. That’s a good thing, he reassures himself. He knew that already, this is just confirmation that he was right. It’s a good thing. 

He breathes in and on the exhale he gives a non committal, “Yeah, that is good to hear.” He unfolds his arms, returning his right arm to the back of the couch.

“Woah holy shit Ryan, what happened to your arm?” Kaitlyn suddenly bursts out in concern, stepping forward a few steps to get a better look at the blood that has stained a dark red against his skin. 

He looks down to it, having forgotten that it was there at all. It’s dried in the stale air, cracking apart and crumbling with each movement he makes, small flakes catching in his arm hair and floating down onto his tshirt. He brushes them off, shrugging at her. “I scratched my arm, didn’t realise how sharp my nails had gotten.”

She looks at his fingers before bringing her own hand up and looking at her own. She grimaces. “Right, I’ll get Laura to write that down. I’m guessing it healed up?” Without answering he stretches his arm out for inspection, tilting it back and forth to show the unmarred skin. “I’ll relay that too.”

He draws his arm back, absentmindedly scraping the blood off with his nearly talon like nails. It clogs up under them and the rest falls to the couch, which is disgusting but the couch wasn’t in the most cleanly state beforehand anyway, so he doesn’t feel too concerned about dirtying his temporary bed. When he looks back up Kaitlyn still stands there, watching him.

“Did you want something?” He asks, his tone a little more pointed than he intended. 

“Yeah, look outside.” She says, her tone sharpening to match his own. 

The sunlight flits in through the leaves of tall trees, a tiny bit dimmer than before. The angle it comes in through has dropped, almost vertically shining past the thick brown trunks and flowing in through the lower branches. It hits the windowpane softly, pouring into the room at an angle and illuminating the dust that dances in the air. The small patch of sunlight that hits the wooden planks of the attic and warms the dark fabric of his sock is slowly dying out. It’s a peaceful sight, but it won’t last for much longer.

“The sun is beginning to set.” He observes quietly.

“Yeah, that kinda happens every night. It’s a little bit of a more pressing matter tonight though and Travis will be here any minute, so it’s time to come downstairs. Chop chop.” Kaitlyn instructs, a sound of authority in her voice.

Ryan’s eyes fall shut for the shortest second and he lets out a small sigh. He knew night was coming, he knew Travis was on his way and he was more than prepared to follow her downstairs. He’s spent all day waiting for this in apprehension. Had it been a request or had Dylan or Abi or one of the others asked him to come downstairs, he has no doubt in his mind that he would simply follow. He should be able to stand up and follow her without any issue. Yet there is an issue. 

Kaitlyn didn’t request, she commanded. The issue is that even if she had told him to come downstairs with a voice dripping with honey, it’s Kaitlyn that’s telling him to do so and something about that means he just can’t obey. There’s just something about the request, the tone of her voice, the authoritative air around her and the thick smokey scent that wisps out of her pores. It’s something that means it isn’t a simple request to do what he was already planning on doing anyway. Something that’s within him and that means he doesn’t move an inch, his hands flexing and jaw tightening on its own accord.

“I need to put on my shoes and grab my jacket, I will be down in a minute. I can meet you down there, if you’d like.” He says, only noticing the true intention of his words after he says them. He’s putting the ball back in his court, making the decision his own to make. He doesn’t know why he feels the need to have control over himself and his decisions so strongly but it seems to have suddenly grown extremely important to him. 

Kaitlyn pushes off the bannister she’s been leaning against, standing up with her feet evenly spread and her spine held straight. Her hands fall limply to hang beside her hips, fingers twitching inwards as if they want to tuck into the curl of a fist. She has suddenly grown stiff like a cur ready to lash out, even slightly curling her lips to show her teeth and staring him down with what he can now see is amber in her eyes. 

“Ryan, do not start with me right now. Just go downstairs and don’t turn it into a pissing contest.” She says, her voice slightly deepened with the rumble that is slowly revving up in her chest.

“I’m sure you’ll all survive without me for five minutes.” He snaps back, eyes narrowing and shoulders squaring.

“I know we would, that isn’t the issue.” She all but snarls. 

He observes her for a second, taking in the defensive stance and harsh glower. Her demeanour changed in an instant, from guarded yet mostly relaxed to outwardly hostile. All because he didn’t obey her order and drew the control back to himself. Because he wouldn’t heed, they’re instantly making a stand against each other, their positions simultaneously both defensive and aggressive. Just like with Jacob, logically he can tell that it is a very threatening sight. He doesn’t feel threatened, he just feels mildly pissed off that she doesn’t just listen . 

The cogs have begun turning in his head but each second that passes with him impassively regarding her, the more wound up her posture grows. He places his hands against the back of the couch and pushes himself upright, keenly aware of how his body instinctually draws itself into an equally aggressive bearing as he stands. 

“I will be down in just a minute, when I’m ready. What’s the problem with that?” He says, his voice maintaining a level of calmness that doesn’t match the heavy stung feeling growing inside of him.

Her eye twitches. He can almost physically see the internal argument play out on her face. He’s sure he knows what she’s thinking, because it so closely mimics how his own mind over the past day has tried to rationalise, all while his external behaviour is pushed forward by instinct. Rationally she will know that there is absolutely no real problem with that. Her strange and powerful new instincts however, tell her otherwise.

For a minute he thinks the logical part of her mind may win out over the compulsive need to challenge him. But then her eyes harden once more and he sees her throat constrict, a thick and foul smell of smoke filling the air around them. He feels disappointed, because they could have avoided a run in, right when it’s the worst time to have one. However another, more wolfish part of him, is almost glad she didn’t back down so easily. 

She doesn’t answer him- she probably can find any fair retort to give. Instead a harsh growl rumbles past her clenched teeth and curled lips. It’s a deep, guttural noise that vibrates out from her chest and ever so slightly shakes her shoulders. Despite looking as human as the day he met her, for the most part at least, it is an eerily similar replica of the sound the werewolves made that night as they crept through the undergrowth and their clawed hands wrapped almost gently around door frames. 

The strain in his neck is quickly becoming a familiar feeling already and he instantly tightens his jaw and tenses his throat. Acid floods through the attic, splashing up into the heavy cloud of smoke. The answering hum that rises in his lungs is a new sensation though. It reverberates through his bones, his chest buzzing with the force of it.

At this moment Ryan doesn’t have the clarity of mind to consider how they appear, standing a few metres apart while they glare each other down and release deep growls that don’t sound possible for a human to make. He doesn’t realise what a genuinely threatening, albeit strange sight they make or how the atmosphere around them has grown dark and oppressive. His mind has emptied to only register Kaitlyn’s challenging presence and how his own reciprocates it. 

He doesn’t know how long they stand there, weighing each other up. It could be seconds, it could be minutes. At some point one of them, perhaps both of them, took a step closer and now they’re only a few feet away. Ryan’s throat has begun to almost feel raw with the force of the growl ripping up from his lungs and through his teeth. His instincts push him to assert himself further, to quash this standoff now.

As much as he has fought against his new instincts and traits, stuffing them down and attempting to ignore the fact that he has changed, he cannot back down now. Why fight something that feels so natural? After only a second of reluctance, the sliver of remaining rationality in his mind warning against it, Ryan lets go of his carefully maintained control. He feels himself release the lesh he’s held over his affliction, freeing the wild thing within him.

His head jerks forward in a sudden movement, his teeth snapping down shut onto thin air. They create a loud cracking sound as they collide, a few sharpened points piercing into his gums and filling his mouth with the taste of copper. His head slowly pulls back, tilted, the rumble from his chest dropping a timber before cutting off with a final dark snarl.

Kaitlyn stumbles backwards, shock wiping the aggressive expression from her face. Her posture has slumped, all defensive mannerism falling away. Her eyes flick almost frantically over his face.

A pleased feeling runs through his veins as he watches her concede so clearly. His own posture slackens in turn and the strain disappears from his throat. Clarity returns to his mind, the thick repugnant scents that have replaced all the air in the attic immediately irritating his nose. He takes a step back, shaking the residual fog of instincts from his head. The leash is returned to his hand.

There’s a tense silence for a moment. Ryan’s head is a muddled mess of thoughts and emotions about what just occurred, clarity bringing with it a sense of embarrassment and guilt. He breathes in deeply, using the burn that runs up through his nose and into his lungs to ground himself. He takes a moment to stuff both the thoughts and feelings down. He can think about it later, when he isn’t only a second past a confrontation and hours away from turning.

Kaitlyn breaks the silence first. There’s a note of hesitance in her voice as she broaches with a simple, “Ryan?” 

He looks at her and awkwardly clears his throat. “Yeah…” 

“Your- you…” She stops to visibly draw herself up into a more calm and collected demeanour. “That was, uh. Intense.”

He nods. The remaining humanity in him desperately wants to apologise for everything that just happened. The feeling in his gut stops him. He can’t throw away his win by immediately conceding afterwards. Instead he agrees with her. “Yeah that was… yeah. I thought you were going to deck me.”

She gives a scoff laugh, though it holds a tension to it that makes it sound a little strangled. “You snapped your teeth at me! If you were a few steps closer I wouldn’t have a nose.”

He sheepishly raises a hand to the back of his neck, the pointed ends of his nails digging into his skin as he lightly scratches at a thick bump made from a knob of his spine. “That’s not- well. Yeah.”

“Your veins went black. And your eyes…” She shakes her head. “You know we really do need to go downstairs, we should- we should go.”

“And I really do need to put my shoes on.” He says with a slight sense of humour, before his voice drops back down to a more serious tone. “I’ll meet you down there, I’ll just be a second.”

Her eyes narrow at him briefly but without a word she turns and descends the stairs. Ryan releases a heavy sigh once she’s gone. He slaps his hands on his face, groaning loudly and resisting the urge to climb under the sleeping bag on the couch to hide from his shame or jumping straight out the window and disappearing into the woods for the rest of his sorry existence. He finds a safe compromise between them, collapsing down onto the floor in the concerningly smaller patch of sunlight that reaches in through the panes. 

He tries not to think as he laces his shoes quickly and scoops up his jacket to shrug it over his shoulders. However he can’t ignore the pleased feeling that runs through him. He hates how victorious he feels, he hates how good that feels. He just bit at his friend's face, he shouldn’t feel good about that in any way. Neither mind that he wouldn’t have reached her no matter how far forward he leant, the threat of taking a chunk out of her at all is depraved. Kaitlyn handed that with far more grace then he would have, had the roles been reversed. She’s not like Jacob in that regard, that’s for damn sure. She didn’t turn tail and run, she held her ground. That does provide him a tiny sliver of consolation. 

Ryan looks around the attic before making for the stairs. He swipes up his phone from the couch as he passes, unsure if he should bring it with him or not but grabbing it anyway. He takes the stairs two at a time, the soles of his shoes landing loudly against the wood. He glances over the edge of the walkway as he passes, down into the mess hall. The group has sat down in front of the fireplace once more. He can smell the tension and anxiety from here.

He’s just reached the last step when he hears gravel crunching and the hum of an engine die. He walks over to the group, his hands stuffed into his pockets. All of them, except Kaitlyn who purposely looks away, turn to look at him but it’s only one particular pair of eyes that catches his attention. Dark brown doe eyes, with the golden flecks of a wolf’s. They’re soft with concern, looking up at him and following his approach.

“You okay?” Dylan asks, his voice low. Right. He can probably smell the residual acrid scent clinging to him, assuming that he hadn’t just smelt the entire confrontation anyway. 

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Dylan doesn’t look at all convinced but Ryan wasn’t trying to do so. He can’t hide his scent and so he can’t hide the truth either. Still, he sends him a reassuring look before switching his attention to the rest of the group. “Travis is here.”

“About time.” Laura huffs under her breath. She’s bent over the exercise book from last night, a pen in hand. 

“Can we really trust this guy? I mean you did kinda… you know.” Emma says.

“We can trust him.” Ryan states before any discussion can take hold. “We don’t really have any other options anyway.”

The last thing they need is to be doubting the one person outside of their group who knows what’s going on. Like it or not they need Travis- without him and his express permission that they can return here every full moon, they’d have nowhere else to go. He has half a decade of experience with this curse, had hidden it away from the outside world and kept those with it safe. Safe, until they came along. He must hate them. 

Still, Travis doesn’t need to like them and they don’t need to like Travis to know that this ‘arrangement’ is vital. Having the FBI swoop in and the whole of America gathering up their pitchforks when they find out that supernatural creatures are in fact real, would benefit no one. He kept Laura and Max hostage for two whole months, covered up albeit accidental murders and then let his family nearly kill Ryan and Laura. It doesn’t matter that the van happened to break down and left them stranded- they shouldn’t have been there on that day in the first place. None of this should have happened. So even if he didn’t want to help, Travis owes them. He knows it too.

“It’s getting pretty late.” Abi says worriedly. “Where do you think we’re going to… spend the night?”

“I think we’re about to find out.” Kaitlyn tells her as the sound of the door creaking open reaches their ears. 

Travis strides in, his hand on his belt and a hard expression on his face. He’s in uniform, the sheriff badge catching the dimming light and gleaming a bright gold on his chest. He pulls to a stop beside Ryan, looking them over before beginning to turn right back away again. “Right, follow me.” He says gruffly,

“Woah woah, hold up.” Jacob exclaims to a chorus of equally shocked protests.

“What happened to ‘hello, how are you?’” Emma jabs, her arms crossing over her chest.

Travis stops his movement, turning back slowly. His mouth twists. “Miss, I frankly do not care how you are. What I care about is getting you out of here before that sun gets too low.”

“Okay but where are we going? I thought we were going to talk about this first.” Kaitlyn says.

“Locking us up indefinitely again?” Max chirps in, the loathing in his voice not concealed in the slightest. 

Travis sighs. He stares at the group for a long moment and Ryan thinks he’s genuinely considering whether to walk out and drive away in his car right now. The look in his eye is one that Ryan reads as contempt and perhaps even disgust. He has to hate them. After a moment his mind seems made up and he explains in a slow and almost condescending way. “The officers that were on leave have returned and the station has also been assigned more men. You will never be going back there.”

“So where are we going?” Laura asks, finally laying the pen to rest and looking up from the book. 

His grasp tightens around his belt, a vein bulging in his neck. “We are going to the Manor. The cages below are still functional and are the safest option.” His first words are spoken through clenched teeth before he forces himself to relax his jaw, stretching it side to side.

“But there's only three.” Ryan points out.

“There’s more than enough space to fit nearly all of you in them. Anyone remaining can go into one of the room’s down there that I’ve secured.” As he replies, Travis doesn’t look him in the eyes, much as he didn’t look Laura in hers. Ryan can’t blame him. 

“Now I’m not answering any more questions. Follow me.” With that, Travis turns and begins walking to the door he only just entered through. He talked more than he clearly even planned to, the door left open and swinging on its hinges. 

“Chipper guy.” Kaitlyn mutters, raising to his feet.

The rest of the group stands alongside her, looking around nervously like they’re not quite sure if they really should follow. Or perhaps just scared to do so, knowing what it means. Ryan can smell the fear, thick and heavy in the air. He’s not sure how much of it he himself contributes. They’re scared and he is too. But they have no choice in this, they have to do it. He takes one last long look at them before summoning every ounce of courage he has ever possessed and turns towards the door.

He waves a hand behind him for them to follow, forcing his feet forward. “Come on, we don’t have all night.”

Chapter Text

His senses come alive as they trek through the forest. The air is filled with smells and sounds that Ryan has never noticed before. He can smell the rot trapped under bark and the wet fur of a rabbit racing past. He can hear the stream rushing from far away and the flutter of wings above him. The forest calls to him, to run through the trees and feel the grass under his feet as he disappears into the wild. 

He ignores the urge of course, training his eyes on his shoes as he follows closely behind Travis. The route they’re taking is painfully familiar. He recognises the jutting rocks and the grass that has worn down into a dirt path as if he’d only seen it the night before. Ryan’s glad that the group hasn’t ventured out of the lodge until now. It’s too familiar, too many memories tucked amongst the scenery.

They walk in total silence, the only sound they make being their shoes crunching against the ground and their clothes rustling with their movement. The light wind is unable to wash away the toxic scents that stick to them. Ryan puts a finger beneath his collar, tugging the fabric away from his throat. The wind may feel cold but he is a good few degrees too hot.

They pass the hole in the ground that he and Laura fell through, Travis leading them past it with a wide berth. Ryan gazes down into that dark abyss as they walk by, a lump growing in his throat. He refuses to look up at the manor that will certainly be looming over them by now, his eyes returning to his shoes as they reach the fence. He’s mindful of keeping his hand from reaching to his arm to scratch at the insistent itching that seems to grow even stronger as they walk.

Travis leads them along it until they reach a heavy metal gate, pulling a key from his pocket and twisting it into the lock. It pushes open with a loud, grating sequel that is painful to Ryan’s ears. Travis walks through and it begins to swing shut, the hinges old and rusted and not used to being opened. Ryan catches it, expecting it to push him back but instead he holds it open easily with only one hand. The group moves past him, quiet thank you’s muttered as they pass.

The last person to walk through the gate is almost a full minute away from the others and as he lets the gate fall shut behind himself, he strides forward and falls into step beside him. Dylan’s hands are wrapped around his forearms in a soothing self hug, his fingers on his right arm squeezing tightly around the tattoo half hidden beneath his sleeve. Ryan notes with curious interest that his nails remain bitten down to the cuticle. 

“This place looks worse for wear, huh? Hope you’re up to date with your tetanus shot.” Dylan says, his voice quiet and the humour in it clearly forced.

Ryan doesn’t follow his gaze to the manor, his own glued to the gold in Dylan’s eyes that reflects the dying light. “I don’t know if that would be an issue anymore.” He says simply.

“S’pose so- or not, I guess. I don’t know.” Dylan stammers off and Ryan feels terrible for not playing along with his joke. He’s obviously grasping for some sense of levity and Ryan just has to instantly remind him of reality. 

“You're right though, you know. With your nose plug idea I mean. I think there’s more than likely an illegal amount of asbestos in there, so it’d probably be pretty helpful.” He attempts, trying to joke back again after failing to do so the first time. He only notices when he’s made contact with soft fabric that he’s placed a hand on the back of Dylan’s arm, guiding him forward. 

“Imagine, after everything, we end up succumbing to asbestos. Lead poisoning might also be a considerable threat. Tuberculosis too if we’re not careful.” Dylan quips, his voice wavering ever so slightly.

“If Travis doesn’t get us first.” Ryan says and he wants to stuff the words back into his mouth the second he spits them out. He drops his hand and stutters out, “I’m sorry, I-I shouldn’t have said that.”

Dylan finally draws his eyes away from the quickly approaching manor, looking at Ryan with an indecipherable expression. “I don’t think we need to worry about that- I don’t think?”

“Really? We ruined his life, his-his whole family…” Images flash through his mind of Kaylee floating in the pool, Constance’s blasted open face, Bobby’s torn out neck, the bodies of Jedediah and Caleb hidden beneath white blankets on stretchers as they were rolled away by police and the hole he shot into the side of Chris’ wolf-like head just moments before he himself turned. Nausea begins climbing his throat. 

“I know, I know but… when he was looking at us, I could smell his emotions… like with you guys.”

Ryan tilts his head. So the whole emotion through smell thing isn’t just reserved to their little group then. “And it wasn’t burning hatred?”

“No, Ryan, it was shame.” Dylan says, putting a heavy weight into the word. “And- and pain and grief. But not hatred.”

Ryan is finally able to pull his eyes away from something other than his shoes or Dylan’s own and he looks up to the group walking in front of them. He regards Travis in a different light. Perhaps it’s his own feelings of guilt and self hatred colouring his view but he thinks it would be more than fair for Travis to hate them. It would be just . Shame on the other hand implies a responsibility, one that he hadn’t thought Travis felt. 

“Well that’s… hopefully he at least won’t shoot us then.” He settles on and Dylan gives a very small scoff.

“At least.”

Ahead of them the group has reached the front door and Ryan watches as Travis pushes inside with ease. He wonders if he’s still been living here- despite how morbid of a thought that is, he supposes Travis won’t exactly have anywhere else to go. They catch up with the group as they pour into the entrance room, looking around at the peeling wallpaper and dust covered floors. 

Ryan spares one last look at the world outside before he closes the door behind him. The sky is a dark orange, the sun hidden behind the trees that contour the skyline into a jagged edge. The walk took longer than he thought it would, perhaps they did leave a little late. They’ll have to be very mindful of how quickly time can slip away in the future- the future , more like next month and the rest of their miserable lives. He pushes the door shut with a little more force than totally necessary.

“This way.” Travis grunts, heading to the right. 

A twisting feeling knots itself through Ryan’s intestines. There are scratches on the walls that he doesn’t recall there being when he last went through, left by either himself or Laura as they ravaged through the house after Travis escaped. Despite everything that happened that night, Ryan had felt so thankful to see him when he’d found Ryan in the morning, after Ryan exploded back into his human skin and sat down in shock somewhere in the middle of the woods, alone and covered in his own blood.  

Travis had Ryan follow him out of the forest before throwing clothes at him, barking orders for him to get dressed and to wait for him in the police car while he hunted down where any of the others were still lost out there. He brought back Nick and Jacob with him. He then dropped them off at the lodge, instructing them to find anyone inside while he went out and found where the others were scattered through the forest. They’d found Dylan in the kitchen, reuniting with spine crushing hugs and wet eyes, finding Abi in the basement just shortly after that. When Travis returned with Emma, Kaitlyn, Laura and Max in tow, he sat them all down and laid out the story they’d give to the police. By the time they’d showered and changed, the police were already pulling up outside. He did it all with such efficiency that there was no time for the shellshocked teens to get their bearings and panic. Ryan’s glad for that- they need their story to hold up for as long as possible.

The group moves through the entrance, looking up the stairs and to the rooms off of the upstairs landing, each as run down and decrepit as the last, turning down to the hallway. The manor is an old building, fallen into disrepair and has the complexity of a time long past, and Ryan remembers how maze-like it felt. They follow closely behind Travis, the others ducking their heads to peer behind them to the open doors of the rooms they’ve left behind them. Ryan keeps his gaze resolutely forward. That is until he suddenly pulls to a complete stop, his eyes caught on and boring into a familiar room cloaked in darkness.

Through the thick shadows he can see the much darker stains of dried blood caked into the floorboards and the walls. The room is painted with it, not a single inch clean of the blood or chunks of flesh. The table he cowered beneath has been pushed over to the side of the room, the glass shards from the broken mirror scattered across the floor. One of which is especially slicked with blood, Ryan recognising it as the shard that Travis plunged into werewolf Laura to prevent himself from getting bitten and providing him with enough time to escape. A ripped ribbon of yellow police tape hangs from the hinge of the door, torn away once the investigation quickly concluded. 

His mind goes fuzzy, like a television filled with static when flicked to a channel with no broadcaster. His eyes are glued to the splatter of blood from where he shot Chris Hacketts head apart and the clumps and pieces within it. Some are grey, some are white, the brain and skull fragments glued to various surfaces by the tacky blood that has now dried to flaking blotches. He can almost feel the weight of the gun in his hand and the bruise against his shoulder from the recoil again. His hand tentatively touches his shoulder, feeling a ghost of the sensation of blood pooling into a yellow and purple clot beneath his skin. He can see where his own blood has drenched the table, floor and walls from when he’d turned. Where that stain overlaps with the blood Laura left from when she turned just minutes before him, it's made even thicker and darker. 

Ryan murdered a man in this room, before becoming the very creature that he sentenced him to death for being. He is more than physically a monster. 

A hand is placed on his arm, gently turning him away from the room. His eyes are pulled away to focus on Dylan’s own. They’re wide with worry, his eyebrows tilted upwards at the inner corners. The gold flecks have grown to swirls of metallic yellow in his iris and with each beat of his eyelashes, each time his eyes open and close, they’re whirled into a different pattern. 

“Ryan hey, c’mon don’t- don’t look at that.” He whispers softly. 

Ryan doesn’t have to struggle to follow his words, his eyes now enraptured with the swirling gold in Dylan’s own. The warmth of the hand on his arm and the large black pupils boring into his own ground him. The static that has clouded over his mind begins to clear just as quickly as it appeared. Without the fuzzy haze however, the grief hits him like a punch to the stomach. His eyes burn and he blinks them down hard to keep them dry. There’s a painful lump in his throat that he tries to clear to no avail and he has to speak past it, making his voice strained.

“That’s- that room is where…” His voice clogs up, choking on the lump in his throat and making him unable to continue. 

“I know, you don’t have to explain. It’s okay, you’re okay, you did what you had to do.” Dylan reassures him in a slightly rushed way, but in the kindest tone that Ryan thinks he has ever heard himself be spoken to with before.

“I didn’t have to though, none of this needed to happen.” He argues weakly, looking down at his clenched hands. “If we only knew then… none of this needed to happen.” He repeats again, lost for better words. 

“No, it didn’t.” Dylan agrees, removing his hand from Ryan’s arm to scratch lightly at his own. “But you know, we didn’t know what was going on at all or- or what would happen and stuff. We were just trying to survive and no one can blame us for that. Not even ourselves, right?”

His words are said in a clunky, fumbling way and Ryan gets the sense that Dylan isn’t very comfortable with or good at consoling others. But it means something to Ryan, for Dylan to try despite his awkward and unpracticed manner of doing so. The effort is enough, as the words connect with something in his brain and manages to provide him with some semblance of comfort, as fleeting as it may be. 

He sucks in a deep breath and tries to regain control over his heavy emotions. He’s got to keep moving, they’re nearly there and then he can sit and stew in his feelings as much as he wants. 

“Right.” He agrees, looking back up to Dylan. However Dylan has gone against his own suggestion and no longer looks back at him, his eyes drawn to and trapped by the sight of the room. It is definitely a horrifying sight, blanketed in shadow and a thick layer of blood. That horror is reflected in his pupils, a sicken look wiping any colour from his face. The shake that Ryan saw in his hands when they’d first reunited has returned full force. 

He realises that Dylan has never been in the manor before, hasn’t seen the gore or damage that Ryan and Laura left behind. The fear of being perceived as the monster that he really is overtakes his own grief and he desperately wants to get Dylan far away from here, so that he doesn’t finally understand and truly comprehend what Ryan did. “Shit, c’mon dude, let’s keep going. You’re right, we shouldn’t- shouldn’t look at that.”

Dylan pulls his eyes off of the room, giving Ryan a small nod as his hands return to his forearms. “Y-yeah, I mean totally. We should go, let’s go.”

Ryan doesn’t spare any sort of glance further towards the door, collecting himself up and stepping forward. When Dylan doesn’t take his own step forward, Ryan places a hand on his shoulder and gently draws him onward alongside him. He looks up to the end of the hallway and with a start finds that Laura is waiting for them from the doorway. She watches them with a slightly curious but mostly grim expression.

She turns into the dining room without a word and they follow behind her in equal silence. The rest of the group have gathered around the room, clogging it up with the smell of bitterness and acid. Ryan’s eyes slip down to the bloodstain on the floor before he quickly looks away again. In his peripheral vision he sees Laura slide in beside Max, entwining her arm with his. She doesn’t even look in the direction of the bloodstain or trapdoor. He drops his hand from Dylan’s shoulder, his fingers scraping his back on the way down. They immediately itch to return.

Travis looks each of them over, internally counting heads before he makes for the trapdoor. He bends down and slings it open, straightening back up to regard the group. “Alright, down we go.” He says, motioning for them to descend into the darkness below. 

Once more no one moves and so once more, Ryan steps forward. He places his hands on the floorboards, finding a metal rung with his foot and grasping the top rung with his hand. He looks below him into the darkness before he just steps off and falls to the ground, landing with a huff. It only takes his eyes half a second to adjust to the lack of light, the outline of the room and its contents visible in various shades of grey.

The others climb down behind him, filling the small space until their breath and body heat begins to fog it up with an uncomfortable warmth. Travis descends last, stepping off the ladder and rudely pushing past them. He flicks a switch, lighting the room with a bright white and Ryan’s eyes burn, raising a hand to block out the worst of it. Travis moves forward, towards the room where Ryan knows the cages are.

He follows him, walking in just as the room is flooded with a red light. It’s as ominous as when he first saw it, the red muddying the colour of his skin and giving everything an even more sinister feeling then it already would have had without it. The cages are large, the bars thick and the concrete floor covered in a dark shadow. It’s blood and a lot of it, Ryan realises, the red light masking its colour. 

Travis walks over, swinging the gates open. He turns to the group, who cautiously enter behind Ryan. “You can either fit three to a cage or have three split off into the room down there.” He says, pointing down to the door that leads to the rum tunnels.

As large as the cages are, they were made in mind with only fitting one wolf inside each. From when he remembers seeing werewolf Nick locked up on the left, there was more than enough room for him but he thinks fitting three of them in there would be pushing it. Even if he’s not going to be himself, he has no interest in being electrocuted all night. 

“I’m not going in a cell again.” Laura states, her arm once more entwined with Max’s. 

“Yeah, no, fuck that, neither am I.” Max agrees with her, his breathing hard.

“Fine. You’ll go into the room. The rest of you, in the cages.” He steps away from the bars, motioning for Laura and Max to follow him and looking back to the others with a serious expression before he walks any further. “Take off your clothes and get inside. I’ll be back in a moment to lock them.”

Laura pauses before she follows, Max obediently waiting beside her. She looks between Kaitlyn and Jacob, before settling her eyes on Ryan and states in an eerily similar tone as Travis, “You three should go in different cages. Just in case.” With that, the three of them walk away, down the long hall and disappear through the door at the far end of the room. 

The counsellors look nervously amongst themselves, losing their motivation now that no one is pushing them forward. The cages do not look inviting in the slightest and no one is exactly eager to begin stripping down. Even Ryan can’t bring himself to step up and keep them moving forward, the horror that is reality settling in. 

They’re really going to turn into monsters, aren’t they? Jesus Christ. The senses and growling and what not is hard to swallow sure, but it’s a goddamn glass of water compared to the battery acid that is actually transforming into an unnatural, horrifying beast that shouldn’t even exist. He can’t play it off in his mind anymore, can’t trick himself to think that everything’s fine and normal and okay. Because he can feel it already, clawing beneath his skin to get out.   

The itching has ramped up even more than it was this morning, prickling under his skin with a painfulness that reminds him of the agonising growing pains he got as a child. He feels hot beneath his clothes, sweat rolling down the shape of his brows and gathering on his jaw. He’s begun aching all over, and fuck, he really thought it would be a little while more until he started feeling like this. He thought they had some time at least before the sun set, and that they might have even had a small grace period as the moon rose. Clearly he’d been wrong. 

“I- I think she’s right. Us three should split up, better safe than sorry.” He says, twisting his jaw from the funny feeling that lights up his bones.

“Girls in the middle, boys on either side?” Emma suggests, sparing a cautious glance at Jacob. 

“Sounds good.” Ryan agrees, his hand raising up on its own accord to rest against Dylan’s back. “Stick with me?” 

He immediately drops it back down as if he’d burnt himself. He asked on impulse and now he wishes he could take the suggestion back. It’s not that he doesn’t want to be caged up with Dylan, rather it’s that he really wants to be and that worries him. Alongside the itching, the tingling sensation in his fingers has grown and he desperately wants his hands on Dylan in any way he can. They keep seeming to move towards him without Ryan realising it and he’s sure that any moment now he’ll be called out for the harassment. 

He vividly recalls how Nick acted just before he turned. The harsh, cruel words he said to Abi. The way he grabbed her, ground against her and buried his nose in her neck. The thought of it makes him hastily take a step to the side, away from where Dylan stands beside him. The rational part of his mind instantly wants to be as far away from Dylan as possible, to keep his distance. He can’t do that to Dylan, he couldn’t live with himself. 

However that simple, small step away alights the thing inside of him with a burning anger. It howls at him to return to his rightful place, to reach out and tug Dylan to his side. To hold him with a tight grip, to feel his warm skin under his palms, to keep him there until his own scent rubs off onto him and sticks to him for days, completely masking the smell of burnt sugar. So no one- so Kaitlyn can't come near him without smelling Ryan. 

He stumbles back a step further. Fuck, that’s not normal and definitely not okay to think. God, what if he does do what Nick did? He promised himself he’d be normal, but the beastly thing within him definitely doesn’t care about any sort of promises he’s made, to himself or anyone else. It only knows instinct and urges, neither of which are anywhere near ‘normal’. He hurries to rectify his suggestion, to find someone else, so he can be as far away from Dylan as possible until his mind settles down. “Actually maybe Nick, you could-“

“No, no, I’ll stick with you.” Dylan rushes out, cutting him off. He almost sounds desperate and fuck, Ryan has to close his eyes and swallow down the noise that begins rising up his throat. 

His head gives a slight movement to the side and he sighs heavily to dispel the breath that stuck in his chest. “Are you sure?” He asks reluctantly.

Dylan makes a stuttered noise and Ryan opens his eyes to find his expression is laced with hurt. “I-I mean if you don’t want-“

“No I didn’t mean- I just meant if you want to then that’s cool, I wasn’t saying-“

“Oh my god, shut up. Nick you’re with me, okay dude?” Jacob exclaims, looking to Nick who nods in agreement, not appearing particularly fussed either way. “Great, now that’s sorted.”

Ryan sucks in a breath through his teeth. As much as he wants to snap at Jacob for interrupting him, he can acknowledge it was necessary. Still, he speaks through gritted teeth to keep himself from doing so anyway. “Alright, we should just get this over with. Travis will be back any minute.”

He doesn’t want to be the first to strip down but the interruption from Jacob was just the right push to get him to forge forward, as he needs something to do to stop himself from lashing out. He shrugs his jacket off and grabs at the bottom of his tshirt before looking at the others expectantly. It propels them to copy his movements, pulling their shirts over their heads and unbuckling their jeans.

Once their clothes lie in puddles at their feet and they stand there in their underwear, another wavering pause grows. His eyes are resolutely pointed to the floor but he hears a ‘omf’ sound followed by a muttered “keep your eyes to yourself” from the other side of the group.

He raises his eyes up to the cages, running them over the bars and warning sign. The thing within him urges him to turn and flee to the woods while he can but he takes a slow step forward instead. The floor is slightly tacky and very rough below his heel, his foot sticking to it as he approaches the cages. Like a mutt loyally returning to its kennel, he steps through the door and to the leftmost cage. He looks at his friends through the bars, their faces downcast. 

“Very homely.” He assures them. 

It earns him a small, perhaps false laugh from Dylan who hesitantly makes his way forward and steps into the cage beside him. There’s definitely more than enough room for the both of them, keeping a foot between them as they stand tensely in the cage. The others slowly mill forward, separating themselves between the two remaining cages until they’re all in their respective places. 

He stands there, having willingly caged himself and Ryan gets the same foreboding sense that he thinks an aggressive dog would feel, as it waits in the pound to be put down.

They kenneled themselves just in time. The door creaks loudly, a lock clicks, and Travis appears only a moment later. His footsteps echo against the concrete as he walks up to the cages. He checks over the two internal doors, making sure they’re secure and closed before slamming the last one shut with enough force to rattle the metal. It’s a harsh clanging sound that makes Ryan’s ears ache. 

He stands in front of them, his hand on his belt once more. “I’ll let you out in the morning.” He says shortly. 

He’s going to speak further when Emma cuts him off with a blurted out, “What if we escape?”

“You won’t. I’ll be right upstairs, monitoring you with that.” He points at a shadowed box in the corner of the room, a small light blinking on the corner of it. “The power box’s been fixed, this will be electrified all night.”

He taps a metal bar with his knuckles before turning and walking to the fuse box. “Hands off the bars now and don’t touch them until I turn them back off.” He instructs them and Ryan hears the shuffled movement of the others stepping back.

He flicks the first one and a loud clunk echoes through the room. It startles them, a hand suddenly grasping Ryan’s own. He looks down at the hand squeezing around the top of his fingers and he gently pulls himself free. Dylan has an almost panicked expression and begins drawing his hand away, but Ryan just flips his own over and looks up at him with a small smile that borders on a grimace and nods down to it. It takes Dylan a second of searching his face but when the second loud clunk comes, he jumps and his fingers thread through Ryan’s once more.

After Travis has flipped every breaker, the room fills with a quiet hum. It’s an irritating sound, one Ryan doesn’t remember hearing when he was last here. Now it’s impossible not to notice, like a million flies are battering against the nonexistent windows. It hums in time with the itching buzz underneath Ryan’s skin and he feels himself grow even more on edge then before. 

Travis walks back over to the cages, giving them one last hard look. “No touching the bars, no trying to get out and no doing anything stupid. I’ll be back first thing.” 

No one answers him, watching him fearfully as if they hope he will just change his mind and let them out. As if they didn’t place themselves here willingly. With no response, he sucks on his teeth and nods to himself before turning on his heel and leaving the room. He disappears with the sound of ladder rungs being strained and a trapdoor falling closed. The room falls into total silence.

After a moment Ryan begins carefully lowering himself to the ground, drawing Dylan down with him. He is extremely mindful of not touching the bars, sitting with his legs bent in the exact centre of the cage. Dylan sits himself a foot away, his own legs also bent, his left arm loosely wrapped around his knees and his right hand pulled away from his body, resting atop Ryan’s.

He feels terrible. His stomach is painfully empty, the group having skipped dinner after running out of time and patience to organise preparing it. He can feel his skin being pressed against from the inside, with a tearing sensation running along his limbs. It feels swelteringly hot down here, despite the cold chill in the air. The blood that blankets the concrete like carpet is sticky and disgusting beneath him. His teeth and nails ache, his stomach rolls with nausea and his brain is ripped in two between himself and the beast within. 

The hand clutched within his own is the only thing bringing him any sense of comfort. It’s warm and a good weight in his palm, despite the way it causes the back of his hand to scrape against the concrete. A small sacrifice to make. His fingers draw back and forth over Dylan’s knuckles, his thumb smoothing over the soft skin. He gets lost in the feeling of it, a pleased rumble just a frequency lower than the hum of the bars ratting the ribs in his chest. 

He doesn’t know how long it takes him to draw his attention away, but he eventually glances up to Dylan’s face. He’s staring off between the bars, apparently also having gotten lost in his own mind. Ryan’s eyes flick over his face, drawn to his lips before he forces himself to actually look at the rest of him. The red light has made the usual lightly purple discolouration under his eyes darker, into a wine red colour that makes them look almost sullen. His pallid skin takes on the red tone and the black veins that have begun to branch out underneath it appear even darker then they would have otherwise. It makes his hair darker, almost black, where it softly brushes over his forehead and brows. The gold in his eyes is neutralised by the red and his pupils have blown wide to adjust to the dim light. 

Ryan doesn’t have the self restraint to keep himself from running his eyes downward to the rest of his body. Dylan’s spine is arched with the way he hunches over his knees, the vertebrae pressing tightly against his skin. There are shallow shadows running down his waist, in between each rib. The soft fat that is his stomach rises and falls with each breath he takes. The underwear he wears sits low on sharp hip bones. The hair that is sparsely spread out over his thighs and that grows thick over his legs is harder to see in the darkness, his pale skin made clearer beneath it. He’s all gangly limbs, twiggy skinniness and knobbly bones. A weary, lanky and pretty looking kind of boy.

Ryan can’t keep looking at him. Just as it had been cruel to himself to rake over him the first night they arrived, it is cruel to do so now too. He aches to reach out and touch him, more than just the grasp of his hand in his. To run his hands over every inch of exposed skin and feel the goosebumps raise under his touch. To scrape his lips over his throat and sink his teeth in. Fucking Christ. 

He forces himself to draw his eyes back up to safer waters, but as they rise he catches on the two narrow lines struck through his chest, the usually faint scars made inky by the filter of the light over them.

“It hasn’t made your scars fade. I mean, more. Completely.” Ryan says impulsively, his voice quieter than a whisper to keep the others from hearing.

Dylan looks at him with a slight start, drawn out of his deep thinking and requiring a moment to process what Ryan said. When he does, he looks down at his chest with consideration. “Oh, uh no, it hasn’t. Honestly I didn’t think about that being a possibility.”

“Laura’s eye healed up so that’s why I said- why I brought it up.” Ryan explains, worried he’s crossed a line. He scrunches his face up in a quick motion, trying to dispel the fuzzy feeling in it so he can focus on Dylan’s words.

“Yeah well, they’re old at this point so... they’re already healed, just the scars left. I guess the werewolf healthcare package must not extend to that.” Dylan hums and after a moment says, “I’m kinda glad it doesn’t, you know? I think I’d mourn if they just disappeared completely.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. They remind me where I was versus where I am. Though,” He waves his left hand around at the cage and room they’re confined in, “I can’t say this is exactly where I want to be, but you know what I mean.”

Ryan makes a noise of vague agreement. He’s never thought about it but he supposes he can understand, though not in any sort of personal experience kind of way. When Ryan first saw his scars as Dylan was jumping into the lake to break up a potentially hazardous play fight between two campers, he distantly recognised what it meant. He never considered or thought about it further than that though, especially not about how important or impactful it may be to Dylan and his life. Maybe he shouldn’t have brought it up at all or maybe he should have brought it up sooner, he’s not sure.

“Sorry, I shouldn’t have just- pointed it out like that.” Ryan says, squeezing his hand in apology. His other hand twitches, wanting to reach out as well but he diligently places it down onto the concrete instead.

“Oh no, don’t say sorry, it’s not a big deal. I don’t bring it up but it’s not something I like, am uncomfortable with or don’t want to talk about or anything.” Dylan glances at the cages beside them. “I’m just mindful of who I talk to about it, but if people know, they know. I don’t hide who I am.”

Ryan could argue that point, though not on how Dylan means it in this context. He nods his head, sparing his own glance towards the others. “I get it, I’m the same with you know, liking uh- liking both. It’s not a secret but not something I bring up either I suppose.”

Mercifully, Dylan doesn’t comment on how awkwardly Ryan said that, simply agreeing with an, “Exactly that.” 

“Do yo-” His words are instantly melted away by the acid that rises up and sears at the tissue in his throat. He clutches his stomach with his free hand, nausea and hunger causing a painful cramp to squeeze his insides. That’s probably what's drawing the acid reflux upwards, he thinks unhelpfully to himself. Closing his eyes, Ryan digs his nails into his skin to try and make a more purposeful painful sensation that he can focus on. 

“You okay?” Dylan asks worriedly, a sound of shuffling movement on the concrete as he twists towards him. 

“Mhm, yeah.” Ryan groans shortly, trying to keep his breathing even. A shudder runs up his spine as a wave of heat burns through him. 

There’s more shuffled movement and Dylan’s voice raises from the below whisper they’d been speaking in. “Shit, has the sun even set yet?” 

“I don’t know.” Ryan groans out again. His hand clutches his stomach so tightly, his nails digging in with so much pressure, that he feels his skin give way and they impale through, sinking half an inch into his flesh. His breath stutters at the pain but he doesn’t prise them from his skin, if anything flexing his hand to feel the way the keratin tears through the deeper layers of skin. 

The hand clutched within his own is growing soaked with his sweat, the skin slicked smooth and sliding against his palm as Dylan twists back and forth between looking at the others and Ryan. He can feel the tips of his claws graze Dylan’s knuckles and so he sits the pads of his fingers flat against the dips between each knuckle. It’s sticky and wet and disgusting and still Dylan doesn’t let go.

“What do I do?” Dylan asks in a breathless way that makes Ryan’s fever spike.

“There’s nothing- nothing you can.” He grunts. “Just, how are the- the others?”

Dylan twists once more and Ryan looks up to follow his gaze. The rest of the counsellors in the cages have also sat down on the blood covered concrete and they stare back with expressions marred to indecipherable by the low red light. He can vaguely make out the black veins that unfurl over their faces and throats. The air is thick with their heavy, terrified scents. 

“Are you guys okay?” Dylan calls softly over to them.

The answering sniff and cleared throat rings in his ears like they’d been made through lips grazing his cheekbone. The others have stayed silent until now and Ryan can wager a guess why. No one exactly feels like chatting when the prospect of turning into a hideous, gruesome beast hangs over their heads. Ryan can’t remember it himself and he isn’t sure if the others do or not, but he’s terrified of the change being painful. The sensations he feels already, the nausea, hunger, itching, stretching, aching and fever are agonising enough as it is. To feel his skin explode as a creature bursts out from beneath it is a harrowing thought- a thought that will be reality at any moment now.

“I- I think I feel alright for now.” Emma quietly calls back. “But Kaitlyn, you don’t look so hot...”

“Wow, thanks Emma. You just look stunning yourself.” Kaitlyn says flatly, her voice holding a strangely deep pitch that echoes below her usual tone.

“I didn’t mean- I’m sorry.” Emma sniffles uncharacteristically. “How long do you… how long do you think we have?”

“‘Not an exact science’.” Ryan restates what Laura told them that night after revealing she was bit. 

There’s no way for them to know. Ryan feels it scraping beneath his skin but that could carry on for as little as a few minutes to hours more until it breaks through. There’s no way to see how low the sun has dipped or how high the moon has climbed. There’s no way to know whether they will all explode at once or if it will happen gradually over the night. They’ve locked themselves into this cage blind.

Beside him, Dylan does look rough but nowhere near the level of distortion that he recalls Laura having reached just before she turned. The girls are all huddled up together, Emma and Abi holding each other and making it hard to see how far along the infection has visibly begun to affect them. Kaitlyn though, sat off just a tiny bit to the side, stares back at Ryan and he can see the way the black veins create a spiderweb over her face and down her throat. Her eyes appear to not have an iris or white, her pupils blowing to cover the entire globe. Behind her, Nick and Jacob sit as far apart as the confinement of the cage will let them. Jacob’s head hangs between his knees but Ryan can see dark splotches growing on his limbs and the black veins bulging in his hands. Nick is hunched so tightly over and hidden behind the girls in the cage between them that he is no more than a shadow from where Ryan sits.

He doesn’t know how long they’ve been down here, without a clock and having gotten lost in his head for an unknown amount of time. So he’s unsure how gradual or how quickly they’ve begun getting affected. They really don’t know much about this curse, do they? He wishes it was all a bit clearer, he feels like so much is unknown and they’re completely in the dark. But they can’t exactly google it and Travis doesn’t seem to be a man of many words. 

“W-what happens if one of us turns before the others and attacks us?” Abi asks, her voice wavering heavily.

“I don’t think they- we- god, I mean the werewolves don’t attack others with the- the curse or disease, or whatever it is, right?” Dylan says, completely tripping over his words as he struggles to find the right ones. They really know nothing if they still can’t even accurately define the right terms to use. “When I was in the crane, it came right up to my face but it just… smelt me? That was after I was bitten at the van.”

At the end of Dylan’s words, hears a small sound, a choked noise that’s quickly muffled. It comes from one of the other cages, but as he’s unable to work out who made it, he decides to ignore it. “Laura said it depends on how far along the infection is. Since we’re all well and truly infected, we should be fine.” As he speaks, his stomach moves with his breath and words, making his nails lodge deeper into his flesh. 

The group falls into another silence. They’re all waiting with dread- there’s nothing much else they can do really. 

Gradually over the next few minutes, Ryan feels his breath grow laboured and heavy. His fever has peaked to a sweltering heat and his stomach turns in such violent waves that he thinks he really might throw up. He can feel it clawing to be freed, the pressure building in his soft tissue and flesh making his skin feel too tight and his bones ache. 

He’s never felt worse before in his entire life. Since he woke this morning, Ryan has felt the sensations of a monster stuck inside him getting ready to burst free. He’s tried to contain it, to push it down like all his emotions since childhood, to keep it trapped beneath the worryingly thin confine that is his skin. He let go of the reins earlier in the evening and nearly bit off his friend's face. Now the leash he holds on it is straining. 

He should fight the oncoming transformation with every fibre of his being. Collar it, tighten the leash and padlock the kennel. But it felt so good to free it. It felt right . He didn’t feel out of control when he let go of the leash, like the beast was overpowering him or forcing his body to act. No, it didn’t feel like that at all- it felt like his instincts, senses and nature finally aligned in his mind. Like he was freed from and unheeded by notions of civility or norms. It wasn’t that he let the wolf take over, it was that he stopped suppressing it, stopped fighting it and actually let it coexist within him. It took away the uncertainty and awkwardness, and he just did . Following his instincts where they led him without second guessing every move he made, every feeling he felt and what that meant for him and who he was now. It was uniting the two parts of him that he had kept staunchly separated until that moment. 

That is until he immediately separated them again when he realised what he’d done, the social norms that have been drilled into him since childhood renouncing any sort of a connection with a monstrous animal. 

He should fight it. He doesn’t. 

Ryan craves the relief it brought, needs to feel some kind of alleviation of the pain, pressure and illness. He can’t hold off the transformation all night through sheer willpower, nor can he truly appreciate any kind of moral righteousness in suppressing it when he feels it within, crying to be freed. It’s inevitable, what’s embracing the monster inside him when it will tear him apart anyway? 

He finally pulls his nails free from where they’ve been buried in his flesh, giving Dylan’s hand one last squeeze before he releases it also. He feels the warmth of blood trickling down his stomach and pattering down against his thighs. He places his hands flat against the concrete, the tacky bloodstains and dusty concrete coating his palms. He breathes in a deep breath and releases control, leaning into the sensation of breaking apart his own skin. 

A pained groan rips through his throat as he keels forward. The fever scorches through him, his nerves fraying from the heat. The itching has turned into a billion, tiny sharp pin pricks that piece into his body relentlessly in no discernible pattern. His stomach churns with a starving hunger and rolls with near vomit inducing nausea. The acid reflux that has crawled its way up his throat feels as if it’s burning a hole through his oesophagus, reaching his vocal cords and dissolving them in nothingness. His teeth ache fiercely in his mouth and his nails sting beneath the plates. 

Ryan’s knees slip down to the ground and he bends over until his forehead nearly rests against the concrete. He’s curled over the ground as if he were prostrating himself before God, his back held up in the air and his hands scraping against the ground until they lay flat below his shoulders, as if he plans to push himself back upright. He can feel Dylan scrabble away to give him room, or perhaps to get as far away from him as possible. 

The small tears he felt run along the underside of his skin earlier turn into thick lacerations, ripping through his flesh from the inside out, stopping just a single layer short of gashing right through. His bones bend under the pressure of something unfurling from inside him, splintering off into shards that impale into his muscles and turn his soft tissue to mince. His head is filled with enough pressure to explode it, his skull and jaw cracking apart in preparation to piece back together into an elongated head and snout. 

Ryan huffs out heavy breaths and grunts from the excruciating pain of it all, his mind has begun to cloud over with foggy detachment as the only thing he can comprehend is the agonising sensations that wreck through his body. Somewhere in the background the sound of crying, frantic babbling, scuffled movement and perhaps even his own name reaches his ears, but it’s lost in the haze of pain. 

He pants and pants and the sliver of the remaining logical, human side of his brain screams at him to regain control and fight back against the thing within him from tearing through his skin. The whole process has only taken seconds since he released control- if he wrangles it back, maybe he’d have minutes or an hour before it overcame him. Ryan doesn’t want control back, he wants to be free from the pain this curse brings. So instead, he ever so slightly flexes his muscles, testing the strength and durability of his skin. He feels it split over his shoulders and biceps, pumping out thick hot blood over his skin and to the floor. His eyes squeeze shut and with one last rasping moan, he harshly contracts every single muscle in his body.

His skin is ripped from his body, exploding outwards and splattering against every surface, in every direction. His skull has fitted back together into a longer, narrower form. His teeth have grown into long, sharp fangs and his tongue lolls from his mouth that draws all the way back to the base of an elongated snout. His hands have grown malformed, his knuckles drawn back and fingers ending in curved claws, his feet similarly disfigured in a more lengthened form.

The force of the combustion forced him upright and he settles on his haunches, arms held bent in front of him. The room is cast in shades of grey, everything clearly discernible but in greyscale. The bars are like black lines in his vision and his head tilts to look between them. 

Ryan looks through eyes as if through a fishbowl, a spectator to his own self. He’s barely aware of what he’s doing, each movement, sound and action he makes being done before any sense of foggy consciousness he still possesses can process it. He’s acting on pure instincts, no real thoughts able to truly form through the haze. He’s not in control, not out of control- Ryan’s lost the higher sense of human consciousness as he’s naturalised back into the mind of an animal.   

He feels his heavy head raise, a snuffling sound filling his ears. Layers of sharp scents fill his nose and rush through the length of his snout. They’re each apparent from the others, a strangely familiar smell of venom in each. An almost piquant bitter scent increases the loudness of the snuffling, eventually picking out a deep sweetness buried underneath it. 

His head snaps to the left, his eyes focusing on the figure beside him. Its chest rises and falls in a quickened manner, sprawled over and barely managing to keep itself upright on a frail, shaking arm. He feels his limbs unfurl, aching as they stretch out and pad a step over to the trembling animal. There’s a rumbling sound coming from his chest, intercut with small, almost clicking like sounds as the growl catches in his dry throat. Around him, the cacophony of sounds- whimpering, strange garbles and weeping- makes it rise. 

His body stretches over top of the smaller sprawled form of the body beneath him, his head tilting forward towards the throat that’s bared with the way its face cranes up to him. He can feel his nose snuffling against it, thick lines of drool falling from his maw and streaking down its chest. His teeth bare, grazing the tender flesh. He can hear the unsteady, rushing beating of its pulse thumping just below his fangs. The shaking feebleness of the animal beneath him tells his instincts it’s prey but the scent, huffed up through his nose pressed firmly against its throat, tells him it’s kin. 

His head pulls back slowly and through the fishbowl there’s a flicker of familiarity in the wolf's mind. His eyes attempt to focus, to try and sharpen the details on the callow's face. They jerk up to the movement behind it instead.

More animals, more meat and prey huddle just past the black lines. His malformed hand-paw places down beside the cowering body of the callow, his head stretching forward with a deep rumble vibrating past his curled lips. The prey just out of reach flinch back and his head snaps forward, his jaw opening as he tries to bite through the bars. His skin is burnt with a loud crack, scorching needles stabbing through his maw. He jolts his head back, shaking it violently to dispel the pain. He snarls at the cowering figures, unable to reach them through the burning barrier. His nose snuffles at them once his mind clears of the pain, picking up the muddied scent of the venom that marks his kin, settling his agitation towards the creatures beyond the burning bars for now.

He retreats to hovering over the callow beneath him, his claws scraping against the ground as he crowds its space, huffing up the sweet scent. He can hear his own rough gnarls echoing in his ears in response to each sound and movement that he cannot reach. His eyes are trained to behind the fledging but his nose returns to snuffle at its throat. There he has poised himself, coiled to attack as he shields its feeble body.

After guarding for some time, a heavy torrent of blood and flesh splatters against his head. Twin howls pierce through his ears, his own throat opening to answer with his own. As it ends with the breath running out of his lungs, he flicks a long wet tongue over his snout to clean the splatter from his skin. His eyes focus on the looming form of another wolf. It sniffs at the possible callow's trapped beside it, it's snout breathing hot air over their faces. It’s feral, snarling at them as the garbles and cries rise in volume, until eventually it languidly pads the few steps towards him from behind the barrier.

It snuffs at the air, a crackling growl breaking through its teeth. As its jaw approaches the black lines, sharp teeth bared and drool slinging to the ground, his ears prick forward and his nose wrinkles. His hand rises upward, curling around the shoulder of the callow beneath him and his claws slightly pierce its skin as he draws it away from the approaching wolf and tucks it further beneath him.

The mangled wolf-like creature snaps at him through the bars, falling back as they shock it just as they had him. It rises up, snarling at him from a safe foot back. He answers with his own deafening growl. The callow shakes beneath him and he presses down some of his weight onto it. They snarl at each other for a drawn out time, until the splattering and howling of more wolves join them. With a final vicious gnashing of teeth, the black eyed wolf backs away to investigate the callow and wolf contained inside with it once more.

A push hits his chest and he snaps at the small amount of space between his face and the callow's, but it doesn’t even notice his aggressive correction. It’s curled up into a tight ball, wrecked with shudders. His nose huffs at it, the smell of venom thick around it. His legs shift him backwards, head cocking in anticipation.

Its skin is ripped apart as the wolf inside is freed, splattering him with blood. It howls and another final howl joins alongside it from elsewhere in the space. It’s hunched down, its shoulder blades nearly piercing through its thin skin and its body rocked up and down with the force of its harsh pants.

He leans towards it, nose twitching, brushing the front of his muzzle over its throat. The sweet scent is overpowering, his instincts going haywire as his teeth grind together. He nudges his nose against its jaw, once, twice, expectantly. The pup of a wolf snarls lightly, its yellow eyes meeting his own, an empty glaze over them. His clawed, bent knuckled hand presses down on its back. It gives a short snarled huff and he snarls back at the feral wolf until it's head bows, dissatisfaction clear in the snap he gives towards it, despite the compliance. It follows his press downward with no more complaints, settling its head down on its bony arms. He also rests his body down, half crushing it. His long, wet tongue lolls out and he licks a long stripe over its shoulder. He begins licking it clean of the blood and flesh that covers it, his claws curled around its torso and upper arm. It's empty eyes close and he huffs, displeased.

His limbs and back ache fiercely, forced to be coiled up in the small space. His stomach is painfully empty and his nose stuffed up with the thick dust, botching his most important and powerful sense. He’s understimulated and keyed up, the forest above them calling to him, with the fresh air, sleek grass, natural cover and flowing moonlight. The urge to escape to his hunting ground, to his territory, is overpowering, to run and hunt as his instincts crave.

The painful zap of the bar keeps him from trying, resigned to rest atop the sweet smelling wolf below him, without hostility despite it's feral nature. When every inch of nearby skin has been licked free of gore, he rests his head down on its shoulder blade. His eyes remain open, sweeping the space for any dangers. His ears remain tilted upwards, to the faint sounds of the world above. His hackles remain up, instantly returning any of the growls that are directed to him with full force. There he lays until the moon completes its circuit across the sky and the sun returns to peek over the horizon.

Chapter Text

He tears through the skin of his beastly form like it’s paper. The flesh, blood and muscle splash off of him in a wide arch, slopping against the already gore covered walls and floor. His bones and skin buzz, though any crack or tear that had formed is completely healed, as if it’d never existed in the first place.

It takes a long moment to find enough awareness through the shock to work out he’s not just sitting by himself on the floor. No, his chest is laid down atop of a soft form and his elbows dig roughly into skin and bone beneath him. He realises with a start that he is once again crushing Dylan. He scrambles off of him, only narrowly avoiding his back hitting the far bars of the cage as he flails backwards. 

He’s shaking all over, his eyes quickly blinking and his chest heaving. He brings a trembling hand up, tilting it back and forth as he looks at it with wide eyes. It’s coated in a thick layer of blood, clots and scraps of flesh, but his nails are once more trimmed and his knuckles lie flat when he stretches out his fingers. A normal, human hand.

His arms, legs and back ache something fierce, he’s the most exhausted he’s felt in a long time, his stomach rolls with hunger, goosebumps rise over his skin from the cold chill of the room and yet… he doesn’t feel completely terrible? Not like last night at least, though anything pales in comparison. He can recall it vividly, the excruciating pain that wracked through every inch of his body for those few torturous seconds. Even the lead up to it was by far the worst he’s ever felt in his life, second only to those few seconds of the transformation itself. He felt like he was dying- or whatever could be considered worse than that. Now he just feels, albeit horribly so, sore, tired and hungry. 

The realisation that he isn’t in immense physical pain doesn’t bring him the comfort he wishes it would. His body won’t stop shaking, his skin is clammy underneath the wet blood that coats it and his pulse jumps intermittently. The transformation, turning into the beast, existing in a cloud of lower consciousness, then returning to his human form, has left him in a state of shock. Ryan can feel his own mind trying to come to terms with what just happened, to comprehend the pain and the shifting level of awareness that he just went through. 

He was there , he remembers it, when he was the werewolf. He can recall his movements and the sounds he made as if he’d been in control and was deciding what to do. But he hadn’t been in control… had he? Not really? His mind wasn’t his own- well no, it was his own. But his thinking just wasn’t quite… there . It was all animal instinct, without the higher level of thought and grip on his behaviour that his human mind, his real mind, gives him. 

Whether he was in control or not, whether he was himself or not, he can still remember it either way. He can recall how he’d sniffed at Dylan, trying to work out whether he was something to tear to shreds or not. How he’d snapped at the girls through the bars once he’d determined Dylan wasn’t prey, unable to reach them to also work out whether they were prey or not either. How when, well it had to have been Kaitlyn, turned he’d snarled at her through the bars, drawing Dylan under him in an overtly possessive and protective manner. How he’d pushed Dylan under him after he had also turned, laying atop him and grooming him. Fucking hell, Ryan thought they didn’t recall their night as a wolf? He wishes he couldn’t. 

He can’t quite wrap his head around it. It was an unfathomable, unexplainable experience. He can’t even really understand it, let alone come to grips with it. If he dwells on it too long he thinks his brain might just give up and shut down all thoughts completely.

Having given himself a moment to at least acknowledge the confused, tangled mess that is his thoughts, he does feel the shock slowly begin to fade. At least enough to return his heartbeat back to a steady pace and his breathing to a more even rhythm. Enough to be able to move his muscles again from where they had frozen with fear.

He looks over to where Dylan is sprawled on the ground in a contorted way that must be horribly uncomfortable. His forehead is pressed against the floor, his arms are curled beneath his chest as it heaves and his knees are awkwardly bent up sideways, twisting his stomach. Ryan can hear his uneven, quick breathing and see the tremors in his shoulders. He instinctively goes to call to him, check in on him, but the only sound that escapes his mouth is an awful croak.

Ryan swallows past the thick lump in his throat, wetting it with a layer of saliva from where it had felt cracked dry from dehydration. His voice has an audible shake when he speaks, but he can at least get the words out. “Dylan? Are- are you okay?” 

A muffled sound that doesn’t quite resemble words answers him and Dylan twitches but he doesn’t make any move to get up. Ryan forces his own limbs to move, a deep soreness in them making him choke down a pained moan. It feels as if they have atrophied, his limbs and back aching after having been stuck curled up from the lack of space when he was a good few times larger than his usual self. He pushes through the feeling, dragging himself back to Dylan’s side.

Ryan hesitates before placing his hands on him, worried he doesn’t want to be touched by him after what he did last night. His overwhelming concern wins out however and he gently places a hand on Dylan’s shoulder, ever so softly lifting it away from where it’s hunched up over his face. “Dylan?” He says, voice no louder than a whisper.

With his shoulder no longer obscuring it, Dylan’s face comes into view and Ryan swallows thickly at the sight. The usual slight purple tinge under his eyes has grown into dark bags that make him look as if he has two black eyes. Blood coats his face, smeared over his cheeks and splattered over his nose. His hair is plastered to his forehead with it, in a stark similarity to that night. His head remains against the ground, his eye’s squeezed shut and his face scrunched up. He makes a noise in his throat that sounds like the constriction he’d make for words and a harsh exhale of air is pushed out of his nose before it continues to rush out as heavy pants through his lips. His chest rises and falls at a rough, rapid pace and his body trembles in such a harsher way than his own that Ryan forgets about the way his body also hasn’t stopped shaking.

Dylan’s definitely hyperventilating and it’s at such a quick pace that Ryan worries he might pass out. Without thinking he moves his hand to grip his arm, slowly pulling him upright and off of the blood soaked, coarse concrete. Dylan follows the movement easily, perhaps a bit too easily as his hand scrabbles against the ground to keep himself from tipping over the other way. Ryan steadies him with a strong hold on either arm. 

He loosens his grasp as Dylan’s shoulders pull back slightly and he begins to faintly sway back and forth. His legs attempt to curl up to his chest but are unable to reach his body as his knees knock against the side of Ryan’s own leg, from where he’s kneeled so close against him. His arms go to wrap around his waist, his fingers twisting into the waistband of his underwear. Something about the sight causes Ryan to distantly make a connection in his mind, the thought making his brows knit.

“I ca- I can’t-” Dylan chokes on his breath, the few syllables he manages to get out at the tail end of shallow breaths, throwing the rhythm of his breathing off even more. 

“You’re alright, you’re alright. You can breathe, just need to slow it down.” Ryan says softly. He’s not really sure what more to say, other than the most obvious and unhelpful advice.  

Dylan swallows a thick mouthful of air and his chin wobbles. His eyes open and though they're completely dry, they're unfocused, darting around like he can’t really see Ryan right there crouched in front of him. He seems really out of it, his hand raising to clutch at his chest as he gasps uncontrollably for air. Ryan isn’t sure if his words even really broke through the panicked haze that Dylan’s in, the only thing he seems to be capable of comprehending is the steadily building sense of self-inflicted suffocation.   

As Ryan crouches in front of him, holding him upright as he hyperventilates and shakes, he feels his own helpless panic rise. He doesn’t know what to do, god what does he do? How do you snap someone out of something like this- without even knowing what it really is? He doesn’t even know why Dylan’s panicking in the first place and with the way the air is barely drawn into his lungs before it’s pushed back out, he’s sure Dylan isn’t able to form the words to tell him why. Did Ryan injure him, is he hurt? Is he terrified of Ryan himself, remembering how he was crushed beneath a snarling monster all night?

It only takes a second of panicking before a tugging in his stomach connects with the same sensation in his mind and his spiralling is halted in its tracks. It’s a gut feeling of what to do with no basis of why, but Ryan follows it in an instant. 

“Come here.” He murmurs, his voice so quiet.

His knees collapse under him and he sits down heavily on the ground. His hands release their grip on Dylan’s arms and slide to cross over his back, wrapping tightly around him. He tugs him forward, gently pressing Dylan’s head into his neck before returning his arm to his back and squeezing him so tightly that he hears Dylan’s spine click. Ryan hooks his chin over Dylan’s shoulder, his eyes closing as he breathes slowly and evenly. 

He can feel the way Dylan’s shoulder jolts against his collarbone with every rattling breath he takes and the way his pulse is a pounding beat as his heart slams against his rib cage. His nose is pressed tightly against the junction between Ryan’s shoulder and neck, coagulated blood sticking their skin together. Ryan’s arms wrap impossibly tighter around him and he feels a hand raise to clasp around his arm just as tightly.

Once he’s shuffled around a bit to adjust their arms and an excess of gangly legs to a more comfortable position, a kick of worry hits his chest. If Dylan is struggling to breathe then shoving his face into his neck and squeezing the life out of him is definitely counterintuitive. He can’t bring himself to loosen his grip or give Dylan more air though. There’s a warm feeling that grows in his gut, a sense of consonance and closeness, like his instincts have been subdued from following through with the impulses it sent him. It webs away whatever remaining panic had built within him and he focuses on calming his own body, steadying his breathing and relaxing the tension in his muscles, in hopes that Dylan’s follows suit. He digs his chin just a little deeper into Dylan’s shoulder and a much needed calmness sweeps over him.

It takes some time but he can feel it when Dylan’s breathing slowly begins to lose its rapid pace and evens out against his neck. When it has slowed to a, albeit shaky and sharp, pace, his heart also begins to regulate to a more steady beat. As if it were hit with a defibrillator, it shocks back into a rapid drum at the strained sob that echoes through the room.

Ryan’s eyes snap open, his fingers curling rigidly into Dylan’s skin, keeping him in his grasp. Through the bars his eyes pass by the girls and to the furthest cage, before returning to the centre.

Jacob’s fists are tightly wound, his knuckles scraping over the concrete. His head bobs back and forth, his body coiled tightly making his muscles strain. His right eye is irritated, the red veins nearly completely overtaking the white, after he had to have rubbed blood in it when attempting to wipe his face free of the splatter. The sides of the waistband of his boxers have been shredded but he doesn’t seem to notice as he stares at a flap of what must be scalp on the ground. 

Nick is hunched over on his knees, making a loud gagging sound that’s in time with every heave of his stomach. A line of thick bile is still connected between his lips and the concrete, swinging wildly as he dry heaves. His hand clutches uselessly at his stomach, his nails scratching against his skin with every heavy retch. There’s no vomit on the ground in front of him as they didn’t eat last night, but his body is trying with all its might to expel whatever it can from his stomach. 

Abi is curled up in a tight ball with her knees bent in front of her and her hands are a blur as she watches them violently shake. Tears stream down her face, washing the blood away in tight, contained lines. Her whole body is trembling like a leaf in the wind and her face is one of silent horror, eyes held wide and eyebrows furrowed up towards her hairline.  

Kaitlyn’s barely able to hold herself upright, her elbow buckling beneath her where she leans over her sprawled out legs. There are pieces of flesh tangled in her hair, a large scrap dropping down to slap against her thigh and she gives a violent shudder as she reaches to pick it off and drop it to the ground. She raises her hand back up and smears the blood on her cheek as she wipes away a quickly congealed clot.

They each look dazed in a total state of shock, some making weeping sounds and some breathing heavy, but it’s clear none of them made the sound.

Emma’s usually blonde hair has been stained with streaks of red and brown. Red droplets collect along her jaw, clear tears dyed red from the blood that covers her face. Her lips are parted, sobs that are increasing in power falling from between them. Her eyes are screwed shut, drawing her brows downwards. Her arms are firmly crossed against her chest, the scraps of her bra laying in tatters on the concrete a few feet away.

Ryan quickly drops his forehead down, resting the bridge of his nose against Dylan’s shoulder. He tilts his head inwards until his cheekbone digs into Dylan’s skin, his eyes running over the hair that has matted together over the nape of his neck. Dylan’s hand around his wrist tightens and the nails of his right hand digs into Ryan’s skin where it sits atop his thigh. Just as Dylan let go of his hand last night, Ryan does not let go of Dylan now.

The next sob from Emma tears through her throat, the words, “Don’t look at me”, crackling as they’re forced out alongside it.

Below the crying he hears shuffled movement and a croak before a cleared throat. “Emma, it’s okay, I’ll get you- I’ll-“ Kaitlyn says, her voice rasping. After a moment there’s a straining sound before a loud zap of electricity and a pained, “Fuck! Fucking christ, Jesus!”

Emma’s sobs grow louder still, her stream of words barely audible beneath them. “Thank you, thank you, thank you,”

“It’s okay, you’re alright, come on, put that on… there you go.” Kaitlyn’s words blend into them until her reassurances finally settle Emma enough to quiet her.

The room is filled with noise even when they fall silent, with the sound of Jacob sniffling back tears, Nick retching, Emma crying and the endless buzz of the electrified bars of their cages. For a long moment Ryan just listens to it all, with the feeling of Dylan in his arms and the smell of gore and bitterness occupying his senses. He barely has the energy to turn his head towards it when he finally hears the sound of the trapdoor opening and the heavy steps on the ladder. 

Travis doesn’t approach the cages when enters the room, instantly turning to the breaker and shutting down all power to the bars. The doors swing open by themselves, the metal bumping into Ryan’s knee. He flinches, recalling the pain of the shock last night, but he only feels cold metal against his skin. His eyes are trained on Travis’ back as he walks away without a word, towards where he had left Laura and Max.

He breathes out a deep, exhausted sigh and his grip on Dylan slackens at last. He draws back, dropping his hands back down to his arms and he holds him at half an arms length. Dylan for his part slowly lifts his head from Ryan’s neck and shoulder, straightening his spine and opening his weary eyes. His grasp on Ryan’s arm remains.

Ryan searches his face deeply. His face, that is covered in blood and gore, with dark circles under his eyes and the most trusting, vulnerable look held within them, makes Ryan’s heart break as he falls just a little more in love. He drops his hands from Dylan’s shoulders and they land with a pathetic little thud in his lap. 

“Okay?” He asks, his eyes flicking away to stare vacantly out the bars, the sight of Dylan growing blurred in his peripheral. 

Dylan nods, his own exhaustion making the movement weighted. “Yeah, just peachy.” He confirms, his voice cracking as his vocal cords strain. 

His breathing has returned to normal and the full body shake has ebbed to only reach his limbs and shoulders. Ryan doesn’t know why his instinctual death grip worked, but it did. He nods, mostly to himself before he has to look away. They’re so close, Dylan’s knees brushing against the front of Ryan’s calves. The ache in his heart hurts far more than the soreness in his limbs ever could. He swipes his thumb over Dylan’s kneecap before he presses his hands against the concrete once more and pushes himself backwards. 

Standing takes more effort than he thought it would. His bones click in a concerningly loud way and his muscles strain as if they’ve never been used. He stumbles when he’s finally upright, his legs unsteady. He grabs a bar to balance himself, offering a hand down to help pull Dylan to his feet too.

Ryan watches as Kaitlyn also helps draw Emma and Abi out of the tight cocoons they’ve protectively sat themselves in, offering whispered encouragement through harsh exhales of her own pain and fear. She gently leads them out of the cage, directing them towards the plies of blood soaked clothes on the ground. 

Dylan limps after them, through the two doors and out into freedom. Ryan goes to follow when he pulls to a stop in the middle cage.

Jacob and Nick have made no move to get out, or any moment at all really. Jacob still stares at the scrap of scalp on the concrete as if he hasn’t even noticed the door has opened and Nick still dry heaves on all fours, trying to throw up but only choking up bile. Ryan pushes the door flat against the bars and crouches down in front of Jacob.

“Hey man, we can get out of here now.” He says, laying a hand on Jacob’s arm to try and draw him out of his daze.

Jacob startles violently, jerking backwards and looking at Ryan with wild, confused eyes. “Wh- wha?”

Ryan secures a grasp around his bicep, pulling him up despite the protests of his own aching muscles. When Jacob’s safely upright, as shaky as he is, some of the confusion seems to fade. His eyes focus and he finally looks at the opening door with understanding. He nods jankily and steps towards it on unsteady legs.

Ryan bends down and helps up Nick next, with a solid grip on his shoulder and a hand on his back. The line of bile finally snaps as he’s pulled upright and his hand disgustingly grasps Ryan after he’s wiped it over his mouth. As Ryan helps him stumble through the bars, he continues to make gagging sounds but the full body heaving seems to settle down now that he’s orientated upright. 

He lets go of him when they reach where Nick had left his clothes just outside the cage, Ryan scooping them up off the floor and placing them in his hands. His top is missing and Ryan turns around to the others in confusion. The girls have mostly dressed, the soggy fabric sticking to their equally drenched skin. And ah, that would be where Nick’s top went, Ryan thinks as he spots Emma in a tshirt a couple sizes too large for her. Ryan trudges over to his own clothes pile, picking up his jacket and returning to drape it over Nick’s shoulders. 

When he kneels down to grab his pants and top, his legs feel like they’re going to give out under him. His arms throb with pain as he forces them through his sleeves and pulling his jeans up is no small feat. The sound of crying that hasn’t stopped for a second and the red light that dyes the room ominously makes everything so much more grounded, in the worst way possible.

If they’d managed to lull themselves into a false sense of security and build up a wall of normalcy and okayness with their pretending, then it has all fallen apart now, shattered against the floor like a porcelain statue hitting the blood soaked concrete. There is no way to pretend or feel like everything is okay and that nothing has changed when they’re covered in the viscera of their transformation, the pain of it is fresh in their memory and the ache of it in their limbs reminds them with every movement.

They stand in a semi circle, just as they had last night, in a stunned silence. Even Dylan, who never stopped telling jokes throughout that night in August and whose mouth seems to run on a motor, doesn’t say a word. The room reeks of pain, fear and the thick coppery scent of blood. Ryan’s barely holding it together.

The heavy footsteps of Travis returning echoes off the cinder blocks, two uneven steps following behind him. He pulls to a stop between Nick and Jacob, mindful not to touch either of them. He looks at the group with an expression mixed between pity and disgust.

“Alright, let’s get you kids cleaned up. Come on, upstairs now.” He says, his voice starkly steady and calm compared to every confused, panicked whisper that Ryan has heard since the invisible sunrise.

He moves past the group, making for the ladder and Ryan watches the group as they mindlessly follow in their state of shock. He listens to each slow step onto the rungs and closes his eyes as he tries to summon the courage to step forward himself. A light touch to his elbow makes him turn with a start, Laura standing beside him with a solemn look in her eyes.

Her hand is entwined with Max and though her shoulders shake, her posture seems a little more loose than what he’s seen in the others. Her eyebrows dip and her lips go tight before she looks away.

“Is everyone… okay?” She asks, her voice rough.

“No, they’re not.” He replies simply, shaking his head a little. A dark feeling wells up in his stomach and he steps away from her without another word, his shoes sliding against the pools of blood on the ground as he makes his way to the ladder.

The muscles in his arms spasm as he pulls himself onto the wooden floor of the dining room and pushes himself upright again. The sunlight that flows in through the windows burns his eyes as he emerges from the trapdoor and he blinks rapidly as he attempts to adjust to the sudden influx of colour other than a red blur, placing his forearm against his brow to try and block out some of the harsh light. 

White sheets have been draped over the chairs at the table, dust visibly floating through the air in the warm rays that split through the murky window panes. It makes the room so warm that Ryan realises just how cold it had been locked down in the crumbling rum tunnels beneath the house. It heats his skin through the mixture of caked, rough and soggy fabric of his clothes. The air is no longer stale, fresh air carrying the smell of the woods in through the small crack in the window. It is still filled with the heavy scent of horror however.

As Ryan adjusts to the change in his surroundings, Laura and Max climb up into the room behind him. He stumbles away to give them room, knocking his arm against Jacob’s. He tenses up, expecting a stand-off, but he only finds a hand placed on his shoulder to help righten him.

Travis gives them a moment to regulate themselves, waiting for the sniffling and crying to slowly die down before he says, “I’ll drive you back to the lodge and you can shower and change.”

There’s a noncommittal noise made from somewhere, Ryan’s eyes vacantly looking out the window to the forest that lies beyond, his mind whirring. 

Travis clicks his tongue against the roof of his mouth. “I can only take a few of you at a time. If you wait on the porch it won’t take long.”

No one makes any movement or word of agreement. It’s like they're too scared to feel the twinge in their limbs or the roughness of their throat if they do. If they leave this old, decrepit manor and step out into the fresh air and sunlight, they’re proving that it wasn’t just some nightmare. To let it wash over their blood stained skin and flow through their soiled clothes just proves that it really was real. That it wasn’t just contained to the night and it will follow them home, follow them wherever they try to flee.

“You’ll be exhausted, sore and hungry. Let’s get you back, come on, move it.” Travis says, sounding exasperated, and yet Ryan also picks up on that note of shame too, that Dylan mentioned yesterday.

Ryan tears his eyes away from the window and forces his legs to move despite how much it hurts. He grabs Kaitlyn’s elbow as he passes, tugging her along behind him and he looks back to see a sort of chain has formed, of hands softly leading those behind them forward. 

They follow Travis through the manor and out to the porch. There he lets Laura and Max continue on, holding a hand behind him for the others to wait. The patrol car’s tires crunch against the gravel as it pulls out from the driveway and onto the small unpaved road hidden between the trees that leads to the deceased Hacketts home. 

They collapse onto the stairs of the porch, exhaustion weighing them down. Emma and Abi have their arms wrapped around each other, the tears yet to stop streaming down either of their faces. Nick clutches his stomach, the light bringing out the green in his cheeks. Jacob keeps wiping his hands over his face like he’ll be able to clean off the blood, instead just smearing it and creating thick clumps of the more coagulated pieces. Dylan has curled himself in a tight upright ball, a small sway rocking him back and forth, and he repeatedly picks his clothes away from body with fluttering hands as if he can’t stand it touching him. Kaitlyn sits numbly beside Ryan, her fists clenched and mouth drawn tight.

First it’s Emma and Abi, then Nick, Jacob and Dylan, the others all whisked away until only Kaitlyn and Ryan remain on the steps. The silence left by the group remains until it’s broken by a harsh, humourless laugh.

“We’re so incredibly fucked up. How are we supposed to live with this- cope with this?” She says, exhaustion thick in her voice.

He has to force his throat to constrict and his lips to move before he can speak, each word feeling as if it takes another year off of his life. “I haven’t seen any support group flyers for werewolves but if I do I’ll make sure to grab one.” Ryan says, his voice just as thick and rasping painfully. His head has slid down to rest in his hands, unable to hold it up without support anymore.

“Thanks, I’d appreciate it.” Kaitlyn snorts before she drops back into a sombre tone once more. “God, what are we supposed to do?”

“Keep trudging on I guess. There’s nothing much we can do.” Ryan supplies unhelpfully.

“Yeah, until we reach our limit and fucking kill ourselves I suppose.” There’s a dark humour in her tone and Ryan weighs up how honest she might be being until he’s certain that she is just joking.

“Might take a bit of testing before we find a solid method, what with the whole instant healing thing.” He jokes back morbidly.

“You think making it a group activity would be easier?” She says with a short exhale of a laugh. “Just like being back at camp again.”

He waves a hand loosely at their surroundings, his forehead tilting to rest in just one hand. “Well we are here after all.”

She sighs loudly. “Yeah, we are. And we’re going to be coming back every month for the rest of our fucking lives. Don’t know how I’m going to explain that to my mom.”

He hadn’t thought of that, concerning the others. Since he moved out, all Ryan had to do was ask his grandfather for a few days off, told him he was visiting a friend. Since he’s not legally employed it wasn’t an issue in the slightest. His grandfather has always been a man of little questions- he doesn’t pry, assuming the best in Ryan, whether he should or not. The others are still all at home to his knowledge though and he has no idea how close they are with their families. Getting out here could prove to become difficult, as disappearing for days at a time every single month is pretty suspicious, especially considering they have no service and were just “witness” to a massacre.

“We’ll work it out.” He tries to assure her but he can hear how flat it comes out.

“Work it out? We’ve barely spoken of anything other than the weather and last night we all traumatised each other. We’re not really panning out to be a tight knit group who's going to get through this with the power of friendship.”

Ryan buries his face in his hands again. “Fuck, me and you really owe some apologies, don’t we?”

“We? The fuck you mean we, what did I do?” Kaitlyn asks, sounding genuinely confused and a little bit indignant. 

He manages to lift his head to look at her, speaking slowly. “We turned first, we were- we were werewolves in the cages with them, long before they also turned.”

“Okay you might have turned but I didn’t, not until after I watched you try and bite us through the bars. It- it was terrifying, you were like, curled over Dylan. I thought you were going to tear his throat out or something.” She says, her voice beginning as argumentative but tapering off to a concerned waver. Something pitches in Ryan’s stomach.

“I know, I know that. But then you changed, and someone else did too but it wasn’t Abi or Emma. You were in there with them for a while before they also, you know, transformed.”

A look crosses Kaitlyn’s face and she stares at him for a long moment. “Wait, how do you know that? You… remember it? After you turned, you remember what happened?” 

Ryan’s brows furrow and he sits up a little straighter. “Yeah, I remember it, like any other memory. You don’t?”

“No? I remember being in excruciating pain and feeling like my skin was being torn apart from the inside out but then… nothing, like I was knocked out. It felt like waking with a start this morning when I- changed back.” She explains.

“Oh. Hang on, you mean you seriously can’t remember it? And it was like your mind was foggy and you were just following instincts like… an animal? But you can remember it like it was you? Right?” Ryan asks, desperate for her to understand and say that she feels the same. 

Kaitlyn shakes her head slowly, droplets of blood falling from her hair and splattering against the steps and Ryan’s pants. “No, Ryan, I don’t. That’s- that’s pretty fucked up.”

He digs his nails into his palms and tries not to beat his hands into his head. “Yeah, it is.” He says, gritting his teeth once the words are out.

“What- what happened? When we were werewolves.” She asks hesitantly. 

“We fought, or at least we tried to, I mean. Me and you, I don’t think anyone else… I didn’t seem to be very focused on anyone else though, so I don’t know. We snapped at each other through the bars, got zapped and then just… growled. I grabbed Dylan with my claws, I had to have- it had to have hurt. And you… you were sniffing at Emma and Abi and- I’m just saying we had to have terrified them.”

Kaitlyn takes a moment before she speaks again, breathing deeply in what Ryan thinks is an attempt to keep herself calm. “I guess we do owe apologies then. Fuck, I can’t image being stuck in the cage with those… when we were… God.”

“Yeah.” Ryan says. “How do you even- even begin to apologise for that? What can you say?”

“I don’t know, I honestly don’t. We have to say something though.”

“I know.”

They lapse into another quiet until the sound of a humming motor and crunching gravel reaches their ears. The patrol car turns onto the driveway, pulling up just in front of the steps. Travis opens the front door, standing to look at them.

“Hop on in the back, let’s get you to your friends.” He says sternly, motioning for them to get up.

With legs that are simultaneously stiff and shaky, Ryan stands. He offers an arm to help Kaitlyn up and she takes it, her knees buckling for a moment before she locks them. They make their way to the back of the car and Ryan pauses as he looks down at the door, his eyes catching on the bright red blood streaks on the white paint of the handle. He wipes his hand against his shirt in an attempt to not contribute any more, but his shirt is just as drenched with it. He sighs, pulling the door open.

Plastic has been laid out to cover the seats and it makes a horribly annoying sound as Ryan sits down on it. He looks at the seatbelt and the blood crusted into it before deciding against it. It’s barely a three minute drive and Ryan doesn’t think his shoulder would let him bend that way anyway. Travis doesn’t seem to notice, as the tires skid against the gravel and they back out onto the small road. 

Ryan’s mind is stuck on the thought of the seatbelt. Travis will have to scrub this car inside and out to hide that they’ve been in it. This is his cruiser, something that he uses for work- he’s risking a lot to let it be covered in enough blood to be considered a crime scene.

In fact, letting them return at all, harbouring them in his basement and letting them paint the walls with gore, is all an incredible risk. One that he doesn’t have to take. He hasn’t changed his mind since yesterday, yes Travis owes it to them and he would be the biggest arsehole in the world to turn them away now. But he’s actually under no actual obligation to do these smaller things to make it easier for them. Under no obligation to stay up all night to watch them to make sure they’re safe, to drive them back to the lodge so they don’t have to walk, to let them stay in the lodge at all when he could by all means have them go to the hotel. Since they’ve returned he’s only spoken to them in short, barked out orders. He doesn’t ask if they’re okay or offer any semblance of kindness. But he doesn’t have to, his actions are more than enough.

Ryan doesn’t think Travis is a good man. He’s done too many bad things, justified too many bad things, to ever be considered morally pure ever again. But he isn’t a bad guy either. Everything he did was for family and then when he had no more family, he’s turned around and helped the people who need it the most but deserve it the least in his eyes. Travis owes them, but they owe Travis too.

“Thank you.” Ryan says, his voice laden with exhaustion but so earnest it almost surprises himself.

From the rearview mirror Travis looks at Ryan in shock and a hint of confusion. “What did you say?”

“I said thank you. For sheltering us last night, for staying up to watch us, for driving us home. Thank you.”

Travis makes a noise in the back of his throat and just before he looks back to the road, Ryan sees how much he didn’t expect that in his eyes. He doesn’t respond, focusing on the road for the last minute of their drive. Ryan doesn’t need him to respond or to even care- he just needed him to know.

They reach the end of the long driveway to the lodge and Kaitlyn is practically out the door before it has even fully stopped. She’s stumbling up the steps by the time Ryan pulls his own door open, standing up on unsteady legs. His shoes are unbalanced on the stones, his ankles wobbling dangerously as he makes his way towards the stairs. He’s just placed his hand on the bannister when a voice calls out from behind him.

“Ryan.”

He turns back and sees Travis standing behind the front door of the patrol car, his mouth twisted like it was a curse just to say his name. He clutches something in his hands, glancing down at it before he looks back up to Ryan with a hard stare.

“You turned first last night.” He swallows loudly. “Caleb, he always turned first too.”

Ryan’s hand tightens his grip on the bannister, his legs growing even weaker. He nods mutely, the small movement making his spine ache.

Travis opens his mouth to continue before he closes it again and looks back down to the object in his hands. He seems to switch tracks in his mind, visibly steeling himself before he speaks, his jaw taunt. 

“Chris talked about you, enough for me to remember your name. He cared about you, said you were a good kid- a good camper, even better counsellor. A positive influence on Caleb.” His chin gives a slight twitch to the side. “And you killed him. He didn’t even get a funeral.”

A thick feeling of grief and self loathing crawls up Ryan’s throat and creates a lump there, before it continues upwards under his cheeks and into his tear ducts, burning his eyes. He doesn’t trust himself to speak and so he just nods again.

“This was his journal, he kept it to try and work out everything he could about the curse. Six years of his thoughts, of what was happening, written down in here. I want you to have it.” He says, holding it out for Ryan to take.

Ryan hesitantly walks back, reaching out for the journal. Travis hands it to his overtop the door and Ryan hands drop an inch as he grabs it. It’s a thick book, with tabs sticking out the sides and coffee stains on the cover. It’s far too heavy, carrying the weight of a dead man’s thoughts within.

“Why- why are you giving this to me?” Ryan asks, his voice choking up.

“It might help you work out what’s going on, what’s going to happen or what might help.” Travis says and after a deep breath his voice drops a pitch, to seething hiss. “And when it does, I want you to finally understand what Chris was going through. That it was exactly what you are going through now. That he wasn’t a monster and he did not deserve to be killed for this.”

Travis makes a short wet sound and then clears his throat. He studies Ryan’s face, the red of his eyes and the tears collecting in his eyelashes. He nods, to himself or to Ryan he isn’t sure, before stepping back and getting into his car. Ryan doesn’t move even as the door slams shut and the motor roars to life, his eyes locked onto the journal in his hands. 

It’s only when a tear drops and soaks into the old, worn red fabric of the cover that Ryan looks up. The patrol car is gone, tire marks in the stones left in its place. He breathes in deeply, the smell of bark, grass, dirt and the forest as a whole filling his lungs. It doesn’t dislodge the painfully sharp lump in his throat.

He keeps his head lowered as he walks through the lodge, his legs straining as he makes his way up the stairs. He tucks the journal beneath the pillow on his couch in the attic, grabbing his entire bag to bring with him downstairs instead of rooting through it with bloodied hands. As he passes the rec room he hears the sound of muffled crying and words, his head hanging lower still.

The bathroom is filled with a warm mist and puddles of water are scattered over the floor. He lets his bag drop with a thud against the cold ceramic tiles. His hand smears blood on the handle of the shower, a heavy clunk and cold spray emerging after he gives it a sharp pull to the left.

His shaking hands grip the bottom of his top, peeling it off himself with some effort. Where the blood has dried the fabric has crusted to his skin and where it remains wet it has grown cold and soggy. It falls to the floor with a slapping sound, his jeans and boxers following just after. 

The stream of the shower is piping hot, searing his skin as it runs rivets over his aching muscles, but he barely notices. His hands manage to run over his cropped hair, down his arms and chest before his legs give out beneath him. He hits the tiles hard, his head knocking against the wall. He leaves it there. Muddied red water pools around his feet, clotted blood cracking on his shoulders. The small cubicle is filling with steam but it doesn’t burn his eyes anymore than his tears already do.

The sound of the shower is just enough to drown out the sound of his sobs. They rip through him until he’s left gasping for air, unable to draw enough in before it’s torn back out with another rasping sob. His hands curl and uncurl until they’re raised to beat against his head, the consistent pounding in time with his heartbeat. It spreads a painful warmth over his temples and into his skull, the repeated thumping of his knuckles grazing the skin and drawing up small beads of blood through the cracks. It just washes away with the rest of it.

Down the drain, red waters and tears flow.

Chapter Text

Sound filters in, the chittering of birds outside the window, the groaning of old wooden beams, the creaking of floorboards just a few feet away. Ryan groggily opens his eyes, a blur of sleep over them. He turns his head towards the stairs where the sound came from, his neck giving a loud crack as his spine realigns from where it’d been bent to accomodate for the small space of the couch.

Kaitlyn stops with one foot on the top step, the creaking noise cutting off with a short and sharp screech. She winces at the sound, looking at Ryan with an apologetic expression. “Sorry, I wasn’t trying to wake you if you wanted to keep sleeping. But there is food downstairs, so maybe it is actually a good thing, if you’re hungry.” 

Ryan buries his face deeper into his lumpy pillow with a noncommittal grunt. It takes his mind, which has just been ripped from a deep sleep, a long moment to register her words but when it does he practically does a double take. 

“Food?” He croaks, his throat raw.

“Yeah, you know, the stuff you eat? It’s downstairs.” She quips before the creaking sound starts back up as she continues her way downstairs. She calls up just as she reaches the second story platform. “If you are hungry, I wouldn’t wait too long. It’s really not gonna last.”

It’s enough to wake his mind up as the mere mention of eating causes his stomach to leap, the deep pain of near starvation like hunger twisting through his guts. It isn’t enough to get his body up and moving however. He feels like he weighs triple his usual body weight, his limbs coated in a thick layer of concrete. 

His leg is hanging over the side of the couch, one of his arms awkwardly bent over the armrest above his head, the other crushed beneath himself. The moth bitten, dust covered couch feels as if it is holding him down, unable to even contemplate pulling himself up off of it.

His muscles ache just as much as before, his throat is raw from sobbing, he’s still exhausted despite his sleep, his skin feels tender from the boiling water and his head feels bruised from beating his fists into it for god knows how long. He feels like he’s been hit by a bus- or more realistically, like he’s transformed into a horrific monster and then had a meltdown in the shower before stumbling upstairs and passing out.

All that and he’s still got to talk to, apologise to, Dylan. Which just adds a mental load that weighs his body down even more. He’s dreading it. Ryan genuinely believes in the power of words but he knows they mean nothing compared to the all too real reality of what Dylan went through.

He can’t imagine how terrifying it must have been to be trapped in that tiny space with a looming, disfigured wolf-like monster. Ryan knew he wouldn’t hurt Dylan. His scent- god his scent - was just as intoxicating to werewolf Ryan as it is to normal person Ryan. It smelt like- like… the words pack and mate whisper in Ryan’s mind and he squeezes his eyes closed, cringing at his own thoughts. God that’s so incredibly fucked up, he’s not a goddamn dog, he mentally chastises the traitorous voice in his head. 

Whatever words his brain uses to describe it, the scent of it meant that even his animal brain knew that Dylan wasn’t to be harmed. He was to be protected and guarded over and- for fucks sake. With the force of his self induced shame, Ryan’s arm is freed from the weight holding it down and he slaps his palm against his face. 

No matter how weirdly his thoughts are describing it now, Ryan knew that he wouldn’t hurt Dylan. But Dylan had no way of knowing that. He was trapped in there with the monster, with Ryan. He felt the fangs graze against his pulse, the snuffling of a snout against his throat, the claws piercing into his shoulder as he was pulled beneath a malformed body. He would have been utterly terrified and it’s all Ryan’s fault.

The only consolation that Ryan has, though it shouldn’t even be one at all, is that before he turned he didn’t do anything too weird. Not outwardly, at the very least. His thoughts may have been a bit… unchaste, in place of a more accurate word, but he didn’t pull a Nick. He didn’t do anything other than hold his hand, didn’t place his hands or lips on him as much as he craved to do so.

God, what has he turned into, to be glad he didn’t assault or harass someone? A monster, that’s what. He’s literally a monster. 

Shame burns through Ryan’s throat and his chest pitches. Cruelly, it brings back with it every other painful emotion from the past night and morning, with the thoughts of that room, Chris and what Travis told him alongside it. 

His eyes begin prickling again before he swallows down a gulp of air, holding it in his chest until his lungs burn. He only releases it when his head begins to grow fuzzy and the pressure of suffocation scorches through his chest. As the air rushes out of mouth, he clicks something in his brain and his shoulders slump and an empty feeling of nothingness floods through him. Every emotion that had begun rising to consume him, shame, guilt, grief, fear- just disappears in an instant. His mind goes blank, the overwhelming flood of thoughts diminishing to splash against his skull as no more than a drop. 

Just like that, with a simple breath in and out with his shoulders slumping, every emotion is gone and god, what a respite it is. He doesn’t exactly know how he does it or how it’s decided when it works, but just as he did now, he’s discovered that he can just make his overpowering, all consuming emotions just… disappear. It’s not something that always works, so he’s so thankful it does now. Sometimes they will only disappear for a second before exploding back into his body, returning to swallow him whole. This time it stays, as they’ve all just vanished, leaving him peacefully empty. 

He may be able to acknowledge that emotions are real now, with Dylan and the scents as undeniable proof. He may be able to acknowledge that he was perhaps wrongly taught to swallow down emotions, to pretend they aren’t there. But he wasn’t taught how to do this. He’s not sure it’s something that could be taught.

The concrete is easier to chip off his body after that. He slowly pulls his arm free from over the side of the couch, clasps his other one against the cushion to help pull himself upright. They ache, but he was wrong, it is a more manageable pain than it was before his sleep. When he stands he sways on his feet for a moment but he stays upright, stretching out his legs and rolling his shoulders. 

He takes a shaky step toward the stairs, rubbing a hand over his eyes, before he pulls to a stop. He turns back, fishing through the sleeping bag for his phone and flicking open the camera, tilting it up to look at his reflection.

Ryan has definitely seen better days. The usual dark shade beneath his eyes has grown darker still, into deep bags. His eyes are a little red rimmed from crying, but it isn’t as noticeable as he thought it might be. A blood vessel has burst in his right eye however, a small red spot reaching out towards his iris. His temples have bruised red and a greyish purple, mottling back into his hairline over his ears. A small piece of dried blood that wasn’t washed out in the shower has cracked over his brow and he picks it apart with his nail until it’s completely crumbled away.

He looks rough, he’ll be the first to admit it. Nothing can be done to change it however and there are no real visible signs of his meltdown, past the bruising, which again he can’t exactly wash away. His head tilts as he lowers his phone. Bruising? Shouldn’t it have healed already, long before it got the chance to bruise? Who fucking knows, Ryan’s far too tired and hungry to question it.

He shambles downstairs, his socks sliding over the hardwood planks. Going down the two flights of stairs causes the muscles in his legs to twinge painfully but it’s a far easier task than it had been earlier. He swerves right, towards the kitchen and the sounds of life coming from within it. His hand presses against the door which has been left ajar, breathing in one last steadying breath. 

“-coming down now, stop worrying.” He hears a stifled voice say and his brows inch downward as he pauses. No other words come though and so he pushes in with a shoulder.

His eyes immediately narrow in on the rather random selection of food that has been spread out over the centre island, his mouth watering and stomach groaning. Toast and spreads, breakfast cereals, slices of cheap pre packaged pizza and pie, fruit and even an entire precooked chicken have been thrown onto the bench with no effort put into trying to hide what a bizarre collection it is. Nearly all of the group is gathered around it, grabbing whatever they want with no need for plates or utensils. Ryan pulls up between Dylan and Abi who stand a little further away, closest to the door, where they’re watching the others.

Abi startles terribly when his arm brushes against hers and he sends her an apologetic look and murmurs, “Sorry”. He isn’t sure if she catches either though, as her arms wrap around herself and she ducks her head, directing her gaze to the floor.

Dylan shuffles a step away to make room for Ryan between them and glances at him for half a second, his brows dipping, before his eyes return back to wistfully gazing at the food. “Came down for the feast? Royalty would be jealous of this banquet.” 

Ryan side eyes him before he answers. Dylan wears a neutral expression, only a slight twitch to his lips as he sarcastically jokes. The mask is fixed in place, sewn to his skin with tight knots. “Yeah. Honestly it could be bowls of cold soup and I’d still be first in line.” He says trying to joke back, but his words come out a little too honestly.

“Think you missed your chance at first in line.” Dylan says, nodding towards where Jacob stuffs a chicken drum into his mouth, barely bothering to only eat the edible meat part of it as he gnaws his teeth down on the bone and tendons.

Even as he snorts his agreement, Ryan steps forward, fishing a slice of lukewarm pizza from the bench and fitting nearly the entire piece into his mouth as he bites just shy of the crust. It may be rude to just shovel food in his mouth instead of actually answering but he needs to get something into his stomach before it consumes itself or screams in protest loud enough for the others to hear. Also privately, Ryan can admit he isn’t really prepared to speak properly to Dylan yet, the guilt welling up within him the second he so much as glances in his direction.  

The others around the island look up at his sudden presence beside them, giving half hearted grunts of acknowledgment and greetings as they continue eating. Laura, who leans against the furthest counter with a pile of collected food in front of her, glances up with a sniff. She studies Ryan for a moment and he gives her a quizzical look back before she slides the notebook over to her and begins scribbling something down within it. He scoffs, picking up more bits and pieces of various food. It was a rude gesture- she is definitely growing to see them as test subjects rather than friends or whatever else she actually considers them as.

As he continues to swallow down everything he’s grabbed, he suddenly looks back to Abi and Dylan in confusion. “Did you two already eat?” He asks, his words slightly muffled as he pushes his current mouthful into his cheek to speak.

“Uh, no, not yet.” Dylan says as Abi shakes her head at the ground.

“You’re not hungry?” Ryan asks, finally swallowing to speak clearly. 

“ Starving .” Dylan borderline moans before realising what he said and embarrassedly clears his throat. “Uh, I am, I was just- waiting?”

He sounds confused with his own answer and reasoning, his head twitching sideways like he only just realised he had been waiting in the first place. Ryan shakes his head slightly to himself- those two must be really out of it, the residual shock hitting them especially hard. He waves a hand at them, moving to the corner of the island and gently nudging Emma to move over to make some room for them. 

“No need to wait, come have something to eat.” He instructs kindly, pulling whatever’s closest towards them.

Like they’ve been jolted back into life, the two of them practically scurry over, hands immediately reaching for whatever they can. The group lapses into a total silence, the irritating sound of chewing and scraping bowls barely registering in Ryan’s ears as he finally fills his empty stomach.

He tries not to look at anyone- their red rimmed eyes and dark circles are a harsh reminder that he doesn’t need right now. They’re all dressed in sweats, hoodies or tshirts, their hair mussed up from just getting out of bed. Even though they’re now all cleaned of the blood that soaked in their skin and caked over their faces, he feels like he can still see the red of the gore and the coloured light washing down over them.  

Their sleep, which considering where the sun hangs low in the sky, must have lasted a good ten hours or so, seems to have let everyone collect themselves a little. There's no longer the sniffling of held back tears, the full blown balling sobs or the sound of harsh breathing. There’s no longer the shaking or tensely held bearing of their bodies. It doesn’t reek of terror and horror anymore, just a muted smell of shock.

There’s a disconnect between the sight of them now and the sight of them in the early morning. From practically naked and covered in gore while locked in cages, to standing around the kitchen in soft pyjamas with hair and skin scrubbed clean. He knows no one has just forgotten or moved on, it’s just that the mind can only exist in a state of absolute horror for some time before it exhausts itself and empties to only consider how starved they have grown to feel. It’s just a strange contrast. 

He’s actually starkly reminded of a quote from a novel he read years ago, one he thought he’d forgotten about, lost in the millions of words he devoured within the small space of his school library. It was about wounds and how we cannot sit and stare at them forever. He didn’t appreciate it at the time. He’d thought the quote, really the novel in its entirety, was clichéd and pretentious. How else does one heal, if not to assess the damage done? If not to feel the warmth of blood pumping between fingers out of severed veins and the slowing beat of a heart losing strength, how do they know they have wounds at all? Perhaps it was his upbringing and having never done so before, but Ryan’s always thought it would be much more cathartic to weep, grieve, and allow himself to break. To sit with it for as long as it lasts, for all time until he’s wasted away, if that’s how long it takes.  

He thinks he can appreciate it now. If words can paint an image, that quote is what he sees drawn in front of him with precise detail. They’ve washed themselves clean of the night, rested their weary heads and now they’ve pushed themselves back up, wiped the tears from their eyes and faced the warmth of daylight, no matter how close it is to setting once more. Never mind that each day past brings them a night closer to living through that horror all over again, they keep living through it anyway. What else is there to do? The wounds aren’t something they can sit and stare at even if they wanted to, there is no visible scar or injury to see. They look so strangely normal, even if they don’t feel it. It doesn’t look like they just went through the most painful, terrifying experience of a lifetime. They just look like normal, exhausted kids, eating a patchworked dinner at the graveyard of a summer camp they once felt so safe in.

They eat and eat until the whole countertop of food has been reduced to nothing but crumbs and scraps. Ryan’s grandmother would be proud- it doesn’t matter how much muscle he gains, how broad his shoulders grow, she’s always scolding him to eat more, to finish off another plate. If they’d been using plates, or utensils at all, he probably would have gone through five. Nothing he ate worked well with whatever next mouthful he took and its all left an odd taste in his mouth but that doesn’t matter in the slightest, as he finally doesn’t feel like he’s starving to death. 

The group standing around the kitchen to see the true final disappearance of the food has diminished significantly. Laura left first with her nose in the notebook and Max trailing hot on her heels with an entire arm full of food. Emma left next and after looking torn between the food and her departure, Jacob followed her.  Nick excused himself quietly, bidding Ryan and Kaitlyn goodnight. Now only Dylan, Abi, Kaitlyn and himself remain.

Abi reaches for the very last remaining scrap of pie before hesitantly drawing her hand back and looking at the rest of them. Ryan nods in a ‘go ahead’ gesture, despite how he’d been eyeing it up himself. She scoops it up and it’s gone in a flash, truly leaving nothing more than a crumb on the counter. 

“I think that was the weirdest meal I’ve ever had.” Dylan says. “This is what my mum is convinced I’d eat if I moved out. Minus the fruit of course.”

Kaitlyn laughs, a light sound that is so out of place in the solemn air around them. “You haven’t had a weird meal until you’re seven years old at Jacob’s house, boiling up a massive pot of noodles for dinner and pouring in kool aid from lack of any other flavouring.” 

“Uh, what?” Abi says, sounding equal parts confused, disgusted and concerned.

Kaitlyn seems to realise she said something she perhaps shouldn’t have and gives a fake, tight lipped smile. “We were- we were just stupid kids, you know, making potions out of leaves and a puddle kind of vibe.” 

They unconvincingly nod their understanding and it goes awkwardly silent. Kaitlyn brushes some crumbs off the counter, looking at the rubbish and platters. “Alright well someone’s gotta clean this all up. Mind helping me Abi?”

“Yeah okay.”

Kaitlyn scoops up the plastic the pizza came in, sending a playfully scathing, expectant look at the two boys. “Well if you're not helping you’d better scram.” 

Dylan raises his hands in surrender, turning on his heel to leave. Ryan hesitates before he moves to follow, wondering if he should stay and clean up- totally not in a procrastinating way. Kaitlyn gives a sharp jab of her chin towards Dylan’s back and widens her eyes at him, silently yelling at him to talk to him. He swallows his anxiety and hangs his head, turning to follow.

He steps out into the mess hall and almost feels lost, as it seems Dylan has managed to just completely disappear. He begins counting his lucky stars before he chastises himself. His uncomfortable nervousness is not more important than the horror and terror he put Dylan through, he’s being selfish. He does genuinely have no idea where Dylan went however.

It takes a moment for him to remember that even if he doesn’t have signal and can’t just send him a quick text to work out where he is, he does have a new, rather accurate close quarter locator now. Ryan breathes in deeply through his nose and instantly catches that sweet scent. It wafts through the air, left behind from Dylan sweeping through. Though it is thicker… this way.

He steps forward, following his nose, but his journey is ultimately a very short one as he’s just led a few metres to the door of the library. Ryan curls his hand around the handle, making sure that his emotions are all either tightly contained or completely disappeared from the shoulder loosening breath he exhaled earlier. He softly pushes inside, refusing to let himself stall any longer.

Dylan sits on the couch, much like he was the first night Ryan found him in here. The sky in the window behind him is coloured amber, casting the room in a warm glow. His subtly sweet scent fills the space, just a slight bit too sour to carry that head fuzzy aura. It almost feels heavy, like a fog in the room rather than the alluring light mist that has been in moments past. He looks over to Ryan from under long eyelashes, brown eyes catching the light and turning honeyed. 

“Mind if we talk?” Ryan asks, worrying his bottom lip with his front teeth. 

He, stupidly, hasn’t written out a mental script of how this conversation would go as he usually would. He wants to be authentic, and frankly he has no fucking clue what Dylan might say, so he thought he’d forgo his usual process for this apology. However it leaves him feeling like he’s about to step off into the deep end of the pool, unable to swim and with no lifeguards nearby.

“Uh yeah, if you want.” Dylan looks away, out the window. He suddenly expands, unnecessarily. “I wasn’t doing anything anyway, just thought I’d come and sit. Soak up the last of the rays.”

Ryan doesn’t miss the nervousness he’s hiding beneath his tone or the way he is restlessly shifting in his seat on the couch. He steps forward, rounding past the bookshelf that partially blocks the view of the couch. Dylan immediately shuffles over to the tucked away corner and Ryan sits down in the same place he did that first night, looking to the door as he gathers the courage to speak.

“I just thought we should talk… about last night, you know? And this morning I guess too. I wanted to apologise.” He starts cautiously.

Dylan makes a small “mhp” sound like he hadn’t even thought about it and doesn’t really mind either way if they talk about it or not. A bold, unconvincing lie. Even if he were blind and couldn’t see the way his lips twitch and he picks at a loose thread on his socks, he still has his sense of smell. His sense of smell that is suddenly filled with the tangible scent of anxiety and apprehension. Ryan continues.

“It must have been terrifying and I am genuinely so sorry that you had to go through that. That- that I put you through that. I can’t imagine how terrifying that must have been and if I had known, then…” Then he doesn’t know what he could have done to change what happened. If he wasn’t in the cage with Dylan then he would have just traumatised someone else. Fuck, there’s really nothing they can do to make any of this easier is there? No matter what, someone’s getting hurt.

“Oh you know, it wasn’t so bad. What’s nearly being mauled by a werewolf when you went to public school anyway?” Dylan jokes with a forcefully light breath of laughter.

Ryan sighs and turns to face him, bending a knee to lie in front of him atop the couch cushion. He searches Dylan’s face and only finds that neutral expression that hides all of his true thoughts and feelings behind it. Unable to physically pry the mask from his skin, Ryan settles on speaking in a slow and serious tone. 

“Dylan, I'm being serious. Let me talk to you, really talk to you- to the real you. Ryan-Ryan to Dylan-Dylan. Please.”

Dylan almost physically recoils. His eyes suddenly skip away from Ryan’s, flitting about anywhere other than him. His shifting increases tenfold, until he finally settles on just pulling his hoodie up over his knees, trapping them against his chest and completely swallowing the entirety of his gangly legs within the oversized top. His hands continue to flutter about, picking at threads, hangnails and stains on the fabric of his hoodie. For a short moment they hover over his chest and do a small shake before they’re quickly returned to their useless mission of destroying any poor thread in their way. It’s a purposeful mission, to keep them occupied. 

Ryan watches him with a heavy consideration, observing each movement and action that Dylan makes in this short pause. That faint connection he’d made this morning sinks into a full on realisation in his mind. In an instant his entire understanding of who Dylan is changes and everything about him suddenly makes a lot more sense. He’s not surprised he didn’t see it before, but now that he does, it’s so clear. 

Ryan opens his mouth to broach his observations before he resolutely closes it again, his teeth clicking against each other. If he’s the first to make this realisation then it would almost certainly be taken poorly if he blurted it out. Unless Dylan or someone else brings it up first, then Ryan will keep this to himself for now, whether that’s a necessary decision or not. 

Even without mentioning it out loud, Ryan can privately admit it is so completely fascinating to see Dylan’s mask slip off. In a rather heartbreaking way. Seeing the way his posture shifts, his mannerisms close and open up in different areas, his eyes suddenly grow allergic to contact with any others, the air growing vulnerable and honest around him. Curiously, even when the bulk of the mask falls away, he still clings to the straps. It’s evident in how he all but sits on his hands and the way he plants his feet to keep himself still. It’s something he has clearly been taught, whether consciously or unconsciously, much like Ryan and his beliefs around emotions. Perhaps they are not so much polar opposites as he initially thought. 

“The real me? This- this is the real me man.” Dylan says once he has finally seemed to settle himself enough to be comfortable- be that either physically or psychologically.

“Now it is.” Ryan says in half agreement, which earns him an unimpressed scoff and an eye roll.

Dylan blows the air out between his lips and then heaves a sigh, his voice dropping to an exhausted, slow tone. “Yeah, it is. So talk ahead.” 

Ryan steadies himself, forcing himself to speak instead of waiting to draft up a script that would be so useful right now. “Not to like, put the burden of this conversation on you or anything, and if you really don’t want to then we don’t have to talk and-” He cuts his own ramblings of assurances off. “I was just hoping you could talk to me, about what happened. If you wanted to. Because I am really, really sorry Dylan. I know that doesn’t mean anything because they’re just words and can’t change what happened, but-”

Ryan’s almost glad when Dylan cuts him off because he was just going to keep going until he ran out of breath. This is what happens when he doesn’t make a script beforehand. He just keeps rambling, desperately trying to find any and every combination of words to express what he’s feeling, none of them quite right. He’s a reader, not a writer- he’s never been able to succinctly and accurately turn his thoughts into words, especially when it comes to emotions. He just has to pray that his point gets across, as faithfully as it can.

“It doesn’t mean anything.” Dylan agrees and whether intentionally or not, he cruelly lets his words sit for a moment before he continues far more earnestly. “Because there’s really nothing to apologise for. I wasn’t expecting you to turn into a golden retriever or something, we knew what was going to happen. You know? Like I knew it wasn’t you, it’s not on you, like as yourself now.”

Ryan could end the conversation here. An easy job done, he apologised and Dylan didn’t even have to accept because he doesn’t think there is anything to apologise for. It’s not that simple though and Ryan knows it, even if Dylan doesn’t. He’s not just going to take the easy way out, they need to have this conversation- Ryan needs to have this conversation. 

“Uh, that’s kinda the thing… It was me, in a way. Like I remember it. So I know it wasn’t just like, sitting in the same cage as you, I- I… really scared you, hurt you.” He can hear his own guilt lacing between his words, a thick thing that makes them come out slow.

Dylan nods his head ever so slightly, swallowing thickly. He doesn’t speak for a few seconds, a few seconds that painfully slowly draws out to a few minutes as Ryan watches him process. 

“Okay, you remember it, cool cool.” He glances at Ryan before his eyes immediately flick away again. “I don’t. But uh, yeah. Beforehand, it was pretty stressful. Did you… did you know what you were doing? At the time, I mean.”

“I knew what I was doing, but I guess not really why? It was like looking through glass. It was like, uh. Like my thinking went away, or was foggy, like I’d just woken up and my brain hadn’t quite caught up yet. I was me but I wasn’t… me? I just had strong instincts and I followed them immediately, before I even knew what they were.” Ryan explains, to the best of his ability. 

“But now you-you know what you were doing. You can remember doing it.” Dylan says to confirm.

Ryan ducks his head. He’s secretly thankful that Dylan is unable to even really look at his face, let alone hold eye contact without his mask on. “Yeah. That’s why I’m really sorry.”

After another lengthy pause Dylan says, “Well I mean, I don’t really know what to say. That’s genuinely insane that you remember but it doesn’t really- well it doesn’t really change anything does it? At least not on my end it doesn’t.” 

“You know it’s been a rough day when even Dylan doesn’t know what to say.” Ryan observes, only considering it as a joke when Dylan gives a light laugh that draws out his own small grin.

“I really don’t, I mean okay it was you but it wasn’t like, you . It was werewolf Ryan and as scary as he is, he didn’t hurt me or anything, so... Nothing to apologise for.” Dylan says with a genuine expression and a shrug of his shoulders.

Ryan distinctly remembers his claws piercing through Dylan’s shoulder, but he won’t argue that point. Instead he says, “Okay, no apology needed but you must have a lot to say. If you want to talk, I’m listening to every word.” The gentleness of his own words surprises him but he truly means every single one of them.

They must surprise Dylan too as his eyes snap to Ryan, searching every inch of his face- all expect his eyes. Ryan feels himself be considered, deeply so. He has no idea what Dylan finds in that drawn out study but eventually he looks away again and hooks his chin over his knees tucked beneath his hoodie.

He opens and closes his mouth a few times and finally Ryan believes him from when he said he doesn’t know what to say. Ryan almost thinks that he’s decided he doesn’t want to speak at all when Dylan finally sighs and words rush out of his mouth in an rather expressive but awkward, stumbling stream that continues to flow until it’s a torrent of unending words.

“It was just, you knelt forward and I thought like, oh we’re all going to turn now, okay. But then you hrm, exploded and- and no one else did.” He gives a short humourless laugh. “So then I was like oh okay, well I’m not going to be eaten, right? But then you came right up to me and I felt your teeth against my throat and I thought- well I wasn’t really thinking, honestly.”

Ryan listens closely, nodding along with a genuine sad expression. Dylan’s method of storytelling isn’t exactly moving per say, but the small hitches of breath between words, the dips in tone, the twitches of his chin and lips, all convey far more than waxing poetry’s would anyway. 

“And everyone is asking me if I’m okay, they’re crying and telling me that it’s going to be alright, that you’re not going to hurt me. And you know what I really thought at that moment?”

“What?” Ryan asks quietly.

“I thought to myself, I just wanted them all to shut up . And that’s so fucked up because I mean, they’re were freaking out worrying about me. And I was terrified too but I wasn’t thinking about the teeth against my throat or the claws curling around my shoulder, I was just thinking about how I was on the verge of a nosebleed.” 

Dylan drops his head against the back of the couch, his eyes squeezing shut for a moment before they return to aimlessly flick around the ceiling. He breathes in deeply, evenly, and it’s a sound that Ryan thinks he will forever appreciate more after this morning.

“All I could smell was their terror, and I don’t know, feeling five other peoples fear kinda just made mine feel a little less, I guess, big? I mean like, their fear felt like, more scary or powerful than the own fear that I was feeling. Does that make sense?” Ryan nods his understanding and Dylan nods back, though he thinks it’s a gesture meant mostly for himself. “And so all I can hear is them in the background, I can smell and physically feel their horror, all while you’re practically crushing me and running your teeth over my throat. So I’m terrified on top of their terror and it was just. Too much. I don’t know. I kinda got to the point where I knew that if you were going to eat me you would have already done it, so…”

He sighs heavily, his eyes falling closed once more. His throat is bared with the way his head is craned back against the couch and Ryan watches the way it constricts when he swallows, painfully reminded of how he saw the very same sight through the fishbowl. The very same sight that Dylan now explains from the other perspective of, causing Ryan’s chest to ache. 

“Then I feel the splatter of blood against my neck and I realise that someone else has changed too. And you’re growling through the bars at each other and you pull me under you with your claws but everything already kind of hurt already at that point anyway. It’s like you were… I don’t know, you crushed me.” 

“Sorry.” Ryan mutters and Dylan waves a vague hand out before he continues.

“It was getting simultaneously worse and better I guess, because with each, what group? Of people turning, the overwhelming fear lessened. But I started feeling worse, in pain and sick.” He makes a short humming sound. “The worst part was when everyone had turned but me and Abi. She was freaking the fuck out, sobbing and begging to get out. I kept telling her that it was okay, she was going to be okay, but I could barely even hear myself. It was a little hard to speak when I was getting the air crushed out of me too.”

Ryan gives a small, hollow laugh, as Dylan clearly expects him to. His mind is reeling trying to keep up with his recount of the night, a very different experience from his own. The way Dylan talks, with lightness in one sentence and a dark tone in the next, is so emotionally unsteady that Ryan can barely keep up. Despite this, Ryan is glad to hear the words flow from Dylan’s mouth, as jumbled as they may be. He meant it, when he said he’d listen to every word. Though Dylan may have not had the words earlier, he’s a talker. Ryan knows he needed this and truthfully, Ryan also needed this. To hear Dylan share how he felt, what happened last night through his eyes, is as relieving as it is painful to hear. To hear him speak means that he still wants to be heard.

He’s never felt so much concern and care for one person as he does in this moment. 

“And then I knew I couldn’t hold it off any longer and that it was tearing through my skin. It was the worst pain of my life, and I’ve had body parts hacked off mind you. There was the feeling of my skin shredding and then I woke up this morning. So, yeah, sorry about, you know, how I was.”

As he finishes his story, the air rushes out of his lungs and he gives a small laugh that quickly morphs into a shaky choking sound. He brings his hands up over his knees to bury his face within them, the sound of uneven breathing filling the room. He quickly flips them over, roughly wiping at his eyes with his knuckles, and then running them through his hair. 

Ryan flicks his gaze away to give him the privacy to compose himself, pulling the inside of his cheek between his teeth and grinding down until he tastes blood. He wants to be able to comfort Dylan, draw him into his arms as he did this morning, but he doesn’t have the right. It isn’t about what he wants, as much as he aches to reach out for him, so he settles for words dripping with genuine care.

“That must have been horrific Dylan, I’m so sorry.”

Dylan gives a laugh, a real one, and if it sounds slightly wet then Ryan pretends not to notice. “Can’t say I’d recommend it, zero out of ten stars. My yelp review will be scathing.”

“A yelp review joke in this day and age? You did get your phone back after everything, right? Just so you know, we’re in twenty twenty one, if you didn’t.” Ryan jokes back, despite not really feeling like it. He knows it’s what Dylan needs now however and truthfully he does feel more than rewarded when Dylan smiles, as small of a thing as it may be.

“I’d hope so, for your sake. Otherwise you’re definitely being catfished by an eighty year old cougar.” Dylan says with a disgustingly wet sniff and he wipes his whole hand over his face in a violent motion, both of which Ryan finds concerningly far too endearing. 

“What if that’s exactly my type?” He says, resting his head against the arm he’s slung over the back of the couch, gazing at the boy beside him. 

Dylan makes a face of pure revolution, side eyeing Ryan with a face of judgement. The redness of his eyes, the way his eyelashes are slicked together, separated into thick parts and how the tip of his nose has gone flushed, severely weakens the gravity of the expression. 

There’s just something about him. He isn’t flawless, not in the slightest. He’s messy in the most human way- his hair always flops over his forehead, painstakingly brushed back to only fall again a moment later. There are always wrinkles in his tshirts, worn yesterday and picked up to be worn again the next. Blue splotches always stain his fingers, from a pen twirled between them absentmindedly, unable to be washed out before they’re immediately replaced again. His laughs land on the wrong side of contained and he smiles on the right side of beaming, each and every time. He has a few small cracks in his skin, imperfections that only he could have seen, picked away over the day with a nail until they turned bloody and raw. But how beautiful is that, to have proof that they’re alive and still human enough to be capable of being hurt? If they cannot sit and stare at their own wounds forever, then perhaps they can stare at each other’s and find beauty in them anyway.

“I am sorry for hurting you.” Ryan says after the minutes begin ticking by, his hand reaching out to brush against the fabric of Dylan’s sleeve before he has the mindfulness to bring it back.

“You’ve never hurt me.” Dylan promises him, and though he doesn’t understand how, it is a promise, the truth of his words hanging in a haze in the air around them.

Chapter Text

Ryan closes the door to the library quietly behind him, the hazy, heavy scent contained within wafting over his head before it is cut off completely. He breathes in a deep breath of the clear air, the slight heady buzz that had started to make his body grow lax, beginning to slowly fade away. 

They talked for a little while more about lighter, softer things but eventually Ryan had to excuse himself under the guise of exhaustion. He is tired, but he knows he’s used up all the goodwill of his insomnia for today and he won’t be sleeping for a long while yet. He just had to get out of that room.

Their conversation clearly calmed Dylan, as his scent lost the bitter tang and taste of anxiety. Which Ryan was happy to find of course. It’s just he still hasn’t quite worked out how to stop the more neutral or peaceful state of Dylan’s scent from filling his head and causing that slight dizziness and warmth that alights his chest. Dylan looked so soft in the setting sunlight and his scent was so warming that Ryan had to step out lest he do or say something he shouldn’t.

It was so hard to force himself to get up and leave. He remembers when he was a child and sunk to the bottom of the pool, looking up to see the light streaming through the water in dancing white ribbons and the world above ripping through a glaze of blue. The water was warm and covered him like a blanket, floating deep below the surface where every noise was muffled and the air from his lungs floated past his head in small fragile bubbles. Eventually his eyes would burn from the chlorine and his lungs would scorch from holding his breath, but he always stayed down there for just a moment too long, unwilling to surface just yet and break that feeling of slightly surreal peace. Something about being in that little library, sitting on that small couch, with the curtains drawn open and Dylan beside him, feels exactly the same way. Like peace, and then the fervent knowledge that he cannot stay lest he drown. 

Clearly he isn’t doing well in his task of forgetting about the scent or moving on from his feelings. He needs something to settle his mind, something to put his hands to work so he doesn’t just turn right back around and return to that peaceful haze.

He steps forward, dragging his feet with the effort of forcing himself away. They’re returning home tomorrow. He believes so at least, as Laura seems to have a staunch and terribly annoying habit of only referring to days as their exact date instead of relativity to others, which is much more easily understandable for Ryan’s mind. He’s fairly confident that they decided to only give themselves one day of recovery however and so he might as well go upstairs and pack everything up, a boring enough chore to wipe his mind of what is supposed to be forbidden affection. 

His feet fall heavily on the stairs, each one feeling harder to reach than the next. He hopes the aching in his limbs fades quickly, he’s losing sympathy for the feeling fast. God, he really doesn’t need this aching in his limbs if he’s going to return to work in the next few days. His grandfather would definitely not tolerate Ryan being unable to hold so much as a broom without some sort of an explanation. 

He reaches the walkway and turns into the large space outside the rec room and stairs to the attic, continuing to make his way upwards when he stops. His nose twitches, the very last wisps of the sweet scent left within his lungs completely burning away as dual acidic scents flood in through his nose. He’s more than prepared to ignore it, stepping onto the stairway, when he hears a voice seeped in venom.

It’s Emma’s voice, her exact words not quite clear, but her tone is sharpened with a scathing edge. She’s in the rec room, the door closed. Ryan lingers on the steps in indecision. He has no interest in intruding on whatever argument is occurring behind closed doors, but the tugging in his gut urges him to investigate and make sure everyone is okay. With a spike of acidicness that seeps out under the doorway, he sighs and his decision is made as he steps back down. His hand curls around the handle, pushing inside. 

His eyes immediately land on where she stands in the centre of the room. Her eyes are red, thick tears welling over her lashes and escaping down her cheeks before she has the chance to harshly blink them away. Her lips are twisted in a mean scowl and her nose is scrunched in visible anger. Though it’s not who he expected, it is Nick who stands a good couple metres away from her. He seems just as angry, his jaw held tight and his nostrils flaring. 

It’s their postures that really catch Ryan’s attention however. Both of their shoulders are hunched, their elbows held tight to their ribs and their feet held stiff and straight beneath them. Though he hasn’t seen either of them hold themselves like this before, he’s instantly sure that they are having their own wolf driven standoff. 

However their posture isn’t the same as Kaitlyn, Jacob or even himself held. It is no less hostile, but lacks some of the more overtly aggressive bearing. It’s almost more defensive, like they are protecting something rather than fighting for something. He’s not sure how he gleans that from how they’re standing, but he’s as sure of it as he’s sure of breathing. He just knows, though unhelpfully he doesn’t know what that actually means or signifies. 

“Can’t you just do it? Like seriously, just listen to me!” Emma hisses, her eyes trained to Nick’s with a nasty glare. 

“You do it, you’re the one that’s making a problem out of nothing!” Nick snaps back, his eyes meeting her’s without so much as a blink.

The surge of acidicness within the room is in time with the clenching of Emma’s jaw and in return a choppy, low growl is released from between Nick’s teeth. From Ryan’s perspective it is a rather even stand off, lacking the stakes and the threatening aura that he knows his own holds. To him it’s like watching two puppies fight, clearly an aggravated encounter but not exactly scary from his view. 

He watches them for a while, their spoken argument having tapered off to be solely communicated through body language, scent and growling. They’re totally oblivious to his presence and it makes Ryan wonder just how absorbed he also got when sizing up Kaitlyn and Jacob. He supposes it is a strange sight, now that he’s seeing it from an outside perspective, but he can’t find it within himself to actually find it too weird. There’s just something so natural about these encounters, their bodies shifting to these stances and pouring out these threatening scents on instinct alone. 

He’s content letting it just play out until Nick spits out with a deep rumble, “Stop being such a cunt Emma, you-“

Ryan straightens from where he’s leant against the doorway, taking a heavy step towards them and snapping out in a harsh, steady tone, “Hey, back off, both of you.” 

They whirl around toward him, surprise flashing across their faces. Nick looks back at Emma and takes a threatening step forward before he glances back at Ryan unsurely and harshly shakes his head with a scoff, his posture slackening. Emma’s own posture doesn’t loosen, though her arms raise to protectively cross against her chest and she flicks between looking at Ryan and Nick.

Neither of them speak and with a start Ryan realises that they’re waiting on him to do so. Just as in the van on the way here with the small squabble between Dylan and Abi, he spoke up instinctually to break it up without really expecting it to work. But just as it did then, his words seem to hold far more sway than he thought they would and they wait for him to continue.

He looks between them, at the frustration on their faces and the shame creeping up their necks. He knows how it feels, after the last couple of days, of getting into these standoffs and then seeing other people's reaction to it. Of knowing that you just did something so animalistic and feeling so much shame at how normal it felt. He doesn’t want to make them feel bad for it and there’s no point in asking what they’re doing, as that’s pretty clear. He just needs to know why this started so they can hopefully sort it out without any more posturing. 

He tries to remember what set off his own standoffs. Well, with Jacob it was simply his presence in the library and with Kaitlyn it was being asked to go downstairs. That really doesn’t really help. God, if they just knew why these standoffs keep happening and what they mean , then it would be so much easier to defuse, if not avoid.

“What’s this about, what happened?” He asks, with significantly less steam. 

“Emma just came in and-“

“Nick wouldn’t just-“

They both open their mouths and begin speaking at the exact same time, an overlapping and barely intelligible mixing of words. He holds his hand out, stepping further into the room. Surprisingly both of their jaws snap shut at the action and he tilts his head sideways as they once more expectantly and irritability wait. “One at a time, c’mon guys. No pointing fingers, just tell me what the issue is.” He says diplomatically.

“I just- I wanted the room to myself, just for a moment and Nick refused to leave.” Emma sniffs, her voice wobbling slightly. 

Ryan looks to Nick and he heaves a frustrated sigh. “I was already in bed- or on the couch, you know what I mean. She storms in and tells me to ‘get the fuck out’.”

Ryan takes a deep breath as he tries to consider both sides. For a moment he considers saying ‘get over yourselves and suck it up’ but he knows he couldn’t. Not only did he purposefully insert himself into this when he could have minded his own business and continued upstairs, but they’re emotionally exhausted from a night of pure horror and they probably just need a level head to get them to settle. Also, the way they look at him instils a sense of obligation to sort this out that he doesn’t quite understand but can’t ignore.

“Why did you want the room?” He asks Emma. More information is always better, gives him more to work with.

“B-because I just!” She blows a hiss of air out between her front teeth. “I wanted to change and I just wanted, a- a moment. I don’t even want to be in here tonight I- urgh!”

He considers the tears in her eyes that she tries to fight back and the angry expression fixed on her face. He’d assumed that was from the stand off itself, but now he supposes it’s more likely that she came into the confrontation with it already and that it is what probably set it off. He opens his mouth to ask what’s got her so upset before shutting it again. Again, night of horror. It’s not surprising she’d be emotional, at all.

“You want the room or not?” He asks in slight confusion before deciding on just trying to find a way for them to both have it. “Why don’t we compromise? Emma you could change in the bathrooms or Nick you could step out for a minute. Doesn’t have to take long, you can both stay in here.” He suggests, trying to keep his voice calm, if not delicate.

It doesn’t work. Emma turns around to fully face him, her shoulders hunched up to her ears and her lips twisting into a sneer. Ryan watches as she positions herself into an even more aggravated posture then she’d held against Nick.

“Oh wow Ryan, because we just hadn’t thought of that, had we?” Her voice has dropped back to venomous hiss. “Why don’t you worry about yourself? Those fucking bruises on your head? You have no responsibility over us, sort out your own shit before you try and act as if you know everything that’s going on.”

Oddly enough, even as he is flooded with thoughts and instincts, his emotions remain contained. He doesn’t feel hurt by Emma’s words, as he doesn’t hold them in very high regard. Frankly, they’re not even wrong, even if she is just saying them because she’s emotional and lashing out. Somehow her thick emotions don't raise his own. Her bearing and tone however does alight something within him, a forceful instinct to correct the demeanour she carries towards him.

That’s why he doesn’t try to stop his body from flowing into a stance that comes so naturally he would think it’s one he’s held his whole life. Tightening his jaw and tensing his neck to answer that strain in his throat now feels as natural as the knowledge of how to move his leg to walk, his heavy scent pouring from his pores. His teeth grind together for a single sliding bite, his head tilting as his back straightens and shoulders widen. It’s the very same aggressive, defensive posture he’s held towards Jacob and Kaitlyn. However unlike them, Emma does not shift her own to mimic it.

Instead she watches him with eyes ever so subtly going wide and nose ever so slightly flaring. Her shoulders raise impossibly higher and her elbows bend as if they’re caving under physical pressure. The defiant look on her face flickers and is replaced with a visible uncertainty. 

“Don’t take your emotions out on me, I’m not going to argue with you.” He tells her firmly.

If Ryan could read minds, which he’s slowly beginning to think he might be able to with the way he picks up on the shifts in their body language now, he would almost definitely find a mixture of curses and apologies. Emma seems to be fighting with herself, though he’s not quite sure which way around that is. It’s either that she wants to make a stand against him but is intimidated, or she doesn’t want to fight at all but her instincts are urging her to do so, or perhaps even that she wants to have a normal argument while not wanting to feel the wolf-like aspect of it. It could be all three too, he’s really not sure. What he is sure of is the uncertain expression she wears clashes with her aggressive posture and she’s chewing on her words before she prepares to spit them out.

He shifts slightly, drawing up to his full height and tensing his neck tighter still. He’s preparing for a full standoff, just as he had with Kaitlyn, with gnashing teeth and dark growls. 

Instead with her next breath in, Emma flinches ever so slightly and her nose wrinkles. She turns to look away, her tongue darting out to run over his lips and she hunches in on herself. It’s a clear surrender, any and all aggression gone from her body.

He immediately relaxes, releasing all tension and just like that his instincts are appeased. It is a strange feeling, to answer these instincts which seem like they should be so filled with emotion, without feeling any sort of heavy emotion. His posture would indicate that he’s burning with anger or at least a raised temper, but he isn’t. With Kaitlyn or Jacob perhaps he was, but now that he thinks about it, his emotions and the standoffs aren’t necessarily entirely intertwined, though they certainly seem to influence either half. This felt more like a correction than an even challenge and therefore Ryan doesn’t feel threatened enough to make his emotions rise with it. 

Not only is it strange that he is so calm shifting in and out of wolf driven behaviours, it’s strange to see how much Emma and Nick seem to be pacified after he has announced his presence, words and adjusted his positioning as urged. Emotionally it is still heavy in the room but their behaviour has mellowed significantly. He can taste the embarrassment in the air, but the anger has quickly dropped to near nothing.    

Now that Emma has settled out of the aggressive posture, Ryan says in a much softer tone, “Why don’t you go get changed in the bathrooms and then come take my place up in the attic with Kaitlyn? Gives you both some space. If you give me a bit I’ll clear out of there completely and it’ll be all yours.”

“Where will you sleep?” She says and finally her voice cracks, the tears rolling down her face in thick streams.

“I’ll find somewhere, it’s no issue.” He assures her.

She nods and her arms go to wrap around her waist. She spares Nick a glance, narrowing her eyes slightly at him before she turns around and scoops up her bag. She looks back at Ryan and looks torn.

He waits patiently until she finally swallows down her pride and asks, “Can you take my blankets up? And my uh, my other bags?”

He thinks about making a joke but instantly decides against it. Emma isn’t like Dylan and definitely isn’t looking for the levity right now that he would be seeking. Emma must be really upset to be asking for help in the first place, let alone from Ryan, so he doesn’t want to break that small, tentative trust that she has placed in him. Instead he gives a nod, gesturing to the couch piled high with blankets and she nods back.

He scoops up every blanket and pillow on that couch and leans down to hook his fingers through the rather excessive amount of bags that she owns. Despite the ache in his arms, they’re steady and carry the surprising heavy load without issue, for now at least. He turns back around and sees Emma waiting for him. He nods encouragingly at the door and after a moment to wipe her face and breathe deeply, she walks out of the room.

Ryan moves to follow when Nick speaks up. His voice is filled with hesitation and more than a hint of shame. “I- I wasn’t trying to- I didn’t mean.”

Ryan turns back to look at him and finds him still standing in the middle of the room. His head is slightly downcast and he shifts on his feet. Ryan can imagine that he’s either feeling guilt now over arguing with Emma when she’s clearly upset or shame over the posturing that feels so natural in the moment but degrading when thought about afterwards. Probably both actually. He sighs, adjusting his heavy arm full. 

“Nick, dude, it’s fine. Get some sleep man, we all need it.” He says, waiting for Nick’s slow nod and awkward return to his makeshift bed before he turns and leaves the room.

He hauls all of Emma’s things up the last set of stairs to the attic, dropping them down onto the wooden floorboards and shaking his arms in an attempt to dispel the aches which have turned sharp from the weight. 

Truthfully he wants nothing more than to just collapse down onto the couch and zone out in place of sleeping for the rest of the night. Even after the odd ten hour sleep that he had through the entire day, he’s not only still tired but emotionally exhausted. He still sees the night whenever he closes his eyelids, but now the blood is just red and the cages are just metal.

He doesn’t drop down onto the couch as much as he wants to though. He steps forward and begins picking up his items scattered around the couch, the novel he brought, his headphones, his shoes, his hoodie and so on. It is not boring enough to completely clear his mind as he thought it would be but it’s enough to purposely distract himself. Everytime his thoughts drift towards Dylan, either negatively or positively, the future or the challenging standoffs, he’s able to quickly point them back to whatever’s in his hands.

The soft thuds of footfalls on stairs reach his ears just as he’s pulling his sleeping bag and pillow off the couch. He turns to offer Kaitlyn a short greeting when he catches sight of the expression on her face. “You alright?” He asks, raising to stand.

Kaitlyn makes an exhausted scoffing sound and immediately makes for her own couch, dropping down onto it and covering her face with her hands. 

“I’ll take that as a no.” He says, folding the sleeping bag over his arm. He doesn’t push any further, quietly returning to his task.

It takes her a moment but eventually she turns onto her side and props a hand under her head to hold it up, looking at him with a now unimpressed expression. “I’m fine,” She says with emphasis on the ‘ I’m ’.

He cocks an eyebrow at her and she sighs, as if he’s forcing the information out of her and she isn’t just going to give it up willingly. “I just had to try and console an inconsolable Jacob. He wouldn’t tell me what was wrong so it was doubly an impossible process.”

“Ah.” Ryan says, a connection forming in his mind. “Might have had something to do with Emma. She was also really upset.”

She hums thoughtfully, though her tone is sarcastic. “A lovers quarrel then. Again. Great.”

“Probably why Jacob was able to abandon the food. So he could talk to her.” He suggests. 

“Probably. He was the first to start eating so he didn’t exactly miss out.” She scoffs. 

An annoyed feeling shoots through Ryan’s stomach with that knowledge and he tries to ignore it, as he doesn’t even know why that useless bit of knowledge annoys him so much in the first place. He drops his now folded sleeping bag down beside his bag and his eyes sweep over the now empty- actually not quite empty couch. They hone in on the red journal laying where his feet rested through his sleep. Once more it is too heavy in his grasp and it feels like it burns his fingertips as he tucks it into the front pouch of his bag. He tries to distract himself from the emotions that begin to well up inside him by turning back to Kaitlyn.

“How’d your apology go?” He asks, perhaps insensitively. 

“Tough but ultimately okay.” She admits. “They were clearly super traumatised and Abi was especially a wreck but both of them said I didn’t have to apologise since it wasn’t ‘me’. It wasn’t exactly relieving to hear when I knew they were both just saying everything’s okay even though it’s clearly not.”

“Funny, Dylan said the same thing. The ‘it wasn’t me’ part at least.” 

Kaitlyn rolls onto her back, stretching her arms over top of her head. “Yeah well, they’re all better people than me. I sure as hell couldn’t say ‘oh no problem’ if one of you guys were a whole ass werewolf and stuffed your disgusting face in mine.”

He gives a quiet laugh. “Dylan says he rates it pretty low.”

“But seriously, they really are better people than us, aren’t they? We’re joking about offing ourselves and meanwhile they come along after actually going through the traumatic shit and just say that it’s all alright. I can imagine- or no. I really can’t. God.” 

He can’t voice how horrific he knows it must have been without bringing back unwanted emotions, so instead he picks up Emma’s sleeping bag and copious amounts of blankets and begins making the couch. As he’s tucking them in, a disgusting amount of dust collecting onto his fingers, he hears Kaitlyn roll back over once more.

“What are you doing?” She asks, finally seeming to notice that he’s actually doing something as he moves around his area of the attic.

“You know how I said Emma was really upset? She got into a standoff with Nick. I offered her to sleep up here.” He explains, glancing over to her. “I assume that’s alright?”

Kaitlyn waves a hand vaguely, causing her head to nearly drop down on the couch, hitting her forearm before she lifts it back up. She places her hand back under her cheek and says, “Yeah, yeah totally fine. A standoff?”

Ryan nods before the movement falters out with uncertainty. “Yes and no. It was definitely a ‘standoff’ but it wasn’t like ours, not quite? It was different, different postures and- I don’t know.”

“Oh wait, I actually know what you’re talking about, I think. Like it was a little bit smaller than ours or something? Less overt?” She says, trying to find the right words to explain it.

“Yeah, like that. How’d you know?” He asks.

“Laura and Max yesterday. After you went upstairs they were just bickering the entire time and a few times they got into the whole posturing standoff thing but it was different than ours. Didn’t quite feel as… important? Serious? I don’t know. They definitely didn’t try to bite each other like you did to me afterwards.” She explains before falling into a more joking tone.

Ryan gives her an unimpressed eye roll and makes a vague noise of understanding before he says, “Right. Guess Laura’s already written it down then. Maybe Emma and Jacob got into one?”

Kaitlyn shakes her head and her joking tone is completely gone, replaced with concern. “No, I don’t think so. He was like, genuinely upset, it had to be a personal thing, not just some werewolf posturing bullshit. God, I can’t believe those two are seriously still going over it? I feel like they should’ve moved on by now, bigger fish and all that.”

“They ended things on pretty bad terms and that was before we accidentally got stuck here for a whole ‘nother night. We all know how that turned out.” Ryan says, thinking out loud. “They could’ve been going over it again or maybe they tried to patch things up and it just made things worse. Don’t know.”

“Yeah and there’s no way to know if they won’t tell us.” She sighs, her piece seemingly finished until a few seconds later when she suddenly blurts out resentfully. “Jacob always tells me everything! I’ve known all his secrets since we were five! I don’t get why he suddenly won’t tell me what’s going on.”

Kaitlyn’s lips have twisted to the side and she digs her palm into her cheek, looking more put out than Ryan’s ever seen her. He smiles sympathetically. “He was probably just too upset and utterly exhausted from last night. I’m sure he’ll open up when he feels a bit better.”

“If it’s possible to feel better.” She counters solemnly. “How are we supposed to go home and pretend everything’s okay again?” 

It’s the same point she brought up this morning. It must be really wearing on her mind. He doesn’t have any better suggestions then he did then though and he thinks their joke of offing themselves would wear very thin if it was brought up again. Still, he tries to find some sort of advice to offer her.

“We don’t have to pretend.” He suggests. “Everyone knows we went through something fucked up, they just don’t know exactly truthfully what. I think we’re allowed to be struggling.”

“Speak for yourself. Your mom might be supportive but mine is already hounding me to sign up for college.” Kaitlyn says, equally humorously and seriously. 

“My moms not around.” Ryan says simply before he can think of how flatly it would come across. 

“Shit Ryan, I’m sorry I didn’t mean-“

He cuts her off, instantly feeling guilty. “No, it’s alright, I wasn’t trying to- I just mean, we’re allowed to not be okay, you know? We don’t have to pretend everything’s great.”

She sighs, dropping her head onto her arms before she looks up with a grim expression. “We are pretending, already. Have you noticed that? Everyone is just ignoring it, no one’s talking. And when they do, well you get what happened with Jacob and Emma.”

“Yeah, I have noticed that. It’s like we’re strangers again.” Ryan agrees sullenly, dropping Emma’s pillow down onto the couch.

“Yeah.” She says, her voice so low and sombre. “How’d your- your apology go then?”

Ryan glances down the stairs, straining his hearing to try and catch any approaching footsteps. None come, Emma must be having a shower or a long bedtime routine. Probably doing a fifty step skin care routine or something similar. He lowers himself to the floor, leaning against his bag.

“It went alright, I guess, as alright as things like that can go. I had to break it to him that it was ‘me’ but he still just told me that I don’t have to apologise. We talked, you know, about what it was like?” He tells her, running through the entire conversation again in his mind.

“So he also just said it’s fine.” She says, sounding so tired.

“Mm, yeah but he was definitely being genuine. He was honest, really honest.” Ryan explains. It hits him how open and important their conversation was, especially in contrast to Kaitlyn’s where it was just more pretending.  

“Oh lucky you- guilt free.” She says sarcastically.

Ryan gives another short, contained laugh. “No, not at all.”

Kaitlyn looks at him and he watches as her eyes search his face. He has been scrutinised so many times today that he just accepts it and gives her the couple of minutes she needs to find whatever it was she was looking for. Eventually her brows narrow and she looks off.

“We’re being honest now, you and me.” She says, as if it is something to be thoughtful over.

“Uh, yeah?”

She looks back to him and her expression is so serious that Ryan feels concern build in his chest at what she’s going to say next. Her tone however does not match her expression. It is almost soft and filled with genuine concern.

“I’m worried about them, Ryan. About all of us. We went through something so horrific- we still are, I mean god some of us killed people!” A dark look settles over her face before she pushes through it. “We can’t talk to friends, family or therapists about it because they can’t know the truth.”

Ryan nods, feeling a little more helpless with each word she speaks. She’s right, they are completely and utterly alone with this. 

“But you know, we’re not alone. We have each other. If we can talk to each other. If we can be honest about it.” She says, suddenly switching courses. “And Ryan, I’m being honest with you. Dylan is honest with you. This morning you helped up Nick and Jacob and walked us out of the house.” 

“So?” Ryan asks, not really getting her point. 

“So? You’re talking to us, being honest. Keep doing it, start doing it with purpose or whatever. You know, lead by example and all that. I know you’re going through it just as much as the rest of us, but I don’t know, you have this ‘ aura ’ now and- and. If you stepped up, I’d be right behind you, is what I’m saying.” She says this so intensely that Ryan doesn’t just discard her words as he would have done otherwise.

Still, he isn’t convinced. With a slightly wry tone he says, “So what, you want me to- to what? Talk to them? Get them to open up? You seriously want the autistic kid talking to everyone, checking in and making sure they’re okay?” 

It does manage to make Kaitlyn laugh. “Yes, I do. Listen, maybe it’s counterintuitive, but maybe that’s what makes it work. When you do talk, you say the honest, right things. Not just the kind things or the funny things or the tough love things. You have a unique perspective and I think it’s a perspective that could really help now.” 

He gives her a doubtful look and she sighs. “Listen if you don’t want to even consider it, I get it, completely. I’m not about to try and sort any of their shit out, I’d just end up being mean and making everything worse. But if you do try and talk to them, get them to be honest- I think you could really change things, for the better. If you want to try and bring all these idiots together, then I’m with you. I’ll try and help out, whatever that means. I just don’t think pretending and being strangers is going to make this easier on any of us. But if that’s what it is, then I guess that’s what it is.”

There’s one word that she says that sticks out to him. Change . Such a boring, common word that’s used every day for thousands of different things. It feels like it means something new now though, something important. He’s not sure that he’s convinced in the slightest, but he isn’t throwing her words out either. He’s not throwing out that word- change.

He breathes in a deep breath, something he seems to be doing so often nowadays. “I don’t know, I’ll think about it, I guess. I just don’t think I could get all of them to open up or be honest or whatever. I’m just- why would they listen to me or what would I even say, you know?”

“You can only try.” She agrees. 

They lapse into a thoughtful silence until Ryan hears the faint footsteps below them move onto the stairs and then the second story walkway. He pushes himself upright, his limbs twinging with the effort of it. He scoops up his bags, once more looping them together to hold in one hand, grabbing his sleeping bag and pillow until his arms are full. Emma emerges from the stairs, her hair dripping droplets of water over the wood and her skin slightly pink from what Ryan assumes must have been a very hot shower. 

Her eyes are still a little bloodshot but she looks a little more put together, at least outwardly. She pulls the sleeves of her hoodie over her hands, pawing at the bag slung over her shoulder. “I can still sleep up here?” She asks.

“Yeah, just on my way out now.” Ryan says, looking at both Kaitlyn and Emma with an awkward wave at his waist from the load in his arms. “Night.” 

Kaitlyn gives her own wave back and one last lingering serious look. “Night Ryan.” 

He glances over at the couch and then over the floor of the attic, making sure that he has all of his belongings before he turns and walks downstairs. As he passes the rec room he tilts his head ever so slightly and sniffs in through his nose. It is silent inside, free of the acidic smell of Nick, though that has now been replaced with a sooty smell that he clearly recognises as Jacob’s. It is upset, though with how faint it is he cannot know exactly in what way.

He continues down to the ground floor and pauses. The sun has now set, darkness blanketing the inside of the lodge in a heavy, shadowed quilt. There’s a soft yellow outline in the darkness however, a broken rectangle from the light seeping out the cracks of the door of the library. He considers it for a long moment. It calls to Ryan, not just from within him but the outward slight hint of that sweet scent. It’s like an addiction, he’s craving just one more hit of being in that warm room, with that drunk like sense from the scent and the peaceful comfort of Dylan’s presence. 

But if he’s going to follow along with this analogy, then he’s trying to get sober. If he knows it’s cruel to longingly regard him, then he should know it’s just as cruel to seek out his company to indulge in that feeling of fanciful intimacy. Dylan said so himself that he tucked himself away in that room to get away from the others, Ryan can’t be so narcissistic to intrude upon that space anymore than he already has. If he wants to be a normal friend to him as the others are, then he cannot let himself steal away sweet moments that only make him crave them more.

With slower, heavier steps, he forces himself to walk to the couch and drop his belongings down beside it. With arms that have grown to ache just as much as they did this morning again, he sets out his sleeping bag and pillow. Falling down onto a couch has never felt so earned, even if it is only hours since he last lay on one and has done nothing more than talk in that time between. 

He cannot sleep, he knows that even before he closes his eyes. He doesn’t have the energy to read though and so he lies, hoping insomnia is not so cruel as to plague him tonight.

He tries desperately not to think of what Travis said, the journal burning a hole through his bag, the feelings and memories of being a beast, the knowledge of what he put Dylan through or the emotions that nearly consumed him in the shower. Instead he thinks of that one word that has been struck in bold across his mind ever since Kaitlyn said it. Curiously, beneath it in fine print are the words Emma spat at him and the truth within them. One word in particular, much like the one word that stuck out to him that Kaitlyn said. Emma may have just said them to get a rise out of him or perhaps she knew they were true, just not how true. Either way, she did make an interesting point- they both did. 

The title and fine print made from their words blur into one concept, the concept of change and responsibility. The concept of change begins with what is and ends with what if. The concept of responsibility begins with the lack of and ends with the growth of. They’re closely intertwined, in this idea of what either means to him now.

Ever since he first left the quarry with this curse in his veins, he’s felt these strong urges, like a whispered voice in his head urging him to act on a more animal nature. Such small things at first, that he barely noticed they were there. As they grew, he kept a tight grip on them, so adamant against letting this curse and anything that comes with it rule him. 

Then he let himself answer it, really answer it. First it was yesterday, to win the standoff with Kaitlyn and then every single call up to and after when he let the transformation take over instead of fighting it off. Since then, he’s felt that they have quickly shifted from urges to more like an intrinsic gut feeling. Like he knows what he should do and just does it, even if it doesn’t make sense or isn’t necessarily the most polite thing to do. Even if it isn’t something he would have once done. Particularly the urges that change his behaviour towards the group. The urges to protect, comfort and lead. To correct, reprove and contend. It’s morphed into a point where he doesn’t know where the wolf instincts start and his own old intuitions stop. 

Already that is change and responsibility intertwined, the growth of both, like vines curling up between his rib cage. Human contrasted against animal, growing to be one and the same. So he thinks of that title and fine print and how he has read them before, even if he didn’t realise he was following them line by line as if they were instructions from within.  

Emma said he has no responsibility over them. But hasn’t he already been taking it anyway? How much care does he have to take for the others before it is a responsibility over them, before it is considered some type of obligation to help them forward? Until he knows it is just something has to do, for himself and them?

Kaitlyn suggested that he can create change for the better. But what about the change he has already made? How much does he have to change before he is something completely different, before it is considered some type of death? Until the first half of him, the original human half, has died?

In the past he held no responsibility over others, nor particular care either, secure in how his mind was his entire world. He would not have stared down Jacob. He would not have snapped his teeth at Kaitlyn. But in the past he may have not helped Jacob up out of the cage, too wrapped up in his own pain. In the past he may not have cared to ask if Abi and Dylan have eaten, considering it their own concern to manage. In the past he certainly would not have stepped between Emma and Nick. 

Change for the better on the other hand is a term he would have once believed in. But he has started to doubt whether it really has to be good or bad, if it is always fundamentally one of the two or whether it can just be. He’d thought it must be the former, when he’d only just begun to feel these new instincts rising up. He did not want any connection to the curse, to the vicious beast within him, to accept it for what it is- because then surely it meant he had always been a monster in the first place, to be okay with such a thing. It is a curse, a malignant venom running through his blood and transforming him completely, from his eyes to his nose to his mind. Ryan does not see any goodness in it, not in the blackened veins or sharpened fangs made for killing. Accepting it felt like giving up. Accepting it felt like seeing the future and renaming it the inevitable, choosing not to stand against it for one more day, as braver men would. Accepting it felt like hopelessness.

Now he’s already changed and it doesn’t feel like hopelessness. He does not feel like a monster. He does not feel like he has lost any old part of himself, he does not feel any less human. He has just stopped resisting the changed parts of himself, the not quite human. It has let him step up and take that responsibility that the group needs so desperately now. Perhaps it should scare him, not just how easily he gave up on fighting it but how easily he has begun to accept it. But where does it stop being hopeless yielding to the inevitable monster inside and begin freeing it, bridging the gap between his old self and new?

He doesn’t know what all this change means for him but he knows he doesn’t fear it anymore. He knows he is changed, has been changed and it isn’t as terrifying as he thought it would be. Not as much as it should be. He does not feel that it is ruling him. He does not feel that it is fundamentally changing who he is, though by all means he is changing. Ryan doesn’t think he really had a choice in the matter anyway, as much as it felt like he did. He’d never be who he was before that night, whether he ended it with this curse in his veins or not. He may have looked at the future and renamed it inevitable, but was it really the future he was looking to or was it the past? 

Change, and by now he has thought of the word so much that it has surely lost all meaning, is difficult to define. When does changing turn into changed? Is there an exact moment he can determine as when it began? Or was it a series of small moments that roll together, with no beginning and no end? 

Was it when he first pulled the trigger at the man dragging a bloodied Nick away, expecting it to end his life? Was it when he first saw that creature outside the radio shack and said nothing, unable to believe his own eyes? Was it when he was bitten by it only moments later, the teeth sinking into his arm and infecting him? Was it when he aimed the shotgun at Laura’s chest, debating whether or not to pull the trigger? Was it when he was stabbed in the ribs, pulling the knife out and finding the wound stitching itself closed? Was it when he found Chris in the attic and realised that he had no choice but to kill him in order to save himself? Was it when he shot him in his wolf-like head and watched him fall lifeless against the floor? Was it when his veins only continued to darken still and he realised he just killed a man for nothing, that he hadn’t saved himself? Was it when he felt the wolf burst out of him and the world faded to black? Or was it yesterday when he gave up and has let it coexist within him ever since? 

So many moments and not one of them can Ryan name the beginning of his change. Not one moment can Ryan say his old self died and his new self was born. So perhaps then, he hasn’t died, hasn’t become someone new. He’s just changed .

In the same vein, when does responsibility begin, is it just an internal feeling or does it have to be something that’s needed, that’s expected? He is similarly unable to name when he began looking out for the others. When his mind shifted from every man for themselves to we’re in this together . Has it been something that has just steadily grown to what now feels like an integral and natural instinct or was there a particular moment he stood up and shouldered that role?  

Was it when he was first instructed to keep everyone inside, failing to do so and knowing then that he could not follow the orders either as he had to watch over them? Was it when Kaitlyn placed the shotgun in his hands and he ran through the woods to find Nick, knowing he had to reach him no matter because no one else was looking for him? Was it when he saw the group walking up the path, leaving the safety of the radio hut knowing that that thing was out there but stepping out anyway to keep it from hurting anyone other than himself? Was it when he decided to accompany a gun wielding stranger who just murdered his friend on her mission to kill someone trusted to him, unable to let her go without trying to prove it wasn’t necessary, that there was other options? Was it when he couldn’t find that proof and the burden of saving them all fell onto his shoulders, that he had to take another's life to save theirs? Was it when he failed to save them and then felt like now he has to try anyway? Was it when he saw them all the next day, each of them drenched in blood with torn clothes and he then knew that all of them had been bitten and were now trapped with this infection? Or was it when he returned to this quarry again and now every small action towards them has been made with their interests and wellbeing in mind?   

So many moments and not one of them can Ryan name the beginning of his sense of responsibility for them. Not one moment can Ryan look to and really say that was where he began to feel the need to take it upon himself to at the very least watch out over them. So perhaps then it is not an entirely new sensation, it has just grown to be more exposed the more necessary it has become.  

And so yes, after mulling it over in his mind under the silence of aloneness and the cold of a building that was once so comforting, Ryan can finally admit that he has been changing and growing a sense of responsibility over them since even before the dark of that warm August night fully set. But that’s just him, alone. The others, that is the unknown.

Surely they must have changed too, even if he can’t quite see exactly every way how they have just yet. Even if they themselves do not know it just yet. Sure, they won’t all change the same way or the same amount, but it will happen- it has happened, certainly. Just as with him, they cannot leave that night without changing. It will happen whether or not he is involved, whether or not he tries to guide it in the right direction. 

Or it won’t. Ryan may see change as inevitable but that doesn’t mean the others do. They may be trapped in the past, in the echoes of who they were, unable to see that they’ve changed and have to keep changing to really live on. Unable to live anything new with all of themselves in the past, clinging to nothing more than shadows of their former selves. There might be safety in that for them.

Ryan feels responsibility, but they most certainly do not. It’s evident in the way they try and playfully snap at each other as if they’re not all one word away from breaking, they pretend that nothing has changed, their feet get stuck on the floor unable to carry them forward without being lead, and the way they’re all stuck in their heads, unable to look to the others outside it. They’re together as a group but it’s out of necessity, not a sense of caring for each other and sticking it through together. 

And Ryan knows he doesn’t know everything that is going on, at all. For everything that’s popping up, he’s just throwing out guesses and hoping they land. Nor is he coping any better than anyone else, they were both right, the bruises that stain his temples are testament to that. 

Yet, there’s still that something inside him that feels responsibility over them, all of them. He knows now that Kaitlyn was right, he has been looking out for them, even if he didn’t really notice it himself. It’s what has had him instructing them in those times where they did not accept it themselves, to play nice, to move them forward through awkward pauses, to be the first to lead them forward to where they don’t want to but need to go, to help them stand and encourage them to eat. He doesn’t think he knows everything that’s going on, but by god does he feel the urge to try and find out. To keep them going, keep them surviving , to try and create some semblance of order for them. 

Ryan, who knows he’s changed with this tender responsibility in his gut, realises that he can’t let them wilt away as yesterday's strangers. They are alone in this, but they are alone together. If they can talk to each other, if they can be honest, then they can change. Not for the better, not for the worst, but change for what it is. They can’t do it by themselves. They have to do it together. If Ryan accepts that responsibility, they can change. 

So perhaps Kaitlyn did have some idea of what she was actually suggesting and perhaps Emma wasn’t just saying whatever just sounded cruellest. When Kaitlyn said ‘I think you could really change things,’ and Emma said ‘You have no responsibility over us,’ they were actually speaking more than just frivolous words to discard. He just had to make sense of what they really meant, to him and to them. 

He understands now and he knows what he has to do, even if he’s not quite sure how. He knows the why and that’s all he really needs. He has to try, try to grow some honesty, trust and acceptance between them. One by one, so that hopefully they can forgive each other for not being the kids they once were. If they’ve felt like strangers these past days, hopefully they can introduce themselves anew and learn who each other is now, who they truly are, the old and the new.

Chapter Text

The lodge is filled with movement once more. It would almost remind Ryan of when it was filled with children during the camping season, with their smiles, laughter and small pattering feet. Except there is no joy in the air today, only a thick cloud of palpable anxiety.

They’re packing up to return home. Running around making sure they haven’t forgotten anything and that the lodge is in a put together enough state to be left desolate for another month. Ryan’s thankful that he packed all of his things last night, so that after another quick sweep, he’s been able to finally catch a moment to just sit and read while they buzz around him.

Usually Ryan gets lost in his books. Ever since he learned how, he’s had an insatiable appetite for reading, devouring word after word, page after page, book after book until he had to ask his school librarian to order in more. It’s not a confined thing, he’ll read anything anytime all the time, from fantasy to autobiographies to warning signs to the newspaper left out on the table. Though his favourite has remained the same since he was seven, in paranormal and supernatural horror, ever since he picked up a Goosebumps book and proceeded to finish the entire series in record time. He reads and reads until the world around him fades to a blur and background noise, the words painting a vivid image in his mind that he’s so wrapped up in. That’s how it’s been for twelve years of his life, but not today.

Today, his eyes keep flicking up from the pages each time someone walks past. He can’t get his mind to sink into the story or really even take in the words, the anxious scents completely throwing away any sense of concretention. He’s trying not to worry himself into pessimism or a bad mood. It’s just that after his big debate with himself last night, now he’s looking at the group with a new consideration and he can’t seem to stop looking. 

They’re doing it today, the pretending. It’s like they’re going through a practice run this morning while they pack, before they get home and the real acting begins. They’d never admit that though, obviously. It’s one of the big parts of what the pretending is actually for- to protect the bubble of normalcy that may remain in their lives outside of the quarry from popping.

He realises it’s actually a rather bold act, now that he really focuses on it. They’re not fooling each other, clearly, as their scents just give them away immediately. Yet still they pretend, still everyone lies and they all just play along. People ask where their bags go, talk about the drive back and how long it will take, but no one dares mention their actual home, family or life past the end of the drive.    

He can’t believe he’s only just realised just how little they’ve actually talked about their lives outside of camp and at home after watching them today. Even when camp was in session, before everything went to shit, they didn’t really talk about it. At first he thinks it was because camp was like a little world away from their own, where you could be free of anything in your real life and no one wanted to break that illusion. After that night however, it’s swapped around and now they protect their real lifes from the quarry instead. Talking of their past and life away from camp almost feels as if it will taint it, bring it into the nightmare that they can otherwise try to mentally constrain to the quarry. It’s surely a hopeless endeavour and from the mixed fog of emotions in the air, the others know it too, but still they try. 

So they know the basics of who each other is. Through pure observation over two months and then a night of horror, he can safely say they know each other's personalities and behaviour pretty well. They know that Abi’s kindness is genuine, Kaitlyn’s bluntness doesn’t determine her level of care, Jacob is actually a very sensitive guy beneath the self-centred bravado and that Emma’s confidence is not a naturally occurring sense of ego. That’s who they are, but what Ryan thinks they’re missing, for lack of a better word, is context. What lives they have actually lived to have shaped them into this and what their ties to the world are outside of the camp. When it comes to that aspect, Ryan knows that Kaitlyn and Jacob grew up together, that Emma has her channel, Abi does art, Dylan has a cat but he doesn’t actually know much more than that.

It means Ryan doesn’t know what is waiting for everyone when they return home. He has no idea what environments they are all living in, it could be anywhere from supportive to worse than werewolves. He knows that only himself and Jacob are currently working, but as Kaitlyn mentioned her mom wants her to go to college. Are the others also planning on going through with more schooling, working or moving out? Are they still seeing their therapists or did they immediately give up on it like Ryan? He has no idea. The cloud of anxiety radiates off of all of them though, so whatever way it is, he thinks that returning home may actually be a bigger fear for them than perhaps it was leaving home to be forced back here. 

It is also bigger than just that however. When they refuse to be open or honest about their pasts or place in the world, they’re missing out on a huge chunk of who everyone really is. If everyone is just a portrait of their experiences, the things they love and the people they’ve met, then they’re looking at brushstrokes without knowing whose hand painted it. Perhaps their smile the same as their mother’s, or their favourite sweater is the one that got complimented that one time in maths class, or their curled fists are the same as their fathers, or their whole philosophy about the world is just from a poem they once read or their belief in love rests within the lyrics of a song their parents played for them when they were young. They don’t know about any of that because everyone refuses to take the admittedly terrifying risk of being seen to actually show it. 

It’s that protective bubble that keeps them doing this little act of normalcy, of pretending that everything is okay when it’s so clearly not. It hides who they really are, the million tiny moments papier-mâchéd into a person, in favour of a piece of paper taped to their faces with the words declaring they're okay across the otherwise empty page. If they want to accept that they’ve changed, they have to first accept what they’re changing from. If he ever wants to broach the topic of their futures, then he will have to first make an effort to understand their pasts and present, about their lives away from this little corner of the world. He needs to create the openness and honesty for them to be able to share those things, not necessarily to Ryan but with each other. Ryan knows he has to tear that piece of paper off and pop that bubble with a knife if need be, he’s just not quite sure how to get close enough to do so.

Once more, he knows what he has to do but he just doesn’t quite know how. Not that it really matters right now anyway. Today, he does not have to work out how to get a bunch of traumatised teenagers to open up and learn to accept who they are now, he just needs to get home. And as some of the movement around him slows down, he thinks they’re nearly getting ready to hop into Max’s car and Emma’s van. Still, he cannot stop looking.

He watches as Abi drops her bag at the front door and leans against the small counter top of the half wall that separates out that small reception space against the wall of the library. She drops her head into her hands and gives a sigh loud enough that Ryan can hear it halfway across the room. She stays like that as the minutes tick by and Ryan is just about to break through his role of observer to active participator in his friends lives today by standing and walking over to check on her, when he hears footsteps descending the stairs and Nick walks into view.

It’s Nick who walks over to her instead and he stops awkwardly beside her, shifting back and forth on each foot and clutching the strap of his bag with a vice-like grip. When Abi looks up, Ryan looks down, running his eyes over the lines of his novel. He doesn’t really take the words in however, as even as he tries not to eavesdrop, he can still hear their hushed conversation as if they were sitting on the couch beside him.

“Hey… are you packed up?” Nick broaches, sounding as awkward as his stance was.

Abi sniffs and Ryan can imagine that she either doesn’t raise her head from her hands or wipes her nose as she speaks, as her voice is slightly muffled. “Yes- well I think I am.”

“It’s- I’m sure you didn’t forget anything and I mean, well it’s okay if you did?” He hears Nick say in what is surely meant to be a comforting way but instead comes across like he isn’t sure of what he’s saying at all.

“Yeah, of course.” Abi admits defeatedly, her voice now clearer and even more morose than before. 

“Well I just- I don’t know.” Nick says in a choppy, lost way. The light scent of a mild day in spring that Ryan has come to know as Nick’s, turns cold and thick. He hears the shuffled sound of clothes rustling and the thud of a bag hitting the ground underneath Nick’s words. “I’m gonna sit outside for a bit.” Just as he did that first day back, Nick suddenly sounds so small and that almost slight, easily missable shake has returned.

The revived sound of footsteps get further away and are accompanied by the creak of an opening door. Ryan lifts his head to see it close behind Nick, leaving Abi looking worriedly after him. She lifts her hands to cradle her upper arms, dropping her chin to her collarbones as she resumes her waiting. 

The stairs groan underneath the weight of the pair that come down it only seconds later. Kaitlyn and Jacob are chattering aimlessly between themselves and though he’s only caught the tail end of the conversation, he thinks it may be about the price of cars. Ryan’s mind instantly tunes it out with the boredom that comes from that realisation.

Kaitlyn looks much more rested than yesterday and any sign of inconsolableness that she said Jacob was last night are seemingly gone from his demeanour. Ryan would say he looks chipper if not for the dark sooty scent that trails behind him. If Ryan watches him closely, he can see the way his eyebrows and the corner of his lips begin to dip until Kaitlyn snaps his attention back with a joke and a grin. They’re old friends, Kaitlyn must be able to read him like his thoughts are tattooed across his face. 

At the sound of another person descending, Ryan is joined by Jacob in looking expectantly back. They both seem to be privately upset at who it is, though Ryan knows that’s for vastly different reasons. Even as Jacob’s face drops into an almost comical frown and the sooty scent begins to really billow off of him, Emma walks past as if he’s not even there. With a slight grunt of exertion, she drops one, two, three bags down into the quickly growing pile. She dusts her hands off in a slightly amusing way before placing them on her hips and turning to look at Ryan across the room.

“We ready to go now or what?” She asks, her voice needlessly raised to a call. Ryan would have heard her just as clearly if she’d muttered it under her breath. 

Ryan looks up the stairs, straining his hearing and finding nothing. “Where’s Dylan?”

Emma shrugs. “Lost something, he’s turning the whole room upside down. Maybe someone go help him so we can actually go.”

Ryan stands immediately, walking towards the stairs in the very same time it takes for Kaitlyn to also walk forward. They pull to a stop right at the bottom of the stairs, eyeing each other for a few seconds.

“I’ll go help him find it.” Ryan says when she doesn’t speak and instead just looks at him with a flat expression.

“Uh no, it’s fine, I will.” She counters, her arms crossing. “You’re reading aren’t you? I was on my way up there already anyway.”

He gives her a scrunched up, incredulous look. “What? No you weren’t, you were talking with Jacob.” They both glance back and Jacob gives a kind of awkwardly small wave just in front of his shoulder, acknowledging that yes, he’s still here. 

Kaitlyn rolls her eyes at him, looking back at Ryan with an even more unimpressed expression than before. “No I wasn’t, I was already going upstairs.” 

“You’re lying to my face right now!” Ryan argues, his hands splaying out in a frustratedly confused gesture. 

“No I’m not!” Kaitlyn lies again. She knows she’s doing it too, half a smirk twitching at her lips as she tries to keep her face serious. “Why’s it such a big deal anyway Ryan, huh? It’s not like you like him or anything right, so why do you want to help him so badly when I’m already going up there?” 

Kaitlyn’s a dick and she knows that too. She’s not being purposefully mean, her tone remaining playful in a mock serious way, but still, she’s being mean . She’s backed him into a corner and once glance at Jacob and Emma’s raised brows confirms that. Ryan has felt safe in his interactions with Kaitlyn since returning to the quarry, but he should have known the kindness and maturity wouldn't last. He spent two whole months with her, he shouldn’t have lulled himself into a false sense of security where he’d be free from her good natured yet undoubtedly patent jabs that border on being straight up bullying. As unconvincingly accepting she’d been when he told her he wasn’t interested in Dylan, he’d been naive to think she wouldn’t throw it back in his face later on. 

Since there’s literally no way for Ryan to respond to that, he's resigned to an indignant splutter. “I- I don’t , it’s just- you know, I was just-“

“There’s no winning an argument with her bro, she’s cheap.” Jacob offers from where he stands back among the bags, in what Ryan assumes is meant to be an encouraging way. Thanks Jacob, real helpful, Ryan internally sighs to himself. 

There is one type of argument he could win against her, he thinks, feeling an odd mixture of pride and guilt at the thought. But strangely enough he doesn’t feel the urge to posture at her at all over this. Maybe it’s because he knows she’s not actually arguing with him, she’s just having him on because she can. He could walk up those stairs the next second and could even demand that she stay downstairs, and though he’s sure that would cause a standoff, this now is just banter. Banter he doesn’t particularly enjoy being at the end of, but it isn’t a challenge. 

Though, Ryan is not above stooping to someone’s level if need be. Fuck it, he’s going to stoop even lower. 

“You know what, you’re right, I was reading. So Kaitlyn, would you go upstairs and help Dylan find what he needs for me?” He asks in a tone that makes it far more of an order than any real question. 

He can’t help the grin that grows as her triumphant expression is slowly replaced by annoyance. He’s backed her into a corner just as she did to him, as she realises that now if she goes upstairs to help Dylan, she’ll just be doing what Ryan told her to do. Is it a dirty tactic that could cause a standoff? Yes. Was it totally worth it anyway? Also yes. 

Kaitlyn visibly weighs up her choices. Go upstairs and be doing what Ryan just told her to do. Have Ryan go upstairs and he wins whatever this little argument is. Or, have a stand-off and work it out that way, but no one wants that to happen. After a moment she sighs and throws up her arms. “Great, as I said, I was going upstairs anyway.” 

She throws Ryan a very childish, petulant look over her shoulder as she begins walking upstairs, with a scrunched nose and little head shake. He has to remind himself that he’s nineteen as to not stick his tongue out at her in an equally childish manner. 

He hears the front door open and turns to see Jacob step outside, the sliver of Nick that he sees through the gap showing him sitting down on the top step. Emma hops up to sit beside Abi, pulling out her phone to do whatever it is she can without any signal. Ryan reluctantly sits back down on the couch and looks vacantly at his book, not even pretending to be able to focus on reading anymore.

He did actually want to go upstairs for a reason. They’re parting ways again, he won’t see any of them for an entire month, so he wanted to say a proper goodbye to Dylan before they set off. They’ll be in the van together of course, he just wanted a moment alone to say goodbye. Yeah, so it’s actually probably for the best that he didn’t then, he tells himself with an internally scolding tone. 

Ryan sighs. He grabs the strap of his bag and drags it over between his feet, unzipping the top and shoving the novel inside. He stands up and throws it over his shoulder, clutching the smaller bag in his hand. He may as well go put them in the van, there’s no point in sitting around doing nothing. 

He carefully walks through the foyer filled with everyone’s bags and pushes the door open slowly, mindful that there may be people sitting right on the other side. Nick and Jacob look up at him as he steps up behind them where they sit on the top step.

“Alright?” He asks.

“Yeah, yeah.” Jacob says back in a light tone. He’s a liar, just as Nick is also with the nod of his head. 

Ryan doesn’t call them on it, saying instead, “Think we might be setting off soon. You guys seen where Laura and Max went?”

Jacob points straight down the steps and Ryan follows his direction to where the couple is standing outside their car. Right, he would have seen them himself if he’d just looked up a little, but he didn’t expect them to be out here. He hadn’t noticed them walk past earlier.

Ryan steps between Nick and Jacob and makes his way down the stairs. He dumps his bags in the back of the van, before deciding better and opening the sliding door up to put them in the footwell of his seat. He’s the first stop on this trip and he doesn’t want to have to dig his bags out from beneath an entire pile of Emma’s. 

Instead of returning inside, Ryan steers towards where Laura and Max talk at the hood of the car. He doesn’t think it’s a private or important conversation with the way Max is leaning against the hood of the car and staring at Laura with a little bit of a lost expression. Laura still has that exercise book tucked under her arm and now that Ryan thinks about it, he hasn’t seen her without it since yesterday. 

“Hey Ryan.” She says when she spots him walking up. “You guys nearly ready to set off? We’re just waiting on Kaitlyn I think.”

“Yeah, she’s helping Dylan find something, she won’t be long I don’t think. So once she’s free I think we’ll be off too.” 

“Thank god.” Max groans, rubbing a hand over his face. “I miss my bed.” 

Laura elbows his ribs lightly. “At least we had a bed here, Max.”

He gives her a kicked puppy expression and clutches his side like she’d stabbed him. “It’s a shit bed though.” He mutters under his breath, side eyeing her in a way that suggests he’s looking for sympathy.

Surprisingly, Laura actually gives it. She laces her spare hand with his and lifts it upwards to give their knuckles a peck. When she drops their hands they stay connected, swinging slightly at their sides. She adjusts the book under her arm and then she looks back to Ryan suddenly as if she just remembered something.

“You’re alright with me taking this right?” She asks, nodding down to the book. 

“Uh yeah, of course. You’ve been writing in it a lot, you going to go away and look at all the notes you’ve got?” 

“Yeah, do some googling, see what I can find and connect between what I’ve written down.” She says.

“Googling werewolves? No offence but if you try and tell us we’re going to fall in love with vampire babies then we might block you.” He jokes, privately admitting to himself that he’s actually being a little bit serious.

Both Laura and Max actually laugh, which he didn’t expect. Max lips pull down in that odd way to give an impressed smile. “Ryan’s watched twilight, alright. Can’t say I would have assumed that.”

“A man of taste.” Laura adds before actually answering. “But no, I don’t think I’m actually going to google werewolves because yeah, you’re right I’d probably get weird shit like that.”

“What are you going to look up then?” He asks, stepping a little bit closer as Nick and Jacob walk past to get to the boot of the car.

“Wolves actually, or just dogs. I have a hunch or two that I want to research, so these notes are going to be helpful. If anyone has anything they want to add I’m more than happy to jot it down for them.” She explains. 

He nods, his mind drifting to his own book that he should be going through to get as much information as possible from. Really, he should give it to Laura, as she seems the most invested in actually working out what’s going on with whatever this is. But he can’t. Travis gave it to him specifically, despite for as cruel a reason as it may be, he can’t just pawn it off to someone else. 

“Well I’ll be looking forward to hearing what you find.” Ryan says and Laura actually gives him a genuine, grateful smile.

“Glad to hear that. I don’t think the others really want to talk about it.” She says and gives a slight glance to Max beside her, who is suddenly very interested in his shoes. 

“Yeah.” Ryan sighs. “We’re going to have to open up about this stuff. You find out what you can though. I’ll work on making people ready to listen.” 

“It’s a game plan.” She confirms. Her eyes catch on something behind him and Ryan turns to look at the lodge.

Kaitlyn and Dylan are at the top of the stairs, bags in hand. Emma is already in the van, still tapping away on her phone. Abi is saying her goodbyes to Nick and Jacob. Everyone is out of the lodge, ready to go.

“Just like that, huh?” He observes, with a slight flatness to his tone that he cannot hide. 

“Yeah, just like that. Honestly I’m surprised people aren’t more like, jumping to leave. It’s nearly lunchtime, I thought everyone would be ready to get out of here by dawn or something.” Laura says, watching the others make their way towards the two vehicles.

“I would be jumping for joy to get out of this place, but the fact I’m going to be back here in four weeks kinda kills any purpose of that.” Max admits, a tilt to his tone like he isn’t sure whether he wants to laugh or cry. 

Ryan turns back to look at them, flicking his eyes over their faces for a moment. “You know, I didn’t ask how the night went for you two. I was kind of an arsehole in the morning, sorry.” He says, scratching the back of his neck in a gesture he knows is a habit he does when he feels awkward or tense.

“Oh. It was, well.” Laura glances up at Max and he gives her a mixed expression back. “It was very painful to turn. Then we woke up this morning and our legs ached a little bit. But I suppose it could have been worse.” 

“You both turned at the same time?” He asks curiously. He doesn’t ask if they remembered it, with Laura’s phrasing it’s clear that they didn’t. He doesn’t mention that he did either, though he isn’t sure why he’s omitting that.

“Yes? Did you guys not?” Laura asks intensely, her eyes flashing with interest and her hand dropping Max’s to pull the book out in front of her. 

“No, we didn’t.” He says before she makes an expectant motion for him to continue. “We seemed to turn in groups. First it was uh, me. Then I think Kaitlyn and someone else? Then Emma and it had to be either Nick or Jacob. Dylan and Abi changed last.”

“Why did no one tell me that! Oooh that’s so interesting.” Laura mutters under her breath, immediately scribbling what he said down in the book.

Max however, after a glance down at Laura’s writing, looks up at Ryan with furrowed brows and a small frown. “That must have been fucking horrific, are they okay? Did anyone get hurt?”

“No one got hurt, but yeah, it must’ve been really terrifying.” Ryan says, the guilt heavy in his words. 

“You split up yourself, Kaitlyn and Jacob right?” Laura asks without looking up. At Ryan’s confirmation, she hums. “If you ask one of the others, I bet you it was Jacob who changed at the same time as Kaitlyn and-“ 

She cuts herself off, looking up from her notes to look at Ryan with narrowed brows. “You turned first, like all on your own? How’d you know that the others changed at different times?”

He doesn’t know why, but Ryan really considers lying for a moment. To tell her that Dylan told him, which would be partly true. But he doesn’t. “I uh, I remember it. When I turned. My thinking was all different and fucked up at the time, but now I can remember it as clear as any other memory.” He admits truthfully, feeling himself brace for their reactions. 

“What the fuck? I thought that wasn’t possible?” Max says in surprise, looking at Laura like she’ll know all the answers.

She clearly doesn’t, as after a short expression of shock, a contemplative look grows across her face and she considers Ryan for a moment. “You turned first and you remember it.” She repeats back to him slowly. He nods.

She nods back at him and for a moment they just stand there awkwardly nodding while Max looks between them in confusion. Eventually Laura gives a sharper nod, snapping the book shut and tucking the pen back into her pocket. “We’re talking about that, okay?” She says, in what is definitely more a demand than a question. 

Maybe this is why he felt like lying. Still, he told the truth and now he has to follow through. “Okay. Wait, you mean now or?”

Laura sighs, rolls her eyes and shakes her head, all at once. Ryan gets the message loud and clear. Still, since it’s Laura, she has to verbally point out what a stupid question that was too. “Emma is two seconds away from slamming her hand on the horn, so no Ryan, not now.”

Ryan glances over at the van and sure enough, they’re all inside waiting for him. He looks back to Laura and Max and gives them a sheepish smile. “Right, well I think they’re ready to go. I’ll uh, talk to you guys soon.”

“Yeah, see you next month.” Max says glumly, barely looking at Ryan as he crosses his arms over his chest. Ryan doesn’t take any offence.

“I’ll message you. See ya, Ryan.” Laura says, giving him a smile before she walks around the side of the car. 

Ryan raps his knuckles against the window as he walks away from the car, waving goodbye to Nick and Jacob within. He pulls up beside Kaitlyn at the open sliding door of the van and she looks up at him with a click of her tongue. 

“Guess it’s time to go then?” She asks and with Ryan’s nod, she leans in as far as she can into the van and wacks Dylan’s arm with the back of her hand before looking to the front seats. “Bye Dyl, bye Emma and Abi. Have a good drive.”

She steps back and elbows his arm, offering him a small smile that he returns. Then her eyes slightly narrow and she gives a slight tilt of her head forward in what can’t quite be considered a nod. She doesn’t say anything but Ryan’s sure she’s reminding him to think about what she said. She doesn’t know that he already has and has realised she’s right, but he can’t exactly tell her that right now. He claps a hand over her shoulder instead, gives a purposeful nod back, and climbs into the van. The door rolls shut behind him and by the time he looks back she’s already walking away. He watches her pull open the car door and disappear inside after one last wave. 

“Hope no one’s forgotten anything!” Emma chimes from the driver's seat, drawing all of their attention. “Actually, it doesn’t matter if you have since we’ll be right back to this shithole in four weeks.” 

For dramatic effect the keys are twisted and the engine hums to life immediately after she’s finished saying the last word in her mockingly cheerful exclamation. From where Ryan sits it drowns out Abi’s reply and he then purposefully tunes out the conversation that begins between them. Now he’s not calling Emma a bad driver, but the way they suddenly lurch backwards has Ryan fumbling slightly frantically for his seatbelt. They’re driving down the driveway in record time, with the urgency that they could have really used that August evening. The van leaves a trail in the small stones that make the driveway and Ryan glances through the back window to see the car’s lights flash as it turns on, slowly backing out to follow them. 

Ryan’s not sure what he expected but barely saying goodbye and then tearing down the driveway to get onto the road definitely wasn’t it. Maybe he thought that after what he assumed was procrastination all morning, they’d stand around and talk for a little bit as a group. Though, he supposes that was unlikely to happen anyway.

Still Ryan’s surprised there weren't more in depth goodbyes, even if they will be back here in a month anyway. He’s doubly glad that he’s riding with Dylan now, as he does still want his chance to say bye that he missed out on upstairs. 

“Did you find what you lost?” Ryan asks, suddenly remembering why he didn’t go upstairs in the first place. 

He glances to where Dylan sits beside him as he speaks, watching the way his brows quirk to show he’s listening to what Ryan’s saying. He’s slightly bent over, his elbows on his knees as his eyes are glued to his phone in his hand, the nails on his right hand being absolutely torn to shreds as he picks out songs. Ryan’s not sure if the abuse to his nails is from anxiety to return home or out of concentration to find the perfect music. 

His thumb taps down on the bottom of the screen and the van is suddenly filled with the building melody of a song Ryan hasn’t heard before. Emma immediately twists the dial to turn it down and Dylan scrunches his nose in annoyance as he turns to look at Ryan. “What?”

“You lost something upstairs? Did you find it?” Ryan repeats patientally.

“Oh, right, yeah I did. Well, Kaitlyn did. It wasn’t anything important, just my watch.” Dylan explains now that he’s actually taken in the words. The light reflects off the black screen on his wrist, casting shards of light over the roof. 

“Where was it?” He asks, nodding down at it.

“Under the couch. Nick’s couch. I have no idea how it got there.” He admits, glancing between Ryan and his phone as he speaks.

Ryan just nods and leans back against the window in the same way as he’d done on the way to the quarry. “Find us some good songs to nap to.” 

“Aye aye.” Dylan chirps, doing a little salute with two fingers before they’re returned to be gnawed on by his teeth. 

He’s not actually going to nap, despite what he said. Ryan’s never been able to sleep during the day, even before the insomnia set in after returning home from the quarry. He just knows Dylan needs the distraction, whatever the reason why, so he’s okay with letting their conversation drop. At the front the girls also fall into silence, everyone letting their attention wander.

The song fades out to be immediately replaced by a softer tune, a man singing with an almost slightly sad tone. Emma turns it back up now that she isn’t having to speak over it. It’s another one that Ryan hasn’t heard before but just as he finds with most songs he’s heard Dylan play, it immediately leaves a good impression, even as it only just begins.

Dylan clearly cares about music. When most people say they ‘listen to everything’, they really don’t mean it literally, but Dylan does. Ryan has admittedly done some shoulder-surfing, stealing a good few looks at the playlists on his phone, in varying degrees of subtlety. It really does span across genres that he didn’t even know existed. Dylan doesn’t just pick out the most popular songs, the most obscure songs or songs from the most well known artists, he really does pick out the best songs, as niche as they may be. Ryan doesn’t know how he does it, he himself just replays the only three playlists that he’s ever made over his life, cycling through them again and again. 

As they move off of Hackett property and onto the public roads, the world outside the windows of the van blur into a green and blue smear. The sun peeks out from behind a sparse layer of clouds, heating up the glass and magnifying the light to spread warmth up Ryan’s arm. 

Inside the van, it is steadily filling with that heady sweet scent and it is quickly making Ryan’s head spin. It’s like they’re hotboxing the van with it and Ryan feels like he’s getting just as high. For the first time in a few days, it is free from any bitterness or too sweetness like rotten fruit. Despite his assumptions earlier, Dylan must be the most calm he has been at least since the full moon. It’s enough to more than overpower the tang of anxiety in both Emma and Abi’s scent.

He relaxes down in his seat, his brain foggy with a stolen peacefulness and his eyes watching the clouds roll by. His mind hasn’t felt so serenely empty in far too long, momentarily free of any worries or concerns. Though it is such a simple thing, just sitting in the van with sweetness in his mouth and lungs, music in his ears and silent company at his side brings him an unexpected sense of calm and he doesn’t want it to end.

However, like all good things must, it does end faster than he’d thought it would. The drive home, being far more familiar and to a much more desired location, feels much shorter than it did on the way there. Eventually the thick blur of forestry makes way for the odd building, scattered around and growing closer and closer together until they collect up enough that they have reached the outskirts of his small hometown. 

Without needing directions Emma makes her way through the streets until his little flat comes into view. She pulls to a stop behind his own car, letting the engine drop to a gentle hum as she slings an arm behind Abi’s seat and looks to them in the back. “Home sweet home.”

He hums, looking at his dim, cold and tiny new home. Sweet is not really an apt adjective for it, but he feels relieved to be home anyway. “Thanks for the ride Emma. I guess I’ll see you next month.”

“No guessing about it, you will.” Emma sighs. “So, see you next month.”

“Bye Ryan.” Abi also says, her tone an odd mix of soft and flat. She gives a little wave but neither of them makes any move to get out. He thinks that the knowledge they’ll be returning is burning them out from giving any sort of genuine, final goodbye.

He reaches down and grabs his bags, his other hand unclicking his seat belt and curling around the door handle. He glances at Dylan beside him and a small shot of coldness runs through his stomach. He doesn’t want to say goodbye. He can barely force his lips to twitch into a smile and his words sound a little empty when he says, “See you, dude.”

Dylan clicks his own seat belt and tilts forward in his seat. “Yeah well, you know I’ll come help you with your door, since your hands are full.”

Ryan steps out of the car, looking down at his two bags that he carries in one hand. He grabs the smaller bag with his spare hand, with a poorly concealed smile. “Oh, thanks man.”

They walk around the side of the building, up the stairs and to Ryan’s door in silence. He can hear Dylan’s shoes scuffing on the concrete behind him and the slight ruffle of fabric from what he assumes is busy hands. He stops at his door, the paint chipping off the wood onto the metal grate of the rusting stairs. Though his hands hadn’t been full when Dylan first offered to help him, after purposefully adjusting them so they would be, he now has to drop the bags down beside his feet to fish his keys out. Dylan makes no move to help him so the offer was clearly just an excuse. Ryan doesn’t mind, as useless as Dylan accompanying him to his door is, he appreciates the last few moments with him.    

When he straightens with keys in hand, he looks at Dylan and is given an awkward, tight lipped smile. Then Dylan gives something that’s partway between a laugh and a sigh, his voice almost breathy as he says, “I’m sorry, this was pointless, I don’t even really have anything to say. I just wanted to say bye.”

Ryan gives the same half laugh back. “It’s alright dude. I appreciated the moral support for the two second walk, it really made the whole thing easier.” 

Dylan’s smile grows into a genuine grin and he scuffs the sole of his shoe against the metal, glancing down at it when he says, “Oh well, you know, happy to help then.” 

He goes quiet and Ryan thinks now he’s supposed to say goodbye, but Dylan’s words remind him of the thoughts he had last night. Ryan lowers his hands with the keys from where he’d been reaching for the lock and turns back around so he’s facing Dylan completely.

“Hey dude, you know…” He starts before giving himself a couple of beats to think of what he actually wants to say, Dylan thankfully waits patiently. “You know you’re not alone in this right? Like, when you- I mean, if you have a nightmare, you can call me.”

Though he wasn’t intending to, he thinks he’s caught Dylan off guard with his albeit clunky, soft words. It’s a good look on him, the ever so slightly wide eyes and dipped brows. Despite the touched look, Dylan shakes his head. “Thanks man, but I wouldn’t want to bother you or anything.”

“It wouldn’t be a bother, I’ll probably be up anyway.” Ryan insists.    

Dylan thinks about it for a moment before he tilts his head and nods towards Ryan with his own insistent, expectant look. “Okay, well the same goes for you. If you ever need to talk about anything and no matter how late it is, just call me.” 

With it flipped onto him, Ryan holds up a hand and shakes his head with a slight laugh at himself. “I’m up pretty late, I wouldn’t want to wake you.” He tries to explain, aware of how hypocritical he is being.

“Trust me, I’d much rather wake up to your voice than to a nightmare.” Dylan says with a playful seriousness. It takes about ten seconds for his own words to sink in and he gives an embarrassed little sniff at the phrasing of what he said.

Ryan gives a halfhearted smile and a nod, unable to bring himself to joke back. That tone Dylan just used, that flirty mischievous tone, immediately brought Ryan back to camp. Then his embarrassment and regret of using it slammed him right back into the present. The shitty, distant present where he has to say goodbye. 

“You call me, I’ll call you. Deal?” Ryan says, holding out a hand. Dylan glances down at it, wiping his own hand against his top and reaching out to grasp it. They shake hands with a tight grip that even after they’ve fallen still in the air perhaps last a good few moments too long. “I’ll see you next month, Dyl.” 

Dylan swallows audibly and gives Ryan’s hand one last squeeze. He offers him a weak smile, before turning and stepping down onto the top step. He doesn’t look back, even as he says “See ya, Ryan.”

It takes Ryan minutes to actually turn back and get the key into the lock. He stands there, waiting to hear Dylan’s dragging footsteps disappear, for the slam of the van door, for the hum of the engine and the crunching of the tires to all fade away. Until he is completely and utterly alone once more.   

Chapter Text

His apartment is cold, a creeping cold that settles over his skin and dissolves down into his bones, creating a conflicting sensation of both sharpness and numbness. His arms and legs go slack, his bags dropping to the floor with a muffled thud and the door closing with a slight bang as his back makes contact with the wood and forces it shut. His hands slide up his cheeks until they rest against the tender bruises on his temples, with only the slightest pressure applied. 

All the exhaustion, exertion and emotions finally hit him now that he’s in the safety of his own space and solitude. It hits him far harder than anything his own balled up fists could do. His eyes sting and liquid forms in the far back of his nose, causing him to sniff as he squeezes his eyes shut. He couldn’t move if he tried, weights dragging down his limbs and head. It feels like the end, or that it should be the end. The end of everything, of this exhaustion and fear. But this is only the beginning.

His mind has been working overtime throughout his return to camp. Analysing every movement, facial expression and tone of his friends. Trying to comprehend the reality of the situation, to try and come to terms with that reality and what he can do to make it all a little bit more bearable. It’s burnt out so completely, that now it just goes blank, though not blissfully so. Moreso a buzzing numbness.

His kitchen sink drips water from the faucet. It’s slow, maybe every three minutes or so. Drip… drip… drip… drip… It must be the smallest drops of water creeping through the tap, but it roars in his ears as if it were an overflowing waterfall. Against his spine, through every fibre of his cotton hoodie, he can feel every groove and notch of the wooden door. He thinks he may even be able to smell the ever so slight stench of rot from what is probably mold inside his walls. 

Though the sensory input has lowered in its intensity from what it was a day or two ago, it is still tenfold from what it was before that night. He’d already been sensitive to sound anyway and this is so much worse. He knows this is his new permanent- and he’s already sick of it. He misses silence.

The sudden loud buzzes from his phone vibrate through his bones and are aggravating enough to nearly cause Ryan to grab his phone and send it skidding across the worn floor to shatter against the wall. He doesn’t of course, not just because he wouldn’t be able to afford another, but because he’s certain he knows who it’s from. He has to respond to his family, but still, gives himself a few minutes longer. Then he lets those minutes drag out into even a few more and those drag out into even more then that and so on. 

It’s hard to even gather the strength to just lift his arm to pull his phone out of his pocket and flip it over. To find a way to focus his blurry vision to read whatever will be on the screen. He feels completely and utterly deflated. If Ryan could stay here forever, on the cold hard floor with his back against the rough wood of the door, until mushrooms grow through his rotting skin and his bones bleach a chemical white in the warmthless sunlight that manages to break through his window- he would. 

But eventually he finds the resolve to force movement into his arm, ever so slowly and weakly drawing it back from his temple to reach down and grab his phone. His head now dropped back against the door and his shoulder, he squeezes his eyes to try and clear the blur and focus on the notifications on the screen. There’s a fair few, grey box stacked atop grey box. He’s sure he’s never had this many notifications at once before. He’s nearly about to drop his phone back down when it dings in his palm, short bursts of vibration sending a disgusting fuzzy sensation up his arm. But now Ryan couldn’t drop his phone even if he wanted to, his fingers curling almost protectively around the metal as he stares at his screen and the notifications that arrived simultaneously. Almost hesitantly, as if interacting with them will cause them to disappear like a fading dream, he presses down on the top lot of messages.

Dylan <3

gn ry, enjoy ur shitty couch and attic >:3

Dylan <3

night ryan

i’m glad ur here w me

i mean the group obviously

Dylan <3

i know i’m gonna miss tonights so i’m sending it now, just pretend the suns down already

night ryan, hope i don’t chew ur face off tonight, apologies in advance if i do

i didn’t mean it like that jeez 

but yeah, hope ur okay dude

Dylan <3

goodnight ryan, i hope you manage to get some sleep. you deserve it

Staring at the texts from Dylan, a lump appears in his throat. His phone must have only now connected to data, sending them all at once. And though they’re all grouped together, Ryan can easily discern what night each text was sent on. He didn’t miss a single goodnight. Not a single one. The lump rises through his throat until it breaks through his lips in a wide, wobbly smile. If his eyes are slightly misted, well no one will know but him.

It’s that gesture of kindness, familiarity and normality that just hits Ryan so hard in the chest. The prior numbness, of being so exhausted from all those overwhelming emotions and endless thoughts, isn’t quite strong enough to stop the flood of warmth blooming beneath his collarbones. The gesture means more to him then he’d ever thought something so simple could.

It restores some life to his weary body, his arms moving just a bit easier and his head just a little bit lighter. Though his fingers are perhaps a little too animated, jolting with the thought of tapping out that spread of eight letters scattered on the left and centre of his keyboard. He trusts himself not to be so deathly stupid and yet he still reads over the ever so simple text he typed back far too many times on his unsteady walk over to his bed, just to be sure. 

Ryan

night dyl x5

His thumb taps the send button and with a squeeze of his hand, his phone shuts off, dropped to his bedside table. In a similarly ungrateful action, he collapses on his bed. The sheets were left rumpled and unmade, one particular bunch an uncomfortable lump against his upper ribs. Just the small walk from his front door to his open bedroom however was enough to sap whatever remaining energy he still possessed, that Dylan’s texts had conjured up from within him. Ryan knows he couldn’t move if he tried, as despite his neck craned at an odd angle against his pillows and the backs of his limbs facing up towards his stained ceiling, his eyelids have never been heavier. 

Sleep, for perhaps the first time since that August night, does not evade him. Instead it pulls him under with its dark claws and false promise of repose. 

The next day he calls his little sister early in the morning, staring down at the street below with a mug of coffee warming his hand. Sarah, thankfully and frankly unsurprisingly, did not seem to really notice his absence. It’s a relief, as last night when he had woken for just enough time to eat and call his grandfather to check if he’s good to come into work tomorrow, he could hear his grandmother in the background hounding for answers of where he’d been. His grandfather had ignored her but he knows he’ll have to face it directly when he visits. He doesn’t have to worry about that reaction from Sarah. Instead, she spent the entirety of the call explaining every minute detail of her current interest, a particular book series that she's working her way through a second time after having only just finished it. He listens attentively, even though he’s heard it all before. 

She’s much like him, with her love of books and video games, though not so much movies for her. She has a vivid imagination, every word adding to the picture formed in her mind. And also just like him, her mind is her refuge. “Away with the fairies” is how she’s often described, by their grandmother especially. It’s a kinder description then he got- emotionless and antisocial but despite the gendered difference in phrasing, it means the same thing. Ryan sometimes feels like he’s the only one who truly understands her now, and though he knows why that is, it doesn’t make it any less depressing. Their dad understood her.

He knows it was the right decision to have Sarah move in with their grandparents, as much as she screamed and cried. They’d been staying there almost semi permanently anyway, but change is always hard, especially so for Sarah. Their grandparents are such good people though and as much as they don’t quite understand Sarah, they adore her. Ryan couldn’t leave her rotting with him in that abandoned, painfully empty house anymore, especially with his uncertainty of what would happen to him. 

Still, he needs to spend more time with her. He knows the situation is out of his control and that she didn’t really notice, much less mind, but Ryan still feels some guilt at having disappeared on her. He doesn’t want her to feel any more abandoned then she already does. So he planned to visit her after work. 

Work, as always, was particularly dull and quiet. Perfect for Ryan, who shoved his headphones into his sensitive ears and let the music deafen him. He mostly hung around in the back rooms, unloading stock and giving the floor a halfhearted sweep. Truthfully, as a small garage owner's nepotism hire, Ryan doesn’t have to do much. His collection of odd jobs around the shop isn’t really necessary- he just does the shit that no one else can be bothered to do, but for that reason exactly, his job feels pretty secure nonetheless. 

After his near twenty four hour sleep the day and night before, his limbs no longer ached and he felt just a little less weighed down by emotion. Though saw dust and grease filled his nose and itched the back of his throat, at least there was no emotion thick in the air or scents to burn through his nasal passage. On the few occasions he was called to reception to help a customer or to move something, he no longer had that biting irritation. In fact, moving things especially suddenly felt like the easiest task in the world. 

At his lunch break he’d sat with his grandfather, who had brought him along a sandwich that his grandmother had made for him. Ryan had sheepishly accepted it, having only just realised he’d forgotten to bring himself lunch. Pop had just huffed a laugh though, also rolling a can of coke in his direction. They’d eaten in silence until his Pop finally asked just one question- “How was your friend?” in that gruff, short way of his. Ryan had answered vaguely but honestly, that they’re going through a rough time but he’s trying his best to support them. Hesitantly, he’d explained they’ve decided to make it a monthly thing, with the excuse of never being able to catch up otherwise without a scheduled plan. Pop nodded his head, twitched his nose and told him that as long as Ryan gives him a week's notice it’s no sweat off his brow. And then they were back to work.

After work he’d jumped in Pop’s truck and they’d driven straight home. His grandparents, and now Sarah’s too, house is an old but well lived cottage nearing the outskirts of their already scattered small town. Inside it smelt of stew slowly cooking on the stove and the light undertone of fresh dirt. His grandmother greeted him with the warmest hug before she got stuck into him about not answering his phone. Ryan explained that his friend's place didn’t have signal but he didn’t have to defend himself long before his Pop intervened. “Lay off the kid, he’s being social for the first time in his life, you’ll scare him away from doing it again.”

He could see as Pop talked she looked him over- and the exact moment she saw the unnaturally quickly fading bruises. So Ryan had taken the backhanded defence for what it was- a very hasty and easy escape. With a sigh, clearly wanting to interrogate him further, Nana had sent him off to find Sarah with a plateful of homemade cookies. Surprisingly he was directed to the backyard, the last place he would have ever thought to look. Nana had instructed her to get some sunlight and Sarah was reluctantly following orders, though the best she could do was curling up reading in the shade of the porch. 

Sarah’s head had perked upwards from her book at the smell of the cookies, a feat in and of itself. As Ryan had settled down on the ground across from her, he swiped the biggest one. These were made by Nana and unlike the poisonous attempts made by Sarah, anything Nana makes will melt on the tongue. He spent the rest of the afternoon talking to his little sister, every so often having to remind her of his presence when her eyes would drift back down to her book. He’s very aware that others can find it near impossible to drag words out of Sarah, but they talked about her series, how she’s settled into living here, how she feels about going back to school, how she wants a pet chinchilla but will settle for a hamster and a little bit (a lot) more about her series. 

By the time isolation began calling to him loudly enough he couldn’t ignore it, the stew was done and Nana sent him on his way with enough for the next few nights- as long as he gave the container back of course. Before he left he promised to visit Sarah nearly every day after work, a promise he would keep for the entirety of the month. 

That night Ryan settled down at his desk, his hand smoothing across his drawing tablet as he worked tirelessly on his animation, an old livestream play through of one of his favourite games playing quietly in the background. When he finally forced himself into bed, his phone had long since dinged with the goodnight text that he has begun to spend his days awaiting.

The rest of his month followed an almost identical pattern; wake to a blaring alarm, go to work, spend his afternoons either with Sarah or picking up what he needs from the shops, eating dinner to the fascinating sight of life below his shitty little apartment and working on his animations through the night until he forces himself to get enough sleep to do the same thing all over again. 

Only small things and moments broke it up into something that isn’t entirely indistinguishable. The random messages sent to the group chat, now callously (or perhaps affectionately) named ‘wolfy support group’, the sparse but cherished text conversations he has with Dylan and ever so occasionally Laura or Kaitlyn, his trips to the butches shop to stock up on meat which always makes his mouth water and of course, the goodnight texts he shared with Dylan. 

It is… not easy per say, but very simple to be back home and living his mundane and straightforward life. Though his senses are now permanently heightened and the odd symptoms give him some pause or anxiety, he’s able to focus on the important things (work, family and his animation) and that keeps him occupied. The more time that goes on, the more he adjusts to the changes he has gone through and as life continues on, the less earth shattering they feel. To be fair, to those around him, Ryan has always been considered a weird and standoffish guy. Following this new pattern of behaviour to him feels like such a change, but to the guys at work and his grandparents, he’s certain they haven’t even noticed anything different. Any especially odd behaviour he’s sure they chalk up to what he went through, as everyone in their state knows about the ‘Hackett Family Massacre’. If anything, his Nana is just happy he’s eating more and his Pop is proud to see him easily stand up to the burly customers with their unfounded demands.

It’s just all strange, in a very quiet type of way. No one around him knows anything’s any different but he feels like everything has changed, himself included, while hypothetically still feeling that nothings really all that different. His behaviour has changed and how he experiences the world, but unlike the month just after that night, he no longer feels himself pretending or holding himself back. After that whole argument and lecture to himself about change and acceptance, he just lets himself be. Doing what feels natural and taking each day as they come. No longer warring against himself, trying to restrict that change or the wolf inside of him. 

His emotions are simple too, at least most of the time. He’s always struggled to distinguish what he’s feeling on a good day between basic emotions, let alone the complicated, conflicting mess that he felt over the days back at camp. At the very least, he has had time to sit with his emotions now and work them out, instead of being immediately hurtled into ten others. 

It is definitely not all easy though. That dark hole in his stomach has returned with a vengeance, often dragging his mind down into it too, a dark place. Sometimes it feels so real, that physical emptiness, that he thinks he’s going to throw up. When he lies down at night to finally try and get some sleep, his hands lay against his stomach and tears unwillingly fill his eyes, gasping for breath that just disappears into that dark void. 

On that note, sleep has begun avoiding him once more as well, as if their one day and night together was too much too soon and they need a break from each other. He at least manages to get enough hours to make it through his days. 

He hasn’t been able to open Chris’ journal either, it nearly felt as if it burnt him when he finally gathered the courage to take it out of his backpack. He was surprised to find it hadn’t burnt right through the fabric and disappeared through the floor to hit someone on the head in the shop below.

Then of course, the month began drawing to an end. Time, Ryan’s sure, is not a static thing because this month was far too short and went far too quick. And as the days begun ticking down, his senses got even more delicate, his hunger insatiable and that horrible fucking hole in his stomach just kept getting deeper and deeper. When the others were discussing carpooling in the groupchat, Ryan was curled on his bed with his arms around his middle, arguing with his mind that this feeling will pass and there’s no need to walk out into the centre of the street and wait for a truck to come hurtle through him. The worst part though, was he’s not certain it is something that will pass at all. 

Now, waiting for the van to come and pick him up, he knows it has worn him down a bit. The bags under his eyes are thicker even then they were last month and despite the feeling of starvation, he hasn’t eaten, scared he’ll just throw it right back up. 

He let Pop know a week ago that once more he’d be taking some days off and going out of town. Yesterday he got Sarah’s nose out of her book long enough to accept his hug and to let her know that he is going away for a few days but he will on no uncertain terms be back again and they’ll catch up about school and her series. He even let Nana know he won’t have signal and not to worry. His bags are all packed, sitting by the front door and all that’s left is to wait. 

As always, he was ready and waiting far too early. He’s pacing when the sound of an engine comes chugging down his street. He’s already checked out the window for the last ten cars that passed and so he continues wearing his already worn floor thin. He’s working on tearing away the nail of his final finger, his left hand thumb, the warmth of blood and the stinging of torn skin mottling each of the others. He’s so distracted by the task, that though he hears it clearly, the buzz of his phone and footsteps up the metal stairs go unnoticed.

It’s the light rap of knuckles against his door that pulls him back to awareness, the sounds of rustling leaves, engines, footsteps and even slightly uneven breathing flooding back in. And high above it all, is the hard to catch even for him, smell of honey and citrus. It may be overshadowed by all the other stenches of life, but for Ryan, it’s the only thing his mind can even comprehend giving his attention to. 

His pacing stops in its tracks, legs nearly tangling together in his rush to turn around and make his way to the door. His hand has barely wrapped around the handle before he pulls the door open, to the only sight sore eyes could ever wish to see. Dylan, in his sweater and jeans, hair flopping over his brow and big brown eyes blinking slowly at the door rushing open in front of him. He doesn’t even have time to say anything smart before Ryan’s smothering him in a bone crushing hug.

He gives a constricted, odd little mix of a yelp and squeak as the air is forcibly exhaled from his lungs. It just makes Ryan squeeze him tighter, his heart also giving an almost painful contraction at the endearing sound. Dylan’s arms are around him only a second later, his head coming to an easy rest against Ryan’s bicep. Though Ryan thinks it may be a little hard for Dylan to breathe, his slow exhales are matched, their warm breaths fogging in the cold Fall air. 

Ryan knows he forgot himself and he’d have never let himself show affection like this so strongly and openly before. But holding Dylan it seems is one of his new instincts that he has begun to allow himself to follow without first debating. Maybe he will have to add a term and condition to this whole self acceptance thing- that he does still keep a leash on those instincts when it comes to his interactions with Dylan, lest he break his other rule of keeping his feelings to himself. He’ll add it once the hug is done though, the rule’s been broken already anyway.

It is such a stark difference to how they parted, with a lingering handshake and sad smiles. But Ryan hadn’t realised just how truly painful missing Dylan would be. He selfishly soaks in the stolen affection, trying to remind himself that he can’t get to close all while he pulls Dylan impossibly closer.

It’s hard to pull away, the warmth in his chest, the scent filling his mind until it’s peacefully woozy and lightness filling the void in his stomach making the prospect rather unfavourable. He does have to let Dylan breathe though, it would be counterintuitive to accidentally kill him now. So his arms give one last squeeze before they slacken and as he steps back he raises a hand to scratch at the nape of his neck between slightly raised shoulders, in an awkward, embarrassed gesture. 

Dylan has a smile that he twists to the side in a failure of an attempt to hide it. “Good to see you too.” He says in a now definitely breathless tone. 

There’s a drop in Ryan’s stomach and he quickly turns away, clearing his throat. His cheeks feel warm and even though he knows his skin doesn’t show it, he still ducks behind the door as he picks up his bags to give himself a moment to settle. He scoops his phone up off the bed, swiping away the ‘nearly here, met us outside’ text that he had clearly missed. 

He reappears a moment later, barely looking at Dylan, just in case, as he locks his door. He almost feels unsteady on his feet, as having been weighed down all month, a little bit of lightness is enough to make him unbalanced and close to feeling like he’s floating. 

“Yeah-“ his voice comes out just a timber too rough and low for his comfort and he clears his throat once more before starting again. “Yeah, you too. Uh, good drive so far?” 

He asked just to have something to say, so the weight of his affection isn’t left hanging in the air. It works, thank god, sending Dylan off into meaningless chitters. The sound of it is peace, like the first bird to sing in the morning before it is drowned out by a cacophony of others. It gives him some time to compose and steady himself, remind himself of the promise he made to himself and to prepare for the next few days. 

“I’m picking the music of course, I think it’s pretty well established that that’s my job. Emma may pretend she doesn’t like it but I know she does, otherwise she wouldn’t keep handing me the cord, even when I offered Abi to take over this time.” Dylan chitters on, the sound of his voice warming the world around them, evaporating dew drops from grass stems and sparking fire to the crumpled leaves beneath Ryan’s shoes. “Emma seems pretty exhausted, bad month I think. Smells like anxiety and something like, I don’t know the right word but like betrayal? Something hurt. So she’s pretty quiet, I’m playing what I think she likes but I know it doesn’t help at all. I just, I don’t know.”

Ryan tilts his head at that information, storing it and reminding himself to be sensitive to how the others may be feeling. As they approach the van Dylan grows quiet, scuffing his shoes against the concrete. Ryan can see the backs of Emma and Abi’s heads in the front seats of the van, though he knows they're not talking, as only the voiceless sound of the town moving on around them reaches him. 

“You okay?” He asks Dylan, who has begun dragging his feet so much he’s almost completely still. 

“Yeah, ‘course dude.” Dylan assures him. He doesn’t pick up any overt negative emotions in his scent in the air, so he has no reason to disbelieve him. He still does nonetheless.

“You uh, you didn’t text me because of any nightmares, you had a better month?” Ryan asks, leaning his back against the van which Dylan is clearly reluctant to get into. Though he doesn’t think nightmares are the cause for the procrastination now, it’s something that’s been weighing on his mind anyway.

Dylan shrugs, “I didn’t get any texts from you about not being able to sleep. Feeling well rested?”

Ryan scoffs but he can’t really argue. They’re at a standstill and after a moment he pushes himself forward. There’s so much he wants to say, to tell Dylan that his goodnight texts have him back some life after the moon, that he goes through each day to receive them that night, that he’s missed him so goddamn much and their conversations through text isn’t nearly enough. That holding him, breathing him in and hearing him talk has nipped away the icy edges of the void that seems to reside within him permanently now. But he doesn’t say any of that. He made himself a promise, he won’t break it. 

Instead he says, “Listen, I know you don’t want to, because I don’t either, but we have to get in that van. Come on, hop in.” He slides the door open, holding it in place with his hand and though he looks like he wants to, Dylan doesn’t argue. 

He throws his bags in behind him, giving one last forlorn look at his shitty apartment and the mundaneness it brings before ducking his head down and taking his seat in the van. With varying degrees of warmth, greetings between them are shared and he loops the seatbelt over his waist. Dylan was right, the van has a horrible stench of a summer night doused in acid and as sneakily as he can he rolls down his window. Minutes later countryside and forest streaks past them, a blur through the windows, his hand hanging out as if he can run his fingers through the blur. It’s a familiar journey that just keeps becoming more and more painfully familiar.

Chapter Text

The car pulls to a slow stop in front of them, wheels angling to the right to give them a wider berth to pass. It’s a long sleek vehicle, clearly not made for these unsealed old backroads. Dirt and small stones flick up from beneath the wheels, soiling the polished black paint and getting caught in the shining silver grille. 

They’d just pulled off the main road and onto the thin dirt roads encompassed within the Hackett estate, when this clearly expensive vehicle turned off from the road to the left and nearly ran right into them. The driver, who Ryan peers suspiciously at from the backseat, is an older man in a well pressed suit jacket and tie. He makes a placating gesture before lifting his hand above the wheel and motioning past him, for them to continue on. 

Emma scoffs loudly from the front seat, twisting the steering wheel as she carefully pulls past him. As her shoe once more presses down on the gas and they continue on at their previous speed, she throws an unimpressed “Arsehole, watch where you’re going next time!” in the general direction of the man behind them. Even if they weren’t inside a hunk of metal, with Emma’s enthusiastic style of driving, they’re already too far away for him to have caught her complaint.

Ryan had twisted in his seat as they passed, looking through the back window over a wobbling tower of luggage to try and get another look. His brows have sunk over his eyes in contemplation. 

“I know jack shit about cars but I know that was a nice one. What’s he doing back here, I thought these roads were private?” Dylan asks, also craning to catch sight of the quickly receding car. 

“They are.” Ryan says slowly, a swirl of anxiety rising within his gut. 

Someone in an expensive car and suit like that doesn’t just drive around the backwoods for no reason. Had it been a busted up toyota prius, he may have assumed some teenagers had borrowed their parents car to snoop out the crime scene or some more goddamn hikers that refuse to read the private property sign. But that man definitely wasn’t here for sightseeing or outdoor activities. The road he turned off led directly to the Hackett Manor and Ryan’s without a doubt sure that he was just inside. 

He also most certainly wasn’t one of Travis’ cop buddies because firstly, he knows they’re not paid that much and secondly, he’s fairly certain Travis doesn’t have ‘buddies’ in the first place. So not a social visit. 

The swirl of anxiety drops into a downright nauseous feeling as he rightens in his seat and faces forward once more. Higher up cops, like detectives or god forbid an investigator higher than even that, don’t wear uniforms right? Just a well pressed suit and tie. Ryan was sure the investigation had wrapped up but what if they discovered something new and are back on the case? What if they tested the DNA left all over the forest and Manor and found that it belongs to them? How would they even begin to weasel out of that one?

“Was that the fucking FBI?” Dylan blurts out, wringing his hands together. He looks nervously between Ryan and where the car was out the back window, now left far behind. 

“Why the fuck would that be the FBI?” Emma snaps, glaring at him through the rearview mirror. 

“I don’t know, maybe they’re onto us or something? Realised the timing doesn’t add up or something like that. I don’t know, he looked like the FBI.” Dylan argues worriedly. The light sugary scent that had been holding the acidic stench at bay has disappeared in an instant, letting the full force of the acid scorch through the van.  

Emma snorts, her tone condescending and erring on cruel. “He looked like my dads lawyer. Do you know anything about the FBI that you haven’t just seen in movies?” 

Dylan leans forward in his seat, his chin resting in his hand and shoulders dropped down. “No.” He begrudgingly admits. 

“Didn’t think so. So stop stinking up the van more than it already is, with your stupid-“ Emma begins in a harsh tone before Ryan, quickly fed up with her tone, cuts her off.

“Cut it out Emma, we don’t know who he was or why he was here, so save your attitude until we do. I’ll ask Travis about it or something and then we’ll know for sure.” Ryan says, not even speaking in a particularly sharp tone. He knows she’s upset but he’s not going to sit by as she lets it out on others. Especially not to Dylan, who has spent the entire ride trying to subtly cheer her up. He doesn’t deserve that. So although his tone was calm, it was also assertive. 

Even though they never really listened to him at camp and despite Emma not being known for doing anything other than what she wants, her mouth snaps shut with an audible click of her teeth. He knows she’s pissed, the acidic scents overlapping within the van so strong that not even the cold fresh air streaming in through the open windows can wash it out. With that much so painfully obvious through the deep burning of his nose, he has no idea why she did actually listen to him. 

The damage has already been done however, Dylan sulkily looking out the window as he fiddles with his seatbelt. Ryan sighs, also turning to look out his own window to stop himself doing something stupid like taking Dylan’s hand and giving it a reassuring squeeze. He’s a little confused with how Dylan is feeling today, with the changes between his seemingly carefree demeanour when they first saw each other to his dragging feet but emotionless scent at the van to now, which is the most understandable reaction, though still definitely too sensitive for Dylan’s usual tolerance. 

Ryan thought he was getting better at reading Dylan but perhaps not. Since feeling emotions through scents is overwhelming as it is, he almost wishes it would just go the full length and let them read each other's minds. Because through his burning nose he can feel that Dylan was right, Emma is really upset and that Dylan is now too- but he has absolutely no idea the actual reason why. 

Now that not only has the barrier been removed, but now also contributing to it, the strength and repulsiveness of the heavy scents within the van have grown to be almost too much for Ryan to handle. Even Abi’s scent has gradually soured over the ride. After having been free from all the emotion filled scents for a month, they feel extremely stifling now. It’s so bad that the dusty and spider ridden attic even calls to him and although it was a joke last time, Ryan may also be actually considering putting his head out the window to get some real fresh air.

They’re nearly at the lodge though, pulling onto the driveway and passing the Hackett Quarry Summer Camp sign, and he thinks he can survive a few seconds more without stooping to that particular last resort. They pull in beside Max’s car, which surprises Ryan. He assumed that they would arrive a little later than them, as they had last month. Perhaps he didn’t get ready as early as he’d thought and in fact his ride had just been late. 

With everyone in such a foul mood, he’s actually relieved to hop out of the van, for the exact same reason as last time. Frankly he’s thinking that next time he might borrow his Nana’s old car, just to save himself from what seems to be turning into a pattern of suffocation on the trip here. He wastes no time dragging his bags from the van and breathing in deep lungfuls of clear forest air. He doesn’t run inside and hide like he wants to however, holding the van door open for Dylan to crawl out of. Dylan’s just dragged his bags out behind him and about to begin walking towards the lodge when without thinking, Ryan has grabbed his arm. 

Dylan stops immediately, looking back at Ryan and waiting patiently. Once again, Ryan had just followed instincts and as Dylan waits for him to say something, he realises he’s got nothing. It’s become so natural to just let his instincts guide him over the past month that he hadn’t thought about how much harder that would make it to reign them back in when it comes to just one specific person. 

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Ryan asks at last, the first thing to come to mind. Now that he’s asked however, questions flood his mind, leaking out his mouth in a worried interrogation. “You seem off today. Did something happen?” 

Dylan’s eyes drop from his, tracing over his shoes before fluttering up and watching Emma pass by. Ryan gives him time, hopeful that it might mean he gets an honest answer. Dylan only speaks when Emma and Abi have begun making their way up the stairs, tossing curious looks over their shoulders that Dylan’s eyes dodge. 

“I- yeah I’m okay. It’s just- wow, what an ordinary, normal month right?” He says, with a laugh, something so small that it can’t really be considered one. 

Ryan shares his weak smile. “Compared to coming back here, yeah. But it wasn’t all normal though, was it?”

Dylan shrugs, finally dislodging Ryan’s hand. Curiously his eyes follow it as it falls away, his own hand replacing where it lay clasped around his arm. “No, I guess not. My mom thinks I’m psychic now, I know what she’s feeling before she can even put words to it.”

Ryan raises a brow, that information new to him. Over his month, he was completely free of any scents and back to having to make complete guess work at what the people around him were feeling. Dylan it seems however, was still subject to them. 

“You could still smell other people's emotions? Do they also have scents?” Ryan asks, his head tilting ever so slightly to the side in his curiosity.

Dylan nods, dropping his hand to swap his grip on his bags to it, shaking his strained arm out. Ryan glances down at his own bulging bags, hanging from the strap held effortlessly in his hand. 

“Well yeah. But also no? Like, well I was only really around my mom, but she just smelt like herself which mostly doesn’t smell like anything and it was no different or stronger than usual.” He explains before pausing and adding a quick addendum. “Everything smells stronger now, much stronger. But she didn’t smell stronger than the usual new strongness. Do you get what I mean?”

Ryan nods, poorly concealing a grin at Dylan’s classic terrible explanation skills. Dylan nods back, again. “Right. But despite her not having a ‘scent’ like we do, I could still smell her emotions. The scent itself just didn’t change.” 

Ryan hums his understanding, thinking over Dylan’s words. Definitely a different experience to his own then. “I want to say I’m surprised but I’m not really. You picked up on Travis’ emotions last month when I couldn’t.” He admits. 

“Yeah great. Raw end of the fucking deal.” Dylan scoffs, though he says it in a lighter tone then he spoke with before. He seems to have brightened a little bit, at least back to his mood before he was snapped at by Emma.

He’s still not okay though, Ryan’s sure. Dylan’s scent is whipped up into the air around them, less overpowering now that it isn’t fogging up a confined space. It’s at its most mild state, though he knows that even then Ryan does not find it mild. Like freshly harvested honey or ripe fruit sliced through and dripping sugar filled juice, it’s back to being sweet without bringing with it that woozy or heady feeling. 

But just as he’s known all day, there’s still something off. Ryan focuses on it, trying to work out the emotions that the scent carries in each molecule of itself. That’s when he finally feels it settle against his skin. The emotion, concealed under a thick layer of ‘fine’ is buried deep within the scent. Hard to detect, so he’s assuming it was there outside the van earlier, he just didn’t pick up on it. It’s sombre and heavy and almost so familiar to him that Ryan can barely distinguish it from his own buried emotions. He just can’t give it a name. 

Concern fills him but having only just gotten Dylan to a lighter mood, he doesn’t want to pick apart his deeper emotions and make him feel terrible again. As much as he wants to. “So you only hung out with your mom? Didn’t go out and party then?” He jokes instead, forcing a smile.

Dylan seems caught between deciding whether to roll his eyes, flush from embarrassment, grin or scoff. So he does all four, all at once. “Yeah yeah, super funny Ryan. Parties are exactly where I want to be right now- no, ever actually.” 

Ryan slides the van door closed behind him, taking a few quick steps forward to fall back into pace beside Dylan, who if he didn’t know better, was fleeing the conversation. “If I remember correctly you are the only one between us to have suggested a party.”

“And that went so well.” Dylan says in a purposefully flat tone, his smile softening the blow of truth to his words. 

Ryan puts a hand on the bannister as he begins taking the stairs upwards, just a step behind Dylan. “You had a good time, did you not?” 

Dylan pulls to a complete stop for a moment to turn around and give Ryan the most frank expression he’s ever seen. He continues up as Ryan chews down a grin and amends, “The first half at least.”

“Think highly of yourself?” Dylan asks, doing a little turn as he reaches the top of the stairs, watching Ryan climb the last few. His expression is now soft, his scent in the air so light and warming that the cold of Fall is chased away. 

Ryan tries not to trip up the stairs. He knows what Dylan’s referring to, obviously, it’s the only thought on his mind when he thinks about that evening- the evening, before the night turned it all to shit. How could he ever forget it? The smoke burning his eyes, the heat of the fire as the wind made it lick out towards him, the bat of Dylan’s lashes against his cheekbones, the weight of his lips against his own and the lingering brush before he pulled away. It was a heavy, meaningful moment for him when it solidified for Ryan that it wasn’t just some summer crush for him but something more. It’s the first time between them that it’s been brought up and to Dylan it seems, it’s a joke. 

Ryan tries so hard not to sound cold, to keep the lighthearted tone in his voice as he says, “Oh, that wasn’t what I- I wasn’t talking about that, obviously.” He truly doesn't know how well he succeeds. 

The temperature drops a good few degrees, cold wind whipping the smell of rotting leaves and fruit through every layer he has on. Dylan’s smile fades slowly, as if it had never been there in the first place, a blank expression made of porcelain replacing it. He switches the hand his bags are in once more, turning around to reach for the door. 

“Yeah of course, I mean obviously. I was just having you on dude.” Dylan says offhandedly as he pushes inside, not even looking back as he disappears into the lodge. 

Ryan lets the cold splinter through his skin for a moment, swallowing the dark feeling in his chest down and letting it fall into the void to grow it that much deeper. He clears his throat, running a hand over his head, hoping that the wind is washing away the surely pitiful stench of his scent. He’s going to give himself just one minute to shake off the wave of emotions that’s flooded him. He doesn’t even get that, as there’s a loud commotion from inside. 

He’s pushing inside and towards the others before the sound that reached his ears has actually registered in his mind. The lodge stinks, a mixture of a dark sooty scent bellowing out to even the far corners of the large building and hints of acid that it nearly completely smothers. 

The others all stand in a spread out group around the lodge floor, their heads and eyes all drawn towards one of the few remaining tables they’d left out. With quick, clipped strides Ryan pulls up beside where Dylan had just reached the nearest person, Nick flicking a worried glance back at them. Ryan gives a quick scan of the crowd and he realises the group had been milling around, unpacking and tidying things up, when they must have all stopped at the outburst.

The sound, Ryan has now registered, was yelling. Jacob stands in the centre of the crowd, his chest rising and falling quickly, shoulders shaking and breathing heavy. Ryan thinks the sight of blonde hair also at the centre of the group would make the situation obvious. However as just seconds ago Emma had caught his eye across the room, her unimpressed expression shifting for just enough time to purse her lips at him, Ryan looks at the people involved in the confrontation in surprise. It’s actually Laura that Jacob stares down, sitting at the bench of the table with Max beside her uneasily looking between them. 

She doesn’t appear upset, her eyes ever so slightly squinted and her brows dropped just the tiniest bit lower. Ryan knows that look, having become quickly used to seeing in on her the last time they were here. He sits back on his heels, his arms folded over his chest, observing quietly for now until more context is presented. 

Jacob huffs a deep breath, shaking his head slightly, as if trying to dispel unwanted thoughts. He grinds down his teeth and a hum revs up in his chest, in the exact same manner as it had with Ryan on the first morning of their stay last month. His thick arms strain as he clenches his fists, his head tilting away to lay his eyes on the floor. His anger- no, not quite anger, something much more complicated covered up with bruising frustration- is palpable in the air. But Ryan can see that he’s trying to swallow it down, taking a moment of silent deep breaths to get it under control. 

Laura’s expression quirks, looking almost displeased before it settles back to what is becoming her new usual look. She stands up, right in Jacob’s space and leans her head down, trying to meet Jacob’s eyes. 

“What, it was just some advice. It’s a bit sensitive to not even be able to take some friendly advice, you know.” She says in what is such a clearly faux kind voice. “I mean come on, man up.”

Jacob’s jaw clenches even further and his arms have begun to hold a slight shake in them. Ryan can smell the coppery taste of blood in the air as Jacob must bite down on his tongue to keep himself from speaking. Ryan does commend him for not rising to the bait, whether it was intended as such or not.

From across the crowd, Kaitlyn takes a step forward. Her hands are on her hips and as she speaks she leans forward, raising one to jab a finger at Laura. “You made your point, stop fucking antagonising him.”

Laura pauses, thinking over her words as if she knows for certain the next thing she says will get a reaction and she wants to be certain it’s the exact reaction she wants. “Jacob, you can handle this yourself, right? Unless of course you do actually need big tough Kaitlyn to swoop in and rescue you. I mean it is obvious who wears the pants here.” 

She was right of course. Jacob’s head snaps to her, his face scrunched in hurt and that cover up anger. He’s shifted to stand straight, his shoulders held wide and pulled himself to his full height. He tries to open his mouth to speak but the only noise that comes out is a terrifying rumble that rattles its way through his chest. The sound of growling doesn’t fade even as he closes his mouth, teeth grinding and then, his neck straining. 

The sooty scent bursts into a downright burning smell, the swelter of his complicated anger curling through the air and alighting Ryan’s skin with an uncomfortable warmth. The intensity of his eyes locked to Laura’s and the posturing portrays far more aggression than Ryan’s seen in any of the standoffs, his own with Jacob included. 

Something clicks for Ryan then, remembering a thought he’d had last month. There has to be a difference between emotion charged standoffs and the one’s for other reasons, unknown as they are. Of course there has to be some overlap, but watching Jacob now, he knows they can’t just be one in the same as this near hatred filled stand off is a very different confrontation then what Ryan and Kaitlyn had. 

Near hatred filled from only one side though he supposes, watching Laura as she in return stands stiffly, her legs held straight beneath her and shoulders hunched slightly inwards. Still she has that expression. Just as he noticed with Emma and Nick and as Kaitlyn commented on, her posturing is so starkly different. 

It just doesn’t hold that weight and it’s definitely more defensive than aggressive. Which surprises Ryan, why doesn’t she also broaden her shoulders and take that aggressive positioning? Ryan may not know her well, but he knows for certain that Laura is no coward and can hold her own. She most certainly doesn’t fear Jacob as she’s the one who propelled this confrontation forward when Jacob tried to control his emotions. She doesn’t look or smell afraid either, in fact her scent has remained surprisingly neutral. So why would she choose not to just mirror his posture?

The group stares in silence, a buzzing nervous tension in the air. Max hesitantly says Laura’s name but the fierce growl in response from Jacob stuns him back into silence. Ryan begins to consider stepping in as the growling escalates in velocity and the scents only darken still, worried where this may spiral to. Ryan doesn’t have enough context to safely say who’s in the right or wrong, but how Laura talked was nearly downright cruel and it didn’t have to lead to this if she’d just let it go- Ryan at the very least, won’t let it go further. But eventually, after scanning him over thoughtfully half a dozen times, all while defending herself with her posturing mind you, Laura looks away. The tense muscles in her legs loosen and her shoulders drop back down, her posture fully relaxing. 

It’s a clear concession. Yet Jacob doesn’t stop, the growling continuing to ramp and the air around him darkening still. He twists around, staring down at the group watching him in shock. His eyes land on them one by one, that challenging look presented to each of them. 

Emma immediately goes into that defensive stance that Ryan had seen her hold against Nick. It is her scent that is the second most obvious in the room, one of the few to not be completely smothered by Jacob’s. It does strengthen, but only for a short moment. With her elbows tucked in at her sides, she glowers at him before she quickly looks away, scowling at the floor.  

Kaitlyn is practically already in full aggressive posturing when his eyes flick from Emma to her. Her eyes are set hard, her throat clenching to release the thick stench of smoke, followed by a deep bark of a growl jolting through clenched teeth. It is Jacob who almost immediately concedes, lips curling as he looks away to the next person, not engaging back in the standoff that he nearly began between them. Ryan thinks that he may have lost some of his fire, Jacob’s eyes practically bouncing past Abi as he moves on to stare down Nick on the other side of the room. 

Nick is probably the quickest concession in these split second standoffs between Jacob and the rest of the group. His shoulders give a half hearted hunch and his knees lock but his eyes barely meet Jacob’s before he’s looking resolutely away again. 

Before Jacob’s even looked away, Ryan’s hackles have already begun to rise with a protectiveness he can’t shake. Dylan should be next in this roundup, and Ryan supposes he is, though not to be measured up in a standoff it turns out. Jacob does vaguely look at him, or rather more past him, but his demeanour doesn’t take on that quick extra hardening that it did when he faced the others. If anything his posture slackens ever so slightly, taking the longest moment out of any of them there for what seems to be a small break for a deep breath before he moves on to his last target. 

Dylan for his part doesn’t even look at Jacob. He’s glancing over at Kaitlyn and back at Ryan between long stares at his beat up canvas shoes. His scent doesn’t change, staying at that low sweet rot, no twitch to his throat to make it take up any more space than it already does. His demeanour isn’t relaxed per say, his hands fiddling with his clothes and his chin tilted downwards in a manner that screams awkward uncomfortableness. But it most certainly isn’t in any sort of posturing, defensive or otherwise, which holds a certain purpose to it that his lacks. The only purpose Ryan could see in Dylan’s posture would be to be ignored and yet Jacob’s eyes still linger too long. 

Ryan has stepped forward almost without realising it, his lip curling to reveal his teeth and chest puffed out with a lungful of acidic air. Logically Ryan knows he doesn’t want to escalate the situation. Instinctually, Ryan also knows he is not okay with Jacob looking anywhere near Dylan while holding that aggressive bearing, whether he’s directing it at him or not. 

Jacob’s gaze hardens instantly as he catches Ryan’s movement behind Dylan, who he was already practically seeing through. He turns to Ryan with his posture stiffening back into that overtly aggressive pose. No longer just a spectator, time skids to a stop as Ryan’s instincts kick into gear and he follows them with every twitch of his lips and tensing of his throat. His focus on the room around them and the others standing by dissipates until only he and Jacob remain. His own scent, which he’s sure is what he can now smell in the air, is acrid and dark and far more oppressive to his own senses then he would have thought. It overwhelms Jacob’s scent so completely the sooty smell seems as if it becomes nearly completely odourless.             

Ryan holds himself with a rigidity that threatens to bring aches to his muscles should he hold it too long- consequences he is prepared to deal with. He’s ready for a long standoff between them, as it had been with Kaitlyn, staring each other down for some time before an escalation forces a concession. But it ends well before it would have ever reached that point. 

Jacob stares him down, the heavy eye contact something Ryan would be otherwise unable to hold now something he returns with force. Jacob seems to be really weighing Ryan up when he both unexpectedly and abruptly must decide it is not a confrontation he will win. The fight leaves his body instantly, shoulders slackening and eyes quickly darting away. Emotion overcomes his face, as now that the instinct driven anger is gone there is only shame. There is no better description for what he does than turning tail and fleeing upstairs, leaving everyone else standing there in shock.

There’s a tense beat as the resounding heavy silence continues, everyone digesting what just happened over those tense short moments. As the rush of instinct driven thinking fades, Ryan’s observation skills return to him and he glances at the shell shocked group. From their faces he’s certain there is a group wide sense of embarrassment or degradation for either participating in or being witness to not quite human behaviour like that. Still, there must be some acceptance in it, no one called the objectively strange behaviour out or asked what was going on- they all knew. Even answering it in turn, whether consciously or not.

The voice that finally breaks the silence is covered in a thick layer of venom. “What the fuck Laura? What the fuck was that? Wh-what, you just decided to be the cruellest bitch to him for no reason?” Kaitlyn has stepped forward, leaning to the side to look at Laura. She’s angry but Ryan can hear the genuine confusion too, the short breath of a laugh at the beginning of her last sentence turning it into a stammer. 

Laura doesn’t get the chance to answer as then Emma throws up her hands, distress clear in her voice. “This is just too fucking much.”

The scents whirring through the air have pushed out any remaining staleness, filling it instead with a foul smelling hash of anxiousness, confusion and awkward discomfort. Ryan knows this was a heavy moment and if it isn’t resolved it will make everything so much harder, for everyone. Being strangers is manageable- being enemies is not. Reminding himself of his decisions on responsibility, Ryan closes his eyes for the one short, savoured moment that had been stolen from his outside and then walks forward to where he’s visible to them all.

He clears his throat, which has become gradually more and more irritated over the day with all the strong emotion infused scents. He speaks to the group as calmly and decisively as he can. “Okay listen, I know that was shit but the confrontation is over, you know? I think we should all take some time to shake it off and let it sit, okay?”

Public speaking, even as public as their little group, is not something Ryan is at all versed in or knows how to do. The words feel awkward and clunky in his mouth. It is no surprise then that no one looks impressed or even agreeable in the slightest. They’re upset and want an explanation, reasoning isn’t going to work. An explanation that Ryan can’t get with them all hovering and interjecting with even more emotions. He sighs before making a sudden decision he’s sure isn’t going to work the second the words leave his mouth.

“Everyone go get some space, or start dinner or whatever. Just clear out of here, it’s no use loitering around. Kaitlyn go and check on Jacob, okay? He’ll probably really appreciate it.” Ryan instructs with faltering confidence that he’s sure to keep out of his voice. 

Kaitlyn’s posture stiffens and her lips twist, parting as if to argue before returning to their side wards purse. She looks from Laura, to Ryan, to the stairs in long consideration. With what he imagines takes considerable effort, she finally shakes her head with a loud sigh and begins to walk away. She leaves up the stairs with a final message to Laura in the form of her middle finger held behind her without looking back. 

Though Kaitlyn leaving without a standoff or verbal argument was a surprise, it’s to his absolute shock that everyone else almost immediately disbands without further complaint too. Heading towards the kitchen, library or front door with short glances back over their shoulders.

Ryan heaves a sigh of relief and something close to awe. They listened? To him? Though it doesn’t feel like it, in the slightest actually, today must somehow be his lucky day or something. That’s the second time where they’ve actually done what he said today and it feels extremely strange. But he’ll take the win for what it is and so with his small victory and hoping his luck continues, he turns back to where Laura and Max sat- only to find them also leaving. 

“Not you.” Ryan states loudly to Laura’s retreating form. He was fine letting the confrontation play out as it happened, to a certain extent, but there can not be big disputes like that without some explanation. 

She turns around, looking up from the notebook she feverishly scribbles in. How long has she had that out? Ryan waves his arms out from his waist in a questioning gesture and Laura looks between him and her book before she ever so reluctantly begins to walk back over with Max trailing on her heels. She tucks her pen over the page she’s writing on, closing the notebook but keeping it held tightly behind her arm. “What?”

“What? What do you mean ‘what’, what was that?” Ryan sputters incredulously. 

Laura shrugs nonchalantly. “I just asked him a question, gave some advice.” 

Ryan’s eyes narrow, thinking the encounter through. “You don’t give a shit about Jacob.” He argues flatly, almost as if he’s reminding her of that fact. 

“Oh no, I know that.” Her raw honesty nearly makes Ryan actually reel back. “I needed to see how he’d react.”

“Laura…” Max says disappointedly from behind her, but Ryan hasn’t caught up just as quick.

“What do you mean?” He asks, trying to work out what he’s missing. 

She taps the notebook, giving him an obvious look. Maybe he sees the best in people, because Ryan really doesn’t believe Laura would stoop so low. Her patience of trying to get Ryan to come to the conclusion himself is quickly worn out and she rolls her eyes.

“I mean wasn’t that a really interesting display of behaviour? He interacted with all of us and everyone had a different reaction to the stand off, some were even ignored entirely! That information is incredibly helpful to piecing together our behaviours.” She explains, the slight animation to her tone and the thoughtful expression on her face making Ryan feel a little sick.

That was what her expression was throughout the entire encounter- that clinical look she gets when she’s observing them. He knows she wants to work this out and he knows Laura has a resolve that cannot be deterred. But at the expense of others? The whole thing really was just manufactured so Laura could see how they’d behave. Laura’s smart, she knows exactly where to dig in to needle a reaction out of someone. 

“What did you say to him? What was your ‘advice’?” Ryan asks, feeling strangely nauseous. 

“I mean what does it matter? If I hadn’t said something we would have never gotten the chance to see such a clear example of posturing between everyone. I mean I hadn’t thought he would transition from an argumental stand-off to then quite clearly assessing pack standing but to be totally honest I don’t think even he-“ 

“What did you say to him?” Ryan repeats, his teeth grinding down after every other word. 

Laura finally falls quiet, glancing away in what Ryan really hopes is shame. “I said… that, well I was surprised he was working so soon. And that, I guess he doesn’t have to. That there’s absolutely no reason for him to and he should maybe spend some time working on himself first.” She explains slowly, reluctancy holding back each word. 

Ryan’s eyes close, his head shaking as if on it’s own accord. He’ll be the first to admit he doesn’t know Jacob well, at all in the slightest really, probably only about the same amount as Laura herself knows about him. He’s not even sure if he likes Jacob all that much. But he too has pieced together the odd comments that have been made. Using that against him, to purposefully upset him?

He opens his eyes, looking directly into Laura’s and uses a tone so stern he didn’t know he was capable of it. “I don’t care what information you get out of it, you do not do that shit.”

Laura gives him a frustrated expression, as if Ryan’s just not understanding why she did it. “I get it, it isn’t nice, but don’t you want to work out how this curse actually affects us?”

“Not if it means treating people like that! Did you not see how upset everyone was?” He argues back, his temper beginning to fray.

“Fine, I’ll leave Jacob alone. But this opened up so many more questions, I just need to see how either Abi or Dylan react because-“

He only has to hear that one name for Ryan to cut her off. Though Ryan did not hear this tone from his Dad many times, he knows that his next words are said in a splitting replica of his rare strict timbre. “No. No, we’re not your little fucking lab rats, you’re not going to poke at us to see how we react and work out what that means. Find another way or let it go, those are your only options.”

If looks could kill and uninfected Ryan was up against Laura’s current expression or twenty starving werewolves, the choice would be obvious. She chews down on her teeth, her face scrunched with obvious anger. Ryan almost thinks she might punch him. Instead she turns on her heel, striding away with the notebook nearly crinkling in half as it’s held behind her arm. Max offers him a weary look, one Ryan isn’t sure if meant to be reassuring, resigned or loyally disapproving, before he follows obediently. 

With the exhaustion of the day hitting him all at once, Ryan collapses down onto the bench at the table. His head in his hands, fingers rubbing his temples, he thinks to himself that this month is only going to get even more complicated from here on out.

Chapter Text

The wind raises each hair on his arm, the warmth of the fading sunlight in turn soothing away its bitter cold sting. Though the sun inches closer and closer to the horizon, the woods are still alive. Rabbits dash through the undergrowth, birds sing their praises to surviving another day and moths begin to awake, fluttering up to the sky through the grass and brush. 

Ryan’s boots leave prints on the path, wet and rotten leaves sticking to his heels, a mixture of dust and mud suck to the outsole. He breathes in deeply as he walks, the crisp Fall air purging every inhaled toxin from his lungs. He can almost taste the pine on his tongue. The smell of dying trees and plants, the sound of the life within the forest, the feel of the sun on his skin and the sight of endless wood provides him with an odd feeling. An odd, unwanted, sense of home. 

The guilt he feels for that is strong. Not just because this is the last place he’d want to find comfort, with the ghosts and violence of its history. But rather because he has a real home and he feels like he’s rather betraying that fact with this odd sense of ease. 

Though he had trekked over to the Manor in hopes of talking to Travis, he hadn’t managed to find him from calling out at the mouth of the great labyrinth, despite his cruiser outside and the front door unlocked. He had also hoped the Manor had signal, which it did not. He wasn’t willing to venture in so deep to reach the landline. So, after waiting around outside for far too long in hopes Travis would show up, Ryan eventually admitted defeat and began the walk back.

He thinks he may be dawdling but the forest brings with it that odd familiarity and homeliness that he would never have expected. He shouldn’t feel so comfortable in these woods that acted as his greatest horror and hell just a few months back. Yet still he doesn’t really want to step out from where the trees encase him and into that stifling lodge. So yes, he dawdles.

As Ryan walks through the clearing, a flock of crows burst through the trees and swoop upwards through the air. He watches them as they soar, batting their wings to carry them higher and higher, travelling far over the forest until they’re just tiny black specks against the sky. Though he knows it's cliché, Ryan does feel a sort of sense of fascination for those strange, intelligent birds. He wonders how much they have seen, if they know of the depravities that have taken place here. He wonders if they call it home.  

The groaning under his feet tears his eyes from the fading splotches against the orange hue. He stands on wood covered in the same orange of the sky from rotting leaves. Wood that is cut into boards, just as damp and decayed as those very leaves. He slows, glancing for the closest patch of solid ground. He hops on one foot to the dirt path he’d strayed from in his distraction, the old wood giving a terrible creak as more pressure is applied. Safely on the path once more, Ryan keeps his eyes on his feet as he continues walking, his sense of smell and hearing enough to satiate his curiosity with the woods around him. 

The sky continues to darken as the sunlight fades, just barely streaming over the tops of the trees now. The beautiful orange colour gives way to the dark blue of approaching night. The trees are beginning to lose their shape, to instead be blackened shadows swaying in the air and dropping dark tears down to the ground below. 

The woods, dark, cold and endless, calls to him with a gentle whisper in the breeze and beckons him to delve deeper with millions of arms made of branches. It promises food, scurrying through the undergrowth. Shelter, under a canopy of stars. Drink, clear water from streams and a rich red swill. Freedom, to give into instinct and shed any need for shame. And lastly, though this promise is perhaps hesitantly given, solitude. Forlorn, he declines. 

With the sunlight now almost entirely gone, the cold has begun to pierce through his skin and his eyes squint to see the winding path ahead of him. Despite that, he does not rush forward or spare any glance over his shoulder. He has no fear in these woods. Not anymore. A shift of course, from that night, as many things have been. Ryan thinks the only fear he has felt since then has been of other people, which he supposes shows where his allegiances now lie and the truth of what he is.

The walk is of course only so long though and soon enough he reaches the tree line, the path to the lodge short from here. It stands tall, beautifully carved and, so far at least, withstanding time. Inside the others must mill or laze around, light spilling out the windows from behind the shutters. He can hear the ever so faint sound of voices underneath the picking up wind and forest sound. He prays, though he knows no god answers him, that some tension has subsided.

It’s been a long day. No one has quite forgotten the confrontation from yesterday or the tense silence at dinner that night. So today they’ve spent split apart, many hiding in their rooms and Ryan is ashamed to admit he was one of them. He has not forgotten his decision or changed his mind, he’s just not ready to start just yet. Truthfully, it’s that he doesn’t know how to start.

To be even more honest than that though, he was too scared to leave the attic in case he ran into Dylan. Dylan who makes his heart ache, who soothes that hole in his stomach, who he wants nothing more than to talk to. Who he shouldn’t talk to, not in the way that he does, with a fond softness in his voice and a yearning biting at space between each word. Realising, or rather more being reminded, that Dylan just sees their kiss and his crush as nothing more than a silly little joke, was good for him. It was also so incredibly painful. 

So he’s spent the day alone, reading and listening to the sounds of the scattered group down below. His walk has just been one more escape into solitude, which is now at its end, even if just for a moment.

As Ryan gets closer to the stairs at the back and with his eyes having adjusted to the quick falling dark, a shape comes into view. It takes him drawing a few steps closer until he can see the details. 

Kaitlyn sits in the middle of the stairs, her legs bent in front of her and crossed arms resting on her knees. The light falling through the cracks of the door gives her a golden outline whilst her face is obscured by shadow. Though he’s not sure if she watches him approach, he has no doubt she’s waiting for him.

He slows to a stop in front of the stairs, putting his hands in his pockets as he stands in front of her. Her eyes, he can now see, are pointed up to the sky but she gives him a hum of acknowledgment. The air smells of smoke, like a warm bonfire at the beachside, spilling a comforting pollution to the sky. He suddenly thinks it smells almost exactly like the fire they stoked that August night, back when everything was simple and okay. 

“Surprised you didn’t run away.” Kaitlyn quips, her voice a heavy sound above the quiet echoes of the woods and murmur of sound from inside. 

“Yeah well, I considered it.” Ryan admits. “How is it in there?”

She shrugs, her golden outline chasing after the movement. “Same as before, smells horrible and makes your eyes sting. I swear the only two who are normal this month are Nick and Abi, though Nick’s new kind of normal I mean.” 

“So quiet and moody, like everyone else?” Ryan asks, pointing out what Nick’s new kind of normal really is.

“Sure but not as emotionally volatile as everyone else. That’s what I mean.” She corrects him. 

“Dylan’s not emotionally volatile.” Ryan argues, only from the lack of anything else to lighten the perspective with, though he admits it’s a weak one.

“How would you know, you’ve been hiding away like the rest of them.” Kaitlyn snaps. She then takes a deep calming breath and speaks in a softer, far more weary tone. “So I guess you decided it isn’t your problem then? I was almost hopeful yesterday, despite it all.”

She still hasn’t looked at him, her eyes trained to the sky above. He follows her gaze, finding the large waxing moon rising up amidst the clouds and ink. It draws in his eyes now just as it does to the tides, the bright illuminance sending down waves of longing. Unlike the forest, its call is not a whisper but a long wailing howl. Ryan feels something shifting beneath his skin. 

With great effort, he yanks his eyes from the celestial body and tries to drown out her call with his own words. “I haven’t decided it’s not my problem.”

Kaitlyn doesn’t answer him, tucking her chin over her knees, her gaze upwards never breaking. Ryan sighs, stepping up the stairs until he reaches where Kaitlyn sits, turning back to face the woods as he lowers himself down beside her. Not wanting the beast within him to stir anymore than it already has today, he focuses on his boots. 

Kaitlyn’s right, he has been hiding away today. Though he’d say it’s for good reason, it’s cowardly, especially after having made this big decision to take responsibility and work to bring everyone together. He just hasn’t known where to start, but maybe this is it. 

“You know, I thought really hard about what you said. I was thinking about how we’ve all changed and what that means and how we’re all acting like strangers now. So if we want to change that we have to be honest about who we are and our pasts and-“ He suddenly cuts himself off, realising this rambling explanation is not actually important to what he really wants to say. Instead he just admits simply, “You were right. You were totally right.”

Kaitlyn snorts, her tone already having grown much lighter. “Did that hurt you to say?” 

“Well it’s the first time I’ve said it and probably the last, so I think I’ll manage.” He jokes back, a small twitch to his lips despite himself.

“You know it’s not something I can do in a day or-or even know how to begin. But I want to try.” He continues on in his explanation. “I just- this is foul, I mean no one’s talking seriously about anything and people are starting to really clash so, you know. It’s important that someone tries, I guess.”

“I’m pretty fucking relieved to hear that to be honest.” Kaitlyn confesses. “It’s worse than last month. Having even you hiding upstairs today, I was like, well this is it, this is how it’s gonna be.”

Ryan hums, trying not to feel guilty. It’s been an awful day for everyone, the lodge brimming with dark scents coated in even darker emotions. Yet no one except Ryan, and now Kaitlyn to join him, dared step outside. So instead they’ve all hid, even eating dinner in the farthest most hidden corners of the lodge that they could find. He knows contributing to that behaviour would have just reinforced it, but Ryan had his own selfish reasons to hide away, whether the confrontation yesterday had happened or not. Just when he’s decided to no longer run from his problems, he has spent the day sprinting, leaving the others to choke on the dust. He needs to grow up. 

“I mean this is not how we’re going to get repeat customers.” Kaitlyn laughs, almost to herself or as a private joke with the moon. 

“You really think they just wouldn’t return?” Ryan asks her in disbelief, the idea impossible to him.

She shrugs again, her tone dropping back down like their private joke has been ruined with Ryan’s intrusion. “I don’t know. I don’t think I really know anything anymore, not for certain.” 

“What do you mean?” Ryan asks, his eyes drifting up to watch where her expression reaches the side of her face, still enraptured by the nearly full moon.  

Her nose scrunches and she shakes her head ever so slightly. “You really want me to get into it?” She asks sarcastically.

“Yeah, yeah I do. Being honest and all that, remember?” He says simply. 

Kaitlyn’s brows raise as her nose scrunches even tighter. “Frankly, I didn't think I’d be the first to get grilled when I made that suggestion.” 

Ryan smiles with his own shake of his head. “Just spit it out Kaitlyn.” He tells her, glancing back to the woods for a moment at a snap of a branch. 

She finally, for the first time since he found her here, looks away from the moon. She flicks a look at Ryan from the corner of her eyes before looking down at her hands. Inspecting her palms, fingers, nails, every vein and pore in her skin. He doesn’t think she’s unsure of what to say or collecting herself, her scent completely neutral. Really, Ryan feels she’s deciding whether to trust herself enough to trust him. 

“Everything I knew is wrong now. I mean not to sound like such a teenager, but I really thought I knew everything I had to, you know? Like I knew right from wrong, who I liked and who I disliked, what I wanted to do with my life, what was important to me and I really, really thought that I knew who I was. But now I just, I really have no idea.” 

As she explains, though Ryan understands the feeling entirely, he can’t believe Kaitlyn is the one echoing it back to him. Kaitlyn, who even as she explains she feels she knows nothing, sounds so confident and certain. Kaitlyn, who Ryan has always looked to as the leader amongst their group of loud and strong opinions. Level headed Kaitlyn, who up to this point, Ryan was almost certain that she knew everything. 

“It’s like, I know nothing for certain about the world anymore or life or who I am. I can’t do anything with certainty anymore, you know? I feel like all I can do is go through each day to get to the next and fucking- take a warm bath and have a tea, like that stupid therapist suggested, as if that’s help with anything.” 

She breathes in deeply, nodding to herself. Finally she turns back to Ryan, giving a frustrated shrug and head tilt, though he knows it’s not directed at him. “So that’s me being honest. I’m really glad you have decided to try and get us to open up, but I can’t tell you about myself or whatever because I truly do not fucking know anymore.”

Ryan takes a moment to process everything she said, his brows slightly pinched. Strangely, he wants to argue with her. Not because he wants to diminish her feelings at all, which are totally understandable and frankly extremely relatable, but because to be honest, he thinks she’s wrong. Mostly because he thinks she knows that too. 

“I don’t know if this will help at all, but you’re still Kaitlyn.” He tells her plainly.

“I don’t know who that is anymore.” She quietly bemoans. 

If anyone else confided this in him, Ryan wouldn’t push back. He’d do his utmost effort to be sympathetic, which expressing such isn’t really his strong suit, but he’d try anyway. With Kaitlyn though? She’s too intelligent and self aware for Ryan to feel good about just nodding along. He doesn’t want to invalidate how she feels but reminding himself of why Kaitlyn said it should be him to talk to each of them in the first place, he decides to say the honest thing.

“Yes you do.” He says, toeing a thin line between insisting.

Kaitlyn rolls her eyes, looking away and back up to the moon. “Yeah thanks Ryan, really helpful.” She scoffs, surely regretting her suggestion of Ryan to be the one to try and talk about these things.

Though he’s worried he’s already messed up beyond repair, Ryan’s gut urges him forward. “You do know who you are, you’re Kaitlyn. You’re headstrong and intelligent and caring as blunt as it may be. You speak clearly and never wear silver and pick on the people you care about, well them and anyone else who happens to walk into the firing line. You know exactly who you are but even then, if all of those things changed tomorrow, you’re still Kaitlyn.” 

She looks back at him slowly, as if she can hide the fact that she is actually listening to his words. With the heel of his boot he pushes himself further from her side so he can turn towards her and face her fully.

“Even if none of this happened, you still would have changed. You go off to college and you change, you meet someone new and you change, you’re not this-this rigid permanent thing. So yeah, what happened was shit and it’s probably always going to be shit, but you changing doesn’t have to be. You’re still you.”

She was not only listening to him, but she heard him too. Not that she seems particularly thrilled about that, but it’s more than enough for what Ryan was trying to achieve. And Ryan is so glad that it is Kaitlyn he is talking to, who he does know and who she also knows, because since it is Kaitlyn, she argues back.

“Okay, sure, I ‘know’ who I am, which is an eternally changing, unknowable thing. Great, yeah that’s awesome. But I still don’t know anything else.” 

“Like what?” Ryan asks, now no longer worried he has messed it up. In her engagement with the conversation, the argument really, Ryan can tell she needed this. Whether she knew she wanted a debate on it is questionable, but he knows she’s not the sort to crave pity.

“I told you, right from wrong, who I like and dislike, whether fucking vampires are real or not, that type of shit. Just fucking anything!” She says, her tone sharpening into a higher pitch at the end. 

“You can’t have lost every bit of emotion or logic or- or all your opinions over that night.” Ryan says, though he says it no longer as an argument and rather more a question. 

“I shot someone because I thought it was the right thing to do. I saw sides of people I didn’t know existed and I can never see them as simply as I did before ever again. I don’t think I’ll ever go to college...” She explains in clipped sentences, until the last one, where her words grow slow as if she’s only realising them as they leave her mouth. 

“You don’t trust yourself anymore.” He observes quietly. 

“How could I? I mean like, I’ve changed so much that- okay, you’re right I’m still myself and I know who I am- and yes that was painful to admit. But I’ve changed so much I barely recognise myself, or I’m forgetting who I used to be and I really don’t know which is worse. I have these urges now to do things I know I shouldn’t want to do, I experience the world so differently now and even my body and senses have changed. Just… everything.” She expresses with a voice of deep contempt. 

Ryan gives her a moment to suck in deep breaths of air through her scrunched nose, collecting herself and her emotions. Her scent is a thick smog around her, quickly rushed away by the rising bitter wind before more radiates from her pores. He’s never seen Kaitlyn cry and though he doubts he will now, he also prays he won’t as he has no clue how he would handle that.

On a thick exhale she finishes. “I don’t know where I stop and the infection, virus, curse whatever the fuck this is, begins. So how am I supposed to trust myself when I never know if what I’m doing, feeling or even fucking thinking, is normal? Because when me and you are there staring each other down and growling like fucking animals it feels pretty normal when I know, I know it is not.”

She looks at Ryan now that she’s said her piece, with a look of bleakness as if she’s certain he’ll have no reply. As if what she said was so outlandish that he’ll only be able to stutter out halfhearted sympathies. But now that they’ve reached the conclusion, the real issue, he knows exactly what she is talking about as he has felt every single thing she said. 

He’s thought about this, deeply, for himself. In a long rambling stream of deliberations. He doesn’t quite know how to express all those same thoughts to her, without going through that same maundering, abstract explanation. How can he turn such a complex stream into brief, easily understood bullet points? Ryan nods to himself, quickly reminding himself of the thought process he went through, before slicing out the centre.

“I get it, I really do, or I did, or I still do. Can I just- can I explain how I felt, to then tell you how I’ve worked through that?” He asks, checking to make sure she won’t just feel like he’s ignored what she said to talk about himself.

Kaitlyn waves a hand and says in a only half sarcastic tone, “Go ahead, I’d love to hear what the ever so mysterious Ryan thinks about.” 

“I felt like everything had changed so much, which I mean it has, that I had been made irrevocably different and I was losing track of where the curse began and I ended.” He tells her, the same simple but devastating concept she herself just explained. 

Though she nods along, he really is just repeating her. So with a deep breath, Ryan divulges a truth that’s a little more raw. “It felt like I hadn’t survived, you know? Like that month after, inside I just shut up more and more. I just kept going through my days, telling myself that everything was fine, that I was okay. Honestly as horrible as it is to admit, the only thing keeping me from becoming full blown depressed was knowing that you guys were going through it too. But because I wasn’t depressed and I sure as fuck wasn’t actually okay, I felt nothing- except that goddamn hole in my gut.”

Ryan’s hand, as if by its own conscience, grazes his stomach just below his ribs. It’s still there, that gaping endless void, like something is just missing but he just doesn’t know what. He’s explained it enough.

“Coming back here was hard but also seeing you guys… those instincts and everything, were just so much harder to control. It felt so natural, and like you said, you know, I knew it was so fucked up. What you’d told me though, I really thought about it, I mean a lot, and I kinda realised, well I went on this big internal rant about responsibility and change especially.” Ryan takes a deep breath to collect his thoughts and stop the flow of words. It is an adjustment he has had to make, getting used to these long wordy conversations that feel so unfamiliar for him.

“So how did you fix it?” Kaitlyn asks, once his pause must have drawn out for too long.

It would be cruel to build to this moment to just say ‘I don’t know, work it out yourself’. The words are so hard to find though. How would he have explained it to himself had he asked?

“I don’t think it is something that can be fixed. I just accepted it, I guess. I’d been fighting so hard to keep all those urges contained, to try and keep acting normal. I didn’t want to accept anything to do with the curse and I didn’t want it to take over. But I mean, change is inevitable, isn’t it? I’d already changed whether I wanted to or not. So I stopped holding myself back and yeah, it really felt like accepting defeat.” He gives her a second to absorb his words before he continues. 

“Then I realised, I was still me, you know, like yeah things had changed and I was doing shit I wouldn’t have before, but I’m still me. It’s not good, but it’s not bad either. I just feel like the two halves are, I don’t know, connected now. I don’t second guess everything and I don’t treat myself with this fear that I’ll suddenly wolf out and be something I’m not. I just do what feels natural and yeah that’s different now, but, I mean it’s true that everything is anyway.” At the end of his explanation he shrugs, watching the twitches in her expression.

She’s thinking about it, considering it. But Ryan knows that this is something she has to decide herself- if he had been told to just let it go and accept the entirely too natural unnatural beastly urges, he would have said fuck off. So he doesn’t tell her what to do, just explains how he himself felt and why he no longer feels it so much.

“So what, I just give up?” She asks genuinely.

“No, you don’t give up, you just accept it, if you can or want to. You’re allowed to trust yourself okay? You did the best you could with what you knew and now you’re allowed to let yourself trust that you’re still doing the same.” Ryan tells her, with a care he didn’t know he held for her. 

“I don’t want to hurt you guys. But then I get those urges and I’m standing off against you and I really try to hold back but…” She trails off.

So Ryan finishes her sentence for her, certain of what she was going to say. “But it feels right. Natural, fucking good even. I know.”

“Yeah.” Kaitlyn sighs, her arms crossing over her legs once more and eyes drifting up towards the moon. 

Though his own ache to follow, Ryan looks at Kaitlyn seriously instead. “You know I’m never upset with you for that right? It’s weird as shit and I still don’t get why it happens, but it’s not something I’ll ever judge you for. I mean I’m right there with you, you’re not doing it to air or whatever.”

She looks back to him, her eyes narrowed and searching. “You sure?” She asks. “Because when I talked to Abi and Emma, they told me how scary and- what was the word she used… threatening. How threatening it is and I kinda feel like a total piece of shit for making them so uncomfortable.”

“You don’t have to feel bad about the standoffs, at all. I mean at the very least not with me, okay? Like I’m sorry we have them, but it doesn’t mean I care any less or that it’s impacting how I see you, I don’t want you to be thinking that.” Ryan tells her, his tone expressing he means it on no uncertain terms.

He is surprised to hear her explain how some of the others feel seeing the standoffs though. Ryan, when he sees anyone else posturing whether it’s Kaitlyn, Jacob or Emma, doesn’t feel intimidated in the slightest. Of course he can tell their posture, growls and auras are certainly intimidating, he just doesn’t feel that himself, for whatever reason. Maybe he’ll ask how- no actually, he won’t.

Kaitlyn studies him for a moment, checking his face thoroughly to see any hint of Ryan not entirely meaning his words. He knows she won’t find it. If Ryan is anything, if everything else is stripped from his being, he is honest. He can lie, though not convincingly well, so omission tends to be his only form of deceit. Until recently he wasn’t much of a talker anyway so what would have been the point in speaking, if on the rare occasions he did was to not speak anything but the truth? He means what he says, in the times when he does get past surface level answers and conversations that he makes just to appease. 

“Okay, well no more apologies for it then, just between us.” Kaitlyn accepts at last. “And, I don’t know, I’ll think about the rest of it, alright? It’s in consideration.”

She mimes dropping a ballet in a voting box, a small half smile at the corner of her lips. Ryan nods back with his own small smile. He’s glad and frankly, a little bit proud. His speech teacher when he was a little kid would be so delighted to learn that all those long hours of trying to coax sound out of him paid off so well. Interrupting his thoughts, Kaitlyn releases a large gust of air that almost startles Ryan, shaking her shoulders out as she releases the tension from her body. 

“Well, there goes my turn! Never doing that again.” She jokes cheerfully. “Your turn now.”

Ryan’s brows instantly knit together, his head ever so slightly rearing back, though his tone is only bemused at worst. “My turn? I don’t think you appreciate how much I just talked and shared.”

“Oh no, I can appreciate it perfectly. Back during camp it was like pulling teeth out with a rusty pair of pliers, especially at the start before you eased up a bit. And I don’t mean talk, which I will admit you begrudgingly did a good amount of, but actually getting any information out of you was” she blows out a breath between her teeth, “Phew, impossible.”

“Don’t be getting greedy now then.” He quips, with just some truth to it.

“Too greedy to ask why you were hiding upstairs all day if you have decided to try and sort some of this shit out?” She asks, almost hesitantly. 

Well, he definitely doesn’t want to give the honest answer for that. Neither does he actually want her to feel greedy for asking him questions or like he won’t talk to her while hypocritically expecting her to open up. So it’s going to be either omission or the rusty pliers. 

“I didn’t know where to start. Like yeah I’ve decided to try and talk to people, get them to be honest, open up and accept what’s going on so we can move forward. Until we started talking tonight though, which I didn’t expect, yeah I had no clue where to begin.” He explains, slowly beginning to feel a little put out again. Talking to Kaitlyn was the easy first step, they’d already kind of discussed it and her issues were pretty similar to his own. The others, who he doesn’t even know how to start an open conversation with in the first place, he’s sure they won’t be so smooth.

“I guess.” She thinks for a moment. “Well I mean for the others, does it always have to be a conversation? Can’t you just lead by example or I don’t know, lay down the law? It worked yesterday.”

Ryan laughs, a genuine sound that he didn’t think he was capable of making today. “Lay down the law? I don’t think you just make a rule that people have to get along or accept this shit. Even if you could, it's not like I’m really in the position to do so, I mean it’s not like anyone would listen to me.”

Kaitlyn gives him that utter deadpan look and Ryan would return it, if he wasn’t so confused on why he’s receiving it in the first place. “Ryan, seriously? Come on, yesterday, as bullshit as it was, when you stepped up people listened. Even I listened despite really fucking not wanting to.”

“Hm,” Ryan concedes that one particular point. He did notice that, but it wasn’t because he, Ryan himself, said it but the fact that anyone did. “They just needed someone to step in, that doesn’t mean I’m any sort of authority.”

“Dude I thought you were just playing coy but you really haven’t noticed, have you?” Kaitlyn says. Her deadpan expression is long gone, completely replaced by a baffled almost amazement.

“What are you talking about?” Ryan scoffs, feeling that many of their conversations end up like this, with Kaitlyn alluding to something that he never knows what. He thinks it probably makes her feel a little smug. 

She actually tells him plainly now though, for once. “You have this, like, aura now.” His blank expression forces her to elaborate. 

“Like, urgh how do I explain this. There’s something about you now, I don’t know if it’s your scent or the way you hold yourself or what, but there’s this strong authoritative, resolute and almost intimidating air around you. Not like negatively but I also don’t want to say fatherly because that’s definitely not it and kinda really weird. It’s just, like you’ve got your shit together and there will be swift retribution if you’re not at least listened to, if not obeyed. You know?” She explains it with a mixture of tone, thoughtful to awkward to jokingly honest. 

Ryan stares at her in muddied shock, his mind struggling to wrap around her words. That… doesn’t sound like him. He’s someone who disappears into the corner, not commands the attention of a room. He doesn’t amass respect, he’s often forgotten in entirety. Even the kids at camp didn’t listen to him because he was some authority, they listened because naively and wrongly so, they thought he was cool and of course he would also let them goof off as much as they wanted as long as they didn’t break any rules.

“No, I don’t know.” He answers slowly, awkwardly shifting his gaze to look out at the forest. “Didn’t realise you valued me so highly.”

“I’m not saying any of this as a compliment, don’t let it go to your head. It’s just a fact on how it is. You think if Nick stood up and told everyone to piss off, people would listen? Duh, obviously not, it’s cause you said it.” Kaitlyn finishes with an eyebrow raise, as if what she was saying was the most obvious shit in the world. 

“Right..” Ryan distantly agrees, processing that revelation that it seems no one thought to share with him. Unless of course, this is just Kaitlyn’s opinion, similarly to how Dylan’s scent affects him so much but got scoffed at when he brought it up. His lungs drop an inch towards his stomach and he looks at Kaitlyn from the corner of his eye. “Have you asked if the others think the same or…”

Kaitlyn rolls her eyes and wrinkles her nose. “I said don’t let it get to your head. Yes I did ask and no I’m not the only one who has noticed, it’s a little hard not to. Don’t go thinking I still have a crush on you or anything, ego would not suit you.”

Ryan’s head reels, unsure if he heard right. “Still?”

“Anyway, can I finish what I was going to say earlier? Jesus. What I was going to say is that I am glad you did step up. I wanted to bash Laura’s cocky dumb face in but Jacob did need me, so it was the right call to make.” She sounds genuinely pained as she tacks on, “So I don’t know, good one. Urgh.”

Shaking the previous conversation from his head, Ryan focuses on this new line of discussion. He looks back to her, blinking a few times to get his mind to begin functioning properly and finally finds words to use again. “Yeah well, I didn’t catch the beginning so I didn’t really know how it all came up. So I didn’t want to intervene, but I should have, especially knowing now what the real reason was.”

“What was the reason?” Kaitlyn asks, her voice alight with anger loyal to her friend. 

Ryan debates telling her, not wanting to stoke any more conflicts or tension, but hiding the truth wouldn’t help anyway. “She wanted to see how he’d react I guess. She’s trying to work out everything she can, which includes our behaviour and what it means.”

Kaitlyn scoffs, her fingers closing into loose fists over her knees.. “She said that shit to Jacob of all people for a reason you know. There’s a reason she didn’t say it to you.” 

“Yeah, I know. It was fucked up. I told her to never do that shit again, I mean she said she needed to see how Dylan would react to something and- It doesn’t matter, if what you said is true then hopefully she’ll listen.” Ryan says, his own temper spiking for a short moment with that reminder.

“Yeah, she fucking better.” Kaitlyn mutters darkly. 

They let it rest for a moment, Kaitlyn and Ryan looking out to the moon and woods respectively. The wind has whipped up into icy blades that cut through their clothes and darkness has spread so completely that it blankets even them, Ryan’s boots and ankles lost to the sea of night. He doesn’t know how long it has been but Kaitlyn's head has begun to have to tilt back and even the forest has grown hushed and subdued. He thinks Kaitlyn’s eyes may have grown heavy, a held back yawn audible in her throat. Ryan feels more awake than he has all day.

“You know I’m sorry if I’ve-“ Kaitlyn starts before stopping just as suddenly.

“If you’ve?” Ryan asks, trying to prompt her to continue.

She shakes her head, her legs finally stretching out from where they’ve been bent in front of her and her arms reaching up to the sky as she strains out the tension in them. 

“I lied, I’m not actually sorry for anything.” She says it with a smile, standing up and facing him. Her tone drops to quiet for her last weighted question of the night. “I’m glad we talked and I really will think about it all. I hope you’re serious about talking to the others too because, yeah well, you know why.”

Ryan looks up to her and he can see that though there’s contemplation and tension in her eyes still, just a little bit of weight has been lifted from her shoulders. He lets go of her secret not apology, focusing instead on that ever so slight lift to her shoulders. No matter what she decides, they talked about it and that Ryan thinks, is the most important thing they could do.

“I don’t want to hide away from it all anymore. I’m going to drag it out into the open and make everyone see it. It's their choice what to do once they have.” He tells her, his eyes meeting her finally for the briefest of moments. She nods, knowing he means her too.

With it now all said, Kaitlyn gives a small and what he thinks is a wearily hopeful smile. There is a lightness to her scent, like some of the heavy smoke has dispersed, no longer a bonfire but a blown out candle wick that will never cease that light stream of airy smoke. She gives his shoulder a light pat as she walks by, warmth flooding out the door before it is contained once more as it falls shut behind her.

Though the night is cold and dark, it is also young and Ryan’s sure sleep will not embrace him tonight. The cold pierces into his skin and the dark envelops him but he doesn’t rise to follow behind her. Instead he picks up the earbuds that hang from his collar, putting them in and clicking the small button on their cord. Music plays, a song he has heard many times before and as he stares out into the woods, he thinks the trees may dance in time with the beat.

Chapter Text

Ryan slides the mug across the table in front of him, coffee sloshing over the sides and staining the wood as it coasts past. When it hits his other hand, his long fingers stretch and send it back skidding, droplets hitting his fingers. There he keeps the mug in a purgatory of movement without any distance travelled and has done so for the last half hour. 

The lodge is warm, almost too much so, the embers of a fire just shortly dead glowing within the fading light. Violent wind batters against the windows, bringing with it clouds broken just enough to let the last few hours of sun reach through. He watches the door, tracing over its grooves and notches that are still quite visible from so far away as he both wishes for and dreads its opening, when the warmth will be pulled outside and whatever semblance of peace that remains alongside it.

While he waits for Travis to arrive he has to keep his hands moving, lest he rip through his sleeves and flesh. With every inch the sun falls, another inch of his skin is internally split. His entire body is alight with an insatiable itching, that burning electrical current flowing through his nerves. It takes a level of self control to not rip into his skin with the pointed ends of his talons, one he is not sure how much longer he can maintain. Before he did so by flicking through a book he couldn’t find much care for today, then through making dinner and now with nothing else left, pushing this stupid ass fucking mug back and forth.

All days here seem to be, but the day of the full moon especially so, has been painfully long. With nothing to do while each sound, sensation and scent are amplified to a piercing extent, the only entertainment is their own agony. Though he’s tried to distract himself, volunteering to prepare both lunch and dinner so they do actually eat this time, he thinks he’s finally reached the point where he actually wants Travis to show up just so he can have something to do. Even if it means that tentative peace he’s struck is completely undone.

For as terrible as he thinks this day will always be, he at the very least has not fled to the attic once. Not that he hasn’t thought about it of course, but he hasn’t and Ryan thinks that has to count for something. He really hopes it counts for something, as his cosmic score balance must be either abysmally bad or exceptionally high from how his year has gone thus far. Maybe his Nana’s dog really is there haunting him and this is his karmic punishment. He wouldn’t be surprised anymore, he’s not sure anything could.

It does count, Ryan will reluctantly admit, even if not to his cosmic bank of brownie points. The others are having just as terrible of a day as him, as is their curse, tempers fragile and discomfort high. Today however, they didn’t argue. No threats, stand offs or poking for a reaction. They tried of course, in the earlier half of the day. Laura and Max, Emma and Nick, Dylan and anyone who decided to take up arms against his constant stream of poorly timed jokes. But each time Ryan stood up to intervene, sent a warning glare in their direction or spoke up to tell them to cut it off, their silence was instant and their postures abashed. By the time midday passed, most of the more highly charged and defiant perpetrators realised that Ryan himself wasn’t going to flee and so they did themselves. It was actually surprisingly easy to keep the peace and has been rather quiet ever since.

He thinks this month may have been an easier time to stay put downstairs on the day of the full moon though, admittedly. As last time, though the stand offs, the intrinsic aggression against Jacob and Kaitlyn, clearer scents and his own irritability were manageable, one specific thing was not. Dylan’s scent, intoxicating and terribly tempting, was what had him remove himself, as to not give into that temptation. This month, it wasn’t a concern in the slightest.

The entirety of the lodge is drenched in misery. It has soaked into the walls and floorboards, a heavy fog within the kitchen, creeping beneath closed doors and eating up all the air in the room, every room. As it was last time, this month too he can distinguish each scent perfectly, knowing exactly how much space each takes up and how laden it is with emotion. Jacob he knows has been hiding in the other attic, soot rolling down over the sides and settling into a thick smog above Ryan’s head. Emma has barracked herself in the rec room with no one else permitted to enter, acid seeping out the door and dissolving the stairs as it travels downwards. Laura and Max are in the office, giving each other the silent treatment Ryan believes, which is at least better than their earlier bickering and posturing. With all those dense and noxious scents burning through his nasal cavity, Dylan’s own bitter gloom seeping from the library is barely noticeable. 

Not everyone is hiding away however, which is another reason why Ryan thinks being present is ultimately worth it. Abi and Nick are also in the main hall of the lodge, at a far table and couch in front of the fireplace respectively. Kaitlyn has swept through the lodge, doing the rounds between the two attics and library, something Ryan isn’t sure is actually appreciated or not. The air has only soured further over the day, so her attempts seem to have been futile.

Ryan should perhaps have tried something similar. He definitely should have. It’s just, with Jacob he has nothing to say that wouldn’t be said or received better than Kaitlyn could say. He doesn’t particularly feel like talking to Laura right now after her ploy and nor does he think she wants to talk to him after calling her on it. With Dylan- well with Dylan he is once more being a coward but he’s too exhausted and pent up to try and find any sort of bravery today. With Nick and Abi hanging around, his occasional comment of halfhearted reassurance when the air sours even more than it already is, will have to suffice.

The mug has just hit his hand yet again when the door slams open in front of him. Cold coffee spills over the wood as the cup is knocked to its side in his hurry to stand, dripping down between the boards to soak the floor in a stain he’s sure will be impossible to remove. Travis strides into the lodge, his gaze sweeping over the nearly empty room before landing firmly on Ryan in front of him. He gives Ryan an obvious look, his brows raising and head shaking ever so slightly. Ryan gets the message, stepping out over the bench as Travis leans back on his heels and waits impatiently. Only a little unnecessarily spiteful, Ryan thinks, let him wait. 

Still he goes to round up the others, hoping with some guilt that they aren’t as defiant as he was to Kaitlyn last month. It is the perfect time too he thinks, the light that still reaches inside low and dim. He knocks on the office door, waiting just a moment before he hears movement inside getting closer towards him. He starts towards the stairs but Abi has already begun upwards, offering him a weakly reassuring smile. He returns his own relieved one back. So he turns back instead, calling up to Jacob in the exposed attic as he makes his way over to the library.

He hesitates before he knocks, his cowardice hitting a peak despite the quickly ticking time pressure and simplicity of his task. He berates himself silently, this avoidance of Dylan out of hurt of- of what? Of what he already knew? He has to get over it, he’s unfairly punishing him for Ryan’s own issues. Though Dylan has certainly been avoiding him too, that will be because of not only Ryan’s initial cold reaction to a simple joke but the following avoidance that Dylan is just reciprocating in turn. He probably, hopefully , has no idea why Ryan’s reacting like this or what Ryan’s even reacting to. As utterly cruel as it is, Ryan does truly pray he’s been left in the dark.  

With his resolve finally found, Ryan brings his fist up to rap against the door. There’s murmurs inside, just ever so faint that even Ryan’s keen hearing made keener by the near rising moon, cannot pick out any distinct words. His stomach twists anyway. Kaitlyn had disappeared inside a while ago, the door falling softly shut behind her, sealing away their conversations and all but the overflow of their scents. He’d put his head down, flicking to the next page of his book, without having realised he hadn’t finished the page. Now they do not answer his knock, not a single shuffle of movement from inside.

He finds it hard to admit it to himself, to give the feeling its name, though he knows what it is. Shamefully, he knows it is not the first time he has felt it either. That swirl of emotion under his ribs, that clogs up his veins and uses them to tug his fingers into fists like the strings of a marionette. The swirl, half white hot and half sickly cold, is an extremely unfamiliar sensation. Still he knows what it is. It’s not that he can’t name it, as he often feels with other emotions, rather it has many names- he just doesn’t want to admit it. Jealousy, protectiveness or even in Dylan’s own words, territorial.

He knows it is ridiculous, he knows that. Kaitlyn is definitely not Dylan’s type for obvious reasons and vice versa. Though even if she was, which she isn't he hurriedly reminds himself, that’s not even the entire issue he has. It’s just something about Kaitlyn specifically being close with or leading to or even just fucking near Dylan that makes that feeling in him rise. Well, that isn’t entirely correct he supposes. He also had that first morning here, when Jacob came to find them and the urge to protect hit Ryan so hard he stepped to block his view and they postured at each other for the first time. 

He has no claim to justify the feeling, no reason other than his own pitiful pining that he needs to force himself to get over. He and Dylan are just friends. Frankly, if anyone had claim to being protective it would be Kaitlyn, who is closer friends with Dylan than Ryan is, as much of an ache in the chest that fact is. A claim he thinks she has made on occasion, which just amplifies his own sense of the feeling. 

With a deep sigh and an attempt to smother down his emotions, Ryan twists the handle and pushes the door in. His stomach drops into the void within him as the swirl rises to his throat. Kaitlyn gives Dylan one last squeeze, her arms wrapped tight around him and her chin rubbing slightly back and forth on his shoulder. Instinctively he knows it’s that last gesture specifically the wolf vying to burst through his skin takes great offence to. His hand clenches down over the handle, the feeling of denting metal not even registering in his mind. 

Kaitlyn pulls back, holding his arm with her hand exactly where Ryan had held it himself two days ago, her thumb swiping in a comforting manner before she lets go. As she stands she looks at Ryan with a raised brow and pursed lips. Completely of its own accord, Ryan’s body has shifted to broad shouldered and stiff legged, without him noticing. She doesn’t ignore it per say, considering him for a moment and her own demeanour stiffening in accord. But her moment of consideration clearly ends with the decision that this is not something she wants to challenge Ryan on, at least not at this moment. She passes by him with her hands perhaps mockingly raised to her chest and shoulders purposefully dropped low. His eyes follow her, catching the look she gives him in that split second she passes him by, something negative but too vague to truly decipher the meaning of. 

Dylan watches his movements as Ryan both relaxes with Kaitlyn's departure and then instead shifts uncomfortably under his gaze. There’s a curiosity or almost thoughtfulness in his expression that makes Ryan uneasy. As he observes Ryan, his fingers thread into the loosely knitted blanket that has been thrown over the back of the couch and half pulled into his lap. Ryan thinks it’s a subconscious action, the fabric intertwining between each of his fingers, a tight web that he holds for just a moment. It’s as if he doesn’t want to forget how it feels, but with Ryan’s theory he thinks he knows the real reason.

“Uh, Travis is here.” Ryan says, unable to stop his awkwardness from seeping into his words.

With an exaggerated huff Dylan lets go of the blanket and stands. He begins to open his mouth with the same mischievous grin he often adopted during camp but it takes just one breath for the grin to fade and the joke on his tongue to dissipate. Instead he nods, “Yeah I assumed so.” He says, his words barely more than a languid sigh. He offers Ryan a weak smile instead as he leaves the library.

Back in the main hall of the lodge everyone has gathered. Travis looks through the crowd to find Ryan as he approaches, raising his wrist to pointedly look at a watch Ryan isn’t sure exists. They’re each in old, loose clothing with empty pockets, clothes they won’t miss as they’re inevitably covered in blood and scraps of flesh. Blood as thick and stains as deep as that don’t just wash out.

Travis’ eyes bounce over each of them, for what Ryan assumes to be counting their heads and making sure no one is missing. For the second time Ryan is struck with shock at the belief any of them would not come to be safely locked up for the night. None of them are saints but neither are they so negligent or selfish enough to choose violence and murder over their own pain and discomfort.

“Right, let's go.” Travis instructs, his eyes flicking to the quickly setting sun outside the door. “It’s getting late.”

He turns and begins down the steps, the group obediently following behind. Fresh air and the sharp nip of Fall wash over Ryan as he steps outside, the cold stabbing through his skin and hitting each of his burning nerves. That final semblance of peace is stripped away with the last of his will power, nails digging into his sleeve to scrape at the skin of his arm beneath. 

He nearly loses his footing on the last step as Kaitlyn whips around in front of him, brushing past him with a muttered “Shit!” as she races back inside.

“Kait?” Jacob calls after her in confusion, the friend at his side having disappeared in almost an instant.

Ryan stops in shock after his last step to solid ground, looking behind him to the door hanging open and banging ever so quietly in the wind, a sound amplified to an almost deafening crashing sound in his ears. He looks back to the group, also having stopped to stare past him with their own looks of confusion. All except Travis.

His jaw is clenched, brows furrowed and eyes narrowed. “Get back here!” He yells, causing the group to flinch and cover their ears. Who he intended it for however, even with her wolf strong hearing, Ryan doubts would have heard it.

Travis scowls, an ugly twisting of his lip as he looks down at the ground and shakes his head. When he looks back up there is a resolve on his face, paired with the frustration to create a dark expression. “You goddamn kids- you’re all going to be secured, whether you want to be or not, you hear me?”

“I’m sure she just-“ Jacob starts to defend but Travis cuts him off with a finger pointed at his face and a harsh tone.

“I do not care, not in the slightest.” Travis looks up to the lodge, walking forward with his hand on his belt. “I will drag each and every one of you to those cages in handcuffs, with force, if necessary.”

Ryan steps in front of him just as he’s about to reach the stairs. With the moon swimming just below the surface of the horizon, his instincts are fine tuned and his body moves of its own accord, even as logic rationals against it. His posture already shifted to that aggressive positioning at his words, he stares Travis down with a glower to match. Travis stops in front of him, giving Ryan a considering once over. 

At first Ryan would think the flicker that passes over his face is one of intimidation or even respect but it is replaced too quickly with an almost smug, mocking humour to know. “You keep that between you dogs, son, that shit don’t work on me.” Travis scoffs at him.

Rage and perhaps a flush of accompanying shame flush up his throat at Travis’ words. Ryan’s lips twitch into a tooth baring scowl and his demeanour only stiffens. He doesn’t snap the harsh words he wants to say back, worried all that would come out of his mouth a deep growl. Not does he move out of the way however, his instincts keeping him glued to exactly where he is. That strain in his throat that is becoming concerningly familiar is answered with the tightening his jaw and tensing his throat before he can even fully process that he’s felt it in the first place. As it does every time, his focus on the world outside himself and his quarry blurs, seeing only the twitches in Travis’ expression and feeling only the tar in his veins. 

Travis finally sighs, his hand dropping from his belt and taking a step back. He talks to Ryan as he slowly turns and walks away once more, ending his sentence just as his back faces him. “You go get her then. No faffing about, I don’t care what the reason is, you get her and bring her over immediately. The rest of you follow me.”

He sets off without looking back but the group lingers for a second, looking to Ryan. After a short glare at Travis’ back, he looks to the group and nods, encouraging them on with a gesture before turning and running up the steps. For a moment, he worries he won’t be able to find her faster enough in the large lodge but the second he steps inside once more, her scent is like a trail left lingering in the air for him to follow. He sets off, lead by his nose, across the hall and up the stairs. Anxiety follows him. Was she not comforting Dylan, but rather he was her? As much of an arsehole as he is, was Travis right, will she resist coming to the Manor? Why did she sprint back inside, just as they were leaving, just as the sun was to begin setting?

Ryan finds her in their shared space of the attic, not breaking down sobbing or standing threateningly in preparation of a standoff, as his worry led him to imagine. Rather she’s tossing back every blanket, discarded piece of clothing and bag she can find strewn across the floor. 

“Kaitlyn, what are you doing?” Ryan asks harshly, to his surprise with no labour in his breath after his quick dash up the two flights of stairs, something that only months ago would have exhausted him completely and left him panting.

“Trying to find something, obviously.” She says distractedly, throwing a pillow across the room, nearly tumbling over the fence to the hall below.

“Kaitlyn we’ve really got to go.” He says, his voice rising to match the panicked rush of her movements.

She scans over the room before her eyes land on Ryan and her brows dip. “Yeah obviously, I know that, just help me look. We can find it quickly.”

“I don’t even know what you’re looking for!” Ryan can feel the time pressure choking his words.

She makes a half frustrated, half rattled sound in her throat. “My bag, my other bag. I brought stuff to help out in the morning, water, jackets, a fucking vomit bowl, that stuff. After talking with Dylan I completely forgot about it but I have to bring it.” She explains hurriedly, returning to her search halfway through her words.

Ryan’s heart softens at the caring thought she’s put in to think of such a genuinely helpful thing. He glances towards the window, shifting his weight on each foot. Sunlight illuminates the glass, shining through each scratch and stain to leave fading chips of light on the rough wooden floor boards near the wall. It won’t last long, but despite himself and every marble of logic still rattling around in his otherwise empty skull, he thinks it will last long enough. 

He starts forward, joining her in her search. As he checks behind the falling apart couch she calls a bed, he asks, “So what were you and Dylan talking about.” Though he couldn’t help himself, he does try to keep his tone casual- perhaps it’s a little too strangely casual considering the circumstance.

“Urgh seriously Ryan, now?” She kicks Ryan’s bag out of the way in frustration when it doesn’t magically reveal her own missing one behind it. “You didn’t move it did you?”

“Why the fuck would I move it? You have your side, I have-“ Ryan begins indignantly, dropping to his knees and looking under the couch. “Found it!”

Kaitlyn scampers over immediately, kneeling down, her yellow eyes glowing on the other side beneath the couch. She paws for the strap but her short arm leaves her just out of reach. “Must’ve fallen under when I first dropped them here. Can you reach it?”

Ryan looks at her incredulously. “Under the couch wasn’t the first place you looked?” She scoffs at him with no other defence. 

He jumps up, moving to the side and all but pushing her out of the way. With his shoulder flat to the floor, he stretches his arm out, his fingers spreading as he tries to reach for the bag. He doesn’t believe for a second it fell this far beneath the couch, more likely she kicked it without noticing. The sensation of his flesh splitting apart from within his arm runs all the way up to his shoulder and down to his hand, causing Ryan to grit his teeth. He shoves his shoulder further into the couch, crushing it slightly, and it’s just that much further enough for the tips of his fingers to hook over the strap.

Dragging it out, he throws it over his shoulder, pain and numbness together making his arm feel fuzzy. The bag rattles as he stands and it has a surprising weight, though nowadays it’s nothing to him.

He’s walking towards the stairs immediately, checking behind him to make certain she’s following and not off looking for something else. They hurry down the stairs and across the hall, making for the door still banging in the wind. Though all the warmth of the fire has been sucked out into the cold of Fall outside, Ryan is feverish with heat. The itching burns over his limbs, his nails raking over his arm, the tearing of his skin mirrored within him as his flesh furthers to slowly tear from the inside out.

“We’ve got to run.” He states and from beside him, Kaitlyn nods. Their footfalls are heavy beats against the wooden stairs.

They sprint into the forest, leaves crunching underfoot and wind whipping past them. They don’t follow the path closely, directness taking precedence over even ground. Ryan’s boots send sticks flying up behind him and slam into the mud that tries to hold him back, begging him to stay and breathe in that sweet forest air. His senses are once more brought to life within the woods, that ardent call within him pleading for him to just veer a little more off path and get lost within the freedom of the wild. 

He hops over a fallen log, the bag thumping against his back rattling loudly in what he would have once experienced as the otherwise serene quiet. Now though the forest roars with noise; bird calls, rustling branches, the buzz of insects, water flow and even the trees themselves seem to thrum with sound, as noise within their undergrowth deflect off the high canopy and floods back to the brush, keeping the sounds of the forest within itself.

Kaitlyn sprints ahead of him, leaping and bounding through the undergrowth with a surprising ease. Though Ryan lags a little behind, it is not due to the bag's weight or lack of stamina. The bag is more of an awkward load than a heavy one. He tries not to jostle it too much, the clanging and sloshing inside keeping him careful, which is slowing him down.

Strangely, despite the array of symptoms which span from uncomfortable to painful, running through the woods is an easy sweep. His breath has yet to become strained, lungfuls of dewy air filling him with an endurance he’s never experienced before. There is pain in his limbs, but it’s from the internal tearing of his flesh and burning nerves, his muscles left free of any strain or ache. Kaitlyn, it seems, must feel the same, sprinting ahead into the clearing well before him.

Ryan looks up to the sky as he continues running forward. It’s a beautiful, foreboding red. The remaining clouds, many of them having been washed away by the wind, are an orange stroke of paint. The sun itself is just a sliver away from touching the horizon to the right of the Manor, a dying ball of light above their dying ball of water and dirt. It stings his eyes, forcing him to look away.

He focuses on Kaitlyn just in time to see her disappear.

Ryan’s boots dig deeper into the dirt as he pushes himself forward with a near inhuman speed, skidding to a stop in the centre of the clearing. The wood broke apart where the lack of support and water damage were the most severe, the snapped boards leaving only splinters to prove they were once connected. The boards that Ryan had stood on only yesterday.

The outsoles of his boots planted on the solid and safe earth, Ryan leans forward over the wooden boards with sudden panting breaths. He tentatively places a hand atop them, leaves and uprooted grass beneath his palm and his fingers pressed painfully against the thick splinters as he curls them around the edge of the last intact board. He peers down into the darkness Kaitlyn fell through, the fading light unable to reach down to the bottom of the black pit. His eyes squint as he frantically tries to see her within the dark chasm but it is not with sight he finds her. It’s the thick, rich smell of blood.

Panic floods his veins. He glances to the sky, just as red as he’ll find below. He doesn’t have long. 

Ryan leans back, sitting down in the dirt and pulling his legs out in front of him. With a wild sort of anger, he shoves the bag further behind him onto the grass, all care he had while carrying it now gone. He takes a deep, shaking breath. Now that he’s caught its scent, the smell of blood drowns out every other, clearer than every other stronger scent in the woods around him. Heavier than iron in his lungs. With a savage strength, he brings down his heel on the wood. It buckles and with a second strike it falls away, falling for some time before it lands with a clatter far below. The next board gives away even easier, as does the one after that until his leg hangs from the dirt into the mining pit.

He turns, with a short prayer to any god who would listen all while believing in none of them, and claws his fingers into the earth. His eyes close unconsciously as his feet leave solid ground, hanging freely in the air for a moment before scrabbling against the rock face. The internal tearing of his flesh splits all the way from his wrist to his elbow, a disgusting ripping sensation inside of him. He finds purchase, and even with fear and the void below threatening to swallow him whole, he lets go.

Ryan climbs down the rock as quickly as he can, his arms and legs not shaking out of the effort, but shaking nonetheless. He scans for handholds, which increases with difficulty the further down he goes with the decreasing visibility. He feels for notches or grooves deep enough to support him, for his hands and feet. At one point his foot slips, loose rock and his heart plummeting downwards. Though he cannot rush himself lest he fall, he knows time ticks away at an alarming pace. As he climbs he hears quiet whimpers from below, echoing off the walls and forcing him deeper. He thinks he might be saying her name, or something as he climbs, but it is lost in his heavy breaths.

When he’s low enough, he finds an out jutting of rock that if he is careful, he could jump to. His nails are bleeding from their tight grip and digging into the rock, his hands having grown slick with it and beading sweat. He has to let go before he can jump. Refusing to look downwards, Ryan breathes not one deep breath but three quick ones that he hopes makes up to it, and pushes off.

The ruggard side of the rock outcrop hits his knees dead on, sending a fuzzy sensation through his kneecaps before it is quickly replaced with spasms of pain. His hands blindly look for hold, dust and small chips of rock covering his palms and embedding beneath his talon like nails. He pulls himself atop it entirely, looking down into the cavern. His eyes have adjusted some to the darkness, some shape perceivable to the narrower parts of the chamber. It’s a bit of a drop still, but the climb looks difficult and will take time that he does not have.

Ryan doesn’t prepare himself for the pain, dropping from the outcrop before he can decide against it. The air rushes past him, the ground surging up beneath him. Electric jolts spike through his feet and his ankle rolls out from underneath him with a sickening crack, sending him collapsing to his side. Hot waves of pain roll through his ankle to his leg, Ryan’s teeth gritting and eyes scrunching closed from the deep throbbing of ligaments torn apart. 

He pulls himself forward, towards the scent of blood. The only sound is of Ryan dragging himself across old stone and Kaitlyn’s increasing whimpers and panting breath. Though the blood has stopped its flow from his nails, the cracks and tears within them already healed, he doesn’t have to pull himself far before his hands are completely drenched in it. The dark pool carries dust and rock chips on its surface, reaching out towards Ryan in tendrils. He drags himself through it, the pain from his ankle fading but still too unsteady to use. 

He sees her in shades of grey he shouldn’t be able to see. She’s pulled herself onto her back, wide eyes staring upwards almost blankly in shock. Her chest heaves with an uneven quake of quick, shallow breaths and the rapid beat of her heart that sends an increasingly limited amount of blood to gush from her. The tear tracks on her cheeks are almost too light to see with the lack of colour, but they end in a drip to the rising pool beneath her, a quiet sound beneath quiet sounds.

The fall has left Kaitlyn mangled. There’s a deep gash over her brow that pumps blood over her ear and through her hair, her upper arm bone has popped out of the socket and pulls her skin taut around it and Ryan has to swallow down bile at the sight of her leg. The bone within her calf has snapped clean in half, having ripped right through her skin to stick each fragmented and jaggard point into the air. The tattered skin exposes the meat of her leg and it pumps blood out at an alarming rate, nauseatingly warm and thick. 

“Kaitlyn?” Ryan croaks, his throat dry and words barely making it past the lump of emotion within it.

“Mm- I” She barely manages to gasp between the ever so short gaps in her heavy panting. She swallows, a click following as her dry throat constricts. “I can’t get up. We- we need to go to- to the Manor.”

She’s barely able to get the words out, dark liquid seeping from the corner of her lips to join the track down to the pool around her. She’s holding it together better than Ryan thinks anyone else in the world could. Her breath heaving and small involuntary sounds slipping between her lips yet she doesn’t scream or wail in agony, still holds that certainty in her voice, as muddled by pain as it is. Still, even as her body has been crumpled into a broken and bleeding mess, does she continue to hold herself with the fortitude and nerve that Kaitlyn has proven she only can claim to truly possess. Ryan’s certain she’s only survived because of the werewolf infection and her own tenacity. A fall from that height, with those injuries including the internal damage that Ryan can’t even see and the blood loss, should be fatal. But instead she’s conscious and lucid enough. Still, he truly doesn’t know the extent of accelerated healing, what it can do. Though he can’t bring himself to look at her leg again, he doesn’t think it can meld her bone back together and tuck it back inside, at least not instantly enough to get them to the Manor.

”Kaitlyn, we’re going to turn here.” Ryan tells her, unable to keep his dread from seeping into his words. It’s a hard thing to tell her, her face screwing up and her eyes blinking closed forcefully for a long second. It’s a realisation Ryan only fully makes as he says it, his stomach churning as he realises what that means. The panic that has flooded through him turns into a tidal wave of desperation.

Her hand twitches at her side and at first Ryan is going to ignore it, assuming it’s another expression of pain, when he notices her fingers stretching out towards where his own lie in her pool of blood just a few inches away. Hesitantly, not entirely certain it is what she wants, he slides his hand over to hold hers as gently as he can. She grips him with a fervour, pointed nails digging into his skin and her palm wrapped around his knuckles so tightly his fingers click and bend out of place. It hurts, as despite her injuries the increased strength of her infection remains, his fingers popping out of their sockets as the staunch pressure dislocates them. If this transfers just a fraction of the pain she’s experiencing to him however, he will happily bear it.

He glances upwards, to the hole in the ground they fell through. The last dregs of sunlight give a dull colour to the wood, the dark sky of near total dusk the only thing laying beyond. Ryan can feel it beneath his skin, shifting and testing the limits of his flesh. The itching has turned into a burning buzz over every inch of his skin and beads of sweat roll down his neck and chest. He will turn very soon and though he trusts himself, he does not trust his wolf counterpart, not with anyone, let alone Kaitlyn immobilised and bleeding out on the floor. 

“Kaitlyn, please listen, I really need you to listen.” Ryan says desperately. “You don’t have to answer me, save your energy, just squeeze my hand if you understand.”

Though it is already being held impossibly tight, the hand around his tenses the smallest amount more for just a second. He breathes a sigh of relief, a sound that rattles in his chest. Her eyes glance over to him before they squeeze shut, an agonized moan ripping through her throat before it cuts off into a half formed sob. Their hands are so slick with blood and sweat that they’d slide against each other if not for Kaitlyn’s tough grip, still the stability even when she is the one crippled and bleeding out.

“I’m going to turn soon, very soon. You have to turn at the same time, okay, you have to try. The second you feel it wanting to break through, you have to let it okay?” Ryan begs with a gravity he can only hope she hears.

He doesn’t even know if it’s possible, they all turned at different times. What if those times are set in stone? He doesn’t know but all he does know is whether it's possible or not she has to, has to try. 

“I don’t want to.” Kaitlyn sobs, a slow rasping breath following. All her energy is taken with her words, pain crunching her blood and tear soaked face, her composure finally cracking. “I-I want to go home.”

Ryan’s own eyes burn, a hot flush separate to his fever running up through his rib cage to burn his throat. The smell of blood is overwhelming, his terror even more so. “I know, I know you do, I know. Just please, I know it hurts, I know it’s horrible, but let it happen. You’ll heal and you won’t remember it in the morning, so please just don’t fight it.”

He’s begging, in a way he never has before. He needs Kaitlyn to turn, the second even a sliver of the moon has broken into the sky. Werewolf healing or not, Kaitlyn cannot lie here for much longer until her near lethal wounds worsen her condition. Nor does he want to imagine what could happen should he turn beside her while she’s in this state, when even though they were separated last time, he still snapped at her through the bars. What if he hurt her? What if she bled out, with Ryan unable to do anything but watch through a fishbowl behind eyes that aren’t entirely his own?

Their shared horror is a physical thing in the air, a heavy mist that tastes like maggots and viscera. With a violent roll of nausea in his gut, Ryan’s forehead drops to the ground, warm tacky blood sticking to his skin. Shudders overtake him, bile burning his tongue and staining his aching teeth. He knows if he looked up he would find only darkness. 

His hand is wrung even tighter, his last finger popped from its socket in a short burst of an excruciating tight squeeze. Relief floods him before his breath stops, his flesh shredding from the inside and bones splintering as they begin to rearrange within him. He hears the sound of a gag and liquid splattering, a warm chunk landing on his forehead. Death is in the air and humanity is fading.

The pain is just as excruciating as he remembers it. His breath is laboured as the itching turns into a full body sting, accompanied by the slicing pain of his skin splitting. His skin feels as if it is pulled tight over his body, like the last thread holding together a tightrope. The wolf is uncurling within him, bending his bones until he feels them shatter and stretching out his skin until it tears like an old roll of thin plastic film.

He does not even feel the ability to hold it off like he had the choice of last month, his instincts now far too in tune with his mind and the process having become a natural progression he is unable to now try and postpone. Horribly too, the relief he knows it will bring, means that even if he could, he doesn’t know if he’d have the spine or humanity to choose to hold it back.

“Now, please. Let yourself turn, you have to.” He rasps, the last words he can manage to say before his oesophagus is burned away from reflux and torn in half with the mutation of his body. 

Nail’s pierce an inch into the lean meat of his hand, scraping his tendons and pointing through the skin of his palm until it stretches. It’s their last act of sapient communication for the night. 

On impulse Ryan flexes his muscles, his skin splitting apart and spouting more blood into the thick pool of it. Kaitlyn’s pained panting is drowned out by his own, his skull cracking and every last rational thought shattering along with it. His skin begins to slough off of his muscles when he squeezes his eyes shut and squeezes his muscles taunt, rupturing his flesh from his body and sending it splattering through the air.

Chapter Text

The blood and large scraps of shredded flesh slop against the rock, sliding down the walls to land against the ground with a splat into thick piles. His long wailing howl pierces through the air above him. As his head drops back down, his nose snuffles against flesh but his beady red eyes and animalistic mind have yet to focus, that remaining cloud of shifting cognition still fading, as quickly it may be.

He pants, a thick tongue lolling from his maw. His long arms lift from the ground and he holds them bent at his chest, blood dripping from his hardened skin. As he sits back on his haunches his elongated, disfigured but practical feet slide in the thick pool of blood beneath him before he digs his claws into the rock ground and holds himself stable with ease. The blood and scraps of flesh that cover him irritate him, shaking it off until he’s clean of most of the gore, though the sticky blood clings to him still.

Behind those beady red eyes, there is a definite lack of complex thought. Feelings, sensation and instincts based off of an inherited intrinsic knowledge rule his actions, rather than the logic and reasoning that his other mind is capable of. It is quiet, at last, of all words. However, although the knowledge of which is lost to the heightening, dampening and melding of two separate forms of cognition, a weak and shaky connection has begun to form. It pulls at his mind, his minds, trying to grasp- reaching for something- some, some misty sort of-

His senses spark with activity and it's instantly lost. The strained panting, whimpers of prey and the heavy scent of fresh blood that invokes a deep hunger from within him. His eyes blink into focus on the prey lying injured in front of him, an easy kill he can now finish off. It gives small sounds of pain and exertion that further alight the famine within him. His fangs bare, a rumbling growl beginning in his chest, dripping maw lowering towards its quickly weakening pulse.

His movement stops abruptly, his snout huffing loudly. Its scent, buried beneath the overpowering smell of nectorous blood, is fraught with the somewhat sweet, tangy venom of his kin. The venom surrounding it is the only thing that keeps his nose snuffling and nudging at its side instead of sinking his fangs into its throat and ripping into the meat as he craves. 

When the thickness of the venom grows to a new height, he gives the callow's shoulder a hard nudge before resting back and cocking his head, eyes scanning over the frail creature. It doesn’t take long then before he’s splattered in more gore, hunks of skin slapping against his head and shoulders. The wolf that burst from the skin trappings of the callow instantly scrabbles to right itself, mangled hand paws slipping on the blood of its previous form. Its deep smoky scent causes him to snap his jaws towards it in warning of their close proximity, the other wolf jolting away reflexively in its remaining haze. Far enough away to be content for the moment, it shifts its weight from its right back leg, where a rough crenate mark covers its surface, as its throat stretches in its upwards crane towards the sky. Its howl is a long and jaggard sound, one that is instantly imprinted into his memory. He joins its hymn to freedom and the night.

Behind the fishbowl, as a spectator within his own body, Ryan feels a vague sense of relief, though his consciousness is too lost for him to really grasp why he feels it. With that relief, felt through the weak connection and strengthening it, the wolf however does feel it. The sensation of release, his freedom becoming pure and unobscured. 

He shakes himself once more, watching with his wide eyes as the splatter lands on the other wolf, coating it further in slick warm gore. It shuffles even further away from him, raising a hand to clumsily paw its snout and eyes clean. It gives a full body shake before raising its tender left leg backwards and shaking it out gently to bring some more feeling back into it. He watches it intently, tracking the movement of its cold black eyes, a low growl reverberating against his ribs.

He stares hard at the other wolf, head tilting and nose snuffling. His mind works at- something, before it is given up in the instinctual aggression at its presence. Though behind the tinted glass of lost consciousness, Ryan might find close familiarity with the creature in front of him, his wolf could not find it quickly enough. From the last time he was awake there is ever so faint familiarity with that powerful scent and dark black eyes but now their venom induced kinship only extends so far. With its scent and eyes, this is another brute of a wolf, a cur, who he cannot let freely roam his territory. It can only ever be one of three things to him- a rival, a packmate, or dead.

With its mind having cleared from the haze, its head turns towards him, its black pupils dilating over black irises in the dark. There's an alertness, an awareness in it's eyes that shows that it's awake and his throat constricts at both the opportunity and the challenge that this wolf will pose. Its ever so slightly pointed ears twitch backwards, its own growl revving up into a drumming sound that echoes off the rock. Its body has stiffened, front paw hand chipping the rock as it sways side to side to show every angle of its thick pointed teeth in an intimidating gesture. 

He stretches his head out towards the other wolf, lips pulling tight over his long fangs as his low warning growls switch to outright aggressive. His hands land heavily on the ground, the thick bones and skin of his shoulders stretching as his stance widens. His throat appears almost gaunt as it flattens and wavers with the force of his growl, cutting off into short clicking sounds in the time it takes to constrict and release waves of oppressive scent from his pores. 

The other wolf, though smaller than he is, does not cower from his challenge. It matches his posture to answer his demand for dominance with its own. He snarls as it pads just a few steps closer, its head lowered towards the ground as drool hangs in strings from between its teeth clenching down so tightly the skin of its lips are pierced. 

His jaws snap out towards it in a hostile warning, its own snapping back at him. His back legs tense, feet digging into the rock and blood beneath him. He springs without warning, talons spread and fangs bared, pouncing without any chance for a defense to be put up. They roll with the force of the impact, claws digging into flesh with a fierce grip and teeth biting down. An arc of blood through the air follows the trajectory of their fall, landing on the ground with a splat and accompanying yelp. 

The movements of the other wolf are wild but deliberate, trying to dislodge him. His teeth and claws are too sunk in for any success. It flails on its back, the hard ground painful on its malformed and bent spine, his jaw keeping it pinned there even more so. Its own claws scrabble against his shoulder, slashing deep into his flesh and causing thick blood to gush out and leave its hands slick with it. Its jaws snap rabidly, straining to reach him, front fangs just brushing against the side of his temple. 

He shakes his head, teeth digging even further into its blood soaked shoulder, slowly ripping apart the muscles and tendons inside. With a final burst of energy, the wolf bites forward, finally finding contact. Its teeth clamp down over the top of his pointed ear, piercing through in an uneven, jagged semi circle. Out of pain his own teeth clench down further in their vice and the other wolf's head rears back, bringing the top half of his ear with it.

He pulls his head back upwards, dragging the wolf up with him through his solid grapple, before slamming it back down. His teeth are up to the gums within the crux of its throat and shoulder, meat and blood filling his mouth. Blood gushes from various wounds on both of them, the pool beneath them thicker and spreading even further than before. The other wolf lost this fight the second it began and yet only now does it cut off its growls or give up on its struggle after a well fought battle. It did not give up easily.

He slowly unclenches his jaw, pulling his teeth from where they’d been embedded deeply in the shoulder of the other wolf. Strings of blood and loose meat swag from his mouth as he moves backwards, his deformed hand giving one last shove to the wolf as it scrabbles away to righten itself. It does cower now, for just a moment to recover its stamina and shake off the pain from its bleeding wounds. His eyes and nose work away at familiarising himself with the cur, who's next actions will determine which of the three things it will choose to be to him, now that he has established who the truly dominant wolf is.

The wolf, a female cur with the scent of smoke, a long snout and small ears, turns towards him once more. Its eyes glance first at the caved in tunnel at the far side of the pit and then at the opening to the cold dark sky above them, deciding whether to run. A low warning growl rumbles out from between his fangs, snapping the wolf's eyes back to him. Should it run, there will only be two options left. With its arm buckling beneath it from the deep bite on its shoulder, they both know it would not get far.

It crouches down, head lowered and tongue flicking out to lick at its muzzle. A posture of clear submission, with authority given fully to him. He pads over, standing over it and looks critically over the posture. A strong wolf to pack with, powerful despite its size and capable of fighting through injuries, just should it remember its place. He snaps down towards it in an aggressive test, the wolf’s lip curling but its head also tilting sideways to reveal its throat. Satisfied, he swallows down the blood left pooled beneath his tongue and wastes no time in immediacy turning to leave, knowing the other wolf will follow. The wolf has been accepted into entering an oath bound by blood, far deeper than just allyship or neutral acceptance. A pack is family, for life and until death.

She pads along behind him, dripping blood in a trail that forms into a small puddle where she stops beside him. They look up through that hole above them, thousands of tiny pinpricks of stars gathered even in that small space. He can hear the forest above them, the whisper through the trees begging him to ‘come hunt’. His claws dig into the rock as he scales upwards towards his territory and hunting grounds. 

His feet on the dirt, he huffs at the clear air and feels the moonlight settle over his skin. His ears twitch towards each sound within the woods, from the distant snapping of a branch to the far hoot of a hunting owl. His nose snuffles in every scent, from the wet fur of a deer to the strange mixture of venom filled scents left lingering here. His focus is determinedly on the first.   

He sets off in a sprint towards the scent, following where the trail gets thicker, tearing through the undergrowth it has been left unknowingly smeared on. Though the hunt is for him to lead, his beta should be on his heels, able to keep pace but trailing just a step behind. She instead lags far behind on three limbs, the blood pumping with her uneven sprint unable to finish its circuit as it pours from the deep wound he left on her shoulder. She will catch up eventually, hunger driving him forward faster and in even strides, nothing able to slow him down in pursuit of his kill.

He breaks into a clearing, his powerful back legs springing him forward onto his prey, completely unaware of his presence until death. His teeth nearly rip completely through the throat of the deer, its head held to his body only through its spine, which is almost pulled from within its body as he rips the head outwards. As large a deer as it was, his teeth sliced through it like butter. Its big brown, doleful eyes stare up to the moon, glazed over and sightless. Hot, rich blood drips from his maw as he pants, recovering from the exertion almost immediately. 

He bites down through wet fur, tearing out a chunk of wet meat and nearly swallowing it whole. Behind him the cur only just breaks into the clearing, limping towards the kill. She watches him rip off another piece before she settles in beside him, claws digging into the hide to steady the corpse as she lowers her head to feast.

It is left as only bones, a head and scraps of the less compelling organs. He is still not satisfied. His beta has laid on her side however, nursing her injured shoulder and letting the air clot the blood flow to a stop. She will not be able to contribute to a hunt with her injury and without hunting there is no need to travel further. With a loud communicative huff, he lets the cur rest. She stretches out her limbs, shifting down more comfortably.

He pads around the small clearing, nose snuffling and eyes mapping out the area. Water rushes nearby, the undergrowth rustles with various animals large and small, the foliage is dense and there are no traces of any scents left behind from other rival wolves. The perfect hunting grounds, free to mark out and solidify as their territory. 

As he patrols the area, he rakes his claws through thick bark, his hand trailing behind him to leave deep and distinct claw marks in the wood. He glances back at his beta, her head tilted up towards the moon rising through the sky, her solid black eyes reflecting the thousands of stars back to the sky. Her demeanor is relaxed, as the apex predator there is little concern in lounging in the open, wounded as she may be.

He will not travel far, tethered to his packmate out of instinct and a now unshakeable sense of loyalty. Still, with her ease, he passes back through the tree line, hunger drawing him deeper into the woods. As he weaves through the trees, he tilts his head, letting his throat run along the trunks and staining them with the oppressive, forbidding scent of their new owner. His padding feet pick up speed as he continues onwards, until they pound against the earth with an unnatural quietness.

Now that he is not below the forest and cut off from the sacred light of the full moon, he can taste the freedom and feel the reverence of wilding. Awoken to the burning lines gone and the woods air in his lungs, the wolf never wants to sleep again. Though he does remember before he’d slept, the other wolves trapped below with him, their unfamiliar scents and howls. The honeyed scent of the pup of a wolf, the sweetness of its docile nature ruined by the feral glaze in its eye. If the wolves are within his territory, they will be found.

His body flows in its movement, finally released to stretch and feel the burn of exertion and life. He can travel immense distances at shocking speed without high exertion, due to his thick bones and strong muscles in his arms running alongside his legs on the ground. They’re as stable and quick moving as his hind legs, his disfigured bent spine and long ganglyness of his limbs allowing for this quadrupedal movement, his elbows folding inwards to keep his body level. As he skids to a sudden stop, his extended arms reach off the ground and he rises to his legs, standing to a menacing and unnatural height far too tall for any human that the posture mimics. 

His elongated snout lifts into the air, pointed ear twitching at the sound that drew him to a halt. There’s a snuffling sound coming from the undergrowth ahead, the sound of heavy feet pulling through the shrubbery and tangle of roots. He lowers to his haunches, the scent clear and leading towards his prey through a trail in the air. He slowly places a hand on the ground, crouching low as he begins to stalk forward. 

The boar forages in the brush, completely oblivious to the monstrous werewolf stalking it from just a few metres away. Red eyes almost glow from behind a bush, lost to the sea of darkness that less adjusted sight cannot make out. Claws sink through its flesh and dig deep within the thick layers of fat below. The boars shrieks pierce through the air and with its immense strength, it is only just capable of twisting around when the hold is released to be readjusted. In a hopeless last ditch effort for defence, the boar rams into the wolf with all its weight, tusks meeting skin. They graze off, the wolf completely unaffected.

Its throat is torn out by razor sharp teeth, a seemingly endless stream of blood glugging out and staining the grass until it soaks into the dirt. An incredibly large game, bearing the scars of attempted hunts from weaker predators that all failed, brought down with an almost lazy and careless ease.

The hunger within him is a deep ring of ache within his gut, a gap in the centre that craves to be filled with any type of meat, flesh or bloody tissue. However he does not rip into the boar, holding back from tearing off hunks of meat to swallow whole or digging into the fleshy underbelly to get to the mouthwatering intestines. He instead stabs his claws deep within its shoulder, hooking his fingers into the still hot flesh and begins to drag it through the dirt.

He hadn’t travelled too far, though bipedal travel with a considerable added weight slows his speed back terribly. By the time the wolf has arrived back at the clearing, the moon has moved faster than he has, hanging midway through the wrong half of the sky. The cur tracks his arrival, his presence known from far away from sound, his scent having never been lost. He throws it between them, in a callous movement as his claws slip from the carcass and it thuds heavily against the ground.

She rises, long tongue flicking out to slap over her snout, eyes flicking between him and the carcass. She hadn’t eaten as much of the deer as him, her hunger certainly all consuming. She doesn’t move an inch towards it.

He drops down onto his haunches once more, claws digging back into the previously left puncture wounds to steady it and tears a thick chunk from its hide. The muscles stretch and snap, blood splattering, the meat left in a jagged tatter where it was torn from the body. He looks upwards to the air, snapping his jaw and swallows it whole. Only when his head returns to bite back down onto the carcass does his beta approach, beginning her own feast.

When the boar has been consumed in its near entirety, the wolves settle back down onto the grass in the clearing, the cur airing her wound once more. He rests comfortably on his haunches for a moment, cleaning his snout and paws of the blood from his kill. The night air is cool and has clotted it quickly, the wind only growing even more bitter as the darkness before dawn approaches.

With the repetitive, soothing motions the wolf's mind should be equally as settled. It isn’t however, though not because he is on alert. Rather there is a sound in the inner sanctum of his ears, one only he can hear. It is not a sound he himself could make, nor is it one he himself has heard tonight. It’s a strange but specific garble among garbles, that he may have heard before he slept, down beneath the earth behind burning bars. It's such a specific sound that the wolf's mind should certainly not have held onto it, as the distinct noises animals make are unimportant, the intonation, volume and tone are all he understands and all he needs to understand.

This specific garble he may have heard last he was awake. Those garbles however ran together in a stream, with no distinctness to him as his inability to understand that each garble those callow's made had defined meaning. The exact sounds unimportant beside the knowledge that they meant pain and fear and weakness. But this specific garble is so unmistakable in his mind, it almost certainly does not come from his own memories. That connection between his own memories and vague glimpses of what is not, that strengthened connection he is quite quite aware of, causes an irritation in the base of his skull as he tries to think and understand with a capacity he does not possess in this form. That sound, burning away in his mind, a noise he cannot make and pains him to conceptualise.

He begins to pace around the clearing, his elongated feet flattening the grass in his repeated track around the circumference of the inner tree line. He roughly rakes his claws through the bark of tree trunks and smears his nose on low hanging branches as he passes. He twitches his ears and shakes his head as he had back in the very first hour of the night to slop the scraps of flesh and blood off of him. Only now he’s trying to shake from his quickly grown agitated mind, that strange garbled sound he doesn’t understand, of “rye-un”.

He, needlessly so but nonetheless, patrols and guards their little moonlit clearing until it is moonlit no more. The moon crept so slowly across the sky throughout the night, swimming over clouds and consuming the stars in its path, until it began reaching towards the horizon and seemed to collapse all at once. It hit the horizon with a splash of colour, staining the clouds a light pink while the stars are painted over with a soft light blue. 

Drowsiness settles over him as dawn approaches. His eyes grow harder to keep open, a heaviness forming within his bones. In those precious last moments of twilight, he finally stills in the centre of the clearing and with all his remaining wakefulness, he howls his ode to the moon, a deep wavering hymn that echoes off through the forest and sends birds fleeing from their perches. It is joined by the other wolf, his new packmate and beta, with her own sung prayer. Their devout congregation of two coming to an end.

As the first inch of the sun is visible within the sky, his skin splits and ruptures. Ryan falls to his knees as the scraps of flesh, muscle and gallons of blood splatter to the earth around him, some falling to slop down over his shoulders and back. He is drenched in it, eyelids blinking in the same rapid pace as his heart in an attempt to keep it from soaking into his eyes.

There’s that same buzz within his bones and skin, that same tremor in his limbs and heavy skips in his breathing. He’s cold and drenched in blood. There’s that disconnect in his mind, as if he’d been sleepwalking, acting without understanding, memories that don’t quite belong to him but are his and his alone. 

And yet there’s no pain. No terrible ache within him, from atrophied muscles or hunger. There is… a deep sense of exultation. Ryan has never experienced such an immense, uninhibited sense of pure freedom before. To unleash himself so completely, to have strength and power and reprieve from the constant thought and concern it requires to simply be human. To just simply climb, sprint, howl at moon and to- Ryan glances at what remains of the two carcasses in the clearing, the taste of raw meat and blood suddenly apparent in his mouth. 

The full extent of the memories hit him. Kaitlyn’s injuries from the fall, begging her to accept turning, their standoff and fight, the hunts and the strange intertwining of what he now, capable of actual coherent and structured thought, thinks was memories. From evening to night and through to morning now, has been complicated and rushed by in a blur. It merges together in his memories as if it’d all happened in a single second, as although intelligent thought has now returned to him, his mind is still jumbled and sluggish with the sudden shifting level of cognition. However, even though the heavy weight dropped back onto his shoulders and the guilt and disgust with himself for this, he cannot deny the exultation has not faded in slightest despite it. 

He takes a steadying breath, calming himself enough to stop the racing tangle of thoughts and push that concerning mix of emotions aside. There is only one clear thought in his mind, that stands out against all the confusion and uncertainty in its earnest simplicity. He has to make sure Kaitlyn is okay. 

It startles him into movement and Ryan stumbles as he pushes himself up from where he was bent over in the blood soaked grass, rising to kneel, still trying to even out his breathing and slow his racing heart. There is some muted surprise that with the movement there’s no ache that makes it near impossible to move, no unsteadiness in his legs, strain in his muscles or clicking in his bones. 

His near frantic gaze finds Kaitlyn immediately, remembering exactly where she had lain, rested and stretched out in the clearing over the second half of the night. Now human, she lies on her back in a concerningly and eerily similar way to how she did the evening before, when she was bleeding out with her bone snapped and impaling out through her skin. The only difference now is that her leg is not bent with her knee in the air, which he supposes must be a good sign. She looks up at the pale blue sky, her skin painted red with blood and shaking with tremors that roll through her limbs in waves.

Ryan drags himself over to her through the slicked grass in an awkward half crawl, stopping just a few feet away. He clears his throat before he speaks, irritating the dry cracks within it but giving some stability to what would otherwise be trembling words. “Kaitlyn, are you okay? Are you injured?”  

She makes a sound that is somewhere between a laugh and a sob before she sniffs loudly and nearly smacks herself in the face as she raises a hand to wipe uselessly at the blood coated onto her cheek. It just smears over her skin, so instead she raises her hands to the sky. Though he still watches her every movement like a hawk, Ryan is filled with an immense relief at the liveliness of those same movements, which had almost ceased completely when he had similarly pulled himself to her side last night.

“I’m completely fine.” She rushes out, a tinge of almost hysterical amazement to her tone. “I feel great even.”

She releases a long, weighted sigh that trails on until all the air must be expelled from her lungs. Her arms drop to the grass with a thud and her fingers slide through the red slicked grass as if she doesn’t find it a disgusting sensation. Ryan glances down to her leg, an almost reflexive flinch following his eyes after the sight of it last night, but the sight no longer brings acid to his mouth and a panic to his bones. As although her clothes are of course shredded, especially the pant of that leg, and she’s drenched in all that blood both clotted and fresh, her bone has fitted back inside her calf and the skin has closed over it. 

It almost make it all seem like a fucked up vivid nightmare. He wonders if this is how Dylan feels when he wakes, the lucidity of it despite the disconnect of what he knows reality to be. His chest aches with the thought. 

This however was somehow real. As unnatural, eerie and unfathomable as it was, it is real. It’s impossible to conceive, seeing it in front of him. He knew of course accelerated healing was a part of this curse, he’d seen that Laura’s eye had healed himself. But he hadn’t seen it get damaged. Kaitlyn’s leg, the last he’d seen just hours earlier, had its skin torn open into tatters, the muscles and meat inside exposed, her bone snapped and sticking outside of her body. Now there isn’t a single scratch to prove it had happened at all.

It all feels so impossible. Her leg is completely healed and they just spent a night free out in the woods, fighting and eating wild animals and- fuck they really messed up. Because worst of all? He also feels great. Ryan’s legs do finally buckle and he drops heavily on his back, staring up at the sky beside Kaitlyn, in a matching hysterical humour and horror.

After a long moment there’s a crackling sound and Ryan jumps at the disturbed silence, his head jerking to look at Kaitlyn. Her whole body shakes, the crackling sound coming in waves of gasping breaths. His arm is underneath him immediately, lifting him propped up on his elbow, face full of concern as he looks at her. He expects tear tracks clearing a pathway through the thick layer of blood on her cheeks, not a wide and genuine smile. She’s laughing.

Kaitlyn glances at him from where she still lays on her back, eyes darting over the furrow of his brows and bewildered narrow of his eyes, and promptly bursts into even louder laughter. 

“Kaitlyn, what the fuck?” Ryan asks in confusion and disbelief. 

She’s able to quell her frankly delirious laughter for just enough time to breathe out, “You- you look like you were just birthed.”

Ryan has no idea what emotions he’s feeling, though he does think offence is one of them. Then, he thinks it may also be a shared genuine insanity as his own laughter involuntarily bubbles up in his chest, completely uncontrollable as it escapes out of his mouth. He thuds back down onto his back, slapping a hand over his mouth to try and contain the deranged laughter.

It is surreal really. It is one thing to transform in cages lit by an ominous red light, with everyone sobbing and traumatised in the morning. It is another entirely to transform after a traumatising night, only to feel perfectly fine, if not kind of great actually, in the morning. Maybe they are actually losing it.

It lasts for far too long, their shared delirious laughter. Blood soaked, lying in the middle of the woods next to the stripped carcasses of the wild animals they can still taste on their tongues, laughing. It nearly simmered to an end when Ryan, latching onto the only feeling he can truly name, said resentfully, “Yeah and you act like a C-section baby, so.” Which of course just jump started it all over again.

When they have truly finally reached the end of their manic expulsion of energy and tension, there is a moment of long silence. He listens to the birds, the rustles through the leaves, feels the cold air on his blood-caked skin and breathes in sharp smoke. Just for this moment, he lets himself accept he’s okay and that it’s okay he doesn’t have to think further on that feeling, the ghost of a smile from their laughter left on his lips.

Beside him, Kaitlyn makes a sort of hiccup of a noise, a clearly involuntary sound as she slaps a hand over her mouth. Her muffled crying is quiet, fought to be contained and lacking that hysterical edge of her laughter. Despite the sound of her crying, the smoke in the air has not grown acidic or stifling, still dispersing evenly, lightly out into the cold morning air.

It’s the relief, he thinks, that freezes his lungs and burns his own eyes out in sympathy. No tears fall, he refuses to let them, but the release of the horror and fear sends a wave of relief through him so strongly that his lungs can no longer constrict to bring in air. He gasps for air, a sound he knows can not fully disappear beneath Kaitlyn’s crying. There’s a certain irony in the burn in his eyes despite the genuine reprieve of all else.

Despite his harsh blinking to keep them at bay, one drop too many threatens to cause a thick tear to leak from the corner of his eye. The thought of it rolling down his cheek through the cracks in the dry blood makes him believe he is indulging this gratuitous release too far. He does not need, nor want, to cry. This release of stress and tension may just be his mind trying to regulate itself, the pendulum swinging from hysterical laughter to quiet weeping. Ryan has always let logic dictate over emotion however. He refuses to fall apart just when he finally feels okay, for the first time in a long time.

So he digs the heels of his blood soaked hands into his eyelids until there is a kaleidoscope of spinning colour in the darkness. With the tears now trapped, his breath instead tries to find release, through that humiliating quick and sharp inhale into multiple small and sharp shaking exhales. So in turn he holds it completely until his lungs begin to burn. He holds it until he can reach the level of suffocation where he can remove all these needless emotions, forcing them into unexistence. His shoulders slump, emotion disappearing without a trace. 

Until it crashes back into him just a moment later, bruising his chest and knocking his heart into his throat. He is silent now, breathing all but stopped entirely as he tries to wrangle back control of this disjointed emotional response. 

His hands raise from where they were pressed into his eyes, to rest in fists against his temples. However they quickly flitter away again, Kaitlyn beside him just enough of a reminder to break through that instinctive behaviour. Instead he places the ball of his thumb into his mouth, serrated but mostly flat teeth biting into his hand with a tight clamp. The taste of three different flavours of blood fill his mouth, a disturbing distinctiveness to each of them. With his teeth breaking his own skin, he regains control of his body.

This release of emotions from them now is so quiet, hidden between themselves. Though they are both certainly people who do not show this vulnerability in front of others, he does not think now it is under the guise of being hidden out of shame. Rather, out of a respect to the other of that fact. Once more, Ryan finds himself glad that it is Kaitlyn here beside him, as neither of them try to offer any comfort or reassurance. They just give each other the privacy and time to pull themselves together, with a sort of unspoken shared solidarity in that they are feeling this monumental wave of tear inducing relief together. Right now, Ryan could not appreciate that more.

With his eyes now dry and breathing returned to even, he pulls his palm from his mouth, the pain having numbed so much he’d barely remembered his teeth were still embedded in his flesh. He has to dislodge his teeth from where they’d sunk deep into his skin and it beads with blood, trickling down his wrist and adding another layer to the thick coats of it. He drops his hand to his chest, resting there and rising with each slow breath. His fingers mindlessly fiddle together, each taking their turn one by one to be pulled backwards until he can feel the pain of the stretch down even in his wrist, the process run through on repeat.

Kaitlyn beside him is still working through to control her emotions, to maintain her composure and pull that pendulum of hysteria back to centre. He can’t imagine the disconnect her mind must be going through, from extreme pain, passing out only to wake up in peak physical wellness. So he keeps his eyes upwards, long after a forced numb serenity has knocked the entire pendulum into nonexistence, giving Kaitlyn the privacy to do the same. 

It takes her some time, though less than he would have thought, but eventually Kaitlyn speaks, in a voice wet from her tears and a shuddering laugh. “I don’t even know why I’m crying. I feel fine, I swear.”

“Because you need to.” He tells her, aware of the hypocrisy but certain it doesn’t apply to him. He cut off his own tears with blood in his mouth and a crescent of abrasions on his hand. He would, and knows he will, do it again.

Kaitlyn clears her throat and then sniffs back the dampness collected in the back of her nose. Then she clears her throat for a second time and sighs. Ryan lets her collect herself without pressure, though privately he does also find it interesting, hearing her run through physical expressions of an internal self collection.  

When she speaks again, her voice is now steady and as assured as ever. “Are you okay?” She asks directly, their emotions able to be acknowledged now that they’re not present, to be referenced as if they’re simply concepts that neither of them really experienced.

“Are you okay?” He asks her right back, his voice rough and deep. It does feel a little strange to hear her speak so soberly again, after the dual contrasting bursts of hysteria, but he supposes that either of them letting themselves express it at all is the truly uncharacteristic behaviour. Shrugging it off, collecting themselves and moving on as if there were no emotional displays in the first place is very much their nature.

“Yes, really. No.” Kaitlyn’s honesty comes slowly, the admission hard to give. He’s surprised she is willing to do so at all. “I feel the best I ever have since that night, right now.”

Ryan sits with that information for a moment. It’s a heavy admission to make in all fairness, after their night and just passed hysterics. The best she’s felt, at all? His first reflex is pure incomprehension or to even disregard the statement’s authenticity in its entirety but he knows with certainty that she is being honest. As he mulls it over in his mind, it’s only when he realises that he feels the same and why that is, that he can understand why she would say such a thing.

Physically, he feels the most grounded and painfully alive then he has in months. However his emotions are a complex whirl after the night, an indiscernible lump of stress, fear, disgust, confusion, power, release, unity, satisfaction, freed, reverence, shame and guilt. Ryan himself cannot find those names to disentangle his emotions, just feeling instead a weight in his lungs and lightness in his ribs. All he knows is that he has never felt more at home in his life than he feels right now laying in this clearing and that the void in his stomach has finally been filled. Whatever was missing has been replaced and as he looks at Kaitlyn at last, he finds that a warm familiarity is what has taken its place.

“So you accepted it.” Ryan states with certainty, looking back up to the sky, where the clouds are rapidly losing their pink tinge.

“It took me a moment. I was thinking, just hurry up and turn but I guess that wasn’t very genuine. Really thinking about it, I thought what the fuck am I doing. Bleeding out in a cave because I forgot the stupid fucking bag.” Kaitlyn hums, but it quickly breaks off into a sigh. With longer sentences he can now hear that her voice does actually still hold just a shadow of the emotions she just swallowed down, making them come slow and thick. “I did listen to what you said the other night though, about trusting myself. I decided I couldn’t fuck the night up more than I already had and that if I can’t accept turning into a werewolf in favour of dying, then I might as well fully commit when I get home and end it.”

Ryan looks to her, deep worry welling in his gut despite knowing what her choice did have to end up being between those two options. He waits patiently for her to continue, his own tangle of emotions left forgotten in the corner of his mind as all his concern is given to her.

“I don’t want to do that.” Kaitlyn says softly, a tone he doesn’t think he’s ever heard her speak in before. Suddenly her tone switches, as if she’d never spoken so softly in the first place, to a far more familiar worried groan. “Fuck, my Mom’s going to be so disappointed in me.”

“That you didn’t decide to kill yourself?” Ryan exclaims in incredulous alarm. His eyes are widened and lips pursed downwards in an open expression of bewildered disturbance.

Kaitlyn nearly matches his expression exactly, with an added flat downward hold of her brows to express immense judgement. “No, you fucking idiot. That I’m not going to go to college and get a six figure job. Dumbass.”

Ryan looks back to the sky in embarrassment at his misconception, scraping some blood from his skin now that it has dried in the slow rising sun. “Oh.”

She scoffs at him in disbelief before settling back to a serious tone. “So, it’s your turn again. Really, are you okay?“  

Ryan sits up, yanking a finger back more roughly then he had the others where he fiddled with them and letting it go to shake the pain out of his hand. “Yeah dude, I’m fine. Seeing your leg was just a bit fucked up though, I guess.”

“I didn’t see it.” Kaitlyn admits, also sitting up behind him. “Everything hurt like a motherfucker and I could barely move, so I’m guessing it was pretty bad?”

Ryan cannot help but cringe as he tries not to picture it. To banish the thought, he glances up at the brightening blue sky, hit with the realisation they’ve spent some time here. “I’ll spare you the visual but yeah.” 

She hums again, though this time it's a shorter sound, closer to a huff. In the corner of his vision he sees her run a hand up her blood soaked leg, pushing the tatters of her torn jeans out of the way to further expose the undamaged skin. “Well, thank you, I guess- no I don’t mean I guess. Seriously, thank you for climbing down.”

“Anyone would have.” Ryan says distractedly, after realising they should start to work their way back through the forest, trying to summon the courage to be able to stand and leave this clearing that irrationally feels like a small oasis of safety.

Kaitlyn makes a hitch of inhaled breath like she’s going to argue but she exhales it instead and says, “No one else would have encouraged me to accept turning, despite it being the right call.” 

“Yeah well, I’m just glad it worked. You nursed it for a second when you turned, but it was completely healed.” He says, flexing his hand as he stares at them with the frustration of his inability to force himself to get up. The clotted blood cracks and fresh beads fill from the deep bite mark. He tilts it back and forth curiously, the self injury still raw and evident on his skin, not healed in the slightest.

“You remember it all again then?” She asks, with a genuine curiosity that he just takes for surface level reasoning. When he quietly agrees, she pushes further. “Okay seriously, what part of all this is really bothering you?”

Ryan sighs, wiping his hands over his eyes, crusted blood crumbling into his lap and smearing a new line of fresh blood just below his right brow. They really need to get up, start to make their way back to the lodge where the others probably just arrived and are no doubt concerned and Travis fuming. Yet he doesn’t have the energy to even worry about that last fact. Every inch of his skin is covered in a bloody crust, his clothes hanging tattered and torn on his frame, his shoes left ripped apart in the mine, there’s animal blood in his teeth, his hand is bleeding and the last thing he wants to deal with is being yelled at by Travis. So he continues to sit and despite himself, he answers.

“None of it, so, all of it.” Ryan tells her. He suddenly has nowhere safe to place his eyes, so he closes them, just for a moment he tells himself. It is not out of shame that he suddenly cannot look at Kaitlyn, the scratches on the trees, the blood on his hands, the scraps of flesh scattered over the grass, the remains of the carcasses he killed and ate raw or even just the light of day. It is out of shame for his lack of shame.

“Ryan.” Kaitlyn says seriously. “I remember it too.”

His eyes open, staring at the grass in front of him as he processes that information. It’s a slow process and eventually, he just ends up saying, “What?”

“I remember it, all of it. Like you explained last time, my mind was so foggy that I couldn’t really think, I just followed instincts and feelings. Like it was me but it wasn’t me, but it was definitely me.” She explains. “I remember standing off against you, fighting, climbing out of the cave, lying down in this clearing, eating the deer and boar. I remember it.”

“It’s because you accepted it.” Ryan all but whispers in realisation, more to himself then Kaitlyn. He turns to face her fully eye to eye for the first time all morning, repeating his realisation to her. “That has to be the reason, I can’t think of anything else that could be the cause. It’s because you accepted it, when you accept turning you’re able to rem-“

“What the fuck?” Kaitlyn nearly shrills with a gasp of horror, her eyes going wide.

Though he thinks it might be an extreme reaction to the information, especially compared to everything else they’ve talked about or that happened last night, Ryan nods in agreement as he tries to continue after the shocked interruption. “I know, but I guess it makes sense right? I think there’s this connection between the two sides, that-“

“No, Ryan, for fucksake, your ear!”

His mouth snaps shut, confusion on his face as he recoils slightly. Tentatively, he brings a hand up to the ear Kaitlyn stares at, his fingers touching the lobe. He begins sliding them up his ear but suddenly he’s touching air. His own eyes go wide and with his brow furrowing, he frantically feels over the flat curve where the top of his ear used to be.

“Is that from when I-?” Kaitlyn half asks in a guilty shock.

Ryan’s lips purse, his thoughts churning. He doesn’t drop his fingers from the missing top of his ear as he says to Kaitlyn, “Your shoulder, check your shoulder.”

She glances down at the crux between her shoulder and throat, but her tattered tshirt covers it. So instead she rips one of the tears wider, until her entire shoulder is bare. The large crescent, with two deeper imprints on the sides and a line of shallower imprints just below her collarbone, is a well healed but terrible scar. It’s a near perfect imprint of a bite, though in places where the flesh tore apart into deep lacerations between fangs it has scarred as thick jagged lines. 

“What the fuck?” She repeats in the exact same tone as last she’d said it. “I thought only silver injured werewolves, let alone leave a fucking scar after changing back!”

A memory surfaces, blurry from unimportance to him at the time, of the coarse, tight scar on the leg of the other wolf. From Kaitlyn’s broken leg, healed by the transformation. Now the injuries they had as wolves, also healed by the transformation, have been left scarred on their human bodies. 

“It has to be mirrored.” Ryan explains, his mind whirring. “As a wolf, you had a massive scar on your leg, but that was from where it’d broken as a human. It healed in the transformation, but I guess then it scarred your wolf instead, because of that? So it must work the other way too.”

“That’s another thing though, why didn’t we heal from our injuries when we were wolves? In August I fucking shot werewolves just to watch them stand right back up, without a scratch on them because they instantly healed. It doesn’t make sense.” Kaitlyn says, frustrated at the inconsistency of it all.

That does give Ryan total pause. There were many things strange about last night now that he thinks about it, but their remaining injuries especially so. Kaitlyn was so badly hurt she just laid in the clearing all night, nursing her wound. Why wouldn’t it instantly heal, just like every other damage the werewolves have sustained? His clawed hold and bite was deep, but as Kaitlyn just explained, it certainly wasn’t as bad as a gunshot. With that thought, it clicks.

“Because we did it.” He says. Kaitlyn just gives him a frustratedly confused expression, so he elaborates. “I bit you and it didn’t heal, you bit off my ear and it didn’t heal. It must be because another werewolf did the damage, right?”

“I guess that’s the only explanation that makes sense, but still doesn’t explain much.” Kaitlyn sighs with a contemplative look, her hand gripping her shoulder. “Hey, we scratched each other too though, right? I cut your shoulder didn’t I?”

Ryan hums in thought, lifting his hand to feel for scarring beneath his tattered shirt, though he’s fairly certain he won’t find any. If he remembers correctly, he had no pain or gushing blood from her claw wounds once he left the mine. Also the only injury he saw Kaitlyn nurse as a wolf was her shoulder, not the deep punctures and gashes he had also left on her ribs. His fingers spread out over the entirety of his shoulder, front and back, his palm feeling for any unevenness on his skin. He finds none and to double check he pulls his collar aside, seeing his skin is completely unmarred. When he looks back to Kaitlyn, he finds she was also doing her own inspection for anymore disfigurement, a relieved sigh leaving her lips.

“So just bites then.” He confirms, relieved at the very least that their instant healing hasn’t seemed to have run out completely.

“Seems so. Fucking weird.” Kaitlyn agrees before her eyes flick up to Ryan’s ear once more. “Sorry about biting off half your ear.”

Ryan snorts, despite the worry in the back of his mind. He consciously chooses to make a joke out of it, Kaitlyn’s rueful expression making him feel far worse than the worry of explaining his missing ear. “It’s fine, I hope it tasted good at least.” 

Kaitlyn’s jaw drops, the corners of her open lips twitching upwards. She snaps her mouth back closed with a grin that wobbles with her effort to stop smiling, her attempt to portray her shock out of disgust and not humour failing miserably. “I didn’t eat it! What the fuck Ryan?”

“Liar.” Ryan states simply, though he laughs in the pause before he continues, his relief palpable. His tone does drop to a genuine tone however, when he says. “I am sorry too though.”

With her fingers feeling how high and far over her throat and chest the scars go, Kaitlyn sighs, but thankfully there’s no anger in her tone. “Well I mean, at least we’re going into winter. My hot girl summer might have to be a bit more modest.”

Ryan’s own fingers had already returned to his ear without his notice. There is something so disconcerting about suddenly missing a part of his body, as small and unimportant as it may be. “I don’t know how I’m going to hide this. Got any good ideas for an explanation?” He asks semi-seriously, covering up the genuine worry in his tone.

“It was never there in the first place?” Kaitlyn suggests. “Anyone argues differently and you are so very offended that they have never noticed your half missing ear.”

“Great advice Kaitlyn but I don’t think that’ll work.” Ryan scoffs. He’s glad for the levity, because this is actually a very real problem that he’s going to have to address and he really doesn’t want to think about it seriously right now.

“It’s all in the delivery, seriously. Or just wear earmuffs, I guess.” She insists before falling quiet again with a slight huff. Her voice drops from humour to a more frustrated tone, though it remains insistent. “I’m sorry, I just feel like I’m even more confused than before. Like obviously it was different because you were out in the woods, but since you remember last month as well, was that a kinda normal werewolf experience or-?”

Ryan understands her frustration. He thinks he’s finally reached the point where letting it all unfold isn’t enough and he really needs solid answers now. At the very least, he needs to be able to make educated guesses, rather than just complete shots in the dark. “No, I wouldn’t say that was a ‘normal’ werewolf night, at least compared to last month which was extremely uneventful in comparison. With the fight conclusion, injuries, scars, you remembering, physically feeling fine and as fucked up as it is, emotionally feeling great, it’s yeah. Not like last month.”

He thinks for a moment, considering whether he should bring it up and ultimately deciding that yes, it has to be important to mention lest he convince himself it didn’t happen at all. “Even just for me, I had this really weird thing in my mind. Like, thinking with wolf level cognition, you know what that’s like now, right?”

Kaitlyn nods her understanding, telling him, “Yeah it’s fucking weird. Probably like being in Jacob’s brain for a night, just with a lot less boobs.”

Ryan makes a face at her and continues. “Yeah so, you don’t really think in words right? It’s just instincts, sensations, feelings and maybe a few concepts with names but there’s no real stream of consciousness there.”

“Yeah Ryan, I just said I get it. Spit it out, what happened?” Kaitlyn demands, curiosity getting the best of her.

“Fine, Jesus. Throughout the night I got this thought and I could hear this sound I didn’t really understand. Now I’m pretty certain it was a memory of a word, but my memory, not my wolf's memory.” A thought hits him, crinkling the space between his brows. “Which I just realised is weird because I hadn’t thought about it but when I’m a wolf, I don’t have memories outside of it. Holy shit, yeah I even considered the month between the last moon sleeping. I remember my time as a wolf but as a wolf I don’t remember my time as a person, except that single word last night.”

“Okay, so what was the word then?” Kaitlyn asks, still in that demanding tone, completely intrigued.

“Ryan.”

She mimes explosions with her hands by her head, followed by a long whooshing sound. “Wooow, the wolf gained sentience, that’s crazy. No but seriously, that’s actually pretty massive right? Like what does that mean?”

“I don’t know, but yeah it feels kinda seriously significant. I need to work this shit out, find out what it all means because it’s going to start driving me crazy questioning all of it.” Ryan tells her. 

“God yeah. But I mean like how the fuck are we actually supposed to actually get any answers for this stuff? It’s all just guesswork.” Kaitlyn complains, resting her chin on her palm, looking very put out.

“I might have a way. Travis gave me Chris’ journal and I’ve put it off, but I have to go through it.” Ryan admits. Cheekily, he adds on, “Laura might have worked some stuff out though, think you’ll tell her what happened?”

“Fuck no, screw her.” Kaitlyn says as she makes a face, knowing that Ryan’s baiting her but unable to help herself. Suddenly she jabs a finger at Ryan, “Do not screw her, I mean it.”

He holds his hands up with his own affronted expression, his nose wrinkling. “Wasn’t planning on it.”

Instantly put off the conversation for the moment, he looks up to the sky, finding that the sun is nearly visible over the tops of the trees. Time is moving too fast and he’s reminded they really do need to get back to the lodge. Still he is adverse to standing and leaving this clearing, though he does not know which factor in why holds the most weight. Whether it’s because he suddenly feels the most at home he ever has, not wanting to have to face the others for explanations of what happened or the wrath of Travis. They have to though, every second more they spend here is just pure selfishness.

“When you try and work stuff out, will you look into what happened after our fight? Or how it ended, I mean.” Kaitlyn says suddenly, interrupting the moment of quiet and Ryan’s thoughts.

He looks back to her, though he doesn’t have to in order to know she’s feeling a mix of emotions. Her scent, which until now has been steady enough to remain muted beneath the all consuming smell of blood, has risen above the other many smells of the forest. It is not technically neutral, rather more balanced, between the two halves of darker and lighter emotions within it.

“Of course.” He assures her. “Are you upset about it? Our fight?”

“I’m not, no, though last night I think werewolf-me was genuinely contemplating killing you.” She admits, with a bit of a dark humour to her words. “Then afterwards, I mean it was fucking weird right? But we truced right and then I felt, I don’t know- well it was better than killing each other obviously.”

He knows she’s talking about it in the most nonchalant manner possible, but Ryan understands why. The weight of it would be uncomfortable to discuss and they both understand it without the need for words. Whatever blood oath their wolves shared through the fight and surrender, was stronger than a promise and thicker than friendship. 

Ryan was never close to Kaitlyn over camp, though he highly respected her. They talked, joked and got along well, but he couldn’t say he knew her well or would have thought much of her once camp concluded. Over the last few months, his respect for her has grown tremendously and he would call her a solid, genuine friend. However this morning, she now feels like something more than even family. She’s pack.

With that sense of a pack, Ryan feels a new sense of security, familial amity, protection and tenacity. Most of all, the biggest relief and greatest shock, is that the void in his stomach has been filled. Only now that it’s gone can he truly understand how cold and empty it had truly left him. As if he’d been starving for so long he’d forgotten what it meant to be hungry. It doesn’t feel like he’s been brought to a feast to gorge himself, the hunger or rather the void, has just been filled enough that the absence is no longer so obtrusively and painfully there. It adds to his sense of relief in such a strength that words truly can not express it.

At last he nods to her and though they won’t discuss it, he asks just to be absolutely certain they’re feeling the same way, “The pit in your stomach is gone?”

“Yeah.” She says, the relief making her voice comes out alongside a long breath.

With that said, Ryan knows they have to go back now. Drawing from a bank of willpower that is almost definitely not his own, he manages to stand. There is some surprise still, in the ease of the movement and lack of pain in his body or muscles. He jerks his head towards the general area he’s fairly certain is the right direction to the lodge, a little right from where they’d entered the clearing. 

“You know it’s really time to head back, we’ve put it off long enough.” He says and as he looks down at her, more words rush from his mouth, that he hadn’t planned or intended to say until they’re already spoken. “And Kaitlyn? I never want to see you cry again.”

It might be a mean or insensitive thing to say but Kaitlyn picks up on the deeper care and lament in his words, while running with the surface level humour to it. “Don’t have to tell me twice. Just don’t let anyone know I’m an ugly crier.”

He gives her a smile, offering her a hand and gripping her wrist to tug her upwards. He glances around the clearing, spotting where he’d burst through the tree line to pounce on that poor unsuspecting deer. Considering for a moment, he tries to work out whether it’s left or right or even completely opposite it that they should go to make their way back to the lodge. Directions were never his strong suit. With a nudge to his arm, Kaitlyn points off through the trees with such an assuredness, Ryan immediately starts in that direction. Kaitlyn does everything with confidence, so he still has no idea if this is actually the right way back, but it’s a start at least.

They break through the trees and return to the thicket of the densely packed and dark forest, leaving the clearing behind. Ryan can’t help but glance back at it as they leave, a longing already rising in his chest to return. The clearing, with light streaming in, softly rustling leaves, deep claw marks on the trees, the remains of butchered carcasses and dark red blood slicked over the grass to soak into the dirt.

Chapter Text

His feet drag as they approach the treeline, leaves stuck to his soles and mud caked into the cracks of the dried blood. If from the edge of the woods he can now hear them arguing, he could smell them from a mile away. Even Kaitlyn herself has slowed from their reluctant but simultaneously determined stride, into a lingering shuffle through the thinning trees behind him.

Ryan can see them, but they have yet to turn from their argument to towards the edge of the forest where they’d be able to spot their arrival. Dylan has his arms crossed, head tilted down to the stairs they stand on, expression twisted into an uncharacteristic scowl. Jacob, in a much more typical display for him, has his arms flailing around wildly and eyebrows knitted. Though his words aren’t exactly quiet, with their distance Ryan would think they would reach him at least somewhat muted. Instead they are clear and sharp.

“Look, I get it, but we can’t go out there dude. You’re about to fucking pass out and my legs are barely able to keep me upright. Travis will find them and bring them back far faster than we could, alright dude?” He snaps in a complicated mix of emotion filled tone, before it simplifies into a stern but not unkind timbre. “Why don’t you go inside and get some sleep instead of risking passing out and cracking your head open on the stairs? I can keep a watch out man, okay? I’d get you as soon as they show up.”

Despite confliction playing out over his downturn face, Dyans reply is short and loud and instant. “No! No dude, if we’re not going in then I’m waiting right here.”

Ryan shares an uncomfortable look with Kaitlyn, who begrudgingly jogs a few steps to catch up with him as he breaks through the treeline proper and out onto the slick grass just off the side to the path. It’s not taken as long as Ryan thought it would to find their way back to the lodge. At first he followed Kaitlyn’s lead, who seemed to have a better sense of direction than him, but eventually that became null and void as his nose found a direct path for them. Though he’s sure they’d both rather turn back, they have to face this and so Ryan draws them nearer, stepping onto the path for the first time since last night. 

Jacob, mid-word just as he’s about to continue arguing, suddenly whips his head towards their approach and his eyes lock onto them. Dylan’s own gaze is brought from his feet to where they just stepped onto the path, his nose crinkling as he looks up. Their sudden silence is staggering and Ryan almost feels like he should pull to a stop, but he continues forward with slow steps, wearily watching them.

Jacob’s right, Dylan looks absolutely exhausted, they both do. They’ve clearly showered, clean from the gore of their own transformations but with no grime to hide behind, the dark bags under their eyes is startlingly apparent. Jacob’s legs are slightly quaking beneath him and Dylan’s shoulders shake under the heavy sweater he wears. They reek of fear, a bitter scent that rolls off of them in crashing waves. Perhaps because Ryan knows that he and Kaitlyn are okay, he almost feels that they, covered in blood and viscera as they are, look more put together than either Dyan or Jacob. 

It’s only by the time that they’re near approaching the stairs that Jacob manages to break out of his goldfish like gaping speechlessness and despite the heavy quiver in his legs, rushes down the stairs two at a time. He stumbles at the bottom, tripping forward and nearly bulldozing Kaitlyn over as he flings himself into a nearly all encompassing bear hug around her. Ryan catches the expression on her face change, from about to complain to softened, when she realises that she’s having to support his weight entirely lest he collapse. She stiffens her legs, holding him upright with ease, despite the difference of size and mass between them.

With a poorly concealed sniffle, Jacob, perhaps to compensate for the emotion, harshly asks, “What the fuck, where were you guys?” His voice breaks at the end of his sentence though and he doesn’t demand answers any further, Kaitlyn hugging him impossibly tighter and muffling the ensuing sounds of crying in her shoulder.

Ryan looks away from the touching, yet awkward display, up the stairs to where Dylan still stands. His expression drives a stake in Ryan’s chest. With upwards turned innerbrows and downwards dragged corners of his lips, that pendulum of relief that had Ryan and Kaitlyn swinging from laughter to tears, is stuck firmly in the centre, leaving Dylan frozen in it. His eyes seem somewhat glazed, looking at Ryan with a head buzzing with thoughts Ryan couldn’t begin to even guess at. 

It’s Ryan’s own step forward, an unconscious movement in his own relief at just the sight of Dylan, that seems to force Dylan himself into action. He swallows, shaking his head ever so slightly and when he looks back at Ryan, his eyes are no longer glazed and his frown has deepend. His hand twitches, one knee buckles, expression so conflicted. His confliction gives Ryan pause, drawing his head slightly back without meaning to. There is something wordless happening here and Ryan doesn’t know what, if even if he’s meant to know what. Finally Dylan’s hand does twitch out into a small stretch towards him and he steps towards Ryan. 

As Dylan slowly, carefully makes his way down the stairs on unsteady legs, his eyes flutter over him, taking in the lack of shoes, tattered clothes and every inch of skin covered in blood and flecks of flesh. There is so much concern in his eyes, worry he lets himself show, not hidden behind a mask of blasé as it usually is. It is in this heavy observation and with this realisation that Dylan’s allowing himself as Dylan Dylan to look at him like that, that Ryan’s attention is suddenly torn to his equally shredded ear, an unexpected feeling rising in him. He can’t quite name it but he knows as Dylan’s eyes rise upwards and his steps bring him closer, Ryan doesn’t want him to see it. 

Ryan twists to the side, taking a few awkward stumbling steps away from Dylan’s approach. He tries to stop himself from bringing his hand back to the smooth top of his half missing ear so as to not draw attention specifically towards it, but cannot stop his hand from grazing his jaw just beneath it. He attempts to make the movement natural and casual, less a sudden jerk away and more of an easy step back from the outstretched hand. Still, it does bring his eyes away from Dylan and to the path, even if just for a single second.

He looks back to him immediately, with his head still ducked and tilted away, cowering in every sense of the word. What was going to be an awkward joke about his worry of getting blood on him, melts away just as quickly at the expression returned back to him. He is not the only one hiding, as it seems Dylan has fled once more, his mask slotted back into place. It leaves miles between them, all the open fear, concern and relief disappeared entirely. In just that single second, that one instance is all it took, for Dylan to give way to something not quite so real.

To his own surprise, seeing that mask suddenly fixed into place after having only been able to see the honesty beneath it for just a moment, pisses him off. Perhaps it’s because frustration is easier than confusion, or perhaps it is the suddenness of the switch. But either way, Ryan’s relief at just the sight of him has bristled into stress at just his very presence. Why wait out here at all if this was his reaction, if he cannot fully be himself even now? Even though Ryan knows he must be being unfair, with spite he breathes deeply, the burnt sugar scorching his lungs and with what he knows is hypocrisy, he savours that Dylan cannot hide from him fully.  

It has fallen back into that deafening silence, Jacob’s sniffling now ended and even the wind dying to let them drown in the unwavering quiet. Ryan can’t bring himself to break it, can’t bring himself to even move in case he exposes his fresh disfigurement.

The air is clogged thick with the strongest smells now known to Ryan. Blood, both covering him and Kaitlyn and now also in parts Jacob, is still hanging heavy in the air around them. It is a fine mist beneath the choking smog of their scents however. Even in those, with Jacob’s thick scent of fear and worry suddenly relieved, Dylan’s scent is an indistinguishable tangle of sweetness soured into something burning and heavy. Always so clear to Ryan, always the strongest, at its sweetest and at its darkest.

Dylan’s voice, as he breaks this deep silence, is not burning like his scent. Instead it is cold, the coldest Ryan has ever heard him. “Travis is out there looking for you. He’s pissed and he’ll want answers, if we’re not good enough to explain it to. You know, since he’s really easy to talk to.” He does not speak in a hostile icy way, rather there is even a slight breath of a laugh with the humour given in his last words. It is cold in his distance, sudden but total lack of worry as if he’d never even cared in the first place. 

With the tension obvious in the thick air, Kaitlyn walks forward to the bottom of the stairs, her arm around Jacob’s shoulder and dragging him with her. She’s subtly placing herself between them, something Ryan’s not sure if he appreciates or if it pisses him off even more. He doesn’t need a mediator between himself and Dylan, frankly he just needs to lower his stupid investment in him, as he’s been apparently unsuccessfully trying to do already. Why does he care if Dylan’s masking now? Not only that, it would be unfair of him to expect otherwise, when he knows why such a thing exists in the first place. In a situation like this, it was even more unexpected for Dylan to drop it at all for that moment, than it ever would be for him to retreat back to it. There should be nothing confusing to it at all. And yet it still is.

“He can be pissed, I know it was my fault,” Kaitlyn says calmly as she carefully deposits Jacob on the first step, keeping a hand on his shoulder as he looks up at her. “I’d forgotten the bag I was going to bring but I shouldn’t have gone back for it, seems so stupid now.” 

“What bag?” Jacobs asks at the exact same time Dylan also says, “That doesn’t exactly explain everything.”

Kaitlyn runs a hand through the top of her blood-caked hair in an attempt to get the near solid strands out of her eyes, sending a glance over to Ryan before she continues on in his silence. “It had shit in it to help us in the morning, clothes and water and stuff. After we found it and started running back, well… I fell down into one of the mines beneath the trails.”

“How far was the fall?” Jacob asks quietly, the canvas of his shoe tapping against the loose stones of the path.

“I don’t know, far. I broke my leg and I don’t know, I was pretty fucked up.” She explains, a grimace on her lips as she must recall the pain. Ryan himself cannot repress the shudder that runs through him at the memory of the sight of her leg, something he doesn’t think is missed by the others.

Jacob’s brows knit impossibly further, pulling up into that sad puppy look that Ryan is beginning to associate with him. His eyes are flickering quickly between Kaitlyn’s face and where she stands on two even legs that are far more steady than his own. “But- but you’re okay?”

Kaitlyn kicks her leg out in front of him, balancing herself through her hold on his shoulder, shaking it out and twisting it side to side. Not a single scratch on it. As if he’d seen its mangled state himself, Jacob reaches out and holds her calf in placated amazement. He doesn’t let go until Kaitlyn begins to teeter to the side and she has to shake his grip loose to stand on both feet once more, giving him a reassuring squeeze in place of his hold of her.

“Did transforming heal it?” Dylan asks after their little display has ended.

She nods, passing a look over to Ryan, with a look of confusion then understanding at the awkward bow and twist of his head. “Yeah, thanks to Ryan climbing down and encouraging me to. Otherwise I don’t know how long I would have lain there.”

With her words, attention is brought to him once more and Ryan’s shoulder and neck straighten, though he still holds himself at a slight angle to keep his ear just out of view. He doesn’t know why he is hiding it. He just knows, as inevitable as it is, he doesn’t want them to see it yet.

Though the eyes on him now are not critical and although Kaitlyn's words were appreciative, without knowing what the other two are thinking, he feels the need to defend himself. “We had no time to get out, even if Kaitlyn could move. She was in a really bad way.”

“So what happened?” Jacob asks.

Kaitlyn and Ryan share a look, their eyes locking for a moment. For someone so terrible at reading body language, Ryan finds himself for the first time in his life able to understand someone’s thoughts through silence, as their unspoken and expressionless weighing up of what to share is tossed between them. He can tell through the thickening of her scent and stiff spine that she favours concealed information, but not enough to argue it. Ryan, though he feels much the same, decided what feels like a long ago now, that honesty is necessary between them. So even against his own wishes, he finally turns to face them fully and explains the night in vague detail.

He essentially bullet points the night, drawing from his blur of memory to pull the important parts and does his best to mitigate reactions to the harsher parts. When he reaches it at last, after a noticeably long hesitation, he bites the last bullet he’s made and gestures to his ear. Better he himself points it out than the shock of them discovering it themselves. 

The absorption of information takes time for them both, though visibly less so for Dylan. He can see the questions welling up in them both, their eyes stuck in a loop between Ryan’s ear and Kaitlyn’s shoulder, the conflicted emotions thickening their scents even further until Ryan doesn’t have to breathe deeply for his nose to burn. Ryan and Kaitlyn steel themselves for the onslaught, as so many words are held waiting in the air now, keeping all of their breaths baited.

However it doesn’t come. Dylan’s eyes flicker over the woods behind them, now resolutely away from any chance of catching the ear or scarring in his sight and his expression is thoughtful, though it is just a painting on the mask. “Well you know, it could have gone worse.” He jokes, a sudden smile cracking across his face. Ryan sees right through it.

The unexpected levity seems to be exactly what Jacob and Kaitlyn needed however, their dark expressions breaking into their own grins and accompanying chuckles. All the questions and all the heavy emotions are melted away with the perfectly timed flippancy. Although he knows it was calculated, purposeful, Ryan still finds himself shocked as that seems to settle the topic, even if just for now. No comment on his half missing ear, on the wolves fight or animal butchery. Just Dylan’s sarcastic and well timed joke, so offhanded that no one else seems to notice the diversion within or the abruptness to the end of their conversation.

His frustration melts away into a mournful sadness as Ryan is once more struck with how much Dylan’s mask is used to unknowingly console others, all while not letting himself express the depths of his own true emotions. Of course he is not absolutely certain if that subtle form of stalling this conversation to a later date was for their or Dylan’s sake, they all still benefit from it. Ryan is very much used to not being able to read people, it doesn’t bother him as it’s always been this way. And yet he hates that he cannot read Dylan, that he cannot understand his thoughts with a single look. As it is, with the frustration faded, the confusion it covered comes back in full force and his mind is whisked away in a futile attempt to decode their interactions in the days and morning passed.

He knows he missed something, certainly this morning through that strange conflictedness in Dylan and that unspoken something, but perhaps something earlier too. He truly does not know what. His mind wants to go to what he knows is wishful thinking, but last month Kaitlyn made it clear that was not an option and there has been no further indication it could be. So there’s something there, something else, that explains this. He has no idea how he’d ask, as he gets the distinct impression it is not something he’s meant to. If only there was a little more clarity in what are turning out to be these fucking useless scents.

“Ryan, come on dude.” Kaitlyn says from the top of the stairs. Having not even known they’d moved, Ryan whips his head upwards to find the others looking back at him, just a few steps from the door.

Snapped from his musings, it is a startling reminder to see the exhaustion on Jacob and Dylan’s faces, and of course the blood caked on Kaitlyn’s. Jacob leans heavily on Kaitlyn who nearly entirely supports his weight and Dylan sways concerningly by the door. Though Ryan’s certain he was only lost in his own thoughts for but a moment, he remembers just how exhausted and sore he was last month. The fact they’re still standing at all has to be a testament to how much they really must care. They deserve the rest and now that there are no explanations barring him from entrance thanks to Dylan, there is nothing more he wants than to wash off the disgusting coat of gore covering his skin. He takes the stairs two at a time to join them.

Inside the lodge is warm, the sound of the fire quietly crackling oddly comforting. There’s no one in sight and he can smell only the light tendrils of the fire's smoke that manages to escape from the chimney, leaving him certain everyone is fast asleep throughout the lodge. As they stumble through the great open hall, Jacob catches his eye.

“They wanted to wait as well but everyone was- well, you remember. Me and Dylan volunteered so they could sleep.” He explains, his eyes half lidded and feet dragging.

Ryan nods, keeping himself from either glancing at Dylan or covering his ear. He isn’t going to give it any further response until he realises that Jacob isn’t looking away, waiting for one. “Good call.” He says, though with the rise at the end, he thinks it sounds more like a question than a statement.

Jacob doesn’t seem to notice, nodding back like he needed that final reply to consider it a job well done at last. His eyes return to his feet in an attempt to stop them from tripping over each other, but Ryan thinks he sees them flutter closed anyway. They make their way over to the couch, Kaitlyn depositing Jacob down onto the cushions. Dylan gracelessly tumbles after him, dropping down and folding over the arm on the opposite side. “We’ll talk when you get back from your shower.” Jacob says in that exhausted, barely illegible way, waving a hand before it thuds back onto his chest. 

Though he thinks both he and Kaitlyn might be keen to linger, to look over their friends who are just barely able to stay conscious in mixed emotion, the desire to wash the near painful cracking of the dried blood and flecks of flesh from their skin quickly wins out. They turn to make towards the showers, Kaitlyn falling in line just a single step behind his own. Some of the tension built in his shoulders fades with her walking just off to his side.

“Dare I ask?” Kaitlyn asks him, before with a smirk she tacks on, “Do I need to?”

Ryan feels himself scowl, though it's a halfhearted effort. “Uh, no. And no.”

“Alright, sure. Well, that went as well as it could have right? They had surprisingly little questions.” She concedes but with a sideways glance to her face, he knows it's a trick question.

He hums. “Only thanks to Dylan and because they were about to pass out. That wasn’t the end of it, we still have to explain what happened to all the others.” With the stairs above him, Ryan once more feels grateful that despite it all, at least his legs do not ache as they had last month. It’s the little things, he supposes. 

Kaitlyn gives what he thinks is an approving short laugh. “So you don’t miss everything then, good.” 

“Yeah, yeah, whatever. Go piss off into the shower, I’ll find us some clothes. You’re disgusting.” With that childish urge to stick out his tongue, he races upstairs, fishing through their still strewn about belongings and just grabbing whatever he can find in his haste.

The hot water cascading down over his hair, shoulders and back creates a safe haven from it all. Last month it created a space for him to finally let it all out but now, it is a space where his thoughts are washed away and all he can hear is the hazy static of the falling water.  As although Dylan’s joke was right, it could have gone worse, the others did not have to see Kaitlyn’s leg splintered into two, the pool of blood around her. They did not feel their teeth sinking into her shoulder, the meat shredding between their fangs. They did not wake up with half an ear missing and feeling the best they have since that night. He did. Now he just wants a moment of true silence from everyone but most importantly himself and his own thoughts.

Of course it ends too soon. Once more this morning, he is forced to leave his safe haven at the sound of a slamming door ricocheting far enough through the lodge hall to reach his ears under the falling water. Scrubbed clean of the filth that had covered him, he as quickly as he can bring himself to, which he knows isn’t especially fast, shuts off the water and dresses himself. 

He converges with Kaitlyn just outside the bathrooms doors, her hair dripping still warm droplets down to the floorboards. It is a stark sight, the difference between the red drenched and crusted Kaitlyn of before to now. Clean of it all, he can see how put together and frankly well she looks, a strange sight when he vividly recalls how she appeared last month- let alone last night, mangled on the rock. After his moment, just a single moment, of reprieve, he finds his will returned back to him and resolutely pushes forward to face whatever wrath will face him in Travis.

However he does not stand in the foyer with rage twisting his features, as he’d expected. In fact Ryan doubts it had actually been Travis arriving at all for a second, as there is no sign of him in the hall. Dylan with his knees curled into his chest and head on his arms that hang out over the arm of the couch and Jacob with his head draped over the back of the couch with his mouth hanging open, are each fast asleep on either side of the couch and have not stirred in the slightest. The only confirmation that Travis is indeed here, is from Ryan sticking his head out the door to see his cruiser left in the centre of the driveway end.

Though Ryan would be perfectly content to wait at a table in the hall, with letting Travis come to him and giving himself the chance to procrastinate that he’d given up just moments ago, his keen hearing does not let him feign ignorance. A faint cluttering from the kitchen draws him that way, Kaitlyn falling in behind his footsteps.

There he’s finally found, surrounded by islands and sun streaming in open windows, decked in his usual uniform and the deep set lines of a man beginning to grow old. Oddly, he holds a teaspoon in his hand that on noticing their arrival, he points threateningly in their direction. “What the fuck were you thinking?” He all but spits.

There’s the rage Ryan had expected, the white hot anger with them for their foolishness and disobedience. It etches the lines deeper into his skin, narrowing his eyes and drawing his back straight at just the sight of them. Yet it crumbles just as quickly. His shoulders sag and he all but collapses down into himself, his elbows hitting the island counter in front of him with his head in his hands. The teaspoon clatters to the countertop, forgotten as he tries to rub those deep set lines in his forehead away. 

Ryan catches Kaitlyn’s eyes, sharing an equal awkward expression between them. He slides the door behind him without looking back until it clicks closed, as she leans against the wall, her arms crossed and knee bent with her foot against the paint. He must admit, although Ryan wasn’t exactly eagerly anticipating what he was certain would be a thorough scolding, he at least had some idea of how he’d react to that. This? This, he has no idea how he’s supposed to approach. As it is, he begins to slowly walk forward, as if Travis might spring up at any moment and turn that teaspoon into a deadly weapon.

He’s just nearing the counter when Travis, without lifting his head, says tiredly, “Just make me a goddamn coffee, I can’t even find a fucking mug in this maze of a kitchen.”

Sending a wild baffled look back to Kaitlyn and receiving only silent amusement in return, Ryan sets to making a coffee. He’s not an expert by any means and Travis is right, this kitchen is fucking maze and takes him a while to even find where they’d stashed the coffee at all. But even despite the sudden order to dump at least two more spoonfuls into the already bitterly dark coffee, he thinks he does a good enough job. 

Travis refuses to mutter even just a word further until not only is the coffee placed down in front of him but he’s downed half of it in a single surely scalding gulp. Ryan has set himself across the island counter from him, Kaitlyn still leaning against the wall by the door as if guarding it. Eventually he looks up, a weary eye trained on them. He straightens up, a hand still wrapped around the hot mug, and kicks out something hidden beneath him. Out from behind the counter tumbles the bag that Ryan had abandoned and all but forgotten about from last night. Its contents, various fabrics, a bowl and water bottles, spill out from its open top and clatter against the floor.

“You went back for this?” He asks, not waiting for any further response past Ryan’s nod. “So you’re all fucking stupid, or is it specifically you two?”

That it seems he does expect an answer to, as Ryan just scowls, he leans forward. “Wasn’t rhetorical. You kids are so dumb and you don’t even realise it. You don’t think I couldn’t just give you this shit if you’d thought to ask for it?” He emphasises his point by kicking the bag again, causing more of its contents to tumble and roll out across the floor.

Ryan leans back on his heels, biting his tongue. He’s not about to argue a point he knows is true and he’s certain there will be many other hills to die on in the future. The man also looks like he’s at risk of combusting and it is perhaps safer for this slow release of pent up steam than the alternative. Kaitlyn for her part, seems more than happy for Ryan to take the lead and although he does not think this is an altruistic decision, it's one he appreciates nonetheless.

“So next time maybe fucking listen and follow me when I come to get you, instead of going back for shit you don’t need. Better yet, have it ready before I arrive, which I understand is a pretty complex notion, so I see why you may not have thought of that before.” Travis snarks at him in a deeply frustrated tone. 

Ryan has to give him that from his perspective they really must seem quite stupid. He hasn’t had to wake in a cage covered in gore however. Curiously Ryan has noted that throughout all of his scolding, his words have all been solely directed at Ryan. Travis does acknowledge Kaitlyn’s presence with the occasional wayward glance and he of course was there last night to know that it was her who forgot the bag, not Ryan. Yet still, every word is spat to Ryan in front of him. He doesn’t mind, but he’s curious as to the reason why. Not that he’d dare ask now.

“Aye aye.” Is all Ryan can think to say after an awkward, drawn out pause where an answer was expected. It just makes Travis sigh.

“What happened? I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt after finding this bag that it wasn’t planned, so what happened to stop you from getting to the Manor?”

The room, with everyone else asleep and Kaitlyn up to this point mollified, had been mostly scentless until now, a near impossible thing in this lodge nowadays. However it spikes now, smoke curling through the room as if a fire has begun to lick up the wall from every point of contact she makes with it. Within it the emotions are muddy, he doesn’t get a distinctive feel from it, rather its presence is just once more becoming known in a much higher intensity. It feels almost exactly like when he first stepped into the lodge this morning, with the same light tendrils of smoke filling the room as had managed to escape from the chimney in the next room over. Once again this morning, he is brought a sense of security knowing she has his back.

Ryan explains the night much like he had for Dylan, however in a far more choppy, stilted way, as he is not certain quite how much he wishes to divulge even as he speaks. The critical and judging eye on him certainly does not help either. At certain parts he sees Travis tense and in others he sees him relax. By the end he is left with no clue on how Travis has taken his recount. 

It doesn’t take long for him to hear his thoughts though, as he’s barely finished his last word when Travis sighs again and shakes his head. “You fucked up, really fucked up kid.” 

“Oh yeah? Which part?” Ryan bites back sarcastically, still at least part human and only able to take so many criticisms and insults. 

Travis gives a huff of a laugh, “Yeah you think you know but you don’t know. Running through those woods isn’t something your dog will forget and keeping it on that leash is just going to be harder now. I am not saying that lightly.” 

“Right.” He hums in a vague sort of agreement, Ryan’s mind flicking back to when he also used the metaphor of leash for himself. For how he let it go. If Travis is concerned about control over a leashed wolf, Ryan wonders how he’d feel about a free one.

Ryan can see the moment when Travis, who’s critical observation of him has not faltered for a moment, sparks with recognition. Then there is resignation. “Ah.” Is all he says at first.

He spares a glance back at Kaitlyn still leant silently against the wall, Ryan hard pressed not to follow his gaze. There is a moment where Travis just looks between them, from Kaitlyn to Ryan to Kaitlyn and back again. Not as if he is looking for something but rather he is gauging something he has already found. That resignation deepens, bringing with it a solemn air near strong enough to whisk away the smoke.

“You reminded him of Caleb, you know. I can see why now.” Travis stands to his full height, that same solemn air cooling his voice. With his last words, he first sends a withering glare to Kaitlyn before it is once more returned to Ryan. “I loved my nephew, he was a good kid. But it was Caleb who bit Kaylee and Chris. I’d advise you to remember that.”

With those last cryptic and painful words, Travis walks from the kitchen and the sound of the closing front door follows him. The air does not stop freezing on his departure, a cold shiver running up Ryan’s spine and sending ice shards through his blood to shred through his heart. He does not know if he will ever be able to hear the Hackett’s names without pain, but especially said by Travis in such a mournful rue, knowing that he is the cause, Ryan thinks he will never get back the part of him that has been replaced by grief filled guilt. 

He turns back to Kaitlyn with his breath stuck frozen in his chest and he is offered just one consoling smile before she says, “You need to read that fucking journal.”

Chapter Text

Their feast of meats, fruits, sweets and whatever else was brought for this morning has been reduced to nothing more than scraps and crumbs. Plastic wrappings and trays are left scattered over the centre island, mixed in amongst teeth scraped bones and fruit skins. Though none of it was difficult to make, with the sheer amount of it all, preparing it took him and Kaitlyn quite some time. It was gone in a near instant, like a school of sharks descending on it in a blood frenzy.

Then of course, the explanations began. Ryan thinks he’s told this same story, what, four-five times today? Too many, that it now sounds contrived and confusing to his own ears. For this last explanation, once everyone had their full and the group was properly together, it has lasted so long with their butting in and questions that they have had to move to the hall. Even now with them seated around the dying fire, the rebuttals and questions have not quelled. 

He supposes he cannot be too impatient, considering how surprisingly and relievingly quiet the day turned out being. Once Travis left, Ryan and Kaitlyn stood awkwardly in the kitchen for a few moments. With the guilt eating Ryan alive and the confusion sending Kaitlyn into a near buzz, they shared a stilted conversation about how to handle the others before deciding to retreat to their shared attic space. Everyone else, including where they’d left Jacob and Dylan on the couch, were fast asleep for many hours more. Yet the exhaustion of last month had not taken either of the two today and so until evening they had the chance to lounge around reading and listening to music as dust poured down over them and sunlight splintered through the window.

Now though, that peace has certainly shattered. He finds himself desperately wishing that despite the pain of last month, this night after the full moon could have gone similarly. That he could disappear into the library, with the warm glow of dusk, the sweet scent in the air and honeyed eyes on him, just for him. A nice idea, a romanticised idea, as it hadn’t even been so simple then. One he cannot even lose himself in now, as a voice slashes through the soft image.

“Ryan I don’t think you understand, half of your fucking ear is missing.”

“Yeah, no, I’m pretty sure I’ve noticed, thank you Emma.” He says with all the patience he can muster.

Emma’s arms are crossed over her chest, lips pursed and eyes resolutely pointed to the left of his head. She’s not the only one who cannot pull their gaze from it, the only proof they have of their story since Kaitlyn, the absolute bastard, only needs to wear a hoodie to hide her own scars. He should have taken her nose for the bemused expressions she keeps sending him.

Despite her comment, it is the others who cannot seem to wrap their heads around what Ryan and Kaitlyn are explaining to them. Which in parts he understands, in parts he doesn’t. Yes there are many confusing elements, with the scarring and remembering, but even just the idea that they turned down there at all seems to send most of them for a spin. Ryan’s never claimed to be a great storyteller but he’d hoped that they would at least follow the timeline of events. He supposes some dreams are too ambitious. 

“So you fought in the woods? Was it over the deer?” Max asks, confusion clear on his face as he tries to keep up.

“No, that was when they were still in the cave Max. And you’re certain it was only bites that scarred? You didn’t sustain any other injuries that have left a mark?” Laura chimes in.

She has her notebook in hand and has been scribbling away with rising ferocity for every word spoken. Though all the others in reaction to the story have had moments of varying concern, shock and horror amongst them, Laura has remained on that one note. Clinical interest, sometimes piqued but always detached and objective. Ryan supposes in some ways he appreciates it as it may end up leading them to answers. He cannot deny however, the coldness of her interest is out of place amongst the rest of them. Since they’ve returned to the quarry, that clinical attitude towards them has had Ryan keeping his distance somewhat. Though he supposes he never really got to know her properly, in that month before their return their messages felt much warmer than she is now. He can only hope that once they get some solid answers she comes right again, though that might be unfair to think.  

“Just the bites.” He confirms. “The boar tried to gore me and it just glazed right off. We scratched each other as well but those just healed instantly. Only the bites left lasting damage to then scar.”

He knows this is why he was so reluctant to show his ear, or he guesses lack thereof. Because now that it is out in the open, every glance towards him strays just a little to the left. Like it such a vital part of him that is suddenly missing, like it is a serious and malignant disfigurement. Worst of all he can do nothing but sit there and bear it, unable to reach up and cover it without drawing attention to his own focus on it. He’d be grateful that at least Dylan’s eyes do not seem drawn to it, if it wasn't coddling himself, considering the fact his eyes refuse to come anywhere near Ryan in the first place.

In ways he is reminded of last month, when they all sat around this fireplace in a near exact formation. Back then however, they all looked at each other like they were freaks for what they divulged about their condition, not just Ryan and to a lesser extent, Kaitlyn. Back when they were trying to gather information to try and work out what they could about this curse. And god, what more have they learned since then? Nothing that makes any sense or proves useful in any way, surely. Never mind only a month has passed since then, Ryan feels like a lifetime has been spent and he’s a new man born again already with no more experience gained. 

“So how come you can remember it and we can’t? Is it because you were in the woods or under direct moonlight or something?” Abi asks, her hands wrapped around a mug spilling steam into the air around her. Ryan noticed when they’d sat down how she’d placed herself just a little further away from the rest of them. She has only continued to lean further and further back as their conversation has progressed.

“No, no I remembered my night last month too. I think letting it happen is what led to remembering it, because Kaitlyn didn’t remember last month but she did now.” Ryan explains, glad to answer a thoughtful question. Especially one that he wishes to discuss with them all, on the acceptance of the wolf. It would be especially convenient if Abi and her helpful questions led him to it, rather than having to broach the subject separately himself.

“Bullshit, I mean you don’t exactly get a choice in turning anyway, do you?” Emma says, her lip twitching up at the corner, though she doesn’t fully sneer until her question ends. “So are the cages still safe with multiple people in them?”

“Why wouldn’t they be?” Kaitlyn asks her right back, that perfected snarky tone put to use. With the fire in her eyes, Ryan knows his chance to grab onto the thread Abi threw out is gone, as this is going to progress with or without him.

“I’ll remind you all again that Ryan is missing half of his fucking ear .” Emma says in that mix of condescension and destain, before her eyes flit over to Jacob, narrowing, and that tone drops down to something even more vile in its faux casualness. “And your summer pics might not look so hot.”

The air is thick enough to choke on, dark smoke rising and soot spreading out to blacken the floor they stand on. This conversation is growing antagonistic fast and Ryan can’t say he’s surprised that the tension stems from between Emma and Jacob. Something has been simmering there, not only from the end of camp, but from whatever happened between them last month. This is going to have to be addressed sooner rather than later, lest someone gets their throat torn out and not just metaphorically as it has been so far.

“What’s your point Emma?” Ryan asks her, his throat tensing in a short moment, the growing mutter within the group and retorts on both Kaitlyn and Jacob’s lips instantly quietening. 

“If you’re fucking tearing into each other, what’s to say one of you won’t attack us in the cages?” She snaps, clearly gesturing to herself and Abi, the only two included in her sense of ‘us’. 

“Well frankly there is nothing, it was always a possibility. Part of the danger I suppose, when turning into a fucking werewolf.” He cannot help himself from adding dryly, before continuing in a more serious manner. “We’ll just have to keep ourselves separated out like we did last month. I know you probably don’t remember the night itself, but did anyone else wake up with scars?”

There’s a series of quietly muttered ‘no’s’ echoing through the room, before Nick, nowadays as quiet as a ghost and faded into the background so much so that Ryan almost forgets his presence, all but whispers “It was really hard, without you two.”

Perhaps because it was Nick who said it, the youngest of them and now the quietest, the truthfulness of the statement cannot be brushed past and the room falls into stillness. Ryan’s eyes pass over each of them, taking in the exhaustion still held in their features and the way they cradle their still aching limbs. If last month he was struck by how after they slept they all found it within themselves to keep moving on, he is now struck with just how lost they all seem. With their thousand yard stares and endless questions in an attempt to understand just anything about what’s going on to try and make it just a little more clear, a little more real. 

With his mind on the day after the full moon last month, Ryan is suddenly left to wonder, who held Dylan until he could breathe again? Who reached through the electrified bars to help Emma cover herself? Who helped Jacob and Nick stand, who led them all through the door to the outside world again? And instantly he knows how selfish he has been today, having not considered any of this for a single second prior. For all he and Kaitlyn went through last night, they transformed this morning to roll on the grass and laugh. He knows there will have been no laughter within those blood splattered cages beneath the concrete and red light. 

Without even looking at her, he knows Kaitlyn has had the same realisation. The pity in her scent is honest but he doesn’t know how well received it would be from at least fractions of the group right now. So Ryan lets the attention return to himself once more, feeling much less sorry from himself this time round, taking the lead as is beginning to feel natural and seemingly growing to become expected.

“No one could have known this was going to happen, I imagine it was fucking horrific for everyone right? No one could have prepared for that and I’m sorry for the impact it had on everyone.” He apologises as tactfully as he can, his voice not pitying but genuine.

“You don’t have to apologise to us Ryan,” Abi says kindly, though incorrectly in his opinion. “From what you’ve said, it was far more horrific for you both. I can’t imagine how you must feel, after- after it all.”

Ryan cannot lie to her, the truth he knows is written across his face. As yes, last night was terrifying and he hopes to never go through something like that again. However, still he feels the best he has since August and he is certain Kaitlyn feels much the same. So in a rather strange sense, it leaves the night before feeling rather unreal and far less concerning to him than many other matters. This leaves him without any real reply to her without sounding apathetic or almost like he’s bragging in some kind of fucked up way.

He hurries to think of a reply, maybe something along the lines of you can’t compare pain and we should focus instead on pulling together to make sure we can make those hard moments a little bit easier together. In fact that would have actually been way better than what he does say, an awkward drawn out, “Ohhh, no, you know it- it was, um. We’re okay, you know, it was fine really.”

Ryan cringes at his own words, relief rising in his chest as Kaitlyn rushes to his rescue. “We’re fine actually. Last night was shit but yeah, actually totally A-okay now. So no need to worry, like at all.” It plummets back down, hitting probably about twelves branches before it lands in an alleyway, making a cat screech as it flees the scene of Kaitlyn’s gauchely brutal honesty.

There’s an incredibly awkward, long drawn out pause. They are peered at by everyone who surrounds them, varying levels of disbelief of two kinds on their faces. Some with disbelief of the authenticity of their statements but most with disbelief at their frankly impressive ability to fumble their responses in an opposite but equally blundering manner. Even Laura’s clinical interest is broken for a moment to raise an eyebrow and smirk down into her notebook in amusement.

“Okay, what the fuck was that, what are you trying to say?” Jacob asks, one of the few left in genuine confusion. 

Emma leans back in her seat, her arms crossed and head tilting slightly, as she scoffs still in that disbelief. “They’re saying that poor little bambi tasted delicious and they feel great about it.” 

“I mean, at least Disney will be grateful for the sequel- as short as it may be.” Dylan pipes up for the first time since they’ve moved from the kitchen, Ryan thinks because he may be unable to help himself from trying to add to the levity when the chance arises. It doesn’t quite work so well this time.

“Great, no, you know it makes perfect sense. While we were panicking, locked in cages, freaking out about these two, they were off prancing about and having the time of their lives.” Emma snaps, rising to her feet. With one arm still crossed, she reaches a hand out and jabs a finger at them all one by one, stopping with an extra jab towards Dylan as she finishes speaking. “Waste of fucking tears, from all of us. Adjust your priorities because these two don’t give a shit.”

There’s a second of stunned quiet before surprisingly, Abi comes to their defence. “She broke her leg Emma, it definitely wasn’t intentional and they’d be just as worried for us were it them in our place. It wasn’t a waste of tears.”

The rigidness of Emma’s spine relaxes as she stands, her shoulders lowering, though just an inch. He cannot see her expression, as she’s turned to look at Abi, but much of the venom has faded from her voice when she replies. “Whatever, I don’t even give a shit. I’m still exhausted, ready to go back to bed?”

Abi picks up on the plea for escape instantly, they all do. With a nod and an apologetic glance to them behind Emma’s back, Abi draws herself up and trails after Emma as she storms away. Left in their place is an unshakable awkwardness, as people question the validity of her outburst, Ryan included. 

Of course, it wasn’t as cold or callous as she implied. He knows too, though not why, that Emma is especially sensitive this month so an outburst is not entirely unexpected. She is not stupid nor fragile however and there is some truth to her words. As he’s already acknowledged, there was certainly selfishness in not thinking of what the others had gone through in their absence. Ryan isn’t used to this sort of dynamic, of anyone other than his little sister depending on him, of having to manage many people's thoughts, feelings and now it seems also their struggles in both his presence and absence. But he chose to take these things on as his responsibility now, he cannot afford to be so self absorbed as to not see something like this again, lest he realise too late next time. Lest he hurt one of them again.

“A shit night, though I’m guessing they all will be. Looking forward to the rest of my life.” Max bemoans quietly, probably to himself more than anyone else, as now he does address the group directly. “On that note, I think I’m also ready for bed. Good to go, hun?”

Laura, who seemed to be furiously underlining something within her notebook, looks up and smiles at the sight of her boyfriend extending his hand to her. She tucks the pen behind her ear, taking his hand and conjoined, they give the group a dual wave before wandering off. Nick also bids his own quiet goodnight, looking a little terrified to leave for the shared rec room, but his exhaustion winning out. 

“Fun times.” Jacob huffs, sending a worried glance towards Kaitlyn before he rubs his face with open palms. “I- I should probably go. Go sleep.” 

Ryan’s not the only one who narrows his eyes at Jacob’s sudden retreat, the other remaining two doing the same. He hadn’t been paying close enough attention to him to know exactly when it began, but Jacob’s sudden skittishness is obvious. He turns tail and flees back up to the other half of the attic that he has now seemingly claimed, with barely a glance behind him. Ryan nearly wants to laugh at the memory of last month, when the others had been so upset he and Dylan had slept in the library and not their designated spots upstairs. Now they seem to be dispersing further and further away from each other, in a few months time he wouldn’t be surprised if someone ends up sleeping in the boathouse or radio shack. The urge to laugh quickly fades, the reality of what an abysmal job he’d doing of bringing them together hitting him.

With just the three of them left, the silence feels a little less suffocating. He does wish he could say the awkwardness also fades, however that is alive and strong between him and Dylan at the very least. Worst of all is the knowledge that it’s his fault. He doesn’t know how he can mend this bridge that feels as if it’s slowly burning away, mostly due to lack of knowledge of what match started it. Before today, he was certain it was him avoiding Dylan. Now he isn’t so sure, a rising suspicion that they’ve been avoiding each other, though not for the same reason he knows.

It was because of that stupid joke. He should have just laughed it off, ignored the chill spreading out through his ribs and carried on to the drama inside. They’d be fine if he had. God how miserably he’s failing at being normal with Dylan. He thought his convictions were stronger than this, but with Dylan there in front of him, all gangly limbs, soft lips and brown doleful eyes, he finds it impossible to let his godforsaken feelings go. Being near him is painful but avoiding him, facing this distance from him, is devastating. Dylan’s own coldness began as a mirror to when Ryan first coolly reacted to his lighthearted joke, a fair reaction. Why would Dylan, known for his playfulness, be friends with someone who reacts to that with severity? Ryan promised himself he would not reveal his feelings to not damage or distance their friendship, but now it seems he’s doing exactly that. There does not seem to be very much he is succeeding at recently.

Kaitlyn sighs, brushing her hands on her jeans as she stands. “I should probably go see what that was about. Great chat.”

As she goes, sending a meaningful look to Ryan that he cannot pinpoint what part exactly it may be about and therefore doesn’t understand in the slightest, she gives Dylan’s shoulder a squeeze. It’s a friendly gesture Ryan knows, but suddenly both he and Dylan are standing. Ryan unclenches his jaw immediately, cursing himself as he raises an embarrassed hand to rub at the back of his neck. He ignores the look back at him that Kaitlyn sends over her shoulder as she continues to walk away, not even meeting her eyes or glancing at her expression, knowing already what he’d see. Knowing already, somehow, that she knows why the room just filled with a dark scent. It’s quickly replaced with his embarrassment.

Dylan seems suddenly very fascinated with the ceiling, his lips pursed and hands clasping in front of him. “Yeah, I have to- yep.” 

The door to the library clicks closed and Ryan manages the few steps forward to flop down onto the couch. What a mess he’s making of it all. He knows within himself with absolute certainty, that accepting this curse and being there to support each other is the right thing to do. His confidence in his ability to convince the others of that however, is quickly being whittled away with each misstep he makes. He’s never thought himself arrogant, but maybe that’s what Travis meant with his confusing and cryptic reminder this morning, as the regard he held Ryan in certainly seemed to indicate he thought so. He never thought Caleb arrogant either though, so he supposes he’s still going to be left wondering what he did mean.

Honestly he wants to feel angry, or at the very least, indignant at how the day has progressed. From whatever the fuck that was with Dylan, to Travis and his cryptic words, to Emma’s outburst and to Kaitlyn’s easy touch to Dylan’s shoulder. Anger is easier than confusion. Instead he just feels tired. Not the physical, bone deep exhaustion of last month but a weary sort of tiredness, where he craves sleep to escape the endless questions that haven’t dulled even in the now still silence.

His eyes drift to the library door, the glowing outline in the dim light, the light escaping through the crack in the bottom to pour over the wooden floor boards. Inside he imagines it smells of honey or freshly cut fruit, sweet enough to make his head spin and his chest feeling fuzzy. He imagines a quirked smile, knobbly knees, sleeves pulled over hands and a slightly scratchy blanket tugged from the back of the couch to draw over them. He imagines falling asleep in the warmth, his arms full and worries eased. He doesn’t kid himself, knowing well and true how imaginary that whole idea is. Burnt sugar is what fills that room and he would find only a distant gaze and blank expression within. So instead, after many hours of lying there staring up into nothingness, he falls asleep where he collapsed onto the couch in the centre of the hall, with the smell of a dead fire and the remnants of acid clouds hanging in the air. Cold with neither a blanket or company to keep him warm, he finds himself very much alone again. 

He woke much the same, colder than even before and still without another in sight. The lodge felt dangerously silent and Ryan wondered distantly for a moment if he was dreaming. Then the bickering began. The group was outside, packing the two vehicles with their belongings as they prepared to return home once more. After finally passing out in the early hours of the morning, tiredness must have caught up with him at last, as the entirety of the group was able to pass him without waking.

Ryan stood in the open front door, watching them while he wiped sleep from his eyes for a while. It had been Jacob and Dylan lightheartedly arguing, surprisingly. He watched their back and forth, with their bright smiles and light brushes of touch on each other's arms as Jacob playfully punched him and Dylan flicked his shoulders. A nauseous feeling had begun to churn through his gut when a soft brush against his own shoulder had yanked his eyes to where Kaitlyn had fallen in place beside him, her shoulder scraping against his own.

Her stare had also been fixed heavily on the two of them. Although it’s not as if he can suddenly read her mind or anything close to it, he felt the same dark feeling brewing within her to match his own. Territorial, as Dylan had once put it, though Ryan refuses to use that label for this feeling himself. He could not say whether her sense of that feeling was for Jacob, Dylan, their interaction in general or out of solidarity for Ryan. Whatever the reason, he felt himself just a little bit more assured as she stood beside him with a matching brooding glower.

The rest of the group weren’t even pretending today, which he wished he could count as a victory. Only Dylan seemed to be holding that charade up, which is to be expected frankly. Having the night to think or perhaps being the day they are returning home, emotions seemed to have certainly soured over the night as Ryan slept. They stomped around, throwing their bags into the trunks with a little more force than necessary and refusing to acknowledge each other outside of the little pairs they tend to split off into. He was left wondering who would ask them if they’re okay when they return home, would their parents notice? Even if anyone outside their group cannot smell the obvious to them dark scents pouring from them all, surely the hopelessness and fear would be seen in their eyes. Would their therapists, if any of them are actually still seeing them, try to get them to explain before realising that this a burden they have to carry alone?

That is why Ryan knows he’s not doing what he set out to do. As they are all still bearing it alone, their shoulders sagging with the weight of it. He arrived at the lodge this month with strong convictions and something that felt a little close to hope. Now that everyone has once more fled from each other's presence, it all comes crumbling down. Parts he feels could be considered a success- his talk with Kaitlyn and their newfound closeness in this sense of ‘pack’, is almost exactly what he set out to do. It just doesn’t feel like he’s taken a step forward when afterwards he immediately took three steps back with everyone else. He tries to think back to last month again, with all the confusion of the standoffs and scents and everything else that transpired. Well, they’ve adjusted to those things by a great leap, but now they’ve been left to face each other. The pretending has given way to just abject misery, which is certainly not an improvement.

He wished in that moment he could take solace in that everyone is just as miserable as he is, but instead he was just left with that knowledge he’s failing. Failing them all. He’s screwed up his closest friendship with his stupid unshakable feelings and he’s yet to do anything even slightly reassuring or helpful for the others. In fact it seems he’s just making them feel worse, as everything goes wrong.

It was as he thought this, that Kaitlyn's shifting had drawn his attention towards her once more. It was then that he chose to hang onto the fact that he hadn’t failed her this month. If he’s taking it one step at a time, at least there was one step forward at all. Of course it was not a favourable turn of events and Ryan’s never believed in the concept of pain as a requirement to grow, but he does believe something good did come of it all. If only it did not have to come at what appears to him now, the expense of the others.

They’d only scattered from their spot watching out over the group when eventually Dylan’s and Jacob’s attention turned towards them, their lightheartedness falling immediately at the expression on both he and Kaitlyn’s faces. That of course just made Ryan feel all that much worse and it was then his turn to turn tail to flee inside, distracting himself with his own packing. 

Their farewells were once more clipped and mopish. Majority of them just threw themselves into their respective vehicle, slamming the door behind them. Those that didn’t, just offered a short and affectionless hug, with a small and exhausted smile saying that they’d see them next month. His goodbye to Kaitlyn was the most difficult. For the rest of them their goodbye was more of a ‘see you later’. With Kaitlyn however even that just felt wrong. That splitting up, his mind supplying him with ‘their pack’, for even just for a month was a terrible loss and mistake. He could feel it in the hole forming within his stomach. But as if he’d ever hang around this haunted place any longer than needed and it’s not as if he’s particularly interested in tagging along to her house and hanging out for a month either. 

So he tried to shrug off the feeling. Yet it followed him the entire drive home. In the deathly quiet van, a heavy smog hung in the air, his nose and throat burning for the entire drive home. He was impatient to escape it. Not so impatient to not feel the sting of his quick boot from the van, however. Dylan did not get out to walk him to his door this month. There were no awkward smiles, soft words or even a handshake with an extra squeeze at the end. Just a lingering glance and a “See you next month, dude.”

Now, at home at last, he lies in his bed and stares up at the ceiling. How quickly resolution fades to futility and living to surviving. The good things he had left continue to chill and the bad things worsen. He thought last month was the dark before dawn, but night continues and Ryan’s starting to struggle without the sun. Honestly he’s letting himself be miserable, but just for today. Because tomorrow he’s going to put on his boots, talk to his family and read that fucking book burning a hole through his kitchen table and mind. He is not giving up on his promise, he refuses to. He’ll read Chris’ journal, fucking learn something for once and they’ll start there. Maybe Laura, questionable methods aside, has also pieced something together through her clinical observations of them all and whatever research she’s managed to find helpful. 

It was a hard month and Max is probably right, they might all be. But in the middle of it, Ryan felt okay. Even if it was just for a moment, even if it all came crashing down immediately after. He’d felt okay for the first time since that August night and if it can happen once, it can happen again. If he can feel okay, or great even, then so can the others. Maybe he can’t force them to and maybe some of them will refuse. Kaitlyn was reluctant at first. He has to try anyway. By god, even if they’re kicking and screaming, he will try. He owes them that much.

As he lies there, the buzzes on his phone come through, Dylan’s name and a third of a dozen goodnight messages popping up on the screen lying beside him. His tentative belief that everything can be alright turns into certainty. Despite it all, alone and a little less hopeless in his run down room, Ryan smiles.

Chapter Text

The journal is a heavy thing, the spine nearly bursting at its threaded red seams. The pages are thinning from age and use, thumbed through many times before. The writing within is a messy scrawl in ink of various colours. Black, red and blue, some pages even written in pencil that have smudged over the lines. Six years of thoughts, six years of writing, all contained in this coffee stained red journal.

It is the hundreds of tabs sticking out all sides of it that keeps Ryan from getting completely lost. They’ve grown to be split and even crushed in places over the years, all overlapping and often where there is multiple to a page, all crammed together. Yet he decodes their colour scheme quickly enough that he is not scared away into putting it down for another day and never picking it up again. Green for information on locations, yellow for information and devolvements to symptoms, blue for theories and unconfirmed information, purple for his personal entries on his thoughts and how he’s feeling, pink for entries on how his children and family are doing, red for when things have gone very wrong. Ryan studies pages tabbed with the first few and avoids the last three meticulously.

After the first hour he’d gotten up, stretched his legs and walked down to the corner store to grab a pad of paper and no less than three energy drinks. Now he scribbles his own notes as he reads through, in case some of the information leaks out of his ears from the sheer volume of it all. This thing is like an encyclopedia of werewolf experiences and information, mixed between heavy entries of Chris’ feelings throughout dealing with the curse and how it so drastically ruined he and his children’s lives.

It doesn’t have all the answers of course, Chris went into this just as blind as he’s left the camp counsellors. Unfortunately there are many things their group is going through that just seems to be completely missing within the journal. But even so, experience is knowledge Ryan supposes and it is helpful to even just see how many similar issues of theirs played out in the long term for the Hackett’s. 

It is an encyclopedia and it is physical evidence. As much as Ryan hates to even think of disparaging his former mentor due to his guilt, Chris was incredibly stupid to keep this. Though once he realised what those red tabs mean he’s avoided them completely, what few entries he read made him feel sick. Frantic scribbling of a man, some hiker, that was bitten. Shot and tossed into the lake. He decided after reading that to go for another walk and has not read another red tabbed page since.

He’s shocked Travis gave him this, considering that. Does he know Chris spilled all their dark secrets into the pages of this book? If so, he either has a hidden tremendous faith in Ryan, security in the belief Ryan feels trapped enough by his own situation to not share this anywhere or he’s just as stupid. Perhaps all three are true, or he just hasn’t actually read this thing he’s shucked off to Ryan to make his point that's already made even without it.

To try and ignore the guilt and disgust at this newfound knowledge, he’s thrown himself into studying the green, blue and the yellow tabbed pages specifically. Ryan never put this much effort into any studying or homework that he did when in school, but the stakes are a little higher here and it forces him to become an exemplary student. Well, not quite exemplary, considering he bounces throughout the book, from early entries to the last, in no particular order. He may have to consider adding his own tabs just to keep track of what he has read, but between the amount of tabs already he doesn’t think any more could fit if he tried and the thought of changing the journal at all, something that was clearly well used and cherished by Chris, it would feel wrong.

Firstly, he jots down confirmation for things he had already suspected or known. In werewolf form, the only things that can cause lasting injury is silver and as Ryan discovered just a couple of days prior, bites from other werewolves. Open injuries in either form will be healed on transformation, but scar the transformed body. Water, though not painful, causes werewolves and those close to transforming to panic, though why that is wasn’t known by Chris either but it does explain why they all avoid showering on the day of the full moon. Basic information he thinks at this point, but good to have confirmation nonetheless.

Next he jots down some things under the title of a single question mark. Things that his and the group's experiences seem to conflict with. Such as werewolves, according to Chris, do not kill their own, hence why the Hacketts covered themselves in their blood and infected are safe. But just as Ryan begins to mentally disagree, knowing that is not entirely true after his fight with Kaitlyn, he finds another passage with an addendum. “*Werewolves don’t kill other werewolves, unless threatened. Bobby says Caleb’s wolf and my own fought last night, bad enough he had to scare Caleb off before it went real bad. He would have killed me, Bobby says. I woke up this morning with my ribs covered in scars. I’m getting more concerned for him, he seems -“ Ryan quickly flips away as the entry turns into a personal account. 

Under this single question mark, to his great frustration, he simply writes ‘void not explained’. Maybe he would find the answers under a purple tab but unwilling to venture into those painful depths, he found nothing on the black hole currently eating him alive, past the vague acknowledgement of its existence he found before he worked out the colour coding. He knows Kaitlyn wanted him to try and find some answers on it, disappointed for not only her sake but his own that he couldn’t. If he remembers back, right when they first discussed their symptoms, every single one of them agreed to having that same strange and fucking terrifying pit in their stomach. It would help them all to have some answers on its actual cause. By now he knows it comes and goes, but he still has no idea exactly why. When he looked at Kaitlyn after they became pack, his nose scrunching at how naturally that word comes to him, it was completely gone. However it has come back with a frightening vengeance now, ever since he hopped in the van to drive away from the quarry. Perhaps it’s because of that ever so serious sense of territory. It's a fair guess but still a guess nonetheless.   

By far the most documented information is on the transformations themselves, which Ryan is unfortunately also very knowledgeable on. There are some good notes within the seemingly endless accounts though and Ryan jots it all down just to be safe. It begins with increasingly heightened senses in what averages out to be a week before the moon, with senses at their peak on the day of. Skin will begin itching in the morning, growing to feel it splitting in limbs towards nightfall. Teeth and nails grow sharper over the day, nausea begins around midday and the black venom may become visible in veins towards dusk. Yellow will begin to show in eyes around the same time before changing to their true colour in wolf form, something Ryan had noticed, the wolves having varied coloured eyes. Then the subsiding or dampening of senses and symptoms the day after, lasting up to a week before returning to normal. Which also explains why his bruises from the month before took some time to heal, instead of the instant it would have been even halfway through the month. 

It’s then that he begins to find some more interesting things spread through the pages, causing him to forget the growing ache in his limbs and the strain in his vision. Notes on things he doesn’t know just as much about.

“Caleb’s begun to take these postures at me, these purposeful postures that I’m sure are to do with the curse. I never thought I’d be scared of a twelve year old but -“ Ryan flips ahead, scanning the pages for a continuation of this thread, allowing himself small victory bites of his cold pizza when he picks out a number of passages scattered throughout the journal. 

The posturing is an act of asserting and determining dominance between them, which he supposes isn’t surprising at all but to have it spelt out so plainly brings with it a sense of embarrassment. Chris describes both their postures that they took up, his description of Caleb’s a clear match to his own, Kaitlyn’s and Jacob’s. The description of Chris’s however reminds Ryan more of what he’s seen from Emma, Nick or Laura. Chris, in another passage, explains that Kaylee has never been involved in one of these standoffs for authority, never challenged by her brother or tried to start one herself. He theorised that it’s because she’s a girl and Ryan actually scoffs out loud at this, knowing for certain that was not the case, having had the most standoffs out of everyone with Kaitlyn. He doesn’t jot that last part down, throwing the theory out completely. It is another interesting point however, that the postures differ between them and some don't get involved at all- unfortunately the most important piece of knowledge there is still missing however, the reason why this is still unknown. 

The passage on hunting has Ryan stop chewing mid bite, putting his slice back down onto the plate. For wolves out in the forest at night, hunting is the main priority, as told to him by his brothers. They’ll race great distances and stalk silently to take down prey with little effort. But he’s told it is not an endless hunger, as once the wolves have feasted a few times, they may patrol their territory or even rest for the remainder of the night. This Ryan all knew of course, having experienced it himself rather than as a second hand account like Chris. But the interest lies in where it leads him.

Territory. The word has come up a few times now, both throughout the journal and in Ryan’s own head over the past two months. Here, it is finally firmly defined. Wolves will choose their territory, places where prey is ample and the land is lush, marking it with claw scratches on trees and their scent on as much of it as they can. Their territory is a very defined thing, of varying sizes per wolf. It will also be defended ruthlessly. There are multiple accounts of Chris being told he was attacked and nearly mauled for wandering too close into what they’d mapped out was Caleb’s territory. Ryan finds it curious the note he finds on Silas, the first werewolf who started this whole mess, who apparently does not have a territory and is instead nomadic. That curiosity is quickly forgotten however, as the next passage on the same matter draws his attention completely.

“He’s nearly impossible to get into the cages now, Ma’s tried everything, even locking him up hours before he turns. Nothing seems to work, he either escapes or panics so badly we have no choice but to let him out.” It’s about Caleb, who clearly became a bit of a problem once he’d established his territory in the woods above. It explains things, he supposes, why the werewolf Hacketts were out roaming freely that night. As negligent as it was despite this, Ryan can’t help but at the very least understand why they would feel that way. Running through the woods, being free, it was just so natural. He dreads returning to the cages, even more so now as he flicks back through the journal to find the entry on their construction. 

His understanding for Caleb is amplified vastly, as he reads how the cages, despite serving their purpose, left them off far worse upon transforming back in the morning. Aching limbs from the lack of room and inability to even extend them fully, which apparently will grow to a consistent almost chronic ache after some months like this. Of course the hunger of not consuming anything within the night, but also the exhaustion apparently stems from the wolf's inactivity throughout the moon, though Chris can’t seem to explain that one. Ryan’s instant theory is the wolves aren’t really able to ‘wake up’ down there, like he could in the woods. It instantly explains why he and Kaitlyn felt so great compared to the still wrecked with exhaustion and pain that the others were. A great chunk of his gratefulness towards Travis has disappeared, as he’s certain he knew of this and never mentioned it.

He’s about to flip away to another blue or yellow tab, when his gaze gets stuck on the lower half of the entry on the page. It’s tabbed pink, so Ryan was preparing to quickly move past it, when he saw the word acceptance, a word that has grown to be very important to him over the past two months. His eyes narrow in on it, brows furrowing as he reads the next page and a half. Caleb, it seems, also spoke of accepting himself and their situation, something that Chris found great concern in and Kaylee outright rejected. He told them that he felt more in tune with himself, his instincts becoming clearer and automatic. This scared Chris clearly, the next page filled with scribbling of what he can do to stop this, settling on the reaffirmation that they have to kill Silas and end their curse. 

Over the next half dozen pink tabbed entries, Chris writes how Caleb’s wolf is showing even more outside of the full moon. He’s transforming earlier, quicker which Chris begrudgingly grants is a good thing. The rest of it though, he does not. Caleb’s more territorial over space, insists on eating first, lets himself posture, tightens his throat to release his scent rather than try to cover it up, growling and ‘scenting’ things, which Chris explains is done by rubbing his scent into something to claim possession of it. It worried Chris that he felt like Caleb was a, “Stronger wolf, or more connected to it or something. And he’s feeding into it, won’t listen to me when I tell him he has to resist these urges.” 

Chris was worried his son was letting himself turn into a monster. That he was letting the wolf take it over. It’s here that Ryan realises, throughout this entire journal, from beginning to end, Chris has always referred to their transforming forms as two different entities. ‘Myself’ versus ‘the wolf’. Two separate beings, disconnected from the other like strangers chained by the hand. In sudden startling clarity, something clicks for Ryan and he connects the loose threads in his mind that he’d already begun blindly grasping at without realising.

He and ‘his wolf’ are not separate beings, as they all consider it to be. It’s just him. It’s just him, in a different body and some hazier thinking sure, but it is Ryan. So accepting ‘the wolf’, it’s just accepting himself and it’s the same for the others, he’s certain. It’s this part of themselves that they keep so fractured that it’s considered a different entity entirely, out of horror and resistance to the idea that it could ever be just them. Accepting it, he now realises, is more than just accepting the situation for what it is. It’s more than letting yourself coexist with this cursed being that brings with it new instincts and senses, forced onto your ‘true’ form. He was wrong, those instincts, senses and memories, they weren’t the wolves. They are his and his alone.

It is not accepting coexistence as he’d first thought when he initially decided it was okay to accept change. No, it’s letting yourself be whole. Mending yourself back together after being torn in two. Realising that, it makes sense why he can remember his time as a wolf and- holy shit. Holy shit, he remembered his own name. As a wolf, his foggy mind was filled with the sounds from a memory, ‘not his own’ as he’d considered it. But it was his memory, just as it’s Ryan’s memory now recalling back to that night. They are one in the same, his memory as he is now and as he is as a wolf. It’s all just him .

Suddenly eager to learn if Caleb explained anymore about accepting it, Ryan looks back down to the journal, flipping through pages until he finds what he’s looking for. His stomach just drops further and further as he reads however. This fear of Chris’s seemed to only grow, as half the book down, Ryan finds that Caleb had also begun remembering his night when transformed. That he could think and see and feel when he was transformed, told of how he knew himself when he was transformed and then able to recount it all in the morning. Ryan thinks perhaps all of this may have been what Travis was alluding to, with his cryptic words the last time they spoke. 

As he reads, he finds that Chris at this point was convinced he was losing his son to the wolf, the other being taking over and Ryan’s eyes narrow in an attempt to focus, the writing suddenly getting wonky, a brown stained droplet crinkling the page alongside many other round crinkling spread along the bottom of the paper. Here Chris wonders whether he should end all their misery and stop this once and for all, so no one else could get hurt and his son won’t become anymore of a monster than he already is. How’d he do it, to create some semblance of peace as they go. 

Ryan immediately flips back to the front, feeling deeply like he just read something he shouldn’t. Those dark drunken thoughts, scrawled out onto the paper, were not intended for anyone but Chris’s eyes. Never would he have thought his former mentor, who loved his family so dearly, who incorrectly used whatever slang the kids threw around to make them laugh and cringe, who was always there for Ryan, every summer, when his home life was unstable and lonely- could ever consider doing something like this. He was truly desperate and miserable to think of something like this, his life torn apart and his son letting himself be taken over by a monster, at least in his eyes. It’s there in the years old dried rum and tear droplets crinkling the page, torment laid bare in the only place he could.

This is why Travis gave him this journal, he said so himself. So Ryan would understand what Chris was going through, that he didn’t deserve to be killed- no, that he didn’t deserve for Ryan to murder him for this. The guilt is suffocating, the weight of the shotgun back in his hands, the warmth of the blood splatter back on his face. His eyes burn dry, a painful stinging in the back of his throat, his stomach rolling with emptiness and nausea.

And there, back on the very first page, is a neat script in fine line black pen ink. “Though I asked for chocolate and scratchies, Kaylee thought this was the perfect present for me. She had this big smile that I think it’s the best present I’ve ever gotten. And at least she taped a snickers to the front. Ah well, might be a good place to get my thoughts in order, God only knows how scattered they are these days…” Ryan slams it shut, pushing it away from him and causing it to hit the wall as it thumps to a stop on the other side of the table. 

His cold pizza and open can have been left long forgotten beside it, moonlight gleaming off the aluminium onto his bedroom floor through the open door. Ryan has not moved for hours, thrown down onto his bed still dressed after he pushed the book away. Initially he waited for the guilt to ebb and since then he has just waited for sleep. He’s beginning to doubt it will ever come again.  

He finds himself not even restless, as he usually is when insomnia hits. Just lying there, staring up at the ceiling and wishing the weight on his chest would either lessen or crush him enough to squeeze the breath from his lungs until he is knocked out. His thoughts shift as he waits in perpetuity, from childhood memories of summer camp and the man who was always there for him, to the night where everything went wrong, to the past two months and of course, as he since it seems he can never keep his mind from it very long anymore, memories of a sweet scent and warm smile.

His analogy of an addiction, one he made long ago it feels now, seems to hold up even now. And just like an addict, in this moment of vulnerability and weakness, his cravings overcome him. With the void in stomach back, deeper and emptier than ever before, all he wants is to hear that voice and his phone is in his hand before he even realises it. It’s too late to take it back now, the needle is already in his arm and the green button has been pressed, a dial starting up in front of him. He stares at it as it rings, half in shock and half in disbelief with himself. He only brings the phone to his ear when the ringing stops from the call connecting, the lurch of his heart causing the guilt and grief to tumble from his shoulders.

“Mph, hello? Ryan?” Dylan’s voice is sleep laden and heavy. It’s disgustingly sweet, something cold within him melting at the sound of it.

Still, consequences and actions and all that. Ryan hadn’t been thinking when he picked up the phone and decided to call Dylan- at what he now in horror realises is four in the morning. Not to mention, Ryan’s probably the very last person Dylan wants to hear from at any time at the moment, much less to wake him in the middle of his sleep. The coldness between them now permeates their every interaction in person, so he doesn’t know what he expects from an unwanted phone call in the dead of night.

“I- I’m so sorry dude, I wasn’t thinking, I shouldn’t have woken you up. I’ll just- yeah, my bad man, go back to sleep.” He stumbles out, already pulling the phone away from his ear to hang up.

There’s rustling on the other end and hastily, though still in that near painfully cute sleep laden way, Dylan says, “No, no, it’s okay, seriously. I was super totally awake anyway.”

Maybe it’s just because it’s over the phone and he cannot see all those small mannerisms that would indicate otherwise, but there is warmth in Dylan’s tone. There’s something else too, but with only a voice to go off he has no idea what, just the knowledge it isn’t anything cold or distant. But it’s this warmth that has Ryan pulling the phone back to his ear, knowing that he’d missed him but only just now hit with the brunt of how much he needs him. 

“You sound very awake.” Ryan says sarcastically, though his hesitancy near covers it entirely, still uncertain in their standing after the month passed.

“Yeah, well you know me. Stayed up watching sports and working out, the usual.” He yawns, some more ruffled movement picked up through the microphone. His voice grows just a little bit quieter, softer. “Can you not sleep?”

Despite having no issue hearing, Ryan all but presses the phone against his skin in an effort to bring it closer. “Yeah, I just didn’t realise how late it actually was, I wouldn’t have bothered you if I did. Sorry.”

“Stop it dude, I told you to call me if you ever couldn’t sleep and I’m going to make an educated guess that this isn’t the first time. So, you know, glad you took me up on the offer.” Dylan says, the sound of his breath every so lightly coming through the speaker. “Are you- are you okay?”

Ryan is now, somehow. He can picture him there, brown hair draped back onto his pillow, his sleeve falling down his wrist where he holds his phone, his ruffled blue hoodie pulled up in his sleep just a little bit to reveal the sliver of a bony hip bone, his spindly legs still tangled in the bedsheets. He has no idea how close an estimate the image is, but it adds fuel to the warmth Dylan’s voice blooms out into Ryan’s chest. 

“I am.” He says truthfully. “I just read- did I ever tell you Travis gave me Chris’s journal?”

“No you didn’t. His journal?”

“Yeah. I read it for the first time today. Not all of it, it’s huge and it has everything in there, every thought he’s had over the past six years. Travis gave me it so we might learn something or- or as a reminder of what I did.” Ryan admits, heaving a breath out alongside the honesty.

“That was cruel of him.” Dylan says quietly, an unmistakable tenderness and sympathy in his tone. 

After the distance and the coldness, it's near enough to bring a lump to his throat. He has not been spoken to in such a gentle way in a very long time and Ryan finds himself embarrassingly growing emotional in the face of it. Like being offered such softness is proof of the fact he’s been decaying in place and Dylan must know it. To cover the shame of it, he clears his throat and in what he hopes is a lighthearted tone, says “Helpful, in his own way, I guess. Until now it’s just been cryptic statements and insults, so at least this is something.”

Dylan hums, a sound that carries through the speaker to reverberate through Ryan’s chest. “I don’t think he’s a very happy man.” He says.

“No, well…” Ryan trails off, unwilling to follow that line of thinking lest he have another person to feel immeasurable guilt for. He’ll deal with those he already holds it for first, those he still can. “I’m sorry this month was so shit. That it was my fault. I’m glad you picked up.”

“Makes two of us. But if you keep apologising I will hang up, seriously it’s- it’s okay dude. Everyone’s alive, that’s the prime outcome at this point really.” Dylan says, a sigh weaved in through his words.

“You really think that’s the best we’re going to get?” Now Ryan’s turn to ask quietly. The idea that Dylan might really believe that leaves a compassion filled sorrow in his voice that he cannot hide.  

“I think I can’t even say I’m happy to at least still be here. But I should be, so I am. If that makes sense.” Dylan all but whispers back.

“It does.” Ryan tells him and it really does, despite the worrying sadness of knowing he feels that way left in his gut. “I’m sorry you-“

Dylan cuts him off, his voice getting further from the phone as he speaks. “Alright, that's it, I told you. I’m hanging up, I’m serious.”

Ryan hates him. His joking, playful tone is a diversion to get the conversation as far away from himself and the sombre truth he just shared as possible. He hates him because since it’s Dylan, with his joy filled tone and disarming lightheartedness, as feigned as it may be, it works. He wants to push it but he refuses to force Dylan to share more than he’s willing and break this much needed warmth returned between them. So Ryan lets himself smile, a ghost of a laugh at his lips. It’s a small thing, but it’s there. “Don’t you dare.”

“Oh I’ve dared, it’s been dared, I am daring.” Dylan insists, the raised brows and mischievous grin visible through his voice. “I mean I guess I can give you one more chance, but that ice is cracking Ryan and if you apologise one more time…”

“Yeah, yeah, I take your threat very seriously.” Ryan promises him, smile still on his face despite himself. He lets his eyes close as he speaks, a weight to them he hasn’t felt in far too long. “You’re very intimidating.”

“I’m probably about as intimidating as a chihuahua.” Dylan admits with a weird sense of belief held in his words. “You know like, yeah it could bite you but could it even get through your shoes? Just stand up and you're pretty much safe from there. Trust me, it’s an apt metaphor.” 

“I don’t know, those little fuckers are scary.” Ryan counters, barely noticing the sluggishness of his words. He really does hate to let Dylan’s earlier concerning words go, but the warmth now in his voice fills Ryan, his thoughts slowing to a relieving drawl.

“They’re actually sweethearts if they’re treated right. My auntie actually has one, wears this cute little cardigan and everything. You know, I’ve always considered myself a cat person, which pftt, ironic right? But if I ever got a dog, it’d be-“ Dylan’s voice begins to fade out as his quietly enthusiastic tangent begins, the shine of his smile washing over Ryan. He tries to follow, he really does.  

But in the dark of his room, just when guilt began to crush him slowly and sleeplessness began to raise pain in his head, he heard Dylan’s voice. Filled with care and softness and concern enough to begin lulling Ryan to sleep, something he finds impossible to find on his own. For just a moment, with Dylan an hour away and speaking softly through his phone, he can put his burdens down. Each weight is lifted from his chest and he feels for once, he is not alone despite the emptiness of his room. He is left instead with only a soft fondness in its place, that has buried itself so deep in his chest, he does not think he’ll ever be able to see the light of day or moonlight without thinking of Dylan again. 

Dylan’s chatter is a soothing hum in the distance that leaves him only barely conscious enough to hear when it cuts off and is replaced by a hesitantly broaching tone. “Hey, Ryan?”

“Mph?”

There is an exhale of breath and then a smile through words. “Have a good sleep.” 

Ryan gets the best sleep he’s had since that night in the library. Far into the day, nearing afternoon, he woke to a message on his phone. Just a single, short but oh so sweet text that he thinks about for the rest of the month. “I hope I didn’t jinx it.”

It is the day after that he returns to work. For as long as he can, Ryan wears his thick headphones that he yanked out from the box of his computer, to hide what he once again knew was an inevitable sight. It doesn’t last anywhere near as long as he hoped it would but surprisingly far longer than he expected. He got away with it at lunch with his Pop, who he thinks was assuming he was having one of his bad days with sound like he often did when he was younger. His Nana however demanded he take them off the second he walked into the house. 

She was near hysterical fussing over him, his Pop offering no help where he was watching over them silently. Ryan very nearly took Kaitlyn up on her advice of pretending it had always been like that, but his Nana was there when he was born and it is just an incredibly stupid idea anyway. With quick thinking, since like the fucking idiot he apparently is, he had been too distracted to think of an excuse ahead of time, he settled on a half truth. When he and one of his friends were goofing around, he got knocked into the table and the top of his ear was sliced by- well he leaves that up for interpretation. It’s not the best lie he’s ever given and he’s already pretty terrible at lying in the first place, but nonetheless it’s better than ‘don’t worry Nana, it was just a werewolf that bit my ear off’. For twenty minutes he assured her he was okay. Yes we went to the doctors, look how well it healed already. Yes it was disinfected, yes he’s had a tetanus shot, yes his friend apologised.

It was frankly a huge relief to find Sarah, to be told his ear looked weird and asked what happened, just to simply tell her the truth with a smile and get only a laugh in return.

Life goes on after that. Sweeping floors and carrying boxes has never been done so happily before he’s sure. He spends his lunches with his Pop, whose usual short conversations feel slightly more stilted, but Ryan doesn’t bother him to ask about it. He visits Sarah, even forcing her to walk down to the corner store with him one evening, awarding her with not just one but two ice creams for daring to leave her precious book behind. It was nice to walk down their old track they’d take to get home from school, Sarah with her freakishly accurate memory reminding him of conversations they had or things they saw along the way. Also, they stopped to pet a cat, but that did sour it a little when he had to refuse her begging to bring it home. Convincing her it wasn’t a stray due to its collar didn’t work, neither did stressing how much Pop did not like cats and eventually he had to resort to telling her it would eat her future pet hamster, which did get her to let the poor cat go.

He finished his animation project about halfway through the month, giving himself a day to admire his work before beginning on a new one. He’s found himself painting teeth and claws and woods across his drawing tablet ever since, the stub of his stylus nearly worn out and needing replaced. As he drew, the chatter from various videos and podcasts filled his ears. Stories of haunted homes, monster sightings and definite proof of the existence of both. 

He messages with Kaitlyn often, still receiving her goodnight messages every other night when she actually manages to remember. She’s never been as committed to the routine as Dylan, who’s never missed a single one. They have some fleeting discussions on the month passed and the month approaching, Kaitlyn asking him once more how he plans to tackle his- their, plan now. He tells her he doesn’t know and it’s the truth.

Though he has not read anymore of the journal, which has been left completely untouched since he’d slammed it shut and pushed it away, he caves in to his own internal debating and messages Laura, requesting they discuss what they have both discovered. Even through text she seemed strangely eager, telling him she’d been waiting for him to read the journal so she could add any knowledge he found to what she herself has worked out. Which she promises is something very big, leaving Ryan with a short feeling of foreboding.

And although he and Dylan do not call again, there is a flurry of texts between them and he’s assured that the coldness has melted entirely. That one phone call was enough to close the gap between them and douse that burning bridge, something Ryan is surprised by but eternally grateful for. He goes through his days much easier knowing that they are okay, they’ll be okay. Friendship salvaged, they’re still friends. Just friends and that is enough, has to be enough.

It makes it all a little easier, knowing that they’re okay. Not by strides, as his coworkers still look at him strangely and his symptoms remind him constantly just how much of his life has changed. And yet there is a lightness there, where once the weight of the distance between them sat heavily on his shoulders. For every goodnight text and for every random message popping up on his phone, there is a smile. The warmth is there. Maybe it doesn’t change anything, doesn’t change what happened or what’s ahead. But it matters that there is warmth there. 

However, it is not all well of course, when is it ever? That void in his stomach has been torn open again, growing ever since he left the quarry. That empty hole he is now certain is tied to the quarry, where he was bitten outside the radio shack by the white wolf and where he transforms under the watchful eye of the full moon. It’s horrible. Even when he can push all his worries from his mind, even in the good moments, it’s just there and it won’t let him forget it. Even outside of the full moon, tucked safely away in his sleepy little hometown, he is called to return back to the quarry.

Which is why when sitting down for lunch one day and his Pop turned to him with such a serious look in his eye, Ryan was convinced he no longer had a stomach at all, the void having consumed it entirely. His Pop isn’t the stereotypical image of a laid back guy, but he’s certainly not a deathly serious one either. Looks like these from him are entirely unexpected and incredibly intimidating. 

Ryan was studied for some time before his Pop looked out over the car park, unwilling to make eye contact with Ryan as he spoke, something Ryan is very accustomed to and never bothered by. In his gruff voice, he told Ryan, “I know where you’ve been going.”

There’d been silence for some time, as Ryan truly hadn’t known what to say. With it no longer an active crime scene now that the investigation has closed and with permission from the property owner, there is nothing wrong with them returning to the quarry as often as they please. In the eyes of the law. In their families eyes however? In the eyes of people who only know and believe that a mass murder occurred there that these poor teens only narrowly escaped, it’s more than a little concerning for them to ever return to such a place. Their mandated therapy could quickly turn into an involuntary stay at the psychiatric ward, which would certainly not go well for a number of obvious reasons.

His Pop though is someone who trusts Ryan’s judgement, always has, for better or worse. So all he said was, “I’ll only ask this once, but just let me know, are you okay?”

Ryan mulled the question over for a few moments and his Pop let him, biting into his home baked and bacon filled bread roll as if he wasn’t waiting at all. When Ryan considered it all, truly all of it, he was left with even scales between alright and total shit. His Pop didn’t ask if he was well or happy, just if he was okay. He thought back to the night he returned from the quarry this month, when his tentative belief that everything can be alright turned into certainty. He held that certainty within him now. He told him as much and that was that.

Until they reached his Pop’s truck after work and he handed Ryan the keys instead. Safe to say Ryan gaped at him in shock for at least three full minutes until his Pop clapped him over the head. “It’s yours now, I expect you to take good care of her.”

Ryan possibly actually went into shock, like the medical use of the term and all, he’s fairly convinced. His Pop has had this pickup for as long as Ryan’s been alive and never once has he seen anyone other than him in the driver's seat. His Dad had often told him how much Pop loved his trucks, joking that he loved them more than his own son. Always with a dramatic hand on his forehead and falling down until Ryan was squished and breathless from laughter. There’s a painful clench in his chest as he looks down at the faded silver of the key and gaudy metal American flag attached to the key ring. 

“Why would you- How much do you want for it? Are you sure?” Ryan tripped over his questions with the emotion and memory filling him, certain his Pop will laugh and take back the keys at any moment.

His Pop had placed a loving hand on the scratched and sun bleached red hood, looking at Ryan with that same seriousness he’d stared at him with earlier that day. “I’m giving it to you Ryan. Your Nana has been telling me for some time now that we only really need one car, hasn’t she? You’re growing up Ryan and if you’re driving up there every month like you said, you need it more than me.”

He’d patted Ryan on his back and with his daily word quota filled, silently opened the door passenger’s side. When Ryan just kept staring at Pop's- no, his truck, Pop had eventually sighed and demanded that he at least get driven home before Christmas came. On the drive, and it was a bumpy one considering Ryan got his full licence when he was seventeen and hasn’t driven since, his Pop barked corrections and reminders all the way home until they parked. It was as if he was sixteen again, sitting in Nana’s car, Pop teaching him how to shift gears. As they pulled to a lurching stop, his Pop told him once more to take good care of it and he hopes it treats Ryan well. He knew also that’s as close to an ‘I love you’ as anyone could ever get from his Pop and he’s only a little ashamed to say he had to turn his head to blink the mist from his eyes.

It was only the next day that Ryan really got a chance to look over it. Just the sight of it reminds him of his Dad and the promises he made to teach Ryan how to drive when he was old enough. The pickup’s an old thing, rust gathering on the once shining silver, the paint all scratched up and the sides dented in places. It’s frigid inside, always has been, the heater busted for as long as Ryan can remember. On cold days the door on the passenger side is near impossible to yank open and the only thing capable of saving him from the freezing leather of the cabs bench is the worn knitted blanket covering the seat. The cargo bed has been left empty, spare the chain his Pop used to tie the dog to as it rode in the back. Yeah, the pickup is an objectively old and worse for wear vehicle, but it’s his. It’s the truck his Dad had always dreamed about buying off his old man when he himself was a teenager, back when the paint was new and the leather wasn’t ripped. He’s not someone who’s ever appreciated cars before, but Ryan loves it.

He started driving himself to work every day after that, despite it being just a short walk. Good practice, before he takes it all the way up to the quarry. As the mundanity of the month moves on, his senses begin to sharpen once more and sleep gets even shorter than before. His temper runs on an increasingly fraying fuse, having to actually remind himself a few times that no, he cannot growl at customers. He thinks he’d be able to manage it a little better if not for the exhaustion choking all patience from him. It’s the gaping void in his stomach that makes falling asleep just that much more impossible than it already is, leaving him in tears and curled around his stomach every night. He doesn’t dare call Dylan again however, lest he break the warmth between them as it seems he is apt to do.

The end of the month is hurtling towards him, the moon waning into something new and then the wax melting away at an increasingly fast pace. He wonders if he’ll always feel the month between full moons rushes by too fast now. However, as short a time it ended up feeling, Ryan feels glad at least for even the brief reprieve. Though he tries desperately not to think of it as a funeral for mundanity, he cannot help but feel he’s setting his affairs in order and writing his will when he packs his bags and texts the group that he will be driving himself this month.

As he hops into his new beloved pickup and breathes one last collecting breath of fresh, scentless air, Ryan lets a hand fall to stomach and the void that expands within it. He’s going to be okay. This is all going to be worth it because he will make it worth it and this month there will be another step forward, no matter how many more there are back. It’s going to be okay, he’s certain. He hopes he didn’t jinx it.    

Chapter Text

The gravel crunches beneath the tires as he begins to slow to a stop at the end of the driveway. It’s a loud sound, louder than even the music playing softly from his speakers. Throughout the drive his hand has tapped along to the beat, knuckles rapping against the cold metal of the door. The wind, growing ever colder as the months pass, has whisked through his open window. It’s been a startling difference, having the car ride up to prepare and not drowning in the other’s scents.

As Ryan pulls to a stop in the space in front of the van, he’s surprised to see a small crowd outside the lodge entrance, much like that first month when they’d waited for the others to arrive. Now they wait for him with what Ryan finds is both relief and dread when he sees the large grins on each of their faces. They’ve descended upon him before he’s even had the chance to roll up his window. Kaitlyn folds her arms over the open window, all but shoving her head inside the cab while the others there surround the vehicle in an not entirely unthreatening way. 

“No, no, don't even think about it.” She says, swatting his hand away from the crank. She has a splitting grin that worries Ryan to no end. “Noticed you turned your music down at the end of the driveway, what were you listening to?”

Ryan draws both his hand and his head back, clicking his seatbelt free while sending a nervous glance to the others circling his new truck. “I don’t know, why? It’s this Russian song, I wouldn’t be able to pronounce- wh- what are you doing?”

The door has been wretched open in the second it took for him to look away, his arm nearly pulled from its socket as Kaitlyn attempts to drag him out of the pickup. He only just has the chance to cut the engine before he’s yanked outside, the faded metal and chipped paint of the little American flag hanging from his keyring catching the sun, from where it's left hanging in the lock. As he’s sent stumbling from the momentum, Kaitlyn slides into his place in front of the wheel, her hands clasping the sun bleached leather instantly. Her eyes flick around every inch of the cab, even opening the glovebox and snooping around the random papers and items left in there. When she looks back at him, her grin has only grown.

“Okay, this thing is fucking old Ryan. I’m impressed you even got it running.” She laughs and when he hears the snort and giggle from behind him, he realises what this is all about. They were curious about his new car and now that they’ve seen it, they’re downright delighted at the state of it. 

He rolls his eyes at her, about to retort when mid roll, they catch on Jacob slapping a hand down on the hood. He leans his weight onto his hand, looking at Dylan beside him with a half quirked smile that puts Ryan’s teeth on edge. “You ever think of Ryan as a country boy, Dyl?” He asks, his glance flicking over to Ryan to show he knows he’s watching. He leans back further onto the hood, his shit eating grin growing.

It raises an indignation in Ryan that he’s never felt so vividly before. He knows it shows on his face because Jacob’s grinning like the wolf he is. Jacob’s in his space, leaning on his truck, smirking like that at his Dy- fuck, Ryan really can’t think that. He tries to settle his anger, breathing out deeply until his nostrils flare and trying his best to relax his tightening throat and jaw. It doesn’t work, this sense of territoriality only growing. That is until his gaze shifts focus and with staggering awareness Ryan realises that in this moment, Dylan only has eyes for him. 

With his dimples in his cheeks, hair honeyed to bronze, front teeth sunk into his lip as he tries to hide that blinding smile, his soft brown eyes have melted into amber rays that look only for him. Maybe it is just for this moment, but everything else melts. There is a sweetness in his lungs and a growing lightness in his head and really, nothing else matters. Nothing else at all really. 

It can only last so long of course before Dylan has to look away, his eyes darting off like he’d been burnt and instead resting safely on the truck. But that calm warmth within Ryan does not fade, especially as Dylan’s smile softens impossibly further when he says, “Oh I don’t know, I can picture the cowboy hat and honestly the jeans are halfway there already. I’m almost disappointed he’s not now.”

“I’ve never been more happy to disappoint.” The corners of Ryan's lips drag upwards and he pulls them to the side to hide it. If he did manage to hide his smile well enough, he knows he cannot keep it from his words. He also cannot help it if they shine through just a little brighter at the thwarted and sour look growing on Jacob’s face, unsuccessful in getting the rise out of Ryan that he wanted.

“I’m surprised you’re not a more cheerful person then, Ryan.” Emma says as she appears beside him from where she’d been somewhere near the trunk. She lifts her chin as she looks at him, breathing in deeply and giving this little tight lipped smile to show that she’s joking. It doesn’t meet her eyes. 

Kaitlyn finally gets out of his goddamn truck to join them, falling in place on his other side. She looks up at him with what can only be considered a nasty grin, but he knows beneath it there is only care and humour. “Get it? Because you’re such a terrible disappointment to us Ryan, really we’ll be expecting monetary compensation.”

Her eyes flit over to Emma, in what he assumes was supposed to be collusion for their now combined mean joke, but her brows only furrow. Emma it seems, the moment attention was taken off her, deflated. Her smile fell, her shoulders slumped and beneath the sweetness still swirling in his lungs, there is the smell of a late summer night losing its warmth as a hurricane comes sweeping through. With their sight back to her now though that smile appears again, brighter than before and she sweetly tilts her head in a humorous but slightly frighteningly convincing mime of innocence.

“Exactly.” She says, giving Ryan’s bicep a sharp poke with a manicured nail.

“If he pays us though, he’s not going to be able to buy that cowboy hat.” Dylan chimes in, observing them all in equal measure.

Ryan must say, and it's kind of funny but it’s really not, there is such a strange tone to this whole interaction. It’s playful and lighthearted, something he’s desperately missed. Underneath that however, there are layers of discomfort and tension that he cannot name. They all watch each other like they’re about to pounce at the exact same time they all joke and insult, well, mainly they insult Ryan to be fair to himself. Now that Ryan isn’t considering decking Jacob, the remaining tension is between Jacob and Emma he’s sure. Though on top of that, they both have something deeper going on, considering both of their foul moods last month that lingers in their eyes. Dylan’s caught on to it too, that much is clear in the way he watches them and seeks to diffuse the already mostly calm moment. 

That pretending that they’ve all done since returning to the quarry, only dropped by Ryan and Kaitlyn now, is really carrying them through this conversation. That protection of the sense of normality is the only thing keeping them from acknowledging the tension in the air. They’re all just so desperate to have one moment when everything feels as carefree as it once always did. Though Ryan feels that very same desperation, he knows he has to start ripping through that bubble, so that maybe they can have these irreverent moments in honesty instead of forced ignorance.  

“True, I’m pretty sure driving this thing adds a license condition of wearing one.” Kaitlyn smirks back before she raises a brow at Ryan as if her words are deathly serious. “You are lucky you didn’t get pulled over.”

Dylan gives the truck a heavy pat, leaning against the side of the windshield as he mimics tipping a wide brimmed hand. In his best southern drawl, he imitates the most laid back and out of character cop that Ryan could ever imagine. “Yessir, this here is a real beaut’. But I notice you do not have on the required cowboy hat to drive Old Red here.” When the act drops, there’s a rising flush to his cheeks as all eyes are on him. “You were thinking something like that?”

There is a moment they all stare at him in varying levels of pained disbelief at what they just witnessed before the laughter breaks out. It loud and real and light and so fucking relieving to just laugh after everything. Even if there is tension beneath it, even if there’s a deep strain between most of them, their laughter is honest. Half of it’s with Dylan and the other half is definitely at him.

“No.” Kaitlyn tells him, her head shaking with this disgusted smile, like she’d just watched a horror comedy and hadn’t quite decided yet which feeling was going to win out yet. “No, nothing like that at all.”

Jacob’s face has gone a little red, the breath all but knocked out of him as he splutters in an attempt to speak through his laughter. “Old Red?”

Emma’s brows are raised, her smile more of a pursing of her lips, a hand raising to hide it. Her eyes are a little wide, as if she couldn’t believe what she just saw but it delighted her nonetheless. “Oh my god. You have never talked to a cop before in your life, have you?” 

Dylan looks far too pleased with himself but he does drop to a very simple, near deadpan tone as he admits with a shake of his head, “Unless you count Travis? No, never.”

Ryan for his part, just gets to watch it all. Mostly he watches Dylan. Nearly entirely just Dylan. And he just thinks to himself, what fucking dork this guy is. A lame dork. His face lit up and his nose scrunching as he now nearly has to bend over from laughing because of a joke he made . Not even a funny one at that, more embarrassing than anything. And Ryan knows then that there’s no thinking about it, he is in love with him. And it is a devastating thing to admit and it is painful. Knowing that he has all this love and having no place to put it down, knowing that he has to just carry it with him. Yet it is also with great softness and fondness he finally lets himself admit it. Not out loud, not yelled or whispered. But said at last, even if just within his mind, peacefully quiet otherwise in the fullness of his laughter.

The others of course have no idea the world shattering and simple admission he just made in his head. Their laughter and joking continues on, the truck still their main focus. As sad as it makes him, Dylan is excellent at what he does, disarming everyone around him until they cannot help but relax their shoulders in his presence. He really does wonder how everyone he meets isn’t as utterly fascinated and smitten with him as Ryan is.

“You know, ‘Old Red’, I kinda like it, I’m gonna say it.” Kaitlyn says, elbowing Ryan’s arm. 

Dylan nods with a shrug and limp gesture of his hand towards himself. “Well I am a genius, obviously.”

“Obviously.” Ryan gives a final smile and shakes his head before he turns and opens the cab back up, leaning over the bench to grab his bags. He swipes his key, but doesn’t bother to lock the door behind him. As if any of them are going to run off with his beloved but as pointed out, old and busted up truck. The others watch him kick the door shut, pushing off the truck to follow his step towards the lodge.

“Not going to lock up Old Red?” Jacob asks with a smirk, his hands dusting together as if to wipe off the cold.

“Do not start calling it that, I swear to God.” Ryan glares back at him but it lacks any real malice.

Jacob jogs to just a few steps ahead of them and then twists around to walk backwards so he can see them as he speaks. “Sorry man, you’re too late. It’s already begun. Thank Dylan for that one.”

With his mention, Dylan gives a pitifully cute small wave and there’s nothing more that Ryan can do other than sigh. “Thanks Dylan.”

Up the stairs, they push into the lodge. What a difference from last month where every single one of them had a dark cloud hanging over their head. Now he tastes raspberries on his tongue and warm smoke circles him as he steps inside. What a difference a month away from this cursed place makes.

He spots Laura across the hall, notebook in hand as always and she all but jumps up to catch his attention. He nods at her, dropping his bags down in the foyer to take upstairs later and getting various smiles and pats on the arm as the little group around him disperses after noticing Laura beckoning him over. He begins forward before he stops himself, looking off to the side at a retreating back and making the decision that an effort will be made now. “Hey Emma?”

She stops and tilts her head back, leaving it half lying on her shoulder as she expectantly waits without making any move back from where she was going. He jogs up the few metres between them, keeping a safe distance as he falls beside her. That doused summer night is clearer now that he doesn’t have the all consuming scent of Dylan beside him. The emotions in scents aren’t an exact science, as Laura had once said in reference to the effects of the infection, and he knows he is not the best at determining what they are feeling from within them. But even if he’s not sure exactly what emotion it is, he knows there is something deeply unhappy laying within her scent. 

Back after that night in August, Emma had actually been the most open of them about how she was feeling. Where the others went silent when days were especially rough or just lied easily through the emotionless communication that is text, she was always straight to the point and honest if she wasn’t feeling okay. Only if prompted of course but it was honesty nonetheless. Ever since last month though, she has clearly been struggling and Ryan has no idea why, as there are too many possible causes. It’s time to prompt her into that same honesty as before.

“Are you okay?” Start off simple, even if he knows the answer already.

She does a little double take before this soft but curious smile makes its way to her lips. The summer rain of Ryan’s memory now has bitter air and it only sours more. “Yeah? Are you? I was only joking you know, I didn’t actually mean it, if that’s what-“

“No no, that’s not it at all. I just, you seem to be having a bit of a rough time at the moment and I wanted to check in.” He hurries to assure her before finally getting to the point.

She hums a little, nodding her head with what is growing into a beaming smile, just a little out of place in the scent rolling off of her through the air. “That’s very sweet. But you know I am a werewolf now and yeah, that does tend to put a bit of a dampener on my mood sometimes. I’m okay though, really. And thank you. For asking."

It’s a perfectly reasonable explanation. Ryan doesn’t believe her for a second. It’s not the glaringly obvious fake smile, the continued darkening of her scent, nor even the choppy way she answers his question. It’s the quickened patter of her heart, the blood thumping through her veins. He can’t understand what he’s hearing at first, until he picks up on that unsteady but unmistakable rhythm. It’s new and just a little bit incredibly strange, to hear her blood pumping in his ears. To hear it when her eyes flick just a little to the side to glance at his half missing ear and it causes it to quicken further. 

He does not know what that emotion deep within her scent was before, the one that is the root of all this. But he can physically feel the panic in it now. So with a voice and hand out as if calming a startling animal, he doesn’t push her any further. “Okay, yeah that’s alright. Just thought I’d ask and you know, let you that if there is something you want to talk about, we’re all here. Going through the same thing.”

Her nod is a little too quick, her smile a little too tight and when she speaks, her voice is a little too breathless. “Yeah, yeah of course. You know I think Laura’s been waiting for you this whole time, I’ll let you two catch up.” She gives this strange little laugh that sounds more like she’s been strangled. “Talk to you at dinner Ryan!”

She’s turned on her heel and all but dashed away before Ryan can say anything more. As the only quickening deep thumping of her heart fades just as quickly as she herself does in her escape, he’s left with furrowed eyebrows and no more idea of what’s bothering her than before. So prompting isn’t even enough for Emma anymore it seems. He notes too, as her footsteps take her upstairs, they do not sound above him as they would on her way to the rec room. Rather high above him, in the attic space he and Kaitlyn share, there is the unmistakable sound of something being thrown and some sort of choked sound before the sound of something that runs on long and is much more muffled. He glances at his bags left in the foyer behind him, glad now he hadn’t taken them up, lest they were toppled over the open attic to land on his head.

He tries not to feel guilty at so obviously having upset her, it was just a simple question and reassurance that he offered her. Yet it makes him concerned. Truth be told, Ryan didn’t really like Emma over camp. He didn’t dislike her, but her playful insulting humour and grandiose attitude did not land for him like it does for say Kaitlyn or Dylan, who often share similar attributes. Also her tryst with Jacob was far more annoying than it was funny. With her confidence, which he has since learned is acted, and her ability to throw out incredibly cutting words, he thinks it’s easy to see Emma as a fairly easily understood but not necessarily liked person. He knows it’s much more complicated than that now and he’s sure whatever began this happened two months ago after her conversation with Jacob. 

He doesn’t want to see her upset, especially when she tries to cover it up with a smile, reminding him painfully of Dylan’s own way of hiding beneath a blinding laugh and smile. However, if just asking if she’s okay sends her heart racing and panic coursing through her, he has no idea how to even approach finding out what among the endless possibilities it could be. However he reminds himself just as he reminded Emma, that just like the others, he himself is not alone in this. For his plan, a little outsourcing is okay.

First things first, he has an important discussion to have with an increasingly impatient Laura, who’s now resorted to waving him down with an annoyed scowl from across the hall. He treks his way over, offering a wave to Abi drawing on the couch, feeling for his folded notes in the pocket of his jeans. 

“She’s something, huh?” Laura says, her waving hand now lowering to fold across her chest where she holds the notebook.

Ryan frowns, trying to push the feeling of Emma’s panic from his mind. “Let’s just stick to what we’ve worked out.” He tells her.

“Don’t need to tell me twice.” She agrees. “Come in here, we’ll use the desk.”

He makes to follow her when he pulls up short just in front of the door. Something incredibly painful twinges in his chest. He hasn’t stepped inside Chris’s office since that night and now faced with the prospect, he finds himself steeped in grief and the idea of it makes him feel a little sick. 

He startles when Laura speaks. “You alright?”  

With her peering at him, knowing it was her who wanted to kill Chris and instead leaving that burden to fall to Ryan, making him a murderer- he doesn’t want to tell her the truth. He doesn’t want to confess his guilt and grief and the countless memories of both Chris and this office that now rush through him. So instead, as his face contorts of its own accord, he plays it off as something truthful, without being honest. “Is it, you know, gonna smell gross in there?”

She’s silent for a moment, watching him with a knowing look. Finally she turns away and he knows she must know what is eating him alive and it isn’t the concern she and Max may have gone at it in the office. But she obliges him, with a simple, “Ryan, don’t be disgusting. As if we’d do it here of all places.”

They step inside and Ryan’s heart shatters. There is light streaming in through the windows, there are old posters stuck to the cork board, there are books and notes scattered all over the desk. In his handwriting, the very same he filled that red journal in. Did he sit here writing in it? Is this where he drank rum and cried as he confessed his thoughts of ending his family's suffering into those pages? Did he know that journal would ever leave this room without him?

Ryan sits down in the chair in front of the desk silently, his movements feeling slow and distant. The acid churning within his stomach splashes into his throat as Laura sits down in Chris’s chair. His mouth fills with saliva and forces him to uncomfortably swallow as his eyes flick down to the photo in front of him, the smiling faces of Chris, Kaylee and Caleb staring back at him, lifelessly. He swallows again, looking away, only for his eyes to lock onto the empty bracket on the wall, the shotgun missing. He feels himself choke, his stomach rolling inwards as the contents of his stomach rush upwards.

“I- I’m sorry, I have to-“ Is all he manages to get out before his jaw clicks closed and his hand slaps over his mouth.

His legs are a tangle as he stumbles from Chris’s office, his free hand grasping at door frames and walls to steady himself through his scrabbling rush to the bathroom. His hands curl around the sides of the sink as he retches and heaves. Vomit splatters onto the porcelain, rolling down through the drain at a sluggish pace. It takes him some time to feel as if it's all come up and he has nothing left to dispel, still left retching long after there is nothing to throw up left. Strings of saliva and bile hang from his lips, tears brought to his eyes from the violence of his gagging. 

His hands are shaking from it as he turns on the tap and washes it all down the drain. He washes his mouth first with the refreshingly cool water, then his whole face. His hands return to the sides of the sink, keeping himself leaning over it for a long moment. It’s the only way he feels steady. Slowly the shaking stops, slowly the burning eases and even slower than that, the television static that filled his brain fades too. 

He looks up to the mirror bolted above the sink, making eye contact with himself. He can almost hear the thoughts echoed back to him through it, a harsh whisper of, “You murdered him, you murdered him, you murdered him,” running on repeat. He flicks the handle of the tap up as far left and as high as it can go, letting the running water drown out the endless mantra and the growing rising steam to hide the sight of himself from his view.

He washes his hands once, to clean any droplets of spittle or bile from his skin. He washes his hands a second time just to warm them. He washes his hands again so they burn. He washes his hands again and again and again, waiting to see the red run down the drain. He washes his hands for nearly half of an hour and he can still feel the blood on them. He will never be clean of it, as much as he tries. 

When he finally leaves the bathroom, he finds Kaitlyn hanging around outside. She’s sitting on the floor with her back against the wall, watching something on her phone with a single earbud hanging out alongside the string of her hoodie. She uses the wall to push herself up, tucking her phone into her pocket and looking over to Ryan. It isn’t pity in her face but understanding. She stands beside him, not touching but her presence gives him a sense of solidity that he did not have before. 

All she says is, “Laura’s set up in the kitchen.” And on they go.

Her notebook is laying open on the counter, along with several pages of what he thinks are printouts, which is nearly enough to make him laugh after what just happened. This is what they’ve had to resort to, Wikipedia articles probably edited by an eleven year old, in just the hope of learning something, anything about what they’re going through. He drags along a stool from the side of the room, Kaitlyn hopping up onto one of the other counters and crossing her legs, phone pulled back out from her pocket. 

“Okay?” Laura asks him, in something close enough to concern to count. 

After now pulling himself together again, he would have offered her an answer, simply for putting her through watching him stumble off and leaving her waiting again for god knows how long. When she glances back at Kaitlyn however, with a look of obvious expectancy, his eyes narrow. Not quite into a glare, but just like her it is something close enough to count and she looks away, instead opting to just ignore the unwanted presence. 

She gestures to Ryan and the folded paper he pulls from his pocket. “Alright, hit me with it.”

He goes over everything he’d added to the list. For each note he had jotted down, he expands upon, telling her everything he knows. It’s all very factual and Ryan finds droning on about the process of transformation and concept of territory to be just what he needed to shake off those last feelings of all consuming guilt and grief off. It also certainly helps to feel Kaitlyn’s presence behind him, not directly involved in the conversation at hand, though certainly listening in. He’d messaged her a photo of the notes he took during the month at home, so she already knows everything he’s going to say. Still he’s glad she’s hanging around. With her scent in the room and knowledge she figuratively and literally has his back, he is put at ease. There is relief too, as over their conversation, as the guilt fades to the background he finds that so too does the void in gut. That cold, terrifying emptiness within him that has been crippling him each night for the past month, begins to fill. He chooses not to question it, letting himself just feel the relief of it and take it for what it is, for now.

Once he’s finished, Laura thoughtfully hums, taking just a few moments more to continue her note. For most of what he said, she just nodded, having already known this herself. Which he expected, the largest section he had after all was tilted basic knowledge. Some of the information was enough of an expansion on prior knowledge to her however that she has added some more notes to her own, an added asterisk here and there.

When she sets the pen down, there is that same eagerness on her face that he’d felt through her text. “Great. Ready for my turn?”

“Ready as I’ll ever be.” Ryan confirms, leaning down onto one elbow, preparing himself for whatever he’s about to hear. It better be good, considering what she put Jacob through for this.

“So, researching any of this was complicated to say the very least, considering searching werewolves just brought up your favourite movie.” She begins, her lip twitching just a little as she tacks that joke on at the end. He resists the urge to correct her so as to not interrupt her immediately. “So to be honest, I just ended up searching up wolves. Wasn’t exactly helpful at first, since all that useful shit you just talked about was obviously missing. But I ended up working out something way better, that you and everyone else here is going to be very interested in hearing.”

Ryan hears Kaitlyn’s earbuds click against each other as she pulls the second out, her interest just as captured as Ryan’s own. He bites his tongue again to stop himself from telling Laura to just spit it out. If her detailed account of what she went through that she gave them in the pool house back in August is anything to go off of, she likes to be thorough in her explanations.

“So everybody knows about wolf pack hierarchy right? Like the alpha down social formation. It’s a disputed theory based on captive wolves, as wild wolf packs move in family units. However,” Laura looks at them with barely contained fascination hidden beneath an air of seriousness. Ryan just shakes his head at her, knowing where this is going and behind him he hears Kaitlyn scoff. “I think that research can be applied, or at the very least used as a basis of understanding, to the social dynamics within the group at minimum.”

“Seriously? No, seriously, this is the conclusion you’ve come to?” Ryan groans, knowing it makes him sound petulant but unable to keep his disbelief and resistance to the idea from his voice. It’s not just the previous association with the terms that has him resistant to it, though he knows that’s what it sounds like. There’s something in her use of those terms that, though they don’t feel completely inapplicable, they feel… misapplied is the best way to describe it. He ignores Kaitlyn laughing behind him, not wanting to know whether she’s laughing at the idea of it as well or at his total chagrin for it.

“Yes, it is and if you’ve not thrown the idea out before you’ve even heard my reasoning, then I could explain.” Laura waits for his vague hand wave for her to continue. “Obviously we’re not related, all the same age and turned at the same time. So there’s no family structure and there is no pronounced enough difference between when we all turned for there to be hierarchy there. I don’t know who infected everyone else, which I will ask everyone when we discuss this with them just to rule it out, but even between Max and me, I do not believe there is hierarchy based on that either.”

Ryan begrudgingly nods along in agreement with each assessment, until on the second use of the word hierarchy he makes a face twisted enough for her to slow her tangent to a momentary stop. “You keep saying hierarchy, where’s that coming from? Do we have one?”

Laura gives him the same obvious look that Kaitlyn had given him last month. That deadpan expression, that tells him on no uncertain terms he’s missed something obvious. “Yes, obviously. How is this a surprise to you of all people?”

Behind him Kaitlyn snorts and when she speaks, Laura looks at her the first time since she entered the room without annoyance. “I thought the exact same thing last month. Don’t worry, he’s just a bit thick.”

Ryan turns around to scowl at her, only turning back at Laura’s huff to redirect the attention back to her. He drops his arm from the counter to flip Kaitlyn off where only she can see. Laura still noticed, rolling her eyes at the both of them. Ryan just shrugs, without much more of a defense than that. “I haven’t noticed any sort of hierarchy.”

“Well there definitely is one and it’s not just social.” Laura tells him, back to her serious, only just less than clinical explanation. “We all fit within it and I’ve worked out where and the basics of why. If you’d at all be interested in finding out what I worked out?”

She knows he is, of course. Even if he was willing to throw out her theory, which unfortunately sounds too thought out to do so, he’d still be interested. How could he not? Even Kaitlyn behind him has shuffled to the edge of the counter she sits on, leaning forward in her curiosity. He gives her one last half hearted scowl before he nods to Laura. 

“Do you want the bullet pointed version or the long version?” She asks, her eagerness to explain rising in her words.

Ryan gives a short hum before he quickly decides he is not prepared to be launched into a full blown explanation of something he can’t quite comprehend just yet. “Let’s start with the bullet points and we’ll go from there.”

The way Laura clasps her hands together and smiles concerns him to no end. “Right, well! We seem to have naturally molded into a hierarchy and I’ve worked out what it is based on. Our biology affects our social standing within the pack.”

Though his eyebrows crinkle at the word tacked on in the end there with some argumentative sort of thought forming in his head, Ryan tries to focus on what she is saying. He’s pretty confident he’s following. Kind of. “Okay…”

“You could either go down a list of us, from highest to lowest in order, or group us up based on our differences. Either works really. I believe the highest determining factor is the internal self perception, then the biological differences between us are determined by that within a structured tier and finally, of course the social aspect.” She catches how as Ryan nods along, the movement gets slower and less confident as she goes. So to truly simplify, Laura cuts all unnecessary words out and punctuates with a hand chopping down onto her palm. “So three systems at play. Internal, biological and social. With me so far?”

Ryan’s looking ever so slightly to the side, his brows furrowed in the inner corners and his nods have slowed to about one tilt of his head per minute. Eventually when he thinks he has digested that information and hopefully possibly understood it? He says to her, “Okay, right. I think you’re going to have to elaborate.”

After waiting patiently for him to mostly understand what she said and checking that Kaitlyn has done the same, Laura absolutely launches into her full fledged explanation. “In actual wolf packs any hierarchy between them is a purely social construct. However, for us there are clear biological differences that each fit within three separate groups, aligning within these different levels with the hierarchy. Like the differences between the two sexes, is the closest comparison I can make. It’s clearly not a random diversity of individuals strengths and weaknesses considering every single one of us fall within this structured tiers. Then of course our behavioral traits also fall in line with these biological differences as well.”

Ryan’s pretty sure he has whiplash and is eternally grateful when Kaitlyn, who’s wandered all the way up to lean on the counter beside him, holds out her hands with a “Whoa, okay, slow the fuck down.”

Not that it matters. He would say Laura ignores her, but at this point he’s pretty certain she doesn’t even hear her. She continues on. “So I tried to work out what would determine these biological and social differences, what made us fall in these tiers. I was completely stumped until I was talking with Max and we agreed we wouldn’t want to be in your position, Ryan. That was when I realised.”

Though Kaitlyn makes an ‘ooh’ sound beside him, Ryan knows he’s more than a little lost. “Biological differences? Sex? Behavioral traits? What-“

Both girls roll their eyes at him, nearly in sync impressively. “Of course that’s the one word you pick out from that whole speech, Ryan.” Kaitlyn scoffs at him, while Laura just mutters an unimpressed “Typical.”

She takes pity on his lost expression though, giving examples for her statements. “When everyone was explaining their symptoms that first month, we had an excellent note taker who ever so helpfully noted down who was experiencing what. When I went over those notes, I immediately found a pattern, the one you pointed out Kaitlyn. Three groups of names were nearly always paired together, while the others would be absent from those specific examples. After I realised that, despite your intervention, I set about determining if our new behaviours, such as within the standoffs, also fit into this pattern. And lo and behold.”

“Right, following now. That was a lot of information at once, okay?” He defends himself, preparing himself for the next bout of it.

She waves him off, probably just happy to get to continue. “It’s fine. So, although there could technically be two ways to categorise it depending on whether you value the biological differences or social standings more highly, no offence but I’ve worked out the rankings.”

Ryan has to take a deep breath before he can even consider telling her to lay it on him. Kaitlyn has no such reservations. With a voice now as eager as Laura’s, she grins. “Hit us.”

“Though the social aspect seems to be becoming more relevant, I prefer the more simplistic and less subject to change nature of our biological differences.” Laura tells them before she raises a hand up, lowering it by an inch for each level she now describes. “That exists within three tiers, each of us fitting under either Alpha, at the top, Beta, in the centre, and Omega at the bottom.”

With a scowl, Ryan covers his face with his hands. It sounds so stupid, these wolf pack labels he now only ever hears of in use by men with fragile egos online. It just sucks that everything Laura has explained thus far has tracked with what they’ve learned and so he doesn’t doubt that she’s right so far. Kaitlyn, he feels, has already worked it all out in her head as well, but just wants to hear someone else say it out loud. She’s getting far too close to leaning over Laura’s notes and into her personal space in what has grown to be her insatiable interest in this discussion.

“You two and Jacob are alphas. Increased strength even outside of transformation, the highest increase to your senses, heavy scents and a heavy aura. When engaging in sexual activity you grow a-“ Laura’s ever so factual explanation is immediately cut off as she brings up that particular symptom again.

Though a challenge to that initial statement had begun to form on his tongue, by the end of her statement it’s forgotten as Ryan just covers his face further, sinking down as far as he can on his uncomfortable little stool, out of abject embarrassment. Kaitlyn however violently waves a hand out in front of her and finally leans back from encroaching on Laura’s space. “Fuck, yes we’re both aware, you can leave that out. Jesus.”

Laura smirks at them both, clearly enjoying their humiliation. She continues on as soon as they’ve managed to shake off most of the embarrassment, both of them suddenly eager to move past it. “Myself and Max, Emma and Nick are in the centre tier, or what you could call betas. Peacefully average increase to senses, more of a sharpening than heightening and also light scents. I would consider this the ‘baseline’ of our experiences in a manner of speaking.”  

Ryan nods, though with a furrow to his brow. What Laura is explaining does track within this framework that she has presented, he can’t help but feel something is off. Too hesitant to interrupt her again though, he reluctantly motions her on. “Sure. Wait so that means…”

Laura makes an agreeing humming sound. “Yeah. That leaves only Abi and Dylan as the bottom tier or omegas. Which I hope no offence is taken from but it had to be someone. They, as we’ve all fucking noticed, have incredibly strong and sweet scents. Their ability to sense emotions through the scents is unmatched and their sense of smell just in general is the strongest of all of us. Their other senses average out just above betas I think.”

Kaitlyn grins so wide it could be considered nothing but malicious, even if he knows it’s not. “Oh he is going to hate this.”

“How come though, and I mean no offence to you either, the ‘bottom’ tier,” Ryan says, something too off for him to call it the names as she presented them- and not just from the awkwardness. Something isn’t right about it past his own discomfort with the terms. “Sounds, I don’t want to say better, but well, better than the mid tier?”

Laura gives a short laugh to show none was taken. He has to believe trying to work this all out was a massive stress on her shoulders as now that she’s exploded out sharing this information with them, gone is the clinical expression she has worn since that first month. She is far warmer and kinder for it, even Kaitlyn seems to have forgotten the animosity she held on Jacob’s behalf after the run in that Laura manufactured between them. He still disagrees with her methods and it doesn’t excuse it, but he cannot deny that it seems to have brought her the results she was looking for.

“Well, you could just use the word stronger, that is an option. But yes, those are the omegas strengths. The other hand, which is where the bottom of the pile side of it would come in, would be the social aspect of it all.” She tells him, holding a hand out to placate as she sees the look growing on his face. “It doesn’t mean everyone’s going to treat them like shit Ryan, nor does it mean they’re valued the least or anything. At least, not for me.”

Ryan pulls his lips to the side and decides not to argue. “So what does it mean then?”

“You ever notice how they always eat last? Or how if you give a friendly enough suggestion, they’ll most likely do it with little genuine complaint? Or even though they are perfectly capable enough themselves, you kind of want to look out for them regardless?” Laura prompts.

Though there was some vague remembrance for the first, he was not with her until the last question. That, sharing a side glance with Kaitlyn, they are both embarrassingly aware of it seems. Their eyes narrow at each other, thinking of the same person and almost certainly many of the same moments. Yes, they understood that feeling and another of a similar vein.

“Exactly. Also you must have noticed that neither of them have ever been in a stand off of any form. If one even begins to turn towards them, they are glossed over or their presence can even stop it. Think of some of the things they’ve said to you, that you didn’t take as a challenge or a threat, while if anyone else said it to you… Get what I’m saying?” Laura leads them to reach the conclusion themselves.

“So not a threat but sweet enough to keep around.” Kaitlyn says sarcastically, while Laura just nods.

“Sure, close enough. They’re not the only ones with specific behavioral expressions from their rank either.” She points at the both of them. “Ever notice how unreasonably pissed off you get when someone eats before you? Because the rest of us sure do. The way you look out for the others, bossing people around and actually having them listen? Your standoffs are also aggressive, vying for a higher position within the social dynamics between you. The postures you take are not a random thing.”

She slides one of the printouts over in front of them, revealing its contents at last. It’s of a wolf, a normal one, crouched down and snarling. Legs held taunt, spine stiff, standing tall, teeth bared. There are a few paragraphs of information on aggressive wolf body language but he doesn’t bother reading it. That picture tells him everything he needs to know. It’s the first thing she has said that he is fully, completely certain is correct.

“Whereas the betas, we also have standoffs but they are more in defense of position or to assert oneself out of emotion, rather than active challenges for a higher one. I’d say we have the least changes to behaviour though. Even so, clearly each tier has their own specific behaviours alongside the biology. The only difference categorising it by the social factor of it all, would be rather than three tiers, a direct top to bottom ranking. Which I don’t really think anyone would appreciate, so not what I’m leading with.” Laura finally finishes, accepting the paper as it’s slid back to her.

Though Ryan cannot find any fault in her logic of it all, nor could he ever come up with another answer that would make anywhere near as much sense, he still feels that scepticism. Nothing concrete enough to try and argue with her on but some of her wording choices stand out to him as just wrong. Some of it too, just feels a little… incomplete? Not that he expected they’d work it all out right now today, but Laura closes the notebook with a finality that makes him think that she does have an unproven faith in her theory. He feels that the theory's logic follows through and contains enough connections to their experiences that it is still worthwhile to explain to the others and he’s not about to throw the whole model out. He’s just not quite convinced they are ready to stop examining their situation in hopes of more answers. However, he’s extremely reluctant to tell Laura that, the weight off her shoulders visible and her methods best left out of play for now with the stress that they cause. 

Still, as weird as it feels to model their interactions off of captive wolves, he knows she is onto something at least. Even if it doesn’t seem to encompass everything, it feels like a good basis. It just all clicks together and feels as natural as everything else new that he’s learned about himself over the past few months, as long as they leave room for more information to fit into the theory like stray puzzle pieces. And if they find different labels for it all, something he’ll swallow for now with no grounds for any real complaint other than that internal feeling. 

“Yeah, no it seems to track. You did a lot to work this all out Laura, it’s pretty impressive.” Ryan says eventually, distracted by all the new information coursing through his head.

“Thanks. It just took a lot of experiments and some fucking patience. Though I wanted to see how they’d react firsthand, getting information out of Dylan and Abi was admittedly pretty easy, all I had to do was ask. But the other betas?” She shares this unimpressed look with them before her eyes roll in an echo of the frustration she had felt. “They were so hard to judge. I couldn’t ask because they got so defensive and it ended up being just a whole lot of observing their reactions to make sure I placed them right.”

“Well what about us? You never even tried to ask.” Kaitlyn asks her, back to leaning her hip against the counter, her finger absently flicking through the notebook she all but stole from under Laura’s nose after she slammed it shut at the ends of her explanations.

Laura just makes a ‘tchk’ sound with her front teeth, standing from the stool she was sitting on and stretching out her back. “Oh please, you guys were so obvious that I didn’t have to. Though I’ll admit, maybe not who I would’ve initially picked.”

“The fucks that suppose to mean?” Kaitlyn demands, now also standing straight in a movement as quick as a whipcord.

“I’m not talking about you. Jacob however- surprised me is all.” Laura says, snatching back her notebook and gathering up her loose papers.

“Well you said it’s internal first, right? So really all of us are what we’re ‘supposed’ to be, since it’s what we want… right?” Ryan both asserts and asks simultaneously. It does make him think. Did he want this, to be at the top of this group dynamic? He’d have never thought so of himself, but he supposes now he’s glad for it either way.

“I didn’t say it’s what you want, necessarily. That’s just the example of myself and Max. Otherwise don’t you think Emma would be stomping around the place, ordering everyone below her on what to do? No, it could be anything from self perception, willingness or lack thereof to fight for your place within the group or even how you think the others see you. I don’t know exactly, I’m just guessing with that, but I am certain it isn’t just random.” She begins to walk for the door, stopping just short of pushing through it, her fingers resting on the handle. “Like I said, I’ll ask everyone who infected them at dinner before we discuss this all, to see if the pattern lines up there. But I really doubt it will.”

Ryan feels the confliction play across his face for a moment before he calls out, stopping Laura once more, just as she’d managed to take a single step through the door. “Hang on one second, I still need to ask you something.”

As she begrudgingly returns just an inch or so inside, enough to slide the door close to shut to maintain their privacy, his resolve hardens and as does his expression. “You’re being really harsh to Emma. Has something happened between you?”

“Other than general bitchiness?” His pointed stare gives her the decency to at least look a little sheepish. She then chooses her words carefully. “No. I suppose I didn’t have the chance to see the best side of her before this, like the rest of you did.”

“Then lay off people you don’t know shit about.” Kaitlyn suddenly snaps, a defence Ryan did not see coming from her. Kaitlyn clearly feels much similar, as even when Laura gives a suddenly chilled ‘noted’ and leaves, she just turns back to look at the counter like she didn’t even hear the door closing.

“I was going to go with the more, let's try to be supportive of everyone since we’re all going through the same shit, but you know that works too.” Ryan jokes before he’s unable to catch her eye and he grows just a little more serious. “I didn’t realise you cared so much about Emma’s honour.” 

Kaitlyn shrugs, looking up and breezing past it. “Well you know it’s gotten awkward since things turned sour between her and Jacob but… ah, who knows. Maybe it’s the chivalrous top tier wolf in me.”

Unconvinced and strangely more than a little unimpressed, Ryan just gives her an agreeable enough, “Yeah, sure. Hey, you know while we’re on the topic, did you ever find out what they talked about that night in September?”

It’s almost amusing the way her lips immediately purse and her arms fold. “No, neither of them would tell me. He still hasn’t told me, the bastard.” The look softens ever so slightly. “I guess at least it was good to talk to Emma that night, even just for the like, ten total sentences.”

“I thought you two didn’t get along?” Ryan asks, leaning back to sit on the counter, something Nick would have once smacked him with a spoon for.

“Well not recently I suppose. Any association with Jacob seems be tainted for her at the moment because of whatever went down between them. Which I still don’t know what it was. Urgh.” Kaitlyn groans, grabbing Ryan’s notes to thump her forehead into. She doesn’t stop even as she continues speaking. “I literally called it as bad news before they even got together, but he wouldn’t listen.”

Ryan hums again, looking down to the only now fading redness of his hands, popping a knuckle or two in thought. “Seems like it’s a little more than just a messy breakup at this point. I just asked Emma if she was okay before and her scent grew panicked.”

“So that was what that was about. I swear I could smell it on the other side of the country, it’s always so strong.” Kaitlyn huffs, bringing her hand up to gnaw on her thumb nail. Ryan gives a polite acknowledgement, though not an agreement. Whenever he’s within the vicinity, the only thing he can focus on is Dylan’s scent, the others fading into the background.

She pushes off the counter again, returning that single earbud to its place and throwing open a nearby cabinet. A heavy metal pot nearly hits Ryan square in the nose before he catches it with quickened reflexes that he really could have used in high school dodgeball and she faces him with her hands on her hips. “If I have to sit through this conversation again at dinner, I’m going to need some really good fucking food to distract myself with, while chaos descends. Wanna help or should I call in Nick?”

Ryan gives a scoff and smile, placing the pot down on the kitchen island and sending it spinning with a finger. “I think we want to keep our dinner requests for Nick from wearing thin, lest we lose the free labour when we really need it. What are we making?”

“Absolutely no idea, but if you’re so keen on being number one top dog, I’m sure you can work it out.” Kaitlyn smirks at him, dodging out of the way as the pot is hurled right back at her.

The rest of their late afternoon is spent there, fumbling through cooking dinner, a surprisingly difficult undertaking considering the size of their group. But the room is warm and smells of smoke, thankfully not from anything burning, and the distant and faint taste of honey has replaced the bile of earlier on his tongue. For just an afternoon, Ryan feels happiness in his stomach, a light and treasured thing to feel. He’d like this, something like this, to return to his life again. In a warm kitchen, with warm food cooking and warm laughter in his ears. And family, he thinks, are just the people you can be in the kitchen with and that it can really be as simple as that. He’d like to be in the kitchen with his family again, another day and another day after that. He doesn't know if he should let himself dream so large, so instead, for just an afternoon, Ryan lets himself live it.

Chapter Text

They’d spread it all out over the sole table still left out in the centre of the hall, squeezing in beside each other with little room between them. A joking prayer was given, as was thanks to Ryan and Kaitlyn, before they ate. Ryan managed to get the first bite in before Jacob even managed to bring the fork from his plate, only realising what he’d done after Laura gave him a pointed, knowing look. He shrugged it off, if it’s true, it’s true and he has already decided to not deny himself anymore.

It is nice though, a distant memory of camp brought back to him. Every dinner the counsellors would sit together, eating and talking and laughing as they do now, minus the added couple that now make it a tight squeeze. If the obvious remaining tension and lack of high pitched laughter from children running rampant is ignored, he thinks it could almost be just like that time, before everything went wrong. Almost. The simple fact is, it will never be the same again.

Nonetheless, dinner holds laughter between those stretches of uncomfortable silence and that’s all that matters he thinks. He was right, a month back home, back to normality, has let some of the tension of the month past lift. Well, that or it has given them the chance to recollect themselves, to put back up that charade that acts as if they’re okay with it all, to protect that normality, to protect their home. He thought of asking them how their month was, was it hard, was it relieving? Was it both? To maybe just bring a little of it here too, since they try to keep it so desperately separated. He kicks himself for not finding it within himself to do so. Instead, once more, he just watches.

Dylan of course he again watches the most. He always will, as Dylan has solely captured Ryan’s attention ever since the first day of camp and he’s been unable to keep his eyes from straying towards him since. He’s the kind of person who looks like he has swallowed the sun and now light seeps from his pores and has turned his smile into something that blinds. However Ryan now thinks that Dylan is actually drowning in it. He says stupid jokes, made funny only by that blinding smile and he lightens those moments when darkness threatens to smother all other thoughts. Yet there is something dampened about his scent that gives him away, the same thing Ryan picked up on last month. Something familiar yet obscured enough he cannot name it. It makes his chest ache, right where that admitted love is. 

Even in the flickering firelight and the dull yellow glow of the lights above, he is growing more pallid each month. That healthy glow from summer has faded, as if ever since he swallowed the sun he has not been under its rays again. There’s a bruised hue beneath both of his eyes, nowhere near the bags Ryan knows he himself carries, but strong enough to be clearly visible. And still, despite the fire warming his back, he occasionally shivers from the chill in the air. It seems the sun inside him shines through to warm everyone around him but Dylan himself is left freezing.  

Next to him, Emma holds a far more fake warmth in her smile that he has yet to see reach her eyes. She is quiet mostly which is particularly strange for her, always confident and bold throughout all the time that he has known her. She joins in with stilted laughter when Jacob is distracted and offers jabs and compliments when they’re due. Yet he cannot help but now notice the guise of it all. Unlike Dylan, it is not a mask that hides parts of herself out of fear, instead it is more an amplification of all positive aspects of herself. With nothing she feels to amplify now, the whole guise of it seems to be falling flat. Ryan can see the tension and emotion beneath the smile, perfectly done hair and makeup. It is trying to hold herself together in the face of everything that happened and yet now still falling apart at the seams.

Whereas Abi has always been quieter, so that is not new. The ever so slight fear on her face when she looks at them now, is however. All the cringing, spikes of bitterness and ensuring awkward silence when anything current is mentioned is from her first and foremost. Every laugh is no more than a reluctant breath and every smile goes no further than a twitch of her lips. It is written all over her face, she would rather be anywhere but here right now, rather be around anyone but them now.

Jacob on the other hand, seems oblivious to it all, appearing to just be glad for the lighter mood for once without the acknowledgement that beneath it, things still aren’t okay. Whether that is a purposeful ignorance or not, Ryan has no clue. He grabs himself seconds and thirds, jokes back and forth with Dylan and Kaitlyn, trying unsuccessfully to rope others in as well. But Ryan himself, in his careful observation, is apparently not as oblivious as he’d once thought of himself. Ryan catches the quick sideways glances Jacob sends to Emma, the nervousness in his inability to sit still. He may look relieved, which he is, but there is still something there still putting him on edge.

Nick, as he always seems to now, all but disappears into shadow at the end of the table. He politely laughs at the jokes, nods along to the back and forth, smiles the few times he’s acknowledged and yet never truly joins in. He was confident at camp, close with Abi and Jacob, if Ryan remembers correctly. But perhaps not, as he’s so easily slunk into the edges of their group, like a stranger at a party. Ryan thinks he’s the hardest to read, with the way he’s sunk in on himself, giving nothing away.

Max however, who Ryan knows the least, is ironically probably the easiest to read. There is this, the exact word escapes him, but he thinks a simple but palpable relief is a close enough description. Which at first notice feels jarring compared to all the other complicated mixtures of emotions in the people surrounding him, yet if Ryan actually thinks about it, it makes sense he supposes. Max now, is the longest infected person that they know of beside Silas, having to transform twice while locked in a jail cell, unsure if he’d ever get free. Obviously the circumstances are still terrible, yet for Max it’s probably still a significant step up from those two months.

Beside him, Laura is just obviously impatient. She’s sitting through the stilted chatter, laugher and silences in reluctant but polite enough patience. He’s caught sight of her at least four times, picking up and flipping through the pages of her notebook, looking around at the others before putting it back down in her lap and continuing her wait. She wants a resolution to this all he thinks, which yeah obviously they all do, but it is wishful thinking. A magical cure isn’t going to suddenly appear after some discussion, nor is Silas going to arrive on their doorstep and demurely bow his head so Travis can fill it with silver.    

Finally, beside Ryan, Kaitlyn has a lightness to her shoulders she didn’t have before. She has in her gold hoop earrings, not a speck of silver, the metal obviously but also the colour, on her. Between mouthfuls, speaking as assuredly as she always has, she picks on Dylan and Jacob and Ryan and even Emma, little jabs that are equal parts annoying and humorous. She at one point, causing them all to either laugh or cringe depending, even growled at Jacob for trying to steal from her plate. She’s still just Kaitlyn, a steady and consistent thing, changing and changed though she is. 

After a while of watching them and seeing their varied levels of misery and struggle to cope with it, he pauses for a moment with his fork hovering over his plate. He disguises it and the accompanying frown behind a long sip from his glass- no one seems to notice. He had planned, after Laura explains to them what they had learned, to finally step up and convince them of how letting themselves transform and letting themselves act how feels natural will let them settle, will make things easier. He wasn’t exactly sure what he’d say to do so, writing script after script in his head, leaving his palms slick throughout dinner as he rallied his nerves. However, even though he has proof that it’s the only semblance of something that they can actively do to not make the rest of their lives a living hell that they decide to cut short at thirty, proof through that red journal and in his own experience, he is suddenly hit with the realisation that despite that hard proof, it still probably- no, most definitely actually, would not work.

Convincing Kaitlyn wasn’t a one stop shop, it took a good few in depth and personal conversations- without them and the life or death situation she had fallen into, he doesn’t doubt that she would not have accepted it. That was only Kaitlyn of course, any of the others may be easier or harder to convince. It certainly wouldn’t work for Abi, though it probably would for Jacob- not that he necessarily plans to drop him down a pit and break his leg, at this point at least. 

But that’s the point he’s struck with now. A broad, logic based explanation to them all probably isn’t going to work and honestly, probably wouldn’t have worked on him either. Something about being told to chill out and just accept this fucked up situation doesn’t foster the idea of actually doing so, without at least trying to gauge what life it actually has ruined first at least. So instead, it will have to be a personal plea, to put it lightly. He could try of course, but Ryan’s not about to make some big speech if it isn’t even likely to achieve anything, he’ll save himself that indignity at least. So, scrap that idea, fuck. Back to square one in a single moment of watching them around the table.

For the rest of dinner he keeps his eyes on his plate as he tries to formulate another way he could find to facilitate his explanation and persuasion, not coming up short per say, just reluctant to the only idea he does have. At least there isn’t a clear time pressure, just you know, before any of them kill themself, kill each other or ultimately fuck something up in some other way out of desperation. Hey, maybe he can spend tomorrow ushering them into the library to talk it over with each of them, like a fucked up job interview or a flash therapy session. Ryan sighs at his own thoughts and as his eyes flick back over to where they nowadays spend their near permanent residence while here at the quarry, he does know at least where he will start. 

He gives himself dinner to mull it over, until forks begin to scrape against porcelain and the serving bowls squeezed into the centre of the table are whittled down to empty. Then, when social graces stand in her way no more, Laura stacks her plate atop Max’s and sets her notebook down in the empty space. Ryan wiped the last remaining dampness of his hands off on his jeans, silently glad that he does not have his own speech to prepare for the end of this discussion and turns his attention towards her. She pops her pen, flicks to a predetermined page and lets that clinical expression fall over her face. 

“So, I have some things I wanted to discuss, but first I have to ask you all a question.” She states simply, as she jots down the first name onto the paper and looks past Max down the row. “So Abi, which werewolf infected you?”

What lightness they’d managed to cultivate just crumbles. Ryan can almost see the shatter cracking out in a web in his mind, Laura’s words like a baseball bat to the window of peace. He can feel it in the air, the instant clogging as it fills with a thick and dreary downcast. Abi’s flinch, the twitch of Jacob’s eye, Emma all but curling in on herself. Each of them recoiling like they’d been struck, a slap in their face with the memory of being bitten and its consequences. Though Laura has already shown just how clearly little sensitivity she has for their vulnerability on the subject, he still curses anew at her total lack of tact on the matter. Well, their dinner was nice at least, Ryan really should have known better than to think it could have lasted.

Ryan, knowing this was coming, doesn't have the same reaction. He speaks up, at long last, doing his best to keep the uncertainty he has with speaking to them with any semblance of authority from weakening his words. “She’s asking because it might help us figure out why some of us share symptoms that others don’t have. It’s fucked up and hard to look back on, but we’ve got to know.”

There’s a moment of silence, where uncertain eyes are levelled at Ryan with almost a sense of betrayal in them for colluding with Laura on her warpath of research that she has forged. With sympathy, he thinks that they will have to get over it for now, as they do really need to know. If who bit them has a pattern, then it could lead to more answers on their condition or even somehow explain how the poem failed them that night. Either their trust in Ryan is strong enough (doubtful) or they realise something similar to his own thoughts on the matter, as their eyes do slowly drift over to Abi, where she squirms in the spotlight. He can not only see, but feel it in the air when she breaks. Her shoulders hunch up to her ears, her head drops a good inch and she stares at a splinter in the wood with an expression of pure discomfort and unhappiness that he can also pick out in the air. “What if we- I can’t remember? It was dark, I don’t know which- or who it was in the- I don’t know.” 

It’s hard not to feel pity at the way her voice cracks towards the end, Emma’s hand raising to rest on her arm with a soothing swipe of her thumb. Ryan is about to speak again when Laura beats him to it, once more cold now that dinner has ended. “That’s fine if you don’t know exactly who it was, a time and location or defining trait like eye colour should be enough for me to work it out, or at the very least draw connections across accounts.”

Abi releases a breath from puffed up cheeks and minutely shakes her head before her eyes flick over to Ryan. At his small nod of encouragement, her eyes squeeze shut and her nose scrunches. She speaks as if it is physically painful to recall, but all the same she gives what information she can. “I d- it was at the start of the night, in the woods. I think there was two? It was so dark though, but I think one had yellow eyes? One I could barely see, I don’t know. That’s all I can remember.”

“Neither were white?” At Abi’s shaken head, Laura hums. “No, that is actually helpful, now we know it was either Kaylee or Caleb. Nick was bitten at the same time right? Okay, how about you Kaitlyn?”

“Caleb, at the scrapyard.” She’s told flatly. Kaitlyn, who is certain, because she shot him only a short time later and killed the boy. God this was easier to plan than it is to actually reminisce and discuss again, wasn’t it?

Laura moves on just as curtly. “Jacob?”  

“I think it had to have been Caleb.” Jacob says, picking at his thumb nail. He shifts a little uncomfortably, eyes darting. “Because from what I’ve heard Kaylee was already…”

Laura ignores the long stares in her direction, no hint of shame on her face, though Ryan notices she speaks next on a deep inhale. “Emma?”

“On the uh, island. So Max, I guess.” The two of them share an awkward glance, eyebrows furrowing, Max with an apologetic expression and Emma with an unreadable twist of her lips.

“Dylan?” Laura says, with some finality, as she already knows Ryan’s recount own of the night and how he was bit by Silas outside the radio shack. 

As they had for each person prior, all eyes that are able to be lifted from the table turn to watch him as he speaks. “It was by the van, just before we went to the scrapyard. So maybe Caleb? I opened the van door and I was suddenly being dragged by my leg across the ground, so I might have missed some things. It wasn’t the white wolf though.” 

Dylan explains to silence, the room quiet with this resounding stillness as everyone ruminates once more on that night. Laura opens her mouth with this thoughtful downcast turn to the corners of her lips, just about to speak when this near electric spike of emotion crackles in the air and threatens to bring a thunder filled downpour over their heads. Laura’s mouth snaps shut with an audible click of teeth, her eyes instantly flicking to Emma with everyone else’s gaze following in just as sudden a movement. Ryan pieces together the reactions in tandem.

Emma tries to hide her emotional reaction for a moment, bringing a hand up to subtly wipe her nose and hide her quivering lips, looking down to the table and giving a delicate sniff. She gives up with a quiet clear of her throat, it’s a lost cause and she knows it. By now they know each other's scents well and there is no disguising who such a distinct scent might have come from. The crackling misery in the air smells of a heavy storm rolling over a sweltering hot day, the heat of summer whipping the storm into a wild thing. She lifts her head and it’s clear how her eyes have misted, embarrassed blinking at the attention turned towards her causing her lashes to clump together. Her head sways in a tilt to the left as she breathes in deeply on a word, before it falls apart in her mouth and her eyes close with a deep exhale.

“Dylan, I am… so, so sorry.” She says stilted but resolutely, unable to look at him as she admits what she did, indirectly. 

All eyes flick over to Dylan, sitting stock still, brows tilted down in the corners. Back to Emma, back to Dylan, back and forth between them in a silent flickering observation as the realisation slowly hits everyone else at the table. It was Emma who bit Dylan by the van, after she’d transformed. Ah, it was her reaction then, that Ryan faintly remembers hearing when Dylan first told him where he'd been bit down in the cages that first month. Is this what she has been harbouring, what has caused an extra stress to settle over her shoulders since that first month? No, it has to involve Jacob somehow, Ryan’s sure of that at least. This though has certainly been another weight she’s been carrying on shoulders slumping under the pressure of it all. 

She makes this aborted, short noise- a sob cut off and it’s the trigger Dylan needed to finally force the processing to end so he can reply. He leans over the table with an outreaching hand, reaching for the one of hers that’s not covering her face from her embarrassment of showing the brunt of her emotions to them all. He falters on the way there, hand retreating and instead brushing through his hair to swipe his fringe away back to its usual swoop. 

“It’s okay Emma. No biggie.” He says, in that blasé, uncaring, lying tone of his.

Just as her cut off sob did to him, his tone functions in the same manner for her, short circuiting her mind to halt both her crying and her attempts at hiding it. Her hand lowers from her face, a stray tear escaping from the web of her lashes to hit the apple of her cheek, yet at the same time, the flow of them is quelled and no more fall. She minutely shakes her head, lips pulling and brows creasing. “No- no biggie? Dylan I-“

He cuts her off near immediately. “No seriously Emma, it’s totally fine. Honestly it would be a little bit embarrassing if I was the only one to not get infected, right? Like it'd make this whole thing incredibly awkward, do we invite Dylan each month? He’s got the trauma but he’s not got the bite so… I mean how would you even decide that?”

No one answers him, even as he elbows Kaitlyn in prompt with a smile. Maybe this time, the others do see that the joke is just a thinly veiled attempt at protecting himself and the others from the discomfort of having to experience any tension or emotion. Or maybe they just don’t find this specific joke funny. Either way, they leave him with no response, crippling his ability to shrug the moment off and away, to breeze on past it. 

He clears his throat quietly, gives a small sniff. “But seriously Emma, you did me a favour really. So it’s okay, no hard feelings or anything.”

Crippled and yet not impossible it seems. The metaphorical hand waving away of the conversation is accompanied by a real one, a hand loosely pawed through the air in front of him with a shrug following after. It is not a violent shutting down of the conversation that most people would do, but it is one nonetheless. Ryan actually feels a little bad for Emma, her reaction seeming over the top in response to his casualness, even though it is a fair one with the knowledge you’ve doomed someone to a life like this, as unintentional and accidental as it was. Ryan, in a startling moment of empathy, feels a shared frustration for where Dylan just left her. There’s nothing she can do but give up any attempts to talk it through, left with no resolution or closure, no idea how Dylan really feels about it or her. Her emotions on it don’t just disappear because Dylan refuses to acknowledge them, no matter what his own are on the matter which he also refuses to share with that blasé, so she’s forced to shove them down and pretend they don’t exist. It’s… a pretty rough spot to leave her in. 

She handles it with what grace she can, giving this awkward quiver of her lips and embarrassed glance around the table before shrinking back from where she sits, shoulders minutely hunching and eyes lowering to stick a single grain of wood on the table, unmoving and still watering. Her throat gives this small twitch which betrays how desperately she's trying not to cry right now. That summer storm around her continues to gather as the others awkwardly glance around, no one quite sure how to deal with Emma’s ‘outburst’, as fair as it was. 

After an awkward pause, Laura clears her throat. “Okay, well… I’ll look over your answers and try to find a connection but hearing it initially I don’t think I’ll find one. So with that in mind, I think I should explain what I’ve worked out about our uh ‘condition’.” 

Ryan doesn’t know if she truly believes that or if she’s choosing to believe it due to the absolute faith she has in the theory she shared with him and Kaitlyn earlier. He supposes it doesn’t really matter, if Ryan can trust Laura in anything, it is to research thoroughly on matters related to their condition, with no holding back and with morally questionable methods included, as she has demonstrated previously. 

As the answering silence drags out, Laura with just a hint of exasperation breathes out a sigh and ever so slightly shakes her head. “Guess the floor is mine then. So-”

Ryan breathes in a steadying breath as the long explanation begins again. Fortunately in this instance he supposes, that Laura is so clinical and curt, to get through it all in a straightforward manner. Now knowing the end diagnostic, it feels like a clearer explanation than when she explained last. Like watching a show the second time around, picking up all the little bits and pieces you missed the first time. Without having to interrupt her with constant questions, Ryan’s able to look back at the examples she gives and realise that as much as he’s known his behaviour has been changing, yeah, shit. They’ve all changed a lot from this and despite how natural it feels between them, even the flies on the wall must be weirded the fuck out watching how they act now.

Ryan will give Laura this, despite her less than ethical research practices, she does extremely well answering the incessant questions as she tries to explain her findings. Kaitlyn was right as well, it’s a little bit chaotic. From the scoffs and disbelieving outcries, to the questions backtracking to something already well explained, to Jacob’s (failing) attempts at making jokes and pestering everyone on what Laura has ranked them, to the surprising huff and petulant arm cross from Abi as she states that well she just doesn’t believe it. It’s a lot of mixed emotions, the lodge can barely hold the swirling mix of scents within it without the window panes bending against the pressure.

He watches all of their reactions of course, keeping mostly quiet himself even as the explanation ends but the carry on continues. Nick looks unsure but isn’t attempting to dispute it, his lips twisted to the side but head slowly nodding. Jacob looks far too proud of himself at being labelled a ‘alpha’ and suddenly Ryan’s convinced that he has certainly been exposed to the online gym rat alpha male beliefs, even though he doubts he really buys into it- this is probably better than that anyway, in his mind. Abi looks almost lost, unimpressed and well, she’s just unhappy with any discussion of their condition in the first place anyway, so none of this would ever really be fun for her. Emma is harder to read, her eyes still red rimmed from earlier and now widened as she tries to take in all the information, however she remains unusually quiet. Dylan, he hates to admit, is a little entertaining to watch. The expressions on his face have morphed over the explanation to now, shifting from comically disbelieving, to this impudent unimpressed look with his head cocked and all, to now an almost offended even more scrunched up version of the last.  

They’ve been going on about it for a while now, Ryan having to resist the urge to check his phone to see how many minutes of weak arguments and repeated questions have ticked by- and look, he gets it, he really does. It’s an uncomfortable and frankly weird way to categorise their experiences, as it really highlight just how animal like they now act even well before the nights of transformation. But it does mostly track and at least makes sense of all their differences and ordered variations of both their behaviour and physical changes. However, at the same time, now that he is no longer just digesting the information for the first time, he's able to hone in on that feeling that there’s something very off about her explanation and answers. He’s tried to shake the feeling, to just accept the theory as it's presented but he knows he can't. The more he has listened to it, hearing all of those parts of it that just feel wrong again- so much so his lip twitches up at times, he grows a little more resolute in why he feels it is wrong. It’s the words she uses, he thinks, specific words that are misapplied and also that it doesn't apply to everyone. Majority, sure, but it is not a complete theory. Still, he doesn’t want to interrupt and tell her she’s wrong, especially after just nodding along the first time in the face of his initial affront and confusion to the bombardment of information. Her, what he thinks, is a mostly correct theory definitely needs some fine tuning he decides. Emphasis on mostly, he doubles down to himself as his lip twitches again into a soft scowl he tries to keep down.

”-es, Jacob you would be considered an alpha. Which is why-“ He’s not going to interrupt. It could sew division, to disagree with her now, on her theory that is earning only reluctant acknowledgement already. “-mean sure, within the pack hierarchy you could be considered the ‘highest’, but-“

”We’re not a pack though.”

Shit. Goddamnit Ryan, it was out of his mouth before it was even a thought in his mind, his lip still tugged up as he spoke. He knows it's the truth, instinctually, and can’t go back and deny it for that reason. Still, he really didn’t want to interrupt and the look on Laura’s face proves to him why.

She pauses, takes in the interruption for a moment before she rolls her eyes. “We’re cohabiting the same space and have a pecking order, we’re a pack whether you like the term or not. It’s going to be an adjustment using these kinds of terms for ourselves but I can’t think-“

”It’s not that.” Jesus, Ryan, seriously? Yet he can’t stop himself, something about this random- his brain trips over the word wolf and girl, combining them into something he wouldn’t be able to pronounce- asserting herself and the others here as his pack when they’re not, sparking something hostile within him. Far more hostile even than her using the words alpha and beta incorrectly, this seems to be enough of an affront to his instincts to draw out words from him that form only as they’re spoken aloud. “We’re cohabiting sure, but we’re not pack, that’s not something we just decide.”

Laura purses her lips, her eyebrows furrowing and eyes narrowing at him in a cold expression even as she thinks over what he said. So, probably still a little chilly towards him and Kaitlyn over the end of their little meeting earlier, then. “You didn’t mention that earlier, what, was that in Chris’ little journal?”

The others watch them like they’re tracking a ping pong ball back and forth across a table. All of them, expect Kaitlyn. One glance to her reveals a knowing look in her returning gaze, a slow nod like she was thinking the exact same thing. Once more reminded she has his back, his confidence grows just a little. Ryan reminds himself of the importance of being the bigger person and all that, shrugging off Laura’s purposefully inflammatory remark and tries instead to really gather up these vague feelings and intrinsic knowledge into something that can be explained.

”No,” He says slowly, “It wasn’t. I just know that while your explanations have merit, I’m not discarding them, I do just know this. We aren’t pack, not all of us and it isn’t a word we can decide for ourselves, it’s- our wolves have to decide.”

Never mind he worked out that they and ‘the wolves’ are one and the same, it is the simplest way to get across his meaning. And listen, he doesn’t have all the answers either, he doesn’t know the ins and outs of how this all works. But he knows when the beastial side of him feels something is off, especially concerning how it itself functions, then he should perhaps believe it and he should stick to that. 

Laura gives him a slightly lost look. “Riiight. Okay, is this- are we just being pedantic about language now? Or can I finish what I was saying?”

Ryan sighs loudly, looks away a moment and shakes his head. Maybe he’s being pedantic about language but it’s language that clearly holds weight, language holding concepts that are far from what their group has yet to reach. He chews his inner cheek, trying to decide whether to push the issue or let it go. His mind is straining a little, forced full with simultaneously vivid and foggy memories of his time transformed. He knows obviously that the thought process is quite different when transformed, not quite words and certainly not pedantic about language to say the least. Yet in the translation of one form of thought to another, he recalls the very specific ways he considered the others, from that first month and the one just passed. Specific concepts on how he viewed them, outside of how he'd word it in this moment. Whereas he'd see the others as people before they transform, that's not how he saw it in his wolf form. He struggles to find how he'd thought of them then... it comes to him in not a voice of his own mind but a instinctual knowledge, like how one knows to form a fist. Callows. No other word could describe it the same for his wolfside, no other word that his 'human' mind could find would capture it, not 'infected' or 'turned' or how ever else they describe it. He realises then that it's the same for these other words Laura has used today, words with very specific gravities that she doesn't feel the weight of.

There's a reason why that is too and he reminds himself that some of his judgement of her staunch belief in this theory is unfair. She hasn't experience the full moon in the way he, and now Kaitlyn too, have. She hasn't been bleary but conscious for it, behind a fishbowl in a mind that has changed to something far more animal. Remembering it all in the morning, recalling those instincts and those concepts he thought of things in, gives him a perspective and knowledge that she just isn't capable of holding. She's working with what she has, what is true to her at this point, but Ryan knows there is another experience, another side to this whole thing that she isn't aware of. If he wants them to reach that point themselves, then he has to make it clear that it does exist, even if they don't understand yet. He can't just let them think they've figured it all out, when he knows they haven't.   

So when the first syllable falls from Laura’s lip, he decides he cannot move on without making his thoughts clear and he interrupts her again, despite knowing for certain she’ll be getting truly pissed off now. He finds it hard to care too much with this feeling of resolution. ”I think you’d be the first to say specifics are important here, right? And specifically, we aren’t a pack. Kaitlyn and Jacob aren’t alphas. The framing is right yet.” He blurts out, slightly more forceful than he intended.

It’s a second at most of silence, but it stretches. Then, the chaos ramps back up. First Jacob scoffs and it sends Ryan’s head swivelling to glare at him. Then he catches Abi’s wide eyes and near feverish nods of agreement, which, weird. Then surprisingly, it’s Max, sticking up for his girlfriend.

”What, only you can be? Laura- c'mon, you know she put in a lot to work this out, man.” He says with petering fire.

Jacob jumps on the opportunity of course. “Yeah Ryan, think you can be the only alpha werewolf here? You think the rest of us should be fucking omegas like Dylan?” 

He earns a sharp eye roll from Dylan for it and a scrunched up nose from Abi, who was pointedly, for whatever reason, left out from his quip. Ryan personally wants to either punch him or bite him, the human and wolf side in solid agreement now. He’s about to snap out his own mean quip, disappointing them both, when Kaitlyn surprises them all by speaking up.

”It’s pretty clear what he meant but- Ryan’s right.” She ignores the gaping expressions turned towards her as she continues. “I mean, what are you the alpha of, Jacob? You have no pack, no one to lead.”

Jacob stares at her, the betrayal on his face amplified in the air around him. She ignores that too, breathing deeply before her nose twitches at the heavy scents in the air, surely regretting her decision of letting it in. But it was clearly enough to gather her thoughts together as she looks with intent to Ryan as she speaks. “My sense of smell and hearing, they’ve settled over the past month. Still incredibly strong but not so… overwhelming.”

She’d mentioned it a couple of times over text, vague relief at no longer feeling like her neighbour is in the room with her, even if she can still hear them clearly. This direct confirmation though feels significant and Ryan’s head starts to fill with his own theories and rationals. In his explanations just past, he had skirted around the fact he knows what pack is because he knows he’s found it in Kaitlyn. Again, not because he’s hiding it or anything, they really had tried to explain last month, but more due to the lack of understanding they showed when they had tried to explain. He knows this has to be connected to their newfound pack, the softening of her senses but- he tries to wrack his memory. No, his own senses haven’t settled or dulled in the slightest, remaining as strong and overwhelming as ever. Is she saying what he thinks she’s saying? She’d be okay with the idea of that? Let alone the fork that throws in Laura’s whole theory of biology over socialisation. Something within isn't surprised however, rather more pleased with the acknowledgement. He's glad at least, that it can be acknowledged as nothing more than fact, not something that creates tension between them. They've already had that tussle and he won that fight fight and square, she bowed down and admitted her rightful defeat. For all the jokes that have been thrown around, they both know it's true- he is the top dog in their little pack of two. 

In the corner of his vision, he spots Laura, who had grown suspiciously quiet, scribbling down in her notebook once more. He feels a little bad now, that her triumphant finish to all her research has apparently not yet quite reached its end just yet. But as he’d thought earlier, it was wishful thinking that this would just wrap it all up with a neat little bow on top. They’re still predominantly in the dark about it all. She looks up so suddenly that he catches the startle Emma gives, the rest of the group technically silent but so buzzing with tension that it’s nearly audible.

“You definitely could have brought this up earlier but hurrah for group discussions I suppose.” Laura says as she huffs a breath and points an accusing finger at him, yet it seems some of the coldness has melted under the heat of her intrigue of any new knowledge. “Alright, I’ll bite. You tried to explain this feeling of pack last month, I have it in my notes. And now you’re saying that your senses have weakened Kaitlyn, after joining this ‘pack’. So…”

“I didn’t say weakened, I said softened.” Kaitlyn corrects.

”You guys are a fucking stickler with that tonight, Jesus.” Laura complains, the annoyance not lasting long enough to really make an impact before she steamrolls over her own emotions. “Okay, softened. They’ve softened, which I definitely didn’t account for. So the biology, which I was certain was a fixed thing, can apparently change. Anyone else experienced something similar, at any point since they were turned?”

The chorus of ‘no’s’ seems to confirm something for her. “Okay, okay. So I stand by my initial theory with an addendum that it’s different for you two. Because you’re ‘pack’. Which happened because you were above ground. Under the moon?” 

Ryan shakes his head slightly, leaning back with his arms crossed, as far back as he safely can on the bench. “Because we let ourselves transform.”

Emma, just as she was the one to verbalise her disagreement and confusion last time, speaks up again. He can still smell the distress clouded around her, mingling with the other heavy scents in the air. “We all let ourselves transform, we kind of have no choice. Duh. Right?” She sounds less assured in the statement this time however.

Already having had that whole speech with himself earlier, Ryan just shakes his head more forcibly. “It’s not the same.”

”Cryptic. Cool.” She pouts, resting her chin on her hand in a stunning example of petulance.

”I’m going to be completely honest, a lot of…” Dylan waves his hand around loosely as he searches for the right words. “This discussion or theories seem really… vibe based. We have no real way to confirm any of this, let's be real here.”

“Yeah. Yeah, parts of it is, but we’re working with the best we’ve got.” Laura says, some of the wind taken out of her sails and some of her confidence trampled with the apt observation. Ryan feels a little bad, he knows she’s put in a lot of effort and stress trying to work it all out and he’s thrown a wrench in it all. He’s not going to hide or ignore things just to fit neatly into the first theory that comes their way however. And she shouldn’t feel too bad, it does seem like her initial theory does fit, just used with the wrong terms or only applicable to those who have yet to stop rejecting their second nature. 

To perhaps everyone’s surprise, after a moment of stewing, Abi speaks up. “So maybe we can use different terms then? If those don’t fit.” The hope catching on her words. Ah, her weird agreement makes sense now. She just really hates any terms that acknowledge their condition, shying away from even the ‘werewolf’ word. It's maybe a little bit cruel to use that to his advantage, but even if it's not coming from the right place, he's secretly glad to have another person on his side with the relabeling.  

Laura shrugs, her lips twisted and shoulders heavy in the movement. “Sure, whatever. You guys can figure it out if you want, I’ve told you what I worked out, so… I think that’s me done for the night. C’mon Max.”

When she roughly pushes herself away from the table and starts to make her way away, Max in tow of course, Ryan thinks he hears a collective sigh escape from each and every one of them. That was a lot of information and then a lot of confusion and then a lot of realising they still don’t have all the answers, all while being suffocated by their own and each other's emotions thick in the air around them. Exhaustion will be weighing heavy on each of their shoulders he’s sure, feeling it settle on his own as well. He reminds himself that one step forward, a couple back is still movement at least.

”Right, yeah. Well my ass hurts, I’m also getting out of here.” Emma forces a smile, unable to stop her eyes from drifting towards Dylan, something painfully sad knitted between her brows. When her gaze flits over to Ryan, the breath leaves her chest and her lips twitch down for reasons he couldn’t quite name. Emma isn’t great at hiding her pain, but the reasons for it she keeps under lock and key. Her eyes twitch to the side but she resolutely keeps them on him, something that looks as if it takes great willpower. “I- I took my bags up to the attic, I should probably unpack anyway.”

It’s a subtle acknowledgement, a veiled heads up for him before she turns and leaves. At least there was one, which he’ll consider progress. Guess he’s stuck on the couch down here again. 

They quickly disperse, just as they had the last time they had a big group meeting like this, quickly hightailing it out of there as if they’ll be held hostage if they don’t make their great escape as soon as opportunity presents itself. As the others say their fast and halfhearted goodnights, complete with a glare from Jacob for raining on his alpha male parade and a soft smile and wave from Dylan as he makes his way to the library, Kaitlyn stops just next to him. She opens her mouth to speak before closing it again. She slaps a hand on his back instead, gives him an approving nod. She doesn’t have to say anything for him to get the message, good on you, we’ll work it out soon, keep sticking it out.

As he settles down on the couch with a ratty blanket pulled over him, picking out two scents from the slowly dissipating mess in the hall, tracing the outline of a yellow glow until it’s snuffed out, he thinks to himself. One step forward. He has a game plan now. They’re worked some things out, he and Dylan are okay, tomorrow he’ll talk to him and it’ll be one more down, six more to go. Seems reasonable. Sleep is not easy to come, his mind is stuck repeating ‘one step forward’, the darkening of night brings honey to clog his nose leaving him in a drowsy haze of ruminating half thoughts. When the quiet sniffling and sobs fall down over the bannister high above him, floating down like the dust that shakes off the walls, Ryan buries his head in the threadbare couch cushion. It’s a pretty shitty lullaby and he knows sleep will not be an early visitor tonight.  

Chapter Text

The sun streams in through the window behind them, the steam of his coffee curling up through the fractured beams and settling against the panes, fogging them for just a moment before that too dissipates in the warmth. Despite the chill of Fall, the library is alight with a warmth that just spreads out from everything within, from the blanket over his feet, to the cotton of his hoodie, to the affection in his chest, to the sugar in the air itself. 

Dylan has on this woollen sweater he’s never seen him in before, a somewhat patchwork knitted mix of orange, browns and few dots of green within the handcrafted pattern. He can’t decide if that, or the thick grey working socks that he has on, look warmer. He just knows he looks incredibly cosy where he’s curled up on the other side of the couch and it makes Ryan’s heart melt just a tinsy bit. 

Ryan had weaselled his way in here after a respectable amount of time, he made sure. Though he's uncertain if it was to prove to himself that he can not be in Dylan’s presence for a while when they’re on good terms and still survive, or to make himself not look quite so desperate to just be around him, he’s actually not quite sure. It was an admittedly long night of little sleep and so the respectable wait this morning felt a little brutal, but it’s past breakfast now and the warmth of everything within this room makes it all feel worth it. He’d question when his mind got oh so permanently occupied by Dylan but he admitted why that is to himself yesterday and there’s no going back now that he’s realised it. He’s a little bit in love with him.

They’ve talked a bit about yesterday, the whole group meeting thing and what they’d worked out. Dylan admitted some distaste at the theory but also conceded that it seemed to mostly track, other than what Ryan had brought up. Dylan’s currently on a roll with quips at his expense on the topic of meals and eating first, which Ryan can’t help but just shrug, grin and roll his eyes at. It’s hard to take offence to any of it when it comes from a dimpled smile and brown eyes turned to a honeyed gold in the sunlight, unable to meet his own- this is Dylan without the mask and god, he just lights up the room. Distantly, he thinks back to what Laura said, about ‘letting them away with things they wouldn’t let the other say’. But he shrugs it off, admitting to himself that he’d probably let Dylan away with anything anyway, whether it was at his expense or not. 

The jokes are getting cornier and less structured as he goes on and at this point, if he ever thought Dylan would care about it in the slightest, he’d think maybe Dylan was trying to see how long he could tease him before Ryan got sick of it. Which, privately, was probably forever considering Ryan just liked to even hear his voice because he’s so fucking gone on him that it’d be embarrassing if anyone had any clue.

Finally, when a question pops into mind that his curiosity gets the better of, he affectionately flicks Dylan on the knee and grins at the way he peters off his last barely coherently strung together joke. Dylan twists his own lips in a poorly hidden smile, asking lightly, “Not my best?”

Ryan hums, returning his elbow to the back of the couch and pretends to think it over as he takes a sip of his coffee. “Might need some workshopping before you take it to the masses.”

Dylan fakes offence with a hand dramatically slapped over his heart and a put on pout that makes Ryan’s stomach flip and chest tighten. He tries to make the mouthful of coffee go down smoother than it just threatened to with a clear of his throat, praying against everything holy that it doesn’t make it’s way up to his nose as he attempts to speak after the sight of that fucking pout. “Uhgh-“ Smooth, Ryan. He breathes out, waves the mug until the dark liquid sloshes up the sides within it. “Ahem, sorry, this is still hot. Uh, no, what I wanted to ask was- for you, with the whole food thing I mean, what does it, like, I don’t know, feel like?”

Dylan still won’t quite meet his gaze, with the mask off they never seem to quite reach. But as their time in the library has gone on, they’ve gotten closer and closer to it, even as the mask is kicked under the couch and left forgotten. This time they land pretty darn close, on the bump of his cheekbone just beneath his eye, perhaps due to the motion of the confused backwards shake of his head and scrunched up brows. “What does food feel like? Um, I mean that’s really a split bag depending on what you’re eating Ryan. Pretty subjective too, I’m fairly certain.”

“I mean with waiting.” Ryan clarifies, certain that on some level Dylan probably knew that, but seems to take great fun in having him on regardless. 

“I mean what does it feel like racing to eat first? It’s just,” He waves a hand around as if that’ll explain it. “Natural. Feels weird if I don’t, I haven’t really thought about it, didn’t really feel like a conscious or big thing until it was pointed out. What can I say, I’m just extremely polite.”

Ryan scoffs a smile before settling to a more serious tone as he reminds himself of why he’s technically in here in the first place. “Yeah, pretty much the same over here. It doesn’t really feel weird until someone makes it weird. So I’m trying to ignore that and just let it happen, you know? What’s the point in fighting it?” 

This is what he came to do, not just to bask in the warmth of Dylan’s company. Start subtle here to open the door to the conversation and then explain. He’s cheating a little, starting this whole thing with Dylan, but whatever works right? Build his own confidence up before facing one of the other’s who he reckons will take some convincing, like Nick- how the fuck is he going to talk through this with Nick, who barely speaks as is?

”Yeah, I mean that’s fair. I just remind myself that it’s just here, you know? It’s not like this at home, this is just the weirdness of the quarry or whatever. Mostly. That kind of helps.” Dylan nods along, as if that was what Ryan was trying to say. Which it definitely wasn’t.

He tetters his head left to right. “Sure… I mean, it’s kind of a part of us now though, isn’t it? It doesn’t just go away when we go home, even if some stuff doesn’t crop up as much. It’s not the quarry that’s changed, it’s us. Right?”

That sideways twist to Dylan’s lips has returned but no longer in a hidden smile. He’d say it looks far more like a grimace now. “I guess. I don’t know, I hate to think I’m bringing this home, I don’t w- I’m not letting this affect my life outside of this.”

Ryan’s eyes flick over the pallidness of his skin, the darkness beneath his eyes, the way he’s bundled up despite the warmth and silently doubts that statement very much. He opens his mouth to speak, to push the issue, before he closes it again, his teeth making an ever so slight snapping sound. He frowns, glad that Dylan’s own eyes have strayed so far away from Ryan that they’re pointed across the room at this point, so that he doesn’t see it.

This, despite how short a conversation this particular topic has been, feels as if it is not going well already. Of course he stands by the statement he made to Kaitlyn, he still wants to drag it out into the open and make everyone see it, see that they can’t keep going like this without either bending first or end up breaking. Yet he knows he has to approach this right, lest his meaning get lost in heightened emotions and fear and cutting off any further chance at explaining. He acknowledged yesterday, tactic switching is a must- he just has to work out what tactics he even has access to. Well at least he knows this subtle agreement whilst prompting type tactic is not working now.

He tries something more direct, though the waver of uncertainty in his voice definitely doesn't project that feeling. “Do you think that letting them merge, home and here, would make it easier though? That keeping them separate, I mean, is that even possible?”

“I-” Dylan starts uncertainly, before he heaves a sigh, his chin resting over his arm, face now fully turned away from Ryan and out to stare at the rest of the room. Now that Ryan is banished to his periphery, he continues with a finality that isn’t lost on Ryan. “No. No. I’m enough of a freak already, I have shit I want- had- urgh. No. It’s all just so weird.”  

This is going to be a long game then. Ryan tries not to feel put out that his first attempt has turned into a massive failure and instead just lets it settle for a moment, waits for the dark cloud of sickly sweet and deeply burnt sugar to break apart into something lighter before he speaks up again. “It is all weird.” He agrees. “So much shit that feels normal now is just kinda crazy. I mean we can smell each other's emotions, that’s insane. But we’ve gotten used to it and I’m sure much of the other stuff will be the same.”

Dylan gives a hmpth of a laugh, but it’s a sound made with ease, a lightness returned to him, thank god. “You’re telling me. I think that one symptom is what firmly shifts this all over to curse, not even including the whole bursting out of your skin once a month aspect.”

It’s Ryan’s turn to face offence now, mock shock and hurt on his face and in his words. “Are you saying we smell bad, Dylan?”

A grin, a roll of the eyes, a sidewards tilt to his head and they’re back to their regularly scheduled programming. Ryan will never get enough of it. Dylan huffs, “No, I did not say that. Not that it would be untrue mind you.” He holds up his hands in surrender with his smile widening at Ryan’s playfully threatening finger wagging at him. “Untrue sometimes, jeez. It’s just a lot.” 

“What, the constant sugar in the air isn’t to your taste? Kinda surprised you’re not a sweet tooth, to be honest.” And fuck. The grin slides slowly off his face to be replaced by what he knows is an awkwardly pained expression when he realises his mistake. 

Yeah, for Ryan the first scent to come to mind is of course the most overpowering, the one that is always clear above the rest, the one his mind always harbours awareness of in the background of his thoughts. That would be of course Dylan’s scent, which Dylan himself most likely doesn’t exactly focus on, considering it’s his own, Ryan you fucking idiot. He very narrowly avoids slapping his own forehead, sticking a nail into his palm instead. It’s slightly sharper than he expected.

Dylan looks at him with a quizzical look, eyes landing on Ryan’s cheek as if he can sense the hidden warmth within them. As if to prove Ryan’s point, the sweetness blooms, like liquid sugar has started dripping from his pores, increasing the warmth everywhere. If global warming wasn’t already a problem, Ryan tells himself, then Dylan just single-handedly killed some poor polar bear somewhere. The dimples on his cheeks pop in what Ryan can, probably only delusionally, describe as a shy smile. Fuck, it’s kids are probably orphaned.

”I am actually,” Dylan says and did he seriously just catch his lip between his teeth? Just for a millisecond as his smile shifted? Maybe Ryan has heatstroke, it’s definitely getting a little too warm in here. “But I can’t say that’s my biggest issue with the scents, no.” 

“That- Yeah, no, that makes sense. Obviously.” Ryan really tries not to mumble, but it was between that and stuttering and he chose the lesser of two evils. 

“I mean they’re all pretty strong but, you know, you notice some more than others.” Dylan continues, giving Ryan this weird look that he’s not quite sure how to read. Maybe he could if he was a little more focused but he feels a little drunk on honey right now.

He’s about to say something, probably something pretty dumb, when a thought manages to dredge itself through the haze his mind has strangely fallen under and his eyebrows do what he’s sure is an odd little motion of furrowing before darting up and then resting back to their relaxed state. How hadn’t he thought to ask this before? “What do I smell like?” 

He’d like to say it wasn’t a demand but the question veered on the edge of it from his sudden burning curiosity. He’s caught scent of himself in particularly dark moments, but that resting state, that usual scent that follows them around, not the horrible stench it turns into when they’re upset, he’s never actually thought to ask what it’s like for the others. For Dylan. Not that he thinks it’ll be as noticeable or all consuming as his own is for Ryan or anything! He’s just curious. And it’s kinda weirdly important to him suddenly to make sure Dylan doesn’t hate it.

“You don’t know?” Dylan asks, head tilting impossibly further, like a puppy trying to pick out a specific sound. And- no he shouldn’t continue with that metaphor lest he get even more lovesick.

Ryan shakes his head, swallows roughly. Gathers his self restraint, because the heady scent in the air is really doing things to his mind and he just watched every syllable of the words Dylan just spoke curve his lips. It’s grown kind of really hot in here. The temperature, obviously. This is just totally normal interactions between friends, it's not hot emotionally, it's just really warm, obviously. Obviously.

Those lips that he’s just a little bit obsessed with curve into this evil little grin and god. Totally normal and not hot at all. “Oh I don’t know. You just smell like axe body spray.”

The bark of laughter that Ryan gives is not attractive, he knows that, but he can’t hold it in. He looks at Dylan with as much of an unimpressed expression he can, but the wide smile surely undercuts any significance to it. The little shit looks far too pleased with himself. “Really? No, that’s crazy, considering that I haven’t used that shit since I was twelve.”

Dylan leans back, head all innocently tilted and smile all placidly sweet. “I don’t know, I kinda liked it.”

”I’ll make no comment on your taste and instead just throw it out there that you definitely wouldn’t anymore.” Ryan says, also leaning back, putting his weight into his arm thrown over the back of the couch. His unfinished mug of coffee rests forgotten and abandoned, hanging from his fingers and threatening to spill the cold drink over the couch.

Dylan makes a short and incredibly dramatic backhanded shooing motion at him. “Pft, rains and parades, Ryan.”

”Yeah, yeah, but seriously. What do I smell like to you?” Watching him like a hawk in wait for the answer.

“Okay, well. You kind of smell like dirt?”

There's a moment spent as they both pause. If he wasn’t so caught up in the shock of that response, he’d probably zero in far more closely to how Dylan flushes a red high on his cheeks. Dylan thinks he smells like dirt? That… doesn’t sound good. He doesn’t want to admit his heart kind of plummets a little, thinking Dylan must hate smelling something like that whenever he’s around. Nothing like honeyed sugarcomb or freshly squeezed fruits or melted lollies left in the sunlight. Dirt. Seriously? That kinda sucks. Not even like, some fancy clay or anything? Dirt? “What?”

“No, no, okay not like dirt dirt. But like earthy, I guess. Like, I don’t know, you know how, like, the dirt smells after it rains? Or like moss or wet tree bark, that kind of thing. Do you get what I mean? I didn’t mean like dirt.” Dylan hurries to explain, the red on his cheeks flushing just a little brighter through his explanation. He finishes unsurely. “Like good dirt?”

It doesn’t sound as bad now, Ryan can get behind moss covered trees and soil after the rain. It makes him think of the forest just outside the window, large and imposing but also filling him with that unshakable sense of home now. He still feels the urge to check though, even if not directly. “So, a bit better than bad dirt, at least?” Though he knows he’s lying to himself, he chooses to believe he had enough self restraint to not let it come out as a question. 

“It’s- you s- It’s a good scent.” As if to cover the red on his face, he clears his throat and leans towards Ryan ever so slightly, conspiringly. “Better than rotting leaves at least.”

Ryan doesn’t have to read into the relief he feels and takes the out that’s being handed to him on that polished silver platter. “And who would that be?”

”Max. It’s not actually bad, when people are relaxed no one smells bad. Some are just… better? Or more noticeable than others, is all.” Dylan explains, the red fading and settling back against the arm of the couch. The odd unnameable tension they’d managed to create dissolves just as easily as that.

Ryan makes the executive decision not to ask, in case he gets his feelings hurt. If the names Jacob or Kaitlyn came up and not his own, he knows he’ll start feeling some type of way and he doesn’t want to ruin this relaxed environment for himself. It’s- okay, maybe he came in here with the idea of convincing Dylan about how it will only make things harder to resist ‘the wolf’ and letting himself transform, letting himself do what feels natural and no longer hold back against these changes would be so much more healing for him than trying to keep himself separate from it all. Yeah, that may have been a big fat fail in that regard, however honestly Ryan considers this all a win. Perhaps a bit selfish, but Ryan has yet to ever feel that spending time with Dylan like this, when it’s warm and comfortable, doesn’t feel like something at least is going right. If his couple of steps back lead him into this library then he still feels like he’s going in the right direction regardless.

As Dylan proceeds to snark and rattle off jokes about all the other’s scents, lightheartedly of course, Ryan tries to smother his smile and as subtlety as possible adjust his collar. It’s still a little too warm in here he thinks, his mind running just a little slow, his eyes dragging over Dylan’s features in a way he promised himself he wouldn’t anymore. When he gives this little huff of a laugh and guilty little smile, Ryan’s on the verge of grasping his cheeks in his hands and kissing him until the both of them are forced to survive on nothing more than the same breath shared between them. It’s testament to the slop his brain has turned into within that hazy warmth and heady scent that he doesn’t even think to berate himself for the thought or urge, just growing a few degrees warmer. That familiar itch has started to tingle in his fingers, that urge to reach out causing them to jolt the mug clutched in his grasp. Honestly, the patter of cold coffee against the fabric of the couch cushion is the only thing that snaps his mind back to itself.

He quickly rightens the mug, using his sleeve to wipe the drip rolling down the side of the ceramic. He thinks of trying to use it to wipe at what has landed on the couch, but with his lips tugging back in distaste, he knows it’s too late and has already soaked in.

”Aw c’mon Ryan, seriously? This is my bed, man, be careful.” Dylan scolds, not sounding serious in the slightest, the amusement bending his words into something a little delightfully wobbly.

That statement however, doesn’t exactly help what Ryan realises is actually a predicament. His chest grows impossibly warmer still, an odd tugging sensation within, due to the idea of this being Dylan’s bed. Which it isn’t, it’s a ratty old couch with even rattier blankets shoved over it. Yet that doesn’t matter to him apparently, considering this strange feeling he’s not actually sure he could name has taken root. It’s then that he decides that although there is nothing more he would like than to stay in the hazy fog of warmth and faux drunkenness that the library brings, he should probably get some air and get his head back on his shoulders. The only thing is, he really doesn’t want to leave Dylan’s company despite this and he knows Dylan was hiding away in here for a reason, the awkward tension thick in the main room of the lodge and the forest looming ominously outside. Although he does have one stone and despite the two birds, he decides to take a shot.

”Have you ever been into North Kill?” He asks, perhaps a bit suddenly as Dylan tilts his head at him and speaks in that tone .

”What, are you going to buy me a new…” He glances down at the new stain. “Bed? Couch?”

”Yeah, I’m sure there’s a massive IKEA right in the middle of town. I imagine it really blends in.” Ryan affectionately rolls his eyes. “No, but we should go check it out. Get a new coffee or something, I don't know what's in town, but.”

Dylan eyes him almost critically for a moment, for some reason? Maybe he was actually upset about Ryan spilling coffee on the couch and shit okay, he actually feels a bit bad now. Maybe he can bring down one of the spares from the rec room or something. But then the look disappears and is replaced by one of his blinding smiles and a hint of colour to his cheeks- so it’s not just Ryan feeling the heat of the room then, the sun must really be cooking the room through the protection the window panes give them from the wind.

Dylan mirrors the shrug Ryan himself had given when he’d finished speaking, telling him with a truly stunning grin that Ryan has to look away lest his heart palpitations turn into a full attack, “Yeah, sure we can go out for coffee. Even if there’s no cafe I’m sure we can charm our way into some old ladies house for a hot drink and some scones.”

Ryan’s brows furrow at the way he worded that, his breath stuttering. He’s about to start boiling alive, he’s genuinely certain. Dylan made it sound like a date, which- shit, had Ryan proposed this weirdly? God, fuck yeah it definitely sounded like a coffee date. Unless he wasn’t actually thinking that at all and Ryan was now the one reading into it because he’s lovesick over the guy. Is he being the kind of guy to read into any kindness or agreement as reciprocation right now? His idea of hanging out with a random old lady for the afternoon doesn’t exactly sound datelike. Unless that was just a joke, which obviously it was. Unless it wasn’t? But Dylan wouldn’t agree to go on a date with him anyway, since Ryan knows he isn’t interested at all. The only way he’d agree was if he was doing that really mean mocking agreement that asshole kids do. Which Dylan wouldn’t do. Obviously. Right? Obviously, Dylan’s not like that. Okay shit, seriously which way was Dylan meaning it?

He’s worked himself into a tangle of anxiety and confusion, so he’s genuinely impressed with himself when he manages to save his disastrous fumble, in what comes out actually pretty smoothly. “Cool, I’m sure at least some of the others are curious too, I’ll ask and see who else wants to come.” 

“Oh, uh, yeah yeah.” Dylan says as he looks away, leaving Ryan unable to catch his expression. He’s fished out his shoes from beneath the couch, busying himself with lacing them. He sighs loudly, before attempting to cover it with a clear of his throat and then a nervous short laugh. “Kait will join for sure. She’d never say no to either a random IKEA in the woods or free coffee, so.”

So that confirms it then, the relief in that response obvious in Ryan’s mind. He stands and now that he’s off the couch and upright, his head must have broken above what must have been the low hanging mist of Dylan’s scent. Just as rapidly as it had grown warmer, the room feels cooler now and the near tooth rotting sweetness has settled to something much more healthy. Maybe a little sour? But that wouldn’t make sense. Either way, it’s a small mercy and relief to his strained self control right now, but mostly he’s just glad to have gotten out of that particular interaction alive and with his dignity intact. Even if Dylan’s relief at it not being a date is a little needle in the heart, he knows where he stands and he’s not surprised.

“I’ll go do the rounds.” Ryan tells him, pausing just by the door and looking back to where Dylan still laces his shoes. He tries to stop himself but he cannot help but add, “And grab a coat, you’ll feel the chill out there.”

Back in the main room of the lodge, the library door softly clicking behind him, he takes an immediate right. He’s not trying to be a dick, not inviting Laura and Max, just making an educated guess that Laura doesn’t want to be around him and knowing now that Max’s scent isn’t favoured by his h- Ryan actually pauses mid step. Jesus, that library has the ability to turn his brain into soup. Not the library, he internally sighs to himself, but rather the guy he just went to refer to as ‘his honey’. Christ Ryan, cool it. While an apt term perhaps, he’s never thought of someone with such a cheesy pet name before, certain actually that he’s proclaimed such endearments as gratuitous and embarrassing to friends before. He’s got half a mind to turn around and invite Max specifically just to spite himself for the thought, but his instincts insist the reasoning remains sound and he cannot bring himself to do it. ‘Over protective’, ‘territorial’ he was warned. Brain, soup and all that, clearly. 

He’s not so lost in his thoughts that he walks into Emma sitting huddled on the stairs, but he does only notice with enough time to stop a mere couple of steps beneath her, accidentally leaving him towering over her and certainly too close for either of their comfort, considering the few metres distance they usually keep between them. He looks down at her, notes curiously the way she holds her phone in her hand as if she’s using it despite the screen remaining firmly blank despite the thumb she’s smoothing across the screen. 

She looks up, just as startled at him appearing in front of her as he was to find her in his path. She gives this twisted apologetic smile, tucking her phone into her pocket and putting a hand down on the wood to support her as she stands, all while not quite as subtly as he thinks she intended, leaning back from him. “Sorry, I uh-”

“Do you wanna go into town with us? Me, Dylan and Kaitlyn are going, thought we’d check out North Kill. Since you know, we’re gonna be here regularly.” He blurts out, feeling somewhere within him that this is an opportunity he shouldn’t skip. Maybe it’s the arid scent still misted through the air, seemingly permanently at the moment or maybe it’s due to the quiet sobbing sound he listened to nearly all night still ringing in his ears. 

She considers it for a moment, which is a step forward in itself, Ryan decides. She clutches at the necklace hung around her neck, one he’s never seen her in before, holding the golden cross in what he assumes is a subtle nervous gesture. A complicated expression crosses over her face before she schools it, looking down and inspecting her nails as if she doesn’t have a care in the world. “Who else is coming? Like Abi or I don’t know, Jacob coming?” She asks and he can tell how much effort she puts into making it sound disinterested. He kinda feels a little bad that it doesn’t even work on him of all people. 

Ryan makes an executive decision then. It is as pragmatic as it is selfish. Emma will obviously decline if Jacob does join the outing and honestly, she’s kind of worrying him at the moment and thinks getting her out of this lodge will do her far more good than it would Jacob right now. At the same time, Ryan can admit to himself that he’d jump on any opportunity that stops Jacob from fluttering around Dylan, making jokes and metaphorically jabbing his ribs while also trying to get a rise out of Ryan or start a standoff. So combine those together and his morals are half there at least. That seems sufficient enough from him.   

“Nah, but you should come. We’re leaving as soon as we have our shoes on so, you might wanna find yours quick.” He tells her, silently hoping that she’d left her shoes downstairs by the front door, rather than up in the attic where he’s heading.

Kaitlyn, as Jacob’s best friend, will want to have him tag along. And technically she hasn’t actually agreed to come herself yet, despite Ryan stating that she is. He trusts he can give her a look over Emma’s shoulder that would convince her to come, but he’s not quite as convinced in his level of expressiveness to silently convey that she should come but can not on any uncertain terms invite Jacob or mention inviting him. That feels like it would be a complicated face to make. He’s going to have to put his eyebrows to work though, since Emma does spare a glance up the stairs and proceed to trail after him as he continues to make his way up.

Kaitlyn is lounging on her own couch-bed, with earbuds in and her eyes glued to the screen of her phone, squinting to make out whatevers playing on it through the sunlight streaming in through the dusty window. She goes to hold up a finger for him to wait with an accompanying glance, but he raises a brow at her and though she scowls, she clicks the power button and pulls out her headphones. 

“I thought you were kicked out from up here.” She says as she crosses her arms, acting petulant because she turned off whatever she was watching. He skips ‘had to’ there because she really didn’t have to- sure, his thoughts were written across his face but he wasn’t going to argue it, all he did was raise a brow. He thinks a month earlier she would’ve ignored him or had he decided to push it, a standoff would’ve started. Now she just sulks as she waits for him to answer, yet with no more complaint or aggression further.

Ryan shrugs, resists rolling his eyes. “Emma’s joining me, you and Dylan to town. Came to let you know we’re going.”

Kaitlyn, quick and clever Kaitlyn, thank god, spares a subtle glance to Emma grabbing her shoes from where they’ve been presumably thrown against the railing. Her lips purse and she nods. “Cool, was waiting for you guys. We taking Old Red?”

Ryan doesn’t resist the urge this time. “Not unless you plan to ride in the trunk.”

Kaitlyn shrugs, always so pleased with herself and amused when she does her little quips. She wouldn’t be Kaitlyn without it and she’s more than family now, so he regrettably finds himself smothering a grin, despite the playful torment being directed at him. “There’s a leash back there, isn't there?”

He makes a face at the wicked glint in her eye, scrunching his nose up at her. “Don’t make it weird. I regret inviting you.”

“I think the term invite suggests a choice, Ryan. But I get it, taking the opportunity to throw your weight around…” She continues to tease and cackles frighteningly reminiscent of a witch when he threatens to jump shoulder slam her like a wrestler, in an aborted move from across the room. He’s kind of glad the two of them have reached a point where actions like that aren’t considered an aggress to cause a standoff- they already did the whole standoff turning into a brawl and despite Ryan winning, he’d rather not have a repeat and lose another piece of his ear.

She holds her hands up in surrender before shoving the cables of her headphones into her pocket in what Ryan knows will turn them into a tangled mess. He looks over across the room to see where Emma’s at and finds himself in a second long pause. Emma’s staring at them, at the tail end of the interaction between them, with an expression he finds himself unable to read or comprehend the reasoning of why it would exist in the first place. She watches them closely, flicking over them both before something in her settles and she gives what Ryan thinks is the first genuine smile he’s seen from her since that dreaded night. He, as subtle as possible, scents the air and to an odd sense of relief and hope, finds that although the summer winds are still bitter, they have settled into something a little more temperate than before.

He’s hesitant to push it and upset her like yesterday, yet his confusion on what she could have been thinking while she was observing him pushes him to lightly prompt, “You okay?”

She doesn’t shrug so much as roll her shoulders, before flicking her ponytail behind her and smiling again. “Yeah. And Dylan assumedly included, we all have shoes on so we’re waiting on you now.” She says in a mostly carefree manner. There’s still some tension held between her brows and in her jaw, but she seems to have let go of this weight she’s been carrying, even if only for a moment.

Ryan cocks his head to the side, showing off his own tense jaw and furrowed brow in that common expression of his that his mom always hated. Defiant and judgemental and just downright rude she always called it- though, she called most expressions Ryan made other than a beaming smile that, so it was really unfortunate for them both that he’s always favoured tight lipped grins. He’s looking at Kaitlyn, on her couch-bed, lounging under a blanket and back to Emma. He points at them both, “You just forgot she’s in the room, or have you uninvited her? Not that I’m arguing if you have.”

Emma mirrors the expression and he guesses he sees what his mom was talking about those years ago, but he could be understating Emma’s admirable ability to make any look bitchier than anything anyone else is capable of. “No, she’s ready to go.” She insists.

He looks back to Kaitlyn in what might be dawning horror. “Dude, please don’t tell me-” She throws the blanket off of herself, tightly laced canvas sneakers hitting the floor. He shakes out a hand at her as he turns away in disgust. “That’s so- stop smiling, don’t even talk to me.”

He hears them trailing after him, their laughter following just behind. “It’s a couch, it’s not actually my bed! Listen I am never allowed shoes to ever come an inch past the entrance at my house, so I’m making use of my freedom! Plus, I’m just being prepared, right? What-”

By the time they’ve piled into the van and made their way down the driveway, Kaitlyn has yet to finish up on her justifications of shoes in her makeshift bed. Worst still, Dylan has joined in, though he’s not even on her side but equally neither on Ryan’s, just both sidesing it, the bastard. The trees whirl past as the playful argument continues, Emma shushing them at times to get them to all squint at an upcoming road sign as they make their way towards town with no true directions or map. When they break through the heavy treeline, into more scattered and dispersed wood, the town looms in front of them. Emma slows the van as they pass the North Kill sign, each of them leaning forward in their seats to catch their first glimpses of the town they will now have to call a neighbour for a few days each month for the rest of their lives. As the white painted wood and slate roofs come into view, Ryan has the sudden but unshakeable feeling that he will die next to this town. It passes just as quickly as it comes, yet he knows, one way or another, it's the truth.

Chapter Text

The roads are old in town, not well paved and the paint nearly entirely gone, chipped away to nothing. It is unsurprisingly tiny, though still more than just a huddle of homes around a town hall at least. They’re on the main road immediately on entrance and it runs down the centre of town, lined by what businesses the town has to offer, until it ends in a small gardened plaza in front of the town hall. On either side of the centre of town, there looks to be a good couple of blocks worth of houses, give or take. So, small to say the least.

As they drive down the main road, Ryan peers closely at the various businesses, though there’s not exactly many. The most modern thing within the town is the old gas station with flickering lights on the very end of the main road when they first started down, then the very run down building labelled Harbinger Motel, a hardware store, a bar, a tiny doctors office and pharmacy tucked beside the local post office and gazette, a small grocer in what has to be an ancient building with a squished shop that appears to be an old record store beside it and oh thank god, right at the end there’s a cafe. All the essentials really, without much more. Ryan feels a sense of smugness when he fails to see a garage, even though he already knew he wouldn’t, as he’s aware that the locals make the hour-long trip down to his Pop’s when they need it. He’s definitely been at the shop working when some of them have come in, but he knows himself and therefore he knows he would not even vaguely recognise any of them.

The town admittedly has a sort of a creepy air to it. Though it’s not the deer heads, stripped of flesh and bleached white, hanging over front doors. It’s not the abandoned cemetery they drove past on the way in, overgrown into a thicket of nettles and cracked stone. It’s not the crows gathering on rooftops tracking them with their beady little eyes, so many of them, more than he’s ever seen before. It’s not the thick clouds overhead, casting the town in a sickly grey light and it’s not the corn fields he can vaguely spot behind the town hall, whatever's left to just brown and rot before the new crop is planted at the end of the upcoming winter. It’s not the crosses hanging in windows or nailed to walls and it’s not the rusted sign outside the church proudly declaring that now is the day of salvation. It’s not even the rundown state of every building, flaking brown brick and chipped white paint, open windows with cracks in the corners and torn white netting pulled out by the wind. Ryan has seen it all before, mixed among the generally more modernised and better off state of his own small town just down the road. He’s not the average city dweller coming in and being shocked at the rundown state of generational poverty or staunch traditionality that refuses to accept any change for better or worse. So maybe it’s all of it, the concentration of it, with no hint of a life or world existing outside of this. Like this is all that’s left of the world, a moment in time from years ago that was left here frozen, while everything else that was new and shiny and good crumbled away.    

Despite the chill of Fall, the locals do mill around these businesses and the town in general though, which lessons the feeling somewhat. Or maybe that just amplifies it even more, again, he’s not sure, unable to quite put his finger on the eerie feel. This town has the distinct feel of a ghost town yet to be abandoned. With warm coats on they trek from shop to shop with arms laden with bags or warm coffees in hand to try and chase off the bite of cold in their fingers. He’s unsurprised by the amount of elderly he sees, people in retirement age, who have most likely lived here their whole lives. There’s younger families too of course, kids hanging off the arms of their middle aged parents, kicking up droplets of water onto their pants as they stomp in every puddle they see along the cracked pavement. There’s just no one Ryan’s age, which, also unsurprising.

He grew up in a small town too, not quite so small and nowhere near as creepy as this, but close enough for comparison. Quite literally the neighbour of this town, so the function remains the same at the very least. These towns are isolated in the woods, small and tight knit. Everyone will have roots here, some way or another. He knows how it works, when kids are finished with high school they get the hell outta dodge as quickly as they can. Most will stay gone, move onto bigger and better places, where there’s anonymity and a variety of people and opportunities. Some will feel the call of home however, reasons including but not limited to nostalgia for their childhood home, some sense of loyalty to keep the tiny town from becoming abandoned, ageing parents they’ve come back to look after until they’ve aged enough themselves that there’s no more point in leaving, or most often the relative safety and cheapness of the town to raise their own family in. So, a lot of old folks, adults and kids but zero twenty somethings. They’re going to make an odd sight, that’s for sure.

Since he knows how these small towns work, he doesn’t have to look to know the van is getting peered at as they pull into a park at the end of the main road, licence plate hanging over the pavement of the plaza. Instead he peers down at the town hall, spotting tucked next to the right side of it a small school, most likely for all ages and on the other, the infamous police station. There’s a road behind it, so he doubts Laura and Max tore through the gardens in the plaza and down the main road when they broke out of prison that August night. He’s most interested in the sight of an old stone building on the right side of the plaza however, only figuratively overshadowed by the beautifully carved church parallel to it. The third church they’ve driven past now, including the one just out of town. Tucked back behind the gardens and corner of the cafe, Ryan doesn’t get a good look at it, but the sight of a family leaving with books stacked in their arms is more than enough to call his attention to it. From here he can’t tell if it’s a library or a bookshop but rest assured that poorly hidden building has suddenly become his number one priority on any further exploration of this town.

As he steps out the sliding door of the van, with the nip in the air instantly biting into any exposed skin and causing him to shove his hands in his coat pockets, he does a slow three sixty scan of the town. The forest encroaches even within the densest centre of it, tall trees with thick trunks and long reaching branches fill every piece of empty space, uncaring of what concrete they must break through to grow out their roots or what windows they scrape with their branches. A rotting array of yellow and orange leaves cover the town in a slick and decaying snow, stuffed into rain gutters and whipping up to fly down the road, ending their journey tucked behind the windshield wipers of parked trucks. Every building has been here for some time, showing their age through chipped paint or sun bleached wood. He spots a tire swing in a front yard of a house just visible to the side of the plaza, a plume of light smoke rising from another, a forgotten pair of gloves on a bench in the plaza gardens, a small dog, a terrier of some sort, chained up just outside the post office. It’s a small sort of melancholy, closer to nostalgia and grief than anything else, that settles beneath his sternum. 

There’s a light touch of a hand to his elbow that makes him turn, looking just down to brown eyes meeting his own for the first time today. It’s enough to startle the feeling away. “You okay?” Dylan asks quietly, lost to the wind for anyone other than Ryan.

Ryan knows Dylan has his two modes of being, masked and unmasked. He knows that masked, he’s stuffing down behaviours and forcing himself to do things he’s actually not quite comfortable with for the sake of appearances, to be read right, conform to expectations and protect himself. Kind of like the smothering of new instincts, Ryan thinks distantly. It’s as much for others as it is for himself, whether Dylan knows the reason why or not. Such as making eye contact. Yet although not a major issue for Ryan, who has always had the other side of it, all his life apparently at fault for staring into people’s souls until they became uncomfortable, thankfully something he’s levelled it out with age, he knows how it can work. Comfort with someone can make it easier, make it not really a problem when it comes to that specific person. Sarah’s like that at least. And with Dylan’s right hand currently being shaken out at his side as if he’s dunked it in water, he’ll safely assess the mask has yet to slide into place. The pride and warmth chases any remaining sense of melancholy away as the touched feeling takes its place.

“Yeah, I’m good.” He nods with a soft smile, taking in every atom that makes up the brown eyes meeting his own, as if it’s the last time he’ll ever see them, in case it’s actually a fluke and it really is. He’s falling back into old habits he knows, staring until he’s drowning in the sight and moment, until it breaks. Later than he expected admittedly, Dylan seemingly indulging him for a moment of drawn out silence.

Finally Dylan nods, pulling in a deep breath and looking away as he gathers himself up. His hand stops its movement, shoved instead into the pocket of his coat. His coat which Ryan told him to wear, which he was desperately trying to ignore the entire ride here, reminding himself that Dylan would have probably worn it anyway. There is no reason for the pride or, dare he admit, possessive feeling he gets from the sight of it. Dylan’s face smoothes out from the slight worried expression he’d worn moments ago and he tilts his head as he looks around. When he speaks, it’s with that ever so slightly off tone that Ryan only notices because he knows why there might be a difference, the mask now slid in place. 

“Just checking because I’m about to majorly let you down,” Dylan frowns before looking back at Ryan with this sad little expression. For an act, the puppy dog eyes are still far too convincing. “There’s no IKEA.”

Ryan clicks his tongue, now trying to also ignore how he feels at the sight of that particular expression. Despite the cold, he’d rather not feel that sort of warmth here in the middle of town. “I don’t think I’ve ever been so disappointed in my life.”

”You know, for someone with a very monotone voice, I think it’s kind of tragic your humour is sarcasm, Ryan.” Emma says as she rounds the front of the van, the largest thermos that Ryan has ever seen clutched in her hand. “You should probably make your sarcasm clearer.”

Kaitlyn, so in time with Emma’s steps he’d assume she would have to stare at their feet to make it so perfectly align if she was not looking right at him, hums her agreement. “She’s right, if I didn’t know you weirdly lack the vested interest in IKEA that we should all possess, I’d actually believe you.”

“You do sound pretty grave about it.” Dylan tacks on with a smile and a nudge of his elbow to Ryan’s. 

Ryan shrugs, purses his lips and flicks out his fingers from within his pockets, causing the bottom of his coat to lift with the movement. “I could be very serious about IKEA, who says I’m lying?”

He’s not impressed with the fact that not just Kaitlyn laughs, not just Emma too, but even Dylan, the little goddamn traitor. Kaitlyn is far too pleased for the chance to remind him that she remembers otherwise. “Because you can’t lie for shit dude, remember when you tried to lie to Nick at camp about the forks? Oh or to Jacob? Oh! Oh or to-“

”Yeah, yeah okay I get it. The fork thing wasn’t even my fault.” He grumbles, leaning back against the van, half in hope he phases through it and gets absorbed by the earth. It wasn’t his fondest memory, the scolding he got from Nick for how the forks all ended up bent and misshapen. The kids didn’t even mind though, it wasn’t a big deal, even if Ryan did end up having to spend the rest of camp eating from an odd angle. 

”You made it your fault when you tried to lie about it and failed spectacularly. Honestly you should have just let Dylan take the fall since it was his fault but-“ Kaitlyn rolls her eyes at herself and huffs, forcing herself back on track. “Not the point. You can’t lie for shit so how can you blank faced, monotone out sarcasm as if it isn’t basically the same thing?”

Ryan raises a hand in his pocket again, lifting the left side of his lip and creasing that same eye, in a derisive puzzlement. “I dunno?”

”And the press is left wondering, more at seven.” Emma states in a similar style of humour to what they’re all on Ryan’s tail about. She switches to a huffed whine as she continues. “Seriously, it is freezing out here, Dylan’s about to die of hypothermia and I’m in desperate need of caffeine.”

Ryan glances to where Dylan is at his side, nearly shivering out of his skin. He gets the overwhelming urge to offer him his coat and not just because he wants to see him in his clothes, despite that old fantasy still leaving him running hot at the thought. But that would stupid, he already has one, he can’t be double coated. Maybe Ryan shouldn’t have reminded him to bring one earlier, the idea of him wearing Ryan’s clothes definitely a winner over just wearing his own that Ryan told him to. Though, they’re both winning concepts really, yet the image of him being drowned in the warm fabric that’s covered in Ryan’s scent, the completely black bomber such a style change from the soft knitted sweater that it’d be so obvious it’s not his is- okay, Jesus, cool it Ryan. Not the time. Not that it is ever, seriously he has to let that spirit go. Friends, normal friends stuff, c’mon. 

After clearing his throat, he looks back to Emma with a nod, to her and then backwards over his shoulder. “Yeah, cafe back that way.”

Strangely, the girls both steady a look at him for a moment, he’s not sure just how to read them. Well, he can read at least the knowing aspect to Kaitlyn’s scrunched up stare. They’re not a hive mind, so they can’t be thinking the same thing but their little observations that they seem to be doing at this moment come out looking pretty similar. Curiosity? Or no, more like they’re weighing him up. Maybe? Whatever, he knows that for all the weird stuff that being infected has brought, mind reading was not one of them and as they stated earlier, he’s usually pretty blank faced. He has faith in that aspect of himself at least, so whatever they’re reading into right now, they surely have no idea what it is they’re supposedly reading. They’re the weirdos right now, Ryan helplessly defends himself in his own mind, against his voice in his head that is fairly convinced it’s the other way around.

Emma scrunches up her nose and slaps her free hand down on the thermos she clutches, the metal giving a click against her nails. “Okay, soo…?” 

Ah, right. They’re waiting for him to take the first step forward then, which makes sense, he was the one that invited them all out- or, actually. He pauses just before he moves, thinking the passive thought over a little more closely. It could actually be because of their whole rankings thing, the ‘aura’ and all that. He’s gotten a little more used to them listening to him and waiting for him to lead than he was that first month, yet it’s still strange enough that his first thought is to try and make excuses or find reasons as to why. But they know why now, at least in parts, with that aspect of the unfleshed out theory holding true. Hm, even if it’s an explanation, it doesn’t make it feel any less strange or unexpected than it did without it, however. 

As if to test the theory, though he already knows what the results will be either way and thus making it a pretty shit test, he pushes off the van and begins to move past the others towards the pavement. Sure enough, they all follow. Unsurprisingly it doesn’t make it any clearer, yet he’s not about to ask and kill what lightness Emma has today. She’s getting along with them all, despite the specific tensions she’s held with each of them and Ryan’s not about to ruin that- he’ll let one of the others do so first, certain that this won’t last forever and resolving to enjoy it while it does.

Dylan trots up to walk beside him, his canvas shoes making a scuffing sound on the concrete stones of the plaza. The cafe is on the end of the main road, one side of it opening to the very edge of the small plaza, some chairs and tables stacked against the glass doors that they must only open in warmer weather. The cafe’s name is plastered to the large window facing the street, in dramatic swooping calligraphy, labelling the place “The Long Last Drop”. 

“Do you think they mean it in the like…” Dylan says beside him, miming a hand across his throat and then pulled up above his tilting head when Ryan glances over.

A shocked laugh is pulled out of him, feeling slightly bewildered when he says, “What?”

”You know, a long drop is a type of hanging? As opposed to a short one. Breaks your neck, honestly kind of dark for a coffee place.” Dylan explains, beginning insistent and ending in what seems like surprised respect at the supposed nerve of the cafe.

Ryan’s bemused grin seeps into his tone. “Yeah, no got that. Just, I’m pretty sure they more likely meant it more in the whole, last drop of coffee, that you’re trying to draw out because it’s so good. Though I feel like short drop would actually work better, like it’s so good you drink it quickly, but whatever.”

Dylan over exaggeratedly shrugs his shoulders and heaves a just as put on sigh. “Hey, what would we know? Maybe the uncomfortable connotations to hanging and unclear messaging really draws in customers.”

”You’re totally right, what are our qualifications for naming things?” Ryan nods his sarcastic agreement, no less deadpan than what they were having him on for. ”I bet they brought in someone really qualified to name this place, for sure. Over qualified probably.”  

“And look at us disparaging all their hard work.” Dylan sighs again as if he’s truly disappointed in the both of them. He lifts his hands, though they’re still kept tucked in his coat pockets, so as he looks down at them in mocking horror, it’s more than a little stupid. “What have we become?”

Dylan does that thing Ryan has only recently begun to pick up, his eyes quickly flicking over to him after he’s finished his joke. He’s not certain why, so Ryan just bites back what he can of his laugh and shakes his head as his hand curls around the cafe doors handle, as if he can shake the smile off of his face- he can’t. He looks over Dylan’s shoulder to the girls just behind them, stuck in their own conversation and waits just a moment to let them catch up those few steps before he pulls open the door for the group. They step inside together, Ryan pulling the door shut behind them. Immediately they’re enveloped by warmth, hands being pulled from pockets to feel the warm air of the cafe.

Whatever creepy air the town has, it melts away into a cosy space in here, all dark brown wood hatched into itself. If he had to guess, he’d say it was all made by the very trees that make up the forest surrounding them outside, pressing in against the town as if the woods are trying to swallow it whole. There’s a fire crackling against the wall to the right, surrounded by a few aged but comfy looking cushioned chairs. It’s a bigger space than it initially looked outside, with a good few tables and chairs, small and squished against the walls as they are. It’s definitely a unique space, clearly a family's life and passion as opposed to the sleek modernity of many cafes in the city. Covered in random rugs, throws and cushions, an exceptionally large and eclectic collection of paintings on the walls with an equally impressively large amount of novelty mugs hung on silver hooks in whatever inch of free space there is between the artworks. 

It’s not exactly busting with customers of course, other than themselves there is just a single elderly lady sitting in the corner at a table, wool spread out over it and needles clicking in her hands as she knits. Dylan flicks him a playful look at the sight of her, mouthing something that looks suspiciously like ‘scones?’. Ryan shakes his head in a firm ‘Dylan, no.’ and has to quickly look away as the lady herself catches sight of the group, staring them down. Old people in small old towns and their staring problem, Ryan’s not sure how he didn’t get away with his own staring problem as a kid, honestly. 

As they slightly disperse around the room, just to get out of the way of the door, Ryan slowly walks up to the counter. He tilts left and right to try and catch sight of someone back there, the register unmanned currently. There’s a door just behind it, leading to what he assumes is a kitchen but it’s windowless, so there’s no chance of catching someone's eye. He pulls to a stop, resting his hands just atop the counter, looking down to the glass showcase also atop it to his right. It’s completely empty, without even a crumb left within. A hint of worry creeps up as he turns back around to the only other customer, sparing a glance at the woman in the corner. He doesn’t recall an ‘open’ sign on the door, now that he thinks about it and that woman doesn’t have any sort of coffee at her table to show she’d paid to be here.

The woman caught his glance however apparently, as she places the knitting needles down and stares him down until he’s forced to look back and hold her gaze. She doesn’t say anything, just kind of stares, assessing their little group. Awkwardly, Ryan lifts a hand to the back of his neck and sheepishly asks, “I’m sorry, do you know if we came in at a bad time or?”

The elderly woman shakes her head, tuts and picks her knitting back up. She levels her stare over it, hands moving out of what has to be a very long engrained muscle memory. “The cafe isn’t closed, if that’s what you’re asking. Go on, just pull that string up there and they’ll come down.”

He looks to where she pointed with a concerningly sharp needle, a long cord coming down to hang from the ceiling just above the empty display case. It’s as old as most things seem to be in this town, yellowed in a way that makes Ryan assume it’s at least been around since smoking inside was the norm. He reaches up, finding it easier to grasp than he’d expected with the height it’s at, and gives it a firm pull, half expecting it to tear out the ceiling. Nothing happens and he wonders if maybe he should pull it again? Ryan steps back, looking at the elderly woman in the corner who is suddenly engrossed in her knitting. The others share a glance with him, everyone a little uncertain to the air in the room.

“They’re always tardy, you’ll just have to wait a moment, dear.” She says finally, with a little huff, though whether it’s at this apparent regular lapse of on time service or at them for having to explain, it’s not clear. 

“That’s alright, we don’t mind.” Ryan tells her, in an attempt to appease, in case it was the second. 

Though Ryan stays where he is in front of the counter, leaning back on his hands grasped onto the side of it, Kaitlyn and Emma settle down in the worn chairs in front of the fireplace, continuing their conversation from earlier. It seems the two of them have reached a sort of peace treaty today, with Jacob unable to intercede trapped safely within the lodge. He did notice Kaitlyn laying it on a little thick in the car, subtle enough though that it seems Emma didn’t notice or she just took it for what it was, accepting the olive branch as it was handed to her. It’s good to see, honestly.

Dylan makes his way to him after a moment, with an exaggerated single step he stops beside him, arms folded and brown eyes looking up to the corner of his own eye, just shy of meeting. With Ryan’s attention immediately on him, he doesn’t have to wait to jerk his head back over his shoulder, towards the far wall. “You noticed that painting over there?” 

Ryan peers over to the general direction Dylan motioned to, trying to find the particular piece he’s interested in. “There’s just a couple, what one are you-” Ryan cuts himself short as his eyes narrow, stuck on a shock of white.

He pushes himself off the counter, drawn towards this one painting so completely that all the others bleed and blur in his narrowing periphery. It’s as carefully and well framed as all the others, an unreadable scribbled signature in black marker in the bottom corner of the piece. It’s not exactly a masterpiece, the colours simple and the technique not quite there, but Ryan’s seen worse and it holds an atmosphere that’s undeniable. It’s textured, paint laid on thick and scruffed up, rising up to the side of the frame. Dark leaves, thick trunks, tall grass and scattered, small orange flecks overlaying it all. A dark red sky, black clouds and a moon so large and bright, the canvas cannot contain it all, hidden behind the forest and cut off by the frame. It’s meant to draw in all eyes, but it’s not where Ryan’s are stuck. A smudge of white in the left corner, spindly legs and flecks of red beneath it, a brush tapped against a finger. It doesn’t have a title, but Ryan could name it for them. ‘The Hacketts' Worst Kept Secret’ by Unknown Artist.

It’s with a heavy sigh he tears his eyes away from the incriminating artwork, sparing a glance to it over his shoulder as he returns to Dylan by the counter. He blows the air out of his cheeks with a grimace and raised brows as he and Dylan look at each other. “Very cool,” Ryan says finally. “Must be a local artist.” 

Dylan gives this short, unimpressed hum. “Yeah, suppose so. Wonder when it was painted.”

Ryan gives a vague grunt of agreement, mind suddenly racing. Someone local has seen Silas at some point, knows of the werewolves, whether they knew what they were looking at or not. Which opens up the concerns he’s tried to push to the back of his mind, of police investigations, of suspicious evidence and accounts not adding up. He’s reminded too of that sleek black car driven by the man in the ironed black suit from the month before. They have to still be looking into it, mustn’t they? So what if the police are still looking into all those inconsistencies? What if that local, who clearly saw Silas some full moon night though god knows when, starts to kick up a fuss about the strange white creature in the woods? What if they know about Silas, what if they find Silas, what would happen then?  

And, Ryan adjusts his weight on his feet anxiously, he hadn’t really thought too deeply about going into town. They could be making everything so much worse right now. That painting has reminded him of the townspeople's awareness of the quarry and he suddenly feels deeply uncomfortable here. They all believe there was a massacre, a vicious mass murder acted out by Jedidiah on his poor innocent family. Shit, Ryan had been reading all the looks and glances as your average small town distrust of outsiders. However now that he actually uses his goddamn brain, he realises that the reason the elderly woman in the corner seems to need to weigh them up so heavily is the fact she probably sees them as tourists, coming to check out the crime scene. Jesus, everyone probably thinks they’re ‘murder tourists”, for people they could have known pretty well, as isolated and reclusive as the Hacketts seemed to be. Travis never mentioned whether it’d be an issue for them to come into town, but knowing him, it was probably because he expected them to use their goddamn common sense. Which it seems they have failed to do so.       

Lost in his spiralling thoughts, it’s only when Dylan nudges his arm with his elbow that he forces his eyes to focus. Kaitlyn and Emma stand beside them at the counter now, trying to hide the worried expressions they hold. He twitches his nose on inhale, the acrid and sharp scent filling the room, like a forest on fire, is all his own. He offers a tight lipped smile that he attempts to make apologetic and reassuring in equal parts. It’s doubtful that he succeeds. “We should probably-”

The door behind the counter opens at long last, revealing to his surprise, not a kitchen but instead a steep case of wooden stairs. A man walks through, with glasses askew and pieces of chopped hair covering the bottom of his top. “-go.” Ryan finishes in a barely audible mumble as the man starts speaking, yet to look at them as he fishes an apron off a hook on the wall.

“Sorry, was cutting Luke’s hair, god knows he needed it cut months ago. Has refused to let me touch it until now, had to take the opportunity when I could.” He’s flicking on the coffee machine, back still to them, chattering away as if they’re all close friends. Ryan hears a quiet but hearty chuckle from the woman behind them as the man continues on, flicking levers and pulling out the portable filter to check that it’s clear. “If you get any hair in your coffee there’s no discount, but Vickie made a ridiculous amount of quiche the other night and at this point I’m desperate to get rid of it, so I’ll throw- oh. Wow, um I don’t know you. I’m sorry, you are not who I expected.”

The man peters off slowly and awkwardly, standing stunned as he stares at them after he’d finally turned around. He blinks a few times before shaking it off, continuing his bustle around the coffee machine. “Terribly sorry, the hair thing was a joke.” As if to prove the point, he brushes a hand over his front to clear it all off, despite the apron now covering it which leaves the action moot. “Not everyday we get new customers. Visiting family or uh, tourists?” 

He says the last word with a poorly concealed discomfit and the question as a whole seems to be mostly directed to Emma, whether because she’s closest to the counter in her eagerness for caffeine or because she projects the most outward confidence and ease around people, Ryan’s not certain. However Emma, with this not necessarily disinterested but rather more deferential pout, glances back at Ryan. The man follows the glance with his own before looking at the other two as well, growing more amused as those traitors also direct his gaze back to Ryan. He seems rightfully confused as to why they’re all directing him to Ryan and honestly he’s not alone, Ryan also uncertain as to why they’re doing so. The rankings? Is that what this is, is it really growing to be that influential? Ryan doesn’t even know and at this point the man has been waiting for just any of them to answer for a solid half a minute or so and therefore Ryan has no choice but to bite the bullet and give another awkward tight lipped smile.

“Visiting a uh- someone local. We’ll probably be visiting pretty regularly.” Ryan says uncomfortably, not quite a lie but also certainly not the full truth. It’s far away enough from it that Ryan struggles, the words feeling thick on his tongue and coming out stilted. 

The man leans back on his heels, spreading his hands on the counter with a look of interest. “Huh. Now who would that be? Hopefully someone who spoke highly of my coffee.”

Ryan gives a subdued smile within a short nod of acknowledgement of the joke. “Uh, Travis. So he’s not um, super chatty. I’m sure your coffee’s great though.” Jesus this is awkward.

The man pauses then to actually lean in as he peers at them. A look of either recognition or understanding crosses his face and he leans back once more, nodding in what seems to be a bit of shock and uncertainty. “You’re those camp counsellors, aren’t you? Read about you lot in the paper.”

Dylan, bless him or curse him Ryan can’t decide, does a little show of jazz hands at his waist. The man snorts before sombering. “I’m sorry you went through that, a damn tragedy. Hope Travis isn’t giving you kids any trouble? Not your fault you were caught up in… in all of that.”

“No, no it’s fine.” Ryan awkwardly assures him, uncomfortable with small talk at the best of times, let alone small talk on a topic such as this. “He’s helped a lot, that night and after, so.”

“First time in his life I bet, that’ll be guilt finally putting his heart in the right place.” The man shakes his head, folding his arms across his chest. “You kids set up at the hotel then?”

“Uh, no.” Ryan says slowly, not exactly eager to tell this guy where they are actually staying. He can’t tell if he’s fishing for gossip, just chatting in general or who knows, maybe he’s the painter of that framed evidence on the wall.

The man’s brows raise, unfortunately quickly coming to the conclusion himself. “You’re not staying at that creepy old house with Travis are you? Oh, no, the lodge isn’t it? Phew, you kids are brave. Luke is absolutely convinced the place is haunted now, not that we’ve been anywhere near it of course. Dark stain on the town, everyone’s worried it’ll bring in the wrong sort. We’re lucky that-”

“-Colton, get the kids their coffee.” The old woman calls from the corner, knitting needles still clacking despite how she’s clearly been listening in on this whole terrible conversation.

The man, Colton apparently, seems to realise now the atmosphere in the room. The awkward and tense smiles they all give him as they’re held hostage in this conversation, shuffling uncomfortably as they wait for the chance to actually order. He’s realised finally that, at least to his knowledge, he is practically interrogating and then breezing on through the subject of a tragedy, to the supposed victims and witnesses of said tragedy. Lucky for him that he isn’t aware it’s both so much worse and not quite as bad as that. Either way, he’s clearly embarrassed now and that solidifies him as the chatty in general type of person to Ryan. Probably a great characteristic for his regulars, but has become genuinely excruciating for all parties present at this moment.

He gives them all a deeply apologetic smile, though now that he’s been directed to him so much, he only truly addresses Ryan as he says, “Yeah, I am so sorry. Jeez. Um, listen, for my terrible and clearly very rusty hospitality skills, whatever you want is on the house. I’ll even make sure it is hair free.”

“Oh, no that’s oka-” Ryan starts, but Colton cuts him off with an insistence that, well, he insists.

The orders are simple, until they get to Emma. A long black for Ryan, a mocha for Dylan and a cheekily requested irish coffee for Kaitlyn, who is very luckily not asked for ID despite the long glance she’s given, seemingly surprising both of them that he lets her get away with it. He must be feeling pretty bad about his service and she’s definitely using it to her advantage. Then it comes to Emma, starting off her order with the offer to pay for it regardless as she’s aware it’s a bit of an ask. She seems almost a little nervous to order, her thumb hooking into the chain around her neck, pulling it away from her as if it were choking her words and she needs the freedom to speak. They’re all intrigued before she’s even said what it is, Ryan conjuring up one of those complicated syrup and foam filled monstrosities from popular coffeehouse chains. It’s not that, at all. It’s worse. 

She places the large thermos down on the counter, requests it be filled with multiple shots of espresso, just a fingerbreadth of milk, filled with hot water and to everyone's shock and horror, she points to the drink fridge beside the coffee machine. Ryan thinks no chain store's monstrosity could be as bad as this when she asks for one of the various energy drinks to be poured in as well, just to top the caffeine overdose off. The man clearly wasn’t expecting all of that, just barely failing to hide his horror and disgusted awe, though he gives an admirable and solid attempt. He maintains that she doesn’t have to pay, the energy drink also coming free, poured into the ungodly concoction as they all watch with horrified expressions. Colton slides it across the counter like he’s glad to get out of its vicinity.

Though the girls give their thanks and step away immediately, Dylan huddles into the counter, squeezing himself in front of Ryan to get closer. Ryan, who promptly sucks in a deep breath and takes a quick step to the side, to give him more room. He also resolutely doesn’t look at Dylan’s back and instead over the top of his head, to stare down Colton’s reactions to this little display. Dylan sticks his elbows down on the smooth tiles, in a way that Ryan’s surprised it didn’t make the elderly woman in the back gasp for his rudeness. 

“I really like all the mugs around the place.” Dylan tells Colton, catching him before he manages to turn back to the machine. 

“Oh, thank you. My brothers have collected them from all over and send them back whenever they find one interesting or go somewhere new.” Colton explains, before tacking on with a playful but apologetic smile. “Not part of the house deal I’m afraid and not for sale, if you were interested.”

“Oh, wouldn’t dream of it, they all seem to have their specific place. Really cool shop though, the artwork, also sent back by your brothers?” Dylan continues, clueing Ryan in on where he’s going with this. 

“Nah, not really the artist types. Most of these are local, some of them done by family.” Colton says as he cocks a hip against the counter, ever so slightly leaning in to talk with Dylan in a way that makes Ryan straighten up and watch the interaction from down his nose. Colton may seem to just be happy someone is indulging him with the chance to chatter away but that ugly possessive beast within Ryan, that he cannot entirely blame on the wolf, doesn’t care whether that’s the case or not. He chews on the inside of his cheek, trying not to let the rumble in his chest grow as it craves to.

“Oh, support local artists, great.” Dylan enthusiastically nods his head and Ryan has to bite down to stop the grin at the put on little performance he’s doing. “That piece over there, with the forest? Super cool, do you know who did it? They have real skill.”

Though Colton leans over the counter to try and follow Dylan’s point, an action that brings him into their space enough that Ryan has to cover what what he’s pretty sure was about to be a growl with a loud and awkward cough instead, he’d already started the action with a shake of his head. “No, I’m sorry, this is all Ma’s collection, it’s her shop. You’d have to ask her.”

Dylan visibly deflates, straightening back up with a sad little pout that makes Ryan want to shake the guy down for answers he just told them he doesn’t have. Colton looks between the two of them and despite Ryan maintaining his usual deadpan expression, Colton has to pick up on something or rather as he laughs when he looks between them. “Luckily for you,” he gestures behind them, “I’m sure she’d be happy to answer if she can.”

Ah, that would explain a couple of things. They thank Colton for the coffee at last, turning to the rest of the shop and its other occupants. Kaitlyn and Emma have retaken their spot in front of the fire, quieted down a little from earlier as they have their drinks, though he can hear Kaitlyn poking fun at Emma’s depraved concoction she calls a ‘booster’ coffee. She’s clearly enjoying it however, as Emma offers Ryan another of those real, genuine smiles when he catches her eye and he makes sure to offer one back before he looks away again, the firelight gleaming off the gold around her neck keeping the sight of them in his periphery. The elderly woman in the corner of the shop, the owner of the cafe itself apparently, continues her knitting but is already looking to catch his eye as well, gesturing him and Dylan over immediately. They track over to beside her table, keeping a respectable distance as to not crowd her like they had shamelessly done so to her son. 

She looks up at them without a falter in the rhythmic clicks, asking them, “Now, what painting was it that you were looking at?”  

With a pause for Dylan to answer that he fails to fill, Ryan points clearly over to the painting that had been pointed out to himself just earlier. “Uh, that one over there.”

In a practised movement, her spectors slide just so down her nose so she can peer over them, picking the piece out immediately. “Hm,” She shakes her head, purses her lips and maybe tries to hide a smile- if she is having to, she does it well as Ryan really can’t quite tell if she is or not. “Figures. That one was painted by Kaylee Hackett, when she was still in school.”

It’s all Ryan can do but give a short “Oh.” There’s relief of course, that it was just Kaylee that painted it and not some local that could threaten to expose them all. Yet with the unexpected answer, Ryan feels like a string snaps within him. All that anxiety that had built up suddenly becomes useless and looking to flee from his body, its only way out in this moment is through a grinding jaw and fingers popping knuckles. 

“As camp counsellors, I suppose you were friends?” The woman asks, adopting an expression of sympathy.

“Yeah, we were. Kaylee was- she was really sweet.” Ryan tells her, the truth of the statement hitting him like an icepick to the chest. He grew up with Kaylee and Caleb, spent many of his summers running through those woods, basking in the sunlight and rowing through the lake. They drifted apart a little around when Ryan was around fourteen- which was about six years ago, shit, of course. The two of them had become a lot more isolated, but they were still friends. Now she’s dead and, Ryan spares a glance at Kaitlyn who is still just peacefully laughing at Emma’s drink, Caleb’s dead too. The grief suddenly spikes, a crack in the ribs, as grief is oft to do. It’ll ebb again he knows, so he musters himself together, tries not to let it show too strongly in the weight dropping on his shoulders. A hand brushes his arm, from Dylan moving closer to hear the woman's next words, and privately that helps too. 

“Unfurl that for me, would you? Don’t want to lose my rhythm.” She tells him as she tugs on the wool that has become gradually more and more strained the longer they’ve been in the shop. He picks up the ball and carefully unweaves a good enough amount while making sure it won’t get tangled on the table amongst all the other loose balls and strands of yarns. It’s a good estimate, engrained after performing the same action for his own Nana many times before. She hums in approval, giving a nod over to the painting. “Go on then, grab it down from the wall.”

”Wh- Sorry?” Ryan stutters in confusion, just narrowly correcting a very rude and undignified ‘what’. 

“Now you seem like good kids and she was your friend. If it caught your eye so, clearly it was meant to be. Go on and take it home with you.” She tells him, politely ignoring the rude gaping expression he stares at her with.

“But… your collection…” He says, not even really wanting to argue the point but feeling forced out of surprise and still unsure if she really means it, despite there being not a single trace of doubt in her tone. “The space will be empty.”

”And I will fill it. Hah, worried about my collection,” She shakes her head in amusement. “I have brought, or collected I suppose, these paintings for one reason and one reason only. They made me feel something. That one does the exact same to you, a good amount more than it ever could for me I’d imagine. So I would like for you to have it.”

Ryan stands still for a moment, processing and sharing a shocked expression with Dylan, until the woman’s furrowed brow and shooing motion she makes through her knitting needles forces him into action. “Thank you.” He tells her, a heartfelt sincerity that he doesn’t have to think to add.

Though now assured, it still feels exceptionally strange and wrong to cross the room and remove a piece of artwork from the cafe’s walls. He has to stand on his toes to reach it and it’s heavy in his hands, larger than it looked on the wall when it was surrounded by so many other pieces. With it in his hands now, he returns to the side of the table, eyes roaming over every brushstroke Kaylee Hackett made all those years ago. The woman’s right, it makes him feel… a lot of somethings, all at once. “Thank you.” He repeats again, now that he’s returned.

”Well I was running out of space, so you’ve given me an excuse to still get something new the next time the school does their little art displays.” She says with a cheeky little smile, like she’s just won an argument that Ryan wasn’t aware of. “Now, you keep hanging around and I’ll lose my place, so off with you. Go put that in your car.”

Ryan nods, hoisting it up to a better position to carry it a further distance than across the room and thanking her once more, aware that he is getting annoyingly repetitive at this point, but quite genuinely touched by this stranger's kindness. Dylan, who has just been quietly observing all of this, holds up Ryan’s coffee that he’d placed down on the table with a little shake in confirmation that it hasn’t been forgotten. They look over to the girls, already standing up in preparation to leave and although he doesn’t mind of course, Ryan reminds himself for future reference that there doesn’t seem to be such a thing as a private conversation in this odd little cafe. 

As they gather up by the door, throwing their last round of thanks over their shoulders, the elderly woman stops him one last time, just a second before he would have stepped back onto the street. “Oh, what was your name dear?” 

He suddenly feels terribly rude. “Oh, uh, Ryan.”

”Ryan. If you ever happen to go by Jacks, oh that would be the bar so you know, then you tell him that Claudia sent you, to make you and your-“ She pauses, clicks her tongue before she chuckles and he’s not quite sure what that means. “-friend the ‘favourin’, but don't let him try to sit down and tell you the story or you’ll be stuck there all night.”

”Uh, will do. Thank you Claudia, seriously.” Ryan says, shrugging off the instant self doubt that she might consider him calling her by her first name rude when she gives him a kind smile that only dims to something a little more sombre when she speaks.

“Of course. I hope this town can treat you better now than it has before. I hope to see you around sometime more.”

The stab of cold air as they step outside feels much more jarring now that they’re exiting from the fire lit cafe, Ryan’s grasp on the painting instantly stiffening, like the feet of a small bird frozen to a metal pipe. He eyes his coffee warming Dylan’s hand with what is initial jealousy but quickly turns to placated resignation with the sight of Dylan not shivering quite as hard as he was before. That is until Dylan shakes the to-go mug at him, beaming that sun eating smile of his.

“So pretty big developments, huh? Of our werewolf powers?” At the confused look everyone gives him, he gives them one back, as if what he’s saying should be totally obvious. “Well I clearly have psychic powers, right? Or prophetic, whatever. I made a joke earlier about Ryan charming an old lady out of a hot drink and I was about to make a joke about coming back here later and breaking in to steal the painting but voila, Ryan’s already beat me to it.”

”Kind of sounds like Ryan has all the powers here, not you.” Emma says as they approach the van, fishing the keys from her pocket.

“I was the one who knew it was going to happen, subconsciously.” Dylan insists, with the coffees in each hand dangerously sloshed around in the crazy hand waving accompanying the equally crazy conspiracy. 

Emma scoffs loudly as she unlocks the van, though it’s clear she’s being playful. “You didn’t do shit. The only power the werewolf curse has given you is the ability to make your jokes worse. Which is actually impressive, I didn’t know it was possible.”

Dylan holds one of the coffees in his chest and holds the van’s sliding door open with his foot in a precarious balancing act, all with this terribly acted betrayed expression on his face. “Ouch, Emma. Just wait until I tell your subscribers how you bullied me. You won’t find me very funny then.”

“I already don’t find you funny now.” Emma laughs, betraying the statement even as it’s said. “So… correct? What are you- that’s so dumb.”

”Also, is it really bullying if it’s true?” Kaitlyn asks, sticking an elbow in his side, nearly sending him into a heap on the concrete as he wobbles dangerously. “We’ve yet to see it but I’m just waiting for these werewolf powers to cure your autism, Dylan. With your terrible jokes gone, that would actually be a real power.”

Ryan’s brows furrow as he leans into the van to put the painting away, safely buckled in on the furthest seat in the front row of the back. Huh. Well, that’s confirmation of what he’d already worked out, Ryan supposes. At least now he knows it is something Dylan knows about himself too. 

"You're... autistic?" Emma asks, sounding surprised and curious in equal measure.

Dylan just shrugs, "Guess so." It makes both Kaitlyn and Ryan snort.

”Huh. Well, seems the vaccines have already done their damage then, unfortunately.” He hears Emma say, in such a deadpan delivery, that had he not had a near exact joke in the back of his mind that he knows he would have delivered in the exact same way, he’d have thought she was being serious. He’s realising today that they might be more similar than he ever would have thought.

“Okay, I’m sorry, what has this turned into right now?” Dylan splutters indignantly. “Can we turn these tables back around, Jesus Christ!”

”Maybe your psychic powers should have seen this coming.” Kaitlyn continues to pester.

”You two find common ground and immediately start shooting at me from it.” Dylan bemoans. “Ryan, help me out here man.”

”Oh c’mon, you can’t go crying to Ryan to defend your honour, he’s gonna start lecturing us.” Emma whines in much the same tone, pouting and crossing her arms at both Dylan and now Ryan that he’s been dragged into it.

He doesn’t take offence, yet he still splutters a little. “What- I- I don’t lecture you guys! You fired the first shot anyway Emma, you can’t throw-“

She holds her arms out at him, her eyes wide and smile even wider at the laughter that comes from the other two. “See! See!”

“Oh my god…” Ryan slaps a hand down his face, exasperated in a way that means he’s really not.

”I think you’re just jealous.” Dylan says, letting his foot fall to let the van door slide closed and standing beside Ryan, holding his coffee out in front of his chest for him to take. 

“What, of your knight in shining armour? No thanks, not quite my type.” Emma says snootily and once more, despite how he could take offence if he has thinner skin, she looks like she’s just having too much fun with this and so he can’t really feel anything other than happy for it too. 

“What! No, that’s not- I wasn’t-“ Dylan splutters and as Ryan takes his coffee he catches sight of the flush of red on his cheeks, feeling a little bad to take a source of warmth from him when he’s clearly still so cold. Dylan cuts himself off to hiss, “Emma!” 

He clears his throat and gets on with his original point after it was somehow, weirdly, nearly completely derailed by Emma’s comment. “No, because I have honour capable of being defended. Whereas you, like every rat main in the world, do not.”

At her blank look, Kaitlyn leans into her side with a hand covering her mouth and a stage whisper. “That was a reference.” Then, as if in shock, she actually pulls back to look at Dylan with furrowed brows and a heavy frown. “...That I hate that I understood. You are banned from talking about your games to me until I do not understand the words you are saying again, seriously.”

”Wow, how have I never noticed what a total nerd you are before?” Emma says in something similar to the horrified awe they held over her coffee. “Huh, you really are autistic.”

”Wow, that’s really fucked up Em.” Dylan gasps theatrically, that slightly evil smile back in place. It’s stunning.

Emma though, realising how it could have perhaps been taken, misses the obvious lack of offence in her hurry to apologise for the possible overstep. ”Oh, shit, I’m so sorry, I was-“

”He was kidding.” Ryan steps in before the lighthearted air gets crumpled, even though he knows Dylan wouldn’t let that happen, he’s not risking it besides. “Nerdiness kind of comes with the territory, every autistic person has their ‘thing’.”

”And what is brooding, mysterious Ryan’s ‘thing’?” Kaitlyn asks, swooping in on the same note, breezing past Emma’s short burst of anxiety. He knows because she doesn’t see him as either of those things anymore and she knows what his thing is, always checking in on what book he’s picked up today over the months at home. It’s for Emma’s benefit alone and he probably appreciates that as much as Emma herself does- they’ve recently tuned into the same wavelength and he’s finding it to be a constant relief.

Emma gives a short, oh!, as if she somehow hadn’t known he was also autistic. As if it isn’t obvious, it’s not something he tries to hide- not like Dylan does. He wonders if this was a double whammy reveal for Emma, the idea strangely funny to him. He supposes most people don’t know all the different ways it can crop up, other than the highest support needs. 

“Reading, pretty much anything.” He states simply, before eyeing Dylan beside him. “I feel like you could have been a dinosaur kid.”

“Dinosaurs are pretty fucking cool and I won’t hear anyone out stating otherwise.” Dylan says, hands spread in front of his shoulders in an exaggerated shrug. “But no, it’s always been astronomy for me.”

”That’s cool.” Ryan says genuinely, the sincerity of it hopefully carrying him through how otherwise lame he sounds. “Ties in with your physics, doesn’t it? Yeah no, that’s super cool.”

Dylan, for lack of any other description, goes suddenly shy. He looks away, scuffs a shoe on the concrete and twists his lips. Which all makes sense as well, these interests are deeply personal and important- revered really, so much so that it’s like they become an aspect of yourself. So it can be a quick way to feel vulnerable or defensive. “You remembered that?”

”Yeah, ‘course I did. Why wouldn’t I?” Ryan asks, a little confused. That wasn’t what he thought Dylan would say or focus on, not something that even crossed his mind.

”It was kind of a chaotic night, not something that really mattered in the scheme of things.” Dylan says, in a light way that makes Ryan think he was aiming for joking but didn’t quite get there.

”It matters to you.” He tells him, the world faded out to a blur around him, with just Dylan in his vision. He leaves out the second part of that sentence, the so it matters to me . He’s not sure what he hopes for me, that it isn’t picked up on or that it is. 

He’s still a little red from the cold, shoe still scuffing on the ground. Coffee clutched between both hands, the sleeves of his sweater peeking out from under his coat, reaching to the first knuckle of his thumb. Ryan wonders if it was made or brought a little large on purpose, thinks to himself that he should buy him a thick scarf to match, to chase off the remaining cold of the rest of Fall. Though he’d mourn the red on the tip of his nose, he could ask his Nana to knit something in the perfect colour. With how bright Dylan is in all the best ways, yellow feels like it should be fitting, but honestly this sweater has proven to him that his boy looks best in the dark browns and greens that remind Ryan of the woods. All of it Ryan’s-

“Jesus you guys are embarrassing.” Emma laughs disbelievingly, snapping Ryan’s eyes to her and Kaitlyn, who strangely looks like she’s silently fuming next to her.

It makes the world around him flood back in, the sounds of cars in the background, bird call and footsteps reawakening. The dark and heavy scent of smoke fills his nose on next inhale, smothering the town's other scents. He’s glad for his thoughts to be cut off, certain his next was about to be something so deeply and inappropriately possessive, he chooses to pretend as if he doesn’t know where his mind was going along with that line of thought. He swears he’s trying to keep his affections for Dylan contained, yet they keep threatening to swallow him whole. He’s not sure what he can do, other than awkwardly refusing to look back at him again and instead peering at Kaitlyn, trying to decipher the look on her face. It’s- shit, what it actually looks like, is the glower before a standoff. Her shoulders are held broad and her feet are planted wide. It’s not the full posture, her arms are crossed and despite the wide stance, she’s not tensed up. Bordering it though, for some reason. Ryan squints at her. She narrows her eyes at him before huffing and looking away with a dramatic turn of her head. Was it because he was ignoring them? While he tries to work it out, confused beyond belief, he hears Dylan speak up.

“Alright, well we came, we conquered, we pilfered, we swindled. And now it’s freezing, so what do we say about heading back?”

Emma throws her ponytail over her shoulder, still holding that bemused expression, yet clearly letting it go as she says, “I can’t believe we came all the way here to just go into one shop and then leave.”

”Not your usual spree?” Dylan teases, flicking a glance at Kaitlyn. So he noticed her shift in demeanour too then.

“Nowhere near. But I’m a team player, we can call it quits if you guys want.” Emma sighs, more serious then any of them really expected. He doesn't know which part to focus on there, the casual reminder of Emma's luck of a fortune at home or the actually kind of sweet admittance at the end.

Despite that building around the corner calling to him, bookshop or library he’s still unsure, he realises that he doesn’t want to push his luck. Today has been good, really good, despite whatever small flare ups there were. Definitely a step forward kind of day. Yet Kaitlyn, for whatever reason, has suddenly become very tense and Ryan most certainly does not want to have a standoff in the middle of town. He’s majorly a part of that concern admittedly, as he knows he wouldn’t back down despite the public setting. After making a show like that they’d undoubtedly have townsfolk turning up with torches and pitchforks tomorrow night and he has enough forward vision to realise that wouldn’t be the best recipe for a smooth full moon. So, quit while they’re ahead and all that.

”Dylan’s right, we should head back before we catch a cold. Not much point just standing around out here.” He says, dragging open the van door from where it hadn’t fully closed.

He lets Dylan pile in first and as Kaitlyn walks by she mimes a hand tugging out from her throat, like a tie or contextually more likely a leash, with a cocked grin. Though the heavy scent has yet to even out, the smile reassures him that they’re alright, for the moment at least. He’ll have to ask what was up the second he gets the chance. 

The van hums to life and they’re making their way back down the main road a moment later. The painting is safely secured, though with it taking up Dylan’s original seat, he’s now resigned to the middle. Knee pressed against Ryan’s, elbow against his arm, head just a tilt away from resting on his shoulder. At least the honeyed scent in the air is quick to chase out any remaining wisps of acrid smoke, warmer than any cafe fire. If Ryan’s dying next to this town, it’ll be an enclosed space with the object of his unrequited affections that does it. He supposes there are worse ways to go.

Chapter Text

The bitter wind does nothing to chill the burn in his limbs or soothe the deep ache beneath his ribs. It sounds like a jet engine as it hurtles through the trees, whipping through the leaves and cracking the branches, making the whole forest groan and creak. Yet it’s still not strong enough to muffle the liveliness of the woods beneath it. The crows caws ricochet through the forest, the waterfall roars from a good mile away and the heavy thump of a rabbit's foot from somewhere to his right makes his calf muscle twitch, as if his legs were ready to take off after it, with or without him.

Ryan steadies the piece of wood atop the stump, bringing the axe down to slice through it like water, met with what feels like no resistance and sending splinters flying. He didn’t even swing hard, has exerted no effort or energy in the time he’s been out here, despite the good sized pile of firewood and kindling beside him. The wheelbarrow has been long filled yet he’s continued on, finding it a good release of the pent up tension within him and it soothes him to be as close to the woods as he can. Something he feels is definitely required today, his composure at times held together by a thinning and frayed string. It distracts him from the insatiable urge to scratch through the layers of his skin too, something to be avoided with the way it is transformed into something paper thin and shallow whenever his razor sharp talons mindlessly make contact with it.

Everything is heightened today, as he had of course expected it to be. But it feels stronger than even last month, it feels different, he feels different. Not that he feels necessarily worse, perhaps even a bit better in some ways, but something has certainly changed. He didn’t quite wake with a bone to pick with the world or have his focus consumed entirely with not tearing his skin off his arms, like he was the last two months. Today has been a bit more everything, all at once, something he hadn’t realised was possible. 

The sounds of the forest are just one thing that is amplified beyond human ability. Every smell, like that of just simply the dirt, or the rot of leaves, hits him with a distinctiveness and clarity he has yet to grow to expect on these days. He tried to stop breathing through his nose earlier in an attempt to soften it, yet apparently breathing through his mouth like a dog only makes it worse, the taste of the scents on his tongue, so he gave up pretty quickly on that one. Even his sight, he swears he can see each grain and individual splinter of the wood, with a higher definition than any expensive camera could hope to capture. That static film over his vision that he’d had all his life has yet to return since it faded that first month and today he finds it hard to imagine what it had ever looked like in the first place.

Despite the early hour still, he can feel his skin splitting from within his limbs, tearing as he raises and drops the axe in a steady rhythm. Though the action probably doesn’t help it and makes him grit his teeth in pain from his flesh tearing apart inside of him, he can’t lounge around today. He has a restlessness within him, forcing him to his feet and to just move, like a hyperactive kid in a classroom. It’s uncomfortable to sit around too, when he can feel his rib bones and spine shifting within him, a new sensation that makes his teeth buzz. His teeth that already feel pointer than before, catching on the inside of his cheeks and lips, filling his mouth with blood at random moments throughout the morning hours. Which, disgustingly, doesn’t help the insatiable hunger that he knows cannot be filled, despite how hard he tried at breakfast and how eagerly he looks forward to lunch. It all snowballs together and has quickly become overwhelming.

A small grace in all of it, is that the void in his stomach is totally gone. Just shrunk into non-existence, completely forgettable in its absence. Being by these woods must heal it. Perhaps it’s because of that sense of territory he now feels, like these woods are his own. It had disappeared after their night in the woods and has done so once more on his return, only to reemerge as he left the quarry, so he thinks it's still a contender for a fair guess. Which really is unfortunate, if it means it’s going to come back the second he leaves again. There’s nothing he can really do to prevent that though and today, when all things are amped up to a supernatural degree, he’ll take the fact that the thing that eats him up outside of the quarry has disappeared completely. Any small graces feel huge when all else has fallen far from it.  

All those physical symptoms are a discomfort though, no way around it. Yet easier to manage it feels, then what his mind is doing today. With everything heightened, his emotions are not excluded. He feels a complicated mix towards the heightened feeling of his emotions, which is also heightened, creating a never ending loop of just a whole lot of a lot. 

He’s found it hard to let Kaitlyn out of his sight today, the urge to just check on her position, to make sure his pack is together and secure. Though it could be strange or overbearing with anyone else, Kaitlyn seems to get it, hanging around nearby and sending her own glances his way. Neither of them have to say anything out loud to know that they both have this overwhelming urge to make sure they have each other's backs, to know that they’ll defend each other to the death if need be, as if they’d ever have to. There is a settling security her presence brings that even the woods cannot, so whenever he’s seen her routinely come by the window since he’s come out here, he’s just offered her a wave and a knowing nod each time. He appreciates the action for himself just as much as she feels she needs to do it for her own reassurance. He didn’t have the chance to ask her what that whole moody shift was about yesterday and god help him if he tried today, but it seems like she’s forgiven and forgotten whatever it was.

Then there’s Dylan, who he’s also found it hard to let out of his sight, but for the good of them both and especially his dignity, he’s forced himself to do so whenever possible. Which would probably be easier if Dylan didn’t happen to appear in every room Ryan shifted to, a surely unlucky series of coincidences, no matter what that little voice in the back of his head tries to imply. As much as it doesn’t feel it, he supposes it’s lucky Dylan feels the chill so, as he’s unlikely to randomly wander out here. It is complicated, being around Dylan today. That possessiveness, that he cannot even internally bring himself to label differently in an attempt to soften or obfuscate with the intensity it has reached, is shocking. He wants to snap and glare at anyone who looks at Dylan with just a hint of that irritability they all foster on full moon days. To shelter him from view of Jacob especially but even Kaitlyn causes his lip to twitch up and reveal an elongated canine, which she always returns. He has the strangest urge to just grab him, run his thumbs along the sides of his neck and rub his cheek over his head, before of course kissing him until just a second before he suffocates. Enough to leave him breathless at least and covered in Ryan’s scent, so any of the others will know instantly who’s he is. Which, yeah, none of that is especially good to be thinking. Best to be avoided, simply put.

That’s his thoughts without even having Dylan’s scent filling his lungs. Which, on a day like this, where everything is amplified a hundred fold, all consuming is the only apt description for it. Dylan isn’t feeling especially miserable today, which is obviously great, he’d hate it any other way. It’s just not great for Ryan, who on the best of days feels slightly drunk and woozy off of it. Now it verges on having a flat out plastering effect on him, like the first time he drank so much that he blacked out, a mistake he’s yet to repeat. His brain empties to anything other than Dylan and that godforsaken scent, a low fire stoked and the urge to get his hands on him in any way that he can is so strong, so instinctual, that whenever Dylan’s within his proximity, they gain a mind of their own. He’ll look down and oh, he’s got a hand on Dylan’s shoulder, or he’s randomly holding his elbow like it’s a lifeline, or he’ll be sitting on the couch talking, only to suddenly realise he’s holding Dylan’s ankle in a makeshift shackle. When talking to him, he cannot help but run his tongue over his fangs, which have been long and sharp since he woke, the buried ivory aching as his eyes would once more flick to Dylan’s throat. So, all that to say, no more library time for Ryan today. 

So he’s not hiding out here, like he was that first month, he is just having a break to get some much needed air. Remove Dylan from the equation, which Ryan hates to think of even in a hypothetical, and all the other’s scents are still strong. Distinct and each their own heavy presence, there’s a lot of different emotion in the lodge today. Better than last month, he supposes, where everyone was just miserable. At least there’s some variety today, even if it’s not the most positive. Laura and Max, he could hear squabbling and then apologising, over and over again on repeat, tucked away in the office and letting out an equally up and down scent from under the door. Abi and Nick share a similar level of discomfort and depression, though it’s not as heavy as last month and they’ve once more decided to not hide away, which he thinks is a good sign all things considered. Jacob is feeling that irritation strongest, the pent up feeling palpable in the thick scent of soot that covers everything it reaches. Emma seems to be running hot and cold, the force of a hurricane through summer hurtling through the lodge at times before it settles to just a light sun shower and then back again after a while. So not abject misery. What a win! Jesus. 

Ultimately, none of it is all that different from the last two months, outside of a few new things here and there. Yet Ryan really feels that today, most certainly in preparation for the full moon tonight, something has changed. Something about him has changed. Not just that it all feels so much stronger while so much earlier than before, as if he could flex his muscles and transform right now, despite the noon sunlight on his skin. Not even just this new strange and painfully uncomfortable sensation, of his bones already shifting within him, not breaking and cracking like they do upon transformation, but tingling and throbbing as it feels like they stretch and grind against each other. It’s more something in his mind, in his instincts and thoughts. 

In a way he’s never experienced before, he feels simultaneously woozy and on high alert. His head feels full and thick, as if half of his thoughts are formed muddied and have to trickle through layers of stones, sand and charcoal before they can finally come out clear. Some seem to get lost in the filter, either too muddy or now too washed out to really understand just what he’s even thinking and others are so distant that they slip through his fingers before he can focus on them, too quickly drowned out by his more present thoughts. Those that do manage to come out strong and solidified enough however, are filtered out clean and simple and clear cut, thoughts that he doesn’t expect to have, but make sense as he’s thinking them. The same instinctual knowledge he’s had before, like when he took his first breath as a newborn or when he first lifted his fang filled maw to howl at the moon. 

Even with this seemingly new back processing in his mind starting up slow and clogged, he’s grounded. Ryan’s never been so present in his body, the input of the world around him processed at lightning speed and his reactions coming even quicker. Despite the aches and pains, he feels like a live wire, coiled and tuned in. If he’d have to guess, he’d say he also feels faster, stronger, today with the way the wood just melts between his halfhearted swings of the axe. He knows he reasons things away sometimes, but even he cannot pretend like it’s not unnatural for his muscles to not ache in the slightest after this much activity. The payoff at least is the new discomfort and soreness within his bones, especially of his calves, thighs and arms. Honestly, added all together and it’s like he’s woken drunk, hungover or just flat out exhausted and then chugged three of Emma’s monstrous caffeine concoctions- mind sluggish but body alert.

Majority of these sluggish thoughts are directly on the others, slowly conjured up after his body has already acted. Such as earlier, when Nick growled at Kaitlyn as she walked past for seemingly no reason, he’d just initially told him to cut it out with vague assumptions as to why he would have done it. However, and although it may have taken a moment for the fuzzy and slow forming thought to come, once it did he realised he actually knew exactly why it happened. It wasn’t just Nick being moody or simply the irritation this day brings for them all. Even as a callow, a hound will be intimidated by a cur within it’s personal space and it was a defensive warning made out of instinct. Like sludge, the next thought had dripped through the filter of his mind, still coming out vague and half formed. He’s feral, he’d thought to himself, yet even in his fragmented state he knew that faced with the alpha of the packmate he just threatened, he was possibly provoking a fight that he had no chances of winning. Nick had long since fled from the room with a look of humiliation for what was surely an involuntary reaction, but Ryan’s mind had stayed stuck on the interaction like a particularly difficult question on an exam, trying to work out where in his sluggish mind he’d managed to find insight like that, alongside the mix of words that come naturally yet appear stilted amongst his regular vocabulary.

Now though, after some time alone with his thoughts and the fresh air of the forest, he’d frankly be feigning purposeful ignorance to act like he couldn’t work it out, or at least have some type of idea, of where these thoughts are coming from. Like his instincts, while they feel as natural and intrinsic as any other, they clearly come from a part of him that was transformed that August night. He has no proof for the statement, but after one thought that had slowly, groggily came to mind after an innocuous stray glance at Abi, he made the connection. With the language he uses in these scattered thoughts, terms he’d never held in his old vocabulary but ones he remembers the vague conceptualization of from within a mind without as elegant speech, such as cur, beta and feral- it feels like it’s clear. His wolf has woken up early.

And while Ryan may have never been an honour roll, straight-A student, at the end of the day, he isn’t stupid. He can put two and two together, even if none of this could be considered simple maths. If Ryan can be a spectator behind the fishbowl when he’s transformed, why would he assume the same couldn’t be said for the wolfish side of him? Admittedly, he had thought that was already the case, that the instincts were the proof of the wolf’s constant presence. It clearly wasn’t, not like this. These are thoughts directly from the primal mind he held in his wolf form, the wordless and instinctual thought process now being slowly translated to something coherent. 

He realises now, that if the slow and foggy thought of his own name that he’d struggled to understand when the full moon was high last month, if that was his human thought breaking through into the wolf’s mind? Then that was what the instincts were to the wolf breaking through in the human. This is a step above that, certainly. This is fusion, this is coalescence, this is understanding. Slow and tentative, just like the thought of his name, but it’s there, trickling through the stones and sand.

It is one thing to feel the instinct to growl at your friend and it is another to understand why you feel the urge, to be able to translate the animal instinct into specific words to give it meaning. To be given the chance to be able to understand not just his own, but the others behaviours, in what is honestly a new social system that they’ve been stumbling through blind. They have, willingly or not, each become a part of a small and distinct society when here at the quarry, with their own social norms and rules that are ruled by the wolfish side of them. So far, they’ve been a part of it without understanding it, like tourists in an unfamiliar culture, bumbling through their words and ignorantly dismissive to new expectations. Having those primal instincts translated into that stream of consciousness is just as significant as recalling his name in wolf form. 

Truthfully, he has his own curiosities too. For the night ahead, when the full moon rises and his skin bursts apart and melds together again into his wolflike form. Will his foggy consciousness behind the fishbowl, smothered by instincts and sensory drives, be awake now too? Hey, maybe he’ll even get a full sentence to form in his primal mind this time, a ‘rye-un’s the name, no longer suppressing shit is the game’. If this all functions two to two, which he hadn’t thought previously but now believes may be likely, then he might actually manage it.

Still, this is all of course, just some logic based guesswork and he doesn’t want to get ahead of himself. To be completely fair, they still don’t know a lot at all, they have no history or basis of understanding for what any of this really is, be it curse or infection or something else entirely. This though, is direct knowledge and understanding of how it functions and still it is a well untapped. Ryan knows the second he tells Laura she will want to sit him down and interview him, create a dictionary of all those words and terms, have him explain and pathologize each instinct or behaviour. For him however, right now there is just this palpable relief to no longer being so blind and lost in the dark that he wants to let himself have first, before it is hacked into with a scalpel and a clinical expression. For all he knows anyway, this could just be an odd one off or is a day of the full moon event only, though that’s not to say it’s unhelpful even then. He just hopes that either way, the translation and breaking through process becomes a little more streamlined in the future, so he doesn’t have to have this slow, sludge-like quality to a part of his mind.

When he made the choice to accept these instincts, to let go of the leash on them and to shrug off the collar that would have kept his transformation shackled, he had not realised the weight either had been holding him down with. Now, he doesn’t know if it was being under the moon last month, the formation of this sense of pack or perhaps even just time, but he feels with absolute certainty that however this does turn out; this is the final shrug and stretching out with it gone.

With this realisation now, what first had him convinced something today had changed, has only grown. He won’t say the feeling only formed now or even that it began this morning, rather probably halfway through the month when his senses began to alight again. It’s the suspense to change, for the moon to lift into the sky and night to fall. It had shifted, after last month, from a suspense filled with horror and fear to something more eager and prepared. And… of course it is painful to transform. He’s been uncomfortable all day, even now his arms burn hot from the skin splitting within them in a near exact way to how the wood so easily slices in two, piece after piece as he’s lost in his thoughts. It’s not that he’s looking forward to it, not really. Kind of. Okay, fine. He is and even at minimum, there is curiosity and a desire for that exaltation, if he was to be truly honest.

So, it’s all a bit different today, even if outwardly not much has changed. Mainly, Ryan is just filled with relief to not be filled with abject misery. He’s a little sore, he’s a little overstimulated and he’s a little irritable, but he’s okay. It’s good to feel okay, in spite of everything.

With some finality to the thought, Ryan brings the axe down one last time, to split what he realises is the last piece of wood from the unshackled pile. He instantly regrets the added heft he put in his swing, the statement of the action losing its significance as the axe slices clean through both the piece of wood and the thick log used for the base. The blade stuck in the dirt, Ryan rightens while shaking out his left arm, a sudden sharp pain in his forearm. With just his right hand he yanks the axe from where he’d managed to stick it in the ground, a good inch or so deep, but he quickly drops it again as a warm wetness thickens the weight of his sleeve. 

The smell of copper has already filled his nose before his eyes even reach his arm. His teeth clench and he breathes a deep inhale through his nose, the pain becoming more noticeable now that he’s focusing on it. The discomfort is half of what the irritation he feels rising is, the rare decision to wear a colour other than black immediately coming to bite him in the ass. Dark red spreads along the sleeve, soaking into the grey fabric in a quickly growing stain that he’d probably find concerning, if not for the whole instant healing werewolf thing. At the very least he should be glad that he runs warm, so that he hadn’t worn his coat out and ruined that too. With a huff he ignores his initial impulse to grab his arm and instead carefully pulls up the sleeve, peering down at the abrupt appearing injury.

The small amount of added heft to his last swing seems to have been just too much of a strain on his already tearing skin. From the inside out, a deep laceration has been split up his arm, wide at the centre and tapering to finer points on either end. He tries not to look too closely inside it, at the disgusting and chunky mix of white, red and yellow, unsure but unwilling to see if he could be put off his lunch. Though it initially had pumped blood, it’s already begun clotting, the pain also ebbing. He rolls his sleeve back down, though he thinks to himself, he’s not actually sure if this will heal up, considering it’s a part of the process of shape shifting. His brows furrow and he sticks his thumb in his mouth to clear it of the swipe of blood on the print, before he pulls his phone from his pocket. It’s a part of the shape shifting process, that has apparently begun as early as twelve thirty. 

He slides it back into his pocket and turns to toss the tarp over the pile of firewood he’s chopped. Travis had called earlier, wanted them over at the Manor at a very stressed and specific time, after what happened last month. No one was much impressed to hear that, but Ryan thinks that it is certainly a good call now. Not that he was ever really against it, if it gets Travis off their back and really, is there much difference to them, between moping at the lodge versus outside the Manor? First though, they’ve got lunch to look forward to and with the gnawing hunger in his stomach, Ryan hopes he’s not having to wait long. He hefts the wheelbarrow up, ignoring the twinge and reignited warmth around his arm, and makes his way back to the lodge.

His nose involuntarily twitches upon entrance back into the main room of the lodge, the scents feeling much stronger after his stint in the fresh air. He rolls the wood over to the fireplace, stacking it up against the stone side and debates throwing another piece on. They’ll be out of here soon enough however, so he leaves the dwindling flame alone. On his way back from depositing the wheelbarrow outside, Abi wanders past, on her way across the hall from either the bathrooms or office. Most likely the former.

”Oh! Ryan, uh lunch is ready. Letting everyone kno- oh! Oh my god, what happened to your arm?” She says, her voice doing a funny little upward pitch in shock as she notices the dark bloodstain that’s consumed half of his sleeve. 

”Oh. Um, nearly chopped it off out there, actually. Dangerous stuff.” He jokes, in his deadpan humour. And maybe the others had a point yesterday, about his sarcasm needing to be clearer, as Abi’s concern grows. He feels a little bad thinking it’s funny actually, the worried shock knitting her brows close together and turning her lips down in an open mouthed frown. 

“How did- god! Okay, um, there’s stuff in the nurses office we could use? Do you need stitches? Shit, should we drive you to the hospital? That looks really bad…” Abi rushes out, far too concerned for either of their own good.

”Abi, I'm just joking, sorry. It’s cool, it’ll heal right?” He says slowly in an attempt to try and prompt her into realising why the hospital is not only entirely unnecessary but also not something they could afford on a day like today anyway. It’s not like it’s a short drive, from out here in the back end of nowhere.

“Oh. Oh right, obviously. Duh. Haha. Um, anyway! I- I still have to tell the others about lunch so…” Abi stutters out stiltedly in that awkward way of hers. “Glad you’re okay though! No hospital!”

He mirrors her painfully awkward smile with an added nod, watching her turn tail and flee up the stairs before giving into the urge to slap a hand over his face. He feels a talon nick his forehead and that just makes him huff louder, only just resisting from making a frustrated growling groan. Talk to the other’s Ryan, it’ll be easy Ryan, you’re the right person to do it Ryan- whoever’s grand idea any of this was, deserves a clip over the ear. 

He finds her in the kitchen and although it’s a terrible idea on a day like today, he’s vindicated enough that he does actually ever so lightly and mostly jokingly clip her over the ear. Despite barely making contact, she whips around and gives a hearty jab of her fist into his shoulder. It doesn’t move him in either context of the phrase, despite the weight put behind the punch. However she then lifts a hand, held stiff and flat, motioning it towards the left of his head.

Her lips pout in a mocking frown. “I’d return the gesture but it looks like someone already took half your ear off. How’d that happen again?”

“Worn any tank tops lately?” He shoots back, their bickering sounding mean but there is a lightness in the air of the kitchen, quarantined off from the rest of the lodge. 

“Wouldn’t you like to know? You imagine that a lot?” She scoffs and crosses her arms, tone obnoxious and disdainful despite their ribbing. However then, and this brings Ryan more fear than he thinks anything else Kaitlyn may do would, her smile and tone turn sugary sweet. “Or not. Other priorities right? Like-“

He doesn’t need to know where she’s going with that. “Shut up, Jesus. You just say random shit.”

Her grin is now genuine, well aware that she’s won. He’s not sure if she knows how much she knows or if she just knows it’ll get a rise out of him, but using her own words, she’s right on the money. Does it bother him that he can’t ask if she’s aware just how correct she really is, every time she needles on this topic? Yes, but he can’t exactly complain about that either. So he just crosses his own arms, fun ruined.

Honestly though, it feels significant that there was at least some fun to ruin. Like him, though she’s been a bit irritable, she seems to be in equally as good a headspace as Ryan. Though perhaps he should feel more relief that his initial assault didn’t cause a standoff or outright brawl as it rightfully could have, he hadn’t actually expected it to anyway. He feels a little more security and normality between himself and Kaitlyn now, something that does more than just let the trust back in. It’s a confidence, even if it’s from someone else, that he’s desperately needed his entire life.

”So what am I being attacked for? Poor, innocent, little old me?” She asks, leaning back against one of the centre kitchen counters.

“You, attacked? I was the one assaulted, look at what you did to me.” He insists with a gesture to his bloodstained sleeve instead of answering, unwilling and finding it unnecessary to go over the halfhearted thought that was the real reason. Maybe he just wanted an excuse to wack her, frankly even then it still would not be undeserved.

She sucks air in between her teeth before releasing it with a tchk. “Shit, I did more damage than I realised. Scratching again?”

“Think more, skin splitting open from the inside.” He lightly corrects.

”Gross.” Kaitlyn hums, as if she’s had a lightbulb thought. “Need to start buying red sweatshirts in bulk- hide the blood.”

”Yeah, I don’t think that’s how that works.” He replies, but it’s distractedly, as his attention is suddenly taken by the whiff of various foods, something sweet and hot pulled from the oven. He’d managed to ignore it upon entrance to the kitchen in his single minded pursuit of landing a surprise attack on Kaitlyn, but his iron will has rusted quickly now that his mission has concluded.

Nick, who Ryan feels a little bad to admit he kind of ignored on entrance, again, very important mission and all, holds a tray in his hands. A muffin tray specifically, but it’s not frosted cupcakes held within it, despite the sweet smell. They all quickly became aware that on full moon days, they’re far from vegetarians and for nearly every plate of food within the kitchen now, all Ryan can smell is meat, meat, meat. The tray is no exception.

”Hey, Nick.” He says and politely waits for the oven mitt covered wave in greeting to be returned before he continues on. “What’s in that tray you got there?”

”Oh, well I figured as long as it’s got meat, you guys seem to kind of eat anything when it’s this close to- you know.” Nick explains, just a little unsure of himself until Ryan nods him on, noticing but not commenting on the subtle distancing done, as if he’s any different from them. “It’s just essentially a use for what I had leftover, so I kind of made cornbread with ham and chocolate chips mixed in, then I wrapped it in bacon and then melted cheese on top? Um. They’ll probably get chucked but everyone paid for this stuff and I didn’t want to throw anything out, so.”

“That sounds disgusting.” Ryan says with what he knows is awe. He may not be drooling yet but his mouth has certainly started watering.

Nick seems to take that comment for what it is though and gives a subdued resemblance to something like a smile. “A breakthrough in the culinary arts, for sure.”

Ryan has enough self control to take the step he’d made forwards back again, leaning against the counter with his hand that is not covered by a blood soaked sleeve holding him upright, for the perfect view of the kitchen. Nick’s outdone him himself, though whether Ryan’s opinion is swayed by his insatiable hunger may leave that up for debate, as really it is not all that different from any other time Nick has prepared a hodgepodge spread for them. Though it’s nearly painfully difficult to sit here and wait the last couple of minutes before they can eat, Ryan has to admit the atmosphere within the kitchen is peaceful in a way the lodge often isn’t. Nick, despite his earlier dour scent, seems to have lightened up enough that the scent of fresh cut grass in the air is neutral at worst. Still, Ryan does admittedly have to wipe at his lip before turning around to face the kitchen door creaking open, Kaitlyn mirroring his actions just a second behind.

Dylan tilts his head and quirks a smile, eyes narrowing in on the bloodstain immediately. He covers his curiosity with humour expertly. “Nick’s turned to force in an attempt to keep your hands off the food?”

”I wouldn’t do that.” Nick corrects him almost instantly, in a strange exhibit of defensiveness, as if Dylan could have ever uttered that with any sincerity.

“Yeah well maybe you should, these two are looking like vultures. Gonna have to put down their plate and back away slowly to avoid losing a hand.” Dylan teases with this amused expression and still tilted head. Urgh, he looks better than the food and now Ryan’s instincts don’t know where he wants his focus to be, eyes struggling to remain on one or the other.

”Have you been back in the library Dylan? You were wandering around a lot but suddenly disappeared for some reason. How come?” Kaitlyn asks conversationally, oddly letting the quips go to chat in that sweet tone that would have Ryan scared if it was pointed towards him. 

“Getting away from you.” Dylan grumbles with this terribly cute pout and Ryan makes the executive decision then to focus on the food. 

The others slowly file in after that, bringing with them their various demeanours and scents, stuffing them all into the kitchen. It’s easier, on days either side of the full moon, to just eat in here. They all come at their own pace, Abi the first to join back after doing the rounds and Emma dragging herself through the door last with a summer storm hanging over her head. Ryan, with Kaitlyn just a moment behind him, had started eating as soon as Nick gave the all clear. Which was a minute after Abi returned, her and Dylan pulling up stools to sit and pour drinks while they not so subtly waited. No one mentioned it of course, but it was obvious now that it had been pointed out.

It was Jacob, upon entrance, that really filled the room up with a near choke inducing smog. He caught sight of the meat between fangs and his expression only darkened. His lip twitched up to reveal an ever so slightly pointed tooth as he looked at how everyone, including Dylan at this point, was eating. “What, you couldn’t wait just five minutes?” He snaps, angling for a stab at their manners, as if a bunch of near twenty year olds would care, rather than his true issue with it.

”You snooze, you lose.” Kaitlyn says around a bite of one of Nick’s muffin abominations. “This fucks, Nick, masterfully crafted.”

Despite being its creator, Nick looks far less convinced and possibly a little put off by the enthusiastic word choice for that compliment. “Glad you like it.”

They’re digging into the spread of food, once more without plates, so no one loses a hand despite Dylan’s earlier quip. Though, admittedly he wasn’t that far off, as in between sparse and stilted conversation, the occasional growl slips loose whenever hands reach for the same slice. Ryan’s feels like a kid’s first time at a candy buffet, grabbing more and more and barely tasting anything as he tries to fill that gnawing hunger, to no avail. Down in the cages, there will be no chance for any midnight snacks to put it lightly and it almost makes him hungrier, despite knowing how futile it is. He will feel like he’s starving until tomorrow evening, when he wakes still exhausted with aches and pains and can finally fill a normal sized stomach, if that first month was anything to go off. As the first to begin eating, maybe he should be the first to finish, but he’s so consumed with his hunger that the other’s occasional comments have faded out in the background until the spread really begins to thin. He’s still picking through the scraps however when the higher volume of a voice is enough to draw some of his attention away, to across the counter and the smouldering scent of oak. 

“-can’t believe you guys went into town without me yesterday, you didn’t even check if I wanted to come. Which I did!” Jacob complains in a mostly whiny tone, around a mouthful of food. A crumb goes flying and Ryan thinks it may have once been a part of a burger patty, spare the rest of the burger which no one could be bothered making. Ryan’s already had five.

Emma’s brows furrow, her hand reaching for the cross hanging from her throat, to fiddle with it in what Ryan’s sure is thought. Not to pat himself on the back or anything, but Ryan thinks he did a good enough job of not making it obvious that he’d purposefully left out Jacob for her benefit. Jacob seems to be trampling over his efforts now however and worse still, he also catches Emma’s expression. His eyes dart over her face, trying to read the frown, his own expression now hardening and jaw tightening. The oak burns darker. 

“Oh, ‘course. I should have realised it was you.” He says venomously, shocking everyone’s eyes towards him from the tone. “What, you’re going to take all my friends now, in what- what, some punishment or something? Is that it?”

Emma looks up at him, face still pinched and shoulders raising defensively with a shake of her head. Her posture is instantly tensed, her jaw held tight. “What? I di-“

Between these two, Ryan doesn’t doubt that this will spiral quickly. He speaks up, in an attempt to cut it off before it can turn worse, their emotions too heightened and nerves too frayed to be getting into an useless argument like this on a day like today. “It was me, actually, who didn’t invite you. We were just checking it out, didn’t think it was a big deal.” He says with a shrug, as casual as possible.

With what he thought was a subtle glance at Emma, she seems to see through it. Understanding crosses her face with a little sideways and upwards pull of her lips, a softening to her expression. She doesn’t say anything but the way she relaxes back down in place and looks back at him with intent, he’s not inept enough to miss the gratitude she feels. She offers him a blip of a smile, a private offer to him that he doesn’t get the chance to return, as Jacob’s glare switches target.

He’s holding himself stiff, yet it’s not quite reached the tension of an aggressive challenge posture. There’s a more defensive, possibly even anxious element to it, not quite clear enough in his scent to say for certain. Either way, the sanctuary of lighter scents that was held in the kitchen just moments before lunch is irreparably tarnished, as the heavy soot will cover its counters and linger in the air for hours after they leave now. 

“Right. Not a big deal, obviously.” Jacob says before his tone becomes even more bitter, covered with just a thin veneer of sweetness on top in a way that makes Ryan think it must’ve been learned from Kaitlyn, though he’s sure he’s never heard her sound anywhere near as hostile before. “Cause, I mean you just wanted to go on a cute little coffee date right? I’d probably get in the way of that.”

Ryan feels his chest go cold, as he swallows around a mouthful that has suddenly turned to sludge between his molars. He knows the room stands still and silent in shock around them, his own movements slow as he lowers a hand to the counter. It curls into a fist, talons sticking into his palm with a soundless pop, the scent of blood lost beneath the rising acrid miasma smothering the soot like ash in smoke. His body has instantly tensed, that now familiar feeling growing in his jaw, that strain that urges to be relieved, the instinct to follow it already fulfilled before it can even truly register.

”The fuck does that mean? There was no date, I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.” Ryan bites back, now just as harshly as Jacob himself. 

Jacob scoffs a laugh, though there’s no humour in it. “It’s obvious man, everyone can see it. You think that we don’t all know about your hopeless little crush? We’re not dumb, you know that right?” He says to the crowd, looking around with arms spread, like a priest to the congregation. There is no applause however, no agreement, just a tense silence that weighs a tonne. 

Ryan doesn’t know what the others are thinking, if it really is so obvious. No one utters a word or shifts an inch. Humiliation burns up his spine, fear freezes ice crystals in his lungs. He wants to be swallowed by a pit in the floor, the weighted stares of everyone around him making him feel like a spotlight has been pointed to shine down directly on him, as if he’s stumbled onto a stage he never wanted to stand on. Ryan doesn’t think he’s ever felt so humiliated, physically unable to bring himself to glance at Dylan, to see his judgement and discomfort at the truth finally spoken aloud. 

Backed into a corner, instincts dialled up to a sparking voltage, he realises now that on that August night he lost the ability to ever flee and he won’t get it back. He’s shifted to that challenging posture, body moving under the direction of instinct as fluid as water. Yet the true fight comes out in the form of an outright caustic tone, even as his fist tightens and shoulders go broad. “I think you’re the last person who can say shit on hopeless crushes, especially when it’s so obvious you’re just projecting. We all saw just how pathetic you can get, your desperation reeked. Reeks .” 

Jacob pulls himself up to his full height, stepping up as close as he can to the counter as he snarls at Ryan from across the way. His shoulders are held high, his spine stiff and top lip tugging in a scowl that shows off a tooth or two. The pose would be instantly recognisable even if Ryan didn’t have his instincts tugging his body to match the aggressive posturing. 

Ryan’s instincts and body have been fine tuned all day to respond to this. That tightness and faint ache in his jaw doesn't even have the chance to grow any stronger as he snaps it shut and tenses. Pure acid seeps from him, covering and burning through all other scents until only his remains. His eyes are locked with Jacob, narrowed and forcing the rest of the room into a blur around them. 

Ryan’s words begin and end with a guttural growl that rattles his ribcage. They’re deeper than what he’d ever thought possible, near unintelligible from the way each coarse syllable has to force itself through the snarl of his lips. “Heel or get the fuck out.” Whatever irony or sarcasm that was originally intended to accompany the words were lost to the imposing and commanding strength of his tone. 

Jacob is nearly shaking from the tension he holds, biceps and fists flexing, nostrils flaring and teeth grinding. It’s released in a far more human growl of frustration than the sound that Ryan had made, his head shaking before then snapping to the side as he looks away. Ryan watches, still in that tense posture despite the clear concession, as Jacob’s eyes flick up to the others in the room. It will be a repeat of the month prior, Ryan instantly knows with the way his shoulders grow tense once more, where Jacob will turn to each of the others in the room in an attempt to weigh up his position among them, whether Jacob himself knows that’s why or not. They don’t need that right now and the only one Jacob needs to know his position in relation to, is Ryan, he thinks to himself perhaps arrogantly. 

“Jacob, look at me.” He says coldly. He knows his words and tone are darker than they need to be, that he isn’t just preventing standoffs as he good and well should be, but also turning his humiliation into a bite. “Either look at me or get the fuck out of my sight.”

Jacob doesn’t look at him immediately, the glance around turning from narrowed eyes in search of standoffs with each of them, into a look for help at the harsh and domineering tone. No one will meet his gaze and he’s forced to pull his eyes to Ryan’s. The instincts to fight splutter out immediately, his shoulders slumping and a great huff escaping him in place of the growl that would be there had he risen to the challenge. 

Standoffs averted, or rather brute force ended, Ryan lets some of the stiffness leave his spine and jaw. He’s still tense, still on the edge and unable to relax should the challenge reemerge, but the moment is over at least. His shoulders lowering and the pinpricks of pain in his palms suddenly alight. He glances down quickly to the four crescents he’d stabbed into his own flesh without realising it, blood beginning to leak when he pulls his talons free. They will heal within moments and concerning his hands, are actually the least of his concerns. Beneath his skin, shallow veins that were blue and hidden just moments ago, have grown a brackish black and risen in a very visible manner. He drops his hands to his sides in an attempt to hide the sight of it, looking back and just hoping the black in his veins hasn’t spread to his face.

If it has, Jacob is too occupied in grappling for a response that he doesn't notice. The challenge may have been dropped but he’s still arguing, albeit from a far more human place. Something which stresses Ryan even further, a physical confrontation easily won, but a return to his pathetic and apparently obvious crush drawing that cold humiliation back, no longer able to turn it into aggression. The food is now left completely forgotten as Jacob throws his hands out either side of him in a far exaggerated shrug, forcing both Abi and Max to stumble away lest they get accidentally hit. “Whatever man, who cares anyway? At least I got some! ‘Cause she’s not gonna fuck you bro!”

Ryan essentially eats the next breath he was about to release, swallowing the words that were tumbling through his mouth with some effort, catching them just before they made it past his teeth. He’d feel the insurmountable relief if the confusion wasn’t far stronger than even that and the pause created by a mix of both is weighty in its silence. The narrowing field of vision that the absolute focus of a challenge creates blurs at the edges and his jaw loses some of its strain, the challenge now completely dropped and leaving the fight within him sizzling to a lower heat. He finally takes the time to actually see Jacob’s expression, rather than just looking at it with panicked, narrowed but otherwise unseeing eyes. 

He’s almost starting to go red in the face, a light amount of colour rising beneath the skin of his cheeks. From both the losing argument and being put quite firmly in his place, Ryan would assume. There’s still the tautness to his expression, held in his brows, lips and jaw. His eyes though, darting between Ryan and Kaitlyn, give a little more clarity to what he’s actually back to arguing, the incorrect assumption saving Ryan from the near, and what would have actually been the correct call. It’s enough to mostly calm the wolfish side of him that was ready to sink its teeth into the other cur for the aggressive tone and accusation, the reflex settling as he’s assured he still has the upper hand and the foot above them.

With the tunnel vision receding, Ryan catches Kaitlyn’s scoff before she speaks, drawing his attention to her. It seems that it was not enough of an explanation for her, as she also must have noticed herself being drawn into the spat by his agitated wandering eye. “Jacob, what the fuck are you talking about?” She says, with genuine confusion and frustration.

”You two and your little ‘pack’ or whatever, which apparently I’m not a part of but Emma is? He probably just made it up because he’s into you! You- You're acting like he’s your new best friend and then you're hanging out with Emma and she’s trying to make you all hate me, it’s- I’m not stupid, okay!” Jacob bursts out, his words merging together and yet disjointed, thoughts splattering out his mouth with no filter of thought beforehand.

Ryan bristles at the disparaging mention of his pack, his fangs piercing the inside of his lip and his body still held a little tense. He watches Jacob with an unwavering focus, searching for any hint that he may return to challenging them, yet he’s unable to find it. Jacob seems to be running on pure emotion now, rather than instinct, after the loss. Either way, he’s not making a huge amount of sense, at least nothing rational that isn’t borne of not even thinly veiled insecurity, rather more insecurity that is just laid bare for them to all see. He might be aware of it, that red of what has to be embarrassment on his face, but it’s not enough to hold it back. With it heightened as it all is today, it’s grown to cover him in an obvious and uncontrollable sensitivity, no prodding needed to draw insecure outbursts out of him. His eyes now solely search Kaitlyn’s face, as if he’ll find some reassurance there, some confirmation that Emma hasn’t somehow made her hate him. Which, with Emma’s affronted expression and growing dark cloud around her, she obviously wasn’t trying to. Despite the clear issues that have cropped up between them, Ryan doesn’t believe that either of them are truly the kinds of people to attempt to turn each other's friends against them, the logic of this outburst truly incoherent and coming from seemingly nowhere.

“Dude, that’s not- what? Where is this coming from?” Kaitlyn tries to be assuring, but it isn’t exactly her forte and the confusion is thicker.

”Emma- she’s-“ Jacob flounders, apparently at a loss to explain and growing more conscious of all the eyes on him as each second ticks by. 

“Oh my god, you really are pathetic, holy shit.” Emma cuts his trailing explanations off as she suddenly laughs, a bitter and angry sound. “Of course you’d try to blame me . How about you just keep my name out of your mouth and leave me alone. You’re actually obsessed.”

Jacob scoffs, shaking his head and seems to regain some of his lost footing. Though both their tones hold that bitter and mocking kind of humour, their laughter is far from joyful. “You think everyone’s obsessed with you because you’re obsessed with yourself. You think you’re the only one allowed to have feelings about anything, ever.”

”Oh man up!” Emma scorns. Her frustration is visibly mounting and that summer storm that has come and gone throughout the day is whipping up into something dangerous, the tornado sirens blaring out their wailing warning.

”Okay, maybe we let it rest.” Ryan tries, despite his own emotions yet to settle. It’s a hard line to get out, both from the remaining mix of unpleasantly heavy emotions and due to the fact his jaw actually aches from the tension he’d held it with. He forces himself to get over it as he continues, realising just how much he doesn't want this to spiral any further. “No one hates you Jacob and I don’t know where the date shit was coming from but-“

He is cut off by Emma throwing her hands in the air with a tight lipped smile, the attempted humour in the expression collapsing inwards as her eyes grow red and misted. “Maybe we should! Maybe we should. I mean, even Jacob hates himself and we know ourselves best, right?”

“Just because I’m not obsessed with myself like you, doesn’t mean I hate myself!” Jacob insists before his tone turns mocking in a way Ryan’s never heard him sound before. “God, sorry I forgot it’s ’that time of the month’ for you. Do they stack, make you double the bitch?”

”Dude!” Kaitlyn admonishes, sounding pissed herself now. The tension in the room is palpable, everyone’s scents now heavy fogs of anger, confusion or anxiety. This has quickly spun out of control, into a group wide spectacle of what feels like something worse than a simple lovers spat.

There’s tears in Emma’s eyes, yet to drop and surely burning, but she acts as if she doesn’t notice them. She’s instead suddenly eerily calm, breath controlled and hands folded over each other on the counter. Her jaw is held tight, words coming out strained. “Yeah, I’m the bitch. I’m the bitch because I didn’t want to get married with five kids at twenty and I’m the bitch because you sabotaged the van to keep us trapped here.”

There’s a muted ‘what?’ in the background and the sound of a deep intake of breath. Her voice raises and she’s yelling now, voice rising and rising to something sharp and shrill the further on she goes. “I’m the bitch because you ruined our fucking lives? Me? Fuck you! It’s your fault we’re living like this now, not mine! I’m not the fucking bitch!” 

Each of the camp counsellors all look like deer stuck in the headlights and behind the wheel is Jacob, suddenly panicking and close to tears. “No! I- I didn’t- it wasn’t- I didn’t know-“

”Oh, you didn’t want them to know that, did you? No, you just told me so you could be absolved of guilt.” Emma says with pure vitriol. Then she shrugs, smiles, breathes a deep breath and despite the stream down her cheeks, she laughs perhaps a little maniacally. “Well now everyone knows! Maybe we can do a little show and tell, did you take it home with you as a keepsake?” 

“That wasn’t why I- no, of course not, I lost it at the lake- I- fuck.” The tears well over and Jacob chokes on a breath, his eyes darting between each and every one of their stunned expressions.

Ryan’s mind feels like an old film reel, spluttering on the stock. This was the weight that she’d been carrying, this was what happened between them that first month back. Jacob sabotaged the van to keep them here? What, to get back with Emma after their failed summer fling? Which not only did that fail anyway, everything that has come after hinged then, on that one decision. The terror of that night, getting infected, the rest of their lives spent now with this curse, forced back here every month. Ryan had to shoot Chris because of this, he had to become a murderer- Chris and Caleb and Kaylee and all of the Hackett family, they would still be alive if Jacob hadn’t doomed them all by breaking the van. He- why would he do that? Why would he do this to them?

”The motor arm?” Comes the deathly quiet, but thundering in the silence of the room, question. Kaitlyn looks up at him, lips pursed and chest giving a heave from a caught breath. She clears her throat before she speaks again and now her voice is louder and clearer, direct and cold. “That’s why you asked me about it when we were packing? So you could break it?”

Jacob’s head tilts slightly, the tears carving through his skin as rivers carve through rock, his voice frankly pathetic as he says, “Kaitlyn…”

“Admit it, if you did.” The strength of her tone peters out and turns searching, like she can’t or doesn’t want to believe it. “Did you really? Jacob… seriously?”

He nods, apparently unable to bring himself to speak. She’s joked about it before but Jacob can’t lie to her. So he nods and ducks his head, shame yanking him by the hair and forcing his eyes to his shoes.

”Why wouldn’t you tell me?” She asks, sounding more hurt by the idea of that then the fact she was forced to shoot and fucking murder someone due to his actions. They’re murderers because of him.

“I didn’t want you to hate me.” Jacob mutters to his shoes, oddly reminiscent of a scolded child. Ryan can hear the slow and uneven patter of teardrops on tile. He feels torn, frustrated at the sympathy it draws from him. Angry that Jacob could be owed his sympathy after what he did to them all.

”Well, thanks for that, Jacob.” Dylan says stiffly, drawing Ryan’s attention to the others in the room. “You’re sure my favourite right now.”

They’re all tense, anger and hurt displayed plainly on their faces. Nick’s hands rub roughly together in an anxious gesture and his teeth grind together, Ryan can hear as well as see it from the opposite end of the counter. Abi holds herself in what must be an attempted self soothing motion, but it doesn’t bring her much comfort, her expression twisted and each breath coming quick and shaken. Dylan keeps swallowing thickly or twitching his lips, shaking his head, breathing deeply and then repeating the actions, over and over again. He looks like he’s trying to conjure a smile, or something else to say, yet failing. Then there’s Laura and Max, inching towards the door and upon catching Ryan’s eye, offering a consoling pity wave before quietly seeing themselves out. He’s not sure if it’s to give them privacy or to escape the noxious fumes while they still can, but either way he manages to find some semblance of humour in it, watered down by the heavy feeling in his chest. Meanwhile, Emma’s a torrent of emotion that’s been bottled up for the last few months and is now spilling out everywhere it can. It leaks from her eyes through burning tears, through the cracks in her voice and the shake of her hand as she points a finger at him. 

“You- you ruined everything. I’m never going to be the same again because of you, I can’t travel, I can’t go to university, I’m never going to just feel normal ever again, because of you!” She covers her face with her hands and her last words come out amongst a sob. “My entire life.”

Jacob looks up, sniffles and wipes a hand under his running nose. “I didn’t mean to ruin your life.” It’s a genuine statement, Ryan knows, but it doesn’t change anything. It doesn’t change the fact that he did. Seven lives, six deaths.

”But you did! You did. You ruined everyone’s life here. Can- can you even grasp that? It’s your fault we’re like this, it’s your fault we’re here and it’s your fault we’re all monsters.” Emma tells him, as plainly as it’s possible to be through the thick venom within it.

The onslaught of blame seems to reignite the defensiveness within Jacob and his voice raises. “I know, okay? I know I made a mistake! I know I fucked up but you don’t need to rub it in, I get it! I feel bad enough already, alright?”

”Oh, I’m being the bitch again, right? Why should I care that you’re crying?” Her voice is scarily honest in her loathing when she says, “You deserve to, you’re right to hate yourself. We do! You know we all hate you, right?”

In the stunned silence that follows, Ryan can taste the grief in the air. From Emma, from Jacob and from each of the others. Tailored to each of them, of just what they have lost because of Jacob’s decision that August evening. Still, although no one, especially not Ryan, feels like defending Jacob in this moment, her statement isn’t true. He- Ryan doesn’t know how he feels right now, he needs a chance to think. His emotions are high, his fist is clenched again and he peters on the edge of another challenging posture, ready for another standoff in less than a second's notice. It won’t come, he knows, Jacob’s already been beaten just moments ago and he’s so suddenly weak and pathetic that he wouldn’t try again. Ryan still remains prepared, from his own anger most likely, but he ignores that fact. However Ryan still knows he doesn’t hate Jacob despite all of that and he knows Kaitlyn won’t either. He’s still glad it’s Abi who speaks up though, as Ryan doesn’t feel like offering Jacob a hand out of the pit he’s dug himself into after either the personal attack or this revelation, even if he was willing to do so if he had to. 

“Emma…” She says, resting a gentle hand on Emma’s shaking forearm. “You don’t mean that…”

“Don’t touch me!” Emma yanks her arm away, backing a step away from Abi and glancing around to the others in the room with tear stained eyes. “I do, I do mean it! I- fuck. How can you not-? You don’t get it, just- just leave me alone.”

With one last glare, filled with tears, heartbreak and hatred, Emma turns for the door. She stumbles through it, nothing more than a sob and the remnants of a tornado tearing up a summer's day left in her wake. There’s only the chance for the collective deep exhale from the tension held by them all, mouths not even ready to begin forming words in reaction to everything that just happened, before the door is clicking and slammed open once more. Ryan hasn’t even had the chance to think over the revelation, to work out how he feels or where to go from here, so he’s certainly not prepared for the round two that’s about to start back up again. With the tears brimming in Abi’s eyes at Emma’s outlash at her and the guilt ridden sobs of Jacob echoing through the kitchen despite his valiant attempts to muffle them, the others aren’t ready to either. He prepares to give his best shot at conflict de-escalation, a hand lifting and lips twisting as he tries to remember how to form a sympathetic tone that will not come naturally in this moment.

It isn’t Emma however. It’s Travis, turning from where he was looking behind him, stopping short and glancing around with a raised brow after his dramatic entrance. The door creaks closed behind him, an anticlimactic end to its journey after the dint it left in the wall. He seems to falter, his expectant look turning a little less certain, as he realises he’s walked into a room heavy with a lot of emotions. Despite having had to of just walked past Emma, he clearly hadn’t expected the just as dark mood held by them all. Since it’s Travis, he manages to shrug it off quickly enough, clicking his tongue and shaking his head.

”Did I not tell you kids to be standing out that door at,” He checks what Ryan still believes is a nonexistent watch, “Fifteen minutes ago?”

There’s no sympathy on his face or held within his voice, just that constant exasperation he has with them. He acts as if he doesn’t hear the crying and he doesn’t notice the expressions on all of their faces. Ryan wonders what it’s like to be able to stand in this room without feeling like his sinuses and lungs are being melted away by an acidic cloud in the air. Maybe it would do Travis some good, if he could, because as it stands he just ignores the tension of the others entirely to stare at Ryan as he impatiently waits for an answer. They had agreed to head over to the Manor just after lunch and although Ryan hadn’t expected Travis to escort them, he really shouldn’t be surprised. Still, it’s only just past noon and Ryan’s really not in the mood for the judgement and insults today. Not that he ever is really, but if he thought he was a live wire earlier, he now feels like a nuclear reactor about to leave the land permanently radioactive if anyone so much as glances at him with a challenging look. 

”Lunch ran a little long.” He says dryly, a blank look returned to the expectancy levelled at him specifically. 

Travis all but groans, managing to cut himself off at a vocal huff of a sound. “What happened?” 

“Do you care?” Ryan shoots back. If it’s antagonistic then he doesn't care, his own sympathy for Travis has been on a thin rope recently and today it’s the last of his concerns.

Taking the question as if it was a reminder, Travis makes an acknowledging expression as if he was remembering that actually, he in fact does not. ”Not particularly. Is it something I need to know?” Travis asks in much the same tone, covering all bases just in case, if Ryan had to guess.

“No.” Not unless he just wants to get even more pissed at them and blame them even more for what happened that night. Which, he probably does, but he doesn’t need to know that. So, not exactly a lie.

”Then no, I don’t give a shit. Get ready, we’re going.” He does an ushering gesture, not humorous in the slightest, sternness etched into the lines on his face. “Hurry up, we don’t have all night. Thought you kids would have worked that out by now.”

Ryan’s still scowling once Travis has seen himself out, to wait for them by his cruiser. He’ll expect them to be walking of course, though most likely not without a stern lecture about not falling into any pits beforehand, as if he and Kaitlyn had done so on purpose last month. What a prick. 

He sighs and stands, attempting to roll some of the tension out of his shoulder as he does, though it doesn’t exactly work. They might as well give themselves something to do, to disperse some of the tension they all now hold and give them a chance to think. Sticking around here any longer also brings with it the risk of more altercations or even worse cropping up and somehow getting in the way of getting to a safe place to transform in time. Which they’re meant to be avoiding. So, once again, it seems it’s on him to round them all up before heading off. Which is fine, if he can get through to Emma. He doesn’t want to make anything more difficult for her right now than it already is, but she can’t stay here tonight either. So, with some anxiety brewing in his stomach, he looks to the others.

”Go change or grab whatever you need and lets go. We- we’ll talk about this when- well. Not right now.” He says, sounding as weary as he feels. 

They scatter without complaint, wanting to get as far away from each other as possible right now, spare Jacob and Kaitlyn. She gives Ryan a slow nod when their eyes catch on his way out and mouths a word to him. He returns the nod, adding her bag to his collection list. Jacob will just have to make do with what he has, Ryan’s not feeling particularly charitable enough to go out of his way to grab something fresh for him. He jogs across the lodge's hall, ignoring the pulling of the skin within his legs, knocking on the office door. He doesn’t have to lean against the wood to hear the shuffling making its way towards him from inside and he turns to leave before the door opens. He doesn’t want to see inside again, not now.

He takes the stairs two at a time, once more finding no strain on his muscles or lungs as he goes. He’s flying up the stairs like an olympian or more accurately a racing hound, until he feels the painful tear and is suddenly flying in the wrong direction, face first into the stairs above him. He catches himself with his hands before he has the chance to brain himself, quickly twisting himself around as he sits and instinctively grabs his calf with his hands in a tight grip. It digs his talons into his ruptured skin and he just as quickly lets go, biting back a groan of pain. His hands come away even more bloody than they already were and a careful twist of his leg reveals another seeping stain spreading over the fabric of his clothes. He can’t see the damage done beneath his jeans, but with gritted teeth, it hurts more than his arm did. It burns, from just beneath the underside of his knee to near his ankle, he can feel the blood running in pearls down the sides. 

He throws his head back and breathes a long, slow, steadying breath. This is another certainly new aspect of today and he can’t say it’s good. They’re far from night and he’s already covered in blood, his clothes ruined and walking around as if he’s the latest villain in a cheap thriller. He’s quite literally tearing apart at the seams, a process of transformation that’s beginning concerningly early. He lifts his hand to his forearm, running his fingers over the laceration in his skin, no longer bleeding but still open and raw. It didn’t heal, as he thought it might not. At least the crescents he left in his palms have healed, he confirms with a quick check, so it’s not as if his accelerated healing has conked out completely. However now too that he’s focused on the sensations of his body, he feels the shifting and grinding of his bones within him once more. Though it’s a new sensation, he worries now that it is of the same vein as the tearing of his skin from within- he’s transforming early, he’s sure. For it to be only noon and for his skin to rupture and bones to shift, he cannot think of another explanation. They’ve got to go, this day suddenly has the seemingly impossible chance to get worse.

He scampers up the rest of the stairs, favouring his leg. He finds Emma there in the attic, unable to exactly hide with the way her scent, like a summer storm, falls over the railing to rain down over the lodge. She sits on the couch he got to call his bed for just a measly couple of nights, her arms protectively wrapped around her legs and her face tear stained. She sniffles at his approach, though he remains by the stairs, keeping the same respectable distance that Kaitlyn had when she had come to get him that first month. Strategic he hopes, in that although short term it hadn’t worked out for her, long term it has brought about the only success he’s had since August. He may be reaching for connections that most certainly don’t exist, but Ryan needs any help he can get after this sudden disaster of a day. To think, he’d thought this month was going so well. His naivety and hope feels childish and embarrassing now, in the face of this. 

”Hey,” He says, remaining respectful of the delicate atmosphere she silently but clearly demonstrates that she has created up here. He admits, the attic does feel like a bastion of safety, despite its lack of doors. Like an open mouthed cave, the image of it brings a familiar despite its newness, sense of comfort. The wolfish side of him feels a faint jealousy to have lost the potential territory, left now a stray in the lodge due to his charity, which his wolfish side certainly does not have in spades.

”Hey.” Emma genuinely whispers, but he hears it as clear as a call.

”I’m not gonna- we can walk down in silence,” He attempts at delicacy, “But we’ve got to go, Travis is waiting and uh, expects us to go now.”

She nods but then she looks away for a moment. He worries it might be a refusal despite the perceived agreeing motion, but it seems she just needed a moment to gather herself, which he doesn’t blame her for in the slightest. She grips that necklace in her hand so tightly, he thinks it has the chance to do the same damage that his talons did to his own. When she looks back, her eyes are kept downcast. That does however, unfortunately land her gaze directly on his pant leg, which has turned nearly completely red at this point. He can feel the squelch of it where his ankle meets his shoe and he hopes he hasn’t left a trail behind him that’ll require mopping up tomorrow, when he most certainly will not feel like doing so. 

“What-“ She breathes out heavily again and shakes the question off. “We can take my van, I- I don’t want to walk and you look like you shouldn’t be, so…”

He nods his appreciation and she gets up, grabbing her bag and handing Kaitlyn’s to him without being asked or making any hint towards it. She pauses at the top of the stairs, looking out the mouth of the cave with visible apprehension. “I just, I don’t want… you know.”

”Yeah,” He immediately agrees, trying to settle her. “I get it, don’t worry. I’ll call in my disability card, no one can argue.”

She manages to give a halfhearted smile. “Nurse Emma has a ring to it, I guess. Dylan might try and weasel his way in though, if that’s our excuse.”

He can see the way she’s struggling to fake it till she makes it, the fakery obvious and falling far from making anything near it. He doesn’t expect the upbeat and confident Emma that he once knew from her but he doesn’t know how to express that right now. As much as it goes against what he’d ever want, when she clearly wants to be alone and is yet letting Ryan accompany her, he pushes his immediate thoughts on the matter to the back. He won’t waste her effort of holding herself together, when it clearly takes a lot and nor will he add to the pressure of it. So he shrugs and begins his way down, turning back to just simply say, “He can take my truck if he wants to, it’s fine. There’s only room in the ambulance for one, if that’s what you want.”

She nods with a watery grimace, retreating back into silence and once more grips the small cross hanging from her neck with such force he’s certain it’ll at least leave imprints within her palm, before she’s collected herself enough to follow him from the mouth of the cave. Out to where they’ll force themselves to ignore the call of the woods and drag themselves to the cages, where they’re locked and bolted in like mongols waiting for the needle. With just how much this month has begun to suddenly spiral, he doesn’t doubt that liquid blue would be more appealing than the splatters of red they are soon to coat the bars of their cells in, for some of them. To the sound of the slow footsteps following just behind him, he thinks, with some luck and grace from God held in that gold necklace of hers, he might be able to convince at least one of them otherwise.

Chapter Text

Ryan tries really hard to not bleed all over Emma’s van but he’s not quite sure how well he succeeds. Little tears appeared on his wrist when he pulled open the door handle and when he stretched to hop in, he felt the rupture on his other ankle. He sits now with a sock that’s grown soggy from the blood, his skin and bones aching, his clothes ruined and thoughts racing. He’s glad for the tense silence they hold, after the spectacle in the kitchen he finds he does just need a moment where he can release the metaphorical breath he’d been holding the entire time.

It was both harder and far less difficult than he expected it to be, to assert that only he and Emma would be driving. Hard because it truly is difficult to let Kaitlyn or Dylan out of his sight, a more keyed up half of his instincts extremely certain that they will fall under a grave and fatal attack should he let them wander off. Another part of him however, and strangely he couldn’t say if it comes from what he’d consider his human logic or if it’s another part of his wolflike instincts, has absolute faith in his betas ability to protect them both. Ultimately it was simple however, as at the time, still keyed up and ready to snap to a challenge at any moment as he was, there was an authoritative air to his statement that had even him secretly surprised. There was not going to be any arguments to that, even if Travis levelled him a severely judging and considering look and Jacob glared at him from behind his still blubbering tears. 

The short yet silent drive has provided him the chance for his emotions to settle, to take him off that edge of a standoff. It means that even if just so, a little more rational thought is manageable. A fairer outlook made possible, than what he’d held before. One of those slow forming thoughts had brought with it the labels of cur and hound, upon realising that part of the reason he feels his thoughts now settle, is the removal of the threat his wolflike side finds in Jacob. No longer on the edge from holding himself in that tense state of anticipation of a challenge, the adrenaline is able to leave his body in just the presence of an upset and vulnerable hound, something that side of him finds far from threatening. His emotions are still heightened, he still feels frustrated and angry and his grief has lurched back up to his throat once more. Some of the blame has fallen apart under the weight of logic returned to his mind, however.

It’s not something he necessarily has to think deeply on, once he’s calmed down just enough to stop letting emotion rule his judgements. Despite how he feels about it at this moment, he knows that logically, it is unfair to blame Jacob for everything that happened. His actions did directly lead to it happening, yes, and a little more directly than a butterfly flapping its wings and creating a tornado that ravishes a town. However he knows that it was unfair to look at Jacob and question why he would do this to them, when he can now remind himself that obviously, Jacob had absolutely no way of knowing that something like this would ever happen. Actions over intent and their consequences of course, but realistically, in the consequences that anyone in his position would have been able to calculate, a werewolf attack and subsequent infection that would leave them permanently tied together and to this quarry, was most certainly not one of them. Jacob doesn’t strike him as someone who catastrophizes and even then, it feels like a very specific and unlikely catastrophe for one's anxiety to focus on, without the meddling of some prophetic divining. 

Still, he was obviously not really thinking of any possible consequence, when he did make that choice. It was never going to work. A terrible plan with an unfortunately even more terrible outcome. He thinks it’s safe to say Jacob is an idiot, who still ultimately couldn’t have foreseen any of this happening even if he was not. Ryan’s sure he’ll be in the doghouse with them for a while, but they’ll move on eventually. Even now though, Ryan doesn’t even have the energy to stay furious or shocked at the revelation, with a higher priority in where the blood is seeping from where his skin has torn open from the inside out. He really does hope he doesn’t have to pay for the vans dry cleaning.

The van may certainly need some touching up either way however, as it gives an unhappy groan and the sudden scraping against the underside ricochets loudly within his ears. Emma makes this odd, slightly breathless grunt of a sound as she pulls them off the side of the private backroads, taking them from the dirt to the underbrush amongst the trees with a quick and slightly wild turn. They lurch to a stop, the van parallel to the road, a tree blocking Ryan’s door from the possibility of opening. 

The van has been filled with heavy rainfall and rapid winds ever since they closed the doors, an acid storm that has only grown throughout the short drive. Ryan has politely ignored the sniffling and occasional heaving sigh that nearly every time would then turn into a sob quickly choked down. He was taking a queue from Emma, maintaining the silence he promised her, taking the time to swallow down and settle his own emotions.

Now though, with his attention snapped back to her from the sudden veer off path, the quickly accelerating speed and shallowness of her breathing has him worrying his lip. He glances at her, makes sure not to stare, spotting the red of her face and reemerged tears dripping down from her jaw. They patter onto her palms, held upwards in her lap, which are shaking in the same rhythm as the engine of the rattling van. He opens his mouth to speak and closes it again. He doesn’t know what to say and doesn’t want to say the wrong thing. He looks down at his own hands for a moment in thought, traces his eyes over the split skin of his wrist, distractedly stopping on the way his skin looks as if it’s being pulled taunt around the laceration- which should be normal, if it was pulled towards the wound, rather than vertically alongside it.

With a heaving gulp of breath, Emma flutters a hand up to her chest and pushes hard against her sternum. “I cahn- fuck- I can’t.”

Her words come out breathless, with what has to be the steadily growing panic at the sensation of not being able to breathe. He tries to keep his tone more casual than soft, far removed from anything close to pitying. “Hey, it’s okay, you can breathe, d-“

”I know that.” Emma suddenly snaps out in one breath, filling her lungs fully once she has and going silent as she holds it. In obvious frustration she releases it, back to the quick and shallow inhales, before forcing herself to take in another deep breath and slowly pushing it back out through puffed out cheeks. On the next shallow inhale she gives another frustrated huff and shakes her head. “I know, so don’t tell me to find five things I can see, okay? It’s stupid, I just need to- to remember how to- shit, do it.”

Not particularly taken aback, Ryan simply shuts his mouth with a click of his teeth and sits back as Emma brute forces an end to her panic attack. She cranks the window down as she keeps forcing herself to take these deep inhales and he can practically hear the voice in her head, berating her lungs for not working how they’re meant to. It doesn’t actually take very long for her to strong arm her panic attack to an end, though he imagines for her, lightheaded and suffocating despite the cold fresh air rushing into the van, it would have felt painfully so. He doesn’t judge her unlikely and undoubtedly not therapist approved method of calming herself, to say the least, as he relates to her execution of methods. In Ryan’s own experience, despite wellness articles and official advice, when push comes to shove a cup of tea likely won’t work. He also finds the force restart, a shutting down and starting back up of whatever system has gone haywire or begun to lag, will more often work even if it takes a few tries. He’s been there, holding down the power button on his emotions through a deep breath or banging against the side of the television with a fist until the static clears.  

“I wasn’t-“ Emma says before she quickly clears her throat and lifts a hand to wipe at the tears on her face, though her gaze remains on her lap. “I wasn’t talking about breathing, I- I was trying to say…”

She shakes her head and he continues to sit quietly, not rushing her. She has to grapple with her breath a moment more before she can manage what she wants to say. It’s through tears, coming out wet and gasped and shame filled. “I can’t go back there. I can’t go right now.”

Ryan nods, even if she can’t see it. His stomach twists, even as he says, “We don’t have to go yet, we have time.” 

The thing is, he doesn't actually know if they do or not. Yes, the sun streams down through the trees around them, dancing in shadows from the swaying leaves. It’s nearly directly above them, warming the dashboard under the cover of the windshield. Yet that may not be enough today. He’s still certain that he’s transforming early somehow. With that horrible new way that his bones shift within him, his radius, femur, tibia, spine and ribs all feel like they’re grinding against their sockets and stretching like he’s on the rack, stretching and surely soon to break. Ironically enough, the horrible itching feel of his skin of previous months seems to have been itched by those splits in his skin, though he cannot say that’s likely a good thing. Those tears that have opened him up from the inside out may have healed enough to curb the blood flow but as earlier, they remain open and raw, still unable to heal due to being a part of the process of transformation. He is pretty sure they won’t scar for that reason, pretty sure and very fucking hopeful. With all that together, even if the fever, nausea and general full body aches have yet to begin, with his stretching bones and tearing skin as it is, he’s not certain he won’t burst from his human flesh whether the suns above them or not. 

Still, he’s not going to force Emma to drive them to the Manor right now in the state she’s in. Not after what just happened, not with her having to force her breath to comply. Just sitting down with barely any movement, though it makes the sensation within his bones more prominent, seems to at least not accelerate these transforming symptoms anyway. So he’ll probably be fine. If he does feel any closer to the edge before they’ve begun making their way again, he’ll let her know. Worse comes to worse and he does very suddenly transform, she can run to the Manor to get Kaitlyn. He’s certain Kaitlyn would be able to hop in the van and drive them to the Manor with no problem, though once they’d get there he’s not sure what more she could do. That’s just worse case scenario though and Ryan holds out hope that the wolfish side of him can contain itself until the moon rises, as he’s not going into those fucking cages until then. It’s fine, this will be fine. 

As if to purposely draw him from his musings, though he knows it was unintentional, Emma sniffles and lifts a hand again to try and clear the tears away. With the way they keep falling, her efforts are entirely futile. He feels bad for thinking that tomorrow, amongst all the other horrible symptoms of recovery, she’ll also have a headache. She hums a vague acknowledgement of what he said, looking out the open window to the dirt road for a moment, letting the cold air do the work for her. It eases the stain too, of the scents in the van. For a few minutes they just let the fresh air flow and the moment settle.

After a while, Emma gives a huffed and still tear stained laugh. “Urgh, sorry, I’m being silly. The drama, oh my god.” She says it from the back of her nose and although she forces a bright smile and cheeky laugh, it’s so obviously fake that Ryan feels even worse for her.

Ryan doesn’t let any pity ebb its way into his voice, as he knows she’d hate that. He’s honest and firm and sympathetic instead. “You don’t have to pretend to be happy or-or okay, when I know you’re not.”

”I- I’m fine, seriously.” She sniffs in a stuffy tone before she then tucks her hair behind her ears, smoothing out the back where it’s left undone. “I’m fine, seriously, I’m just being silly, I’m good. Good to go.”

“It’s fi-“ He stops himself from his simple agreements with a short, stuttered pause and decides immediately against letting it go. How many times is he going to let these conversations go without a fight? If he wants them to finally be honest, then he cannot let these chances passively slip him by.  

He quickly switches tracks but it’s not like he has to rush his next words out, as she hasn’t exactly twisted the keys in the ignition, rather just sitting there with her hands now clasped tightly around the wheel. “I mean, you’re not okay and you probably won’t be in a couple of minutes, let's be real. But…” He tries and fails to hide some of his hesitation, unsure of what her reaction may be. “You know that’s okay, right? You’re allowed to be upset about this, I wouldn’t expect otherwise.” 

“I- I know that, obviously.” Thankfully, though Ryan cannot say expectedly, despite her words she hasn’t seemed to have taken it as condescending or a stupidly obvious statement like during her panic attack. If anything, she looks to be trying to hide her surprise. Then her expression switches and she’s back on the defensive. “What do you mean, ‘wouldn’t expect otherwise’?”

He makes sure to not speak slowly, like he’s patronising her. He just rests back against the car door, putting some distance between them while being able to actually face her. He keeps the hesitation internal now, forcing certainty into his tone. “I mean that I’m not judging you, at all. So don’t worry that you’re embarrassing yourself or whatever, because you’re not. Hadn’t really even considered that as a possibility until you brought it up.”

“Oh.” She takes a moment to think, as if she hadn’t considered that lack of consideration as a possibility itself. Then, once more her walls are immediately slammed back up with a slight cringe away. ”You’re not hitting on me are you?”

He doesn’t take it as hurtful, even if he possibly should considering her full body flinch, as it was quite obviously and most certainly not his intention. Those with more fragile outlooks may have also seen the question as arrogant or vain, but she is far from either right now. If he could not feel the sturdy floor of the van beneath his feet, he may have thought she had physically dragged him down with her to the dark well of insecurity that he can now see she has sunk within. So he tells her plainly, ”No, Emma, I’m not.”

”Okay.” She exhales and then he thinks maybe she’s trying to convince herself, more than she is him, when she says, “Right, okay. That’s good. Sorry. Jesus, okay we should go now, I’m- I’m fine.”

Ryan closes his eyes in a long blink, for just half a second. Is this what it’s like talking to him? How did Kaitlyn put it, like pulling out teeth with rusty pliers? This is exactly what the issue he noticed in the group as a whole is, the constant lying and pretending to be okay, but with Emma it’s- and he’s doing some quick maths here- probably about a billion times worse. The slight frustration with his uselessness at getting anywhere near a solution to it forces the words out of his mouth before he’s thought them over. 

“I’m not. I’m not fine. I’m really worried about you and I’m a little pissed at Jacob. I’m frustrated that everyone is struggling and it seems like there’s absolutely nothing I can do to help that actually works. My symptoms are worse today, I’m probably transforming early and I’m dreading going home to that hole in my stomach and I really don’t want to go in those fucking cages tonight.” He blurts out on a long breath. “I’m not fine and so I don’t believe you for a single second that you are either. But if you want to pretend and say that you are, then go ahead Emma, but we’ll both know that you’re lying.”

She glances at him, shocked, if the raised brows and slightly gaping mouth are anything to go by. “You think you’re transforming early?”

“Not my point.” He sighs and with the way his heightened emotions function on these days, he’s not just annoyed that he let that slip and instead he actively imagines punching himself in the head about twenty times. 

Emma must pick up on that fact and therefore she thankfully doesn’t push it. Her eyes stick on him however, flicking over his face as she studies his honest expression and seemingly does consider what his point actually was. Her hands fall away from the steering wheel and her shoulders ever so slightly raise with some held tension. Emma looks away from him, as if she doesn’t want him to hear her, when she admits, “I don’t know what else I can do?”

“Be honest?” He suggests, a little obviously.

Emma scoffs at her hands in her lap, as if it’s the stupidest thing she’s ever heard. Admittedly, it might be. “People don’t really want you to be honest. Even if they say they do, they don’t mean it.”     

Ryan can’t believe what he just heard. It does force him to have a startling realisation though. Obviously he’s long since realised how they’ve all been pretending since they were forced to return to the quarry with this curse thick in their veins. Acting as if nothing has changed, acting as if they’re okay, acting as if they’re the same kids they were before that night. In that attempt to protect their life outside of the quarry, as if they’re somehow stepping through a pale and turning into new people whenever they walk through the doors of the lodge. Ryan knows he gave up on that in the first month back, however, he hasn’t really been able to say that, has he? He feels he has at least attempted to demonstrate so through his actions, but that certainly isn’t as direct and forthright as a statement. 

Emma, the others most likely included, probably thinks that he is still acting too. Still pretending to be okay, lying about how he is doing, hiding his intentions and thoughts. He isn’t. Clearly though, she doesn’t know that. Her defences are up, high walls lined with barbed wire surrounding her, scanning for deceit, judgement or ulterior motives. She doesn't trust him, can’t see that when he speaks to her, it is with honesty and intentions within clear water. There is no murk to hide attempts of pursuit beneath kindness within, there is no judgement swimming beneath the surface. He’s not sure how to make his honesty any clearer. 

“Can we make a deal?” It’s a long shot, he’s aware of it even as he asks. He still has to make the attempt, at the very least. “While we’re in this van, when it’s just us two, we’re completely honest. No lying or obfuscating allowed.”

She looks to him from the side, with just the one narrowed eye visible to him. A strand of her long blonde hair falls in front of her face and as she soothes it back, she straightens up and leans back against the car door in a mirror of his own posture. She rubs her nose roughly as she speaks, sniffling between every other word. “Not a suspicious or possibly very weird deal at all. You’re not about to ask me something weird right?”

”Honestly? Because I do mean it and I'm already doing it anyway. So I don’t want you to be misreading or second guessing everything I say and I don’t want to be doing the same thing to you either. I don’t see the point.” He explains, direct and simple. Then he makes sure to promise, “I’m not going to ask anything weird.”

In the time she spends weighing his statement up, she takes her thumbs and gives one last swipe beneath her eyes to confirm they come away dry and gives a final sniffle almost as confirmation. Then she says, “Makes sense, I guess. What happens if you do lie?”

“Instant death? This is a blood oath, just throwing it out there, in case you didn’t realise.” He says, deadpan and silently glad to see the smiled roll of her eyes, before switching to a more genuine tone. “No, I mean what happens when you lie in truth or dare? Nothing, really.”

She nods, that glimpse of a smile already faded. “So, like, it’s like truth or dare but only truths. So it’s basically a game. Sure, why not.” Ryan can hear how her agreement holds no resolution but really, she had nothing to lose by agreeing, he just freely admitted she can lie. Still, he just hopes the spirit of it, like the spirit of the game, does prompt some more truthfulness in what she says. He chooses not to think about how their last game of truth or dare ended, at Emma’s own hands.

He realises very promptly why she agreed, when she then says, “Okay then. You like Dylan, don’t you? Like, a lot.”

She’s already looking at him when his eyes snap to her face, both of them wearing the same carefully neutral expression. She gives nothing away, with no expectant raise of her brow or curious tilt of her head or anything other than that defiant tone she spoke with. He knows Emma’s smart, he knows what she’s doing. She doesn’t believe he truly wants honesty and whether she already knows the answer or not, she has put his word and the game to the test. He lies and it was a nothing offer as she expects it to be, he tells the truth and he’s given up a pretty big confession that she knows he doesn't want to give. It’s not fair and she’s certainly not being a good sport about it, but he put himself in the corner and so he can’t really blame her for testing how sturdy the walls are.

Still, it is a decision he has to make, quickly enough that the choice isn’t made for him by inaction. He really doesn’t want anyone to know just how much he cares for Dylan, he doesn’t want that information in anyone else’s hands. He can barely keep it hidden within his own, let alone manage the knowing side eyes sent in his direction or any type of advice on the matter. Yet, if he put his limited social observation skills to work, he’d think that the strange look she’d given him yesterday may have been enough proof that she definitely does already know. He’d be giving up plausible deniability and honestly, it would feel strange for Emma of all people to be the first and hopefully only person that he admits it to. But… with a deep inhale of a summer downpour and the sight of eyes left puffy from tears, he knows he cannot go back on not just this promise, but many. To Emma, to Kaitlyn, to himself and to the group as a whole, he owes it to all of them to not let this tentative trust that is being tested break. He just really, really hopes that this isn’t all for naught. 

“I didn’t really want to bring this up with anyone,” He says slowly, “But in the face of instant death, then I guess I don’t really have a choice. Yeah, it’s- I do.”

He can’t really look at her, eyes unfocused somewhere on the distance just off to the side of her head. He knows if he does look at her right now, he’ll end up staring at her, trying and most likely failing to read her every micro expression in an attempt to gauge her reaction. Ryan felt the weight of those words on his tongue, despite the casual simplicity of them. To her, he hopes, it was just the admittance of a crush. Juvenile and fleeting, unobtainable and uncomplicated. To him, however, he knows what it really is. It’s a love held from a distance, buried under the delicate strength of a friendship that he refuses to shatter. It’s a love he cannot put down, has refused to speak aloud until his hand was forced now, that sits in his chest like a burden he’s unable to unshackle himself from. It looks like Dylan’s smile, sounds like his most embarrassing laugh and smells like freshly harvested honey. It’s far more than a simple crush, though that's something he gladly omits. 

She hums and it’s a noise of surprise, he can see her weighing him up from his periphery. Then she laughs and it’s back to being a slightly wet sound, with a sniff at the end as her nose clogs. “That’s really sweet.”

He nods, a little unsure of her reaction. She stares off out the windshield with a slightly distant look in her eye. For Ryan, there’s relief of course, in the fact that his position within the answer seems to be of less importance to her than the fact he did admit it- that he was honest, when he didn't want to be. That this clearly long and firmly held belief, that no one truly believes in or actually wants honesty, was just forcefully crumbled by a simple confession. He’s not sure how she feels about it, and honestly, he doesn’t think she herself actually knows either.

They’ve lapsed into a short silence, as Emma thinks it over and Ryan works out where to go next, taking the acceptance of his statement for what it is. He can work with this, he just needs to work out how exactly. Now that he’s here though, he’s actually not quite sure what to say. Same as with Dylan, immediately out and saying it doesn’t exactly feel like something that would go over well, despite directness seeming to work well with Emma. He knows it isn’t quite as simple as that too, the others are not actually trying to make things harder for themselves, he knows that. There is a reason why they don’t let themselves just simply transform and it’s because it requires not only leaning into the excruciating pain but also taking an active part in becoming a monster, as opposed to it being something that happens to them. They fight their instincts from shame, from resistance to change, from whatever it is they have at home that will inevitably be affected by letting their wolf-like side into their otherwise fractured self. He knows that he probably found simplicity in it through the difference he has always had, between himself and others, himself and society. He’s never been a poster boy of good, normal social interaction and he’s never truly succeeded in forming himself into something he isn’t for societal norms or standing. For the others though, he doubts it feels quite so simple.

While he is still working it out, Emma beats him to the punch, with a still slightly distant tone. “You really meant that, didn’t you?”

His lips twist, but he sticks to his word and tells her, “Yeah. I- He means a lot to me.”

Emma opens her mouth, then closes it, then opens it again and now that she's brought back fully to the present, she has a slight quirk to her lips. “I meant, you know, that you were going to be honest. I didn’t think you’d admit it, um, which you just did again I guess.”

Ryan has to close his eyes and smooth his fingers over his brows to avoid punching himself in the face, the urge calling for more than just imagining it this time. He doesn’t know how he hasn’t blabbed to everyone and anything, cops and media included, about the truth of the quarry if this is how poorly he keeps his only other major secret. He breathes out a deep sigh and does an odd mix of both shaking and nodding his head as he says, “Yep, no, realise that now.” 

She gives a ghost of a smile and he’s glad to see it, even if it’s at his expense. She does at least keep them moving past it, a small mercy after his blunder, though it’s to a question that otherwise seemingly comes out of complete left field. “So you don’t like Kaitlyn then?”

Ryan draws his head back as the question takes him by surprise, not expecting that of all things and unsure as to where it may have come to- until previous arguments spring back to mind. He knows the initial confusion comes through in his voice. “No, I don’t… Why do- Is this because of what Jacob was saying? Do you- do you still like him?”

”Well, with your whole new- thing.” She says and even if he can pick up on the relief, he doesn’t understand the cause of it. What he does most certainly catch is the expert way she avoids his last question. “I- you’ve just gotten a lot closer. So. But, you know, you like Dylan. Which is cool. Kaitlyn’s cool with it too, obviously?” She ends in an almost weirdly suspicious tone he can’t quite read.

It’s a statement but she phrases it as a question. Her fingers tap louder and his brows furrow deeper. “Yeah? Why wouldn’t she be?”

“Some people are weird about it?” She asks again, shoulder shrugging and voice a little high. “Not that I am, duh. Or that it is weird, cause it isn’t. People shouldn’t be weird about it. Cause… obviously.” 

He squints at her. She is being weird about it but not in the way he’s used to. There are lines to read between here and with a dawning sort of feeling, there’s a realisation that he’d have never considered before. To be worried that Kaitlyn of all people would be weird about it is also almost a novel idea, though understandable if given that added context. Either way, she obviously has nothing to worry about in that regard. Kaitlyn’s not only extremely close friends with Dylan but she’s also a tomboy through and through, with athletic wear, shorts, sneakers and novelty tshirts a staple of her aesthetic without much deviation from that. Not that that would necessarily mean anything but her favourite movie is Jennifer’s Body, so like, come on. It’s not as if she’s exactly hiding it. Or maybe none of that actually is obvious enough and it was just obvious to Ryan since they’re in the same spot on the field, batting both ways.

“I don’t think anyone here is weird about it,” He tells her. “Especially not Kaitlyn, but she also doesn’t know, so.”

Emma sniffs at him, an unimpressed sound that loses some of its weight with the accompanying returned sniffle that tacks itself onto the end. “I thought you said no lying.”

Ryan breathes out a deep breath and sure, reluctantly he’ll give her that. Really fanfuckingtastic job he’s done keeping it under wraps. “Okay, I guess she does know then. I don’t get why she’d care though.” 

“She got mad at you yesterday. For flirting with Dylan.” Emma tells him quietly. 

Ryan hates to admit it to himself but he genuinely splutters. “W-what? No, I wasn’t- I wasn’t flirting with Dylan, what?” He stops at Emma’s unimpressed expression and promptly changes courses, not wanting to be called out for another rule break. “That was what Kaitlyn was upset about?”

Emma nods, this short movement with this little sympathetic twist of her lips alongside it. Her scent has begun to settle as they talk, the dour emotions washed out by the chilled air sweeping in through the window and she nods again now in prompt for him to continue talking. It’s sympathetic, it’s giving him a space to talk about what's been otherwise, even if apparently extremely poorly, a held secret- and that's when he realises. She avoided the question because he asked the wrong one. She’s flipped the whole game against him and is using his own plan against him, getting him to open up and talk instead of her. He doesn’t know her very well, he’s aware. How much of that has been a purposeful effort on her behalf?

His resolve strengthens and he asks her directly, “You didn’t like Jacob, did you?” Even as he speaks, she’s already shaking her head, not in answer but in reaction to the subject of the question itself. He’s not so cruel or brash to outright say it, but he thinks they both know what he’s implying. She’s backed into the corner herself now, most certainly unwilling to even acknowledge that unspoken question and therefore forced to answer the question that was spoken. 

“That’s it, isn’t it?” He thinks he’s coming to understand that, like a dog baring its teeth, she laughs and smiles when she’s upset. With this polite little simper and deep inhale that straightens her spine, she shakes her head and gives a breathy laugh at the end of her words. Those words however come out strained and tense, like a wire cable about to snap. “I mean it’s funny really, right?”

He doesn’t respond, just watching her as he waits. Ryan can feel, or rather smell in the air, the growing tension as she bubbles up, about to burst. It irks her, he can tell, that he doesn't respond, providing her no chance to find an out. Her high strung emotions replace his earlier pliers, doing the work for him, Emma’s jaw gradually tightening and cheeks quivering as he sits there. The explosion is not quite so dramatic as fire and shrapnel, but with the sudden return of a strained voice and misted eyes, he thinks it’s near enough. 

”Fine. Fine! You want me to be honest?” Emma snaps, her tone both light and bitter, “I never liked him! Happy now? Isn’t being honest so much fun?”

Ryan isn’t surprised, at either admission or outburst, and he doesn’t pretend to be. She studies him with frantic eyes, seeking out any hint of emotion or judgement that may have proven to her that she was right to believe that honesty is not something others ever want nor expect from her. She doesn’t find it and he watches as the defensive fight leaves her, and although it’s not out of anything he’s done, Ryan actually feels bad for seeing how she deflates in relief, that last brick of guarded reservation chipped away for now.

Emma takes a deep breath that causes her to slump back against the van door. She picks at her thumb nail, still perfectly manicured, and begins to explain at a less frantic pace. “I don’t- didn’t, like Jacob, okay? I know I probably sound like a total bitch. I guess it was pretty shitty, but… it was just for summer, you know?”

She sounds insecure, her statements all ending on an upwards tilt, turning into questions for reassurance. She sounds as if she can’t believe what she’s saying, that she’s actually admitting to the truth, even as she says it. Despite the lack of any surprise from him, she’s still waiting for his every reaction, for him to either confirm her fears by agreeing she’s terrible for what she did or to placate her by statements of understanding. He just asks instead, quite confused, “Why would you date him then?” 

”He is really sweet, he picked me flowers from the lake bank. He really liked me.” She says, still looking down at her hands and picking at her thumb with her nails. “He was kinda funny, more silly than most people let themselves be. He lived in the moment and he seemed to know what he wanted, I didn’t think he’d- I guess, get attached. I could tell that- and I still- I know he’s a good guy, at heart. So I thought ending it would be… fine. I told him from the start it was just for summer but… I don’t know.”

”But you didn’t like him for any of it.” Ryan says, a prompting statement rather than a question, as he doesn’t doubt otherwise.

”No.” Emma says, quiet as a church mouse. “I just… thought I was meant to? He really liked me. It’s what everyone would have wanted or-or expected me to, so I thought if- it was just a summer fling? That would have been enough, right?”

Ryan has never seen Emma like this, anything like this before and honestly, he never expected to. Her exaggerated confidence is a facade, that was never difficult to see. Everyone is squeamish about something within them, lack of any insecurity is either delusion or performance. Still, no matter how much of her confidence is performative, she is still self assured and collected, from what little was discussed she held herself together exceptionally well that August night. He understood the emotional collapse afterward as not something that is contradictory to how she handled that night, but rather as a reaction to the permanence and continuance of the situation. It is one thing to hold yourself together over one night filled with adrenaline and another to hold yourself together every night after with the knowledge you will have to continue to do so for every night more. Jacob’s confession was the first crack and today has been the shatter. 

Shattering apart, she is unlike herself. She, in a way Ryan’s never seen before, is very suddenly reminiscent of a small child, with blonde hair falling forward and obscuring her face, with a weakness and smallness to her voice. All of her confidence and that performance of holding it together has been chipped away, leaving her in this vulnerable and emotional state. Within the mutually assured destruction of his own confession, the truth spills from her like a child finally confessing a minor crime that has caused insurmountable guilt, with a parents opportunity to crush any future chance of honesty or to forgive such a small disobedience. He thinks he could guess how it would have gone, where this all began. He can picture her, in her Sunday best, with her hand clutched within her mothers, swinging over her head as she’s led to the confession box for the very first time, the other girls her age giggling behind their own hands at the sight of it, at the shame of it. Though this is all a little more serious than a cookie stolen from the jar or bright blue crayon marks on the wall, he thinks with how she has bloodied the manicure on her thumb, she could do with her hand held again. Perhaps this is the chance for a do over, a reaching out. However Ryan isn't a parent and Emma isn’t a child and he doesn’t dare risk accidentally cutting them both on the shattered glass of the cookie jar and ruin his attempts to help clean it up. 

“I don’t know, Emma.” He tells her honestly. She’s not asking for his approval, she’s asking for something he is unable to give, that he is sure of. Shallower wounds are easier to inspect however, before the deep cut. “Did you tell them about him?”

She shrugs, an action that causes more hair to fall in front of her bowed head, her face hidden from him. “Yeah, they didn’t really- it wasn’t the most exciting thing I’d told them I guess. My Mom did ask when he could come round to dinner, meet the guy who saved her daughter's life.”

”Talked him up that much?” Ryan aims for joking, lands somewhere more around baffled. 

It manages to draw an ever so brief laugh from her, more of an inhale of air than anything. At least it’s more genuine than the stress responses of before. “Hardly. An expected assumption.”

“An incorrect one,” He states plainly, before asking a question which he is certain he already knows the answer to, “You didn’t uh, correct her though, did you?”

Emma gives a scoff from behind the waterfall of her hair, with a particularly hard gouge to the skin around her nail to accompany it. The cuticle and nail fold have already been torn to ribbons, a stark contrast to her other fingers, which remain perfectly manicured and painted. “Not much point.” 

Ryan frowns, eyes still on the blood that is now rolling down to the pad of her thumb. “Did you tell her you broke up?”

“It- I will. Soon. I was going to and then everything that happened… I swear I will, it’s just. She thinks it’s really sweet that we went through something so horrible and stuck through it together and- I’m going to tell her.” Her arguments are weak, both in theory and delivery. Her voice is small and the tears must have returned, snuffling any fire that she might have been able to conjure for conviction in the back of her throat.

”Emma, you shouldn’t feel like you have to date anyone you don’t want to.” Ryan says, starting off slowly in the way he’s tried to avoid before he remembers to correct his tone. He puts weight into his next words, hoping she catches the deeper meaning within. “You should be with someone you actually want to be with.”

She shrugs again but there is an irony in the movement, a casual gesture laden with heavy feeling. The fresh air coming in from the window behind her head has begun to lose the battle against the near viscous smog that is once more surrounding her. “Sure, except it’s not about me,” Her breath hitches, shoulder jumping. “It’s not like it’d change anything if I did tell her.”

“Well it’s definitely not about your mother,” Ryan says dryly, adjusting his shoulder against the car door, purposefully ignoring the strain within his bones as he does so.

“You don’t get it.” Emma shakes her head as she trails off, before mumbling through tears, so quiet that she would be near silent if not for the way everything echoes like a pumping bass in Ryan’s ears today. “Dad wants me off to college next year, legacy admittance. If it wasn’t Jacob, then Mom would be setting me up with Mrs Clark's son and she’d already be planning the wedding. My friends want me to go travelling with them the second winter hits and then probably summer and then whenever they want because we all have the money to do it, so why the fuck not.” 

Her words and tone fight against each other as she speaks, determined words and a reluctant tone, unsure words and a relieved tone, alternating between each. It’s strange, she seems as if she cannot tell if she is relieved or devastated that these life plans, any of the bunch, have fallen through. Leaving Ryan trapped between sympathies and congratulations, he just agrees halfheartedly in the long pause. “Seems like it’d all be difficult to do, having to come back here each month.”

“No one knows I’d have to and I just… I really don’t know what to do. I'm trying all the time but it’s just too hard, I can’t do or be what everyone expects me to be anymore. Everything is just so different now but at home nothing has changed and they expect me to be how I used to be but I just can’t. So I’m stuck here and I’m stuck in that day before everything changed and I wasted my whole life waiting to feel like myself and now the chance has gone and I have no one to blame but myself.” Her words, which began with quickening breaths, end in a sentence sustained by one breath alone, each word growing more quiet and softened then the last, until that final word is barely audible to even Ryan’s hearing. 

She cuts herself off with a sharp inhale, reorients and purses her lips before heaving a deep breath, one that is more than enough to sustain the simple yet bitter conclusion. ”So yeah, well. Probably not happening now anyway. Nothing is.”

Ryan chews on the inside of his lip, still just watching the blood flowing from her thumb. It would have dried, healed already, if she would leave it for even a second. She goes as far as squeezing the digit in a slow, tight massage, to draw more blood from the shredded skin around her nail. It’s drawn so much out that it’s pooling in her palm, soaking into the creases and slowing to a halt just above her wrist. He’s not sure if it’s an entirely conscious effort, even as fixated on it as they both are. She’s detached herself from the gentle violence of it in her attempts to self soothe. He watches her and lets the echoes of her conflicting tone bounce through his mind, each word screeching through his ears with such individual emphasis, like they’re being written on a chalkboard in front of him, with the shriek and dust and Ryan finally pieces it all together. 

Emma said she’s still stuck in that day before that August night. He can picture what she’s trying to express and the image of her life at home now comes to him with startling clarity. Her father enrolling her in the colleges that he wants, dictating a major to her and judging the electives that Emma chooses herself, unaware that she’d be dipping out monthly. Everyone is still trying to hook her up with various guys who are into her, who share nothing in common with her, who know nothing of what she’s been through, who she couldn't care less about. Her friends, dragging her along to hangout, always expecting that confidence and shallowness, their awkwardness and coldness palpable when she cannot perform. Growing now, most likely, as she fails more and more, until she’s pushed to the outskirts and is no longer invited out at all. The cross she wears around her neck is likely a gift from her parents, alongside the hand-me-down religion and expectations, that Emma has lost all faith in her ability to ever bring herself to also believe in or fulfil. Her mother expects a marriage within the next half a decade, which suddenly brings startling context to the ‘married with five kids’ comment made to Jacob. In fact, every single thing she told Jacob that he ruined for them all, for her, is exactly what she’s been dreading but expected to do. She’s a failure now, a complete failure in all of their eyes, now that she is unable to fulfil any of it. 

None of them would understand it, even if they tried. Instead, all of them will ask her, why can’t you just be like us, why can’t you be happy with this? It’s the same question she’s been asked her entire life, that now holds an even deeper weight. None of them get her, none of them really know her, not her parents or her friends and from the sounds of it, they never really did. And sadly, none of them probably care enough to try, especially now that she’s failing to meet those expectations more and more. She’s watered herself down for them, over and over again, until she’s nothing more than a stain and it’s still not enough for them. She laughs when she doesn't want to, she dates who she doesn’t care about but who they’d approve of, she wears what they wear, she does what they all want when they want and yet she’s still not enough for them because it isn’t her. It’s not a real person, it’s this sculpted mimicry of one, made in their image and from their ideals and expectations. Maybe they all do it and it was just that August night that was the final nail in the coffin to a dying performance. He can’t say that’s the worst outcome from that otherwise horrifying night. 

As she said, she’s still stuck in that day with all the same worries of that time, yet now also within the maw of her infection. Everything’s the same and everything’s different, she cannot move forward and yet she cannot change anything to go back. Fortunately, if she lets herself believe it, she’ll realise that only half of that is true. For all the anger she directed at Jacob for ruining her life, it may have been the nicest thing anyone’s ever done for her, as unintentional and misguided as it was.

“And thank god for that.” He says genuinely, perhaps a bit forcefully, perhaps a bit recklessly. She must agree or feel the strength of his tone, as she finally looks up. 

He’d been right, the tears had returned, though less intensely than before. Now they fall like a drip from an IV, rhythmically and slowly. She doesn’t cry often, he’s sure of it, as she blinks forcefully. Like she can’t believe that she still has more in her, can’t understand why they won’t clear. There’s a lack of power in being unable to get your body to cooperate, unable to quell them as she did with her quickening breath, a lack of control over the one thing you should be able to. He understands why she’s bowed her head but he is glad to meet her eyes once more.

She doesn’t answer with anything other than brows furrowing in the middle, confusion and perhaps a little bit of shock at such a proclamation. He continues, a simple end to his statement.

”What do you want to do?”

He could expand his point, make it clearer, but he doesn’t have to. He is giving her the choice too, to decide what and how much she wants to say. They both hear the silent, unspoken question beneath what he did ask. When was the last time Emma did what she wanted, without valuing others expectations and wants above it? Emma is smart, she knows what he is saying, how he has stitched together her own words into a patchwork of understanding. She’d practically told him earlier, if he had listened closer. She can’t change anything now, that’s what she’d said. That everything is going to stay the same. While Ryan toiled that first month over how everything has changed, to Emma, her greatest fear had been realised- that nothing will.  

She takes a deep breath, closes her eyes and forces her words through quivering lips. “I just want to feel like me again.” Then she cries.

It’s an honest cry and it is purely a guess but Ryan’s sure she hates it. Still, she doesn’t try to cover it or hold it in, she cries like she’s needed to- with an audience. An audience who doesn’t judge the way her face screws up and goes red, the pearl of snot dripping to the top of her lip or the ugly sounds reminiscent of a slow to die roadkill. An audience who doesn’t have any expectations, of turning this into a funny little story for views and likes, to get over it and move on afterwards to maintain the veneer of unshakeable confidence, or to keep everyone safe from feeling any sort of worry for her. An audience who doesn’t politely ignore it, like it’s an unseemly or shameful thing, who instead reaches tentatively for her hand after a moment of debate. Their clutched hands hang between them over the centre console. The blood rubs off onto his own palm, crusted in places and gelatinous in others. In this van she’s not the perfect daughter, or the cool best friend, or the pretty popular girl or the lighthearted and fun influencer. He’s not a parent and she’s not a child and this doesn’t make up for all the approval and assurance she’s been desperately missing her entire life. Hopefully, it is a start. 

She doesn’t let go as the tears eventually quell for a third time today. If anything she grips harder as she slowly collects herself, without rush she breathes deeply and sniffles as the tears slow on their own. It is not the most comfortable hold, his arm stretched and her back slightly hunched. He can feel the tearing beginning in the inside of his elbow and he ignores it. She will release the hold eventually and he will not let go a moment sooner than that.

Her voice has a crack as she begins to speak, like the concrete of a dam bucking under the pressure before the water breaks through in a flood. “I’m just… I’m not me, not with anyone, not even with myself. I’m never me and no one knows who I am and I don’t know how to stop lying to everyone but I just… I really can’t do this anymore.”

”I’d like to know the real Emma.” Ryan tells her quietly.

With this almost painful sounding crackling deep breath, she looks up and shrugs her shoulders, jostling their hands. “No one wants to know the real Emma, because she doesn’t get to fucking exist.”

He squeezes her hand, mindful of the sharpness of his talons resting atop the back of her hand. Her perfect manicure that has kept drawing his eye for this reason, looks strange next to the stretched and thick keratin, an unnerving contrast that reminds him just how serious these early transformation symptoms are. He ignores it all the same as he says, “Kinda feels like she exists.”

It brings out a watery smile from her and that, at least, is a win. “That’s not what I meant.”

”I know.” He admits, in an anticlimactic and plain sort of way. “But I did mean what I said.”

“I wouldn’t know where to start.” She says as if that’s it, there’s too much and it’s therefore insurmountable. He knows they don’t exactly have the time, but if they have to start from day one, nineteen years ago, then they will.  

“What’s the first thing that comes to mind?” He prompts, looking up from their hands to find that look in her eyes again, that uncertain and unconvinced look. “This whole time we’ve been talking about this, there has to be something, anything, that comes to mind.”

Despite the doubt, she slips her hand from his own, mindful to not knick herself on the razor sharp talon ends as she straightens her back against the door, to look at him. Really look at him, with a piercing gaze, weighing him up as she had done earlier when he first proposed their deal turned game. Deciding if Ryan, of all people, is who she is going to confess anything to. He sees the resignation come across her face, the realisation that if she doesn't take this chance now, when will she ever? 

Without giving herself the chance to second guess it once she’s decided, the words rush out like they’d been waiting a lifetime to be spoken. They probably have. “You know my real name is actually Emmaleigh? I’ve always just gone by Emma because it’s so fucking embarrasing, but… that’s the name on my birth certificate.”

Ryan instantly finds himself stuck between deciding whether to hide his smile or not at the admission. Smile, due to the fact that she really did it, that insurmountable hurdle of moments ago was just knocked down into the dust with ease. Don’t smile, in case she thinks he’s judging the confession that was hard fought to receive. It leaves him with this wobbly sort of grin, he’s sure. “It’s not embarrassing.”

“You can laugh, it’s a little embarrassing.” Emma says with her own wobbly kind of expression, a small twitch to her lips and crinkle to her nose. Yet she does seem to be genuine, this fear of confessions not borne from a fear of solely judgement necessarily.  

Still, Ryan picks his next words very diplomatically. “It’s not surprising.”

She can clearly tell and it transforms the twitch into a light laugh and embarrassed small smile of her own. With that, the floodgates are opened and every little truth that she’s kept to herself comes rushing out. Her tone is such an up and down mix, each new little fact about herself said in a completely new tone from the last, but it all holds that tinge of astonishment to it, as if she can’t believe she’s finally admitting it or that it’s even true. “And I actually wear glasses, too? My eyes aren’t even fucking blue, these are contacts! And I like to knit and crochet. I fucking hate muesli and greek yogurt, okay I hate it and I can eat a whole bucket of chicken and I hate the feeling of skinny jeans. And I don’t believe in God and I kissed Madeline Perkins in seventh grade!”

She falls silent instantly and they look at each other in a shared surprise. “Shit. Holy shit- I didn’t. Okay, um, I just said that. Shit.”

“I kissed Thomas from Mrs Walker's class when I was eleven. I’ve never told anyone that before either.” He says, laying down his own cards on the table, to at the very least make the admission equal. He furrows his brow at that thought however. “But that was because he had buck teeth and a mullet, so I don’t actually know if that makes us even.”

Emma breathes out a sharp and short whistle from between her teeth and puffed up cheeks, her eyes still wide. She shakes her head at the end of it though. “No, no it’s fine. Just, you’re not going to, um…”

“Of course not Emma.” He’s quick to reassure her. “Kinda forgot to add it to the rules, but what’s said in the van, stays in the van. I wouldn’t share a word of this.”

She nods slowly and she seems to believe him, thankfully. But then she sighs and visibly deflates, the misery suddenly returned. “What’s the point of saying any of this when nothing’s going to change? It’s- this was stupid, I’m being silly and-and selfish, I need to just… get over it.”

He is not going to let her unravel this conversation in one downward spiral and so with force in his voice, he asks her, “What if this is your chance? What if the silver lining in all of this happening is that it’s given you this?”

”How?” Emma asks back, that uncertain insecurity returned in full force to her tone. “This is the worst thing that could have ever happened.”

”Admittedly unconventional,” He concedes before returning the strength to his words. “But sometimes, for better or worse, life forces us to make the hard decisions. Who’s to say you wouldn’t have lived the rest of your life in indecision, never working out how to be what others want you to be and never having the courage to be yourself?”

”I- I don’t know?” She says, unconvinced and unsure of where he is going with this.

He cuts to the point. “There’s no way of knowing. All we have is what we have now. Your future is going to be different from how it was planned but fuck, maybe that’s the best thing that could’ve happened. Because you get to pick what you do with it now, even if you have some tethers. The chance to do what you want with it is right there, if you want to take it.”

“It’s a nice speech Ryan, genuinely.” And she does sound genuine at least. “But I don’t know how, I don’t know where to start or how to- to say it, any of it. I’d be a different person, I am a different person, I just-“

He doesn’t cut her off, she stops abruptly with a breath let out from puffed up cheeks. When she makes no sign of continuing, he tells her, “And you’re under no obligation to be the same person you were yesterday. You don’t have to be what people want or expect you to be. You can try but… how miserable does that sound?”

He watches her as she gives a scoff at that last comment before it turns into a hum of thought, her hand returning to fiddle with the necklace around her neck, as he’s noticed off and on since he first spotted it. Her scent has stabilised somewhat over their conversation, no longer a tornado ripping through meadows and instead growing to be more of a sun shower in this peaceful silence that she has left without a response. He’s reassured her at least, which is not a feat he’ll minimise, but he wants to do more. He can do more. He doesn’t believe you can instruct someone on how to feel like themselves, but maybe he can nudge her in the right direction. He thinks he knows where she could start, as after watching her for a few minutes more, he realises that his earlier assumptions were wrong. She doesn’t fiddle with it in an attempt to find comfort, but rather in discomfort. A symbol of another’s beliefs, a collar of expectation under the guise of a reassuring gift. She knows it too, it’s just not her. It’s not even her colour, a sparkling gold that stands out in the contrast to the silver hung from her ears.

Taking a risk, he tells her, “Take the necklace off. If you don’t know where to start and you also don’t want to wear it, take it off.”

She glances back up at him, her nails making a clicking sound against it that he’s pretty sure wasn’t as audible as he heard it. She looks conflictingly at the metal. “My Mom wanted me to wear it-“

And okay, maybe he does cut her off this time, leaving no room for justifications, making the choice clear. She either wants to wear it or she doesn’t, she’s either wearing it for her mother or she’s taking it off for herself. “That doesn’t mean you have to. Do you want to wear it?”

She doesn’t answer and maybe he’s over stepped. But he doesn’t apologise, lets the moment sit. She picks up the small but heavy metal cross, twists it on its chain to look at it. It’s no longer facing him, so he cannot see the small patterned carvings that her eyes trace. She just stares at it, for one minute, two. Debating herself, arguing silently in her mind, against what she knows she wants and what she knows others want of her. Emma drops it, lets it rest back against her chest and looks at him. He tries not to be too disappointed. He refuses to frown, to sway her choice and end up just making her do what he wants, rather than what her mother wants, defeating the whole purpose. It has to come from her and if she can’t bring herself to yet, he just hopes she can one day. God, yeah so his plan really is going kind of shit.

Emma reaches behind her neck and unclips the necklace, catching it with her hand before it falls to her lap. She then swiftly and without looking, tosses it behind her head and out the open window. She takes a deep breath that she releases quickly and she smiles. “What next?”

He now has to refuse to let himself gape. “Easy as that?” He says, something he definitely meant to keep internal. 

“You made it seem so.” She says lightly, a gentle teasing tone so far removed from how else she has spoken today, downtrodden and miserable and with righteous furiousness. The cross hanging from her neck seems like it must have weighed a tonne, as a lightness returns to her shoulders.

“Alright.” He says and he knows this is his chance. “After this, I can’t tell you what to do anymore. Only you know who the real Emma or I guess, Emmaleigh is. You have to work that out, but if I have one last piece of advice… let yourself transform tonight.”

She narrows her eyes at him but it is more in thought than with the incredulous or defensive manner that she has reacted with to the idea previously. “‘Let myself transform’, you’ve said that before. I don’t get what you mean.” 

“I mean don’t fight it. Lean into the feeling, do what feels natural in that moment instead of trying to stave it off.” He explains. “It might sound stupid but it really does make you feel like yourself again. I mean, you’re going to turn anyway right? A couple of moments of leaning into the pain is better than trying to fight it off and prolonging it just to transform anyway. You’ll probably remember your night too, so there’s that.”

”Huh.” Emma says, visibly thinking it over. He can’t tell quite how convinced she is by the idea but at the very least, she doesn’t seem to be throwing it out as an option completely. “Is that what you and Kaitlyn did?” 

“Yeah.” He says simply. “We tried to explain but… it's kind of hard to, I guess. Doesn’t seem like it would change anything but it really does.”

She nods, slowly, and after another couple of minutes of silence where he lets her think it over, she gives one final and now determined nod. “Okay. Okay, I mean, why the hell not right?’

”Why the hell not?’ Ryan echoes. He tries to keep his lips together but the corners still lift in a triumphant grin. Fuck yes. He did it and honestly, it feels really good. As if he’s finally, finally done something right on purpose. This, this moment here is what he had set out to do that very first month and he kind of wants to celebrate- he’ll buy himself takeaway pizza when he gets home. Never mind he was going to do that anyway, he’ll do that with purpose too and he’s sure it’ll feel just as good for it.

“Okay.” Emma repeats again, as if the echo was confirmation to a genuine question. However, her determined look suddenly morphs a nearly nervous sort of expression. “Do you think I’d look okay with bangs?”

Ryan reels, his head pulling back at the sudden switch of topics once more. Then it clicks and he realises why she’s asking, defeating the purpose even as she may be. “Do you think you’d look okay with bangs?”

“I don’t know.” Emma says and she’s back to looking thoughtfully out the windshield. 

He answers in a casual and almost quiet tone, to give her a chance to think. “Maybe you should try it out.”

“Maybe I will. Yeah. Maybe I will.”  She says with a nod, but she takes a few more moments, brushing a hand through her hair. He can imagine for her, a lot of possibilities just opened up, so much that she’s wanted to do but thought she couldn’t or shouldn’t. Maybe she’ll widen her scope from throwing out a necklace and cutting herself bangs, to something more like telling her overbearing mother and peer pressuring friends where to shove it, and maybe she won’t. Either way, whatever she ends up changing or not, he’s happy to see a little more Emmaleigh within the acted mimicry of the Emma he’s known so far. 

When she’s grounded herself again, her eyes flick over to him and her expression softens as her head tilts. For the first time in a long time, possibly for the first time since he’s known her, there’s a total lack of tension within her. It’s not held within a pinch of her brows, a fiddling hand, a narrowing or widening to her eyes, or a back straightened until it must ache. She’s dropped the weight of about ten secrets or so and you can truly see it. He’s glad to see it, something far more human revealed within her, despite the irony of such a statement.

“So, I know it wasn’t your point earlier, but while I have you here being forced to tell the truth,” Emma hesitates for a moment, before deciding to go through with the question, “What did you mean you think you’re transforming early?”

Ryan looks down at his hands, the talons that have grown from his nails and the sliver of the laceration visible beneath his bloodstained sleeve. He runs his tongue over a fang as he speaks, “It’s uh, just a feeling.”

She gives him a judgemental look that doesn’t actually seem to hold much judgement within it. “Does sarcasm count as lying?”

“Wasn’t in the terms and conditions.” He’d absolve the entire thing if it was. 

“Yeah, well, you don’t have any black veins popping out yet, so I think you’ll be fine for the drive over?” She says it more as a question that he thinks she intended to. 

“Are you feeling up to going now?” He asks, focusing on that aspect, rather than the subject of his strange and early arrived symptoms. If he starts to think about it, he won’t hear another word she says.

“Yeah, I think I am?” Another statement said as a question. 

Ryan returns to that casualness, in an attempt to soothe the uncertainty and anxiety she still clearly feels in actually committing to going to the Manor. “I’m ready when you are, but there’s still no rush.”

”No, no, it’s good. I’m good to go.” She assures but he feels it’s more for herself than it is for him. Then with a little more confidence, something reminiscent but far more genuine than what she has held previously, she says “You said it, right? The worst thing that could have happened already did. What’s the worst that can happen?”

“I did. You are also toying with fate right now, I hope you know that.” Ryan tells her in a light tone but even if he didn’t used to be superstitious, with the whole werewolves existing thing, he can hear the barest hint of belief in his own words. 

“Oh, we’re definitely getting hit by a UFO now, I had them on speed dial for this exact moment. Though Dylan said if we ever contact aliens it means we’d all die or something.” Emma jokes- or at least it starts as a joke and as she tacks on the last sentence, there’s a strange exasperated truthfulness to it and Ryan really wants to ask but forces himself not to and really that should be the main takeaway. That he does some semblance of self control. 

Instead Ryan just nods, a little slowly, as if he understands. Emma, the real Emma, Emmaleigh, is delightfully weird, he decides. “Yeah, makes sense.”

“Yeah, so, speaking of which… Dylan, huh?” She grins and actually, Ryan lied. He does hope this perfectly feigned innocence is the very next thing she throws out the window or otherwise he’s not going to survive with any shred of dignity left intact.

Two can play at that game however, the arms race is over and Ryan’s now more than happy to leave them at a stalemate. “So Kaitlyn, huh?”

She nods to herself, as if she should have seen that coming, which really, she definitely should have. “I have no idea what you’re talking about” She says and her voice is a little high. Her hand blindly reaches for the keys hanging from the ignition as she attempts to look convincingly stern at him, despite the embarrassment making her look for anything else to do, namely driving out of here. 

He shouldn’t push it. Maybe just a little. “None at all?”

“None at all!” She repeats with what is now clearly a sense of embarrassment, though thankfully still lighthearted enough that he doesn’t feel it was a mistake. Honestly, despite her suddenly reddening face and hurry to leave, there is a sweetening to the smell of summer within the chilled Fall air and he thinks that this may have been what she needs. To treat these confessions with a lightness and casualness may for her, make them feel as if they were never so heavy in the first place. That admitting to something like her real name or her crush can be just a silly and lighthearted thing, rather than such a terrifying and life changing ordeal, that she may feel more inclined to do so in the future. He hopes it is, at the very least. 

Emma finally finds the keys and gives them a rough turn, awkwardly clearing her throat and twisting in her seat to face back out over the dashboard as the van rumbles back to life. Her hand hovers over the wheel. “Yeah, okay, you ruined it. I am definitely ready to go now.”

She backs them out from between the trees, a short rev to get the back tires over the side of the road again. She leaves the van humming in the middle of the road for a moment, taking one last deep breath of air before she sets it in drive and they begin to slowly make their way forward once more. Dirt and dust spray up from beneath the tires, mixing with the rotten orange leaves whipping through the Fall air, settling back down onto the backroad within the woods as they drive away. They cover the gold chain and cross, dug into the dirt and forgotten, buried and left to be forgotten. The first instance of a grave dawning lighter and kinder things within these woods.

Chapter Text

As they pull off the dirt road onto the gravel driveway, Ryan watches the Manor grow to loom over them. This is the first time he’s been brave enough to take it fully, since that night he became a murderer within its walls. What a bleak sight it now makes. It’s fitting, he supposes. Clearly though, it had already been falling into disrepair for many, many years but now that it is just Travis in residence, its abandoned visage has only worsened. With overgrown weeds breaking through the cracks and spreading water damage to the already crumbling foundations, with chipping paint and with cracks in the window panes. It’s old and damp and crumbling away, a forgotten and near abandoned thing, with a history that deserves to be forgotten and abandoned alongside the rest of it. 

He spots the others as the van pulls around to the front, scanning his eyes over them as they lurch to a notably clanky stop. They’re sitting spread out over the porch steps, just like that morning in their first month back and probably last month too, even if Ryan wasn’t there to see it. Within the van, he cannot smell the mixture of scents they make sitting there together, but he doesn't have to. He can imagine the dark smog hanging above their heads just fine, acidic and bitter and too thick to be washed away by the cold wind.

Laura and Max sit off to the side looking terribly awkward. Even if they weren’t there for the entirety of the explosive revelation earlier, it seems what they did see, combined with the other’s downcast moods, has been enough to subdue them. Both months prior, they argued and bickered something fierce, with Laura threatening murder and Max taking even the most innocuous statements from her as a personal attack. Now they just quietly mutter to each other, the sound of vague and mostly unintelligible words reaching Ryan’s ears from even here, despite the low tone, far distance and glass panes between them. 

Abi sits off on the other side with Nick and Dylan scattered around her, though they're far too spaced to be considered sitting together. She has her knees in her arms, head tucked and face hidden. Nick has his chin resting in his palm, looking almost bored and maybe he is, despite everything that’s happened today. Or maybe that distant look in his eye means he’s a thousand miles away or lost somewhere in his head, who knows with him.

Dylan, he just grazes his eyes over for the shortest second, or he knows they’ll get stuck on him. He’s picking a seam from his sweater, scuffing his shoe on the gravel and the wind blows through his hair, causing him to shiver. Ryan will ask his Nana to knit that scarf for him the second he gets home, he’s just decided, when another thought creeps in. That’s a terrible idea, why would he ever cover Dylan’s throat? It’s just a thought, he tells himself, but he can almost imagine the curled pawlike hand and bared teeth as the slower formed thoughts of that wolfish side of him come to the forefront of his mind as if in a whisper. Why would he ever think of doing something like that, when that throat is being so plainly bared, just for him? All that pale, unmarked skin where the honey and fruit flows, why would he ever try to resist?

Ryan tears his eyes away- at least, he tries. That earlier image is replaced by teeth, fangs and pierced skin, dripping blood onto a tongue and a scar left high above the collar of that sweater, visible for everyone and anyone to see exactly who’s he is. Even as Ryan gives halfhearted arguments to his own thoughts, his eyes are still locked to that space between shoulder and jaw. No, Ryan knows why he resists both temptation and thoughts of said temptation, he’s made himself a promise to not ruin their friendship and he’s keeping it. No matter what the wolf wants, Ryan thinks chidingly to himself, separating himself from the wolf instincts for a moment, as if they were not his own thoughts and instead an actual dog that has chewed his shoe. He’s given his wolf-like instincts free range, accepted it completely, but Dylan is off limits. He’s promptly punished for the separation and comparison as he imagines his thumb running over the scar, the individual indents left by each tooth, his hand cupped possessively at the top of his spine, and Ryan’s genuinely unable to tell for certain which side of his thoughts it comes from. Ryan doubts he wants to know. 

“You’re staring Ryan.” Emma rudely, or maybe thankfully, interrupts his thoughts with far too smug a tone.

Jostled into the present, he’s quick to deny. “No I’m not.” He says, flicking his gaze over to where Kaitlyn and Jacob sit in the centre of the stairs as if that’s where he’d already been looking. So much for a quick glance.

“Uh huh.” She just sounds unimpressed now and Ryan ignores her when she mutters, “You lie way more than you think you do.”

They’re a good arms length apart and Kaitlyn sits a few steps above him. Jacob’s sniffling and not from the cold, his eyes and cheeks red and glistening. He doubts Kaitlyns given him any words of encouragement, she’ll probably consider herself being kind by not grilling him about it, and that’s at best. For her part, she looks tired. Irritated. She’s scratching at her arms something fierce as she sits there, periodically glancing at the van and when she catches his eye, she sends him a nod with a slight hint of relief. He returns it, something within him also settling at seeing his pack unharmed and returned to his field of vision. 

That slow trickle of a thought comes to him, with a gratitude and pride of sorts brought with it. Kaitlyn’s a good beta, he trusts her implicity to remain amongst a bunch of feral callows without fear she may begin any fight she cannot finish or even worse, swing the other way and cower from one if it did start. To trust her with the fawn too is testament to not just her capability but his trust of her- the thought is washed away as the more present part of his mind hones in on that label. Fawn… fawn… he cannot place why that word, that label, of all things would be used from those half translated thoughts of his. There has to be some mistranslation happening, right? Hound makes sense and even if most certainly misapplied when explained, Laura’s captive pack terms are for him already quite naturally within use, though only between himself and Kaitlyn specifically. But fawn just doesn’t make sense to him, even if it came to him as naturally as the others and, he supposes, the fact that he can kind of see it in Dylan, with the big doe eyes and curious as well as secretly skittish nature. 

“What does fawn mean to you?” He asks Emma, spooking her slightly as he suddenly turns to her. 

She looks up from where she’d been focused on biting her nail, the same previously abused finger that had left a blood smear on the leather of the steering wheel. “Like a baby deer? Or the colour?”

Definitely not the colour and still the animal doesn’t make sense either. He scowls with the frustration of no clearer answer than his own, despite the new perspective. The time spent decompressing in the van may have done his aggravated emotions some good, but they’re still heightened as anything today. It leaves him wanting to clench his fists as tight as he can, sinking his talons into his palms until he hits tendons and bone. It’s not like it wouldn’t heal within the instant.

Still not wanting to pay for the vans dry cleaning however, he asks instead, “What about hound?”

Emma drops her hand completely now, leaving the butchered finger alone at long last, to turn and look at him confusedly. “You mean like a greyhound? A racing dog? Why? Are we playing guess the animal right now, or what?”

His lip twitches again at the lack of help, but he might as well ask three for three at this point. “And cur?”

She’s just staring at him, clearly unimpressed at his lack of explanation. “You forgot to pick a new animal.” She tells him flatly.

”Just answer the question, Emma.” He responds in the same exact tone.

“Another dog? An aggressive one, like a mangy stray, I guess.” She throws her hands up halfheartedly. “Seriously, where is this coming from?”

That answer furrows his brow in thought because yeah, he’d have probably said the same thing, before the word became so intrinsically linked to himself, Kaitlyn and Jacob from those wolf-like instincts. He’d practically forgotten the meaning of it, outside of a name for their type of wolf or really that it even had meaning outside of that. An aggressive dog makes so much sense, though he takes a little offence to the mangey description. And yet still, fawn does not. 

“It’s how I think of- how my wolf thinks of you all.” He explains, simplifying the concept as to not get into a whole discussion or likely debate on how they and wolves are one and the same. “How Laura ranked us, seems to be correct, though I think it can change. But she used the wrong terms, I th- my wolf uses cur, hound and fawn.”

”So dog, dog, baby deer.” Emma says thoughtfully, rubbing a thumb over her chin. “That is kinda confusing. Fawn is sweet though, if a little patronising.”

”It wasn’t like I decided-“ He begins to protest before he turns to her and it’s just the picture of pure, blinding innocence looking back at him. She’s having him on and delighting in it, if the light summer air that drifts through the van is anything to go by. “Har har.”

Emma beams at him and once more, despite all their favourite hobby seemingly being teasing Ryan above anyone else, he’s glad at how much more at ease she seems now after their conversation. That whirlwind of shifting emotions that have followed her in a smog for the last couple of months have just dispersed into a soft misted calm. He doesn’t doubt that it will rise again with evening quickly approaching, but honestly, even if he did not care for what it signified of her overarching wellbeing, his nose and sinuses would be thankful for the reprieve regardless.

As the smile naturally fades, she flicks a glance out the window behind him and she suggests, “Why don’t you call Kaitlyn over and ask her? She probably has better insight than me, since she remembers the night like you do, right?”

She’s not wrong, Kaitlyn had even shared the same sentiments as him at dinner the night before, about Laura misapplying the labels. He reaches for the handle, but it’s not Kaitlyn his eyes initially seek out, rather Dylan. It’s always Dylan. He’s still just shivering in the wind, shoulders hiked nearly to his ears from the cold, hiding some of that exposed throat. He doesn’t understand why Dylan always seems so cold, as Ryan himself has just always naturally run warm, warmer still at the slight hint of his throat still visible. He looks away again, well aware he’s acting like a Victorian gentleman catching a glimpse of an ankle or well, more realistically, he’s acting like a literal animal.   

“Invite your boy over too if you have to, no need to get all sad over it.” Emma tells him, not unkindly, but certainly not with a false sweetness either. It’s an immediate improvement from their conversation, yet the painful mix of emotions that statement causes means he’s not as celebratory as he may have been otherwise.

”He’s not-“ Ryan starts before he realises just how dark the defensive anxiety was making his tone and forces himself with an admirable amount of self control to level it out to something direct and flat. “Don’t start with that.”

”Hey, it was your deal! I thought honesty was our favourite thing now.” She defends herself right back. Emma does however then take pity and in a softer tone she tells him, “The deal that’s honesty between just you and me while in the van. Don’t worry, I’ll act like I have absolutely zero idea otherwise. I’ve had a lot of practice.”

He nods, both in acknowledgement and thanks, but the expression quickly morphs into a scoff and an eye roll instead when she tacks on jokingly warningly,  “It is your fault if I get rusty though.” He can’t say anything against it otherwise, reaping what he sows and all that. Maybe no good deed really does go unpunished.

He pops the door open and despite his eyes unable to keep from flickering over, it's for Kaitlyn he calls and Kaitlyn alone. He needs to keep away from Dylan on days like this. The responsibility was taken from his hands last month with the circumstances as they were but it's firmly back in his hands again now. He needs to stay away, even if his instincts are urging him to all but crawl over there. He is staying away, he firmly reminds himself with what remaining reason he still holds these days. 

Kaitlyn has just stood up and begun making her way across the gravel when the door to the Manor opens up behind her, caught by the wind and banging against the wall. With the state the Manor is in, he supposes they’re lucky that it didn't cause the whole building to crumble to dust around the steps that the others sit on. Though, the window panes do give a worrying wobble that glass most certainly shouldn’t, a few chips of wood falling to the deck. He’s not sure whether to frown or congratulate himself on picking up the sight of that from where he is and instead focuses on where Travis has appeared.

Travis spots him in the van immediately, his eyes scanning for barely half a moment before he’s located Ryan, who is beginning to realise he should probably consider himself as Travis’ liaison for their group. Even from here, much like those tiny chips of wood, it’s as if they’re under a microscope and Ryan can clearly make out the lines between his brow, deeper than when Ryan had last seen him just a little earlier at the lodge. He’s been frowning, rather dramatically Ryan would guess. There’s a slight twitch to his expression as he looks back at Ryan and he spots that just as easily too. He begins towards the van at a brisk pace and Ryan cannot help but give a halfhearted smile to the way Kaitlyn quickly hurries over in an odd little jog, to avoid walking beside the man. He’s not the only one to find him a little off putting, then.

”You decided to show up then. Lucky us.” Travis states with the added sarcastic quip when he’s close enough. Though Ryan knows he would have been able to hear him just as clearly had he spoken at the same volume while still standing at the front door. For that reason, he’s a little loud this up close, something Ryan hasn’t noticed with Emma during their conversations. Clearly he must find that specific tone that Travis speaks with particularly grating. 

“I can go if you want, Travis.” He replies tiredly, sarcastically and most certainly against his better judgement.

“After your little excursion last month, I wasn’t so sure that you wouldn’t.” Travis huffs right back. “You’re late.”

Ryan looks up at the sky through the windshield and not just in an attempt to summon some patience from his already extremely low reserves. It has notably darkened since he and Emma pulled off the road and stopped amongst the trees. Their conversation had gone longer than he thought it had at the time, between frequent pauses for thought and collecting themselves. He’s not going to apologise but he can’t exactly disagree with the man's point either. “Well, we’re here.” 

”Mm.” Is Travis’ barely existent acknowledgement. “Right, well I want you to head downstairs now. Get the others moving.”

Ryan doesn’t even have the chance to respond before Emma is arguing. “But it’s so early! We’ll be sitting down there for ages!”

“And?” Travis just raises a single brow at her, almost as if he’s only just realised she’s there at all. “What difference does it make?”

”What difference? It’s horrible down there and-and what if we need to pee?” She’s clearly grasping for straws with that last point, but Ryan understands her aversion completely, agrees with her even. If he can bring himself to acknowledge that he does secretly want to turn tonight, then he can easily acknowledge how very fucking little he wants to do it down in that pit of hell.

Ryan can see on his face how instantly Travis is done with her, the immediate dismissal said while he disinterestedly looks back to Ryan. “Hold it.”

”We’ll go down when we have to, but for now everyone’s going to be much calmer sitting up here.” Ryan tells him and he’s really using every bit of rationale and reason that he has, as opposed to the snarling that another side of him wishes to do. That settled feeling he found in the quiet of the van is very swiftly departing and that feeling of everything being just too much while weighing on a thinly held temperament is rising once more in its place.  

“It ain’t about when you can see the moon, you know that? It’s about when night descends, the darkness of it.” Travis lifts a single finger to point at the sky. “And winter’s going to be coming quick. Night comes earlier, you turn earlier. You know how dark it needs to be for you kids to start sprouting fangs and claws?”

Ryan shakes his head minutely, barely wanting to make the gesture at all. His fists bawl loosely where he’d rested his hands against his jeans when he had turned to face out the open door and even with his fingers pressed flat against the ball of his thumb, the sharpened points of his talons nick into the skin. He runs his tongue over a fang, the tooth long and aching and sharp, an absentminded motion he hadn’t intended to make. He’s very suddenly reminded of the blood stains that absolutely cover him at this point and he knows you don’t have to be a cop to notice that he looks like he just walked from the middle of a crime scene. Travis is in fact a cop and suddenly this all makes a lot more sense.

”No, ‘course you don’t. I don’t, no one does, not exactly.” Travis says and he doesn’t sound smug. He just sounds like he doesn’t want to be having this conversation at all, ready for it to be over and done with. He does however now give an obvious and purposeful glance down to Ryan’s bloodstained sleeve. “But if you’re transforming earlier, you need to be in the cages earlier. Which you are and you will be, I’m not arguing this.”

It’s- maybe he’s right. Maybe he is. But he’s not and Ryan knows he’s not, this- this is different, Ryan’s sure of it. Emma’s nails are perfectly manicured and Kaitlyn’s wisp of a smile she gave him earlier was perfectly flat and aligned. No one else’s skin is rupturing from within and no one else has complained of their bones shifting and grinding within them. It’s just Ryan and whatever is happening with him this month, with this early transformation and these strange trickling thoughts. Maybe he’s right but even so, it should just be Ryan going down into those cages early, not all of them so soon. 

Which Ryan would never say. Emma’s right, it’s horrible down there and he may have always been a loner, who prefers to tackle things by himself and keep his problems to himself but… Very suddenly, Ryan has realised that he cannot go down into those cages alone. He doesn’t want to go in them at all, knowing what he knows and with stark memories of the last time he was down there- but most certainly especially not alone. This may be selfish, but Ryan will not act the part of sacrificial lamb tonight. 

“It’s not winter yet and we have a while longer before we should head down, just give us that, alright?” Though he asks, the force in his voice is so strong that it could be taken as nothing other than a declaration. 

“Listen, I respect you-“ Ryan’s scoff interrupts his sentence and he pushes on with a perhaps sincere but otherwise firm quality to his words. He even ignores Ryan’s second scoff, interrupting again just the second sentence after. “I do, believe me or not. Look, I get it. No, really I do. You been reading Chris’ journal, right? Yeah, I’d thought so. You know-”

Whatever he was going to say is left unsaid as Travis promptly switches tactics. The sincerity is lost and he hardens in both tone and expression in an unexpected instant. “No actually, this ain’t a choice I’m afraid. We both know what happens when you don’t lock yourself up and I’m not making the same mistake twice. So you are going down there one way or another. Don’t make this difficult for everyone.”

He doesn’t care if it was implicit, his instincts are wired up and after the standoff and revelation in the kitchen earlier, he finds himself quick to fall back to that defensive mode. Ryan’s lip twitches up, surely revealing one of those elongated fangs, a rumble in his chest that’s roaring to him but he’s unsure if it’s yet audible to the others. Travis licks his lips, a nervous tick, and shakes his head, looking away for a moment before his eyes return to bore into Ryan’s own. Something within him bristles even more at that gesture and he thinks Travis knows it. Yet the challenging stare into his own eyes isn’t what has Ryan standing, drawing to his full height and squaring his shoulders. It’s in the fact that the quick break of eye contact before it was returned was used to look at the others on the stairs. The eyes that Ryan’s certain were paused on Dylan a moment longer than the rest.

The rumble in his chest makes its way into his words, causing them to become thick and raw and slightly choked. “Don’t look at him.” Maybe he intended it threateningly but instead it came out low but panicked. He spoke deathly quietly but he may have well shouted for the resounding silence that follows.

Even the slight movements of each of the three surrounding him turning their heads to stare at him registers. He can hear how Emma’s hair slips from behind her ear as she looks up and the ever so slight pop of her mouth falling open. Kaitlyn’s earring jingles and despite how she’s just otherwise observed, the gravel crunches beneath her as she now mirrors his broadened stance. Travis shirt collar crinkles slightly as he near imperceptibly tilts his head and as the world closes in on them, the sound of that steady thu-thump rises in Ryan’s ears as if it were his own blood rushing through. Or, not so steady it seems- the old bastard has a murmur.

“March yourself down there and I won't have to.” Travis replies just as quietly and it’s as loud as the torrent of both his blood and Ryan’s own blood combined. 

He rips his eyes from Travis’ own and he’s moving across the driveway before he can even feel the gravel shifting beneath his boots. He hears Emma’s scramble through the side of the van, the slam of the door, the steady beat of Kaitlyn following just a step behind and the fading murmur as Travis watches them go. If it is shock and surprise that he can smell in the air from the girls trailing after him, then he doesn’t want to imagine what he’d pick up from Travis if he could sense those things on him too. He cannot say what moved him more, the logic or the instincts, the barest hint of a threat towards Dylan forcing him into motion without another thought. Complying is not what he wants to do, but right now, Ryan has enough self awareness that it is that or raking his sharp talons through Travis’s face and he doesn’t want to make a mistake that he cannot take back. He adjusts his aching jaw with a hand and curses under his breath as he approaches the stairs, the others looking up, some of them already watching. 

“We’re going down now.” He practically barks at them, brokering no room for arguments or questions, slightly hypocritically, as he had done so himself. He knows there won’t be any arguments. The wind has picked up, stronger than before, but even that cannot wash away the viscous pollution that his scent sends billowing out over them. It burns his own nose with a physical pain at just a whiff of it and his own scent has always been the hardest for him to pick up. 

He catches Dylan’s eye, brown doe eyes already on him widened in surprise and concern, unable to stop himself with this aching need to check over him. Ryan scans him as if Travis’ words had summoned harm to him in that half moment it took Dylan from his sight, that minor, violence free and only implied threat enough to send his heart into a beating frenzy and his adrenaline rushing. It settles him somewhat, to see he is just as unscathed as he’d been just the few seconds ago that Ryan had last laid eyes on him and the sigh of relief that leaves him is as genuine as it is unnecessary. It is not an entirely conscious action when he reaches down a hand to help Dylan up as he continues forward, simply expecting the others to follow. The feel of his skin against Ryan’s own, the warmth held within it despite his shivers and the physical sensation of that live pulse under his fingers, is enough to slow the frantic beat of his own.

The air has become thick and the world has slowed as he walks, leading them through the Manor. He doesn’t truly see where he’s going, with every small tear in the wallpaper, each grain of the wooden floorboards and each speck of softly falling dust filling his vision instead. He doesn't see any of the rooms they walk by, he can barely recognise where they are at all, with so many tiny details filling his senses. The Manor groans in the wind and there’s a faulty light upstairs, blinking where it’s been left turned on and it's so loud that he cannot really hear his thoughts as they go. It’s all too distracting to think, mind tugged this way and that as he scans their environment, his instincts hiked up to a tense alert. It’s not until he has to let go so he can climb down the ladder hidden beneath the floor of the kitchen, that he even realises he had never let go of Dylan’s hand in the first place. The sudden loss of comfort and security is instantly noticeable now that it is gone. 

He drops to the concrete, the cold creeping in through even the thick soles of his boots. He walks through the room that is left in not the pitch black he knows it to truly be, but instead in shades of grey cut up by the yellow of the light from the kitchen above, like a knife's slash of colour to a black and white television screen. He pushes through the door and it's here that he finally stops dead in his tracks, even as the others stream into the room around him, still vaguely tracking how Dylan ends up to his left and Kaitlyn takes her place within an arm’s reach just to his right.  

His head had felt stuffy as he walked, filled with the magnified and amplified input from every sense possible. Now those slow dripping thoughts drown out every remaining rational one he had left, the relentless patter on the stone base of his skull leaving no reason attainable. He feels as each thought slips him by, escaping through his fingers and he tries to grasp for anything at all as pure emotion rushes in to take its place. It’s horror and fear and dread that’s chilling him all the way down to his aching bones. 

The room of red light, that mingles with the scent of stained blood on the floor, warps around him. He can do nothing but remain standing still as the room closes in, blurring at the edges and dilating in his vision. He cannot see the bulb set into the ceiling with metal casing and bolts, he cannot see the wiring exposed against the wall. He just sees the mist of blood in the air, he swears he can feel the way it is thick and sticky and wet. It’s covering him, his face, his hands, his clothes. It’s lingering there, it remains in the air, it’s clogging up his fucking lungs and making it difficult to breathe through all that blood. On a gasp he tastes it on his tongue and it’s rotted and it’s foul and he nearly gags. It’s death, it’s death within the air, he knows it. It’s blood of malt and molasses, it’s not like their blood, it’s a rotten and festering pollution in the air. There’s venom in the pollution, that slight nausea inducing sweetness, but it’s not his, it isn’t his packs, it’s not of the other callows beside him, he knows this scent, it’s dead, it’s a dead scent. 

The deafening bang of the shotgun leaves his ears ringing for a moment, with a building pressure filling within them that has no time to pop before he feels the phantom of the recoil against his shoulder. There is no gun in his hands yet his ears ring from the shot all the same. He waits for the warmth of thick blood to come gargling from his chest, thick as the smog in the air, misting out from the tatters of his flesh to mingle with that rotted pollution already there, his scent soon to be just as dead as well. His laboured breath continues, a rasping sound that doesn’t reach him through the ringing, but there is no blinding white hot pain or new scraps of his flesh splattered against the walls. He looks up in a panic, his eyes jolting back and forth between the others, to see who it was that took the shot for him- from him? 

They each stare at him, maybe, but he sees only the cages. That centre door has been opened, it still rattles as it swings back to the centre in a slow stop. 

Thick grey metal bars, that will be filled with shocks of electricity, scorching his skin and separating him from his pack. The walls chip of their dust and dried blood, the scraps of his flesh stuck to them and slung over the vertical bars, adhered to them halfway through their flop to the cold hard ground. The moon locked away from him, the breath of night and the chorus of the forest all drowned beneath that red light. His skin smothered in that red mist, choking on it, losing all oxygen down in this soon to be sealed tomb. Concrete scraping against his claws, shoulders hunched and legs curled, the ache of hunger and unstretched limbs. He’ll never get out, he’ll never be freed, he will rot down here with the dead scent in his lungs and a head full of lead. There’s another bang of a shotgun and Ryan takes a blind, stumbling step back, unsteady enough that he fears he may fall, all led by a push to his shoulder. There’s a light whine that makes it through the buzz. It’s not his own, his jaw too rigid to creak open to make any sound like that.

A new red descends over his vision, the mist in the air melting to sludge that dissolves on the ground, the ringing from the shotgun blast fading out to the true eerie silence, until the sound of footfalls behind him filters in. Despite his consciousness snapping back to the present once more, his focus remains single minded, his eyes locked to Dylan in an instant and there is no one else in the room now. He’s still shivering, though it cannot truly be from the cold. Ryan doesn’t register the movement that brings Dylan’s arm into his hold, his elbow and wrist clutched within each hand, firm but gentle as to not sink his claws in. He scans the room with a different kind of narrowed vision, sweeping over it and everyone in search for what has caused the distress. He finds nothing but his own lip curled with a rumble he hadn’t noticed deep within his chest and his own scent varnished over the room, so heavy that he spares a distant thought as to how he’d managed to pick up any other scent at all.

”Are you okay?” He asks Dylan, in a low grumble of a sound, aware that he’s still holding his arm captive but helpless to let it go at this moment. It’s the only thing keeping the red light from turning into a mist of blood choking him from within his lungs.

”Are you?” Dylan asks right back and it’s concerned confusion, he’s now present enough to tell. With it, his voice is a smidge higher than usual, the words holding a touch of the same note used in that harrowing whimper.

Ryan doesn’t answer, doesn’t know if he would have even had an answer, as his head snaps with a light click in his tense neck when the footsteps come to a slow behind him. Dylan’s arm is pulled along with the sudden turn, forcing him to either hold it out even more extended than before or be tugged along to Ryan’s side. He seems to fall into the movement, letting himself be dragged along and then shuffling a few steps closer, until he’s practically pressed against Ryan’s arm and shoulder. Something keyed up and on high alert within Ryan settles ever so slightly at the gesture.

“What are you waiting for?” Travis gruntles upon his stop now in front of him. The other room has lost the knife's slash of light in it and Ryan belatedly realises that it was the trapdoor closing that he heard. The door banging against the cage the first time, the sound just amplified to deafening with his heightened hearing. There was no push to his shoulder at all, just the ghost of recoil.

While it was those conscious thoughts that had previously slipped through his fingers, now that he has warm skin beneath them, Ryan finds the pieces of himself that were lost to the haze of fear, panic and guilt. He squeezes Dylan’s arm, as if to remind himself that it is truly there in his hold and his heart lurches to his throat when he feels it gently tug at his grip to be released. He wants to tighten his grasp, squeeze until his palms and knuckles ache, to never let go. He loosens his fingers with a burning in the back of his chest and throat, the sudden difficulty to breathe easily returned twofold. He only gets a single hitched breath out before he feels a palm slide against his own, tucked between them from where he’d dropped his arms as if they were made of lead. Fingers slide between his own, in a grasp that others would most likely consider too tight and bordering on aggressive, but instantly pacifies Ryan’s scorched nerves. He sits his fingers between each of Dylan’s knuckles, his talons, they must be longer than before as the tips dig into just the very top layer of his skin, though not deep enough to pierce, yet Dylan just squeezes his hand even tighter.

Ryan glances to the others in the room, checking first on Kaitlyn, still close but a further step now that Travis has stopped between them. Her eyes are flicking between Ryan, Travis and the cages. She’s tensed and almost bordering on the posture of a standoff, with fists curled and eyes narrowed. It’s an aggressive front but just beneath his own scent clogging up the entirety of the room, he can pick out the smoke filled with fear and aversion. Perhaps it’s not the same experience, but she’s feeling the same thing he is. 

The other’s hold various expressions of what he’s assuming are concern, nausea and confusion. Noses are scrunched, likely at the acidic stench of his scent burning through nerve cells. Coming from him, he doesn’t think he can probably truly appreciate or understand just how much his scent commands the room, but through those expressions he thinks he could hazard something close to a guess.

Finding himself a little more grounded, he can manage taking in what Travis had said. Processed it does nothing more than square his shoulders. “We’re down here.” Ryan says defensively, or perhaps argumentatively, he isn’t sure. His words don’t sound like his own, voice rough as if he’d been sprinting across the country and he raises a hand to his aching throat, as if a simple touch will give him the answers as to why it does now ache.

”Regret the growling now?” Travis jeers just as argumentative as Ryan must have been, matching scowl and all. He seems to realise he’s meant to be the collected and responsible one here the second it leaves his mouth, shaking his head tiredly, though if that’s at himself or Ryan, he can’t tell. “Okay good, you’re down here. Now you get in the cages.”

Ryan’s free hand clenches into a fist and his spine instantly aches with how straight he’s standing. He shakes his head and says simply, “No.” No, he can’t do it, he thought he could but he can’t. He has to get out of here, he has to get his pack out of here, it isn’t safe here. There’s death in the air of this tomb.

“We just went over this, for fucksake. Do you want me to-“ Travis cuts himself off in a frustrated grunt, realising he can’t bring himself to threaten one of the kids in an attempt to manipulate another to do what he wants. Now, whether that’s because he doesn’t think that’s a fight he’ll win with them all there or because it does actually go against his morals, Ryan’s barely listening closely enough to wonder. 

He’s back to tensed, ready to gnash his teeth and draw blood with his claws at a moment's notice. He feels backed into a corner, with the cages on one side and Travis blocking the exit on the other. If he cannot claw his way through concrete, he can claw his way through flesh and bone, his animal instincts assure him with more comfort and confidence than they had only moments ago above ground. He hears Dylan breathe out shakily beside him and then he’s all but tucked himself into Ryan’s side, the back of Ryan’s arm slotting against the front of Dylan’s, his knee knocking into the side of Ryan’s and left there. Ryan’s eye catches Kaitlyn’s and her jaw hardens, her head gives the barest hint of a nod. She’ll go down fighting with him, he knows instinctively. 

Ryan musters every last ounce of reason he can in a final effort to stop it coming to that and says, “No, we can’t be down here. We’ll go somewhere else.”

Travis looks just about ready to tear his hair out. “Where else would you go kid, huh? You agreed, you all agreed, that you would do what it takes to keep yourselves, me and every other fucking person who might wander along, safe. This is how you do it.”

Ryan’s about to take an aggressive step forward when a voice stops him, the sole of his boot only half lifted from the concrete. “What about the island?”

It’s Emma, stepping forward with fingers reaching up to nervously grasp at a necklace that is no longer there, fingers closing around air. She continues speaking, in this nervous outburst where her words are hurried and high. “It’s surrounded by water, so no one can leave and no one will randomly get to it if you keep watch.”

Travis doesn’t immediately discard her words again, unable to with the logic she’d made certain to stuff them full with, but he’s unconvinced that’s for certain. At least he responds with actual thought, rather than immediate dismissal this time. “We don’t have time to get you all to the island and above that, it’s a risk we shouldn’t take, having you above land in open space.” 

“I don’t want to go to the island anyway! Max was there and you still got bit Emma, it’s not secure. We did all agree that we wouldn’t be reckless and that we’d be in the cages whether we liked it or not.” Laura argues against them, aligning herself with Travis against all odds. She fixes her gaze to Ryan as she finishes. “We’re only three months in and you’re already acting this irresponsible because you want to what? Run rampant and eat whatever you find, people like us possibly included? This is ridiculous!”

”Shut the fuck up Laura.” Kaitlyn snaps. Her shoulders draw back as she leans forward to say it, spitting it with pure vitriol. 

“Hey! Laura’s right, we all agreed!” Max defends his girlfriend but it’s ignored by everyone, lacking the fire either of the girls had held in their own words to draw any sort of notice.

”I- I don’t want to go either, it’s horrible but it’s- we know it’s safe down here, right?” Abi adds in hesitantly. Emma turns a sharp eye to her and throws up her hands in a gesture that conveys a ‘you’re not helping’ sort of emotion. Abi recedes back, not arguing the point further, but there’s a firmness to her expression that shows she meant it and will stand by it. 

As the arguments continue, Ryan tilts his head to his left to look at Dylan. He’s still wide eyed, though now with an added furrowed brow and lips twisted unhappily to the side. Their faces are so close together with how tightly he’s tucked to Ryan’s side and Ryan tries desperately to ignore that as he asks, “What do you want to do?” He keeps his tone even, refusing to let it give away just how much the answer will determine what Ryan will do. If Dylan truly wants to stay, against all his better instincts and against his own wellbeing, he’ll force himself to stay too.

”I don’t want to stay here.” Dylan whispers back and that settles that.

“Well that settles it.” Travis echoes Ryan’s own thoughts in the opposite direction, after watching the group fall apart into arguments and snarls, stepping in to either stop them tearing into each other or more likely to capitalise on the group-wide indecision. 

“No it doesn’t!” Emma practically yelps, her panic beginning to show. Despite having not spent the last month above ground or having accepted the wolf side of her, her desperation to not spend the night down here is palpable. “I’m not staying in those cages!”

”You can’t keep us down here, Travis. What are you going to do? We have another option and we’re taking it.” Kaitlyn tells him with a bite of frost to her tone. Travis sneers at the tone and it only grows with her use of his first name, not appreciating being so informally addressed by her, despite Ryan never truly noticing that same reaction to his own use of it. 

He does look like he has about twenty ideas of exactly what he could do, none of them pleasant or legal, but it’s actually Max’s scathing tone that pauses him from letting her know exactly what he’s thinking. “He’ll keep you locked up in it for months straight if his track records anything to go off.” Max mutters the words but it’s the most hateful sounding thing that Ryan has ever heard come from his mouth, the strength of that hate something Ryan hadn’t thought him capable of and it silences the room.

Travis sighs, a loud sound even amongst all those other amplified noises buzzing within Ryan’s hearing. He brings a hand to his face, rubbing a thumb and a finger over his brows, but he doesn’t manage to smooth those frown lines away. “Okay. Okay. Fine, you know what, alright. But we have to go right this fucking second and if anyone makes this difficult in any way, you’re all suffering for it.”

With that he turns and marches back to the ladder, a foot in the first rung not a moment later. Despite the warning, no one instantly moves, everyone looking between each other with a nervous expression or glare considering. 

”Unbelievable.” Laura snaps at them. She shakes her head and yanks Max along behind her as she takes them off to the room they had assumedly spent the night in these last two months. Max however sends a secret thumbs up there way, tucked behind his back as he’s pulled along, vanishing from sight as the door is slammed behind them. 

Jacob sighs, following them only to the door, where he drops the old wooden bar lock into place, slides the barrel bolt across and clips the padlock closed, triple locking them in as Travis had that first month. He stares at the door a moment, looking close to wanting to bash his head in against it a few times, before turning back and kneeling down to begin unlacing his shoes. He glances up at Kaitlyn and catches her eye. The way he’s silently pleading is so obvious that he doesn’t have to say anything to express how badly he wishes her to stay. Kaitlyn’s jaw is still set hard, though whether that’s because of the argument that has just taken place, the residual fear of the cages themselves or due to the information revealed earlier, it’s unclear. She doesn’t even shake her head to decline, just turns away and makes her way to the ladder. She doesn’t see the way Jacob’s face crumples, the tears springing to his eyes and the betrayal that has to burn his throat going down, but Ryan does. 

Abi hugs her arms around herself, refusing to look anyone in the eye. Now that his own scent has stabilised somewhat with this decision made, even if it still lingers darkly throughout the room, the other’s scents have begun to manage breaking through. The usual floral scent she carries has wilted to something oily and thick on the tongue, a pungent stink with the slight smell of sweet, like maggots wriggling through a withered bouquet. It however is not the pure misery he has smelt before, a tinge of relief in the mix. She may not say another word to them or look them in the eye now, but her scent gives it all away. She wants them to go, is glad for them to be leaving, would have them all go if she could. She doesn’t want to be anywhere near any of them at all, being forced to return each month to the cage beside her is the only thing that keeps her acknowledging their presence at all.

Nick, as always now, is the last Ryan’s eyes glance over. Bathed beneath that red light, encased in shadows, he looks sickly, gaunt and blends even further into his surroundings than usual. He’s the only one to look up and catch Ryan’s eye of the bunch, however. His irises are black under the filtered light and they bore into his own with an intensity that Ryan hasn’t seen since that night. The shadows carve out a hollowness beneath them and he looks like a man facing the gallows. Ryan recalls his quiet words spoken last month and Nick doesn't have to echo them for him to know that if last month was an accident, then he believes that Ryan is truly and purposefully abandoning them now. Nick looks away and Ryan thinks that even if he’s right, he cannot stay.

He turns and without another word, they exit up through the ladder, passing back into the light, freed from the red tinge and the mist of the dead scent. They stumble into the fresh air outside and it has grown colder, colder still that Dylan’s hand has yet to return to his own. The air, crisp and filled with the scent of pine and bark and life, clears out the rest of that rot that had filled Ryan’s lungs down beneath the Manor. He can finally breathe easy again. The four of them spend no time peering between themselves before they pile into the back of the cruiser rumbling in wait for them, the decision has already been made and there are only sighs of relief to be heard. 

No one is brave enough to take the front seat beside Travis, the man’s patience pushed to its limit and his nerves on the same frayed string as their own, that it’s honestly a wonder the stress won’t cause him to explode at the same time they do tonight. With four of them in the back, seatbelts are discarded and it’s a tight fit. Ryan is the last to hop in, a mistake he instantly recognises. With Dylan beside him being respectful of Emma’s space on his right, he ends up half on Ryan’s lap. A leg not just pressed against his own, but hooked over it, a knee rested just above his own, the tip of his shoe scraping the footwell between Ryan’s boots. Dylan’s side is pressed flush against his own, forcing Ryan to sling an arm over the back of the seats and therefore also over Dylan’s nearest shoulder. There’s a stutter in Ryan’s heartbeat and a low flush of heat, as if he’s never felt another’s touch before in his life. Each and every one of his fingers ache, the hand resting uselessly by the door quickly stuffed beneath his own knee to banish the temptation and possible unconscious action of grabbing to take hold of Dylan’s thigh, while the hand over the back of the seats is twitching at the urge to sling itself fully around his neck. 

The drive is silent at first, just gravel beneath the tires and breath stolen by the air rushing through the open window in the front. Ryan doesn't mind the quiet, is thankful for it really. Heightened as they are today, each new emotion that comes completely replaces the last, memories of a scent that’s familiar yet remains only as something that lingers, is forgotten as his entire being is put into forcing his hands to remain still. It takes far more effort than even that to keep his thoughts moral and pure, with warmth and skin and soft fabric pressed against him, not just within reach but in the rightful place tucked beneath his arm. He fails his first attempt when a sharp pain suddenly spikes through the back of his hand that’s slung over the seats. 

“Ow! Kaitlyn, what the fuck?” Ryan’s yip turns into a grumble as he begins to draw his arm around the front of Dylan’s neck to survey the damage, before aborting the action halfway, placing it back down lest it get any ideas of where it should settle after that. With the prick of warmth running down to his palm, she’s drawn blood at least.

”Stop it.” She hisses at him, genuine anger in her tone. 

“Stop what?” He grunts back in an even mixture of irritation and confusion.

There’s a scoff but it’s without humour. “You know what.”

”No I don-“ “Ryan was asking me before about what the word fawn means to me. I told him to ask you but we didn’t get the chance, so Kaitlyn, thoughts?” Emma interrupts the bickering with a slightly strained tone and he knows she doesn't really want to talk about this right now- she just doesn't want to hear them argue. He instantly feels bad for putting her in this position again, so soon after their conversation, forcing her to push her own emotions aside to subtly care and smooth over theirs instead. 

“What? Nothing.” Kaitlyn says and though the anger is still present, the confusion is stronger and in this second, the surprise segue is enough to momentarily distract her from it. 

He should take the olive branch that Emma’s shoving into his hands, for Emma’s sake at the very least. Still, he glances at Travis, not actually wanting to have this conversation in his presence. “You know, when you're turned and I’m guessing now too, how you think of the others? As in, uh, the type? Of, you know…”

His second glance is caught in the rear view mirror, Travis holding his gaze for as long as he’s confident to keep his eyes off the private and likely homemade gravel road, which unsurprisingly and thankfully is not very long. His brow furrows deeper and Ryan can’t see the frown, but he’s certain it’s there all the same. His face might actually be stuck like that at this point and Ryan doesn’t exactly have enough proof to say that’s an unlikely speculation. 

“You mean like Laura’s theory?” She spits the name and she’s more focused on her reignited anger than she is actually thinking of what the question is asking.

“No, like when you think of me, what word comes to mind.” He tries again, desperate to hurry to the end of this conversation, overly aware of their audience.

”Oh. I’ve accepted a lot of shit Ryan, but I’m not calling you an alpha male just because you’ve had a bad day.” She grumbles again, her arms folding in front of her and the way she tucks her hands in, he thinks she’s also having to force them to not act without her permission. His own hand skitters a little further back in fear that her self control may slip. 

“That’s not what I was asking, Laura and her theory have nothing to do with this.” Ryan cannot resist another glance to the front seat as he continues. “I mean outside of pack terms. You remember it right? How you thought of me before we fought?”

That captures her attention entirely at last. “Oh like- when we were turned? You were another pike.”

”Oh. That’s- okay.” Ryan’s not quite sure how to respond. It’s certainly not the word he thought of her as.

“Like the fish? Honestly I’m kind of happy to just be considered a ‘hound’ at this point.” Emma quietly mutters that last part, but even if they weren’t in such a confined space, it would have been easily heard by the two… Curs? Pikes?- the two of them.

Kaitlyn shakes her head, “What, no it's not like a fish, it’s just… You’re not even a hound anyway, what? You’re a clover.”

All heads turn to look at her, Ryan’s hand absentmindedly slipping forward to hold Dylan’s shoulder back as Ryan leans forward against the door to stare at her. None of this is correct, or at the very least matching up with how Ryan’s wolflike side of his mind has thought of the others, like at all. Either she’s having him on or this is far more confusing than he already thought it was. From the look on her face though, she’s not kidding. “Right… Uh, okay, I guess what do you think of Dylan as then? Or I mean, Abi too?”

She looks just as confused as he feels as she leans forward to make eye contact with him, all previous anger forgotten completely. “The exact same thing. Right? What the fuck are you guys asking? Don’t you think the same shit? I thought we were on the same page with this dude!”

”No, no way.” Ryan says a little distractedly. He’s trying to wrack his mind, that other half of his mind, the back half that comes with information he has to translate and decode, for some sort of explanation to these completely new terms that she’s brought into this discussion. He’s coming up with nothing. His terms at least make about two thirds of sense, while hers just seem totally random.

”What do you mean ‘no’, we agreed Laura didn’t have the terms right for everyone, these are the right terms!” Kaitlyn argues, her confusion transforming back to frustration. A vein pulses in her neck and it holds a flash of black within it.

”No as in no, what do you mean ‘what do you mean no’, obviously I mean no!” He snipes back anyway, imitating her voice in a very poor impression that he knows will just piss her off more. “I haven’t been thinking of you as a fucking pike, that doesnt even make sense.”

”Like, I don’t know, they’re just the terms, it’s not like I chose them, did I?” Kaitlyn's tries to defend herself but clearly even she is just guessing. “I didn’t really think about it, okay? It makes sense to me.”

”Well clearly you guys have not reached a consensus yet.” Dylan pipes up at last and Ryan is momentarily distracted by the odd strain in his voice. With his attention drawn back to him again, he notices suddenly how tense he feels against him and how the scent in the air has turned almost sickly sweet. Ryan’s just scrunched his nose, breathing in to try and find the emotion held within the almost physical sensation of warmth in the air, when a throat is cleared in the front seat and his attention is yanked away once more. 

“You kids ain’t coming back from this.” Travis begins muttering before his voice is unnecessarily raised for them to hear, as if they couldn’t already.

He’s not the only one who’s blood runs cold, he can feel the cold spike of fear piercing through the air like a shard of ice. The ominous words feel like their meaning is clear and Ryan’s eyes flick to where Travis holds the steering wheel, half afraid he’ll drive them all straight into the lake. The gun and its silver bullets, that Ryan’s sure he has kept but has not asked about for everyone’s sake, is not resting in the front seat but that doesn't mean it hasn’t been stashed in the trunk. That protective streak within him, a natural part of both sides of him that’s been souped up by the moon so close to rising, has his fingers curling into the dip beneath Dylan’s collarbone and ripping tiny holes into his sweater. 

Ryan’s stomach is suddenly cold and his voice holds the same chill when he asks, “What do you mean by that Travis?”

“Talkin’ bout what you’re talkin’ bout, refusing to go into the cages tonight… I knew it too, after last month but… well I didn’t think you’d manage to get the others in on it as well. ‘Spose that was naive.” Travis makes a tsking sound between his teeth. His eyes catch Ryan’s again in the rear view mirror and he now truly regrets going through with that conversation in his presence. “Caleb, you know, he spoke the same way, after he started refusing to go down there too. Took him a good few years longer than you kids but… He’d call himself the hydra and his sister a worm, which she never much appreciated.”

Ryan’s brows quirk downwards as he hears that, a thought, a possible explanation, forming with these now three separate examples of differing terms for what is clearly the same concept. He doesn’t get to stew over it as Travis continues. 

“There’s no coming back from this, Caleb grew, well, different after and he never went back.” Travis seems to be struggling to find the words to explain. He glances now at the group of them in the back and shakes his head, resigned or perhaps giving up. “I see the same thing in you kids back there and I’m just… don’t want you to end up like him too.”

It is a surprisingly tender thing for him to admit, a caring disguised as a warning. It lands with a solemn air however as Kaitlyn turns her head and looks out the window, stock still and spilling a dreary cloud of smoke through the cruiser. They drive the rest of the way in silence, each of them mulling over various concerns or thoughts, watching the forest roll by as the light above fades. Night will descend soon and they have to be on the island long before that.

Chapter Text

The gentle lapping of the water against the rocks is the bass of a cacophony that fills the island. Crow caws sing the chorus, rustling trees the woodwinds and footfalls the percussion. Beyond the island, over the lake, through the forest and far behind the Adirondack, the sky has begun to rust. The beautiful paint strokes of pink and orange are fading as quickly as they had appeared, leaving behind darkened clouds and a sea of brimming night. The gentle glow of a full moon's light will break through the horizon and cascade down to the dirt of the earth sooner than expected. 

The small dock creaks and groans beneath his weight, the wood weakened from the cold water and years of inattention. Even just standing a few metres above the water, with the threat of falling in, has his body twitching with the urge to get his feet back on solid ground. Still, he watches as Travis locks up the canoes and hides the paddles, now that he’s rowed himself and the small boat back to land. He brought them over himself, to make sure that they are completely stranded until morning. Well, technically he was just brought along for the ride so he could take the boat back, as it was Kaitlyn who did the grunt work of the rowing itself. Ryan had tried at first, putting all those years of practice to use again for the first time since camp, but he had to pretty much instantly pass the job over. His sleeves are still heavy and his arms aching and sticky from the amount of blood that had poured from the splitting of his skin that the action had caused- he’d had to hold his arms over the side of the boat so as to not drench everyone, while they stared at him in horror.

Travis had made a face after he shooed them out of the small boat, which had threateningly wobbled as they climbed onto the dock, something that had brought all their hearts to their throats and not to mention another tear to Ryan’s calf. He’d had a dip to his brow, those lines in between deepened even further for a moment, as he’d given simple advice; be safe. Ryan knows that he struggles to read the man, always has since he first met him that August night. He doubts he’ll ever be an expert at it but he’d at least like to be able to read whether it’s genuineness he speaks to Ryan with or a hatred covered in learned politeness. Possibly it was just that Ryan’s skin bursting open in front of him was enough to scare him into some kindness. Ryan might never know.

”D’you think he meant that?” Dylan asks from beside him, just a step back from the edge of the dock that Ryan himself stands on. Ryan turns to look at him, but his eye isn’t met, as Dylan instead regards the water wearily. The cold wind runs over his shoulders and through his hair, lifting the front that has fallen over his forehead and brows. He doesn't shiver this time however and Ryan doesn't doubt that the fever has begun to take hold, the sweat falling in beads down Ryan’s own sides despite the chill. 

“You’d have a better guess than I,” Ryan gestures vaguely towards his nose, “With your, y’know. What’d he smell like?”

“Exhausted?” Dylan says as he takes a shaky step back, cautious without allowing himself vision, in what Ryan guesses is Dylan’s version of respectfully continuing to face him as they talk, even if he won’t meet his eyes. “I mean I don’t exactly know if he tucked himself into bed last night with a tea and a lullaby, but I guess emotionally at least, he’s exhausted.”

Ryan trails after him at his meandering pace backwards and almost wants to assure Dylan that he can save himself the anxiety and just look where he’s going. He doesn’t, the sight of it too amusing and adorable. “So, our fault, you think? Cause there’s your answer there.”

Dylan might not see it but he clearly hears the smile in Ryan’s voice and softly his lips tug to match. “I mean, maybe? I dunno still, not exactly an empath.”

“Yeah well, got a better insight than most people now, though, I’d reckon.” Ryan points out with a tilt to his as his eyes trace over Dylan, free to meander while Dylan’s so focused on looking anywhere other than back.

“Not really, the reasons why are still entirely guesswork. And Travis’ poker face is… Uh, though, speaking of which,” Dylan then hedges with a nervous expression. “Are you okay, man? You smelt awful down there.”

”Thanks, Dyl.” Ryan replies, sarcastically flatly. Then with a little more thought, his segue takes on a little less offence and much more guilt. “Oh. Shit, it wasn’t me stressing you out down there, was it?”

”No!” Dylan rushes to assure him and the force of it even brings his eyes to Ryan’s own. His face twists in this odd expression that would be a lot more funny if it wasn’t so obvious that yeah, it had in fact been Ryan stressing him out. “Well… I was uh, worried. For you. I guess. Like, barely though.”

”Barely and yet still worried enough to…” Mewl? Oh god, yeah most certainly not. Whimper? Whine? Either of those are probably right but Jesus, Ryan cannot say either of them to his face, for either of their sakes. He can feel in the air how painfully awkward he’s suddenly made this conversation and anything he might have been able to conjure up to save it is dropped down into the metal shredder of his mind, as the sound replays in his ears. 

After a moment of Ryan very obviously getting stuck trying to find the right word and trailing off, Dylan fills the void, though he clearly can no longer meet Ryan’s eye once more. He turns around now that they’ve finally stepped off the dock and scuffs his shoe on the dirt as they walk. “Jesus Christ. Yeah, so, you didn’t hear that, okay? That’s so… God. But I guess it’s just, I mean… You were terrified, right? And guilty and… I’m not sure. So I was just-.” He ends on a shrug. 

Ryan nods along in somewhat amused, somewhat guilty agreement that he totally definitely didn’t hear the worried little whimper and instead then sighs in defeat, jogging a few steps to walk beside Dylan. He finds himself sombering as he prepares to tell the truth of it. The words are hard to get out, but he forces his way through. “Yeah, um. It’s- I smelt the Hackett’s scents down there. Chris’ scent. And I could tell in it that it was, um, you know. Ahem. Dead. Guess I- I freaked? Sorry.”

Dylan shakes his head, looks a little sad from what Ryan can see. “Man, don’t… you shouldn’t apologise, I know what you mean, and it’s, I mean it’s really horrible. And I didn’t even go through- Nevermind, I’m just glad you’re feeling a bit better out of there.”

“You could smell it- them- too?” Ryan asks in pure uneasy surprise.

”Yeah?” Dylan looks up at him again and his lips tug to the side. “Oh. Shit, you- you hadn’t before, had you? I’m- Jesus, man, I’m sorry, that’s- that really sucks.”

It had been there the whole time? Ryan knew his senses had sharpened to a degree they have not before today, obviously, but he hadn’t realised there was even anything more that he could have picked up on. Let alone something like that, the lingering remains of a scent in the air, the scent of his dead mentor, his friends, his victim. “You’ve smelt that the whole time?” He asks and he knows his voice comes out quiet, sad and pained, he can’t stop it.

”Yeah, it’s-“ Dylan sucks in a breath, switching to a connected topic on a lighter tune. “Those airport security puppies better watch their backs, because I could seriously come for their gig if I wanted to. Though hey, sounds like you could too, or even for mine. This is really just turning into a chain of stolen gigs.”

Ryan takes the joke and pivot as it’s offered to him with a silent gratefulness. With his heightened emotions as they are, he cannot continue that conversation anymore without doing something along the lines of sitting down and sobbing his eyes out or throwing himself into the lake, instincts be damned. “Nah, you’ve still got me beat there. I can’t pick up other people like you can, like Travis or others, just cal- infected.” He says, clearing his throat as he does his best at ignoring how the guilt still nips at his heels as they walk. 

“Great, I get the most useless sense to become overpowered. Of all things to get buffed, right? Okay, but kinda seriously though, it all just really does suck. Like, I wish I couldn’t tell that my therapist is bored whenever I would sit there lying for an hour, or that my Mom’s worried constantly or like even that my cashier is horny?- like seriously, it’s midday and you’re scanning pistachios, why are you-?” He cuts himself off with a scowl and throws up his hands. “It’s more stressful than it is useful.”

Ryan scowls back but it holds a little more fire than Dylan’s mostly joking expression had, what amusement he had managed to find in Dylan’s nerdy choice of terminology at the start of his tangent instantly burnt away. “He has eyes is why.” He scoffs, thinking less about what he just said and more on the fact that had Ryan been there, as he should have been, it wouldn’t have been an issue at all.

”What?” 

“Huh?”

”She- sorry, what did you say? My therapist is a she though. Not that I’m going to her anymore, so not really mine, I guess. That whole thing was totally useless, like yes, go to a therapist but also you can’t tell them anything that actually happened or anything that’s affecting you now afterwards expect maybe about how you lo- nevermind. Anyway, what did you say?” Dylan says, looking up at last, though it seems he didn’t actually hear what Ryan had said, too caught up in his own thoughts and the incorrect assumption at the beginning. 

Thank god; he thinks Ryan was talking about his therapist, which he most certainly wasn’t, but seriously, thank god. Ryan doesn’t know what he would have done if he had caught what Ryan was saying. Alongside the violent swinging of his emotions back and forth clearly accelerating in tandem with the process of transformation as they walk, Ryan’s filter is clearly also decaying. It’s as if his instincts are bleeding through to his coherent thoughts, which is a recipe for disaster with Dylan nearby. Even with that acknowledgement however, it still doesn't appease the possessive flare and he tries his hardest to shove it down with a cleared throat and awkward nod.

“Just- yeah, that’d be frustrating, I imagine.” Ryan quickly changes tune as he mentally slaps himself in the face for letting anything else slip loose. He means what he says however, he’s sympathetic. The heightened senses, any of them, are still a constant adjustment. They are only three months into the rest of their lives.

“It’s- I dunno. I’m getting used to it, it’s just weird. Stressful I guess, I feel like I’m on high alert at all times.” Even as Ryan’s brows furrow Dylan just shrugs. “But you know, and this is kinda terrible, but I do feel a bit… well, just with how the others have to deal with sensory input that's way too much for them, it’s like having them step into my shoes and see how I’ve always found it. It’s a little bit vindifying.”

He knows, okay, he knows that it's just the amplified emotions that come with being just a hair's breadth from the full moon rising. But instantly all of his guilt, awkwardness and tension melts away and is replaced by solely affection. It’s stifling in its warmth and intensity and he doesn’t know if it is scorching him or not, if he‘ll ever escape this without being charred and singed at the ends. He does know, of course he does, what he should really wonder is if he truly wants the burning to end or not. He thinks he knows the answer to that too, even if he won’t admit it to himself, even as he lets the fire of affection within him burst out of him into a blazing smile that he cannot extinguish. 

He knows and yet it truly feels as if his heart is about to explode as his eyes trace the outline of Dylan’s profile and he laughs with the force of fondness that he is stuffed full of for the boy walking beside him. “That’s- that is definitely not a word.”

“I know it’s not, if I wanted a proper word I’d use vindicated, but that sounds like a superhero name and as we’ve established, my power sucks ass, so I don’t feel vindicated, I feel vindified and I stand by what I said.” Dylan promptly corrects him in a hurried and haughty little speech and if he had glasses, Ryan’s sure he’d be pushing them up the bridge of his nose right now.

Ryan holds up hands of surrender, hoping one of his palms covers his lovesick grin from view. “Yessir.”

Dylan gives a suspicious but accepting sort of hum, before he sighs and exclaims, complete with the expressively shaking hands at his head and everything, “It’s not even satisfying feeling vindified by it anymore though. I’m being completely serious when I say it’s like we get super cool, secret werewolf powers but they just fucking suck. It was a terrible deal.”

“It is a curse.” Ryan says bemusedly and as easily as that, he’s well and truly back to feeling kind of alright despite it all. With the fresh air, the sound of the island woods, Dylan beside him. He’s glad too, that Dylan himself seems to be in somewhat lighter spirits now than he was before, even despite the darker skies and fever that Ryan catches flushing his cheeks when Dylan glances at him. 

Dylan has looked away again, kicking a stone on the ground as he grumbles, “Yeah, well, could be way cooler. Give us a consolation prize at least. Also, we don’t even know if it’s a curse, it spreads like a virus. We could be like werewolf zombies.”

There’s a quiet lull in their conversation after that as Ryan digests the absurdity of that statement and they continue to follow the tracks Kaitlyn and Emma left in the dirt, just a little ahead of them. Ryan can still hear their soft chatter amongst the other sounds of the underbrush and island. His and Dylan’s own conversation doesn’t cease though, picking right back up when Ryan declares incredulously that Dylan cannot truly believe that and thus beginning a small but lighthearted argument in hushed voices, as they bicker over whether it’s more likely a curse or disease. Perhaps a heavier topic than best discussed right now but their subdued back and forth makes it feel like they’re not really arguing over the root cause of their current predicament at all. Just talking in that way they can- about anything. 

They run into the girls at the end of the path, directly beneath the treehouse and their argument fizzles to match their silence. Kaitlyn leans against the ladder with her arms folded and she might have been the picture of put together cool, if not for the awkward glances she sends to Emma when she thinks it’ll go unnoticed. Meanwhile with the way Emma repeatedly rakes a hand through her hair, she is nerves personified. Ryan only caught snippets and he tried not to eavesdrop on the apology that Kaitlyn gave for the part she played in the rotor arm being taken, even if he did hear how it was unnecessary but sweet, as Emma had assured her. It’s left them in a bit of an awkward silence, that with their arrival, is now filled by equally as awkward discussion on where they should situate themselves for the night ahead. 

Before discussions can even really begin, Ryan makes an executive decision that surely only the imminence of the moon's rising gives him the gall and arrogance enough to do; Dylan will transform in the treehouse, while the rest of them will find somewhere else to do it. It’s a confusing combination of the most selfish decision he’s ever made whilst also the most selfless. As Dylan will transform last, if the months past are anything to go off of, if he’s up in the treehouse he’s at least sheltered from the wind and cold in that time. Even if it means he’s alone- especially if it means he’s alone. All Ryan wants is to have Dylan stay by his side and that he knows, means that under no circumstance should he. Luckily Ryan’s mom taught him early that we can’t always get what we want, so even as the words bring a slosh of acid to the back of his teeth, he grits them out. No one argues it, though as discussions truly begin, Ryan has to look away as an upset expression crosses over Dylan’s face, ignoring it as Ryan has no idea why it’s there or what it means. 

Emma looks hesitant during the discussions but Ryan watches her as she visibly draws up the self courage and tells them that she’ll go wherever they go, joining in with her own suggestions of spots that meet the criteria of not too close to the treehouse and not too far as to be too far to reach before night has fallen. The island is larger than it looks from land, extending out a good while further from the end of the walkway and with an even greater width on the far side that is hidden by trees and a dense underbrush. None of them have actually been to the other side of the island it turns out, as they didn’t bring the kids over here much during camp and the foliage grows thick enough to discourage wandering even just a few steps past the underneath of the walkway. Even as sailing instructor Ryan hasn’t seen it, keeping the kids paddling in the space alongside the island and never around it. 

Those very deterrents that kept them from exploring the full size of it during camp, do pose the same issue to them now however. They’re unsure if the underbrush thins out in the area between the walkway and the other side of the island. It’ll be a good amount of space, Emma reckons, if it does. Otherwise however, if they are confined to just the patch of land beneath the walkway? It’s not the same as the sprint through the forest that he and Kaitlyn got last month and already his instincts urge him to head towards the clearing that he’d marked up with scratches. Even though it’s impossible anyway, he still does his best to ignore it- anything is better than the cages. 

At last they simply decide to make their way as far as they can, in the time they’ve got left. It’s not like they have many options otherwise, other than sitting down right here and waiting, but it feels like a choice is made nonetheless. A choice they realised with a jolt had to be made quickly, fevers beginning to reach their peaks and skin thinning from within. They bid a hurried goodbye to Dylan with an agreement that if anyone ends up misplaced or lost in the morning, they’ll all make their way towards the treehouse to meet up. However as the girls turn and attempt to begin making their way through the thicket, Ryan pauses, his eyes glued to Dylan’s back where he’d also turned away to approach the ladder. Ryan steps forward on impulse, a hand around the back of Dylan’s arm stopping him in his tracks. 

“Dylan.” Ryan says, swallowing thickly as Dylan turns back to look at him with something inexplicably bright in his eyes. “Can you- just, please try and- just let yourself turn tonight. Please.”

That brightness, whatever it was or meant, dims in an obvious confusion. Dylan’s brows dip, his bottom teeth scraping his top lip, Ryan’s eyes dropping and tracking the movement of their own accord. “I don’t know what that means, what do you- what does that mean?” 

“Just…” Ryan breathes out a harsh exhale through his nose, words failing him. This impulsive decision to tell him this now of all times has left Ryan with no time to really explain. The sincerity in his voice will have to be enough, he hopes it’s enough. “Just let it happen, you know? Like how me and Kait tried to explain last month, just- try. Please.”

He knows it’s not any more of an explanation, but Ryan doesn’t have much time left, he can feel the strain of his skin over his bones and the fever boiling the blood in his veins. He’s got to get out of here if he wants to be able to leave at all. He just hopes this was enough, even as impulsive as it was. This hasn’t been the first time this has been mentioned before though and he’s succeeded in convincing both Kaitlyn and Emma, so he should feel more than assured by now, that’s a hundred percent success rate isn’t it? He just couldn’t leave without putting it out there again, trying again, but Ryan really has to go, his grip on his self control weakening more with each ticking second as the sky darkens inch by inch.

“Just try, please.” He says- no, he begs, this is begging- one last time. He waits for Dylan to nod back, forcing himself to let go once he does and taking a step back, then another. When Dylan doesn’t move, Ryan urges him towards the ladder, biting a hole into his cheek with the effort it takes. 

Ryan watches him climb up the ladder with a frown, having to stick his talons into the flesh of his arm to keep himself from calling him back down and demanding he accompany him. His talons actually pierce through the side of one of the large tears, coming back out to the air in the centre of the wound, when he forces himself to turn and walk away, gasping and half keeling over himself as he stumbles away. The pain is the only thing that keeps his instincts grounded enough to not rush up that ladder himself. 

The girls have forced a way through the underbrush’s edge and he catches up with a few long steps once he’s shaken the pain off and forced himself steady and upright. The three of them have to push their way through, attempting to take the path of least resistance but still having to bat away branches, step over rocks and kick away tangled plants that wrap around their ankles. He doesn’t know how far they have walked before the overgrown underbrush does actually thin out, with how difficult of a terrain it was to traverse he doubts it had been as far as it felt. Not only is the underbrush thinner here but the trees are less dense too, letting the grass grow through in greater patches and providing them a chance to spread out from the tight single file line that they formed. 

It looks almost exactly the same as the forest just across the lake water, which with the history of this place, makes obvious sense. This was just a patch of land within the quarry that had not been excavated, high enough to not be drowned when the quarry was flooded. He wonders what animals have returned when nature retook the land, if there are only birds to be found or if any terrestrial creatures dared make the short swim across. He doesn’t delude himself into thinking he’s curious simply for curiosity's sake- his stomach twists with hunger and nausea. 

There’s another worry that surfaces as they trek through these sparser woods. Last month, and the month before that too now that he thinks about it, he tried to fight Kaitlyn- he did fight Kaitlyn. He was going to kill Kaitlyn, had he not accepted her into forming a pack. He spares a glance at Emma to the side of him, batting away bugs in the air and swishing her hair with sharp jerks of her head when they get too close to her face, like a mare flicking its tail to keep the mosquitoes at bay. He, obviously, does not want to hurt her, let alone kill her. What if he’s convinced her to accept those wolflike instincts and transformation, to follow him out to the island where she was turned, only to doom her once more? No, no, he practically ignored her in the cages that first month. It’ll be fine, it has to be fine. 

Yet, he couldn’t exactly get to her while in the cages though, could he? He tried to fight Kaitlyn through the bars and very promptly discovered that would not work. With no barrier between them he doesn't doubt it wouldn’t have ended up like last month. He knows tonight however, with this pack established between them, they will not fight each other. Emma is neither pack, nor is there another prime target to save her from his deadly attention. Shit. He can’t exactly send her back now, can he?

Every other step now stretches the lacerations split through each of his limbs, the skin still strangely pulled taunt vertically alongside them with each movement he makes. Though the lacerations may have dealt with the bulk of that itching sensation, he can still feel that uncomfortable prickling irritation growing beneath the skin of his torso. His stomach has begun to roll, though noticeably less than previous months. His buzzing, aching, straining and chafing bones are getting harder to ignore however. He doesn't have very long left at all. That secret eagerness he’s felt all month to transform completely gives way under the bubbling anxiety that he may hurt Emma.

He trusts himself not to hurt Dylan or Kaitlyn. He trusts Kaitlyn not to hurt Emma and he trusts Dylan not to hurt a fly. Ironically, he’s not particularly concerned that he may hurt her before she transforms, safe from any aggression as a callow. That may not be the case when he sees her as a lone wolf around his pack and territory. Ryan halts dead in his tracks. This island is larger than it looks, even if it is clearly not as large as the forests and mountains surrounding them. Still, maybe if he distances himself from them a little, they may not run into each other through the night. At the very least, Emma won’t have to try and convince herself that letting herself transform is the right thing to do, while he stares her down like a meal. He knows it’s far fetched, whether it’s through smell, sight or confined space, they’ll run into each other tonight. He just thinks maybe a delay in that meeting might be for the best. 

He doesn't want to call out, his throat aching with the splash of acid that had sloshed up as they walked. But he finds his own decision hard enough to follow through with, with how he doesn't want to let his packmate out of his sight. So he knows if he just disappeared without saying anything, Kaitlyn would come looking. On a raggard inhale, he yells out to them, “Go on ahead, I’ve got a few moments left, I’ve gotta- I’m sitting down.”

As he thought she might, Kaitlyn instantly begins to double back, but a stern look and shooing motion with his hand keeps her moving forward. No matter how unimpressed she looks with the order. Emma follows along behind her obediently and Ryan breathes a side of relief when they disappear amongst the trees and thick undergrowth after a few moments.

Still he makes his way left, just to put a little more distance between them. He makes sure however to not retrace any steps he has made, lest he find himself unable to stop from returning to where he left Dylan. Where he left him completely alone and without protection and now he’s abandoning him even further and- he pulls himself to a complete stop, having twisted westward without even realising it. Ryan sits right down in the dirt, to stop himself from taking another step in any direction, in a compromise of sorts to himself.

Despite the way his clothes are already bloodstained and his skin torn, he doesn’t feel as physically bad as he had the three previous months just before he turned. It’s just about as dark as it had been last month now however, even darker now that he’s sat amongst the underbrush. He tugs his hoodie over his head and kicks off his shoes, before staring dejectedly at his blood soaked jeans. Though it’s not an uncommon choice for her, Kaitlyn definitely thought it through and got something right with the oversized basketball shorts she was wearing today. He's left himself with two choices. Leave the jeans on and let them get torn to shreds, or strip down to his boxers and hope that those don’t get torn? Kaitlyn brought her backpack that they’d stuffed full with fresh clothes for them all in the morning, but who knows where he’ll have ended up by sunrise. Ryan collapses back in the grass and weeds, leaving his hands resting atop his thighs in indecision. Indecision will decide for him, he thinks to himself, as he lies there in wait. 

It doesn't take long for those symptoms to become all consuming, a few moments at most. An insatiable itch beneath buzzing skin, a simmering fever quickly reaching its boil, a roll of acid churning nausea, a new but familiar sort of aching in his teeth and bones. It just takes a few moments as the last wisps of light are surrounded by a dimming evening, the shrouding of night appearing in the sky, visible in flecks through the canopy of branches and leaves above him. He closes his eyes as he expects the stirring within him to begin, that indescribable pain that would be unbearable should it last any more than the few short moments it takes before the release. He opens his eyes again when it does not come, just in time to see that last wisp of muddied light fade from the sky above.

However there is no uncurling of the waking wolf from its slumber within him tonight. It does not wake as the top of the moon surely slips above the horizon, does not test the confines of the prison that is his body, does not bend his bones or stretch against his flesh. There is no slowly unfurling limbs into a jolt awake as night descends. There is no slumber to be woken from. The wolf does not tear itself from his skin, it merely reshapes it. It is not a process of excruciating transformation, it is a second, at most. A pain, sharp but fleeting, as if it was never there at all. A crack, bones instantly snapped into a new shape. A slough of his flesh onto the grass beneath him. A twist of his spine bringing him to his front. All within a blink of his eyes.

Ryan watches the leaves swaying in the wind above him, as he looks up to the canopy he had been staring at only a blink before. He blinks again as his eyes fall to the woods around him, then another as they drop to the flesh and blood coating the grass beneath him. A final, long and slow blink, to the realisation that he stares at it with clear eyes. He sees through his eyes, red eyes, his own eyes. There is no delay, no fishbowl, no dissociating, he is no spectator. He shakes his head and with the movement brings his snout upwards to the sky, a long and unbroken howl tearing from his throat. He’s awake, all of him is awake.

There was no shift from one isolated part of him to another. It was just a blink. He remembers himself, he knows himself, he remembers the day and all that came before. He is Ryan, that strange and foggy garbled sound that he hadn’t understood last month, it’s his name. He understands now, the aspect of his mind that holds language and memory no longer dormant beneath the full moon and instead lit up and welded together into one with the primal instincts he’d thought possible to separate himself from. This is coalescence. He is Ryan and these instincts are his own.   

He can feel it, the presence in himself. He rests a moment on instinct and it is no different instinct from months past and he follows it no less quickly. Yet, the change is monumental despite the lack of any difference of execution. It is no longer the body moving as his foggy mind follows a step behind, barely aware or conscious enough to realise what he’s doing until he’s already done it. No, no this is a new experience entirely. It is his instinct, his mind working in tandem with his body to move and shift him, moving his own body as he follows where his instincts direct him. The instinct nor the execution are any different, but he understands now, it is now truly his own.

He’s hunkered down on his haunches, rasping breath out into the cool Fall air. On his lolling tongue the hundreds of scents within the air are dragged along until his lungs are filled and he can not just smell it, he can taste it all. The rotting leaves, the rock dust, the wet gravel, the feathers of birds above and the dirt below. His senses are sharpened to a razor' edge, every blade of grass around him clear and distinct in his red eyes, down to the stem within and even the smallest droplets of blood atop, to the minutest dark speck unable to even bend the strand it has landed upon, like the lightest dew drop. 

He is enveloped by his senses. However it is not overwhelming as it was earlier. He is just as enveloped by his instincts. They have each reached their crescendo with the risen moon, at their highest peak and sharpest edge. Senses sharpened to serve heightened primal instincts, primal instincts risen to navigate sharpened senses, the familiar ouroboros of the full moon. Now too with an added scale, an extra fang, the snake's eye opened. All of Ryan is awake, there is an awareness and presence within the night’s infinite loop, he has become a part of it and it has in turn unfurled itself for him.

Meaning, he understands it now in a way he couldn’t before, he has language for it all. For the blood, grass and trees that he flickers his gaze over as he catches his breath, he has words for each. For each instinct there is understanding and thus there is explanation. Slowly and then all at once, it has clicked together, leaving behind the need for translations or vague understandings. His instincts are as much his own as the internal monologue that has run through his mind for the entirety of his life and he suddenly understands them just as naturally. He is no longer a tourist but rather now home in his own mind. It was never about control over either side, it’s just all him. Ryan finds himself feeling as if he has been restored after a violent shatter.

He stands upright in a stretch before dropping back down to all fours. His own viscera sinks beneath his claws and he shakes his body free of the remaining flesh scraps and yet dried rivers of blood. His body has changed in this shift, from even the last two months he can tell. His head is heavier with a longer snout, a thicker coat of hair over his skin, there’s a healthier weight to him and a greater height than even before, his limbs most certainly longer. It’s a fleeting thought, but his mind connects the change in his body now to both the tearing lacerations and the vertically stretching skin that had plagued him all day.

There’s something in the air. Amongst the smell of dirt, evergreen and his own flesh on the grass, there's that familiar scent. Drifting along, caught by the wind, comes something sickly sweet. Rotten fruit, burnt sugar or soured candies. It’s Dylan, he knows it’s Dyan’s, he knows Dylan. He’s shut up in that treehouse, alone and upset and Ryan’s talons are digging into the dirt and following the scent before he thinks twice. He darts between the trees with ease, his long limbs keeping him above the underbrush and when he runs into a fallen over log or bunches of bush that are too high to simply run over, he takes soaring leaps, landing back on all fours without a single falter in speed. Until he comes to a screeching halt, the dirt dragged up into a pile around his claws and the grass torn up beneath him. That howl that pierces through the air, he’d recognise it anywhere. Imprinted into his memory, the specific cadence and pitch, that long and jaggard sound. For the first time, it happens in tandem, with it now all welded together. The instinct to answer it no different than months previous yet now accompanied with the technical insight of why it was so imprinted, the realisation that he has to be able to distinguish it as his betas howl from any other, as he has to recognise it and hone in on it from many miles away to reunite his pack.

With a snout thrown to the sky and ears flattening back, Ryan answers with his own howl and then back through the dirt and underbrush he goes, weaving between trees with much more grace than the van of earlier this evening, the thought not stopping him but certainly slowing him as the memory returns. It hadn’t been lost, not like months past, not anymore, just forgotten amongst revelations and other priorities. It doesn’t feel like anything significant now though, the thought slipping from his mind as quickly as it came. His instincts, a part of him in a way they had not truly been before in their fractured state, do mean that he will do what he must for whatever situation appears. He cannot let a rival wolf, feral or not, prowl or skitter about his territory. Yet he won’t kill Emma, he knows the wolf he’ll come to face sometime in the night will be Emma, he can understand that now. He won’t kill her, though admittedly that’s not necessarily because it’s Emma, it was just never really on the table in the first place, whether he knew it or not. He has no need to kill any unthreatening hounds, past perhaps a little maiming to keep them from his territory. There is only one way off this island though and by morning she’ll either be pack or she’ll likely need to be fished out from the lake. 

The wolf whips out from behind a tree, skimming his side and only narrowly avoiding a collision if not for how he dodges left and skids through the dirt. Their necks both crack with the speed they turn to face each other, panting breath fogging up the air. Cold pools of oil, thick enough to drown in and subdue any flailing attempt to escape them, lock to the equally dark well of blood that colour his own. The forest around them is filled with smoke and a tangible tension and he would recognise his beta anywhere. Kaitlyn shakes off the last few scraps of flesh clinging to her shoulders, as that tension immediately morphs to a relief and spiritedness with her reunion with her pack. He knew his howl would call her to him, yet he’d hardly travelled far before she almost collided with him in her haste. She’s faster than she was last month with her injuries healed, the skin of her shoulder now smooth and unmarred, though her leg has kept it’s crenate scarring from calf to knee. His own ears, perfectly full and intact, angle forwards as he looks at her. 

He gives a sharp fang filled equivalent of a panting smile and she bunkers down, prepared for a play fight. But he doesn't engage her, they’re not in their claw and scent marked little clearing of the month past, not that she probably remembers it in such clarity. He does remember and truthfully he feels a little on edge that their little home centre within the territory they’d mapped out last month is now out of their reach. His eyes scan through the trees around them and his ears perk at each sound amongst the brush, weighing up if this could be a good replacement. It’s not so different, though they need to find shelter and find how ample prey will be before confirming it as home. Then there’s the issue of the two callows on the island, of which to deal with first. Kaitlyn makes this low gnarl of a sound, a step and a nose pointed towards the direction she just came from, and even if his memories were not intact, he would now know instantly and thoughtlessly what that means. He finds himself torn between two equally strong instincts, of which callow to seek out first, to begin left or right.

His instincts are torn in a way he doesn’t think they ever have been before, not to this level where he is left pacing for a moment, in a tense step left to right and back again, ignoring how antsy Kaitlyn grows in the meantime. She’s not present enough to get annoyed at him for ignoring her, rather the animal consciousness keeps her tensed but obedient in wait, as confused as she may be on why they don’t just go as her instincts must urge her. At least now he has the understanding of why his instincts are so torn. He has such a sudden but innate and encompassing insight into his own instincts to understand that the hound, callow or not, should be his higher priority due to its potential to steal and scavenge around this potential territory unless it is dealt with. However, there is another instinct, just as strong, to go to the darling feral fawn that for some reason he just knows within his very bones. The word there, darling, may come from this new merge with the language capable half of his mind, yet the feeling of it, of him being so beloved and endeared to Rylan, is not a new sense or feeling within these primal instincts. No matter how shattered apart he’s been, apparently every shard of Ryan will inevitably end up irreparably gone on Dylan.  

Once more, indecision often becomes a decision in and of itself, and the time spent within this transformation does not end up lasting long. A howl breaks through the quiet Fall air, carried by the wind until it echoes through the woods around them. A burst of grass and dirt is sent into the air behind them with the immediate push off from strong back legs. Their movement is instant and coordinated even without speech. Their pace is even, matched, with Kaitlyn just a single step behind his heels. The forest floor is torn up beneath their claws with each sprinted step and they’re upon the freshly transformed wolf before it’s even had the chance to fully wake up, let alone begin to clean itself of the gore of its own transformation.

They pull to another skidding stop as the wolf’s eyes snap up at their sudden approach. It’s smaller than either of them, though with longer lankier limbs than Kaitlyn’s. With these long ears that sit flat against its head and these big white eyes, that makes it appear as if it has been blinded. The airy scent of summertime that seeps out between the coat of blood and scraps of gore that still cover it clashes against the Fall winds, familiar and comforting in that fact, despite the unfamiliar form. It, it, it, it’s Emma, he knows it’s Emma, he has the word- the name for this specific wolf now. However she doesn’t know that it’s him. She’s tensed, blood running rivers down her arms, she’s completely still, breathing so shallow it’s imperceivable. Wide eyes watching, waiting, for any sign of movement. Frozen but coiled, she’s ready to bolt. She watches them, he watches her. He doesn’t have to question whether she ended up taking his final piece of advice or not- he can see it in her eyes, her presence, not a presence like his own, not coalesced like he has become, but that feral sheen has been wiped from her eyes. 

There’s stillness, for a moment. She gives the faintest twitch. There’s a burst of movement. It comes from him. 

He lunges, his claws sinking into the air and then raking through the dirt. She’d sprang at the slightest perceivable hint of his movement and already she is gone from sight. He’s pushed himself back up and into a sprint immediately and he knows that his beta follows close behind. The summer wind is left as a faint trail behind her, but this Fall has been cold and filled with bitter winds that sweep away all but the lightest residue of it. It makes it more difficult to follow her at high speeds, his nose drawing in deep lungfuls to try and track the scent through the undergrowth. She’s dipped and weaved and taken sudden sharp turns left and right and she’s fast. Faster than he is, faster than Kaitlyn now at full capability. A racing hound, she’d suggested and he thinks she’d been more right than she’d known.

His talons scrap rock and then he’s dropping through the air, a good few metres of fall before he’s landed on sand. Water laps against the shore of the thin beach and his tongue lolls from between fangs in something like an imitation of a grin, as half his instincts urge him to flee and the other half realises that this fear is his victory. He can’t tell his beta directly his quick thought plan; he doesn’t need to. All he needs to do is give an inciting growl and he knows his beta will stay hot on the hounds heels as he breaks off to the right. A flying leap sends him back off the beach and into the woods, where he doesn't lose speed in his sprint now parallel to his pack and prey.

She’s very quick, would outrun them he’s certain, could run them around in circles until dawn despite the cage of the island and she probably would have, if not for his memory remaining intact. Ryan’s never seen the back of the island, the beach they were just on, but he’s seen where it ends and that’s where they’re headed. His breath has yet to labour, however as they draw nearer to his trap, his tongue recedes back into his mouth, a pointed fang catching the side of it and filling his mouth with his own blood. It’d be worked into a pink foam should he open his mouth to pant, an urge brought by the exhilaration of his sprint and chase, but he keeps his teeth clamped close. The blood is thick on his tongue, his mouth full of it. 

He’s finally caught sight of her again through the trees where she skids to a halt, a precarious one that brings her to a stop just half a metre from the rock face that signals the end of the beach on the furthermost side of the island. There was a subtle incline in the sand that began a little while back that led to here on the rocks and it is not a high fall, but it is a fall directly into the cold water of the lake. Emma takes one hurried step towards the trees just as Ryan emerges, his steps now slow and purposeful that the chase has been won. She doesn’t realise this immediately it seems, as she whips herself around, prepared to continue her fleeing in a backtrack along the beach. She turns only to face Kaitlyn, who pulls to stop already in a threatening posture, ready to sink her claws and teeth in should Emma try and make it past her. They have her cornered, but it seems the only thing her instincts have to tell her right now are to run and she tries to break from the space left between them. 

His teeth are in her ankle before she can take a single step past him. The force of it pulls him forward a step or two on his end, but for Emma it sends her into a sprawled heap on the scattering rocks. His fangs are sunk into the thin limb, teeth nearly meeting in the middle with the force of which he’d bit down. She yelps and yet strangely doesn’t flail, falling still with a heart beating so quick Ryan can feel it in the blood rushing past his teeth. Like a rabbit caught in the jaws of a hunting dog, any struggle to free herself would only cause greater injury. His head curls forward, his teeth tearing through her skin in a surely painful manner, made certain by the yelps and whimpers picking up in volume. His teeth no longer plug the punctures he had made, now ripped wide and the blood that had filled his mouth mixes with this fresh wave. It’s a needless instict, the shake his head gives before he lets go and drops the limb, blood pouring in streams from between his teeth to splatter over the now lame limb beneath him. He swallows the rest, thick copper coating the inside of his throat and sealing the oath, his own signature dripped into the wounds he left in her ankle. 

There’s no decision or test necessary in his instincts here, like there was for Kaitlyn, where he had to make sure she would heel. There will be no fight for his rank or leadership, a worry his instincts only have to spare towards other curs, while this hound is just added numbers to his pack. Though that isn’t to be dismissive, that has tremendous value in itself alone. Additional added value in that he is already familiar with her scent, fond of her and most importantly, in that she was exceptionally quick. Maybe a little less so for the rest of the night, her lanky limb curling into her body as she pushes herself back upright. His own fault. She doesn’t try to look him in the eye nor even protest the handpaw that’s recklessly pawed down on her head, sending it ducked back towards the ground as Kaitlyn’s snout is brought near her head, deep breaths snuffed up by Emma’s throat, the hand never removed. He ignores it as he turns to leave the short cliff.

He pads along slowly, showing far more grace to Emma’s injury than he had for Kaitlyn’s. He wants to sprint, he wants to hunt, he wants to mark up this entire island as their territory, yet there’s a stronger instinct that keeps him padding along in a straight line across the island. It’s for the best that he leads them forwards at a, albeit impatient, walk for his new packmate even outside of her injury. Kaitlyn uses their slow meander as an excuse to fall back from her step behind position to bother Emma as they go, but he doesn’t doubt she’d have found another excuse even if they had run. Kaitlyn nips at her heels, snaps her teeth in the air near her throat, paws at her side even as it throws Kaitlyn herself off balance and she routinely gives small rumbling sounds every few steps that they go. It’s not aggressive behaviour, but it is bullying behaviour- he doesn’t interfere, just observes with frequent glances back over his shoulder. There is a judgement that Ryan is meant to make, however whether she’s aware she’s doing it or not, Kaitlyn is making her preference of outcome loud and clear. 

The howl comes not long later and like a bolt of lightning on a hayfield, Ryan ignites. In moments he is back where he stood only an hour or so prior. He can hear his pack scrambling to catch up behind him, but they will in a moment or so and all of his patience was contained to that walk. It spills out between his talons now as they pierce into the wood of the walkway, scaling it with ease and bringing himself atop. He edges towards the door, claws scraping on the wooden planks, his nose giving a twitch at the strength of bitterness from within. He can hear a heartbeat within the treehouse, pattering away, too fast and a little too heavy. He pauses just short of it. 

There is a senseless instinct to claw and tear his way through the door in front of him that exists within him, yet a calmer and more confident instinct has left the violence of the first in its shadow. He knows already what lies within, can hear his panting breath and smell the sickly sweet rot, he knows this fawn, he knows Dylan. He knows this fawn is Dylan. 

That may be different from months past, yes, but it changes the instinct nothing. The name could mean nothing, Ryan knows him by scent and sound alone. He can feel his presence within his own bones, he feels him in his skin, his blood thrums with his presence and his heart mirrors the thudding beats. And this, him, the fawn, Dylan has been deeply buried within Ryan’s instincts well before the infection filled his veins. He didn’t need to coalesce to recognise him, Ryan would know Dylan even when reduced to his smallest splinter. Maybe nothing has truly changed, as this instinct is the very same he had last month, the same he had this evening, the same he had that August night and will, he knows, always have.

The bone deep, soul bound instinct to do whatever he may to keep Dylan okay. Where his instinct with any other new wolf within his territory would be to burst into the treehouse, this is not any wolf. He pauses, because that’s Dylan in there, he knows that now, in a way that changes nothing and everything. Dylan may be in another form right now, he may be more than capable of defending himself with claws and teeth, he may not remember any of this in the morning and they both may be running on instinct alone. But that is Dylan in there and he’s already scared. Bursting in there would just scare him worse and it’s Ryan’s every true instinct for him to be okay. The racing heartbeat echoes in his ears and the scent of rot fills his nose and he doesn’t move. 

He rests first on his haunches, eyes boring into the door before he spins in a small circle, resting down against the wooden planks with his eyes scanning out over the world boring in against the treehouse. He will guard it with every talon, fang and ounce of strength he has, as needless as it may be. He understands their behaviours enough to know that his instincts towards Dylan don’t make sense, shouldn’t make sense and yet it does, simply because it’s for Dylan that it doesn’t.  

Anyway, the rest of his pack can go and scout out the island tonight or even just his beta if need be. There’s a deep urge to keep the pack together due to not just assured safety and strength in numbers but the affection towards them that remains stronger than family, yet there is still little danger in splitting up if needed. It often will be. Thankfully this island is safe and, should there be food and shelter, it’ll make a perfect home too. As Ryan bunkers down in front of the door, a huff escaping him, his eyes keep glancing to the large gap of a window routinely. He gives a short and quiet bark to the girls now resting a few metres from him to stay put, so they don’t do something as reckless as barrelling through the window or door to investigate the strange wolf, even as he can see their anxiety rise. Their own instinct seems opposed to his own and yet, his lead is law. He’ll send them off hunting soon after giving Emma a chance to rest her leg, to repel some of their anxious energy that only grows with each second past. 

He was prepared to stay there all night, shirking all other necessary tasks or responsibilities in favour of needlessly standing guard in front of the treehouse. His watch comes to an end long before that. A clawed paw-like hand curls around the window sill and a narrow snout comes into view. The arm then reaches entirely through the window and in a delicate stretch, Dylan crawls through the window and stops just beside him. In this form, Dylan is just as thin and lanky as he usually is, with a long and thin face, fangs that hook over the sides of his lower jaw and eyes made of molten gold. Eyes that hold a feral glint to them, that feralness that means he is running off of instinct he doesn’t understand and won’t recall, like a sleepwalker or someone in shock. The sight has Ryan washed with emotion that his mind does not have the space to yet process and is thus swallowed up amongst the instinct to survey the rest of the wolf’s state. His heart remains beating a little quick, but has eased from its jolting race after what Ryan realises must have been the shock of transformation. Even as he hears his packmates rise to their feet behind him, Ryan doesn’t expect the fawn to run and holds no surprise when he doesn’t.

Instead, Dylan inches a step closer, cautious steps on lightly placed feet. He lowers himself to the wooden boards beside Ryan, who up to this point has just watched him, but then he tilts his head ever so slightly and something within Ryan soars. Even his instincts, coalesced and clearer than ever thought possible, aren’t quite sure what to make of it. This is not true trust, at least it shouldn’t be, but the expected behaviour ended with the imitation of a bow in a show of deference and passiveness. It’d be enough to show he’s no threat, to let him scurry off without harm, not that Ryan would ever do him harm nor let him scurry off alone. Baring his throat for him however, is trust, clearly an instinctual trust and it wasn’t given to his beta, to Kaitlyn just a few steps away, but to Ryan. More than trust, it’s a request. A bite to make him pack. Ryan had never thought of the bites much before, outside of their scarring, but he’s thought of Dylan’s throat before and with the two concepts colliding, a knowledge becomes suddenly clear to him. A bite can become a blood pact to create pack, a bite to the throat would do much the same but mean so much more too.

Yet what he does know, is that no bite on a feral wolf will make them pack, he’s known that since that very first month back. Despite that, the instinct comes to bring his fangs to the offered skin. Closed mouth, teeth bared, his fangs run along his throat until he pulls his head away. Ryan is able to recognise the almost mournful and impatient feeling that stings his fangs where they touched flesh and fur. With an almost frustrated emotion to it, he stands; there’s no point hanging around here any longer and they have an island to scout. He gives another short bark and his pack rises after him, making towards the side of the walkway. Dylan follows behind, inviting himself along in another unexpected behaviour from the feral wolf. Unexpected but entirely welcomed by Ryan, an instant balm to the frustration he’d felt only seconds prior. 

When they hit the ground they’re off, a less hurried sprint than the chase or their hurry to the fawn earlier, more of a relaxed run. It’s as exhilarating as it was last month. As a pack, plus the feral fawn tagging along with them, they scour the island. Most of the chunk of nature suspended in the middle of the lake is just that, a patch of forest with the rest of the land fallen away from around it. The trees are mostly dense, but there's a clearing or two, one in particular that takes its place as all of their favourite. The grass has grown long in it, a half buried but large rock just off the centre, a small pond on the far side, various species of flowers littering colour through the clearing and a jaggard tree stump off to the side from where one of the bordering trees had collapsed to the forest floor. Ryan marks the clearing, raking his claws through the bark of a few of those bordering trees before snapping at Kaitlyn’s heels for attempting to claim the rock, causing her to jolt off of it from her lazy and entitled lounge atop its surface. 

After that they’re off again, staking out the small cove and stream that runs a little into the island, the very cove that Emma nearly plummeted into at the beginning of the night. They move around it, through the forest, up the rocky incline, until they’re back at where they had cornered her and then they begin their backtrack along the thin beach. Further past where they had first ended up on the gravel and sand, the beach widens slightly and hidden among the rocks and exposed roots of the trees is a small cave. Hesitantly, Ryan enters just the mouth, thankfully finding it completely dry. Even in particularly rough wind, the lake does not get very noticeable waves and certainly none that could reach far enough to flood the cave. It isn’t very deep and a bit of a narrow crawl to enter it, but it would fit them all easily, would fit double the size of the pack if they were to pile up atop each other. Most importantly, it’s a shelter that would keep them dry and safe from the dreaded rain.

Eventually they end back up at the clearing and as luck would have it, with the carcass of a boar dragged behind him from his claws buried deep in its flesh. It wasn’t the only one they’d found, another dragged behind Kaitlyn while the rest of their unlucky prey’s group sent shrieking as they scattered across the island, hopefully not to swim back to the mainland. With their feast laid out, Ryan eats first and Kaitlyn second, however when Emma goes to join she’s stopped with a snap of teeth and a growl. It’s not from Ryan, who would have let her take that place, but from Kaitlyn, standing over the carcasses and blocking them from Emma’s reach. Emma recedes back with wide eyes flicking between Ryan, Kaitlyn and the boars, sitting down and not patiently waiting but rather sulking as she is forced from her meal. Dylan, sitting now beside her, brings his large golden eyes to Ryan’s in a wordless beg. He’s not pack and fawn or not, it should be Ryan’s instinct to now put his foot down and get the feral wolf to back off of the pack’s meal. It isn’t, his head sways towards it in concession and he shifts over to make room. Kaitlyn takes a step back from over the boars and settles down once more to continue her feast, seemingly fine with the concept now as the remaining two wolves come to join. It’s all devoured rather quickly after that.

The rest of the night is spent lazing, much as it was last month. Ryan continues to mark up the trees with his talons, in between basking beneath the moonlight, atop the off centre rock. It’s as close to sitting a throne as he’s ever gotten. Dylan edges close to him in one of these moments, with his head held low and ears held flat. Ryan just watches him as he cautiously creeps atop the rock beside him, resting himself down with a quickly pattering heart. It only softens to its usual pace when Ryan rests his head atop his and his claw grapples around the nearest wrist, apparently finally settling him enough to rest instead of pacing about or hovering on the edges of the clearing. Ryan doesn’t get up to scratch and mark up the clearing again. Instead for the rest of the night, he just stands, or well, he rather lazes around, in watch. 

Which unfortunately mostly means he’s just watching his packmates bicker. It is entertaining at least, on a couple of levels. Kaitlyn’s spending her night bothering Emma and Emma’s spending her night letting herself be bothered. Kaitlyn’s shoving Emma’s shoulder to the ground until she’s bowed and then dismissively walking off, before rounding right back to nip at her heels, as if she’d forgotten that’s what she’d just been doing. Whenever Emma makes a growl of complaint or tries to swat a clawed paw back, which she doesn’t try often and even less and less as the night progresses, she’s swiftly scolded and the bullying ramps up. Not that Emma seems truly bothered by it, on the few occasions she is ignored, she goes skittering over to lay down beside his beta, staring at her with wide eyes and annoying little yips for attention, which starts it all up again. It could be a cause for concern, it could be genuine oppressing behaviour, it looks close to it, if not for those few specific giveaways that Ryan now picks up on without even trying. It is obvious to him what this is. Kaitlyn is metaphorically pulling her pigtails and Emma is purposefully leaning her chair back so her hair falls in Kaitlyn’s face. He doesn’t intervene.                                  

They haven’t shifted from these points much when dawn begins to break. Ryan and Dylan are still lounging around on the rock while Kaitlyn and Emma, with the drowsiness that he assumes comes to them with dawns approach, are just off to the side, in a bit of a fitful rest as they cannot stop from rudely pawing each other, annoying the other until Kaitlyn tries to put an end to it, over and over again. Just as colour begins to appear in the sky, the last dregs of night beginning to be chased away by the waking sun, he lifts his head in a howl that is joined by the other wolves in the clearing. He stands, hopping down from the rock as a safeguard for his transformation, nipping at Dylan’s wrist for him to do the same. In the last few moments of night, he wonders if the break of dawn will reach his mind, if it will be the shatter that parts him in two once more. If it can survive the day.

Chapter Text

The blood lifts from his skin to swirl in the water, curling out in darkening swirls, the thick sludge of it diluting out into muddied wisps. Sunlight reflects from between the small gaps in the thick layer of algae and rotting leaves that float atop the surface, a shining light that hides the mud and blood and slowly sinking chunks of flesh below. As he lifts his arms from beneath the calm surface, the ripples scatter the light and for just a moment he thinks all that darkened and diluted blood could itself be the reflection of the early dawn sky, the watercolour swirl of orange just made murky in the shadows of the trees. It is just a moment as only a second later the bitter tang of copper in his nose breaks the illusion once more.

The water rolls down in droplets along his arms, pattering against the grass and leaving raised bumps in their wake, chilled by the wind and low light. It is cold this morning, the blood drying quickly in the sharp sting of the air, the warmth of sunlight not yet quite reaching them through the cover of branches and leaves that encase them within the clearing. It’s a sting that collects into shards of ice crystals in the congealing, cracking blood, that splinters and bursts with each dunk of their arms and hands into the cold, stagnant pond water. 

It is quiet, too, this morning. The clearing feels as if it’s been encased in a shroud of silence, within their own pocket of space where all sound is swallowed within the vacuum. It is not truly silent, it never is for Ryan anymore, if it were not for the birds shrieking amongst the branches or the wind rustling through the leaves, it would be the quiet thud of his own heartbeat or the ever so low rush of his own blood within his veins that would be picked up by his fine tuned hearing. It only feels this way, he knows, in the aftermath of more notable previous sound. There are no more playful, attention grabbing yips or small, rather unthreatening growls to alight the clearing in frivolity. Nor is there the sound of vomit splattering against the grass or the harsh, laboured yet quickened breathing that just to hear it had whipped his own breath away. The soft dripping of water as hands and arms are rinsed, the even breath and the occasional sniffle feel as equable to silence as he may ever get again. 

The break of dawn was not a shatter, it was just another blink. It was just a ray of sunlight curling through the sky and morning came slowly then all at once, the light of the sky above him igniting his skin into an instant burst of blood and flesh and bone. A burst, not a shatter; a blink, not a tear. He had not been broken apart again, he remained whole, even with their little clearing coated with gore and streaks of red. 

He doesn't even remember the sensation of pain, it was so fleeting; like a small electric shock, it was less of a pain then it was a jolt. Somehow, even with his bones still having had to have ruptured and snapped back into place, his skin sloughing off and regrowing to knit back together, it felt just simply as a jolt. 

The shifting of his body may have been a jolt, but today, dawn did not bring him to jolt awake. There was no sensation of waking, of a part of him receding, of disconnection or slowly returning awareness. Just his eyes opening and closing, red to brown, a single half a second and a feeling of settling. The wolf doesn’t sleep, that part of his mind is as alight and connected as it was through the night. His mind and his thoughts shifted in that blink of course, there still remains a notable difference between the day and the night of the full moon. Today however, it was not the shifting cognition like a lever pulled and a train switching tracks, rather more a dial lightly twisted and the volume turned down.   

He’s had no chance to dwell on it though, whether he’s needed or wanted to or not. Night to day was just that to him, a simple shift of the sky from one one colour to another, black to orange like red to brown. For the others, dawn remained a shatter at best and a forced tear into consciousness at worst. 

Emma, after just a moment of sitting stock still in a daze, scanned the clearing for the bones and little remaining flesh of the carcass they’d devoured in the night. As if she needed the sight of it to prove to herself it had ever existed. The memory of it was clearly prominent for it to have remained so present that it was her first thought even amongst the still shifting cognition, the dazed look still yet to have left her eyes. Upon discovery it was real, the carcass and memory both, she promptly threw up over her blood covered legs, just bile and chunks of meat to further coat what already covered her. It’s being washed from her now, each handful of water rinsing it from her layer by layer, leaving it to soak into the grass or the bottom of the pond. 

Kaitlyn had shook her head, once, twice, a few times after that. He’d sympathised with the feeling through his recollection of his own month before, alongside a slight curiosity of what thought may have broken through to her in the night, that he knows himself well enough to be sure will only grow. There remained a slight distant look in her expression, as she continued to sort through memories and perhaps draw connections, a quiet contemplation as she had half heartedly and ineffectively splashed water over herself. With what he’s sure they both consider such a peaceful night after the month before, there’s been no hysterical laughter or poorly hidden sobbing, just her own contribution to the absolute silence. 

Dylan- god, Dylan. He’d shaken with full body tremors in the aftermath of the pain he’d felt the night before, clutching at his shoulders and arms as if he could still feel the wolf stretching and tearing at his skin from within. He’d hardly noticed Ryan beside him, eyes jumping around the clearing, taking in the sight for the first time. He hadn’t known where he was, what had happened, who was there with him. The soured scent of panic had been strong enough to overpower even all that blood. 

Ryan hadn’t intended to, but his own heart had been thudding within his throat at the scent of his panic combined with such a heavy scent of blood, and his hands had moved on their own. Moved by his instincts, the animal part of him now left entirely awake, the half of him not beholden to his respect of or fear for their friendship but just solely to emotion, to how much he truly does care. He had cradled Dylan’s face within his hands, smearing the blood there or smearing his own blood atop it or most likely both, and forcing their eyes to meet. He watched, never letting go, as the heavy cloud of panic, confusion and disorientation slowly lifted as Ryan spoke to him. Told him that he was okay, nothing exciting happened, they were still on the island and to please for the love of god, breathe. Ryan can admit that his own secret and hopefully well hidden panic had also calmed down once Dylan’s breathing had returned to steady and full.

He had them all drift over to try and wash some of the blood and gunk from them before they make their way back to the dock. Travis will take some time to get here, he’s sure of it, will take the others back to the lodge first before coming to the island. Ryan has spared many thoughts to how the others are doing this morning, the sense of guilt and worry growing with each thought that comes. But Ryan keeps trying to shove it from his mind, keeps trying to remind himself that he will see for himself soon and there’s no point stressing himself out about it before then. While the others are being taken back to the lodge by Travis, Ryan has his own little pack to look over, something that he can do, that is within his control. At least they’re in no rush, they have the time they need to reorient and wash the night from themselves first. 

Well, if they’d take the opportunity to do so, at least. Emma is the only one truly taking the chance, almost frantic in getting it all off of her. Whereas Kaitlyn and admittedly Ryan himself are a bit more lazy in their efforts, assumedly more acclimated to the feeling after essentially hanging out covered in the stuff last month. Dylan just kind of shook his hands out in the water and then gave up, sitting crossed legged with his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands. It causes a crack to form within Ryan’s chest and emotions fall from a valve he’s tried to keep tightened at the sight of it.

“Hey,” Ryan says softly, before he can think better of it, “Can I- can I help? You don’t want to be cov- Or, it may just make you feel a little better, at least.”

His offer isn’t very convincing and he almost expects Dylan to say no, before his nearest arm is pulled from his face and weakly held out in the air. With his face a little more visible now, Ryan can see how his eyes are closed, head hanging and held up only by the pillar of his other arm. He looks just moments from passing out from exhaustion but Ryan doesn’t think it is the physical exhaustion like what came from being locked in the cages down beneath the earth. It’s a mental one, the mind fried after hours of pain worse than torture. A heavy one, if it’s enough to force him into such an uncharacteristic silence. Getting some of this blood and gore off his skin won’t take those echoes of agony away but it’s a start to making him feel a little more human again. Human, even if he isn’t really, isn’t solely. 

With Ryan’s steady grip now supporting his elbow, he cups some pond water in his own right hand and raises it to trickle the water over his forearm. His palm smoothes over the skin, wiping through the blood that has begun to crust and dry, leaving streaks and clumped blotches. Again and again he repeats the process until the forearm is once more clear and as pale as streams of moonlight coming down through the atmosphere. Then his upper arm, his shoulder. Over the short time it took, a little more presence has been returned to Dylan and by the time Ryan’s ready, the next arm is already being presented.

It’s quiet now, not silent. The difference is the birds no longer shriek in the early morning light, he can hear the music in each of their notes. It’s that the bugs buzzing around them no longer resemble the drone of the electrified bars, they are the sign of countless life amongst the grass and leaves. It’s that the scent of blood is but a copper tinge beneath the scent of the watermelon and berries and limes that have sprouted from it as if it were fertiliser. The difference is the clearing holds now an air of calm, not fear or pain.

With his hands smoothing over skin, Ryan thinks any of it, all of it, was worth it for this moment. In the slowly warming early morning sunlight, it is moonlight he holds within his hands. It is the feeling of a pulse slowing to a calm and steady beat within the wrist his thumb smooths over. It is the feeling of getting to care for someone in a way he’s never been able to or allowed himself to before, even if just for a moment, even if he never can again, even if it means more than he could ever say. It’s a moment that doesn’t pass in a blink, but settles over minutes, warping to hours and years within his mind. He knows it will be twisted and bent into a circle within his memories, should the before and after fall away and be forgotten, this moment will remain on a loop whenever he thinks of it again. His hand rounds up from wrist to elbow again and what will be a noose of a memory coils tighter. 

“Thank you.” Dylan whispers, an exhausted and miserable hitch to his tone.

“It’s okay.” Ryan says back, just as quietly, as if anything louder will shatter the vacuum around their little clearing, will make the birds and bugs drop dead to the grass, will cause the harvest to wilt or unspool the memory of this like old film tape dropped down the stairs.

He lets Dylan’s arm go feeling something like a mix of guilt and love and guilt for the love. He forces the moment to end with that, looking to the girls with a simultaneously genuine and lying kind of concern in his expression. Genuine in his concern for them, lying in how equal it is to what he has just shown. They know it, they already knew it, he isn’t sure why he thinks he’d be able to hide it from them. Kaitlyn, she knows, he knows she knows, he’s been told by Emma and all but told by Kaitlyn herself. He can see it on her face, the narrowed eyes flicking to his direction as soon as he looks her way. Emma said she was mad at Ryan for, well just interacting with Dylan because he really truly wasn’t flirting with Dylan, obviously. Ryan would have been the first to notice if he was. Yet apparently Kaitlyn gets mad at him for that, which putting two and two and another two together, it- yeah no, he still can’t seem to make it make sense. He just doesn’t understand why Kaitlyn gets mad at the fact Ryan cares for- likes- is in love with Dylan, depending on however deeply she believes he cares for him. He doesn’t know and he can’t exactly ask about it, so he ignores the glare and focuses on Emma instead. She’s who Ryan should be worrying after anyway.

In all honesty, he gets a bit of a shock when he looks at her. Emma’s hair hangs heavy over her shoulders, drenched with pond water and a single scrap of algae hanging from one of the strands by her jaw. She’s done her best effort to wash all the blood out from where it’d been matting together, leaving red tinged droplets tracking trails down her cheeks like the tears she hadn’t let fall despite the welling up that they had done while she threw up over the grass. She’s shivering in the cold but she is the cleanest of them by far, only her torso and back still stained red. She looks at him from beneath a thick wet strand of hair made brown by the saturation and offers a small smile. Her eyes are brown this morning and that in itself is more than enough for him to offer her one right back. 

“I’m okay. Really okay.” She offers without having to be asked but no more guilt takes him for it. It was a genuine statement, he knows it. He feels it even as he furrows his brows at her, that connection that has formed.

He cared for her before, he would not have had that conversation with her yesterday if he did not have any care for Emma at all. He can feel it now though, what that shallow care has become, after just one night. It wasn’t the night that created that though, no, it’s her blood in his veins and his blood in hers. Stronger than a promise, more than family, she’s now a part of the pack. He knows she’s telling the truth because he trusts her implicitly now, he can feel it in her words as palpably as he could feel the blades of grass beneath his fingers. 

“I can feel it, I know what you meant now.” She says, with a little nod and smile to herself. “I get what you meant. I’m sorry I… That I- I just didn’t understand.”

“It’s okay, I’m just glad that you’re, you know, that you’re okay.”

“I’d be better if I had clothes.” Emma grimaces back, picking the baggy and ripped up top from where it’s sticking to her side. Her head tilts, brows going up and eyes going slightly wide, a puppy expression with the purpose of being convincing. “You don’t think you could get the bag, could you? Please?”

Ryan sighs, but nods his agreement anyway. He doesn’t want to leave any of them, not with them still in this vulnerable, confused and adjusting state of theirs, but he’s the one up to the task and he won’t be long. He remembers exactly where he spotted the discarded bag last night and it’s not far off. Without needing another word said, he picks himself up and begins the short trek. 

He doesn’t worry too much on how they’ll be in his absence, they’re rather subdued. He doesn’t know if it’s how many of them are on the island together, if it’s because this was planned or if it’s just because no one fell and snapped their leg in two but he thinks compared to himself and Kaitlyn last month, this morning has been handled well despite it all. He thinks by the time he’s back, enough time will have passed that they’ll all have adjusted and sorted through those second hand memories just fine, or Kaitlyn and Emma will have at least. He doesn’t know about Dylan, couldn’t speak to how the process goes for him.

He’s tried to keep the thought from his mind, still not yet ready to process the emotion he knows thinking of it will bring. But Dylan was feral last night. He hadn’t leaned into the transformation, he hadn’t done what Ryan had begged of him. Not that he’d said he would, thinking back to it. It’s not like Ryan can blame anything other than himself for this outcome either but he still just- he just wishes Dylan had listened to the plea, as hasty and surely confusing as it must have been. 

Because Dylan this morning, man… Ryan remembers the pain of that first and second transformation, excruciating in a way he’d never experienced before in his life, tearing through his usual high pain tolerance like he’d never experienced any sense of pain before in his life. It felt like knives slicing through his skin from the inside, then the feeling of his bones shattering and sending their splinters through his muscles, then the feeling of his skin bursting and then- now it may just be a jolt for Ryan, but for Dylan and the others it remains as the single most unbearable pain that can be experienced. God, even the panic and confusion in Dylan’s eyes this morning alone is something Ryan never wants to see again. 

With that reminder, with seeing Dylan like that this morning in the aftermath of that pain, how could he have expected such a sudden plea to have worked? Was it just ignorance that let him be able to make such a bold request yesterday, to him or to Emma? Dylan asked for clarity and Ryan couldn’t give it, because how on earth was he supposed to be able to find the words to tell him to lean into it? To let it hurt, to make it hurt impossibly more than that, even if just for a few moments? His one hundred percent success rate has hit a sudden nosedive and he doesn’t know why. What did he say to Emma, or even Kaitlyn, that he could not express to Dylan? Something that was clearly able to work for her and she’s better off for it, admitted as much herself. 

But it didn’t work for Dylan, his words didn’t get through, Ryan clearly hadn’t tried hard enough for them to. His first failure makes the concept of a second plea harder still. How can he tell Dylan, who he can barely bring himself to imagine in pain, that the ends just simply outweighs the means and how could Ryan ever be trusted enough to be believed? It’s like the ink has run dry, any script he tries to write or rehearse are just empty indents on the paper of his mind, unable to get any further than the first word before the pen gives out. All he’s ever left with is one word. Dylan.

With his mind spitefully remaining empty of anything more on the subject, with a sigh as he walks through the woods to where Kaitlyn left the bag, Ryan takes the island in instead. The bird calls, the rustling leaves, the grass and dirt beneath his feet. His senses have settled as they always do in the trough after the moon, but they remain stronger than they used to be, this trough now at the strength of what used to be his middle of the month. It feels less overwhelming now, though whether he’ll still feel that way once he’s left the island, that remains to be seen. This island, much like the clearing last month, brings a sense of calm and tranquillity to him. One night he’s spent on this island and already it is familiar to him. Already it feels like home. Actually, it feels like what Dylan feels to him; like something deep within his skin; like something within his bones recognising it as his own. 

He wishes that didn’t bring a spiking anxiety to shoot up through his sternum, but it does. This sense of home here is stronger than it was even in that clearing. Yet it isn’t his home. His home is a tiny, cold apartment a town over. He already knows that a gaping void will appear within his guts the second he steps through his doorway and it’s going to eat and chip away at him all month until he’s left freezing and exhausted and miserable. Just like the month before, where it had disappeared in that little clearing and reappeared as soon as he left the quarry. Just the thought of it is enough to put him on edge again in dread filled anticipation.

He tries not to let it sour his mood. He can deal with a little difficulty in his time at home, really, that’s the least of his troubles. His major concern was last night going without a hitch and if he isn’t jinxing anything by thinking about it, he’d consider it to have gone well. No one nearly died and at this point, even if it’s at bare minimum, that would still constitute a success. Emma has become a part of the pack and was left without too terrible a scar, though he didn’t catch eyes on it this morning, a bite to the ankle can’t be considered the worst. He knows it’s not the worst, lifting a finger to run along the smooth flat top of his half missing ear, grateful that at least he wasn’t left with another scar himself to add to the collection. 

Despite being back down to one and a half ears and despite the small spike of anxiety about the return of that void once he’s back in his apartment, Ryan does ultimately feel good, he must admit. Really good and not just physically, though for that alone he’s glad. He can probably even jog, he bets himself, cautiously picking up the pace without a single strain or pain. He grins to himself, running the rest of the way and although it doesn't bring the same elation as it had last night, the relief of his skin not tearing and his muscles being ache free is a good enough feeling to be as close as it could to being on par with it. 

It’s his mind, connected, that really changes everything. Having it stay coalesced during the day makes him certain that this is a permanent restoration. It feels less… shocking, as maybe he’d thought it would. It wasn’t like it had all coalesced together to become Ryan of four months ago or god forbid, that the animalistic part of him just took a backseat that meant he could’ve spent the night sitting in wait for dawn or doing some taxes. It wasn’t like that at all but equally, he doesn’t feel it would be honest anymore to make the statement that it isn’t him or that he is taking a backseat through the night. It isn’t true anymore.

He was completely instinct driven still, yes, but those were his instincts. His urges. His own thoughts driving him, him moving his feet, him biting down and him, Ryan, reacting to the world around him with understanding and presence. Ryan doesn’t think things like choices or control really come into it, either in a way that could absolve him or condemn him. Not when those were his own instincts and not when he was so instinct driven as he was, it isn't really about choice at that point. Man may logically know he is not afraid but he will still reflexively jump from the teeth and an animal may love the hand that feeds it yet end up biting it all the same. Neither can be blamed for their instincts. Ryan is now the man and the animal, the hand and the teeth.

An argument could be made that it is not the instincts that need be condemned, but the act of following them that may be. It’s not one Ryan feels the urge to have with himself. Maybe that should worry him, that he doesn’t even question these instincts, now that they've become his own. Maybe that should scare him even, but it doesn't. It should frighten him, or at the very least four months ago it would have frightened him, the concept of becoming one with the animal side of the mind like this. It should frighten him, or it would have, to know that he’s become so intune with it that he doesn’t doubt he would tear a man to shreds to defend his territory and pack. It should concern him, shouldn't it, the idea that he can kill and would feel justified in it? And he would feel justified, if they were a danger to his pack and home. He knew he could, he knew he would and now in the day he knows he still would. Maybe he should consider what that says about him, what that means for him. How his morals have seemingly been fundamentally changed over the last few months. 

He would worry over his morality, if it had shifted so drastically. He doesn’t think it has. He has already shot and murdered a man, someone he cared about, to protect his friends. Laura may have pressured him into it, all his attempts at talking her out of it failing, yet it was Ryan who pulled the trigger. That was a choice he made and it was with a wolf yet woken and two hands that he did it. For someone to stumble upon them now, that would mean all of their deaths. Is there really a difference in murder depending on if bullets or teeth are used? It’s murder either way. And he would, he would kill someone, if it kept them all safe. He doesn’t think that sentiment is new at all. 

So, that’s not really all that different either, even if the zealousness of the thought will surely brighten and dim through the stages of the moon. It’s more of the same he supposes, that it’s all just a heightening of what was already there. It feels different, even if he knows it’s not, but it also just feels right. He started out that first month pondering the line between changing versus changed. He’s certain he’s tilted over into completely and irreparably changed- and yet? It’s still all just him. 

So, as strange and different as it could be, Ryan finally fully, completely, truly feels like himself for the first time since that August night. He’d gotten closer to it over the past couple of months, sure, but this is it. He thinks he hadn’t been able to sincerely comprehend just how torn in two he had been until this moment. Before it had been instincts coming from somewhere unknown, thoughts trickling through that didn't really feel like his own, accepting it and reaching a vague sense of harmony between the two sides. There's no sides anymore. It’s just Ryan, it's all just him. He thinks now he can legitimately grapple what he had perhaps worked out but not truly felt until this moment. That wolflike side of him, created that August night, was not something new torn into his mind or something alien or completely different from who he has always been. This whole time, it has just been a part of him, always there but so shoved down and buried by the social norms and politeness of their age, that it was unrecognisable to him. Just primal instincts brought to the surface, drudging up new behaviours alongside it and heightening those instinctual responses, but none of it was something that did not exist within him before that night. He’s thought he’d become wolflike, a monster, an animal- but they’re all animals, as far as they try to remove themselves from it, it is only human language and hubris that separates them from any other. That separation removed, Ryan feels himself humbled, the knowledge that he has always just been an animal returned to him now. It’s more than freeing, he’s made whole once more.

It’s a solely good thing, he knows, to have this insight. It will only be an aid for them, will stop miscommunications and mistranslations before they’ve the chance to really take root. Yet, well, maybe not solely. Sure, it’s become clear to him just how truly the wolflike instincts and behaviours are just a different and stronger presentation of their own feelings of before. He knows that but also at the same, is it that way all the time, with everyone, with everything? His mind is flittering between images of a wolf baring its throat to him, of crawling upon a rock to rest beside him, of settling only when they’d settled together. If that was all truly just a different presentation of his true feelings… Does Dylan like him? No, no, that's ridiculous, surely. That’s wishful thinking, is what that is, because Kaitlyn had explicitly told him that Dylan had said to her that he’s over it. Maybe it’s just the last crumbling vestiges of what schoolboy crush Dylan had once had or, if Ryan stopped projecting his own feelings onto animal behaviour, he’d be able to accept that it’s just simply that they’re friends and Dylan trusts his friends and that translates terribly into that wolflike behaviour. It’s nothing, simply put. He should stop overthinking it. 

Just if no- okay, moving on from Dylan, he’s not going to overthink that, seriously. On a related note though, the very same concerns could be directed towards Emma and Kaitlyn. Yeah, that seems a safer territory of thought. After seeing all that, understanding what that behaviour meant may be one thing, but now that he’s back to walking on two legs, he’s doubting it. Maybe not doubting his reading of it, but intentions still have to matter, don’t they? Instincts are instincts, clearly a defining and important part of them, but who we are is measured by what we do. An initial instinct can exist and yet be ignored due to not being a true desire. So how could it be determined if any followed instinct was a true desire? Or, worse still, how can he determine if what he has labelled under instincts are not a more complicated spread ranging from wants, needs, urges, cravings to desires to even obligations? The more he ponders it, the more any distinction or determination he tries to make becomes irrelevant and meaningless. He’s neither a philosophy major nor is he able to read minds and lacking either of the two, means this thought process can only be directed inwards and that’s just quite genuinely the least of his problems right now.  

Instead he switches his focus onto something that he’s only just now realising the implications of. They’d already acknowledged that it was very likely that their ranking could change within the pack structure, but that’s most certainly confirmed now, which is pretty significant isn’t it? Their role within the pack is not set, not solely determined by what kind of wolf they are when they were feral or yet to be made pack. It does unfortunately only create its own new questions of the same line. What at all is the point of their feral wolves being classified within those three types, of curs, hounds and fawns- or how Kaitlyn put them, pikes and clovers, or Caleb with his hydras and worms? Not only does that seem useless, the types don’t even have a set name or label, as if they all just made up their own names for it in absence of having any way to actually describe it- Ryan slows to stop, barely noticing the bag resting just a few metres away.

They made up their own names for it in absence of having any other way to actually describe it. Of course. Even now, with no need for translations in a mind melded back together, he cannot conjure up another word for what Dylan is other than a feral fawn. Fawn is just such a random word, it doesn’t fit or have commonality for any other label that has come in a more accurate and natural translation. With no more translations needed at all, if this really was such a butchered translation, then by now he would be able to find the right one, surely? Yet that’s the only name that remains. It just fits right for him, but Kaitlyn and Caleb clearly translated it differently, to something that felt right for them. So it isn’t something there is a specific name for then. There’s such a clear difference between the types though and they have clearly felt the need to label it themselves. So what’s the unifying factor? Even with this worked out, he feels no less confused than before.

With a sigh, Ryan walks those last few metres to the bag, where it was left resting against a tree and he scoops it up, reaching a hand in to root around for the clothes he’d shoved into it the day before. He’s dressed and making his way back in less than a moment, though still without boots, which he’ll need to find before they head for the docks. He starts back in a jog, half just because he can and it actually feels good and easy to do so. Though he finds that even if his muscles are strain free, even after his wash in the pond, the bloody residue must remain as his tshirt and shorts feel uncomfortable and tight to his skin. Nothing a good warm shower won’t fix once they’re back at the lodge. The other half is the chance at a little more clarification for his confusion is resting in the clearing now and he finds himself eager to try and finally solve what’s been eating away at him for months now.

He almost wishes he’d dawdled a bit more however, when he approaches the clearing to the sound of bickering. He’d been so focused on the wind in his ears and the chill of the air on his skin to pay attention to the tone of the voices before he’d passed through the trees bordering the clearing. By the time he’s noticed, it’s now far too late to slink behind a tree and hide from the argument between the two girls. He’s still half tempted to try it anyway, as Kaitlyn’s eyes land on him and he just hopes against all hope that he isn’t dragged into it. Already he knows that it’d be much less entertaining when held in a language they all understand.

Kaitlyn and whatever frustrations she has with him, are clearly not at the top of her list right now however and he gets out what he considers scott free, as she just holds an expectant hand for the bag before ignoring him completely to turn back to Emma to say, “Oh, you think I’d let you have first dibs on my bag, really? After-"

With a roll of his eyes, he fishes out what Dylan had packed and tosses the bag over to the two girls, not ready to touch the spat between them with a ten foot pole. They can argue it out themselves, he’s more than happy to be left out of whatever that is. He looks over to where Dylan sat himself off to the side by the pond, watching the small ripples in the water in an uncharacteristic silence. Ryan hedges over hesitantly, the messily folded clothes held out in an extended hand. “Hey, uh, delivery.” 

Dylan looks up with a bit of a start, again clearly not noticing Ryan’s approach, but the look in his eye is now clear and present. He accepts the clothes with a ghost of a smile and a quietly muttered thanks. Ryan glances away as he pulls on shorts and an oversized tshirt, both smartly coloured black, easy to wash whatever residues of blood may end up coating them. Still, Ryan mourns the usual colour he wears, those soft browns, blues and greens. He hates to see Dylan looking like this, the deep bags under his eyes and the shake in his hands. He hates to see Dylan like this and yet even as he looks at the grass to give some semblance of privacy, he wants to look back. He always wants him in his sight, at his best, worst and at his most mundane. 

Even those few short moments of staring at the grass leaves Ryan restless. “Are- are you okay?” He asks, even though he knows the question is stupid and the answer is obvious.

He gets silence in return, which yeah, that’s fair. Ryan shuffles his feet, picks at a hem on his pants. He doesn’t know what he can do, he just knows that he should be doing more. As if washing some of the blood off his arms would change anything, help anything at all. God, Dylan woke up in a completely different location than last night covered in blood and then Ryan had just up and left him this morning and maybe he- “Ryan.”

Ryan lifts his head just a little, to show he’s listening as his eyes remain resolutely on a very specific single blade of grass. His emotions and instincts aren’t the souped up mess that they’d been the night before and even then, he’s been restrained enough to never pull a Nick with Abi that August night. However his brain is stupidly and pesteringly stuck on its own wishful thinking that it’d conjured up from nowhere earlier and he has the embarrassing urge to stare at Dylan for as long as it takes, as if it were possible, to discern whether it could be anything more than wishful thinking. Which of course means this stare down against the grass is his best bet to retain some dignity and he’s not risking so much as a blink. He’s not making the same mistake that he’s made a million times before, a quick glance at Dylan always turns into a longing gaze. 

“Ryan.” Dylan repeats and then with a sigh, he jabs a finger into the back of Ryan’s hand, “I’m changed, you can turn around. It’s not even like you had to, I mean it’s nothing you hadn’t already seen and there’s not much more undressed I could’ve gotten.”

Ryan twists his lips to the side, bites the inside of his cheek to keep from making any sort of disagreement or worse, longing comment on that fact. Then he bites down a little harder to keep any sort of image related to that fact far from reaching his mind. He’s only partially successful and he gives himself another second or two before finally turning to Dylan. As his eyes land on his face, he catches just the barest hint of an expression, of brows dipped down in the middle and lips pulled flat, before it transforms into a bright smile. “Jeez, no need to look so pained, the ghastly sight is gone now, I promise.”

”What?” Ryan says dumbly, before he finally catches up on Dyaln’s meaning, so far removed from anything Ryan would ever think that it took him a good half a minute and a dramatic flourish of Dylan’s hand towards himself for him to get it. “What! No, no that’s not what- you’re not ghastly at all! I mean, I just wasn’t saying that- I didn’t say anything actually, so that’s definitely not- I mean, more like, ghostly, right? Because you’re- you know, cause you’re so pale… and, all- all that… Ahem.”

Dylan has this odd little expression as Ryan trails off, pinched upturned brows, narrowed eyes, pursed lips that are also squeezed narrow in the corners- it’s as confusing as Ryan’s ramble was, but if he had to pick out what it conveyed, he’d be confident enough to say there’s at least a mixture of bemusement, judgement and surprise in there but he’s sure there’s other things he’s definitely missing too. Which again, fair. Ryan doesn’t know what his own face is doing in the effort to not slap himself right in the middle of it. He doesn't even attempt a smooth recovery, as nothing could save that mess of a reaction, instead opting to just sigh and try to switch back to the original track. “Seriously, are you okay?”

The expression doesn’t drop for at least three slow nods of Dylan’s head but he does let the switch happen at the very least. When it does drop he looks back down to his shoes, where he laces them with a sort of laser focus that cannot be anything other than as a means for avoidance of eye contact. He does end up telling his shoes how he is after a few moments at least. “I’m… I feel really weird, to be honest.”

Ryan’s instantly checking over his form, checking for anything out of place but he finds nothing more than what he’d already assessed. It doesn’t stop the returning flood of anxious restlessness from buzzing in his ribs, sweeping away more logical questions in favour of repeating himself in a tenser tone. “Are you alright? What’s wrong?”

Dylan looks up at him, brows back to quirked, fingers stilling in their now useless flutter with his tied laces. “No, no, I’m alright, that’s what’s weird. I’m not sore or hungry or anything.”

”Oh.” Ryan swallows down the nerves, feeling silly that they’d risen so strongly at all. “Well, that’s good right? I’m glad. That you’re feeling alright, I mean. Of course that’s what I meant, obviously, what else could I have meant?”

“I don’t- yeah, I got what you meant… What else could you even have- Did I do something?” Dylan asks suddenly, shoulders hunkering a little as his fingers go back to fiddling with the lace.

”What? No, no.” Yes, kinda. “Why would you think that?” Shit, don’t answer that. “No, nothing you’ve done, just…” Now he has to come up with something, goddamn it. “Do you know why Kaitlyn’s mad at me?”

Success. Dylan’s shoulders relax again and he nods, put at ease as he assumes Ryan’s just acting odd from that, rather than what is actually tugging and poking at the back of his mind. But he’s not overthinking it, he’s not going to, at all. He’s not acting weird, is he? If he is, which he isn’t, Dylan is sufficiently distracted by the question to notice it anymore at least. “Oh, you’ll never guess.” He says in a challenging sort of tone.

Ryan’s willing enough to try and take him up on the bet. Even if just to escape this conversation that Ryan is somehow managing to make more and more awkward by the second. Still, he tries to seek out where the girls have ended up now, a suspicious quiet returning to the clearing now that their arguing has seemed to cease.

Emma remains sitting in the grass, further from the pond now, hopefully far enough to have not overheard this entire conversation. Her hair is now tied back and her cheeks are flushed with colour, something he’ll certainly manage to find the time to tease her for eventually. She’s peering down at her palm and he tilts his head at the sight, before he realises with his senses sharpened as they are, he doesn't actually have to squint to see what she’s staring at. Her contacts, likely not even prescription anymore with all of their better senses and healing. She’s weighing them up, studying the things as if they were not contacts but little blue cyanide pills instead. He has his hopes on her decision, but makes no comment and looks away.

He looks over to find Kaitlyn, who is now dressed and standing, leaning back against the rock with folded arms and a scowl pointed in his direction. The guess he goes for, even if he knows it’s not wholly correct, is easy to make after that. “Something to do with the rock?” 

“How’d you guess?” Dylan snorts, an unattractive and adorable sound that makes Ryan awfully fond. “That and something about you being incredibly obvious and stupid, which I’m assuming is also connected to the rock? I don’t even know dude and that’s not even getting started on the argument between those two right now. Be glad you’re not a part of that.”

Ryan just hums his understanding. So, it's not really about the rock at all then, as expected. It’s still about him and Dylan. Which he still doesn’t understand and he really should bring it up with her. He knows himself well enough to know he’s not going to though, he’ll keep avoiding it as long as he can. So yeah, it’s about the rock then. He glances down at Dylan, who’s now stood, finally putting his shoelaces to rest. “Might as well face the music then. C’mon, there’s something I wanted to ask them before we head back anyway.”

He makes his way over to Kaitlyn and her prized possession of the rock, leaning against it beside her and nodding to its smooth surface. “You know it really wasn’t that comfortable.”

She scoffs at him, calling out his purposefully obvious lie immediately. “Yes it was.”

”Yeah, it was.” He shrugs back, not feeling a half bit guilty over claiming it for himself. If he had to put up with her and Emma’s back and forth all night, then the least he gets is a comfortable rock to lounge around on.  

“Well I wonder why?” Kaitlyn says back snarkily with a jut of her chin towards Dylan trailing just a few steps behind him. “You sure looked cosy.”

Ryan narrows his eyes ever so slightly at her in warning, “So did you, rolling around in the grass. Didn’t seem like you minded it so much, honestly-“

”What do you mean by-“

The start of their bickering is promptly cut off by a groan of pain and the three of them whirl around in a panic. Emma has begun to hobble towards them with a hand reaching down towards her ankle, lips in a sad little pout and another dramatic put on noise of pain making its way past them. “I can barely walk! You’ve crippled me.”

The panic very swiftly transforms into an unimpressed bemusement. “That’s not how it works, Emma.” Kaitlyn tells her, a little more snappily than necessary, yet the worried glance down to the scarring on her ankle does severely undercut the tone.

Emma stops at Dylan’s side, before after a seconds pause, she collapses against his side with an arm slung around his shoulder and her free hand daintily pressed against her forehead. With an admirable amount of effort, he manages only a small stumble before he’s got an arm around her back and is holding her upright. “No, I’m pretty sure it is, gosh I can barely stand.”

”She’s telling the truth.” Dylan says gravely, morosely, always eager to get in on a joke. 

“I am, I really am,” She sighs and Ryan thinks he finally understands why she was theatre coach at camp- he knows it’s not true, he can see her acting and yet he’s still inclined to believe her, even if just to go along with the whole show. “I’ll need to be carried back. I already need to rest.”

Her eyes flash and Ryan thinks he’s only just begun to appreciate how weird, brilliant and just pure evil Emma can be. “Yes, I really must rest. I need to sit, where can I-? Oh, that rock looks perfect. Ryan, help lift me up, won’t you?”

”You are laying it on so thick,” Kaitlyn scoffs at her, “He’s not even going to be able to- Ryan, what the fuck?”

Ryan sends Emma a look with a tilted head, certain he’s being used here to an extent further than he realises, before he decides he actually doesn’t particularly care. He might not be able to finish their bickering argument with Emma’s dramatic approach, but he’s more than happy to play along with this whole performance if he gets to piss Kaitlyn off right back. Mature? Certainly not. Petty? For sure. Satisfying? Entirely. He’s pushed off against the side of the rock and has walked the few steps over to Emma before Kaitlyn can land what was surely going to be a painful swat against his arm. 

Emma leans even further against Dylan, nearly tumbling them both to the ground in the process, to peak past Ryan’s approaching form and send a sickly sweet smile to Kaitlyn. “He’s got a sleeper build, he absolutely can. If you want to sit on the rock next to me then you could- oh, wait. Never mind, just me then.”

She looks up at Ryan, notably still with brown eyes, which makes him grin at her until it then drops upon the visible double take that she does. “Oh. You’re taller.” She states simply, confusedly. 

He looks down at her- so yes, he is, but he doesn’t get the chance to even process that information, let alone respond, before she’s hoisted herself into his arms. Even something as strange and magical as Ryan growing a solid bit taller overnight isn’t enough to distract her from her mission of irritating Kaitlyn to the best of her ability. Their mission actually, as he’s most certainly a partner in crime now with how he deposits her atop the rock with ease and an unnecessary smugness.

“Great, so everyone gets to sit on the rock but me, I guess.” Kaitlyn complains, kicking the bottom of it and all in a petulant display. “No I mean that’s totally fair, fuck me right?”

”Did- did I sit on the rock?” Dylan asks, amused and confused in equal parts.

”Yes! Yes you got to sit on the rock!” Kaitlyn throws her hands up in the air. “And you don’t even remember it and so you can’t even appreciate it!”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” Dylan laughs, a bright and feather light sound, like wind chimes in the summer air. Ryan’s ribs expand with it, he’d let every single man, woman and child in the world sit on this stupid fucking rock without ever letting Kaitlyn even touch it if it meant he’d get that reaction out of Dylan even just once more again. “But what is so special about this rock?”

Kaitlyn’s scrunched up face cracks just a little, into something resembling the smile that she refuses to give into, more of a reluctant grimace than anything. She’s not immune to Dylan’s joy either. It’s a little more infectious this morning too, being the first expression of genuine happiness after what he went through last night, and that seems enough to break through her pissy exterior. Kaitlyn is nothing if not stubborn though and she tries to kick the rock again to reignite her anger. With the stronger force she puts into it, she just ends up clutching at her toes. “Ow! Ah fuck- I don’t know man, it’s just a cool fucking rock.” She ends her complaints in a grumble, not entirely a lie on her behalf as it is admittedly a pretty cool rock, yet most certainly not the entire reason why she’s so put out about this.

Throughout it all, Emma just sits perched atop it, self satisfied and entirely innocent smile in place. Evil, Ryan’s certain, pure evil.

”It is a very comfortable rock, I feel so rested now, thank you Ryan.” She says sweetly and with such gratitude Ryan would half believe it was genuine, if not for what he has very quickly learnt what this innocent demeanour of her’s is used for. The way the smile then drops and she gestures to her ankle with both hands also admittedly makes it a bit obvious. “But in all seriousness, you didn’t say you’d bite me!”

She doesn’t sound mad, as if she didn’t really find it all that unexpected, so he doesn’t feel too terribly guilty. Still, he reaches up a hand to scratch at the back of his neck in a sheepish gesture. “Yeahhh, sorry, wasn’t certain I would? You did run. And you’re not missing half an ear at least.”

”Oh I wouldn’t dare, unlike some-”

”Why would you bring that up, it’s not even-“

The responses fade into the background, as like cogs in a rusty machine finally buckling under the pressure and giving one last turn, the realisation hits him. “Oh shit. You ran away last night.”

The two girls fall silent and look at him with these obvious expressions. There’s a beat of silence before Emma just slowly nods her head with that same look still in place and says slowly, “Yeah and you fucking chased me. What else was I meant to do?”

”Wait, what do you-“

“No that’s it, I shouldn’t have expected you to do anything else- and I mean, I didn’t really. Holy shit, it does actually all make sense.” Ryan doesn’t even register that someone else had begun to speak as he bursts out his words with admittedly wild hands and a little bit of shock in his amazement. This whole time, it’s really been so simple. Well, that half of it is, the other half- it could make sense, if he can just fit the pieces together. But if it’s really been so simple, then that other half would just make no sense actually, and then-

”Ryan what the fuck are you talking about?” Kaitlyn asks, her obvious expression turned to just straight up confused.

Though he does register this, he completely ignores her in favour of his own question, his excitement at finally getting some answers just completely shredding whatever semblance of manners that he usually holds. ”Emma, how did you think of us last night? Like we were talking about yesterday.” 

“Oh. Uh, bears.” She says, simple as that, as if they’re not on the verge of working out a massive part of their condition and the curse on them.

”What is with you lot and- never mind. So obviously I’m not a bear.” Ryan says but it’s not in defeat, he expected this, he expected it to not make sense. But it will, it will if he can just find… Something.

There’s a snort from just behind him, a little off to the side. “Yeah, you’d definitely need to eat more.”

Ryan turns around to him even as he continues mulling it over. “What?”

”I don’t think you’re quite hairy enough either.” Dylan says plainly, with a shrug and strained smile. Ryan’s brows dip in momentary concern and he doesn’t even attempt a smile in return or acknowledge the joke. He only just manages to stop himself from derailing the conversation and losing his thought process entirely by asking once more if Dylan’s okay. 

”Okay, okay,” Ryan forces himself to say instead, turning back to Emma with some effort, “And what about yourself?”

”Oh! Easy!” Emma brightens, “A perfect darling angel.”

Ryan breathes out a long sigh. He knows he’s right on the edge of working out something massive and no ones being particularly helpful at the moment. “Can you two be serious for just one minute, please?”

”I dunno, that seems kind of hard.” Dylan chirps from beside him now, stepping further into the tight little semi circle they’ve made around Emma and the rock. Ryan can hear the off key strum of tension within Dylan’s tone, even as he forces out another joke. Ryan can’t stop himself, mouthing an ‘are you okay' to him and receiving a not very convincing but enthusiastic small nod back.

Ryan hates to let it go but with no other options left, he looks at Emma flatley. “Dylan then. How’d you think of him?”

She gives in with this little back and forth sidewards tilting of her head. “Alright, a jackal. Why, what’s this about?”

“There’s a connection here and I’ve just got to-“ He cuts himself off frustrated, mouthing all these eclectic collections of names until it grows more and more audible. “-bear, jackal… Cur, hound, fawn…”

”You were reading Shakespeare at camp, weren’t you?” Dylan asks him randomly and with a little more life in his voice. While yes he was and the fact that Dylan somehow knows that makes Ryan’s chest feel light, he’s too focused on the issue at hand right now to get into a discussion on his own interests, as important as it is to him- the rust dissolves, cogs turning freely.

”Dylan you’re a genius, holy shit, you’re just brilliant.” Ryan whirls upon him and the small yet now genuine smile that Dylan’s giving him proves that this was not a shot in the dark that Dylan made, he’d worked it out. “You are acid, man, I swear. Fucking rust dissolver, it’s so obvious.”

”Okay, genuinely, did you hit your head when grabbing the bag?” Kaitlyn finally pipes up again, looking lost and yeah, actually a little genuinely concerned. “No one would judge you if you did, dude, but maybe we check you for a concussion or something. Does anyone even know how to do that? Oh, a hundred percent Jacob will. Oh. If you can get him to, you know, talk-“

”I didn’t hit my head.” Ryan cuts her off before that ramble can go any further than it already had, continuing on himself, with all these light switches flicking and igniting all at once. “But I just- Dylan just- God- You’ve read the bible a lot, haven’t you Emma?”

Emma has her teeth exposed and brows quirked down in the centre with the baffled expression she openly wears. A smidge of judgement enters her words now that it’s been resolutely stated that Ryan has in fact not hit his head and given himself a concussion. “Has this turned into book club suddenly, or what? Cause yeah I feel pretty alright but I’m still not in the mood for… That. Or whatever this is.”

Ryan breathes out deeply and then inhales just as slowly, trying to gather himself and slow himself down. He knows he’s not explaining any of this well, or really at all, and now that he’s got the answer thanks to Dylan’s help, there’s no rush. He starts to attempt an explanation of his thought process to his unimpressed audience. “I was reading Shakespeare’s play scripts over camp. You’ve read the bible probably hundreds of times over the course of your life, right? Then get this, Caleb played dungeons and dragons, was obsessed with it since he was a little kid. And Kaitlyn, I’m guessing you play cards, don’t you?”

”I don’t care what you say, you definitely hit your head. I don’t play cards.” Kaitlyn says and Ryan almost wants to repeat her mistakes and kick the rock in frustration. That doesn’t make sense, it was all lining up, the theory can’t be shot to shit this soon, surely-

“I don’t play cards, I win cards. Ask Jacob how many times he’s beaten me.” Kaitlyn finishes in a correction, holding up a hand curled into a circle at the end, mouthing the words, “Absolutely fucking never.”

And there it is. He’s actually put it together, it’s all clicked and already Ryan shifts it over from theory to just straight up fact in his mind. He’s never been more delighted to be asked to explain than when Emma asks a very direct, “Okay what is this? Stop leaving us hanging.”

”So the terms we use, for feral or lone wolves? Kind of meaningless. It’s just the closest thing our mind could translate the concept to without our regular use of language or understanding.” He explains. “That’s why it’s different for each of us and then I guess it kind of just becomes stuck as that association grows stronger, with the words for the actual concept getting pushed to the side in favour of these personal associations.”

”So it’s just random?” Emma asks, in an airy way as if she’d decided that because it’s random, it’s then useless. She’s never been so incredibly incorrect before.

”Yes and no, it’s something that was already present enough in our mind and that it could fit into. I was reading Shakespeare over camp, where the terms cur, hound and fawn are in the text. Bears and jackals are repeatedly referenced to within the bible. Caleb was into D&D, so I bet he wasn’t actually calling Kaylee a worm, but a wyrm. Kinda like a dragon, sounds like there’s no difference but there is.”

”Yeah, okay,” Kaitlyn nods along before rolling a hand at him to hurry it up. “But what’s the context? Just the different types of wolves?”

”Yes, it’s the whole- okay.” Ryan starts and stops. He wishes he had a white board or something to explain this all, but for now the dirt and his waving hands will have to do. He ignores Kaitlyn’s groan on the first word as he continues and pushes forward, “Laura’s theory is halfway correct. Like we agreed, it isn’t a structured tier of different types of wolves that then just neatly fit within the pack structure. It’s based on our overall typical stress response. Honestly, I can’t believe I didn’t see it, the word was right there.”

He’s given another confused and expectant look, so he quickly continues. “It’s our fight or flight response, but with the added freeze or fawn response. I’m feeling pretty fucking stupid for not seeing it before, since it was so on the nose for my mind to- never mind. What I’m saying is that it’s like when you get infected, that response that you are typically predisposed towards is jacked up to a million and I guess our differences come from our body also reflecting that even physiologically, right? It makes sense.”

Kaitlyn now nods in understanding, a gesture that grows stronger over the next couple of seconds before she gives a final nod and says, “Right, I get what you're saying. So when Laura called us alphas because we take the aggressive stance and we’re stronger or whatever, that’s because we’re actually just in the fight response?”

Ryan nods back in agreement. “Exactly, it’s like we get stuck in that response and then with it so jacked up with the infection, even our bodies have changed to make us more adapted to following that response through and I guess, like succeeding with it?”

”So what about what she called me?” Emma asks, curiosity tilting her head.

”So she called you betas-“ He rolls his eyes at Kaitlyn’s quiet growl, though still acquiescing, “-which no one but Kaitlyn actually is. That’s because you’re in the flight response. Maybe freeze too, if your standoffs are anything to go by, though I’m not sure. Either way, you don’t need that strength because you’re not going to actually fight, right? Because you just book it out of there, which would explain why even your scents are the least noticeable and lingering, cause it didn’t really leave a trail. I mean you were incredibly hard to follow last night because of that, not to mention you were way faster than us Emma, we only caught you because of the water.”

Throughout that particular explanation, he notices the way Kaitlyn eyes him from both their periphery, a small sort of scowl on her face. If last night was anything to go off of, she’s internally in heavy disagreement with his assessment but he thinks she’d rather chew her tongue off than say so, considering what a strange argument it would be to make and how sound proof his own is. The only reason she’d have to disagree is some vague sort of instinctual feeling inside her, or perhaps even something far more aware of why she might disagree. Either way, it’s not something he thinks she’d ever willingly bring up, no matter how much she may be accepting her new traits and instincts. He hates to consider that a good thing, but in this moment, it works in his favour certainly. 

“Yeah okay, it’s making sense,” Emma agrees, “How about Dylan then? If fight, flight and maybe freeze are already used, then what’s left? The… fawn thing?”

”Well,” Ryan starts and tries mostly successfully to not look in his direction in an anxious gauge of his reaction, “That’d probably be freeze and if it isn’t, then it’s most certainly the fawn response. I read about it a while ago, it wasn’t proposed alongside the original fight or flight, but there’s been discussion now on the survival instinct of complying. Which uh, would make sense why their scent is how it is and the whole getting ignored in standoffs, so…”

He cannot help himself but flick his eyes to see Dylan’s reaction, only to find him already looking back. In a flair of blasé carelessness, Dylan just shrugs at him, a gesture that seems intended to convey agreement that yeah sure, that still makes sense. Yet Ryan knows him better now. There’s still that tension held within him, there’s something still wrong, and he’s doing his very best to play it off. Even if it’s not about this specifically, as Ryan thankfully doesn’t think it’s been made any worse with that last explanation. This he hopes at least feels easier to accept anyway, a little less random or like they chose this for themselves and more like what he’d already discovered- that the same way everything that the curse has brought to them is, this too is just an amplified and enhanced presentation of something that was already a part of them. 

However he doesn’t know when or what happened to make Dylan so tense. Ryan hates feeling like there’s nothing he can do, but Dylan’s eyes meet his unwaveringly and that he knows, means that Dylan’s protecting himself right now. He shouldn't have worried over getting another reaction, even if Dylan hasn’t accepted the transformation or the emergence of more primal instincts and reactions, he’ll only ever be laid back and agreeable when he’s like this. Ryan supposes that in itself would be enough to solidify this all from just a theory if he hadn’t felt it’d been already.

“Well, yeah, this all feels… Well, it seems mostly right.” Kaitlyn says, drawing his attention back to the other two. With how her arms cross in front of her, he readies himself for where he’s certain she will continue. “How’s this any different from Laura’s theory though? The reasons are different, sure, but I mean our wolves don’t even know what to call it. And I just- we both knew she was wrong already, right?”

”She was wrong- even if our wolves can’t seem to translate it very well. Also, you are your wolf by the way.” He ignores the confused or thoughtful looks shot in his direction as he continues, “However it’s incredibly different because it isn’t fixed. Which yeah we’d kind of vaguely worked out, but this completely explains why it doesn’t actually strictly determine where you’ll be in a pack.”

Ryan nods to Dylan, now feeling more nervous than he has all morning. “It’s like you said yesterday Dylan, that you felt like you’re on constant alert. I think it’s as if our initial stress response is amplified until you accept it and then when you become part of a pack, those stress levels lower and become more moldable, I guess. Kaitlyn your strength has settled and uh,”

He feels jittery, unsure of how to continue. He’s getting into territory that he hasn’t yet managed to broach with Dylan and this is most certainly not how he wanted to do it. Not when Dylan’s got his guard up, mask in place and lying through his teeth on how he’s feeling. Not like the hasty, thoughtless, stupid attempt that he had made last night. An actual conversation, a genuine explanation and that’s something he isn’t sure how to have, but one he knows he doesn’t want to force through indirect mentions that Dylan has no chance of truly understanding or believing. It hadn’t been enough last night and even if it’s not just Ryan talking from his own experience anymore with Kaitlyn and Emma here to vouch for him, he has no reason to hold any lasting faith for the method.

There’s even more to his nerves than that though, as even if that wasn’t a concern, the girls themselves might make this next part awkward. They remember how the night went, but they’ve yet to reach that understanding of why it went that way. With what Emma told him yesterday too, or rather what she didn’t say but made very obvious, he feels like every aspect of this conversation has suddenly led him out onto thin and cracking ice. The threat of plunging down into cold, adverse reactions from each or every one of the three of them has his palms growing slick.

He wipes them off on his sides and with an awkward smile, he picks up from where he’d suddenly trailed off. In all the sudden anxiety of it, he doesn’t end up going far. “Just uh, trust me when I say I am absolutely certain that it can very much change depending on our social rank within the pack, which can also very easily change.”

”Why?” Emma tilts her head at him before her mouth pops half an inch open and her eyes narrow in thought. “Oh, huh. Because you decide, don’t you?”

Ryan sucks in a deep, audible breath and looks slightly to the side as he shrugs in a fluid, feigned carelessness. On the breath out he says airily, “To a certain extent.”

”Uh huh.” Is the only response, clearly unimpressed.

“So it’s all fight or flight and then it’s your social position changing that reaction?” Kaitlyn says with a little finality and then a sick little amount of glee at the end, “Okay, I’ll give you this Ryan, that is a pretty big discovery. Laura’s gonna be pissed she didn’t think of that herself.”

Ryan doesn’t comment on that, though he’s not sure he could disagree even if he wanted to. Laura probably will kick herself for not thinking of that, but with the difference in levels of insight, he doesn’t think she could have ever had the chance to. To be fair to her too, she did set the groundwork for the discovery, getting them to even talk about their differences in the first place and then all that research she’s done. They wouldn’t even know their experiences were different at all without her. If she didn’t have a more limited insight, he’s certain she could have worked this out in minutes, rather than the slow piece by piece put together that Ryan has done.

He wants to feel more accomplished by this than he does. It’s a big piece, a huge piece even, of this curse to have worked out, he’s certain. It just doesn't feel as good as it should because right now, in the come down of the excitement he felt finally putting it together, it doesn't help any. It just makes him feel a little bit worse to know that not only is Dylan still experiencing that excruciating pain whenever the full moon comes, he's also in a heightened state of fight or flight or more specifically fawn or freeze all the time. He had said so himself yesterday, Ryan just didn’t realise to what level. He knows that dwelling on it does nothing, that it all just circles back to having that conversation, which then circles right back to that one word. From Dylan to Dylan, Ryan doesn't know when he became such a simple minded guy. 

He’s going to try again, better this time, whether he knows what words to use or not, before the full moon rises next month. Now just isn’t the time however. “We should probably-“

“You remember it too now. The night. You all do.”

The wind whistles, picking up stronger than it was throughout the night. It isn’t loud enough to break the silence that follows Dylan’s words. It’s not what he said, Ryan thinks, it’s how he said it. Words so brittle, each letter made of metal so rusted that no silver can be seen anymore, a smile so tense it must sting. No matter how light, careless, how oh so very blasé that he says it, the tension cannot be entirely hidden. Ryan realises then, where it began. Just after Emma claimed the rock for herself and defended herself for running, making it clear that she recalled each and every moment of the night that Dylan had spent in the dark. 

The girls both glance at Ryan, quick shifts of their eyes as if they could hide it. He’s expected to speak and yet still Ryan doesn't know what to say. He has no choice, still trying to shake the pen out and get the ink to finally flow even as he begins his attempt. “Dylan…”

Nothing more was going to come. He hates to admit it but he’s silently just a little grateful when Dylan cuts him off. “Which none of you seem surprised by. So maybe I’m actually the one who’s the shitty werewolf.”

”What?” Emma says, confusion in her voice, before clearly recalling when he had called her the same thing in September. She shakes her head, at him or to herself it’s unclear. “No, Dylan, it’s not that. It’s what these two said last month, about letting it happen or, I don’t know how to-“

”Yeah I know, I tried and I guess it just didn’t…” Dylan pulls a bit of a face. “Work? Yeah. Which is- whatever, never mind. Honestly, I don’t think I want to anyway and that’s not what I- I guess I was just wondering if I’m a part of that whole, y’know, pack thing?”

“You’re not but that doesn-“ “Yeah, you are.” Words finally come to him and as if the ink pot has been suddenly overfilled, they spill out of him. It’s only Kaitlyn’s confused and almost judgemental look that forces him to actually hear what he's just said. He doesn’t take it back, even though he knows he should, it isn’t exactly true. He does raise a hand to scratch at the back of his neck as he speaks again, with a little more thought this time. “Not really. Kind of? An honorary member, I guess? Uh. It’s not an exact science.” 

He’s pissed Kaitlyn off even more with that last line he’s sure but he doesn’t know what else to say. There’s a whirlwind of thoughts in his mind right now, with Dylan standing alone in the eye of the storm. Firstly, to start with the simplest of whirling thoughts, Dylan was- is- was feral last night. A feral wolf cannot be made pack, put two and two together and no, Dylan isn’t a part of their pack. That matters so little to every part of Ryan. It, and he knows, he knows that it isn’t true, but it feels like he already is. Either way, Dylan will become a part of the pack the moment that feral sheen is wiped from his golden eyes, it hasn’t taken Ryan’s mind coalescing for him to know that, he can feel Dylan in his bones, even months ago he knew him through sleep and his own sheen of ferality. Dylan will always be his first choice. So he’s not really pack, as much as Ryan wants him to be, but that doesn’t matter in a way because at the same time, it feels as if he already is. Maybe Ryan’s confusing the type of love he has for Dylan for the familial sort of love that this sense of pack creates, but it feels just as strong- actually no, truthfully, it feels impossibly stronger.

To make it a little more complicated however… For all Ryan’s stressing about it, Dylan had taken his hasty plea and had actually tried to let himself transform last night? And it… it failed? How- it worked for Emma and it’s not like Ryan was anymore clear in his instructions there. Why wouldn’t it work for Dylan? That truly makes no sense, the difficult part was meant to be convincing him to try, once the attempt was made why would that ever not work? Is there a way to let yourself transform… wrong? Did he not let it break through quick enough or- that doesn’t make sense but none of this makes sense.

“Did you…” Ryan hedges, unsure how to really ask or clarify. “How did you try?”

“Did what you two said last month, down to a T, followed it like a fucking Ikea instruction manual.” Dylan shrugs, shuffles his feet a little under their scrutiny and scrunches his face at the memory. “Tried to let it rip right on through with no complaint, stretched my shoulders, tensed my back, flexed all my crazy super strong muscles and I don’t know, did I miss something?”

“No, no that’s- that’s it, that’s all it is- should’ve been.” Ryan says, his voice petering out into a mutter in thought.  

Dylan’s voice drops the edge of humour he’d been managing to maintain and goes quiet as he admits to them, “I really did try.”

Ryan doesn’t know how to respond to that. He believes him, of course he does, though that is not comforting. He can see the way Dylan’s angled himself just to the side, his eyes flicking between them as he’s stared at. Ryan doesn’t know exactly what’s going through his head, but it makes the clearing smell of sweet rot and embarrassment and something else that’s so stifling and familiar that Ryan has to clear his throat. He doesn’t know what exactly it is, but he recognises it nonetheless. It’s something that seems to be constantly buried with Dylan’s scent, drudged up to a more noticeable element occasionally and is now spilling over, like marshwater swallowing the land. Dylan did try and now Ryan feels even worse than before for his hasty plea, that somehow didn’t work but not through any fault of explanation. Why wouldn’t it work?

Ryan had already known it hadn’t, with just one look in his eyes last night he could tell that the wolf was feral, the Dylan in front of him now in a sleepwalk through the night. He hadn’t had any doubt about it.  

“I don’t- I’m not trying to be- anything, by asking,” Emma starts unsurely before finishing on a more assured note. “But why are you asking about the pack? If you knew it didn’t, you know, work for you…”

Ryan swallows thickly as Dylan runs a hand through the front of his hair and nods to himself before he visibly makes a decision. Some of the tension he’s been holding fades to a more nervous demeanour as he speaks again. “Um, I just- well, I guess I thought, uh. I mean I figured that since this morning- I’ll just, hang on.”

Dylan gives a half turn on his heel, turning his right side to them and raises a hand. Just beneath his right ear, where he’s let his hair grow a little longer there over the past few months, he pulls it back for them. To reveal a scar. A scar made of small, jaggard but evenly distributed circular indents, formed within a crescent that wraps around from beneath his ear to the back of his nape. It’s placed high, just beneath his hairline and has been easily hidden by his hair, if this sudden reveal is anything to go off of. It’s a bite mark, sunken into his neck, clear as the day around them.

Ryan’s chest grows warm at the sight of it. Then, just as quickly as the warmth had appeared, it crystallises and shatters. His stomach drops out beneath him, his guts surely spilling out onto the grass beneath him and sending frozen droplets of blood flying off to smash against the trees. He swears he can feel the weight of his guts within his hands, like he’s picking them up to try and shove them back inside, when he sucks in a deep breath. That’s a bite mark on Dylan’s throat and not only does he know what that means, he knows that Ryan couldn’t have done it himself, as much as he’s shamefully fantasised over the thought. It can’t even be the bite that infected Dylan in the first place. 

Dylan drops the short strands of hair back to cover it, turning to them again. “So, I figured since you seem to get a scar, y’know, a bite mark kind of scar, and then you talk about being pack or remembering the night or- I don’t know. I thought that meant that this meant- urgh. You know.”

“How long have you had that for?” Ryan asks, quietly, the air sucking any strength from his words out through where he has been torn open navel to collarbone. 

“August?”

“August? Or August. Was that a question?” Kaitlyn asks, glancing between each of them.

“Did I do that to you?” Emma asks at nearly the same time, her eyes burning holes through her palms where they rest in her lap.

Dylan looks a little like he wants to be swallowed up by the sea of blood splattered all over the grass beneath their feet. Like he regrets speaking in the first place at all. The realisation that he can’t toss the dirt back in the hole he just dug himself is visible on his face and he sighs. “Yeah, August. You didn’t do it Emma, that bite didn’t scar, just this one. I noticed it like a week after I got home.” 

“If it’s scarred on you now, then it happened when you were a wolf, yeah.” Kaitlyn says with some thought. “Why didn’t you mention it in September?”

Dylan just shrugs. His guts now safely shoved back inside himself, with a quick glance, or rather admittedly glare, sent in Kaitlyn’s direction, Ryan speaks with the inside of his cheek being chewed between each word. “We can’t know who did it, no one remembers that night.”

“Right. So… I am? A part of the pack? Or not?” Dylan asks, looking between both Ryan and Kaitlyn in confusion.

Ryan uses all of his will power to not look at Kaitlyn again. It wouldn’t make sense for her to have bitten him that night, especially not there, it’s so incredibly unlikely that it was her. And yet… and yet it would explain why she gets so mad at Ryan for his interactions with Dylan. And yet it would explain how close they are. It wouldn’t make sense and yet a sense of betrayal settles deep within him, one he tries to to stop from growing. He said it himself too, there’s no way to know who did it, there’s no point feeling so horrible about it. That doesn’t stop his words coming out flat anyway. “You are Dyl, don’t worry about it. We should probably get back though, Travis will be here any minute.”

With an awkward or tense sort of quiet now, everyone begins to make their way across the clearing, with Kaitlyn and her stupid impeccable sense of direction at the lead. Everyone except Emma, who calls out from behind their retreating forms. “I do need help down, at the very least, if I’m not getting carried back.”

With a sigh, Ryan turns to take a step back, when a heavy footfall catches his attention. Kaitlyn has also turned back, her arms folding. “You’re not actually a princess Emma, do it yourself.”

“Obviously, I already said I’m a perfect little angel, do keep up. Oh, also, no.” Nearly every other word is accompanied by an eyeroll, which is frankly a little impressive. He wonders if that’s the true reason she ever did need contacts, to help with the strain after performances like these. 

“Fine, if you-” Kaitlyn begins to stomp back to the rock but Emma sends a lightning quick wide eyed look to Ryan and he doesn’t need to know the reason why for him to step in. 

Though in his own poorly sifted hurt he cannot look at her, he raises a hand up to Kaitlyn, making himself force another louder and far more dramatic sigh than before, acting all frustrated with himself when he tells her, “It’s fine, you guys go ahead, I put her up there in the first place.” 

Kaitlyn stays still for a moment and from the corner of his eye he can see her looking like she’s going to continue arguing it anyway, before she scoffs and shrugs and heads back to Dylan at the treeline. After that whole show last night, he may have thought there was a chance that maybe they were just doing the same act as each other, pretending to feel an irritation or frustration that neither of them truly did. However the burning smoke in the air, undercut only by the sour and steadily rotting scent of fruit, is enough to make him know that frustration has to be real. Jesus, Ryan may know it’s a solely good thing that he has this complete insight now, yet he kind of wishes that the strange interactions between Emma and Kaitlyn were not the first he understood. Because despite whatever playful bullying was going on last night, it has not translated to the day. He thinks maybe he hadn’t understood it as well as he had initially assumed. If that bite was hers too that would- no, he’s not thinking about that. 

Once Emma has slid down the rock, his hands supporting her forearms for less than a second until she is able to stand on her own completely fine, he gives her a pointed look. “Hope that was worth it. You alright?”

“Kaitlyn definitely likes you.” She says back, straight to the point.

He’s beginning to think the quarry, on top of the whole werewolf situation, also has some strange time warping bullshit going on or something of the like. Nothing else could explain how Ryan feels as if he’s aged at least a decade over the past few days. He doesn’t slap a palm to his face or tiredly rub his temples, but it’s a near thing. “That’s your priority right now? Really? Not remembering the night, not everything we worked out, not Dylan being mysteriously bitten, hell, not even me being magically taller- that… That’s your priority? Why?”

Emma's head ticks sideways and she purses her lips at him. “Ryan, I am not stupid and so I do not expect you to pretend to be either.” 

“Yeah, alright.” Ryan says with a shake of his own. “You’re definitely reading that wrong though.”

“Well it’s certainly not wishful thinking, is it?” She says wistfully. “Explains why she’s so mad at you whenever you flirt with Dylan, doesn’t it?”

Ryan shakes his head, turning back to start following the subject of their conversation, looking back with a flick of his head to get Emma to follow as well. “That’s not it, if it’s anything it’s… well, what we just saw. 

“What, do you think Kaitlyn did that?” Emma asks curiously. “How come? And what relevance is there?”

“A bite on the neck, it’s- it’s different.” Ryan makes a face as he wavers in what he’s saying, despite knowing it’s true, he’s unsure how to say it. “It’s romantic?”

Emma laughs at him. It’s a short one sure, but it’s a laugh and it’s directed firmly at him. “Right. Okay, romantic biting, what else would it be. I don’t know what I expected at this point, honestly. Wait, I’m sorry, you think Kaitlyn bit Dylan romantically? What?”

“I mean, who else?” Ryan mutters, put out now that he’s not only feeling shit but being laughed at for it too.

“Literally anyone.” Emma states obviously, throwing her hands out in a shoulderless shrug before clapping them together. “Literally any of us who were out in the woods- so that’s who, like, Jacob, Nick, Abi, me, YOU. Only Max truly couldn’t have done it, sooo?”

She admittedly has a point. A little of his betrayal dissipates at it being stated in such a direct and obvious matter. Still, it had made sense, with how Kaitlyn’s been acting towards Ryan’s interactions with Dylan. “Okay, well, why else would she hate me and being- y’know- towards Dylan?”

“Again, she likes you.” Emma rolls her eyes but there’s this sad and truthfully, pathetically pity inducing downward quirk of her brows and glance of her eyes that speaks volumes to how she really feels about that prospect. “That’s what this is all about.”

“Yeah it’s definitely not that. We’re not like that.” Ryan tells her plainly. 

“You’re not, yeah, we all know why that is.” Emma says with a petulant display of crossed arms and once more pouted lips, a little less pity inducing and a lot more whingy, while maintaining its patheticness at a pretty consistent level. He’s never seen her like this before. 

“Yeah alright, cool it.” He tells her in the same manner he does to his little sister when she’s getting worked up over something trivial just for the sake of it. He switches subjects, feeling a little better himself and both knowing his time has come and the fact it was Emma herself who presented it to him on a silver platter makes him feel even better. “So what were you two arguing about before?”

She purposefully swishes her ponytail behind her in a gesture meant for dramatics. “Oh come on, you remember the night too, you saw how she was treating me! I was being bullied.” 

“Yeah? So then why were you blushing?” He asks and even manages a grin at the sight of the instant eye roll, the longest and most dramatic of all she’s done today.

“Shut the fuck up Ryan.” She throws over her shoulder after managing to quickly overtake him as she stomps ahead on, lo and behold, two legs that work perfectly fine.

He lets himself have a small scoff of a laugh under his breath despite everything else that now weighs on him after this morning, catching up to her on longer legs and settling into the quiet as they make their way back to the track and dock, with a small detour for Ryan to fetch his boots. Luckily for himself and Emma, the other two have left an easy to follow path through the small stretch of woods. It’s not that they’ve cleared it for them by making their way through first, no, branches still clings to their clothes and the overgrowth makes its best attempt to entangle them. It’s the scent, hanging in the air like noxious gas, only growing lighter by the time they’re just a few measly steps from the wooden planks hanging above the lake.

Travis does indeed wait for them, but the annoyance on his face isn’t deep enough for him to have been waiting too long. He probably took his sweet time in an effort to make them be the ones left waiting, a clearly failed plan. He doesn’t speak a word as they drop down into the little row boat, just shifting the oars out of the way to make their boarding a little less hazardous. He squints at Ryan before thrusting the oars into his hands, scowling a little at the raised brow that Ryan gives him.

“You look perky enough.” Travis tells him, a judging eye scanning over his figure, likely spotting what it took them all far longer to notice.

After last night, he still feels slighted enough towards the man to feel completely warranted in being a bit of an asshole. Ryan rests one of the oars down to lift a hand to his chest, glancing down at his pec half confusedly, half disgustedly and entirely sarcastically.

Travis does a mix of a groan and a sigh in one, clearly fed up with Ryan before he’s even had the chance to say a word. “Cut it out. I don’t want none of that, I’ve got news for you kids.”

All eyes are immediately on him, the little row boat even rocking slightly with the force of which the others turn towards him. There is a slight pause where he nods at Ryan to push them off and set across the lake, the steady rhythm of the rowing settling Ryan’s nerves, as he works up the question he’s truthfully felt too scared to yet ask. “Is this about the man in the suit?”

“What? Who are you talking about?” Travis rears back as if the question was a bird flying low over the water and about to collide with his forehead.

“The man last month, driving away from your property, had a black car, wore a suit.” Ryan reminds him, clearing his throat as he tries to convince himself that he does want the answer to his next question. “Why was he visiting you?”

“The man… You mean my lawyer?” Travis asks and it is with genuine confusion, Ryan’s pretty sure. It’s only Emma’s pleased little huffed hum from being proved right that makes him actually certain.

“Right. Sorry,” He feels stupid for asking now that he has, but that’s a mystery solved and a lingering anxiety reduced at least, Ryan supposes. Still, it’s only the oars in his hands that keeps Ryan from reaching a hand to rub at the back of his neck in his staple awkward gesture, “Uh, continue.”

Travis gives him an odd look, but does continue. “Okay? Well no, no, this is uh…” Any surprises these days are enough to unsettle Ryan. Maybe he picks up on that, as Travis almost immediately trails off to visibly steel himself before he continues and with a still shaking head, he opens his mouth with an aborted wince accompanying it. 

“You can go home.” Immediately he is forced to cut off the rising interruptions with a raised hand and a tut. “Ah, ah ah. Proper home, wherever you came from, out of state. As I said they would, seems like they’ve given up on all the blood tests. Investigations fully wrapped up.”

Chapter Text

The world blurs behind the panes of glass like a hand smeared over the canvas of a beautiful landscape painting, rendering it nothing more than splotches and streaks of green and blue. His palms tap against the steering wheel in time with a song, falling out of rhythm for a moment as he smoothes the wheel around to take a corner, the world losing some of its blur while gaining new smudges of colour, adding hints of white and various hues of red to the palette as homes pass him by. It’s all vaguely familiar to him and now with a month of driving under his belt, Ryan’s hands steer him through upstate New York while his mind wanders off, thoughts inattentively drifting through memories, floating through song lyrics and stumbling through unwritten scripts of greetings and pleasantries. 

All things considered, Ryan’s time home so far has been fine. He’s felt normal in a way he has not achieved before now. Now, that’s not to say he’s acted any more normal than months past, but truth be told, he hasn’t really noticed those ‘unusual’ behaviours this month. They’ve fitted into him, become a part of him that isn’t separated from the whole, he’s remained as coalesced in his time home as he had been beneath the full moon. The same is to be said of his senses too. They’ve remained stronger than even the last few months and yet they no longer bring that overwhelmed feeling along with them. Loud things remain loud, quiet things are clearly audible, smells are distinct, minuscular things are placed beneath a microscope in his vision. The difference is, he thinks, it no longer feels like his senses have been suddenly upheaved to something that he was not made to experience. Rather it feels like his body is now suited to senses of this potency and anything less would leave him impaired and the world around him dull. As it has all become in this coalescence, it has become natural- normal, innate, intrinsic and all together rather unexceptional.      

That aside though, it has still not been a fantastic time home by any means. Rest assured, the ever expanding and ever freezing black hole in his guts sees to it that he stays a little ever so humbly miserable at all times. It’s just to say that it hasn’t been too terrible either; just fine really. He was home half a week before Thanksgiving, giving him enough time to think of various excuses and explanations, in an attempt to not be caught spluttering and speechless like he nearly was when confronted about his ear.  

It turned out entirely unnecessary however, as Ryan’s Nana was simply thrilled with what she has dubbed his ‘long overdue growth spurt’. She’s convinced her home cooked meals she has been sending him off with nearly every night the past couple of months is the cause and remains quite proud of this fact. He wasn’t completely out of the woods with the matter however, as Pop had eyed him suspiciously when Ryan showed up for work that first day back, staring as if Ryan had grown a second head. He’d looked much less convinced that Nana’s heapings of soul food had managed to seemingly extend his bones and stretch his skin over the weekend but he kept mute on the matter regardless. Ryan thinks perhaps there’s not much that can be said on the matter, as suspicious as he may be, so for once, he’s actually not worrying over it too much.

Ryan himself is just taking it in stride, as to him, it’s a bit like yeah, sure, why not? If he can spend the night as a monstrous wolf-like creature and feel completely normal about it, then why would he waste a single second questioning waking up from that with some added height? It’s really not the craziest thing that’s happened to him this year and it is, at the very least, an answer to the cause of all those vertical lacerations he’d torn open that day before the moon. If anything, he’s just grateful none of that scarred. It’d definitely be harder to explain that than it was a sudden, random as it may be, growth spurt. This is just the most benign change he could have experienced and thankfully the easiest to explain away too- growth spurts are certainly unusual at Ryan’s age but as he has demonstrated, clearly not impossible.

Outside of that, Thanksgiving itself was another fine affair. Just fine. Spent of course with his grandparents and Sarah, he’s been coasting off the leftovers ever since. The rest of his month he’s just spent at work or on his most recent animation project, working tirelessly, though barely making a dent. He’s been calling Dylan while he does, some nights. That’s nice. That’s really nice actually and probably the only thing that’s kept him from doing something drastic.

Something drastic like grabbing the nearest empty energy drink can and ripping it open, using the sharp aluminium to slice into stomach, reaching through his intestines falling into his lap, reaching into his gut until his hand disappears, then his wrist and his forearm and until he is elbow deep in his own stomach. Elbow deep and unable to reach any further solely due to the connection of his arm to his torso by his shoulder; the void in his stomach vast and deep and perhaps never ending and freezing his bloodstained arm until the skin blisters and blackens with frostbite.

Ryan shakes his head, clenches his jaw and blinks his eyes shut hard and just long enough to chase the vivid image from his mind. Or something drastic like checking himself into a voluntary stay at the ward for having thoughts like that. 

Clearly, he’s not handling it well, the void. It hit the second he got home and has only gotten worse as the month has progressed. It’s impossibly worsened more than even the month before, he swears. It may not be a traditional sense of pain, but it is more excruciating than the transformation has ever been. He’s not sleeping, barely eating, he sweeps through work like a ghost and curls up in bed with arms clutched around himself as if he’ll be able to starve off the cold. He doesn’t know what to do. 

He does know that he can’t complain, at the very least. His month, despite the pit in his gut driving him to concerns for his sanity, has ultimately been fine. Nothing to write home about, this way or that. The others though, it’s safe to assume that they’re all having a much worse month than him. Chaotic, at the very least, compared to Ryan’s quiet month home in his sleepy little town. 

Even if some of them weren’t thrown into an immediately incredibly stressful month with packing and moving, it may still come. Like Ryan himself, though not immediately affected by the release from being held within state, this will very likely send ripples that may affect them all in unexpected ways through the upcoming months or even distant future. This could make things a lot more difficult for the others, concerningly so. If any of their parents are even slightly strict about their kids going off for a, at minimum, three night ‘holiday’ each month, then their attempt at a gap year for adjustment and healing might well be cut short, if they’re forced to move out and thus get a job to support themselves. This could bite them all in the asses, harder than they may initially assume. Or it could be totally fine. Hopefully that. 

Despite vague discussion back at the quarry, they’d all listed off where they’ll be moving back home to in their text chat. Which, thank god, as Ryan would not have remembered everyone's home states and towns otherwise in the messy and unorganised verbal attempt. Those vague discussions were a little hard to follow, in the midst of their relief, excitement and anxieties. It’s a bit of a mixed bag, Ryan supposes, they’re pretty spread but luckily no one is too westward. 

Laura and Max are down in North Carolina, though those two are the most likely to move into their own space in Ryan’s opinion, so he wouldn't be surprised if they decide to move within New York state. The two of them have lived on their own for the last few years and have just been renting in a town around the outskirts of New York, Ryan's pretty sure, so they could choose to just continue the lease. Better than what’s probably around a fifteen hour drive every month.

Ryan’s talked to Kaitlyn a bit about her situation, what about how she and her mom have been temporarily renting out a couple motel rooms in the outskirts of NYC, something that got very expensive very quickly. She’d told him her mom would be all but sprinting home on foot the second she’s back, back to where her dad’s been holding down the fort with her little brother while they were away. Which, the faith in returning to a house not covered in kids toys and crayon marks hadn’t seemed strong. She’d called it too, they’d driven back home over that first weekend. Now she's home, she's actually the farthest over to the West. She's also who Ryan has the least worries about making it back.

Jacob however is apparently planning to stay in state. He’s moved in with his dad, Kaitlyn said, what was meant as a short term stay and has become his more permanent resolution to the permanent anchor they’re now attached to in the remote upper state. Though he hadn’t pried why, she’d sounded worried about the prospect, despite things being a little strained between them at the time. She was likely just upset that she will no longer be able to make the hour trip between their sister states to visit him, when they inevitably made up. Which they already have. It made sense to Ryan though, Jacob has a job around here now and he’d either be having to buy a car and a boat load of gas each month, that or plane tickets. Assumably free or at the very least, low board housing with his dad is far, far less expensive.

Meanwhile Emma is going back home to Virginia. She still has her van, but it's doubtless that she will be flying up each month. It's not like she doesn't have the cash. He can’t put his finger on how she’ll be feeling about that, now that she has suddenly lost all of her passengers and will certainly making the switch to air travel, if she will enjoy the peace or if she'll secretly miss their bickering and Dylan’s music. He thinks even for all her complaints, though she'd never admit it, it’ll be the latter. 

Abi doesn’t have to go far at all, only adding two hours to her trip as she returns home to Boston. However she is admittedly someone Ryan worries about getting back to the quarry anyway. It’s still a five hour drive she'll be making alone each month and there is no longer anyone to force her into the car. Does she even have a car? He feels a little bad to admit it, but he genuinely knows nothing of Abi’s home life, whether she has siblings, lives with both her parents, or anything really. He should probably ask, even if just to get a read on how she’s going to be making her way back to the quarry each month. 

Now while Nick doesn’t actually have to move at all, he’s definitely still the one left in the most awkward position. The kid only turned eighteen in July and began his last year of school at the start of September, online classes, if Ryan’s not mistaken. While the rest of them have had to give up college dreams, Nick will be forced to be a high school dropout if he can’t make this work. If his parents don’t let him leave every month, he’ll have to move out and get a job to support himself, while very likely failing to manage classes atop that. It’s a worse case scenario of course, but the other option of a worse case scenario is not making it to the quarry and mauling countless innocent people; so yeah, one of those is definitely worse than the other and it probably isn’t having to work blue collar.   

Then there’s Dylan, heading home to Maine. He and his mom have been staying with his uncle just out past Albany, holed up in his guest room. Dylan's excitement to get home cannot be overstated and Ryan can’t blame him, he doesn’t think he could imagine anything worse. He doesn’t know how Dylan plans on getting to the quarry each month, but it doesn’t really matter, he’s already planning to offer him a ride. What’s an added thirteen hours to Ryan’s own monthly trip when he’d get at least half of that with Dylan chattering away beside him? It’s simple mathematics really.

Everyone now spreading out through the east is not necessarily an unavoidable train wreck in waiting but it is a rock on the tracks, that’s for sure. They’ve all acknowledged the permanence of their condition and made agreements to not be negligent, to not risk others, to return to the quarry each month come hell or high water. Still, this dispersing and distancing of them brings far greater risk of things going wrong. Perhaps another conversation needs to be held on how they’ll continue to manage this through the future, or if not, then even just another reiteration of the mortal importance of making it to the quarry for their transformations. 

So, with all of that going on, he’s probably not the only one going through it. Still, it doesn’t stop him feeling sorry for himself. He’s kind of been holding out for this all week. And- checking his route on his phone- he’s only got about ten minutes more of his drive left to wait.

He’d been struggling through more intricate rigging when he’d called Dylan, though he swears showing Dylan his current work wasn’t procrastination. Maybe caving in and showing him some of his previous finished works may have been. Going down a rabbit hole discussion about one of Dylan’s favourite video games, which Dylan swears his art style is similar to, yeah, well that definitely was. But it led to Dylan trying to get Ryan to download said game, which led to Dylan whinging about needing to live vicariously through Ryan since his computer was already packed up, which led to talking about moving and his dread towards it, considering it was going to require two trips since his uncle is out of state at the moment and his car taken with him. That all of course led to the most obvious conclusion, with Ryan offering to help and now, instead of working on his animation, he’s about to drive about seven hours each way. He passed procrastination a while ago, this has to be something entirely separate at this point. 

Smoothing the wheel around another corner, Ryan squints at each letterbox he passes, until he’s found the shiny silver numbers he was told to look for. The driveway is empty and he backs in just enough that he’s off the road, prepared to move it back out to the street if need be. The engine sputters out, the keys left in the ignition, the door closing with a thud behind him and Ryan’s only made it a couple steps down the driveway when Dylan emerges from the front door.

He waves a hand over his head, as if he were hard to spot as the sole person in the middle of the driveway, as if Ryan was ever not completely conscious of his presence or his absence. “Hey! You made it!”

“Don’t sound so surprised, you’ll make me think you have doubts in my driving abilities.” Ryan titters back, the offended tone overridden by the exhaled laugh that escapes between his words.

“Oh, I have full confidence.” Dylan says with a serious conviction that is emphasised by the end of his approach and crossed arms. “You’re entrusted with moving the two most precious things I’ve ever had, nearly everything I hold dear in this life. Oh, also my life but that’s whatever.”

Though he ended it with this wishy washy little wave of his hand and tilt of his head, an obvious joke, the sentiment of what he was saying has Ryan- well, he refuses to call himself bashful, but regardless he finds himself quickly stuffing his hands in the pockets of his hoodie and chewing the inside of his cheek. He clears his throat and knows he sounds awkward when he says, “High praise.”

“The highest.” Dylan agrees with a cheeky grin and a tilt of his head, before the grin fades to something more thoughtful, something softer. “Thank you for coming and helping me with this. It’s uh, it’s good to see you.”

Ryan nods and says just as genuinely, “Yeah, o’course, it’s good to see you too.”

Dylan nods back and there’s a moment of awkward silence where they just look at each other, Ryan still chewing the inside of his cheek and Dylan still with a tilted head. Then they go to speak at the same time, words overlapping until they are intelligible and after an awkward pause, Ryan gestures for Dylan to go first. He finally straightens up, though only so his tilted head can sway around until it’s slightly tilted to his left instead, his eyes flicking up to the sky, to Ryan, to the ground and back to Ryan before he does speak at the beginning of an awkward laugh. “Um, this is- it wouldn’t be weird if I uh, ah. Right? Um.”

Dylan nods to himself again, despite Ryan having no clue on what he was just asked. Then Ryan’s arms are filled with Dylan. Immediately, unconsciously, naturally, he’s wrapped his own around his ribs, hands resting against his shoulder blades like they are equally both sharp enough to slice deep lacerations into his palms and brittle enough that they should snap if he applies any more pressure than this gentle touch. Dylan has no such qualms, his own arms around Ryan’s torso in what is nearly a death grip, his hands reaching as far around Ryan’s ribs as they can and trapping Ryan’s elbows between them. It isn’t the most comfortable but it wasn’t meant to be, he thinks, with how Dylan nearly broke his own nose against the top of Ryan’s sternum with the force of which he propelled himself forward. It’s not the most comfortable but that’s not why Ryan let's go. Dylan mumbles out another awkward filler and moves to take a step back when Ryan pulls him back into the hug. This time though, he is able to wrap his arms over his shoulders, holding him tightly and securely, exactly like he’s needed after what he’s suddenly decided was a hellish month back home.

They stand there for entirely too long. Yet Ryan refuses to let go until Dylan does and when they pull apart, despite the mirrored nervous smiles and embarrassed clearing of throats, there’s something warm in Ryan’s chest that’s shining rays down into the cold pit in his stomach, melting away the ice crystals formed around the edges of the void, leaving something light in their wake. He feels himself settled, winter making way for summer, warmth in the air and breath in his lungs. 

“It’s good to see you.” Ryan repeats and it sounds like everything he can’t say. 

“Yeah, it is.” Dylan returns with this small smile and it’s so clear where the sunlight in Ryan’s chest has come from. Maybe, he realises with clarity as blinding as Dylan’s smile, maybe this is what really makes the void vanish. Maybe it isn’t the quarry or the clearing or the island, but it’s this. Or maybe it is those things and maybe Dylan has just become home to him too. It doesn’t matter either way, he can feel the way that void that has plagued him all month withers under the beams and it’s like finding the surface when crawling from the grave. It’s going to be a hard drive home. 

With that in mind, Ryan would be more than happy to continue standing here in the chilly Fall air but with a little start, Dylan looks back to the house before suddenly looking guilty. “Shit, we should probably get a move on, hey? Mom’ll be waiting, she wants my room set up again first or she knows for the next week I’ll just hang out and annoy her while she’s watching tv, so.”

Ryan flicks a hand towards the front door, “Lead the way.”

He follows Dylan down the driveway and into the house, led to the front of what he assumes is the guest bedroom door before he’s stopped, Dylan turning around after grabbing the doorknob, still holding it with his back to the door, as if he’s hiding it behind him. “Now listen.” He says very seriously.

“Yuhoh.” Ryan jokingly grimaces. “Feel like I’m about to be forced to sign either a waiver or an NDA.” 

“No, no. No such thing, I promise. Just, I have a horrible little creature locked away in here and thought I’d warn you that she may not like you but it’s nothing personal I swear,” His lips twist to the side before he continues. “It’s the whole… dog thing. Took Dinger two months to be normal with me again, so, y’know. No offence.”

Ryan raises his hands in front of him with a nod. “Warning appreciated and no offence taken. But I’ll charm her, you’ll see.” Now, Ryan doesn’t have explicit confidence that he actually will do such a thing, but despite his failures with the general populace through his life, little kids and animals he has a pretty high success rate. 

Dylan’s twisted lips remain that way, but transform into a smile instead, his head tilting sideways before his body follows it through and in a fluid movement he has turned and entered the room. Following behind, Ryan finds himself in a shockingly cramped space; a twin bed shoved in the corner in a way that removes any possible access to the closet, a desk squeezed in at the end of it, it’s office chair forced on an angle just to fit, while the double bed, that’s assumably the only piece of furniture actually intended for the room, takes up the majority of the space. Other than the furniture it’s been stripped, leaving it pretty bare bones, except for the box labelled ‘Wires’ on the floor, the PC and monitor in the middle of the room and an empty cat carrier atop the desk. The so-called horrible little creature lifts her head from where she was curled up on the bed, standing immediately upon either seeing Ryan or smelling the scent rolling off him.

Schrödinger, or Dinger for short, is hardly a little thing, this big ball of orange fluff at the end of the bed. She’s not entirely orange, with a little white mask and ruff, but Ryan’s pretty sure ginger girl cats are rare as is. This is of course not the first time Ryan has seen her, photos being sent at all hours of the day, ranging from her being genuinely exceptionally cute to just looking like a normal cat, though Dylan swears there’s no difference. Ryan offers her a nod of peace as if she’d understand it, before electing to just completely ignore her in an attempt to acclimate her to his presence. 

“You’ve been sharing this room with your mom this whole time?” Ryan asks, despite having been already told as such. Ryan’s not sure he could share this tight a space with anyone without ending up just packing his bags and moving to the backyard after a night. Night at most, hour as likely. 

Dylan, though he clearly picks up on Ryan’s tone, just shrugs. “Yeah. She’s my best friend, so it’s not really- um.” His face scrunches and he makes that embarrassed tight lip smile. “Which, saying out loud I realise I probably shouldn’t admit that, but it’s true. Uh. We’re really close but honestly I probably drive her crazier than me, so. I get the sentiment, you’re not half wrong.” 

Ryan doesn’t really know what to say to that, an ugly, familiar, green and muddied feeling reemerging from the depths of his chest. “Uh, you- yeah, I mean you sound close.”

“I think she’s the only person who really understands me.” Dylan admits in this hurried sort of way, like he isn’t sure if he’s allowed to. “Sometimes I wonder if she’s the only person who ever will.”

Ryan isn’t quite sure what to say to that either. Though Dylan tries to lighten it with a tacked on laugh at the end, convincing as it is, he’s always convincing, and Ryan sees right through. He truly believes it and how condescendingly presumptuous would Ryan be to disagree with him? Meaningless, baseless reassurances ring hollow, so as he finds he always does, Ryan just says what he knows to be true. “I’d like to.” 

Maybe he’s overstepped as now Dylan himself seems unsure what to say, his face making this complicated and indecipherable expression, his head slightly turning away and his chest visibly expanding with a deep breath of air. Clearing his throat and attempting to save them both from this teetering exchange, he looks at the carrier stuffed full with hair covered blankets and asks, “She good with car rides?”

Dylan visibly gathers himself back up and gives a short hum, a sarcastically amused sound. “Ah well. She is probably going to sing to us the entire ride, I’m afraid. At least until she tires herself out, which may take a while. Little popstar in the making, this one.”

“Hmh, I’m sure she sounds just like you.” Ryan says purposefully distractedly as he slowly makes his way to stand beside the desk, looking down at the pattern of the blanket in the carrier, his right hand hanging by the end of the bed. 

“Wow. No really, wowww.” Dylan says in mock offence, drawing out the length of the second repetition until he very quickly finds himself beginning to run out of breath. 

Ryan allows a hidden smile for himself that grows as whiskers tickle his thumb, a tiny nose bumping against his knuckles before to his surprise, Dinger gives a full rub of her cheek against the back of his hand. Feeling that’s as plain acceptance as any, Ryan slowly turns around her, offering his hand a little more and she repeats the action. He watches her smudge against his hand for a moment in pleasantly surprised confusion. Admittedly charming her was far easier than he anticipated.

“What the fuck.” Dylan scoffs, sounding equal parts happily amused and almost a little offended. “Guess you meant it, huh? Wait no, actually she just likes you because you were mean to me. Was that your plan all along?”

Raising just one hand this time, as now his other is occupied patting the apparently very friendly cat, Ryan acquiesces. “You caught me. Worked though, didn’t it?”

Dylan gives an unimpressed hmph sound. “Yeah alright, let’s find out if you stay friends after the drive first and then we’ll see.”

Never one to overstay his welcome or test his good luck, giving one last scritch behind Dinger’s ear, Ryan steps away to pick up the PC case and after hefting it into his arms, he plainly states, “Hey, you said nothing about a lasting friendship, I’ve already followed through with all the promises I made.”

Heading out the door, Dylan tails after him while carrying his monitor and muttering something about loopholes and how he will actually be requiring written and signed agreements going forward. They pack the truck cabin first before Ryan sends Dylan off with the office chair while he frees the desk. On his return, together they shuffle it through to the sliding door and then slowly waddle it to the truck, using a bit more effort to lift it into the truck bed. Dylan, stick man that he is, nearly breaks Ryan’s fingers on at least two separate instances, but well, it’s not like they wouldn’t just heal right back up anyway. In fairness, Ryan did not help the situation, distracted by their bickering, but he had good reason to be. As what had begun as an interesting conversation on pet cloning, had instead rather quickly turned into deliberation over the very possible future reality where they are faced with a zombie cat outbreak, which at the time of lifting the desk, had by then become said bickering over the exact percentage chance of this zombie cat outbreak actually occurring. However after all that, it took barely any time to secure the desk and chair and once they had herded Dinger into her carrier, they were on the road. Well, technically, the bickering on that last point ended only when they were quite a few roads down, but that remains besides the point.

It’s a long enough drive, the longest he’s done in one go before, but he reckons he’s done enough three hour drives that if he just adds them up then it’s not so different. Despite having not done much until he got his truck, he’s never found driving to be a strain and actually rather enjoys it, he’s just never had reason to go so far before. What is different however is driving with Dylan beside him, it’s actually very different from driving alone. Dylan was immediately fiddling with the radio, trying to find them something to play in the background but mostly landing on static. Eventually, after an admirable effort, he finally gave up and fished a portable speaker from the wires box by his feet. Filling the cab with handpicked music, Dinger finally found herself with a backing track. Her grating singing from between them was intercut with periodic breaks where she would quieten down but for the first leg of the journey it remained mostly relentless nonetheless. Conversation drifted in and out between them, at times in depth discussion on topics ranging from Dylan’s interests of physics and video games to Ryan’s interests of animation and reading, to how school went for them, to food hottakes, to very serious deliberation over various songs. After their mid point stop, stretching legs, grabbing drinks and giving Dinger some water, with their fingers crossed the brief break wouldn’t start up the singing once more, they were back to it. At one point, when Dylan had twisted in his seatbelt and rested the back of his head against the window, Ryan had told him he was fine to have a nap if he wanted but he’d been assured that Dylan was sticking the drive out awake, that it was the least he could do. Ryan wasn’t quite convinced he would stick to the assurances, with the way he caught Dylan’s eye fluttering closed in the corner of his vision, but he didn’t argue the point.

Ryan did however have to roll down his window at this point, letting the crisp air roll through the cabin and clear his head. The contentedness and ease that Dylan feels permeates around them, blanketing the cabin in something sweet and heady like an airborne anxiolytic. It leaves him foggy, a drifting peaceful calm wisping away all thoughts and unfortunately, that is not the best condition to be in when driving. At least with the window open, even though it washes away the bulk of the scent that was leaving his head stuffy, a residue of sweetness has remained in his lungs. 

The cold air seemed to wake Dylan up too anyway and thankfully, with Dinger having adjusted to the ride, they were able to focus on the music and conversation without the constant interruptions. Drifting between the two after a couple more hours passed, they found themselves somehow brought to a random thought that sparked an entirely unnecessary but extremely passionate debate. Ryan can’t even remember what was initially said that has somehow managed to bring them here. 

“Okay, so, just to sum this all up, right?” Ryan taps his hand against the steering wheel in a grounding gesture made as an attempt to turn his bafflement into conviction. “I can’t believe in bigfoot, because that’s such a ridiculous idea, and yet you can believe in aliens? And that is entirely reasonable to you?”

“Yes! Yes, that is completely reasonable and if you had actually been listening to anything I said you would understand why.” Dylan argues back immediately.

“Oh, trust me, I was listening, but that doesn’t mean you’re right. Heaps of proof of bigfoot, zero real proof of aliens.” Ryan asserts again, as if it needs repeating. It’s an unfair statement and he’s completely aware of that- that’s what makes this fun. This entire debate is ridiculous in the first place.

Dylan makes a series of scoffing sounds in varying levels of shock and offence, petering out before his indignation is relit and he scoffs even louder. “No- Uh, excuse me? No evidence? Seriously? Okay, setting aside there is just as much ‘evidence’ of aliens as there is of that guy in a suit- oh sorry, of ‘bigfoot’, regardless, the likelihood of the existence of aliens is equivalent to the size of the unexplored universe, right? Which, that’s like, ninety five percent of it, mind you. And I mean, the universe is suggested to be flat, right? Which means it’d be technically infinite even if we can only observe a certain amount of it. Infinity means there’s a ninety nine percent chance aliens are out there.”

“Oh and that’s a scientifically backed number, huh? Ninety nine percent likelihood of aliens?” Ryan laughs right back at him. “Yeah, okay, flat earther.”

As expected, that has Dylan waving his hands about in offence as he defends himself. “Flat earther? What- don’t you dare. The flat universe has been the widely agreed upon consensus among scientists, don’t you try to discredit me with your dirty debate tactics just because you’re losing.” 

“Uh huh, right, what’s next, you’re going to tell me that birds aren’t real and JFK’s head ‘just did that’?” Ryan’s snickers turning into a full blown laugh as Dinger, randomly but with expert timing, starts back up her yowling. “See, Dinger agrees with me! Your facts and logic mean nothing here, sorry but you are outnumbered, outvoted, do not pass go.”

He’s not sorry at all and Dylan’s unimpressed expression makes it clear how very aware of that fact he is. He tips his head up and sniffs in a display of dramatics that Ryan’s not completely certain he hasn’t copied from Emma. Dylan sticks his finger through the bars at the front of the carrier, letting Dinger nibble on it before giving a little scritch to between her eyes. It quietens her again for the moment, gaining them another reprieve from the screeching, for now at least. “Can’t believe you would betray me like this, you evil little wretched beast.”

As much joy as Ryan takes in this new found ability to wind Dylan up, there is something incredibly attractive about his little fact filled tangents as he explains scientific theories with both an impressive accuracy, as if he’s pulling this information from a wikipedia page he’s left permanently open in his mind, and also in the way he delivers it with such ferocity, as if he’s certain he’ll be able to win and convince Ryan if only he should be able to explain it just right. It’s nerdy, it’s a little socially naive, it’s almost unintentionally arrogant in a way, it’s proof of his intelligence and yeah, it is just downright insanely cute. Ryan really can’t help himself but try and draw it back out of him. “Okay, okay, let me put you on a new one then. Ghosts.”

“Ghosts. Just ghosts. Is this a general topic or are we arguing ghosts exist now?” Dylan says, and as unimpressed as he tries to sound, the smile creeps through his words like vines, alighting each word with a brightness that Ryan will be bereft to ever hear him speak without again.

“Oh, ghosts exist.” Ryan says plainly and he knows immediately he’s about to get an earful; not that it will be possible for Dylan to change his mind on the matter but he’s filled with an eagerness to hear his attempt in a way he’s seldom felt before. 

“Yeah okay,” Dylan laughs at him, jabs a finger in his direction as he gears up his argument, before he’s forced to deflate. “Ah. You are so lucky. Saved just by the bell.”

Ryan believes him, though he’s disappointed nonetheless as they pull off the interstate and don’t even make it a minute into town before Dylan’s gesturing wildly from him to pull left and get them into the drive through so they can grab dinner. Then he has Dylan not even insisting on paying, skipping that step entirely and instead going straight to half clambering over him to pay for all three orders. This is all before Ryan even knows what’s happening, only able to share a panicked look with the poor employee who gives an apathetic look in return. To be fair, they’ve probably seen it all and a customer hitting their card against the reader at the speed of light is likely far from the craziest thing they’ve ever seen. Nor would Ryan’s panicked look to them, as he holds his hands up like he’s got a gun pointed at him, likely be particularly shocking either he supposes- it’s not as if they know how much effort it takes to keep his hands up, to keep them well clear incase they decide to smooth over the small of Dylan’s back or take a possessive hold of his hip bone. Regardless, they make it safely out the drive through with their three meals stuffed into a large paper bag, balanced precariously atop Dinger’s carrier, a sneaky paw batting at the ceiling in an attempt to blindly steal a loose fry.

Dylan directs him through the streets and like a cowboy with a stalk of wheat, he has a new fry hanging out the side of his lips for each corner they turn. He of course specifically informs him that they are in fact from Ryan’s carton too. Thankfully it doesn’t take long until they pull down a little dead end street and Dylan, stealing one last fry, informs him that this is their stop. As he pulls into the driveway Ryan, who has kept it together masterfully if he may say so himself, though credit where credit is due that’s in no small part thanks to Dylan’s own calmness, feels his anxiety finally rise. This is the part he really rather wants to go well, though he has already noted where the liquor store is, one he can make a detour to before he finds himself a motel room for tonight- should this go really poorly and he ends up needing to beg someone outside to grab him a bottle that he can then attempt to drown out his embarrassment with.

“We’ll take everything in after dinner, hey?” Dylan suggests as he unbuckles his seatbelt and carefully slides Dinger’s carrier over the bench. Acting fast, Ryan nabs the grease soaked paper bag from atop the carrier as it starts to tip and hooks his fingers into the crocheted throw, so neither end up falling through the door. Dylan acknowledges the action with a sheepish smile as he steadies himself and the carrier, “Thanks.”

“You alright?” Ryan asks, setting their dinner down on the bench momentarily as he nods down to the PC case that’d been held steady between Dylan’s knees for the drive. “You sure you want to leave it out here longer than necessary?”

Dylan, though he does a silly uncertain teetering motion with his head, has an odd expression on his face at the question. The same complicated, unreadable expression as earlier actually. “Oh. Uh, you know what, yeah, yeah, let's bring that in now too, if you don’t mind?”

Ryan nods with a wry scrunch of his nose, having known the answer before he’d even asked the question. Shimmying the PC from the footwell, he sets their dinner atop it and hefts it into his arms. He closes the truck door with his boot, following Dylan towards the front door and tries to breathe deep to lessen the tight feeling in his throat and chest. He reminds himself that he is Dylan’s friend and he needn’t be any more anxious than what that entails- which is nothing at all, meeting the parents of your friend is nothing at all. He supposes that means he’s not doing great on that front, he’s nervous as shit. He does have some basis for his nerves to be fair, Ryan isn’t known for good first impressions. He’s too monotone, too deadpan, speaks too plainly and directly. He’s awkward at best, standoffish in general, and to older folk especially, he comes across as just downright rude at worst. Yeah, he has reason to be nervous. Yet there’s nothing he can do but march forward, so march forward he does.

He naturally catches up to Dylan on a few long steps and as they walk up the short path across the house, his eyes flick around this first proper glimpse of the property. It’s a split level house, built similarly to a few others on the street, with a carport to the left side and the second story to the right. It may not stand out but Ryan finds every molecule and grain etched into his memory. The lone tree that drops its leaves through the yard, the green paint that’s flaking around the windows, the edges of the path that are overgrown and how from between rotting leaves the last daisies left on the lawn stretch for the fading rays of sunlight as evening approaches. There’s light behind the net curtains and as they step up to the door, it spills out to bathe the concrete path in a warm yellow, the door opening before them. Immediately Dylan beams just as brightly.

A woman stands bathed in the light that pours out from behind her, her fingers left resting on the door handle and head tilted in a very familiar manner. She’s a tall woman, with auburn brown hair piled atop her head and wide, deep set brown eyes. She wears a patchwork of blocked colour, from yellow shoes to brown pants to a teal wide sleeved top to a short orange poncho. She reminds him of a high school art teacher, only missing the paint brush shoved through her hair and the stains on her shoes. She offers them a smile, stepping aside and gesturing for them to come in.

“How’d you boys get on? Didn’t hit anyone?” 

“Just crashed into a bus filled with kids and swerved into a little old granny but, y’know, other than that we did alright.” Dylan tells her, pausing for half a second as he walks past to bump his head towards her, to let her give a quick kiss atop his hair in what is clearly a habit for them.  

“Ooh, high score.” She congratulates him with a small laugh. As Ryan takes his first step over the threshold she turns back to him and with a kind smile and fluttering hands she hurries him inside. “Come in, come in. Oh! And you brought dinner too? Dylan, I thought I told you I was going to make kulajda.”  

“I’m not letting you feed Ryan gruel.” Dylan calls back over his shoulder in response, walking deeper into the house to place down Dinger’s carrier on the kitchen bench and pop open the front grate. “And did you even go to the store? ‘Cause we won’t have any eggs. Or sour cream. Or literally anything.”

“Yes.” She replies sounding both disappointed and disgruntled by the question, though the expression she makes is an exact replica of one he has seen on Dylan many times before and that, he knows, means she in fact has absolutely not gone to the store or likely even remembered that she’d meant to. “And it’s not gruel, don’t be so rude.”

“Looks like it.” Dylan mutters, a sound that fades into the background as Ryan looks around. 

Ryan has stepped inside to find himself in a semi-open plan combined kitchen and living room, the front door opening up directly in front of the singular interior wall that constitutes the divide. He’s directed left, to the kitchen’s side of the space, shuffling around the small dining table that’s been squished against the wall beside the front door. Despite its size, it still barely fits the narrow space, its outer legs only remaining on the wooden floor by inches before they would cross the steel transition strip that borders the linoleum of the kitchen. The kitchen, which is built to feel like it’s just been shoved into the corner of the already cramped living space, is made even more constricted by its galley-style layout, the two parallel countertops leaving barely any space between them. The dividing wall that runs along the back of the counter on the right side is the colour of seafoam and has been cut out with a serving hatch. It solely serves to visually separate the space, as it extends no further than the end of the counter and with no further embellishments or attempts to hide the fact the wall simply ends halfway through the room. The flat surface of its midsection catches his eye however, as he notices sharpie marks stained onto the green paint- dozens of little dashes rising incrementally. Something within him softens to realize it's Dylan's height over the years, the first mark barely reaching Ryan's knee, and the last having only just barely disappeared behind Dylan as he’d walked past it seconds ago.

Even though they’ve only just returned home today, through the serving hatch he can see how the living room looks almost perfectly undisturbed, like Dylan had never left for camp at all or like the two of them weren’t forced to leave it abandoned for months in the aftermath. With just this short glance he can see how well loved and lived in the house is. The photos in mismatched frames, crooked and nailed into the old wallpaper, serve as proof of it. One is from an elementary science fair with a posterboard of planets behind a beaming face; the ribbon of a plastic medal caught over a pigtail, unnoticed entirely in the blinding flash of the camera. There’s another much more recent photo of Dylan, alone in the kitchen with an embarrassed smile and a birthday hat atop his head; another of Nadia outside an animal shelter, holding an apricot kitten as if it were a metal slinky; and another of Nadia and Dylan together, standing beneath a sky gleaming from countless stars, woolen hats atop their heads and their noses flushed red. Ryan can really see now just how much Dylan meant it when he said how close they are.    

The room itself, though the space remains cramped, has been styled well; albeit eccentrically, with bold colour blocking once again and more throw blankets tossed over the couch than he thinks could ever really be used. The whole space feels straight out of the sixties, which is certainly his moms styling, but Ryan finds signs of Dylan all through the place too. He finds Dylan’s spot immediately; the armchair in the corner, tucked beneath the serving hatch and covered in cat hair to a degree nothing else in the room is. It has a blanket all scrunched up in a circle on the seat cushion, with its corners tucked between the cushion and arms that suggests it's a permanent little nest he’s made with it. One of his sweaters is tossed over the back of the armchair, though whether that is still considered his or if it has become Dinger’s property, Ryan would bet the latter. Beside the armchair there’s a short side table, which he can barely see from this angle, but atop it he can still vaguely make out a tangle of charging cables and a messy stack of DVDs, which is surprisingly old school. Ryan kind of wants to go collapse down into the armchair and stay long enough that he can claim squatters rights, if he’s honest.  

“Don’t worry, just chuck it down anywhere,” Dylan’s mom says reassuringly, drawing his attention with a vague flicking motion with her hands. “I’m sure you can take it up and bring everything else in after we’ve eaten, or Dinger will beat us to it.”

“Please don’t chuck it anywhere.” Dylan says in an echo after her.

Though the reassuring tone was kind, Ryan, glancing down at the case in his hands, realises he actually had forgotten he was holding the case at all, let alone that it’s meant to be heavy at all. Quickly, though heeding Dylan’s plea he does so exceptionally carefully, he places it down on the linoleum beside the cabinets to the left, just out of the way of the fridge. Dusting his hands against his sides nervously, he turns back to Dylan’s mom to make his introductions, realising he’s gone far too long without them at this point. Which means he’s probably made a terribly rude first impression already, for fucksake. However he finds her already looking at him, waiting to do the same, but it’s with this kind of patient and non pressuring expression to her- oh. She has purposefully let him take in the new area and adjust until now, he realises with a touched start. 

“Hello. Thank you very much for this. Ryan, right? I’m Nadia, Dylan’s mom, though I hope that’s obvious- not just some random strange woman, I promise I didn’t kidnap him.” She introduces him with a wink and a smile that widens at Dylan’s scoff. Immediately, he can see where Dylan got his speech patterns, terrible jokes and mannerisms from, the resemblance of that far starker than any visual one.

“Mom, people are going to start genuinely believing that if you keep opening with it.” He steps back into Ryan’s field of vision beside his mom with an armful of orange fluff. To Ryan, he rolls his eyes towards her. “Any guesses where I got the autism and ADHD from?”

“And you need to stop telling people that.” She retorts right back, reaching up to scritch the top of Dinger’s head and getting a happy rumble in return. “No doctor has ever said as such.” 

“Doesn’t mean it’s not true.” Dylan points out. “And it’s a necessary disclaimer.” 

“Uh, well, it’s very good to meet you,” Ryan says the second he gets the chance, with a nod and what he hopes isn’t an awkward smile. “And it was no problem, more than happy to help.”

“Well it may have been no problem to you but it saved us a lot of hassle, so, we’re very appreciative.” Nadia reiterates before she continues, taking on an almost mischievous tone that strongly implies she already knows what reaction she is going to get in response, “It’s great to finally put a face to the name. Dylan’s told me everything about you, I probably know more about you than you do yourself. Though, it’s not like I haven’t already seen photos either.”

“Jesus Christ Mom! Not everything! ” Dylan’s outburst is immediate and although he soundlessly mouths the second part to Ryan, it’s done just as vehemently. Then he stresses, “They were camp photos, of all of us. I don’t know why she said it like that. You know what, how about we just eat silently, that seems really fun. You know I hate talking actually, ew, who wants to talk ever? Not me, hate it.”

Dylan deposits Dinger down on the table- and then immediately picks her back up as she makes for the dinner bag and plops her down onto the floor instead. He seems intent on ignoring their reactions as he tears apart the bag, both Nadia’s pleased expression and Ryan’s confused cock of his head. He didn’t think Nadia said it any which way until Dylan said as much, mostly due to how he was also so clearly lying, so much so that Ryan’s barely convinced he was even attempting to hide that he was lying at all. Well, Ryan knows an attempt was made but even for Ryan’s standards it was a pretty terrible lie. What he was exactly lying about Ryan isn’t sure, but it was definitely a weird reaction, he knows that much. And well, Dylan’s intent on ignoring them, that is until Nadia gets half a syllable out and Dylan whips back to look at her instantly, making it as clear as his lie that he was in fact fine tuned into them. 

With a jabbed finger, he makes a threat so thinly veiled that even Ryan understands it, cutting her off before she gets the chance to follow through with whatever she was going to say. “We can eat upstairs.” 

She nods her surrender, taking one of the two chairs at the small table. “Okay, okay, I’ll behave, settle down. C’mon, take a seat Ryan, before Dylan tries to squirrel you away from his evil mother.”

Ryan hesitates a moment, almost refusing the chair to give it to Dylan instead, but Dylan immediately hops up to sit on the edge of the counter. He looks very comfortable up there, balancing his meal in his lap and placing his drink on the ledge of the serving hatch in the wall, all with practiced ease. Another habit. There’s something about watching Dylan in his natural habitat- of seeing what his natural habitat even is. It makes something within Ryan ache. 

They don’t eat in silence, obviously. Nadia asks Ryan all sorts of questions, the most obvious small talk ones, like what do you do, in study or working and all that. But she actually seems genuinely interested in all of Ryan’s answers, prompting him further to go in depth and reacting as if it’s all really captivating information. It has any anxiety he’d held about first impressions or awkward introductions or pleasantries all just fading away. He finds that she is a very easy person to talk to and if she secretly doesn’t care for his answers at all then she hides any perceivable hint of it. Even something as boring and simple as Ryan explaining how he mostly just moves boxes and dusts the floors at work has her digging around until he finds himself explaining the history of Pop’s shop, how he came to buy it in the early nineties and has spent his life in it ever since. 

Conversation continues for a little while after they’ve finished eating but it was already dim outside when they arrived and it doesn’t take long for Nadia to suggest they bring everything in before it gets truly dark, offering to make them a drink once they’ve done so. It wasn’t difficult to pack up the van so Ryan has no concerns the reverse will be either, as it turns out Ryan genuinely was just entrusted to move the important things. Nadia had already taken the real bulk of everything else, all of her own stuff as well as Dylan’s clothes and bedding, which she kindly informs Dylan she’s already all unpacked and set up for him. Which Ryan guesses was done to save herself from a week of Dylan standing in front of the TV and the cheeky grin he gives her kind of confirms that. 

Ryan and Dylan agree immediately- worst first. Nadia hops in her car to tuck it into the carport so Ryan can back his truck up the driveway, minimising the distance they have to awkwardly shuffle the desk inside. Turns out however, that unpacking is far more difficult than packing and he really hadn’t appreciated the sliding door at Dylan’s uncle’s like he should’ve. It’s still not the heaviness that does it, it’s more the sheer clunkiness of the old wooden pedestal desk that makes it impractical to move at best. Ryan can’t hold back his snarky comment after the ordeal that was getting it through the narrow front door and he gets lectured for it all the way up the stairs. Something to do with honourable years of service and a committed relationship or something- Dylan attempts to drop it on him for his underbreath comment that perhaps to truly honour this desk they should shove it on a longship and set it ablaze with fiery arrows shot from the shoreline. He bites his tongue after that, but the sentiment remains. 

Dylan sends Ryan off to bring the PC case up while he dashes out to get the box and chair from the van, leaving Ryan with a chance to glance around the room once he’s returned a good while before Dylan, who’s 'effectively’ rolling the box in atop the chair. It’s definitely less than efficient, as Ryan can hear him having to pause every few steps to steady the box, which, just from a glance anyone could tell that it’s way too oversized for the chair to be anything less than precariously balanced atop it. Ryan would go help, but well, Dylan did try to drop a desk on him, so. 

It’s small, like all other rooms in the house, around the same size as Ryan’s own room back at his apartment. The contrast between their two rooms is stark however. What immediately stands out is the walls and ceiling. Atop the dated yellow wallpaper, there are countless posters thumbtacked into the wall, so numerous that many overlap and, like a never ending game of Tetris, they have clearly often been adjusted and moved around to fit more in; as for what is left visible of the wall between them, with his keen vision he can see how many holes have been poked all over the place. Surprisingly, while music posters are in no short supply, they’re mostly outnumbered by diagrams and maps, though only one of which is actually of Earth itself. There has to be at least one for every planet in the solar system, though Saturn has to be favoured heavily, since Ryan thinks he counts at least four different prints for it alone. It’s not just planets however, with more posters of constellations than he knew existed, a good few for sci-fi horror movies with varying levels of obscurity and also enough nasa posters that he’s certain they must have sold out at this point. Ryan, genuinely taking a second to think about it, is pretty sure he has… three things on his wall, tops? Just three photos bluetacked by his bed. And he most definitely doesn't have anything on his ceiling. Dylan has what must be multiple packets worth of those glow in the dark stars stuck all over it, seemingly at random, though Ryan wouldn’t be surprised if they were arranged into constellations, though he has no chance of recognizing it either way.      

There is also the fact that Dylan’s room is jam packed with a thousand different things, in what Ryan gets the sense is an organised chaos, where he’s certain Dylan knows where everything is but god help if Ryan tried to find anything within this ADHD explosion. The desk now slotted into its place beside the window may remain bare for now but the bulging lid of the cardboard box beside it, aptly labelled ‘Desk Shit’, reveals how crowded it usually is. He has a bookshelf wedged beside the open closet, in such a tight fit that it prevents the closet door from fully closing. To Ryan’s nosy disappointment, it contains no books, but instead every shelf is filled to the brim with CD wallets, piled up records, even more CDs spread about either in their case or left out loose and at risk of getting scratched. It’s an impressive, if cluttered collection and it’s very likely that Ryan’s being overly cocky to think he recognises about half of them. One shelf remains mostly bare however, directly in the middle of the bookshelf, where the record player, digital sampler and stereo take center stage. Even after being away for months, the dust over them is relatively light, proof of how both well used and well cared for they are. 

Across the room, past the dresser next to the door and- oh, that would be where the books are. Of course they’re not on the bookshelf, what a silly assumption that would be. Messily stacked up on the floating shelves attached to the wall on the left, there are various maths and physics textbooks, science fiction novels and nonfiction works on astronomy, space exploration and astrophysics. Off to the right side below them, pushed into the corner and already made again, is Dylan’s bed. Compared to the rest of the room, it’s really nothing special, freshly made with plain sheets and a slightly above average number of pillows. Ryan’s eyes nearly skip over it entirely to look at the motley arrangement of knick knacks on the windowsill- but then they catch. His brows furrow and he gives a cautionary glance over his shoulder before he takes a step closer.

Both the cautionary glance and the step closer were entirely unnecessary; he could very clearly hear Dylan and Nadia downstairs already and his eyes had in fact not deceived him. That’s his hoodie on the bed, that is Ryan’s hoodie on Dylan’s bed. Somehow. It’s one he hadn’t even realised he was missing, when would the little shit have even taken it? Actually, he doesn’t even care about that, why is it on Dylan’s bed in the first place? Why is Ryan’s hoodie covered in cat hair and draped over his pillows like it were as much a fixture as the sheet or duvet? He takes another step forward, keeping his attention split to catch any foot fall on the stairs even though he knows he would hear it no matter how light, gently tucking his fingers beneath the fabric of the hoodie. He lifts the edge, barely, trying hard to not visually disturb it. Not that there was any doubt about it, bu it’s his hoodie alright, all it takes is a slight lean forward and even from just under an arms length away, the scents fill his nose. Now, the whole room is covered in Dylan’s scent already, the honey dripping from the stars on the ceiling, the sugar scattered across the floor like sand in the cracks, the mango juice smeared over the window panes. However it has settled into the room over his absence, present but muted, while Ryan’s hoodie is nearly radioactive with the strength of it. Just not quite radioactive enough to entirely melt away his own scent that had long been soaked into the fiber and left behind like a stain. It’s the smell of all that cat fur that has him stepping back again though, as the urge to sneeze threatens to take hold.

Ryan’s eyes didn’t deceive him, but now he tries to convince himself that the silly idea lurking in the back of his mind has to be. Failing that, he tries to ignore the thought completely, turning back to the rest of the room to see what he recognises amongst the various posters. He finds one for the Smiths and another of Jonsey from the original Alien and well, y’know it would actually explain why Dinger was his instant best buddy, wouldn’t it? She’d probably be pretty used to his smell already if she’s been curling up on his hoodie every night. 

It’s probably no more complicated than that. Just on the bed for Dinger to sleep on. Even if that doesn’t really explain why it’s drenched in Dylan’s scent as well. Or why he took it in the first place. Or why Nadia had draped it over the pillows at the head of the bed, like where one would place a soft toy, instead of dropping it at the end as would make more sense for a cat blanket. It- he knows what would have it making sense but that would be ridiculous, wouldn’t it?

Ryan refuses to look back at his hoodie on the bed, because he isn’t actually stupid and though he did make an admirable effort, the proof is right there. His hoodie has been turned into a makeshift pillow cover. Which… Ryan knows that it doesn’t really mean anything but god does it make him feel some sort of way. Something possessive, something both pacified and gratified, something muddled as his mind revisits the question he’d tried to shrug off in the morning after the full moon. He’d told himself he wasn’t going to overthink that. He won’t overthink that. He’s not. Yet he’s still grateful for the reprieve of it all when he hears Dylan begin his struggle up the flight of stairs, shrugging the messy thoughts off with some effort and rolling his eyes fondly before moving to finally go help him.

With a little push the chair rolls into place beneath the desk and with that, Dylan is fully moved back in. Though he really, really does not want to, Ryan will have to be heading off soon, to find a room before it gets too late- as a night in the cab of his truck wouldn’t be the end of the world, but likely not the warmest either. At least the thought of Dylan in his own bed, not just safe and sound but with Ryan’s hoodie tucked in there alongside him, would make it more than worth it. 

“Got a good look around?” Dylan asks cheekily, leaning back against his dresser.

“That would take me a couple months longer I think- didn’t know it was possible to fit this much on the walls.” Ryan tells him. “Or your bookshelf. Where you don’t keep your books.”

Dylan gives a light huff of a laugh and concedes with one of his awkward closed-lip smiles. “Oh is that what it’s meant for? Yeah, no the uh, the music collection kind of overtook it pretty fast. We used to go to the thrift store and I’d leave with just arms full.”

Ryan wanders over to the bookshelf, motioning towards the sampler with a hand. “You ever make your own music?”

“No, no, I would not even make an attempt at that. No, listening is more than enough for me, they do stuff I could never even think of.” Dylan laughs lightly at the idea. “No, I have that to record my CDs and records actually. Upload them to my computer, install them onto my phone, can listen to them anywhere.”

“Pretty sure there are multiple very well known apps for that,” Ryan says with an amused huff and expression. He plucks a CD from the top of a pile, twisting his hand to vaguely skim over the back. “What, are some of these not available to stream or are you just being an old man about it?”

“Uh, some of them maybe,” Dylan says in a suddenly stilted tone. That and the quiet sound of shuffling movement has Ryan sparing a concerned glance over his shoulder, only to find Dylan has moved in front of the bed where Ryan himself was standing just a moment ago, freezing like a deer in the headlights when Ryan’s eyes land on him. Despite his awkward posture, Dylan smiles as if nothing is afoot and continues to explain, “It’s mainly because I refuse to pay a subscription for music I’ve already bought? Even if it means there’s a meow in the background of songs sometimes. Ah, but between the possible mastering differences, tracklisting and compression, I prefer how it sounds from my records and CDs anyway.”

“So, old man yells at cloud.” Ryan ribs wryly, once he’s given a more genuine acknowledgment with a thoughtful hum. Even so, with another concerned glance back, he places the CD back atop the stack and turns to face Dylan fully. “You okay?”

“Yeah, yeah. Um. Just possibly some bad news?” Though Dylan phrases it like a question in a way that would usually suggest anxiety, he doesn’t actually seem to be- still just exceptionally awkward. Ryan’s stomach dips anyway, preparing to be politely kicked out. “Uh, Mom demands our presence downstairs. Well, yours more than mine. I kinda sold you out, she really wants to keep talking to you and I accepted her hot chocolate bribe. I’m sorry but she’s roasting the marshmallows and adding chocolate syrup, so the betrayal was pretty much unavoidable.” 

“Hah. I don’t blame you, sounds like she pulled out the big guns.” Ryan snorts, an ugly sound made due to the mix of relief and humour. He is unfortunately forced to sober slightly, taking on an apologetic and regretful tone as he’s now instead forced to politely kick himself out. “I would actually love to stay and keep talking, and I really mean it, not just being polite or anything. Uh, but I should really get going if I want to find a room before it gets too late? Sorry.”

In a contained, short movement, Dylan rears back with a shake of his head. “What? Wait, do you mean- dude, I thought it went without saying but you’re staying here tonight. Right?”

“Uh. No? I wouldn’t assume that, no, I was going to find a motel or something. I don’t want to intrude,” Ryan says hesitantly, his uncertainty in his own words deepening as Dylan’s expression grows even more bewildered the longer Ryan talks. Dylan looks at him like he can’t quite process what Ryan’s saying, as if the idea that Ryan wouldn’t just assume he was staying the night hadn’t even crossed his mind. But no actually, Ryan will remain steadfast in the fact that it would have been way weirder if he had just obnoxiously assumed and invited himself.

“Oh my god, you think I’d make you-” Dylan cuts himself off with raised hands and a scoff as his bewilderment turns into an amusement filled assertion. “Not even me, cause obviously I want you to stay, but above that, you think my Mom would let you go? What, make you pay for a motel room after you saved her from driving an extra fourteen hours? Dude, she likes you more than she likes me at this point, you would not be intruding at all. Also, I have a hot chocolate downstairs that proves her interrogation of you is really not done yet, so?”

Though Dylan sounds absolutely certain, Ryan remains a little hesitant. “Are you sure?”

“Yes.” He’s told simply, firmly. “If you don’t want to then that’s another thing and it’s up to you but y’know, you’re like super-duper welcome to stay. I uh, I like having you here.”

“Well, it would be good not having to try and find a motel this late,” Ryan says sheepishly, his chest suddenly tight with a mix of warmth and tenderness from that last little admission. He doesn’t know what to do with the feeling, it makes him feel almost nervous, so he immediately tries to push it aside with an awkward clear of his throat. “I mean if you’re cool with me taking your couch, yeah, yeah, that’d be really good.”

“Oh, no way.” Dylan immediately disagrees, with a disgusted tone, grimace, shake of his head and everything. And yeah, now Ryan’s officially lost. “You can genuinely only sit on one half of our couch ‘cause one side has at least three loose springs and an internal board missing. Dinger doesn’t even sit on that side, I think if you tried to sleep on it you would quite literally fall through. And uh, I kinda doubt you’d fit curled up on one side now.”

Seconds of silence follows as Ryan nods slowly at him, his brows gradually scrunching together before all at once his expression switches to one with scrunched features, widened eyes and an accompanying slight head shake, trying to work out if Dylan is serious. “So the motel it is then?”

“No, no, we’ll share my bed, obviously. Oh. If that’s okay?” Dylan asks, suddenly sounding unsure. “I mean I guess I just assumed that’d be cool cause we’ve shared a couch before and not only is my bed way more space but also much more comfortable, so, um. Sorry, uh, if that’s not cool then I totally get it, that’s my bad for-”

“It’s cool, it’s cool.” Ryan cuts him off, pretending his heart rate hasn’t risen at the thought. “If it’s cool with you then it’s totally cool with me.”

“Great, cool, yeah, no cool with me, cool with you, awesome.” Dylan nods before sucking in a breath between his teeth. Ryan must have made this weirder than it was meant to be, feeling a little bad over the prospect, but Dylan breezes on past it. “I should probably warn you though that you’ll be in Dinger’s spot? So, since she seems to like you, you might end up suffocated in the night? Also I usually sleep sideways? Which, I’ll try to go to sleep not doing that but if I shift in the middle of the night, uh, sorry? Okay I’m kind of understanding why you might’ve wanted the motel now that I’m hearing myself outloud.”

Right now, Dylan could probably tell him that he routinely stabs people in the midst of sleepwalking and Ryan would not be deterred in the slightest. With the option now presented to him, even his own reprimands, his own self-cautioning, his own attempts to cling to his vanishing self-restraint- it all becomes futile, instantly fading as if he’s never even tried to keep himself in line before. Worse still, he lets it go, he doesn’t even try to cling to his conviction, like a turncoat fleeing from the frontline at the very first echo of gunfire. Ryan would make a really terrible knight, his vow broken at the first sight of him, his honour left in the dust, forgotten and walked over.

“You can sleep on your side, don’t make yourself uncomfortable because of me.” He tells him, truly meaning it, he’ll be quite content regardless. “I really don’t mind.”

Dylan looks at him with a squinted eye. “Even if I kick you in the middle of the night? Like I’m more than happy to take you up on that ‘cause I’ll be comfortable, but you’re seriously okay with being both suffocated and kicked in the face? Possibly at the same time?”

“Probably around like ten percent of all the sleeping I’ve done has been so top and tailed. Really no stranger to being kicked in the middle of the night.” Ryan shrugs. “And if I’m stealing Dinger’s spot then I feel like I can’t really blame her if she decides she won’t be displaced.”

Dylan shrugs right back and as he speaks, he ends with a singsong tone, acting like a cat who got the cream. As if Ryan would ever deny him something like this. “Okay, if you’re sure. Guess we have a plan. Though, we do still have an interrogation and a hot chocolate to get through first. Well, you have an interrogation and I have a hot chocolate. Which is probably getting cold, so time to face the music.”

“You make it sound like such a bad thing,” Ryan says, taking a step back but pausing again when Dylan himself makes no sign of movement, despite what he’d just said. “I liked talking to your mom, she’s lovely and uh, really engaged?”

“Yeah, she’s a journalist, so, she loves asking questions and she loves hearing the answers.” Dylan says, sounding a mix of proud and amused. He still doesn’t move. “I know it might seem a little… overbearing maybe? But she’s just genuinely interested, likes getting to know people and I guess she just doesn’t realise most parents kinda ignore their kids when they have friends over.”  

“Ah, now, that makes sense. Seriously, it’s cool man, your mom’s cool.” Ryan nods, before then giving a minute shake of his head. “Uh, we going though? Or?”

“Uh, yeah, totally.” Dylan clears his throat and the awkwardness returns full force. “Actually, you know what, I’ll meet you down there. I should- um, uh, change? I should change. My socks. I’m going to change my socks. But I will be down in one second, right behind you.” 

Dylan does a thumbs up. If that clear excuse hadn’t already been so obviously made up on the spot, the thumbs up alone would have sealed the deal that something’s up. Huh. That lurking thought at the back of Ryan’s mind does everything it can to get his attention and he really does try to ignore it. Yet with furrowed brows, Ryan does spare a glance to the bed behind Dylan and sure enough, Dylan every so slightly leans in the same direction. Ryan has never been so glad for how deadpan he most often looks, outside of the more exaggerated expressions he makes for reactions in conversation, expressions that Dylan himself usually pulls out of him. It means he has the ability to hold an excellent poker face when he really tries but even now it only just scrapes by to save him from breaking into an amused grin. Yeah, he’s pretty sure his hoodie is about to be magically and mysteriously lost to the void again, while Dylan ‘changes his socks’. He’d tell him that he’s not mad about the hoodie theft but, well, maybe Dylan deserves to squirm for the minor offense of turning a well loved hoodie into a cat bed. Ryan just shrugs, agrees to meet him downstairs and leaves the room.

He finds Nadia downstairs with the hot chocolates ready and her place taken on the only viable side of the couch. He’s directed to a barstool beneath the serving hatch, where Dinger sits on the ledge. After he’s sat down the air goes cold by the missing top of his ear as she gives him a long and considering sniff. While they talk, with Dylan joining not soon after and now much more relaxed, Ryan leans back and ends up with Dinger’s paws on his shoulder, little claws kneading into his collarbone. He sends a couple of very smug looks over to Dylan about this, earning looks of pure betrayal back.

One of Dylan’s CD’s plays light music through the radio beneath the TV, quiet music beneath their conversation. It’s warm, despite the harsh chill outside. It’s remarkably comfortable, the conversation actually not awkward in the slightest despite the fact that this is Dylan’s parent that they’re talking to. The topics are constantly evolving and not solely focused on Ryan himself, despite the forewarned interrogation. For some time in fact, it is just Dylan rambling for near over an hour about his favourite game and they listen to each and every word, despite the both of them having heard it all before. To Ryan, that is a louder declaration of the love held for Dylan within this room than any words spoken could ever be. 

It’s a lovely evening, it really is, in a way he didn’t know it could be. It’s lovely and it opens a hole in his chest. It’s not the void, the void that has plagued him all month, that has sent ice crystals into his bloodstream, only able to be melted by the sunlight that shines out through Dylan’s skin. It’s not the void, which is still withered and diminished, its presence not vanished entirely but now negligible at best. No, it’s something older, something that has been in him since he was a child. Something that has never truly healed, that seals and unseals like a vault of hurt left within him. The hole that resurfaced earlier and has now reopened again is ugly, it’s familiar, it’s green and it’s muddied. He ignores it, of course he does. There is nothing he can do to patch it, there is nothing he can do to change it, there is nothing he can do to fill it. He will not let her ruin this for him.

Night descends, the glow of the living room chasing off the darkness pushing in from outside, the drinks drained down to no more than a residue left inside their mugs, the words in the air growing slow and spread. Nadia makes a joke a parent probably never should, Dylan laughs so hard he snorts, Dinger rests her head down on her paws and Ryan breathes out the last ice crystals left in his lungs. Night descends but the light remains.

Chapter Text

Ryan wakes amorphously, the hands of sleep loosening their grasp one finger at a time, sleep flowing into languor as the river flows into the sea. In this brackish water amidst dream and lucidity, he’s back on the pool floor, where the light dances in white ribbons and the sky above ripples through a glaze of blue. Gently, all at once, the tiles dislodge and drift away, floating up from beneath him to roll amongst curling waves above. He sinks deeper, through the vast and open ocean revealed beneath the ceramic floor, deeper down until the sediment lifts up in a cloud around him and the sun fills the rippling sky.    

This deep down, his senses return to him just drip by drip, droplets of awareness pattering onto the waves above. It’s all muffled and muted, sunk here beneath the depths, where the weight of the sea keeps him submerged and his thoughts drift with the current, carried away from him, headed towards shore. He’s lying flat upon the seabed, where the creases of the sheet resemble ripples in the sand, the foggy exhales of breath rise through the air like bubbles floating up to the surface, and where the duvet swells over the warm air trapped beneath it, like the tide that lays above beams of sunlight that are dragged through the undertow. It has enveloped him in a warmth seeped so deep, even the darkness behind his closed eyes seems to hold a ruddied glow. 

He lets himself drift, lets himself stay sunk within this surreal peace. He is often slow to wake, as with how his sleep is short and restless, more often does morning bring exhaustion with it than night ever does. However, never does he feel so lured by it, nor ever so gently released from its hook. He floats down the estuary between sleep and waking, as drip by drip, his senses give shape to the true form of the world around him. There is birdsong out the open window, each note carried in on its own fine strand of the wind, blowing inside intertwined with wisps of woodsmoke, tendrils of white ash and threads beaded with dewdrops. This woven wind wafts into the room, biting cold and weighted, coiling through and diffusing the gossamer sweet, hazy fog cloud that swirls and spirals through the air. He drifts, through the estuary, through the ocean beneath the pool floor, through the hazy fog of dissolved honey, he drifts. Then something in the air, ever so slightly in the cold, woven and laden air, something shifts.       

It nips at the exposed skin of his face, an attempt to draw the warm blood that’s in his veins, blood that pumps lethargically through his heart and pools in his hand. His fingers twitch. It tightens his already firm grip. The last droplets fall not alone, but in a sheet of rain, pelting down upon the sea. Down on the seabed, the ensuing tidal wave is strong enough to rock him as it lurches past, but not to exhume him, remaining on his back even as he follows the movement with a leftwards roll of his head. Ryan cracks his eyes open and for a moment the blurriness of sleep makes the dark room look as if it really is underwater. He gives a tight squeeze of a blink and only now does he find himself truly awake.

Dylan sleeps on however, not a twitch to his expression. Still not assured, or perhaps just out of selfish longing, Ryan watches him through drowsy blinks. He sleeps just as he said he would, though it’s more at a slight angle than it is directly across the width of the bed. Likely just so he can have his head propped up on the pile of pillows that are shoved in the corner of both room and bed. The duvet only half covers him like this and overtop it a thermal blanket has been tugged over him to fill in the gap. His right leg is bent inwards, unconsciously providing a space for Dinger between them, saving Ryan from forewarned suffocation as she instead sleeps placidly by his shoulder. His other leg, specifically his calf, is draped over Ryan’s ribs. 

It’s this that Ryan’s hand wraps around, in a grasp come of such an innate and ingrained possessiveness that it was made even in his sleep. With fingers over his shin and thumb hooked around the back, pressing into muscle. He knows he should, but he finds himself unable to unfurl his fingers. Instead, in a poorly shaken habit, Ryan’s eyes are drawn up to linger on the vermilion border of Dylan’s lower lip. Where it is always split and swollen from the constant chewing and scraping of his front teeth in thought and feeling, where completely irrelative to this, to Ryan it has always been and remains unceasingly and entirely captivating. It’s only from there, in the dim shade of his upper peripheral vision, that Ryan just barely catches the flickering and rapid paced movement happening behind closed eyes. 

Dylan sits up with a lurch. Pin straight upright, with eyes that are foggy yet wide, an expression of a sluggish kind of disturbed. The flickering movement behind closed eyelids now ceased, he instead unwaveringly stares off to somewhere Ryan is certain he could not follow. From the corners of his eyes, in the mist of his breath, dripping from his nose and from the pores of his cheeks, beads aery tears of scorched sugar. Like melted wax, it follows the tracks left by the sweat rolling down from his temples and what doesn’t pool alongside it in his collarbones, is instead whipped around the room in a scalding hailstorm. For a moment there is nothing in the stillness but the heavy thud of his heart, audible deep within Ryan’s inner ear. Then another and another and he still doesn’t move, petrified in place, the rapid shallow breaths and heavy drumming pulse the only life beneath the marble. Without a word to startle him, Ryan’s hand gives a feather light and gentle squeeze to the hold of his leg already in place. Dylan’s eyes snap to him, his pupils dilating even further, becoming the black pits of a shark’s.

“Ryan.” He says simply, almost a matter of factly, if not for the slightly startled tilt. For minutes he says nothing more, doesn’t so much as twitch, as his eyes now dart around and his breathing maintains its quickened pace. “Ryan- you’re here?”

In a quiet echo, “I’m here.”

“Right. Yeah.” For the first time since his upright lurch awake, he unfreezes, even if only through just a slight judder of his head and neck. He swallows thickly and makes a failed attempt to thread a light breath of laughter through his words. “I uh, I- I thought they shot you, for a second there.”

“I’m here.” Ryan softly repeats, his voice still thick and deep from sleep, so unlike Dylan’s own laboured, breathless tone. “It was a dream. I’m okay- you’re okay. You’re at home, we’re in your room.”

“Yeah. No. Yeah, I know.” It holds no conviction and the burnt wax-like honey still chars holes in the walls, but after he sucks in a deep lungful of air through his teeth and a slow exhale through pursed lips, with no small effort he manages to slow his breathing to a calmer rhythm. 

Ryan just watches him in the moments following, with his thumb absentmindedly swiping back and forth, looking up from where his head remains against his borrowed pillow. Within his mutated vision, true darkness has lost its gloom and exists only in shades of grey instead, where not a single feature is obscured despite the early morning of which dawn has not quite yet reached. Dylan’s expression is more of a closed mouthed slack jaw than it is to one steeped in taunt lines of tension. He woke disconcerted and disorientated, groggy from sleep despite his agitation, likely unsure if he had even woken at all. Ryan doesn’t ask questions, doesn’t speak at all, he just lets him find his way back. Silently, Dylan takes the time he needs to reorient, to feel the blanket beneath his fingers and trace the familiar outlines of the furniture in his room with his eyes. He needs it, to find where he actually is, amidst the vivid memory of what he just experienced and the truth of the reality which he didn’t.

When Dylan told him of his nightmares, he doesn’t know what he expected. Ryan admittedly hadn’t ever imagined sobbing, screaming, weeping or panicked thrashing- it’s hard in any circumstance to imagine Dylan doing any of these things and he has no desire to try. Maybe he hadn’t actually imagined anything at all. He knows that he hadn’t expected this. This was a body awoken with eyes looking past the world to somewhere only they could see, rooted to a tear in the veil that usually separates the dreamscape. In a stare of such harrowed transfixion, one with such presence to it, that Ryan felt how real it was to him. So real to him that Ryan himself almost felt like he could see the shrouded dreamscape through the reflection in his haunted eyes. Or, worse still, that had he just followed the gaze, he may have also seen what could come crawling out of it. He knows he couldn’t, but he doesn’t know if Dylan knew that. Not with the way he was staring into and out through this tear in the silk veil, one that was shredded open with edges frayed, one that showed no signs of sewing itself closed. That too Ryan doesn’t know and he doesn’t risk asking how long it may have taken to do so, had Dylan’s eyes not snapped from it and to Ryan instead. He knew Dylan had said it felt real. He hadn’t realised what that meant.

However long it takes is unclear, as the thumping heartbeat lulls and the horror-filled haze of confusion lifts, but he watches as slowly Dylan’s wide eyes soften from shark to deer. The marble casting him in place visibly cracks and chips away until he can fully shake off what dust is left clinging to his skin, arms slightly buckling from where they hold him upright, shoulders slacking and head dipping forwards. The sugar water takes on a new, bitter taste to it alongside the burn.

Through however long it takes, all the while, Ryan can feel his concern and tenderness carry through his pulse from his throat to his fingers. With his palm clutched around the side of his calf, he tries to radiate warmth from the arteries in his own wrist into the deep veins buried within it, to seep this tender calm from himself and infuse it within Dylan too. It may still be a futile attempt, but to his own surprise, it is not solely a symbolic one either. Even if not directly through the press of his pulse against skin, it radiates with such potency that for each heart beat, it overflows and pours into the air. For just a second, just one single second and perhaps for the very first time, even Ryan himself is able to pick out the scent of it. For just a single second and this he’s certain is for the first time, he can actually feel the presence of it, when it is something more than just an acrid miasma. He can feel how there is indeed something profound and imposing to it, an old growth forest that has no beginning and no end. With branches entwining over the walls and moss unfurling over the carpet, it rises into the air like the quietness enveloped beneath the canopy and it encases the room like a thicket laced with thorns. It is not the acrid and sharp scent of a forest on fire that he has only ever known before. Now it is both the impenetrable and unmoveable brambles that shield them within and so too is it the secluded sanctuary of the glade. 

It is just a single second that he picks it out before he loses it beneath the burnt and the bitter. A single second was all that was needed. He could feel how his love bound his scent together, the same as the forest loves the sun’s light. He could feel his own emotions in the air, transforming his scent into something both protective and gentle in one. He could feel that part of him that he has carved out that only Dylan can fill. Maybe it was only for a single second in an unknown number of minutes but he’s glad it’s gone. Maybe it was only for a second but the knowledge of what it’s really like, a knowledge seeped in anxious vulnerability, well, that lingers.  

Long after the second has been lost to minutes, long after Dylan has chipped himself from the marble encasing, he closes his eyes and drops his head to his hands. He wipes his face with such force he leaves red marks on his temples and seconds tick by, as the marks fade and he rests his hands over his cheeks, fingers lightly pressed in underneath his eyes. Until eventually he sighs and glances at Ryan from beneath his brows. “Ahm. Okay, um. I didn’t- I didn’t wake you, did I? You can try and get more sleep?”

“I was already awake.” Ryan tells him and even from his own mouth it is but a gentle sound beneath the wind. “Will you be able to fall asleep again?”

With another deeply drawn breath, Dylan blows it back out through his lips in a frustrated trill. He shakes his head in a resounding no, even as he does finally collapse back against his pile of pillows in the corner, landing gently propped up against them. With a practiced little nod and shake, he’s tucked his chin against his collarbone and under the neck of his hoodie, burrowed down until it covers up to just beneath his nose. His left hand thuds down against his chest, tugging with it the thermal, his sleeve over his fingers and adding to the bunched pile of fabric in his fist. Woken by the initial impact, Dinger rises and blocks Ryan’s view for a moment as she stretches, before she steps up and stands in a wobbly perch atop Dylan’s thigh. Spinning once, twice, she flops right back down, to just rather predictably slip into the narrow space between his leg and the wall. Unfazed by all this, she’s back to snoozing immediately and Dylan’s free hand sinks into her fur, stretched over her side where the slow and sporadic scrunching of his fingers fit something close to a loose definition of a pat. If Dylan hadn’t fully calmed before, the hand submerged in soft fur is what grounds him completely, burning sugar taken from the flames to now simmer. 

The two of them settled again, Dylan squeezes his eyes closed as he stiltedly says, “I’m sorry. S’stupid. I just- y’know I dreamt that- and then even though I know we came home- for a second- and I'm just right- urgh. Honestly I don't even know. Shit’s crazy.”

“At the quarry?” Ryan asks, before clearing his throat to try and clear the rasp of sleep. Then, because there is a stark difference to him, “Or at camp?”

“Is there a difference?” It’s an eerie answer to what was unspoken. 

“Isn’t there?”

Dylan shakes his head, his eyes still squeezed closed. Ryan thinks they’re speaking something unspoken, of something that can not be described in words but only in feeling. That even if they cannot say it, the two of them both have a watercolour painting splotching within their minds. For Ryan, all he sees is a library cast in a warm glow, a smile causing dimples within cheeks, Kaitlyn covered in blood but laughing so hard she cries, an imaginary cowboy hat being tipped, Emma’s brown eyes rolling at him, a lettuce leaf tangled in black hair while cooking dinner, front teeth sunk into the lip of a blinding smile, a half buried rock in a clearing and a hand threaded with his own. For Dylan, he thinks, all he sees is breaking bones and all that blood.

After this moment of quiet thought, with the fading of the watercolour bloom, Ryan risks asking, “Would you like there to be?”

“I want… or, I just wish- I don’t know. It’s so stupid to say out loud, because it’s so obvious, but I wish camp never happened at all. I wish I never had to go back. Y’know?”

“Then I would have never met you.” Ryan says and he may be unable to directly disagree with Dylan holding such a sentiment himself, but he has never felt more opposed to a statement than this before. Quickly he tacks on, “Or Kaitlyn or Emma or any of the others.”

“Yeah, god, you could’ve dodged a bullet there.” Dylan scoffs and doesn’t seem to notice the dipping of Ryan’s brows as he continues. “So okay, fine, maybe not all of camp. Just- I’m not even mad at Jacob or anything, I mean that just feels kind of pointless since it’s not like he knew. It’s just, yeah, wish we could’ve just… gone home. Have none of it happen.”

Ryan gives a hum of acknowledgment, though not necessarily agreement. It’s tripping and tentative, when he says, “I guess. Just, it did happen though. And- and maybe we can’t change that and maybe it was terrible- no, it was, it was terrible. I mean, what I’m trying to say is we don’t have to still suffer for it. We get that choice.”

“I suffer for it whenever I have to go back there. Which is for the rest of my life, mind you, never mind what comes after that. Kinda unfair that my eternal suffering has commenced a bit early. Not the pick I would have made if it was one.” Dylan quips after he’s given a snort, like it was a joke that Ryan made, not another of his genuine attempts clearly failing once afuckinggain. “So, not much of a choice there. I know, I know, it could be worse and we could have died, any of us. I’m glad we’re still kicking or whatever, and like, yeah I know you’re only here because we do still have to keep going back but-”

“I would be here even if none of this ever happened, just if you asked.” That was entirely too honest. That was too honest wasn’t it? Ryan probably should have stopped himself from saying that at all, let alone in a tone above what is suited for the early morning. With the hush of it lost, the statement came out firmer than he would have ever intended, in a way that it matches his true sentiment on the matter. How true it is to him. 

“Oh. Oh, that’s, uh- thank you. Um.” Dylan wavers and goes quiet for a moment, which Ryan finds himself glad for. He needed the chance to gather his composure, forcing himself to let the embarrassing admission go so he can pay proper attention again. With a sniff and tiny cough in quick succession, Dylan continues on to breezily explain, “I just meant that, well, here I just want it to be us, you know? Not what we’ve become. Dylan-Dylan and Ryan-Ryan, not werewolf Dylan and werewolf Ryan. If that makes sense.” 

He may hum an agreement but that’s the difference isn’t it? Ryan-Ryan is werewolf Ryan now. There’s no distinction between them and there’s no going back to when there was. He found his acceptance with it and he has not doubted once that this is, at the absolute very least for just Ryan himself, what was needed to do to feel like himself again. He is himself again. This is the first time the decision to do so has hurt. It is not the first time being so, being himself, has hurt. He is what he has become, Ryan thinks, but he knows it’s more than that. He always was what he has become. 

It’s not like he feels a chasm open between them or anything so drastic, it’s just an old and familiar feeling reinforced. It feels like childhood again. As even then, he knew that there is something within his very core of being that is just… Off. Not terribly, just slightly, something a little off. He knows it and he can call it whatever he likes, find whatever excuse he can, from being born with it, to being raised with it, to autism, to a goddamn werewolf curse, it doesn’t really matter. It just is. Ryan makes connections, he does. He has family, he has friends. He has Sarah and his grandparents, Kaitlyn and Emma. Before them he had Chris, he had Kaylee and Caleb, before even them he had his Dad, he had his Mom. He has Dylan here now, lying beside him, calf in his palm. Still there is just something within him, the truth of him, in being himself, something that is just off and it’s his biggest fear that others know it too. 

He’s not quite sure what it is. A separation maybe, a sheet of ice between him and everyone around him, where he looks out as a witness, never quite melting through. If not simply that sheet of ice, then maybe it is the raw animal he keeps frozen behind it, trapped within the iron barred cage within the concave of his chest. The animal he is, with claws that would sink into all he can, taking chunks of flesh with him when he is inevitably shaken off and forced to let go. Worse, he thinks, is the prospect that maybe in this coalescence he has shown his bloodstained claws. Worse than that, if he unwillingly knows it to be true, is that neither ice nor cage has ever contained it at all. He learned as a child that was what growing up meant, that it was to let go over and over again. His room is bare, he has no keepsakes, he has only three photos, he doesn’t say his name. He cherishes his truck, he keeps a box of DVDs hidden beneath his bed, his Pop implying he loved him misted his eyes, he checks his phone obsessively each night for a simple text goodnight, he does not let go of Dylan’s calf, he never really will. For all he has changed, Ryan’s hands are still bloodstained and there were already chunks of flesh embedded beneath his claws. Ryan always was what he has become.

In the lull fallen between them, Ryan finds this silence between them to be one that he does not know how to break. It’s not out of hurt, it doesn’t hurt, this was no new realisation for him. Really, it doesn’t hurt. It’s more, well, it’s more from how steadfast he remains in the face of it. Yes, that’s what it is, a resolution. He knows it to be the truth, that Dylan’s suffering does not have to be inevitable and that is not changed by this something ‘off’ that exists within Ryan, which is on him and him alone. He will roll that boulder up that hill until Dylan does not have to suffer for it each time he returns to the quarry. He will take the title of Sisyphus until behind Dylan’s eyes, all that blood is more than just red and the watercolour can bloom in a mosaic of kinder memories. 

What Ryan won’t do, is push it when Dylan has woken fresh from a nightmare and stated so plainly that he does not want to bring it here, to his home. Here to his home, where it already lurks, not just in the tear through to his dreamscape or lying in his bed beside him. It’s already here within him too and maybe he already knows that, maybe he just doesn’t want to hear it spoken. So Ryan will not speak it. He has not spoken it. With admirable effort, he has completely kept his eyes from his throat, has erased all images and thought of the scar there from his mind, as if it were his own nightmare haunting him in his awake. He resolutely does not think of it and he does not speak it and he is not hurt and there is no chasm to call across. Ryan just doesn’t know what else to say. When all that blood remains red, what else could he ever possibly say, that would be loud enough to be heard over that resounding, unspoken something? No joke appears on his tongue, no mild observation on the weather comes forth, no casual remark can be found. 

Dylan however, of course it’s Dylan, he always knows how to shatter silence. Sure, he lets it sit for some minutes, but he doesn’t seem to ever exist within it long. No, it’s never unbreakable to him. Selfishly grateful, for both this fact and for Dylan’s obliviousness to what was churning in his mind, Ryan doesn't argue the first point as he might have otherwise. He just lets Dylan shatter the silence into dust swept behind them, breezing on past as he says, “Alright, I’ll stop being a bummer. What time is it then?”

Just like that. He acts like it’s so easy. Taking the chance provided, Ryan lets the thoughts blow away into dust, distracting himself with where he left his phone instead. Which, lifting just his head up to take a craning look around, that would be… That would in fact be on the bedside table to his right, which does present a minor issue. Once more, even if Ryan knows he should, he is truly unable to let go of his grasp. Not yet, in a literal sense; not ever, in another. Instead, making it far more difficult than it needs be, Ryan awkwardly twists to reach his left arm over himself and near blindly fishes his phone from the surface. Retrieving it with more than a slight sense of accomplishment, he settles back down, lifts the phone up and immediately squints from the flash of bright light. With an audible thud of his knuckles against his sternum, he thumps it down against his chest and squeezes his eyes closed in an attempt to clear the splotching bleach stains in his vision. 

It’s only the snort sent in his direction that has him tilting his head and cracking an eye open again. Dylan squints at him in a smile that may be hidden but is obvious nonetheless. “Real smooth. Phone one, Ryan zero.”

“It’s basically six.” He croaks.

“Thanks, great. You know my phone was right there, yeah?” Dylan nods down to the phone that Ryan does in fact only now notice is lying between them. Right where it’s within a slightly less awkward reach, thanks to the couple meters long charger threaded beneath his pillow. Clearly it’d just been hidden under Dinger’s fatass all night, as her own personal heating pad. No, great, super helpful of Dylan to only point it out now, after Ryan has already been blinded twice. 

“You trying to set us on fire?” Ryan groans, flopping his head back against the pillow and closing his eyes again as he rubs his free arm over them. “After what I just went through for you?” 

“Isn’t that what you wanted to do to my desk?” Dylan nags in turn and yep, he’s back, in all his glory and snark.

Beneath the arm over his eyes, he makes a vague grunting sound, cause yeah, he did. Then, as the information dredges up in his mind, he finds himself mumbling away in acquiescence. “Mh, yeah, okay, ‘spose it’d track. Norsemen, or y’know, Vikings, they did bury and cremate their pets with them actually. ‘Specially for men, or uh, I guess a desk? Yeah, well for a desk of such high regard that it’s getting a ship burial, then having thralls or even a widow sacrificed to be buried with it, to accompany it to the afterlife, would I guess yeah, it’d make sense. Don’t know when I signed up as a sacrifice for your stupid desk but…”

“Right, for sure, that was definitely what I was getting at.” Dylan quietly laughs at him again, his voice hushed but his tone now well and truly returned to its usual casual and perpetually amused sound. “Six am and you still somehow remember all that? You got Viking funerals and human sacrifice just always swimming around up there or- why do we know this?”

“Generally, I would’ve just read it in some book at my school library or in any number of the random articles I’ve ever found. Uh, but specifically, this’ll be due to the spiritual aspect, ‘cause of the uh, y’know, the supernatural stuff. So kinda yes?” Ryan does answer the question genuinely while he drops his arm back down and tilts his head to Dylan’s direction again. Looking at him now however, he twitches a cheek and starts with a scoff, “And okay, yeah, it’s six am and yet if I asked how many constellations you could name right now…?”

Immediately and undeniably beat, Dylan’s nose does an adorable little scrunch which, even though it’s covered, betrays his put out and reluctantly amused scowl. Undeniably beat and of course he still tries to deny it anyway. “Mmh, nope, not the same. You’re an information-filled sleeper agent activated by anything vaguely paranormal, while I have a cheatsheet.”

“No no, off the top of your head, closed eyes, how many could you do?” Ryan digs and with Dylan’s indignant squint proving his point, he grins up at him. “Yeah, thought so. No cheatsheet needed. But hey, trying to pretend otherwise when you literally have half the universe glued to your ceiling is bold, I’ll give you that.”

With a dramatic sigh from beneath his hoodie, Dylan finally concedes. “Fine, you got me. Made a valiant effort, but clearly remain unable to beat the nerd allegations. I humbly beseech you to not go spreading rumours of my star ceiling around to people and further tarnish my reputation of being a super cool badass. Please.”

“Hey, I think the star ceiling is cool. Even if I’ve never been more let down than I was finding out they don’t glow.” Ryan tells him seriously, shifting his gaze up to the stars, pinpricks of grey against a slate of it. It helps too, to look away, when something as simple as Dylan saying please does something to him.

“Mh, sorry to disappoint, you’re about a decade late. They were admittedly cooler when I was nine, unfortunately.” Dylan tells him, refusing to sit up and instead just making a vague grabbing motion with his hand. While he continues speaking, Ryan thoughtlessly presses his own phone into his palm, putting all his effort to use and avoiding the awkward backbending of his arm if he’d tried to snag the makeshift heat pad itself. “They’re still accurate to the constellations, at least. It’s my cheat sheet. God, you should’ve been there when we put them up though. Mom'll tell you, I was like an evil little foreman who let the power go to my head. Oh, plus they still make pretty great shurikens if the need arises.”

Of course they’re accurate. Ryan shouldn’t have even considered the possibility of anything otherwise. As Dylan speaks, Ryan chews on the inside of a growing smug smile and takes his phone as it’s handed right back to him, only now with the flashlight turned on. He doesn’t need to be asked, he just dutifully aims it up to the ceiling. Out of the kindness of his heart he doesn’t point out that they’re not actually a cheat sheet if they need to already be memorised anyway and instead he just grants Dylan his last point with a light huff of a laugh. “Sure, ‘course. Does the need often arise?”

“Oh, you know it.”

Even if the stars no longer glow in the dark, with the light now shining on them, the glitter baked into the plastic still glimmers. Lying beneath them, with only the flash for light amidst the morning dark, it’s actually a rather enchanting view. Ryan hates winter and they sit on its precipice, yet for as chilled as the room is, it is seeped in a warmth, like the glitter reflection is truly the light of them. Silence settles over them as they take it in- as Dylan takes it in. For Ryan, as always, his eyes drift back down instead, to Dylan beside him. Dylan, cocooned in his hoodie and blankets, warm and quiet in the peace. Dylan, looking up at his ceiling like it’s the first time he’s ever seen it, the glimmer reflected in his wide brown eyes. Dylan, looking at the stars as if there isn’t sunlight beneath his own skin. The fog of honeyed calm has gradually returned to the air and now it hangs beneath the stars, the same as the clouds beneath space. Ryan looks up through it and sees the gentle waves rippling against the ceiling. A haze saturates the room to blue, a heavy weight swirls over him, a breathless buzz swells his lungs. He breathes sugar in and exhales salt out.      

“Do you have a favourite? Of the constellations, I mean.” Ryan whispers in one breath. At Dylan’s hum, Ryan spares another to ask, “Point it out to me?” 

“I’d say Hydra, but Scorpius leeches the win through association.” He murmurs back or maybe the sound is just muffled beneath the tide. He points up to his ceiling, tracing his finger down. “That would be it there. I can name them, but constellations don’t really interest me as much as the stars within them do. That’s Antares there in the middle, the heart of Scorpio.” 

“Your favourite star?” Another hum, a little more committal this time, still no less muffled despite the way he has tugged the hoodie from over his mouth at last, to twiddle the drawstrings between his fingers instead. The ocean sound it is then. “How come?”

Dylan tries to shrug the question off, with a hushed little laugh and a whisper, “You know I’ll start talking about it for hours.”

“I’m not going anywhere.” Ryan tells him and there’s a pause. Ryan holds his breath in each second past. Then Dylan begins to speak.

“Okay, uh well, it’s a red supergiant, so, super easy to see. Oh, well, not so much from here though. It’s uh, it’s one of the largest known stars, around fifteen times bigger than the sun. Actually one of the brightest too, I think also around the fifteenth? Around that. Uh, also, it sits on the ecliptic, which- that’s like the path the sun takes and the planets follow it. Uh, that means though, that it often got confused for Mars. Which is why, funnily enough, its name roughly translates to ‘Not Mars’. And that, I mean that fact alone would probably be enough to make it my favourite. Though, when I was younger, it was-” 

He speaks in this echoing hushed tone, like the ocean sound ricocheting off black rock slick with salt water, his airy laugh dissolving amongst the seafoam. Ryan watches his fingers twitch at the start of every sentence, he traces the outline of his mouth forming each word, he breathes in every exhaled syllable, he etches each letter into his very bones until one day, when they find his remains, they will read of the stars.

He looks upward as Dylan’s explanations ebb to a quiet listing of each constellation and his various favourite stars within them placed upon his ceiling, following each path his hand traces with heavy eyes. The heady scent in the room has replaced all air and even the ropes of woven wind dissolve within the saltwater. The birdsong and creak of the stairs are all muffled under the lilt. Vaguely he thinks of ceramic tiles and stinging chlorine and a necessary fervency and then that dissolves away too. No sense left within him can create heed for him to spare for it, lulled by the lilting sound and as suffocated as they are. So too, after months of insomnia he has no struggle against those pale hands of sleep as they rise through the bedsheet again, raking nails through his skin in their attempt to hook fingers into his limbs. To be grappled in their hands means to be left with a mind leaden in drowsiness, one that indulges itself with emotion, one narcissistic of its own abstraction and one that releases the vividity of dream to meld with all thought. He knows this and yet he lets the fingers curl around his arms, cling to his legs and hook into the corners of his eyes. He knows it and it feels like gnosis.     

For if his hands are stained with their blood and if beneath his claws are the chunks of flesh torn from those of which he cannot let go of, then it is Dylan who he does not only bruise in his grasp now, it is Dylan who he has buried far deeper than merely down to the quick. He may feel Dylan in his skin, however now he realises that flesh can slough away, his heart can be eaten by decay, his face can turn to wax and his mind, with his memory, his morals, his emotions, what is truly the essence of everything he was in life, well, that can scatter back into the world in atoms merely borrowed and returned. It is in his bones that Dylan will stay. There he will always be able to be found, as with him imbued through to the honeycomb core within, it is there in the hollows that Ryan keeps him. 

In all the countless poems he has read, none of them have even described, let alone captured, what this feels like. It’s love, yes, and it’s one he has never felt before. He’s dated, he’s had flings through school, even if none of them were the conventionally serious type. All the same, outside of fumbling around in the dark with someone he met that night at the edge of a party he didn’t even care to attend, Ryan doesn’t really have interest in dating without a base of trust first, he never has. It was always when friends turned into something more and so yes, he did genuinely love them, he loved them first, he loved them during and he knows it still remains within him now years later, in some crusted blood on his cuticles. He doesn’t discredit that, but oh how he knows this is different. Maybe it didn’t begin as such, but by god how it has grown. He feels as if he has never loved so much before, feels he could never love someone more and somehow in spite of that, he knows he will love him impossibly more tomorrow. It’s love, yes, and it’s something entirely, incomprehensibly, breathtakingly different too. 

As every kind of love, even though it may not be not contained to emotion but existing through action too, the very feeling of it- that always comes tinged in grief. It is an anticipatory grief, in the awareness of what is to come and it is living in a constant state of bereavement, far before the bereavement does come. It is the threat of severing the tie and it is the threat of the truth, which is that no matter what he does the tie will always remain around his wrist, forever cutting off circulation and hanging limply at his side. The apprehension of that, he hasn't lost yet but he will lose and he misses them already, of that he fears times end but it will end and the time wasn’t enough. He thinks of what he will say when it comes, at a funeral or at the threshold of a door, and he finds the words already filling his mouth like blood from a broken tooth. He can swallow it down or it can spill from his lips, either way it will refill with everything he wishes to preemptively say, with the feeling of this imperative need to try and impart how much he loves before his chance is gone. Because it will go. 

To feel love is to feel the consequences of love before the punishment and to love is to ask not to be abandoned only to be abandoned anyway. A fundamental pillar of love is loss and it is not therefore a futile experience or effort, rather just that it is no more than an illusion of choice which is presented in the question of whether this means if it is better to have lost from love or not loved at all. There is no choice, there will always be love and there will always be loss. Knowing any of this does not change it nor does it make it hurt any less.

So yes, he loves Dylan, that is undeniable to him, always aware of it, tinged in anticipatory grief as it is. He can feel how the love he holds for Dylan is made all the exact same and even if he should try to measure it against any past love, as much as it may tip the scales immensely, they are both on the same scales regardless. However this feeling isn’t tinged with grief, it has permanence unable to be reached by it, it’s replaced the marrow of his bones. That then is not the love itself which is different, rather that it is something unique of its own. Certainly that means it has to be something else entirely, this feeling in him. 

It is an ineffable feeling. It is apperception, it is átopos, it is tacit knowledge, it is the explanatory gap, it is the noesis of the noema, it is the very problem of qualia. For every theory or piece of philosophy, for all the difference between subjectivity and objectivity, for if everything supervenes on the physical and it is no more than oxytocin in the limbic centers of the brain, to him it is no more than a linguistic mess. All this to simply put, he knows it is different because he feels that it is different, he knows it exists because he exists. Most importantly, he doesn’t care for the orthodoxy of philosophy on this because all he knows and all he knows to be true, is that this is something which can only be felt in these bones and in this mind, this ineffable, irreplicable, incomprehensible feeling.

His understanding of love no longer contains it. It is connected, intertwined, made of the same body and mind, but it is separately distinct. In its difference, perhaps it exists as the paradox of ineffability, to find meaning of what it then truly is. It is possible only as apophatic in nature, described by what it is not, supervening on the meaning of other words that cannot truly capture it. His very own self made differánce, a word in a state of becoming, self collapsing in an endless deferral of meaning. For if in its very essence, this is the raw feel, the what it’s like, the isolated, visceral, and untranslatable; then all of what he has left for language, is of what it is not but what does come of it. Through that, of what is expressed from it, he can find the name for which meaning is not inherent.

It is not reduced to the observable, to the smile that tugs at his lips when he sees him, the hand he reaches out without intention, the softening of his voice, the fading of his insomnia. It is not reduced to his volition, to emotion, to the behavioral, to the physiological, nor to the cognitive. It is an emergence that comes from the connection of all of them, returned to the subjective and descriptive, forced into metaphor as all language of understanding is entangled in. Ryan is not a religious man, he would not call it devotion. He is not blinded by devotion, he sees Dylan not as an ideal trapped within that rigid meaning, he is seen for all he is, all the perfect messiness of him. To be devoted would be to create the personification of the holy and in turn remove what makes him to be real. It would strip from him the blue ink splotches always staining his fingers, to the rambling way he speaks straying down every path in the forest before he reaches his point, to the constantly mismatched socks mussing up his leg hair, to the awkwardly tense jokes told at the absolute wrong time and even in concept it is a tragedy, Ryan never wishes to see him reduced from any of all of what he is.    

He thinks he thought of it right earlier. It feels nearer to resolution. There is a subtle distinction between the two and to him, it’s an incredibly important one. Resolution, to define this aftereffect, has meanings that stretch from its root like the branches of the oak and exists already in its own unstable nature. It means something to him, it means a lot to him. Most prominent of which it means to make a firm decision, such as how Ryan has promised himself to stay friends rather than risk casting aside this little bit of anything that he has with him. It means to be determined, such as how Ryan does not have to imagine Sisyphus happy, he gladly chooses to strive for the hilltop, relentless should he reach it or not. Then to the condition of which no further changes can occur, for as long as Ryan lives, to whatever comes after, he will come should Dylan just call. To the action of bringing harmony, which more than just the sensory binds Ryan to him like glue, it is where to speak and share a space with him feels like coming home to rest. At last, it even means an in depth examination of the details, of Dylan himself, where Ryan’s knowledge of him is as vast as it is insatiable, both his very desire to and an understanding itself of which neither have an end. 

With how each of these definitions make up the parts of the greater whole resolution, if any one of them were missing it would be sorely incomplete, as it cannot be reduced to their sum or their difference. He is left with a becoming definition that is not simply unstable, but circular in its very nature. He defines the emergence as resolution, while defining it at all is by and of itself another resolution of belief in the existence of the emergence. This emergence which is from all of what there is, of that there is something it is like to feel this, this which is different from love, this which has no definition and cannot be defined. A circular, crumbling staircase of meaning where the floor has fallen through, never to be reached.

So no, of this emergence, devotion does not do it justice. Dylan is his resolution. He knows that it could be said he’s playing with semantics, that it is meaningless in that it only has meaning for him, something only he can know and understand. He is well aware that it remains isolated in that way, that it is still just as incommunicable as it began, that it is in a tangled web of language of which both he and it are trapped within. Fine, okay, he even understands that if this resolution outwardly exhibits no differently than love, then for it to be emergence and not just another component, means it must be acknowledged that it has to be the vines through the cracks of what his love is not enough to fill. He does not want to know if so, if it is a part of the chimera, if once more the difference is indeed the what is off. It could be any part, the separation between, mouth of cave, frozen ice sheet, melted droplets patter, iron barred cage, door creaking open, blood under claw and teeth filled animal, that is within.   

Somehow, the more he’s acknowledged any of it, the more the undefinable nature of the space between the difference and the meaning seems foreboding. The absence of anticipatory grief does not make it safe, he realises, it makes it haunted by the lack of it. He thinks, perhaps he needs it to be di- no, no he knows, he does, it is different and that is objective knowledge of the objectivity of this subjective truth and that’s it, nothing else more. He doesn’t care if that doesn’t make sense, he knows it anyway. And yet, still there is no resolution in naming the emergence of this feeling as resolution. 

The eeriness of that disquiets him. The enormity of it terrifies him. It rises up and sits in his throat. He does not know whether it is the words he cannot say or if it is the very thickness of his emotion choking him up. He doesn’t dare wonder if it is the blood of a broken tooth. He does not know, so he does not dare speak. He listens to the names of each constellation, through Cetus, to Eridanus, to Vela, until those upon the ceiling run out and the guiding hand falls softly to the blanket once more. A soft kind of silence falls over them, in the wake of one’s lilting tone and another’s ruminating thoughts. The only sound to be cared to notice now is the wind coming in from the window and rolling over into the gentle crashing waves against rock. In the moments following, he lets the enormity of his worthless acknowledgment and his futility to articulate it just dissolve from iron to salt on his tongue. With the spring-tides cresting by the delicate draw of the sun's force, the seas curl towards sky and stars and beneath it all, it is the feeling itself that quells the thoughts and considerations made squall into calmer waters.  

As he focuses again on the true feeling of it itself, rather than his own attempts to define it, he thinks he knows what really matters. That although he will never be able to truly speak it aloud, not even to himself, he still feels it within him, more tangible than any of the scents have ever been. He realises then, it is for that reason he knows he would not need words anyway. For more than the emergence of it, proof of the feeling itself will reside within him regardless, unspoken and without inherent meaning as it may be. 

All he has to do is try to draw marrow from his hip and instead find that the needle will fill with a thick sludge of honey in its place. Further, should he cut open his chest, past skin and muscle, it’s written there in a scrawling script around each of his ribs, in a spiral up to where his sternum is chiseled and chipped away. With his chest wall split in half and held apart by hand or retractor, there he would no longer need any word spoken. There anyone could see how the sun is carved in, with a golden inlay and shining light out, reaching each corner of the room until he is stitched back up. 

The acknowledgment of that fact completely settles him. Perhaps he will never be able to say it and certainly he will never need proof of the feeling, yet there it will always be. He has to endlessly carry it with him and he can never put it down, not because it is something cradled within his arms, but because it is as much a part of him as the atoms binding him together. One day those will be returned to the universe and one day the ineffable will diffuse with them, but just as they carry on so will it. When he is six feet under the earth, left to rot on the forest floor or drowned where the sediment settles in the dips of his skin wrapped over his bones, it will remain. As the worms, fungus and bacteria eat away his body there will be vestiges of Dylan still, from in his smallest bones will be the sound of his voice, to in his eyes will be the vision of him in the moonlight and to in his teeth will be all the words Ryan did not know how to say. It is inevitable that when what he once was becomes feasted by decomposition, the rot will too taste the ineffable feeling and in turn consume, grow, then return to the earth the resolution of that there was something it was like for him to feel this. 

It is that too which makes the acknowledgment of what emerges from it to be more than futile. More than just the vines that creep through the cracks of what his love is not enough to fill, the emergence of these vines at all means he must then understand that they are the whole which is more than the sum of its parts, that it is irreducible to them. This resolution is more than the ineffable and the ineffable is more than the resolution. It then doesn't matter that it will all slough away, including his bones where it is in the hollows that he keeps him, which one day will also finally give up their resistance, to be broken down to sand or dissolved amongst the salt to release sunlight through the deep dark. It emerged from them, yet it remains without them. Ryan is not a religious man and yet he knows, from atom to atom and dust to dust, with his own existence, now that this has been felt, it will always exist in the world. That which permeates and persists past silence and language. That is what truly matters and that is what the resolution of the ineffable is. Together it is permanence, all together it is the inevitable. That is what settles him, that all this attempt to grasp at gnosis and yet with his hands around it now, it’s so simple. All of this just so simply means that not everything feels like something else.            

So soothed over this time, that he has not felt the gradual piercing through his skin, the water soaking up through the mattress to swamp around him or the tightening grip of the hands until now. Not until the steel hook gives a hefty yank and as he is torn through the mattress, he feels his body fall. His eyes flinch shut, the muscles from his back, to his shoulders and down through to his arm all give a simultaneous jolt against the sensation, then within the very instant, it has already passed. While this familiar reflexive startle may have ripped out where the hook of sleep had caught in him, when he blinks his eyes open, he looks up from where he never left, amongst the sand and silt. The hands of sleep withdraw, fingers releasing their grasp and wrists slipping back through the sediment. His own hand curls a little tighter around the side of the leg within his palm, finger hooking into his shin bone, thumb swiping through leg hair, over his skin as if he can memorise each pore. He needs no anchor to stay down here, not here beneath the sun.   

Less of a shatter than before, Dylan breaks their peaceful quiet with a light laugh, “Okay? Tired?”

“Something like that.” Ryan mumbles back, feeling how the stream of sunlight sways through the sea in an echo of his laughter.

“You can sleep if you want to.” Dylan assures him again, however long later from the first time.

Ryan replies in no different essence. “I’m wide awake.”

The twilight outside may still linger on the edge of a nautical submersion of its own, however now down upon the seabed it feels that eons have gone by. Beneath a sun that has never set, from his body roots have grown, threaded outward through the sediment. At the bottom of the ocean an old growth forest has risen, trees emerging through the depths to sway in the currents, their leaves rolling in the sea foam of the waves high above. From his stomach this all grew, the root of each tree connected from where they came weaving between his intestines and punctured through the skin of his waist. Life does not grow within a freezing and endless void. It’s gone, completely. He hears his own sigh of relief, his lungs finally and fully emptying, all oxygen exhaled.

“I’m sorry.” Dylan blurts out suddenly. It’s louder than the hush they’d kept themselves at and his tone, slightly nervous and strained, is a shockwave that sends columns of bubbles curling upwards through the salt. 

Ryan lifts a brow and tilts his head towards him. “Huh?”

“I’m sorry I feel like I uh, misspoke earlier? And that I, well, possibly upset you?” With eyes now turned to him, Dylan fingers flutter from the string to the fabric at the neck of his hoodie, with a slight tug before he forces them to return. Ryan tracks the movement, sees the desire to hide as he speaks.  

Both of his brows dip now and he sounds a little dumb even to himself, as in his genuine confusion he has nothing more to ask again than, “What?”

“Earlier, when I said something like, ‘name-name’ versus like, ‘werewolf name’, or something? Um. Remember?” Dylan imitates himself and scrunches his face as he tries to find the words to explain.

“What? No, no dude, you didn’t upset me. I don- Don’t worry about it.” Ryan says groggily and blinks his eyes again in an attempt to wake his mind enough from its dreamlike abstraction to a grounded process that may be able to make the connection he is missing.  

“I did though. And I know I did, so.” Dylan says and then with a shaken head, he cuts off another attempt at a confused and now nervous-leaning reassurance from Ryan. “No, no I know I did, okay I felt it. In your scent, undeniable. It was like I sprayed pesticides and made the fucking forest start withering, okay? I single handedly caused climate change and G- no, sorry, I’m being serious, I am. So let me just- I don’t know, reword it? ‘Cause now I think I know what it sounded like to you and that’s not what I meant.”

A little stunned and still in a souped up haze that is fading at a stubborn rate, Ryan just nods. He does not truly wish Dylan to continue- he does not want to hear him speak of what he knows Ryan to be, someone with something a little off within him, someone who became what they always were. He did not want Dylan to have picked up on his thoughts, that acknowledgement of himself. He told himself it didn’t hurt, why would Dylan bring it up now with this assurance to it like it had?   

“I just meant that- yeah, I meant everything I said but at the end there, I just…” He sucks a breath in and blows it back out through his teeth, sitting up a little and psyching himself up before he continues. “Guess I’m sorry that I’m like this constant reminder of it.”

Ryan sticks his left elbow beneath him to prop himself up on his side, to meet Dylan’s eyes at his new level, so relieved at the misunderstanding that he doesn’t even catch himself as he admits, “That is so far from how I see you.”   

Dylan just shakes his head and continues to try explaining what Ryan already plainly knows to not be true. “Okay. Well, no, I know that, what I meant is that- god okay, maybe I don’t know. I know it's not just that, but more like, I wish that we could have, y’know, had this without me ruining it by waking up from a stupid nightmare. I guess what I meant when I said that, was that I just feel like you’d like me a lot more without all this hanging over us? I swear I was like twenty percent more put together before this, which I know isn’t a massive improvement, but-”

“Dylan, I like you just fine.” Ryan says, a little thrown, but confident in this. His thumb gently presses in against his muscle as he continues, trying not to minimise the feeling while remaining quite confused at the logic, or lack thereof. “With nightmares, without them, doesn’t change a thing to me. I mean, seriously, why- how could it?”

“Okay. Yeah, okay.” There’s a pause. Dylan flicks his eyes up to just shy of Ryan’s cheekbone. “Ryan? Uh. This sounds so st- Nevermind, just- Do you like me? Like, y’know, like me like that, I mean. Uh, because I don’t k-”

“I don’t!” Ryan repeats instantly, all he heard and all he can hurriedly echo. He chokes on the saltwater that’s filled his lungs, coughing from the suddenly prominent burn and he forces himself to keep going through it, speaking before his stomach has even finished its plummet. “No! I’m so sorry, I don’t like you, not like that, I am- I’m sorry if I- god that I made you feel unco- or feel like I’m- no, I’m so sorry, uh- shit, um.”

The sea freezes over. It spreads through the saltwater and forest with the devastation of a fire, as a single ice crystal drifts down from a toiling storm to land atop the waves crest. It rapidly grows in a flash freeze, encasing the top of the ocean, holding the waves in place mid curl, the foam evaporating and loose droplets falling to the iced over surface like glass beads dropped to a porcelain floor. It expands downwards in a finger of death, an ice stalactite that sends spires outward through the water and it creeps towards him until Ryan feels his stomach pierced. There along the roots from his stomach it spreads, each crystal eviscerating the forest from inside out, the moss over the seabed transformed to razor sharp crystals, the leaves ruptured from within. The sun above the ocean is no more than a blurry halo of light through the thick ice, the space between them now opaque and scattering the light. No longer does its warmth pass through the tide, no longer does its beams ripple in the currents, no longer does it reach him on the frozen seabed. 

Dylan blinks, once, twice, maybe a few times in quick succession. Ryan isn’t sure, he can’t really meet his eyes. Still he hears the short laugh, a violent sound, more of an exhale in a forceful burst, accompanied by a visible recoil of his chest as it contracts from the punch of the sound. “Right. No, ‘course, sorry, that was so fucking stupid. Um. Wow. I’m sorry.”

Ryan grinds his jaw to the side and he swears he feels a tooth break. His tongue tastes of blood and salt and a cough lingers in the back of throat and still he remains silent. He says nothing as Dylan lifts his hands from fur and drawstring, placed at his sides as he awkwardly shifts around and stabilizes himself. Ryan neither lets go nor tightens his grip, as Dylan withdraws his leg back to himself and tucks it beneath him, Ryan’s fingers grazing along to the bottom of his achilles tendon until they flex around nothing but air. His hand left empty, feels cold in the wake of the warmth he clutched in his palm. His lungs remain just as empty too, unable to draw in a breath to turn to sound. Slowly, he also pushes himself back to sit upright, eyes pointed to the indent of his knees. There are so many things he can say, that he wishes to say, and none of them would be another lie. He does not dare speak.

Dylan laughs again and there’s no humour in it, it sounds nearer to the gurgle of lungs filled with blood, shredded to ribbons by crystals of ice. “No saving that one, huh? Jesus. Probably rate it the most embarrassing thing I’ve ever said and I think uh, almost anything I say is at least a strong seventy percent high on the embarrassment scale, so. World record maybe?”

Ryan nearly cringes at the sound of it. He hates to leave Dylan stewing in the perceived embarrassment, but what other choice does he have? If he says anything to assure him otherwise, he will be admitting to what Dylan was just telling him he does not feel the same as. Worse than that actually, far worse, he would be admitting to being in love with him. He would be admitting to the resolution, to the ineffable, to the inevitable. Some needless, momentary embarrassment is a little bit awkward, while loving past a point he can even put words to will ruin the friendship irreparably. It’s not a rock and a hard place when the answer there is so clear. 

The best he has to offer in an attempt otherwise, is weak to even his own ears. “I walked around with my shirt inside out the other day?”

“Oh, yeah you totally got me beat, man. Phew, don’t know how I’d recover from that one.” Dylan says, with his tone so breezy that Ryan knows instantly what he will see if he looks up. He knows and he cannot stop himself from flicking his eyes upward anyway. 

Dylan's face has shuttered. He has fastened the straps of his mask around his head until the edges of it merge into his skin beneath. He has this lopsided smile and leans back on his hands, just the picture of carelessness, unphased by anything. There is not a twitch to his expression, not a flicker of fidgeting movement to his hands, not a betraying tightness to his grin. Picture of carelessness had he not just both physically withdrawn, limbs kept tight to his body, and emotionally withdrawn, all vulnerability tucked beneath the mask. Both equally pulled from Ryan's grasp. It is the opposite of genuine relief and as well as it hides him, Ryan finds himself looking right through it anyway. Dylan looks right back, eyes meeting his completely steady. Still, there is no connection or meaning in eye contact with so much between them, as Ryan looks out from the mouth of a cave, through a sheet of ice and Dylan looks out from behind the mask, through the porcelain mould. Suddenly there is a frozen ocean and entire atmosphere between them. Neither of them are who they said they would be, neither of them are who they wish the other to be. Werewolf-Ryan and Blasé-Dylan look each other in the eyes and it is empty.  

Not only has the ocean frozen over, not only has he fled behind the safety of the mask, but the room near instantly becomes bitter sharp. It is Dylan’s scent and it isn’t. It is near unrecognisable, far from the burnt sweetness of earlier, instead it is almost scentless in a contradictory way. Ryan over the past months has become very accustomed to the scents, to their subtle shifts, to their presence, to the tangible emotion in them, from clearly noticeable to present yet unnameable. This is unlike anything he has past experienced. It is not embarrassment it reeks of as would be expected. It is a sting, serrated and metallic. It smothers all else in the room, an invisible gaseous smog made of needlelike spikes, it is perceptible only in the numbing sensation of frostbite crawling up the bridge of his nose and the sudden lack of all other scents, as if the woven wind has been consumed by it. The wisps of woodsmoke, tendrils of white ash and threads beaded with dewdrops are completely gone and for the first time in four months, Ryan finds himself truly deprived of one of senses. It is disconcerting and disturbing, something he never thought he would experience again and now that he has, he feels immediately agitated from it.                  

For as much as he can see through it, Ryan would believe the mask was fitted in place to save from embarrassment, he’d believe that. Ryan hates to see it slotted over his face, let alone be the cause of its appearance, but he does not hate Blasé Dylan. Blasé Dylan exists for a very specific purpose and that is namely to protect himself. To shield himself against embarrassment, sure, it would make sense. Ryan almost desperately wants it to be as simple as that. It isn’t. That’s how Ryan knows he has really fucked up. Clearly, it is not just some momentary embarrassment. Ryan has never been a good liar and that was the boldest, most fear filled lie he has ever spoken. He knows. Everything that Ryan has tried to hide and still he’s given it away, still Dylan knows. Fuck. What was it, what did he say? What has he done? 

Ryan looks away first. “I’m sorry.” He says and he means it. 

“It’s fine man, I shouldn’t have asked. Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answer to, right?” Dylan says back and Ryan can tell he means it too. 

“Right.” Comes the echo.

He doesn’t know what to do, what to say. His mind feels almost blank. Wordless, thoughtless, nearly emotionless. This shouldn’t hurt, it’s not new information. Kaitlyn told him herself, Dylan wasn’t interested, why would it hurt anymore having that reiterated? If anything it is better confirmation, to hear it from his own mouth. That doesn’t hurt, that’s fine. Maybe what hurts is that it won’t change anything for him. It’s not some closure or release from his feelings, no. It’ll remain. Ryan, for all the good it’s worth, knows himself. Knows this about himself at the very least. He knows for as short a time that he’s lived, this will remain for as long a time he has left and to the after when he’s gone. He may be young but he just knows, resolute in it, that it is different, it is unique, it is irreplicable, it is unchangeable. He’s it for him, he’ll always be it for him, it is him, solely him. This doesn’t change anything for Ryan.

He’s had one objective in mind, one resolute promise to himself, that he couldn’t stop himself from breaking. It’s pathetic really. He knew what would happen and he let it happen anyway. It was the very first month they returned to the quarry, the very first night. His stomach dropped and he promised himself that he would not ruin their friendship over unrequited feelings. That he could be normal, could be the friend that Dylan deserves. He should have been able to contain it, swallow it down and forget it exists.  

For Dylan however, with the frozen ocean, sun without warmth, frostbite scent smothering all others, it’s clear that it does change things. Yeah, if there’s one thing he’s completely assured of, it’s that he knows Dylan. Maybe not his whole life story or every interesting tidbit about him, but he can read him, he understands him, he sees him. Ryan understands this too. Dylan said that Ryan has never hurt him and God, what a lie that was. What a heartfelt, fundamental misunderstanding of what Ryan is, a selfish and deceitful man. He not only broke his trust harbouring his love and resolution, the ineffable and inevitable from him, but then to top it off, he lied right to his face when graciously given the chance to come clean about it. Ryan has never felt so selfish in loving someone before, he didn’t know loving someone could even be such a selfish act. He understands, he does. God if he hasn’t been yanked from a mind leeching dreams into thoughts and into a nightmare reality at a disorienting rate though. One of his own making worst of all, no one to blame but himself.   

Inevitable, inevitable, inevitable. That’s what it all is. Inevitable that he could not keep this something ‘off’ within him from ripping scratches into his limbs until he pulls away, inevitable that the something off within him keeps the blood he’s drawn under its claws, inevitable that he buries it so deep within him that it’ll remain until he is scattered to atoms. He thought maybe this something ‘off’ within him wasn’t malicious, just, y’know, a bit off, that’s all. When he was a little younger he contrasted it against a lack of empathy or antisocial behaviours. He kept to himself mostly, never minded being alone, he had that separation from others and when he latched on to someone, he never let them go from within him. However he never hurt little animals, he cares about others, he doesn’t have an inflated ego and he felt regret, even for simple things, like when he stole Ben Wilkinson’s NatGeo book- actually, he still feels bad about that, it’s a good book, he’s kept it on his bookshelf to this day. He’s always been a bit off, but he wasn’t bad. Yeah, well, he’s reconsidering.

Considering how that was all before he held a shotgun in his hands and pulled the trigger. Before he was a murderer, a murderer of someone who cared about him no less, someone who was kind and good and Ryan killed him. There was already blood on his hands from childhood and no amount of his hesitation meant anything when he willfully added more. He could have just not pulled the trigger. He thought about it and still he chose to do it, he made that decision, another nightmare of his own making. It is impossible to know what would have happened if he hadn’t shot, but Chris would be alive, he would. Ryan wouldn’t look in the mirror and see his own reflection as a mere smudge, something half drenched in blood and something half so bright it blinds him, a reflection of not him as he is, rather another form of him, of all the good he could have been. The good without the rot, the good without the blood, the good without death guiding his hand. Yeah, maybe his hands wouldn’t be clean even so, but they wouldn’t drip splatters of blood to the ground, leaving a trail behind him as he walks.  

With all of that, for him to think even for just a moment it’s possible that this something within him isn’t disgusting? Isn’t reprehensible and cruel and capable of evil, that’s- that is naive at best and proof of it at worst. No, it wasn’t the curse that made him possessive or selfish or off. Born with something rotten inside of him that has festered as he’s aged, has he ever tried to stop it? He used bloodshed to end bloodshed and now the stains pile on his hands in layers and layers and they will never be clean again. He doesn’t believe in fate, he doesn’t, his choices are his own. He could have changed this, any of this, from age seven to nineteen, yet again and again his choices have resulted in death. With that in him, with that being him, then of course it’s contaminated his love too. How could it not? No, he knew what it was, that it’s bloody hands, it’s flesh beneath his claws, it’s sinking them in and dragging them through skin until it breaks, it’s possessive, obstinate, violent even, like a dog with a bone. And he loved and he loves anyway. It’s disgusting, selfish, pathetic and condemned by its very own nature. And the accolades keep piling up in his mind and more and more he understands the withdrawal from him. Yes, he always was what he became and Ryan would keep a frozen ocean’s worth of ice away from himself too. He should probably just be glad the saltwater froze, instead of becoming an ocean’s worth of the blood he’s spilt, drowning him beneath the copper taste of his selfishness and crushing him beneath the weight of his choices. He understands what Dylan feels, he feels the same. His very own sense of love disgusts and scares him too.

“I- You know, I think I’m going to go have a shower. Uh, so- well. I might be a minute. Shit, your drive’s pretty long, right? I won’t hold you hostage, um, don’t feel like you have to wait around or anything. You can head off whenever, no worries.” Dylan tells him and it’d be pretty believably genuine, if it wasn’t so obviously not. Props to him, it’s such a polite boot out the house that even a Southern grandma would be impressed. 

“Right, yeah, should probably get going.” Ryan agrees. He keeps all his regret and reluctance from his words. It’s the least he can do. 

“Oh, ‘course, sure.” Dylan says, feigning surprise like that wasn’t what he had subtly asked for. “‘Suppose I’ll say bye now then? Thank you for all the help, seriously man, really- uh, really good of you. Thanks.”

“Anytime, y’know?” That he has to still know. And this, well, this is for his own selfish sake. “I was happy to. You uh, need a ride to the quarry, this time coming up? Happy to do so. Uh, same as, anytime.”

“Oh, no, no it’s alright, thanks though. I mean, might take you up on it eventually, but I’ll hitch a ride with- this time I’ll be alright.” He smidges a little over to the top of the duvet, earning an unimpressed meow as he shuffles down the bed away from them. “Guess I’ll see you then?”

“Right, right. Uh, see you then.” Ryan forces out.

Dylan nods, probably to himself more than anything, pushes himself to the end of the bed and hops up. Ryan doesn’t know what he’s meant to do, so he just sits there while Dylan roots through his closet for clothes. He just stares at his knees. Listens to the sound of rummaging. Hooks his hands around his own shin to replace the lost weight in his palm. Tries to not to freak out from the deprivation of his primary sense. Then there’s a thud on the bed by his feet. He glances up, first to the box at the edge of the mattress and then slower, hesitantly, back to Dylan again. 

“It’s the first today. Could be the start of winter, considering.” Dylan tells him, hesitating with a little nod down to the box and that clicks it together.

“Yeah, ‘suppose meteorologically. Feels it already.” Ryan talks around it as if the box is invisible, the same way as when he’s at his grandparents house and politely tries his best to pretend not to see the money in the birthday card until he’s read it through. No matter how much he avoids acknowledging the box with anything close to even a glance, it’s the fact they’ve suddenly been reduced to talking about the weather that is nearly physically painful.  

“Well…” Dylan does a start and stop, catching and forcing himself to acknowledge what Ryan said. He runs his hands over his upper arms, barely nodding an agreement so he can push through until he’s able to flee. “Um, well. First of the month today. Start of wint- ah, it’s your birthday. In four days. Five, counting today. Pretty sure you know that. Hopefully. Um, listen, this is- it’s really stupid and lame and now I’m thinking it might be uh, kinda bad taste. I mean, honestly some Reese's or something may have been better, but. Uh, I’ll tell you this, for all my many super cool and crazy talents, gift giving is not really one of them, so.”

He picks it up again and does a very gentle toss of it over to him, landing a little tilted on the angle of the duvet lifted by his knees. Ryan steadies it with a hand and doesn’t really look at it. “Uh, totally unnecessary dude, thank you, I really wasn-”

“Don’t open it yet!” Dylan blurts out, cutting him off. He clears his throat a little and makes himself sound much more composed. “Uh, that is a birthday present. And birthday presents are a birthday only privilege, by law, okay? That’s codified and everything, so just- yeah. You’ve got a few hours left. Open it up on your birthday.”

“Yeah, ‘course, ‘course. Thank you.” Ryan’s glad to agree. His reasons are selfish and, well, a little less selfish. Selfishly, he doesn’t know what his reaction will be, he can’t even look at it as right now it could be a fridge magnet and he still wouldn’t trust his tear ducts. Only slightly less selfishly, it’s also so clear that Dylan wants to get out of here as soon as possible. He’s injecting little laughs between his words and guising his discomfort beneath a playful tone, but for Christsake, he’s just repeating scripted lines that are thrown off by no more than a comment on the changing seasons. If Ryan had to guess he’d say Dylan doesn’t want to give him a present at all anymore, let alone be forced to linger in his company or sit through him opening the wasted effort. Ryan’s fingertips burn atop the varnish. 

“Cool, cool, cool. Uh well, I’m off. Have a good birthday man.” Dylan sends him a short pawed wave, aborted halfway through. He’s turned his back and started for the door before he would have caught the returned loosely given two finger salute Ryan sent back. He doesn’t blame him.

He hears the footfalls stop and he feels the barbs of the scent turned ice grow impossibly sharper for a second. He can’t stop himself from glancing up to the door where Dylan has paused. His back still turned, he shakes his head to himself, this nearly imperceivable gesture. His spine arches beneath the fabric of his hoodie as he draws in a deep breath and turns around again, his eyes locking to Ryan’s before he can shift his gaze. He opens his mouth as if to speak and closes it again. A second ticks past, a second too long that it is unbearable. 

Ryan’s jaw grinds left again, his mouth opens of its own accord and it feels like he’s throwing up as he says, “I want you to know- I want you know that I’m- But I want to- I hope you’re- and I’m- I’m sorry.” 

Dylan doesn’t say anything in response to the nonsensical auditory bile and it hangs in the air sounding stupider and stupider with each second past. Then he just smiles. He just smiles.              

It isn’t real, mostly. Still, there’s something genuine in there, a little, maybe. It’s something, at least. It's anything. Ryan will always take this little bit of anything that he has with him, over the everything of anyone else. He returns the smile as best he can, of course he does, incessantly compelled to by the mere sight of it. It’s not the same, he’s aware. The difference is, Dylan’s lips curl up and it isn’t mostly real but it is the most Dylan part of Dylan, and it isn’t warm but it is no less radiant. Difference is, Ryan’s lips split open and it isn’t just the strings of blood dragged between them but it is the uncovering of fangs broken off in the hope it may resemble teeth; and it isn’t just the blood diluted saltwater gurgling past his lips into rivulets trickling down his chin but it is the overflowing of it all, from the exposed pulp of his teeth, to his bitten tongue, to the scratches left inside his throat of every word he gnaws on before swallowing down. 

A beat passes. The door creaks and the staircase groans and ever so faintly there’s murmurs beneath the linoleum squeaks. Ryan drops his face into his hands. He runs a tongue over his teeth as if to check they really aren’t cracked and just finds his gums feeling raw instead. Yeah, that’s the difference between them and what will always be the difference between them. Dylan covers himself with a porcelain mask, polished and unblemished, without a single crack or chip. With a smile and a laugh and a joke at the ready, no matter the situation or emotion. This spans to even when the jokes do crack in the kiln of a petrifying fear, the porcelain of the mask melting in a sludge of magma over him, cooling and recrystallizing, instantly sculpting him to marble. Either way, this mask, he can paint it on himself so finely, in the like of something he is just not quite. With brushes dipped in a colour that brightens the cold stone and glossed over every little fissure, so not a single pore could bring shame or offence. Well, for all that he can blend himself to it until no one seems able to see it isn’t really him, not all of him, not the skin of him; Ryan has seen the shivering, it must be cold, this molded, painted, smoothed over veneer. It’s a thin layer of skin over his own or it’s a coat of paint over marble. Either way, when he retreats beneath it, he keeps himself hidden in the dark. It’s not a good thing, Ryan doesn’t think that in the slightest, it’s just- the thing is, he can take it off.

Ryan has never managed to craft something as delicate as porcelain into a mask, nor steady his hands to paint with such detail. It’s not like he wears his heart on his sleeve, instead it’s that he is nothing so polished. He is always this rawly himself, he’s never known how to stop, how to stop it escaping out from behind bars, out from the cave within. Always, he feels flayed. He speaks to the people he cares about and it doesn’t just make his skin crawl, it makes it shredded, it carves it from him, and somehow- it’s- and he’s not- he- for fucksake. He talks to the people he cares about and he doesn’t know if they’re holding the knife or if he has turned his own claws against himself. Not like it matters. He's always left spilling out his entrails and grasping out his mangled hands either way. He walks away, this skinned carcass that has pulled itself from the hook, still hot to the touch, seeping out, all bloody muscle and corded sinew and oozing pus. He knows that neither ice nor cage has ever contained it at all and he always knew it and it leaves him flayed. 

He’s tried to drag himself off to the corners, to solitude no different than a dog hiding beneath the porch to die alone, only he hasn’t died. He’s still here, has survived everything life has tried him with yet and while he thinks of death constantly, knows it with a vile intimacy, he doesn’t think of his own. He just ends up coming crawling out from beneath the porch, always, for all he’s tried. Ryan is a cruel and selfish bastard, he never lets go, he tries, he swears, he really has tried. He only has three photos. He hasn’t watched a single DVD. He doesn’t even say his goddamn fucking name. He keeps his eyes from the scar. He stays out of the office. He’s dropped the painting in the gap behind the bench’s seatback. On and on and on he tries and still he never does let go and still he never will. He sinks his claws in and on and on and on he clings to limbs, until they’re the ones who are forced to rip lacerations into themselves pulling free. He keeps his claws bloodsoaked and on and on and on he clings to his love for them, long after they’re gone. He thinks his desperate and clinging and needlessly grief stricken attempts at love must be horrifying to witness. People have to notice it and it has to be a revolting sight, to see this flayed man or this skinned animal.

Something like panic begins to claw at his throat, that disgusting flayed beast howling in this chant, that he tried so hard, he can’t lose this, he can’t lose him, he can’t, he can’t, he can’t. He shuts it down instantly. Then Ryan starts to seethe. 

He can’t lose this, he can’t? Well he is, he already has, because he couldn’t be fucking normal for just once! Just once in his entire life and he couldn’t even manage that. His word means absolutely nothing, the promises he crushes like snails beneath a brick. It’s not even some werewolf bullshit he can blame this on, this is him, this all him. He always what was he fucking became. What was it, what gave him away- what, that he couldn’t let go of his leg? Clinging and clinging to it, that’s pathetic in the most humiliating and demeaning sense of the word. God, or- or what? What, was it all those lovesick glances and slips of the tongue, as if he really couldn’t help himself? He’s acted as if he wanted this to happen, as if he wanted him to see this skinless clawed thing, as if anyone wouldn’t recoil at the sight of it. Or was this his scent, giving him away this whole time, fuck, why couldn’t he stay away? Selfishly indulging over and over. And- and still he has the godforsaken gall to think he knows best, knows what is right for not just Dylan, for anyone- and he does, he does still think that. No, of course this hasn’t changed anything for him, of course not. Not a waver to his resolution, not one. He’ll crawl under the porch like a dog to its death and he’ll lick his raw exposed flesh wounds and he’ll come crawling right back out again. He is sick, he is rotten inside, flayed skin and rot within.

That’s when the resignation sets back in. His attempts at self loathing are worthless if he doesn’t change anything. There’s no dignity in his anger when he already knows it won’t. He’ll come crawling right back out again because for however much that Ryan could never say it, he hates to feel alone. He likes his own space, his own time, his own company, needs his peace and quiet where he can keep to himself. It’s not to be alone, it’s to feel alone. It’s that- that feeling inside of him and like the ineffable he would never be able to speak aloud what it is, but unlike it, he thinks he can name exactly what it is. It’s- He gets lonely. He gets sick with it.    

That sickness it’s- behind his eyes in an instant, a memory bubbles up from the depths, somewhere forgotten and left to rot with the rest of it, of a time when he was a kid. Must have been, what, maybe nine or so? Back staying at his Mom’s, when he watched Hostel for the first time. He doesn’t know where she was, evidently not around to tell him not to watch it at least. It was his first big kid horror movie and he spent the majority of it peeking through his hands, both horrified and unable to look away. Until it got to the scene where the main character is strapped to a chair, gets his achilles tendon sliced and then stands up, splitting it open in a snap. Ryan truly couldn’t stomach it, he had to avert his eyes. Before though, it’s that short moment before that which this memory centers on. It’s how he cringed, a wince and shudder and recoil, which forced the turn of his head. It was a reflex from his visceral aversion and revulsion to what he was seeing and honestly, Ryan to this day cringes at the thought of it again. Yeah, that’s what it is. It’s the same response to hearing the sound of the crunch, in one of those early internet videos. The handheld capture of someone sitting with their feet atop a coffee table, until a kid jumps off a trampoline and comes right down onto their outstretched legs. With that memory for reference, he knows exactly what it’s like, more than a movie or recording, he had known it intimately the past few months. It’s the bend, snap and crunch.

There’s just something sick about it. It’s something specifically sick about it too, unlike a firehose of fake blood sprayed over a theatre or some other impressive practical effects. When it comes to bones and tendons, it’s this gut-deep cringing response, a genuine physiological reaction to seeing and hearing something be broken that never should. That is what he feels of himself, of his loneliness, this desperate and disgusting thing. He thinks that is what he evokes in others too, if not immediately than inevitably. That’s what he thinks it feels like, so it’s what, what like this flayed and clinging ‘off’ thing within him walks on bones snapping beneath his own weight, tearing open his own tendons with each step? God. Yeah, it is, he can picture it pretty bloody vividly. He can’t paint himself another layer to his own skin but if he nailed the stylus to his hand, given some time he could give image and movement to it all. He’d barely get to show it off before it was banned for objectionable obscenity. 

He should go, fuck, he should just go. He needs to get out of here. He drops his hands from his face and sets them down beside him to push himself up. There’s a loud merp before he manages to do so. He glances to his side and Dinger stands up, disturbed by the series of dips in the mattress beneath her. His chest gives a short and violent tug inward, the air going to the back of his throat, as if preparing and stopping short of a sob that was never going to come. He breathes silent and even and still he firmly blinks his eyes as Dinger smudges her cheek against his elbow, despite how they’re completely dry. He doesn’t know why his body feels as if it is on the precipice of tears when he genuinely feels no need or want to cry. Maybe it’s just that he likely lost a friend and yet still gained another, he thinks to himself, lifting his hand to hold a hooked finger out for her. Maybe it’s the way that in her smoodging against it, with how her little fang glides over his skin, it catches his skin on the way back down. He tilts his hand as a small bead of blood wells from the pinprick, to keep it from staining her fur while he gives a scritch to the incredibly soft spot behind her ears. She resumes her fang filled smoodging against his wrist, endlessly pleased at the attention. 

“We’re not so different, huh?” He says, swallowing past the lump in his throat to smile at her. She doesn’t reply, obviously. He thinks if she could, she’d tell him that while they both have fangs and claws that make the people they care about bleed when they try to show their love, she hasn’t killed anyone. She proved her mercy when she didn’t suffocate him last night as was warned. He whispers to her as she begins to purr. “Yeah. I really didn’t mean to- didn’t want to, though. I really have tried. Hey kitty? Would you believe that? Thought cats were good at judging that sort of thing.”

To that she’d probably not say anything and just meow because she’s a fucking cat and Ryan is making up an imaginary conversation with her that should land him in an involuntary hold. When he’s resorted to assuaging his guilt through asking a literal animal, then he thinks the answer to his questions has to already be pretty damning. She’s just a good cat and he’s well, definitely not. He smooths his hand down her cheek and neck, letting her walk along to graze her teeth along his elbow again before she circles back, purring all the way. 

“Hey cat. Seem to like me anyway, don’t you? Not a very good judge of character, but we’re friends anyway, huh? Yeah?” Yeah, the answer must be, her fang catching now on his wrist. With one last scritch, he withdraws his hand and pushes himself off the bed. He whispers his apologies at her disappointed ceasing of purrs. “Sorry girl.” 

He gathers his things quickly. He has to, he has to get out of here quickly, while he can bring himself to. Tugs on his cargos, stuffs on his boots without lacing them, shoves his phone in his pocket and checks his keychain is still attached to the carabiner on his belt loop. He pauses when he grabs his hoodie from atop the duvet. He decides to leave it, how forgetful of him. He swipes his jacket from the back of the desk chair instead and pulls that on, patting himself down just in case he managed to forget something. He finally glances at the box on the bed. It’s about a shoulder width long and every visible inch is covered in a varnished collage. As he finally really looks at it, he can tell instantly that it was hand done by Dylan himself. It’s a coat of what ranges from newspaper headlines, to stills from kids horror shows, to stills of constellations, to print outs of book covers and various cryptids. He picks it up without looking at it again.

He’s set, well, other than the hoodie. He nods to Dinger, where she sits watching his movement around the room. He relents, walking back to give her one last scritch and one last chance to smoodge his hand. “Won’t probably see you again, yeah? So, gift to you. And him, but don’t tell him that, yeah? Good cat.”

With that, he stiffly forces himself to straighten, turn, step, one, two, three, four. He walks out through the door and does a short sideways jog down the stairs. He makes it halfway through the living room before he’s pulled up short, just another four steps from the door. Nadia pauses on the edge of the kitchen, a coffee in hand. “Everyone’s up early today it seems. Morning Ryan.”

“Oh, uh, yeah, probably best for me to- it’s a long drive so, should probably head out. Thank you though, for having me, thanks.” Ryan stumbles through, edging towards the door. He should really go now. Right now.

She tilts her head a little and gives this unexpectedly and strangely warm and almost- sad? She gives this smile as she looks at him and he doesn’t know what it means. “Totally understandable. I was just about to get the paper, I’ll walk you out and see you off.”

The way she says that- she wants to say something to him, clearly. God, does even she know? Did she work it out herself or were the murmurs hidden beneath the linoleum squeaks Dylan telling her? Or is Ryan seriously about to get told off for something he didn’t do? He didn’t even think about it! He just nods. They head out the door and Ryan hovers by the cab of his truck while she wanders on down to the mailbox. He can feel how he stands pinstraight, drawn tight like a bowstring, but he has no idea how to make himself physically relax. He worries his skin would slough off if he managed it, anyway.

As Nadia wanders back up the short driveway, he has to actively remind himself to breathe, wouldn’t really suit his hasty escape to pass out on the concrete and get dragged back inside due to his dramatics. So he breathes and waits patiently while Nadia appraises the first few pages of the newspaper. It isn’t as long a wait as it feels before she makes a triumphant sound and flips the page to face Ryan. His eyes drop down to where her finger taps against it, a steady tap tap tap beneath the bold inked heading. ‘The Horror’s Over’, Camp Counsellors Finally Returned Home After Massacre. Ryan swallows thickly at the title presented to him, sparing a quick glance down at the short piece beneath it, seeking out a specific name from the end. However, the author’s name is one Ryan has never seen before. Uncertain of where this may lead, nervously he forces his eyes to meet hers once more to find out. 

She gives him a small but kind and most importantly, seemingly genuine smile. She turns it back to herself, drawing her head back slightly to look down her nose at it, in a gesture that betrays the glasses she would usually wear when sizing up the paper like this. “Shot and a miss with the title if you ask me, which notably, they did not. You are heading home however and I promise I won’t keep you long, I know your parents must be eager to have you home. I just wanted to quickly say again, we are so appreciative of your help and one thing, if you don’t mind.”

Ryan doesn’t correct her, just nods along politely, as he was taught. She seems to pick up on what he didn’t say regardless, somehow. He watches as she folds the paper in her hands and fixes him with this flicking look, an assessment if he’s ever seen one. “Ah. Well, I was going to ask you to look after my boy, but…” But you just threw away your friendship with him and now neither of us trust you nor would ever want you to do so, Ryan fills in the blanks before she needs to speak them herself.

“But I know you already do- that night and even now, you look out for all of them. Now, I know as much about you as Dylan does, likely some things more than him in fact, yet I don’t know who looks out for you anymore. And I do not mean to overstep,” She tells him, contradicting herself as she does actually take a physical step closer, “However I must tell you this and I ask you to set Dylan aside completely here.” 

Ryan just barely resists closing his eyes in resignation and manages instead a solemn and once again polite nod of his head. Two streams of thought pass through what has slowly turned into the otherwise hazy valleys of mind. The thought that, of course she knows of that night, yet the acknowledgement of what he has been trying and failing to do, is kind at least. Even if she doesn’t know the half of it, the half that is filled with his complete failure after failure. A heartfelt compliment before the critique. As clearly, she has sized him up and found him lacking, to ask him to set Dylan aside. That’s where the second stream comes in from the sea to intersect the first, the thought that this is another person he will inevitably fail. Maybe in the next moment she will ask him to promise that he will do as she just asked and maybe in the next moment he will make that promise. It will be another, that try as may indeed, he will not maintain. To set Dylan aside is the true impossible task and for as much as either she or Dylan know him, if they do not know this, then they know nothing of significance. 

“I ask you to set him aside for this because it is really important to me that you truly understand, it does not matter what happens between you. It does not matter if one day you find yourself at odds, if you both end up heartbroken, if you think he hates you or if you think you can no longer be friends after this, just anything at all.” She spreads her hands apart to give emphasis as she looks at him very seriously. “Okay? Dylan aside completely, I need you to know that, nevermind should you want or need it, no matter what there will always be a hand and a home for you here. If you ever need somewhere to stay, if you ever need some help, if you ever need anything at all, you can call me.”

With that, from the bun in her hair she pulls a pen and tears a piece of the newspaper off, jotting down her number and handing it to Ryan. She asks him if he understands and Ryan wants to nod or say yes or really anything in the affirmative, if even just to make his escape come sooner. He can’t. He truly doesn’t understand. She can tell too, that much is obvious and she offers him another one of those smiles that makes something ache in Ryan’s chest.

“You don’t deserve empty words, Ryan, so please give me the benefit of the doubt in that I would not offer them. You went through something no one ever should and then and now, you looked out for the people around you. You’re a good kid and you are doing what a lot of people couldn’t. Still, it would make me feel a hell of a lot better to know that you had someone to look out for you too.” She tells him, looking him in the eye as she does so. “You don’t ever have to call, but I hope you understand that you are able to, for whatever reason. This is my home and I get the final say, so when I tell you that you will never be intruding here, I mean it. Anything that is within my power to help too, I want to. You don’t have to accept it, but you do understand that?”

Maybe it is just from the shock of the direction this went, a far north of anything he was ever expecting, but somehow, he does. Ryan swallows thickly again and despite the tightness in his chest from this necrotic hole drilling deeper in with each of her words, he nods and tells her, “Yeah- yes, okay.”

“Alright. Off you go then, if you must.” She says, satisfied at last, closing his hand around the paper and opening the truck door for him. He sits himself down inside and slips the torn piece of paper into his pocket, rolling down the window once she has closed the door behind him. 

“And Ryan?” She asks over the sudden hum of the engine. She gives him one last heartfelt smile and leaves him with a statement she does not seek a reply to, patting the side of the truck and offering a nod before she steps back to return inside at the end of her sentence. “Sometimes we can’t see what everyone else can, when we’re too close to it. But if I could give some advice? Don’t pull away for the chance at vision. Just trust your instincts and what it feels like. You don’t need to see it when you can already feel it.”  

With that she takes a step back and despite his furrowed brows at her confusing words, Ryan doesn’t risk being caught lingering, as soon as the door closes behind her, he pulls the truck out of the driveway. He calmly retraces his path through the town and makes it back out to the highway before the panic grips his chest. He remembers through the panic, what he couldn’t in that room. This morning, lying on the seafloor, he forgot to surface. He forgot he was holding his breath. He forgot why Dylan made him feel like he's underwater. He forgot he was drowning. And now he can’t breathe.

For minutes that pass in the same distorted warp as the other cars blurring by on the highway, he can’t suck in any air, his throat closed off completely, unable to draw in a single breath- or maybe he’s breathing fast, too fast. Honestly, he can’t tell, but the air feels thin, like he really is trying to suck oxygen in through saltwater and it burns like it too. He knows he should pull over at this point, but he doesn’t. He forces himself through the lack of air as he holds his breath until he finds the switch in his brain that he can click it all off. It takes a moment, while the pressure builds up in his lungs and he fights the urge to close his eyes, but finally, the emotions dissipate. The fog in the valley blankets his mind completely, leaving all thought and emotion and that rising panic beneath a deep and hazy numbness. His eyes feel fixed to the road and the only sense of his body is where his palms clutch the wheel. He drives the entire way home like this, stopping a few times for food, drink and to stretch his legs, everything feeling fuzzy and distant. He never stops for long, lest he be drawn back through the fog, letting himself go through the short stops in blinks of the eye, experiencing the present of those short few moments like ones already in the past.  

He drives home feeling like an animation of his own making came to life, his eyes the monitor screen and his autonomy turned to nothing more than the simple left turn, right turn, blinker button, peddle step of driving. It’s only when he returns home, that he realises that he has in fact not returned home at all. He kills the truck engine with a sharp twist of the keys, that haze lifted in an instant, as a shock of emotion cleaves through. 

The truck is parked on the side of a street and out through the windshield, the footpath is familiar. The curb is still cracked, the storm drain is still rusted, the weeds still grow through the leaves clogging up the gutter and the telephone pole is still buckled in towards the sidewalk. Shards of glass will still be able to be found in the grass strip and the concrete has russet stains baked into it, still there, over a decade later. Once more, he finds the air thin, even as he opens the door and the cold air rushes into the cab. He steps out surrounded by the scent of pine and the smoke from a nearby chimney. With his sense returned to him, there is a faint relief, buried beneath the pile of grief, guilt and that feeling there is no right word for, not in this language. He doesn’t want to be here, he thinks to himself as he takes a step closer to the curb. He shouldn’t be here, he thinks to himself as the pounding in his ears mimics the sound of blood dripping from his fingers to the roadside. He isn’t meant to be here. It’d be rude to leave now.

He walks forward until his boots hit the curbside. The sight of it has his legs growing weak beneath the weight of emotions and memories thrumming through him, welling up in his eyes in an attempt to escape him, constricting his throat in an attempt to halt him. He hits the ground with a dull ache and sits with his back against the telephone pole. So Ryan just sits there for a while, breathing shallow, remaining silent, breath fogging in the cold. Sits where the flowers were once left, years ago. Sits there until the sun tracks through the sky far enough the light has begun to dim. Sits there until his Nana comes to pick him up, sent by a nosy neighbour no doubt. She pulls him up with a gentle yet firm hand and drags him into a hug. He cranes over her now, more than he did before, his shoulders up to her forehead and he wonders if this hug hurts her in its reminiscence. She lets him sniffle and stay silent, doesn’t let go of his arm even as they pull away and she looks at him with this expression that makes him avert his gaze. 

He looks at the dented telephone pole and he knows. It was never contained, it’s all too familiar here for it to have ever been. The boots he wears, the truck parked beside him, his eyes, his nose, his hands. His hands, that for all he has imagined it, have been clean and dry all morning. The real blood isn’t on his hands, it’s soaked into the sidewalk he sat his palms upon. It’s all and always the same. He won’t let go of Dylan either and still, a resolution can also mean the end of something too.

Chapter Text

The fog clouds roll past his window, isolating the sound of tires on damp concrete from any sight of the cars driving past on the street below. Winter has begun mild and dreary. Each day the clouds swirl over his apartment, circling until the near approaching day when they’ll release a torrent of wind and hail. Ryan remains certain it will be warmer outside than it is within. It’s shards of ice slicing through each nerve, fracturing outwards and tearing its way through to a cellular level. It’s burning in the cold, his nerves alive, without the mercy of any numbness from either the burn or freeze.

The dim of the fog outside leaves his apartment cast in a gloom, everything tinged grey, from the walls, to the linoleum, to the scratched up and rickety table he sits at. The lights are off. Their dull yellow glow would provide him no warmth now, nor would crawling inside an incinerator and pressing go. Not when a pyre of his own making has left this frozen void within his stomach vengeful. It feels worse than ever before, in a way that leaves him at the end of his rope. At the end of his belt tied to the ceiling fan, if the easy way out was a viable option. It isn’t, it isn’t actually the easy option and it isn’t an option at all, not to him. If anything could ever make it considered preferable though, it’d be this. 

In some ways, he’s remained far more stable than he has in months past. His senses haven’t hit that peak and trough, staying at that new sharpness. In the rest it is less stable than it is stuck. A record scratch, the music cutting out. A switch flipped, a light bulb blown. He’s drifting through work. He can’t sleep, not just his usual inability to fall asleep, but an inability to stay asleep for more than an hour or so at a time. His jacket, which he wears permanently indoors or out, feels paper thin. It’s cold, but it isn’t just cold. One night, a few weeks ago, while Ryan painted useless details on a still unfinished asset, Dylan rambled on about space. His favourite topic and even through the tinny distortion of his headphones, his voice held that excited quality to it that Ryan is ever so fond of. Space is not freezing, he was informed, well actually it is, he was then corrected, but probably not in the way he thinks. It was his own personal podcast as he painted and in the end, what stood out to him is that being out adrift in space, the immediate danger is not freezing. It’s the suffocation that kills you first. 

And that, Ryan has felt squeezing him blue ever since he stepped back into his apartment. It’s like a hydraulic press compacting in from all angles. He just can’t seem to catch his breath. An endless pit, the vacuum of space, a black hole, whatever it is, it’s killing him. It hurts, it really fucking hurts and Ryan doesn’t know what to do. He can’t live like this, each day compounds and it’s all getting worse and worse.

Ryan feels like he’s been torn in two all over again. This time it has nothing to do with anything supernatural at least, though to a certain extent, Ryan thinks he’d rather it would be. Honestly it’s not even really a split in two this time either, more like a glass pane dropped on the concrete and fractured into countless shards. It’s memories, thoughts, memories, emotions, memories and more and more memories, and memories after memories and memories from memories. It’s a cascade of them and where once he knew how to push them down and aside, he has forgotten how. He doesn’t know where exactly this began. Maine, would be the easy answer, but he doesn’t think it’s quite the full truth. Coalescence would be his next best guess, which he thinks does take a significant portion of the truth of it. Finding himself parked in front of a bent telephone pole would take the rest.

No matter when the initial crack was chipped into the concrete, the dam has broken and every memory he kept carefully separated and preserved from his mind has flooded in. They keep hitting him through the day, like flashbangs dropped at his feet, nearly robbing him of his sight and hearing as his mind retreats to the past. Doesn’t help that he’s now permanently exhausted, leaving his mind already prone to detaching from the present for a moment of rest, leaving him idling with a blank stare. It takes these moments to conjure memories he had forgotten he was able to recall at all.

From Maine, to August, to Thirteen, to January, all those years ago. It’s become hard to tell now, how much memory is normal, if the near total lack of it after shoving it all away is or if the reminders haunting every blink of his eyes is. He tries to shut out the world to lessen the chances his mind finds something to reminisce over. If it were just that, maybe he’d manage. With the frozen void and black hole in his stomach too, he has to try taking everything one second at a time, just to get through. Really, he is less living these days. It’s closer to slogging through a slurry of grease ice. 

His birthday was spent alone, freshly twenty years old and his big celebration was a takeaway burger. Of course he visited his grandparents and Sarah the next day, accepted the new drawing tablet with gratitude, ate chocolate self saucing pudding, avoided the studying gaze of his Pop. Every smile feels plastered. When he can manage them, mostly he doesn’t have the energy. He hasn’t managed to paint a single line. He only got so far as to plug in the new drawing tablet, when he knows they must have saved for it. He barely remembered to text Kaitlyn on her birthday, a few days after his own, a year ahead of him. She just sent back a thumbs up anyway.

All Ryan’s done is go to work with his headphones on, driven home to maybe eat, before he tries to sleep, still in his jacket, hoodie and jeans. He’s more than ready to drive up to the quarry, regardless how temporary the few days will be, up there amidst the forest he’s claimed territory over. It will be a relief he could not continue on without, no matter how temporary. Despite this, he has not left at the break of dawn, procrastinating and prolonging his own pain. First, he has a birthday gift to open. 

He couldn’t do it on the day. He could barely text his thanks. Luckily it’s easier to lie over text and Dylan didn’t ask him about what he thought of it. All month it has been left atop the table he sits at now, wedged against the painting which he finally brought in from his truck to instead be left leant against the window. Together they’ve made his kitchen table a shrine of malaise he hasn’t dared go near. Take it one second at a time. He releases a shallow breath outward. Hooks his ankles around the chair legs. Pulls himself in. Raises his hands. Steadies the painting. Draws the box towards him. Unties the string holding it shut. Pulls the card from the envelope. Reads the pleasantries within. And he lifts off the lid.

What he sees within immediately makes him smile, this amused yet painful expression, where his face contorts of its own accord while his throat is filled with painful stings. He swallows around both as he lifts the cowboy hat from the box. It’s a brown felt cattleman and it seems the distress is genuine. Clearly secondhand and well loved, but standing the test of time impressively. Ryan nearly misses the stitching on the brim, it’s so subtle. This stitching is a new addition, in dark brown thread that only stands out due to the otherwise worn out wool and fur around it. A collection of tiny little stars dot the front edge, in a short line, split in the center by a small tree beneath a raincloud. For how small it all is, the stitching is well done and intricate enough to be clear what it is, undoubtedly hand done. Ryan immediately recalls the box by Nadia’s spot on the couch, filled with knitting and embroidery supplies. This alone, is above and beyond for a gift, something that is somehow heartfelt and meaningful despite coming from an offhand and stupid joke. It is especially meaningful to Ryan, in ways Dylan couldn’t have foreseen, due to the timing of that particular joke, made in the exact moment Ryan realised he was truly and helplessly in love with him. The stinging increases in intensity until he’s forced to put it down.

It was not the only thing within the box. Next, Ryan picks up a book, one of five stacked on the bottom, also made thick with use. Ryan knows a second hand book when he sees one and this book has passed through many hands. Actually, he knows immediately where Dylan got this, considering he’s been stuck sleeping in a library for the past three months. This gift too, would be appreciated simply for being a handpicked selection, but the true heart in it reveals itself when he thoughtlessly flicks to the first page. As he riffles through the book with a thumb, for each page that shoots by, scribbles of handwriting fill the margins and underline sentences and arrows point to words and doodles fly by, the stars inked into the corner of every other page dancing around in stop motion. He rushes to pick up each book, repeating the action and sure enough, each is annotated. Ryan has to close his eyes from the emotion slicing up through his throat. 

It’s horrible, it’s been so fucking horrible. They’ve barely spoken, not a single call, scarcely a text here or there, the perfect record of daily goodnights dropped like it never existed to begin with. Ryan misses him so much the sludge within his bones aches. It hurts at night when he’s alone and freezing, after another evening of silence between them, it does. It hurts most in the morning, when he waits for the jug to boil and the sunlight streams in through the panes, after the smell of honey on toast makes him so sick he cannot eat for the rest of the day. If he could just get some sleep. The way he curls in a ball with his arms wrapped around his stomach, freezing cold and so empty it makes him feel sick. Ever since Dylan stopped saying goodnight, Ryan’s stopped sleeping. He can’t close his eyes without the heavy drag of exhaustion pulling at him.

So, the void is not the sole culprit of his misery. It’s not absolved from blame, Ryan would be just as miserable if it was the source alone. It’s not that he blames Dylan either. He understands. It’s just that it’s winter and he’s cold and he can’t sleep and everything aches. Honestly he’s starting to think it reaches a point where any added misery just becomes null amongst it all. In the same way a log thrown on a burning city is incapable of making the situation any worse, right now whacking his elbow against the doorframe or stepping out to find his truck stolen would just shift where the source of hurt lies, rather than create another branching stem at a new level of agony. He’s experienced the worst pain imaginable when his bones all broke and his skin tore open, and even that reached a point. This is worse, in so many ways, anyway.

When he can force himself to open them again, he carefully places it all back inside the box and pushes it back to its tomb across the table. He stands up, scoops up his bag from beside him, swipes his keys from the table and makes for the door before his mind has the chance to stew over all his regrets and guilt. Not a good gift giver his ass.  

He breaks through the fog a little while out of town, a gap that he can see is only temporary, thick clouds hanging over the mountains and forest in the distance. The tiny water droplets cling to the windshield and the leather bench creaks every time he lowers his foot against the pedal. It’ll be colder up north, the dense water droplets within the fog certain to become ice crystals when he makes his way into the Adirondack Park. His hand has just returned from the heater dial when he feels his phone begin to buzz within his pocket. He glances down to the name over the screen and grimaces, nothing good to come of this. 

Ryan lifts the phone to his ear. “What’s up?”

“Yeah, hi, listen,” Kaitlyn’s voice comes crackling through, “I’ve got a favour to ask.”

Ryan hums an acknowledgement, already mapping out where the nearest grocery store is, focusing on that rather than the frost coming in through the speaker. She’s been cold with him since he returned home from Maine, no doubt given a play by play from Dylan. It’s strange, considering she had acted like she already knew before, but Ryan doesn’t blame her anyway. He hates himself at the moment too. 

“So, well. I need you to go get Jacob. He told me he was going to ask Laura and Max for a ride, but they’re here right now with no Jacob in sight. So I guess he’s bailed. You need to get him, but… Yeah.” She tells him stiffly.

Ryan keys into her hesitation immediately. “But what?”

“Nothing.” She says, growing sharper. “Can’t have him transform there, can we? Everyone else is here except you two. I’ll text you the address, alright?”

Ryan mumbles something that must resemble a vague enough agreement and the beep of a terminated call pierces through his ear. Sacrificing some of his limited and nowadays valuable air to give a weary sigh, Ryan tilts his head as he looks for the next place to turn back around. He’d rather have been drafted for a grocery run, but she’s right, someone has to grab Jacob and he is the closest. He turns up his stereo as he heads right back from where he came.

The wheels roll to a stop beside the curb, but Ryan doesn’t kill the engine, keeping the heat pumping until he’s ready to face the cold blast of air awaiting him. He’s out in the thinner edges of a town around the city, where the houses are still spread out and scattered enough. This street only has a few, fitted either side of a tire shop. There’s no sidewalk on this side, just the curb and the metal guardrail, which fails to stop the outreaching past it of invasive vines and weeds growing beneath the overhanging trees.

On the other side of the street though, sits number forty-five, his destination. And, well, calling it rundown would be an understatement, he thinks the Hackett Manor looks well maintained in comparison. The driveway is short, gravel laid in just enough to fit the small hatchback parked there, with barely any room for the car's back door to open before it’d hit the short stairs leading up to the cramped and visibly uneven porch at the front door. The patch of grass beyond the car, running alongside the small shotgun house, is filled with, well, random shit. A broken down lawn mower that has clearly been out of use for years, with how the grass grows up around the stacked tires, decaying cardboard boxes and deflated basketball. Even under the rumble of the engine and from within the truck cab where the window’s barely cracked, Ryan can hear the mumble of the tv and taste the scent of cigarettes that both waft out from within. He cuts the engine.

Stepping out onto the sidewalk, Ryan makes his way around the cab and jogs across the street. Up the rickety stairs and onto the uneven porch that squeaks concerningly beneath his weight, he raises the back of his hand and raps his knuckles against the chipped paint of the door. He waits. Nothing. He twists his hand and uses his fist to bang a little louder. He waits. Inside he can still hear the buzz of the tv, louder and much less faint now, some shitty adult cartoon playing at a far too loud volume. He trusts his hearing on a day like today implicitly and there isn’t a peep otherwise, no cluttering or footsteps, no one moving around within. He tilts forward on the toes of his boots and brings his ear to the door, trying to make out anything beneath the tv buzz. He catches it, the ever so faint sound of even breathing, audible only due to his coalesce. He bangs against the door even louder than before, but an ear against it afterwards proves the sound hasn’t caused a single stir. With his breath fogging out in a cloud and drifting up to obscure his own vision, he takes a step back and leans against one of the porch beams. 

He lifts the phone to his ear once more and waits for Kaitlyn to pick up. It only takes two rings. “Hey, you sure this is it? The blue one right?”

“Yeah, that’d be it. So what if it is?” Her voice comes with a warning, in the same way a guard dog barks before it bites.

Ryan hopes his eyeroll is somehow picked up by the microphone. “‘Cause if that’s him in there, knocking is doing nothing to wake him up.”

“He’d be in his room though- shit, okay, uh, hang on. Is there a car there?” She asks and after his confirmation there’s quiet for a moment, before a sharp sigh comes through the receiver, as if he were the one that parked it there. “Yeah, okay, he’s there, but that isn’t him. His room will be at the very back, it’s the last window on the right. He always leaves it permanently unlocked, so you can go jump through it, it’s not high.”

“What the fuck? No? Call him, tell him to come out.” Ryan scoffs at her, squinting at the door, hopefully sending enough vitriol fueled physic waves that Jacob marches himself out within the very next second.

“Oh great idea genius, how could I have not thought of that?” She scoffs right back, though it’s degrees more scathing that Ryan’s own was. “I have. He’s not answering, there's a hundred percent chance he’s dead asleep. Calling won’t wake him up and knocking is just going to piss off his dad. So definitely stop doing that. You’re just going to have to go round back. I know what it looks like bu-”

“Kaitlyn,” He hisses, incredulous and frustrated, “I don’t give a fuck what it looks like. You do realise how tone deaf and risky it is to ask me of all people to break into someone's house? The fuck is wrong with you?” 

She softens at that. It’s the first time she hasn’t spoken to him with words sharpened to cold steel since the day he woke up back in state. “I know, I know, I’m sorry, okay? But please Ryan. He’s been… Having a rough time, alright? We have to get him and I don’t know, maybe a drive up with you will do him good? Y’know, talk to him or whatever.”

“You mean I have to get him.” Ryan makes what he’s well aware is a petulant, but also very well justified, huff. “Fucksake.”

Without waiting for her reply he frustratedly hangs up, stuffing his phone and hands into his pockets. He eyes the door warily, from her tone he finds himself suddenly glad the sound of the breath within continues to remain even. In a few quick steps, he makes his way back down the short stairs and trying to look as unsuspicious as possible, squeezes past the car onto the dew sodden grass beside the house. This is a terrible fucking idea and it’s fucked for Kaitlyn to ask this of him. He would say no under all circumstances past this one, the one where Jacob transforms into a werewolf and slaughters the entire neighbourhood the night after next, should Ryan not get him now. Still, this is absolutely Jacob and Kaitlyn’s sin, not his own, that he’ll grant himself.

The grass streaks lines of water over his jeans and he’s glad for his boots, any canvas shoes certain to become instantly drenched. It’s not exactly a long walk, but Ryan drags his feet through the dew, hyperaware of a neighbour making a call over any suspicious scurrying. He’s not at all interested in spending a night in the kill shelter, nor testing just how bulletproof he really is two days out from the moon. Hopefully he can bang on the panes to wake Jacob’s ass up, without the need for any breaking and entering accusations thrown at him. Still, less than half a minute later he reaches the window, last on the right as Kaitlyn said, though it is higher than she’d told him. It’s not out of his reach, but he spies the upturned plastic rubbish crate beneath it and finds out exactly why she was so certain about this all. 

Ryan kicks it out the way and steps nearer the wall to peer inside. The curtain covers half the frame, but the dim sunlight shines in through the rest of the pane to illuminate the scene inside. His eyes are drawn first to the bed in the center of the room, where Jacob and his plaid-patterned duvet are both halfway down the bed and halfway to falling off the side of it. He’s on his stomach, right arm balancing on the very edge and leg hanging off the side completely in what looks like- pink? Yeah, no, pink and worn enough to no longer be fuzzy, Hello Kitty pajama pants. It’s a stark contrast, or maybe attributable to, what Ryan’s eyes then shift to. Countless beer cans cover the floor, crushed in the centre and tossed to the carpet to leak out stains. His bedroom is a dump, between the beer cans threaded between dirty clothes, the game cases scattered on the floor, every dresser drawer pulled open and spilling out its contents in a waterfall of clothes. Even the bedside table has been tipped over, the lamp shade snapped and the clock’s plug torn out from the fall. Notably there is at least a half packed bag at the end of his bed, even if the clothes were only halfheartedly and haphazardly shoved inside.

In his mind, the image overlaps with bright white flashes of memory. His lips pull to the side as he tries to shrug off the uncomfortable feeling the sight instills. It doesn’t look good in there. It wouldn’t to anyone. Ryan can see the weekends left alone in a small cold house, phones calls where not a single word is intelligible, the dotted line on a permission slip that never got signed, horror movies on the tv not intended for a kids eyes, little plastic amber bottles with their white cap long lost, the overlapping chatter from the next room over that makes sleep impossible, the sentiment of ‘I love you, hunny’ meaningless beneath the unignorable slur, the lies, the begging, the broken promises, the absence that grows until there’s nothing left. No, it doesn’t look good in there at all. Ryan drops his head and lifts a hand to loudly rap his knuckles against the window pane. He already knows Jacob will not stir, yet he politely waits all the same.

He gives him a full minute. That’s the most he’s got in him, with the chill biting at his skin. Ryan lifts his head again and after a quick nervous glance behind him, his hands too. Feeling alongside the bottom of the window until he’s got them at an even distance, he digs his thumbs into the small gap and lifts outwards. He pulls it back until he can rest the heavy pane on his elbow and ducks beneath it. With a solid grasp of the sill, Ryan pulls himself up and throws a leg inside, the pane battering against his other knee. It clatters shut loudly as he stands and turns to face out to the room, Jacob so undisturbed by the sound that he gives an obnoxious snore. It reeks of stale beer and sweat so strongly in here, that Ryan finally loses the last shred of relief he’s maintained since he got the sense back on the drive home.  

With how this whole thing gives Ryan the uncomfortable feeling of a stalkerish voyeur, he doesn’t bother stepping over the various beer cans, kicking them aside loudly on his approach. He grabs Jacob’s shoulder none too gently and gives a hefty shake. It doesn’t do anything except make his arm fall off the bed. With a frustrated and grumbling growl, he gives Jacob another violent shake and admittedly it’s not in an attempt to wake him, done purely out of frustration. He wanted to get out of this room before he even climbed in. Ryan turns on his heel and scans around until he spots an empty glass perched precariously atop the dresser. He makes right for it, snatching it up and twisting the handle of Jacob’s door. Before he steps through, Ryan sticks his head out into the short and uncomfortably tight hallway, relieved to find a door closing it off from the front of the house. Still, despite the proof that anyone home won’t be woken from his loud knocking, he cringes at the sharp squeak of the bathroom door. 

Comparatively, the two steps back down the hallway he makes in a march. With such a straight track mission, he’s almost forgotten he doesn’t own the place- which, after all of this, he is owed something or rather, that’s for sure. Crushing a can beneath his boot, he tracks back over to the bedside and with a sharp snap of his wrist, he dumps the entire glass of tapwater onto Jacob’s head. Spluttering from the cold water dripping over the side of his face, Jacob lurches up, pushing one hand against the mattress and the other scrabbling against the side of the bedframe. There’s a spike of fear that ruptures through the odour of stale beer. His torso twists and his fist smashes into Ryan’s nose. Out of nowhere there’s a white hot flash and sick crunch. Ryan’s sent stumbling back and he lands hard amongst the landfill. 

The crack still echoing in his ears, a surge rushes through him. An electric shock of it, tensing his muscles and jerking his head forward. It’s his body instantly ready to fight back and defend himself, his thoughts in accord, only half a second behind. The mangy cur drew his blood and a rising snarl from within him warns a pool will be spilt in return. He looks up with bared bloodstained teeth and narrowed his eyes. His head tilts at the sight before him. The off hand hook was followed through with the full power of Jacob’s torso behind it and gave it more force than the awkward angle deserved. It also sent him sprawling. 

Jacob scrambles backwards to get his spine against the wall at the sound of Ryan’s growl. He’d landed in a heap on the floor, legs tangled in the blanket, shoulder hitting the ground first and leaving him flipped onto his back. It was pure luck, the narrow miss of his skull from cracking against the bedside table. There was none left to stop the ceramic shards slicing through his skin from the lamp broken apart by his fall. Without Ryan’s help, Jacob’s blood has been split already, rolling down in a light but steady stream from the various shallow cuts spanning from his shoulder to elbow. 

His hand doesn’t draw back into a fist. It lifts to clutch around the widest laceration on his arm. He has a startled, fearful even, wideness to his eyes and a bewildered furrow to his brow. The punch was the fight or flight of it, that was the instinct of the cur. There’s no fight left in this, in the disorientated and fearful cowering against the wall. He thinks even if he wasn’t coalesced, the two sides would be in agreement on this. There’s no threat to challenge and no honor in fighting when a guy looks quite this pathetic.

The rush leaves Ryan within the same second of its birth. The pain filters in immediately. He blinks in shock at the sudden intensity of it and his hand instinctively flies up to his nose. Another flash of pain radiates out in waves, curving over the bones in his cheeks and drilling deep beneath his eyes, like a migraine centered just beneath the skin. He flinches back from his own touch, his eyes squeezing shut and teeth gritting together, before his palm returns back to tentatively hover guard over it. The thick smell of booze and fear have already been lost beneath the far overpowering scent of his own blood. It’s everywhere, streaming over his lips, down the back of his throat, clogging up in his sinuses, roaring in his ears from the kick of adrenaline and leaving the sound of his pained groan disgustingly wet. He didn’t even notice it when snarling at Jacob, the heavy taste of the metallic sludge already pooling beneath his tongue. 

Ryan forces himself to swallow it down and Jacob clambers to his feet clutching his arm. At the exact same time and in the same shocked and irate tone, they both bite out, “What the fuck dude?”

“You broke my fucking nose!” Ryan continues on without him, the gravel in his words spluttering out into a quiet whimper pushed through clenched teeth. He doesn’t need to risk touching it again, he’s already felt it. There’s a bend at the top, between his eyes. High up the bridge where it has to be his nasal bone, not just the cartilage, that is broken and now curving in from the right. It fucking hurts, bad enough that it merges with the pain slicing out from the void. It brews into a cloud of daggers at the back of his throat, the burning hot needles of his broken nose whipping up the frozen splinter filled shards from his stomach.  

“Ryan?” Jacob blanches. He stares back into total confusion, sounding groggy and genuinely surprised at the realisation. The defensiveness kicks in just a second after. “Man, I thought you were going to axe me! Christ and you- you broke my lamp!”

Looking at him from the floor, hand hovering over his nose and blood spewing down his chin to his throat, Ryan manages as incredulous a face as his broken bone and quickly swelling undereye allow. Admittedly, the sight of Jacob is growing a little blurred, between the overflow of his watering eyes and the slight spin of the room. What doesn’t come across is surely carried the rest of the way by the antagonistic incredulity spiking through his voice, “The fuck do you mean ‘axe you’?”

“Like fucking hit me with an axe or something man, I don’t know!” With that out, Jacob drops his shoulders from his exaggerated shrug and sits back down on the side of his bed. He grabs a handful of the blanket to pull it off the floor but ends up just clutching it while he sits there and blows out a weighted exhale on the first syllable of a deflated sounding, “Fuck. Scared the shit out of me. God and how- how are you here?”

For as confused as he sounds, it's still far less than would actually be reasonable considering the situation, which leads Ryan to think either the alcohol hasn’t yet left his system or Kaitlyn has broken in enough that he considers it a normal thing to do. Whatever it is, it leaves the moment feeling absurd, a layering of weird to weirdly normal and back to weird again because of that. For some reason, taking precedence over any confusion or even anger, what Jacob really seems is suddenly guarded and nervous. Defensive, in a different way, in a more skitterish vein now the righteous outrage has waned. Even in Ryan’s blurry vision he can see how Jacob has grasped the blanket so tightly his hands pale and how his eyes skitter around the room as if there’s incriminating evidence he’s left laying out. Lifting his hand from the sticky beer stain it landed in when he fell, Ryan amends, if this is the evidence he’s worried about then it’s a bit late to hide it. 

“I drove.” Ryan tells him dryly, in tone only, his voice accompanied by a wet click and smacking sound from all the blood draining down his throat. “And you should probably start locking your window.”

“What the fuck are you doing in my room?” Jacob’s skitterish sort of defensiveness sharpens for how long it takes to snap out the words. Then he wipes a forearm over his eyes, continues his agitated look around, squinting at the sunlight streaming in. He actually doesn’t know why Ryan is here. Incredible.

“I came to pick you up, asshole.” Ryan snarks at him, though once again it doesn’t come through to the degree he intended. At this point it just sounds nasally.  

“Jus- shit. That’s today?” He asks in this weird cadence, a sudden spike in pitch as his tone abruptly stutters over from aggravated to agitated. He pulls the blanket to the bed as if he needs free hands before he can grasp this information. Now even Ryan is confused, only it’s at how anymore confirmation could still be needed. Again though, yeah there is confusion in his voice, but as always with Jacob, the various shades of defensiveness seem to rise above everything else.

Ryan can’t help himself, he was already feeling worse than shit, now on top of that he’s nursing a broken nose and a bruised ego too. He makes sure to get the snark across this time when he says, “I wouldn’t have a broken nose if it wasn’t.”

Jacob gives a long weary sigh and while the nervous energy sticks, the adrenaline whooshes out of him completely. With a force that has his head dropping into his hands, the drowsiness of his startle awake visibly hits him hard. Ryan goes to scowl at the sight of his own blood splattered on Jacob’s wrist, before the pain makes him think better of it. He lets himself be vindicated by Jacob’s own blood streaked over his arm instead. He watches as after a moment, Jacob goes to reach out for the bedside table only to close his fist around air. He scrunches his face and the extremely obvious side eye he sends to Ryan was probably meant to be subtle than it was. He’s not sure whether it’s from the embarrassment of being so disorientated he forgot he’d crashed into it just a second ago or if it’s the blame he places on Ryan for that, could be either, could be both. Shifting fully back onto the bed, Jacob swipes his hands around beneath the blanket, taking measures to avoid smearing blood all over his sheets and failing miserably. He finally finds his phone beneath his pillow, but he only spares it a glance before he flinches and places it back face down. With this expression that betrays how much he’s trying to both wake himself up and gather himself up, one made of twisted eyebrows and tight creases in the corners of his lips, he looks up and for the first time today he manages to keep his eyes firmly on Ryan.

“Man, swear I meant to call Max- I mean I did call him but he didn’t pick up. Goddamnit, I was going to try again, alright? I just forgot what day it was. And- shit.” He makes a deep grunt of a sound and roughly shakes his head. “I’m going alright? Didn’t have to fucking maim me. So you can- just- uh, fuck. Shit man, I really did a number on you. I’m sorry, okay? Let me set that for you and then you can get out. Here, I can-”

Ryan has already scurried to his feet before Jacob can finish his rambling, holding a finger out and halting him from making any move forward. “Don’t even fucking try it.”

“I’ve set heaps-” Jacob cuts himself off at the pointed jut of Ryan's chin and the goading tilt of his head. He gets the message loud and clear, they may be even as of now, but he takes a single step closer and he’ll get a crook in his own to match. Making the wise decision for perhaps the first time in his life, Jacob lets it go, though not without blowing out a scoff and raising a brow in a disapproving twitch first. “Alright man, whatever. You’re the one who’s gonna regret it. Just- take this at least, or whatever, I don’t care.”

He does care, that much is obvious. It seems that for Jacob, where all of his other competing emotions fall behind in the race, it is his guilt alone that is capable of temporarily overtaking his eternal defensiveness. He fishes the nearby box of tissues from the floor, grabs a handful for his own already clotting arm and tosses the box with the rest of them over to Ryan. He speaks around a frustrated groan when Ryan catches them with one hand, only to look down at them with an apprehensive and preemptively disgusted expression. “They’re tissues dude, for your nose. I use them, for my nose. It gets fucking cold in here, alright?”

Ryan gives them another unconvinced glance, but Jacob sounded offended enough to mean it and the blood trickling down to the collar of his hoodie doesn’t give him much choice. Ryan wipes up what he can but his mouth, chin and throat are all covered in it. Not to mention the thick globs of it coating the back of his mouth and pouring down his throat. He needs some water to wash up with if he wants to make it to the quarry without being pulled over for a suspected body in the trunk. He holds a handful of bunched tissues to his nose and tries to ignore the pain it causes as he looks back up to Jacob.

Jacob, who seems wildly distracted, his shoulders hiked up to his jaw and his eyes flicking around again. It’s not solely the excess of beer cans over the floor making him nervous like Ryan thought. He’s looking around the room at whole and it’s as if he wants to hide the very walls of it. Like he’d knock them down right now if he could, let the roof collapse in on them, have the rubble bury the proof any of it had existed. From how he’s acting, when Ryan follows the next jittery flick of his eyes, he almost expects to see every written terrorist manifesto plastered over the faded and peeling wallpaper. Instead there’s just some waterstains and a hole or two in the drywall. Ryan trails after him, from beer can to beer can, to the scratch on the tv, to the exposed bulb of the overhead light, to the missing bottom hinge of his closet door, to the old photos pinned in the back of his door and the spot where his duvet is wearing thin. Jacob pulls the blanket towards him, covering his pajama pants and subtly folding over where it’s becoming threadbare. 

He doesn’t know what he’s missing until Jacob speaks, when their eyes meet and that nervous emotion turns brusque. “Cool, you good? You can go now. I’ll make my way up.”

There was nothing he was missing. Jacob wants Ryan out of here impossibly more than Ryan wants out of here. The fear transformed, not lessened, when he realised who the intruder was. From an axe being brought down over his head to the dark brown irises converting light to electricity. There was never going to be any confederate flag hanging limply in the corner or embarrassing porn magazines shoved under his bed. It’s not even the news he comes bearing or the rude bloody awakening, because it’s not really Ryan he’s focused on at all. At least, not specifically, not him out of all people, not who he is. He’s a face in the crowd and he could be any face in the crowd. It’s simply the room and it’s Ryan in the room. The house in its entirety, quite likely. The whole premise is his very own manifesto of shame.

Ryan is on the precipice of understanding. He has enough for empathy but not enough for sympathy. He gets it, he does, probably wouldn’t have deduced it so quickly if he didn’t. Thing is, Ryan wouldn’t have to be here at all if Jacob had just made one lousy phone call or woken up before he was forced to clamber through his window. Yeah sure, to be fair to him, he has no real way to know there is no judgement coming from Ryan, nothing past some mild surprise. It’d be a bit hypocritical if there was, the house brings him an aching sense of nostalgia for a reason, not to mention his apartment now with its leaky pipes and nonexistent heat retention. He really could not overstate how little he cares about some water stains or broken closet doors. 

It’s so far removed from what his actual concern is right now. Ryan wants to jump on the offer, except uh, yeah, no absolutely not. If he wants to waste fuel driving up to the quarry in the hatchback instead of the truck, whatever, Ryan really does not care. But he’s not going until he sees that engine start. They all agreed, they arrive at the quarry with a day to spare. A meteor hitting the road they’re driving on isn’t a good enough excuse to stop them. It’s hitting the middle of afternoon already and Jacob is barely packed. Ryan lacks even a semblance of trust in him and nothing near enough to doubt he wouldn’t just decide it’s reasonable to push it off until tomorrow.

“I’ll watch you pack.” It’s not really a question, more than a statement. 

Jacob’s face screws up in surprise and disbelief. Again there’s an element of absurdity, in expecting the polite manners of a house guest from the guy who is currently in the process of trespassing after some light breaking and entering. He either seems to realise this or his insecure defensiveness cracks as it reaches its peak, throwing his arms out towards the window. “No, you’ll get the fuck out of my room!”

Ryan shrugs off the caustic tone. Fine, he can get out. Jacob isn’t going to let him venture into the bathroom to clean up at this point and the blood is starting to quickly congeal in a familiar feeling he’s not keen on experiencing before he’s forced to in two days time. He has a water bottle in the truck that will have to do. He’s earned a little more snark before he goes though. “Break my nose, give me the boot and you’re not even going to walk me out?”

“You climbed in, climb back out of it.” Jacob sneers, dropping his arms. He quickly clutches his arm again and Ryan does get a small hit of satisfaction from the wince he gives. He’s not proud of it. It is deserved. 

The bottom of Ryan’s eye twitches in thought. His dad is home and there’s only one car outside. He scoffs. “Do you even have a car?” 

“I can ask.” Jacob grumbles. Which, that’s a no. “So just get the fuck out.”  

With another shrug, he scrunches the tissues in his hand, tucks the box under his arm and takes a step towards the window. No point in arguing when he already knows what the outcome will be. “Do me a favour and find something fresh, I don’t want my truck smelling like a brewery.”

A snarled expression is sent his way in response. Ryan smiles back. It’s the first one to not feel plastered on, because it isn’t made to feign joy. He’s just showing off his teeth and the blood caught them. Jacob dodges his gaze. It’s an equally petty and important exchange. Still, he finds himself surprised there’s nothing more to it than that. He didn’t rise to the bait at all. No growling, straightening spine, bearing teeth, his posture and body language all off and wrong to be anything near a challenge. He just looked away, near immediately. Yeah, Ryan’s coalesced together and integrated between what used to be two halves of himself. Jacob hasn’t, however in every month past he still felt the tug of those instincts, still followed them through before he realised what he was doing. Where’s any of that gone now? He has no idea and has no interest in sticking around to ask.

His tumble out the window is less than graceful, but he lands on both feet, so ultimately a success. Ryan takes what wins he can, has for a while. Tracking back through the grass and across the road, he fumbles with one hand to get the truck open. With the tissues held beneath his nose, he reaches behind the seat to grab the waterbottle. A patter or two still falls on the bench, from the congealing droplets hiding in wait on the underside of his chin. He groans in frustration, kicks the truck door shut behind him, drops the box of tissues on the hood and twists the side mirror out far as it goes. His reflection in the tiny mirror flinches when he pulls the sticky clump of tissues away and reveals the extent of the damage. God, he looks about as rough as he feels. 

The top of his nose has definitely been left crooked, just how badly will remain to be seen when the swelling goes down. He knew it was from what he felt with his fingers, but he had his now dashed hopes in the off chance it wouldn’t be visible. It could be worse, at least? If it was down further around the middle he’d be more worried, but considering how high up the bend is, he’s tentatively faithful it won’t be too severe. It’s not like his nose is lying flat against his cheek, it’s a concave at the top, a bit of a bend to the left. Well, there’s nothing more he can do anyway, other than cross his fingers it won't end up in a pronounced curve or sit terribly off center. All and all, he’s off to a great start. Fucking winter. 

With a tired exhale, he uncaps the bottle, grabs a fresh handful of tissues, gets to work mopping himself up. The more red tinted water that splatters to the concrete, the more his reflection scowls. His skin is hot to the gentle prodding of his touch, the swelling pretty bad already, as are the bruises spreading out to his undereye. At this point he’s certain any attempts Jacob would have made at setting it would have just done more damage and he’s probably definitely supposed to head straight to the emergency room now. There’s no need, sooner or later the accelerated healing will kick in, though preferably it is sooner rather than later. Hey, maybe it’s in the same realm as Laura and her eye. According to her it was more of a mess than any broken nose could ever be. Yeah, of course, he’ll be waking up tomorrow morning with everything snapped into place and perfectly straight again. No doubt about it, if he’s got anything going for him, it’s this at least.

The leaves drip a dark wet stain onto the curb from the mix of water, saliva and all the blood he’s spat out. He’s got a final gargle for good measure left in the bottle and it’s halfway there to his mouth when a noise lifts his head. It’s barely a sound, almost closer to the shake of heavy bass reverberating out through the walls. Ryan twists on his foot to watch as voices become audible and a moment later the door slams open across the street, quivering in place after the impact. He readies himself to sweetly ask if he’s made sure to pack the adorable pink pajama pants he’s now swapped out for baggy jeans, when he sees him come stomping through. 

Jacob only makes it down two of the four steps, before something comes sailing at his head. It’s worse how he had to be expecting it, ducking down with hunched shoulders, not a single break in his step. It clatters into the middle of the street and rolls a short way before it comes to a rest. Another beer can, a now familiar brand printed on the aluminum. From this angle, Ryan can’t see the man, but the whole neighbourhood probably hears Jacob’s dad yelling about how he’s a worthless squatting bum and if he’s going then he best stay gone. Whatever quip Ryan came up with dies on his tongue. 

Jacob doesn’t have the same wide eyes Ryan’s watching him with. He hits the sidewalk and steps over the curb with his head down and stare fixed on his unlaced sneakers. Doesn’t even glance at the old hatchback. Bag slung over his shoulder, hands shoved in his pockets, hair stuffed beneath a camo cap. He boots the can down the road when he walks past, the initial clang muffled by the louder bang from the door slamming shut behind him, only the metal skittering around on asphalt left in its wake. He stops by the headlight across the hood and still doesn’t look up from his shoe he now scuffs against the ground.

Ryan’s brows draw in and his jaw twitches. He opens his mouth and hesitates. Snaps his teeth shut until he’s sure he’ll be able to ask very carefully, “Did… Did you just get kicked out?” 

“He won’t remember doing it. So not really.” Jacob mumbles to his shoe. He looks up with a roll of his shoulders, head and eyes. “Can I get a ride? You won’t believe it, but he said no.”

There’s no satisfaction in being right when Ryan nods and waves a vague hand towards the passenger door. Swiping up the tissue box and empty water bottle, he dumps them in the gap behind the bench, along with the bag Jacob slings in after. It's taken enough time that the cab of the truck has leeched out all warmth again and the whoosh of cold air inside when the doors shut doesn’t help. It isn’t just the chill leaving them tensed up however. Ryan twists his keys, the engine hums to life and he pulls out to retrack back down the street. The beer can is crushed beneath his wheel on the way. He wonders if it was one grabbed from the floor of Jacob’s bedroom or if it wasn’t his at all. He thinks it probably doesn’t matter. The smell permeated every room either way.  

The silence between them is brittle and stretches longer than what they can see of the highway beneath the truck, from the fog above both. Ryan refuses to turn any music on. If they’re to stew, then they will do so without any pretense that it is anything otherwise. Maybe that is a little petty but Jacob broke his nose and misery loves company. With how much stewing Ryan has been doing, some equally miserable company seems like an end of quarter reward. Or punishment. He’s not quite certain on that one. 

Still, for all that the bitter silence suits him, there’s an annoying nagging in his mind he finds himself unable to shoo away. He spends an hour trying to tell himself it’s not his business, that he’s overstepping, that it’s not his place. Enough time the pain in his nose has faded completely, even if he has had to swallow enough mouthfuls of blood draining down from his sinuses that he now feels a little queasy. He adjusts his hands on the wheel and clears his throat, determined to ignore the fact he has a passenger at all. Ryan really should have learned after his night in Maine that he can’t keep well alone, as much as he may try or tell himself otherwise.

“Were all those cans from this month or from over the past four?” He asks suddenly, startling Jacob if the sudden snap of his head in Ryan’s peripherals is anything to go by.

“Fuck off dude” Jacob grumbles back, tucking his fist beneath his jaw and looking back out the window beside him. 

“You still seeing your therapist?” Ryan asks instead. He doesn’t bother asking how long he’s been drinking. Not only would he not get an answer, it’s irrelevant if this began back in August or just this month. He’s still either binge drinking or daily drinking. It’s an undeniable problem, no matter which way he cuts it. Ryan knows what it looks like, he remembers what it can become, the thought of it makes him sick. “Can you text them or do you have to call?”

“What do you care?” He scoffs as if he himself isn’t the answer to that.

Ryan nods, mostly to himself. His fists tighten over the steering wheel. He has no idea what the right thing to say is, how to be sensitive, sympathetic, unwavering, get through to him and keep his patience all at once. He’s going to push it anyway. “You need to text them now, or there’s also still time to call.”

He’s visibly brushed off with a shoulder raised defensively and turned towards him. “Whatever, man.”

His teeth grind together and he really doesn’t know how to talk to him about this because he’s already lost his patience. He's speaking before he has the chance to weigh whether it’s a good idea or not. The words are already out his mouth and he knows it's not. “Yeah see, the thing is Jacob, I’m not asking, I’m telling you. And that is because I care, not just for everyone that’s put at risk if one of us doesn’t show up, but because I care about you. It turns to sludge in your fucking veins, it becomes you and I don’t want to see another person who is nothing more than- Fuck. Okay, I’m sorry. Listen, I’m not the person to talk to, I know that, alright? I don’t know how to deal with this but your therapist will. So call or text, right now.”

He says simply, scathingly, “No you don’t.” 

Ryan hears the rest of the intended sentence as clearly than if it had been spoken aloud. That he doesn’t care about him. Something about that accusation raises barbs in Ryan, filled with this affronted disbelief, a shockingly similar emotion to when he found himself laid out from a rear hook to the face. If he didn’t care, he wouldn’t be here at all, would he? Yeah, it puts them all at risk if one of them doesn’t return for the full moon, but Ryan easily could have pawned off the chauffeuring to Kaitlyn. If he didn’t care, instead of being concerned he would be angry right now, angry that he had to turn back and angry that they’re having to drive up at all due to Jacob’s decisions in the very first place. He would be shoving all his guilt to the easy target sitting beside him, rather than shouldering it himself. If he didn’t care, Jacob would probably be better off, but he isn’t because Ryan does. Yeah, maybe Ryan’s a bit prickly about being told who and what he cares for right now, after he tried so hard to stop it and had it come creeping out to ruin everything anyway. But it really rubs him the wrong way in the face of that, to be accused he doesn’t at all, not when his care is such an exposed and callous force. 

“Oh, really?” Ryan asks, well aware his voice is dripping in this unimpressed and sarcastic tone. It’s scathing with it too. 

It’d be impossible to miss, hence the aggravated tone returned right back. “Uh, yeah. I know you all hate me, so- fuck you too?”

“I don’t hate you Jacob” With a sigh in his voice, he tells him truthfully, no matter how much he wants to repeat the insult back.

“I said whatever, man.” 

A beat passes. Ryan’s hands taunt around the wheel and Jacob’s fist shoved under his jaw. He gives him one more beat. He doesn’t move. “Now, Jacob. I’m serious.”

“What are you, my mom?” The back and forth immediately picks up right where it left off. Only this time, Jacob’s aggravated enough to finally turn towards him again. He’s scowling and glaring away in Ryan's periphery. It really doesn’t feel threatening.     

“No. But I’ll call her if I have to.” He tells him, straightforward and simple. 

There’s a crack in his puffed up and surly demeanour. “You wouldn’t.” 

Ryan hones in on it. Seems all he has to do is be honest. “You already know that I would.” 

“I’m glad I broke your stupid nose.” Jacob bites out and maybe it all really is just the change in Ryan. This close to the moon, he doesn’t think even a month ago he would have heard that and been able to shrug it off like he does now. Well, or otherwise it’s just being around someone even more miserable and pathetic than himself is actually doing him some good. Who knows? 

“Okay.” It’s a disregard, in that tone he knows everyone including himself finds aggravating, with how it drips with contempt and indifference. “Now get your phone out or I will.”

He thinks they’ll have to keep arguing it, he’s prepared to and he’s also prepared to follow through on every warning he’s made. Jacob takes his threat seriously though. There’s no small amount of angry grunts and huffs, but he pulls his phone out of his pocket and violently taps away at the screen. Ryan makes sure to watch out the corner of his eye as Jacob sends a message off. He’s more honest in it than Ryan was expecting him to be, even if there is an aggressive tone to it. He mentions the drinking and the ‘friend’, placed in quotes, who is forcing him to text. Jacob slaps the phone down on the bench and is halfway through asking if Ryan’s happy now, when it begins buzzing. Jacob gives him a withering look and picks up.

Ryan tries not to listen too closely, but it’s an enclosed space and he has souped up dog hearing. The woman's voice comes through as loud and clear to him as Jacob’s own murmurs. It isn’t a long call, a couple of minutes, at most. An appointment organised, a subtle chastise for the last one that was missed, a question of if he’ll be safe until then, a direct praise for contacting her and a reassurance that this is the first step. Ryan’s glad no much more is said, he doesn’t actually want to stomp all over Jacob’s privacy, not anymore than he already admittedly has. The conversation does make him gather that this seems to be a new development, though not one that didn’t have its forewarnings. Pretty direct hereditary throughline, Ryan thinks. 

“Great.” Jacob snaps once the call has dropped. “There you fucking go. You’ve covered your own ass and now you can stop pretending to give a shit.”

Ryan opens his mouth with another sarcastic jab or more likely what’s been proclaimed to be his ‘lectures’ on his tongue. His jaw abruptly snaps closed instead. The silence swathes over them again. His mind begins to whir. Beneath the rumble of the engine, the drone of the tires on the road, the light buzz of the heater and the squeaking of the leather, the sound within his memory comes to him muffled but distinct. It’s only then he realises this is the first time he and Jacob have really spoken since the day of the full moon, a month ago. By the time they got back from the island, Jacob had already secluded himself off to the far attic for the rest of their recovery day and only showed his face the morning after in his dreary stomp out to Max’s car. Ryan knows he’d made up with Kaitlyn rather quickly, even if not right when she’d sought him out after a necessary shower when they’d got back, bringing up a whole serving platter of food with her. All the others, Ryan included, however? Not a word has been offered by them and nothing has been extended from Jacob either, to the extent of Ryan’s knowledge. Well, Ryan isn’t really in Kaitlyn’s good graces right now, so it isn’t impossible that Jacob has made up with everyone barring Ryan and it’s her limited communication with him that means she hasn’t mentioned it, but he highly doubts that.

He knows he should have reached out. Once more he is reminded how when something is said and believed, even when it becomes clearly demonstrated to be untrue, it will continue to be believed. God wouldn’t still be such a hot topic otherwise. No wonder Jacob thinks he hates him. Actions speak louder than words, but words give meaning to actions. Intention is the paintbrush, words are the contour lines and actions are the colours spread across the canvas. Ryan thinks, much like his untouched and unfinished animation project at home, he’s failed to pick up the pen and put anything on the canvas at all. He has his excuses of course. He’s had a miserable back half of the month. Feels like everyone hates him too, though nowhere near as much as Ryan hates himself. At least- Ah. That was said too, wasn’t it?

Pointed out specifically and all, Ryan shouldn’t have taken it as the throwaway insult that he did. Emma is intelligent and has a sharp tongue, a nasty combination that shows its true viciousness when she’s hurt and looking to hurt. He’s vastly underestimating her if he ever again dismisses her barbs to anything less than precise strikes aimed to the most delicate chink in the armour and calculated to piece deep enough that the hurt she’s feeling is returned tenfold. In their conversation after, Emma testified how well she knew the truth can slice deeper than any lie ever could and over the month since, Ryan has forcibly come to prove how correct she is. The gavel bang of it all is that it’s true. Jacob hates himself. 

Ryan never saw it before now. Maybe it was staring at him in the face this whole time, he doesn’t know Jacob well. Same as Emma, he made sure to keep a wide berth from them both over camp and since then they’ve mostly just butted heads out of instinct. He decided pretty early on they seemed different enough people that Ryan’s had no interest getting any closer with him than needs be. Atop a shallow read of him, Ryan had his assumptions and the small things he noticed, sure. Jacob’s the jock type, brash and thickheaded at times. He’s obnoxious and loud, not one dinner went by without Jacob making some scene or another. It was never mean though, more often than anything else it was compliments shouted down the table to Nick’s cheffing, standing up on the bench to get the campers one by one breaking out a dance move before they ate or playful scuffles with Kaitlyn that first had the campers set against the counselors with a bet on who will win. Ryan could be cruel and conclude that Jacob’s just too slow to be properly mean, comparatively to Emma and Kaitlyn, he is a sloth racing against falcons. It isn’t that though, Jacob has this very obvious sweet and silliness to him that doesn’t quite get buried beneath all the arrogance.   

Admittedly it was a surprise to Ryan, but Jacob was great with the kids in a way that no one else really managed to achieve, not to the same extent. He always had the campers heading off to their next activity happy and finally tuckered out, which all the other counsellors were eternally grateful for. Even the kids who hated sports seemed to favour Jacob. He found out why when both their groups were down by the lake side one day and he noticed how once Jacob had the sporty kids set up, he’d rounded up the shy or nerdy kids in their own little groups, outside of the game. He got them weaving up flower crowns or running around with sticks for longswords to defeat whatever evils he set them off to face. Now, Ryan did also spot when it somehow became Jacob that was the one beaten with sticks and feigning grievous injury. Not to discredit him at all, but if he was letting the kids pretend to murk him, he was guaranteed to be popular from the start. That was part of it though. He encouraged them to have fun and made sure every single one of them was included, by throwing away the schedule to just meet them where they were at.

That was the first example of what he’s seen firsthand. He can think of many more, from catching him binding together the flowers he picked at the lake bank for Emma, to the way he gently held Kaitlyn’s leg while she teetered sideways in a gesture of relief after all his worrying, to even the heartfelt if albeit questionable and misguided attempt at girl advice to Nick. He’s certain that with people Jacob is close to and with whom he lets his guard down, that side of him will come out in countless ways Ryan himself has never witnessed. But for however much it is a part of him, Jacob is not solely an overeager puppy in human form. 

Jacob is an overflowing melting pot of insecurity. Just, maybe not in the way Ryan had initially assumed. On one hand, it was a fair assumption, Jacob walks through and presents himself to the world in a very specific way. On the other, no, it wasn’t fair at all and it was very far from the truth. It’s not the same as what Emma has done through her life, but it’s not entirely dissimilar either. From what Ryan got out of his conversation with her, Emma really struggled from a lack of identity, borne from all the expectations she felt forced to meet and a need for affirmation that she was doing so. She never came across to him as someone who needed to be liked, not necessarily. Jacob, he’s starting to piece together, seems desperate in that need.

Which is strange to Ryan. Not just because he’s never had that issue himself, rather that it seems unnecessary? Now, Ryan knows that fear and insecurity like that isn’t rational and it always comes from somewhere. From hearing how his dad spoke to him just once, he can imagine where a heaping of that insecurity comes from. Yet ultimately, Jacob is a likeable guy and at the end of the day he is widely liked, faults and all. On the face of it he comes across with confidence that frequently takes a wander over into arrogance, that is until his relationships go deeper than skin and small talk. It’s there where the brittle trust and the pervading fear draws the strings taunt. Evident in both his entire fling with Emma and with the implied accusations levied at Ryan last month. 

It makes Ryan feel a little bad at his misjudgement of him. He knew Jacob was a good guy obviously, he just had no interest in getting to know him. Which has led to this realisation only now, that in any conversation he’s either had with Jacob himself or has overheard, there’s never been any mention of his childhood or life at home. After that night in August, all of them began to avoid any mention of home, terrified to bring it into the nightmare that they can otherwise try constraining to the quarry. For Jacob, he's been a zealot in this endeavour since the first day of camp. However, Ryan thinks for him, the concept is reversed. He wonders if before now, to Jacob being forced back to the quarry each month was actually a relief, despite it all.

With that thought, looking at his decisions in another light, it actually brings a little more sense to them. It was never malicious either way, yet it is one thing to sabotage a car for the chance to continue trying to pursue a girl and it’s another to sabotage a car because he was so uneasy about heading home. Mh, even that too would be reframed. For this it remains immature and misguided either way, however it explains a lot if his attachment to Emma was less to Emma herself and more to what she represented and provided. If Emma dated Jacob out of expectation and Jacob dated Emma out of escapism, well, then that would unfortunately make them both a terrible match and yet, ironically, also a rather fitting and predictable one.        

Actually, it reframes a lot of Ryan’s initial assumptions. He very quickly dismissed him as a frat boy to be, someone who’d head off to college solely to sleep around, drink himself unconscious every other week night and scrape through his classes until he can spend the rest of his life in a low tier management position or something similar. From how he talked, he took him for someone who had a big group of mates from his football team and someone who’d run in similar circles to Emma. Turned out instead, it was Kaitlyn and her kid brother that are exclusively referred to with the affectionately dubbed title of ‘The Boys’ and it’s also become starkly clear that his circles are an entire private school and four tax brackets removed from Emma’s. Oh, and yeah, no apparently he doesn’t even play football in the first place. He’s been a hockey player since he was four, where he met Kaitlyn on the field and even after he left for the ice at seven, they’ve remained glued at the hip ever since. So, wrong on all accounts.  

Well, okay maybe not all. He knows that it’s the fault of baseless judgements and not to repeat the same mistake, but Ryan thinks if he had gone, his college life wouldn’t look too different. Just there would be a tonal shift. He’d be miserable for the entirety of it and there’d be no frat, he doubts Jacob would make it through the hazing nor would he be capable of hazing others. Which, in Ryan’s opinion, is a compliment towards him. He’s getting distracted. Point is, it’s dawning on Ryan that yeah, he made a lot of assumptions about Jacob. All baseless, from his character to his daily life. Maybe he hadn’t spent much time imagining what his house looked like or guessing how many beer cans his dad threw at him a day, but he hadn’t ever considered it could look straight from his own childhood or that the number would be any higher than none. Honestly, everything he knows about Jacob’s life, has come secondhand through Kaitlyn. Otherwise, he filled it in with his assumptions and beneath it all, was just a deeply insecure yet sweet guy who hated himself and wanted to be liked. Ryan didn’t even give him a chance, for as much as he liked Jacob for his character, he assumed enough that he didn’t care to dig any deeper- Ah. At last, it clicks. 

With the road blurring beneath him and the fog pushing in against the windows, Ryan finds himself finally able to put together what scattered pieces he holds. It fits together like a jigsaw and yeah, there’s plenty of missing pieces, but he realises that’s exactly what this all has been for him. Jacob lives his life in blanks. Ryan doesn’t know what came first, the assumptions or the gap at the center of the puzzle. He doesn’t think it really matters. Somewhere along the way, Jacob brushed the pieces off the table and let the assumptions replace the missing block of jigsaw pieces. 

It’d be a feedback loop, what he hides and by extension, what he hates about himself, folding in on another. Sure, it’s possible Ryan could be miles off with this, but he doesn’t think he is. He of all people would know best that everyone tries to hide the ugly parts, the parts they hate, to varying avail. Considering how Jacob gives away his personality and emotions freely, it’s not the constructed identity of Emma and it could never be the painted mask of Dylan. He doesn’t try to hide himself, he hides his life. It is much more grounded in circumstance, only, the circumstances of our lives is our life. If the center of the puzzle is all his years, then Jacob seems willing to only spare scattered pieces from the outer edge. Or rather, he attempts to shout over to people while he waves his arms out, in an effort to distract them from the great-big crate hidden behind him, the one that’s overflowing and spilling out all those suspiciously missing puzzle pieces. Then, Ryan can imagine, when anyone takes a step closer, talking around and ignoring the great-big hazard-marked crate gets difficult.

It is difficult. He wants to be liked and he refuses to open up. That’s the feedback loop of it. He hides his life in an attempt to be liked, lets the blank spots be filled with assumptions, which prevents anyone getting close to him, which makes the insecurity grow, which pushes people away even more. His attempts redoubled and on around it goes. It’s thick iron links, interconnected and hammered out of shape. Looped together in this vicious cycle, the links won’t combine with the rest of the chain, to make that connection with others he so desperately craves. People don’t connect with a cardboard cutout of a person. What’s difficult is that one of those iron links? The one that is flaking rusty iron hammered into the shape of every childhood memory, that one Ryan does understand. He has nothing much to say on the matter. He’s half a second from dropping his tongue to the back of his teeth and letting it go completely, when he inwardly sighs instead.

He doesn’t know whether Kaitlyn is the angel or the devil on his shoulder, but whether it’s a holy arrow or fiery pitchfork, her voice pierces through his mind either way. He’s giving up again, when the existence of Kaitlyn at all proves that if Jacob’s done it once, he can do it twice. Perhaps he is unable to bring himself to open up of his own accord, but Ryan has in both a literal and metaphorical sense, seen the dirty laundry on his floor. Now that Ryan has noticed the cardboard cutout, seen the iron chain holding it in place, spotted the crate hidden behind it, he knows it was a waste of his precious air to sincerely declare he doesn’t hate him. It would be no less pointless than if he hated a piece of cardboard or tried to convince it otherwise. It’s just cardboard.

This doesn't negate that Ryan did still have to tell him as much. He just knows it wasn’t enough. He also knows Kaitlyn wouldn’t grant him any excuses. She wouldn’t let him throw in the towel simply because Jacob won’t open up to him and tell him every shitty childhood tidbit. He doesn’t need to, Jacob has that in Kaitlyn already, who was there for it and has seen it all. Ryan wants to snark at her voice in his head, in that case, shouldn’t this be her job? There’s a reason why it isn’t. Kaitlyn is already well aware of all of this, she’ll have caught layers to it miles beyond what the purview of Ryan’s own tertiary observations could ever take into account. He thinks they would all be forced to agree, Kaitlyn is Jacob’s blindspot and vice versa too. It will always be out of everyone, she doesn’t count, he doesn’t count. 

What they would never admit, at least not out loud and in spite of what they clearly both know, is that Kaitlyn can not be every person in Jacob’s life. Try as she might, catching sight of the jigsaw pieces before they’re swept away does not mean she alone can fill the role of his mother, his father, his entire understanding and sense of family. Not that she would likely ever give up trying and not that she would ever tire of it, but one person can only be so many things and there are roles she unequivocally will not fill. Already she is his best friend, his older sister, his little brother, his knight in shining armour and his priest in the confessional. She cannot be every stranger on the street, each friendship he deepens, any lover he pursues. The dual effort to fill in the other roles is apparent, what with Jacob’s fling with Emma and with how Kaitlyn drags Jacob into conversations with her heels planted in the ground at any vague mention relevant to him. Still, with his refusal to fill in the blanks himself, she remains his everything that she can be. 

Which is why, in this, Kaitlyn’s forgiveness and an affirmation of her care were likely both of the utmost importance and of the least significance. It’s always out of everyone that she doesn’t count and she can’t be his everyone else. It’s the rest of them that Jacob really needs it from. Unfortunately, more than just two things can be true at once. There is no basis of trust or love lost between them, so not only would a heartfelt declaration not do much, scripting out an emotional speech on opening up to accept said declaration would likely not be received well. Ryan doubts he could bring himself to make one at this point anyway, a little too miserable for anything even vaguely optimistic and a little too self aware of how he’d have to block out his words lest he find himself preaching to his own one-man choir. So the feedback loop remains spinning and there’s no easy acid to throw on the iron chain.

Except, he doesn’t need his weirdly and annoyingly Kaitlyn-themed conscience to tell him what to do. The conclusion is obvious, no matter how much he kind of hates it. It’s the only option left. Sequestered into her odd position where her word is believed and yet isolated to herself, it’s an invitation she cannot meaningfully extend. Ryan however, can. All he needs to do is simply convince him to come to the island. Which is no small feat and not to mention, he’d then have to convince him to transform, then likely fight him, win the fight, accept him into the pack and determine where he will fit within it. So yeah, there’s a couple more steps. He didn’t think it would be an easy answer, just a simple one. Regardless, Ryan knows what he needs to do. If not even for Jacob himself, then for Kaitlyn’s sake. She may hate him right now, but she’s pack. That’s even more of a promise than the one he made.

He has thought extensively about it since his failure with Dylan the month before. Then his second failure in Maine. Ryan keeps failing him over and over and it isn’t leaving him with much faith in his abilities. He can’t understand how it didn’t work for Dylan, who said he did as instructed, who already bears a bite mark on his throat. That fucking bite mark on his throat. Ryan refuses to let himself think about it. Why would it work for the three of them and not him? For all his thought of it, he still doesn’t know. And yet, he remains resolute. Of course he does.

He’s seen the change in not just himself, but Kaitlyn and Emma too. He can see the relief and he can feel it, feel what it means to be a part of a pack. And he understands, he does. He knows it is a difficult decision, that it requires pain first, requires a trust that blends into faith and that the misery of inaction is at least familiar compared to the fear of change unknown. He understands that, he knows the choice he presents, but if they do not bend they will break. He is the knowledge that letting go of that leash, letting themselves transform, whatever melding that may then cause; at absolute minimum, it turns the process of transformation itself from agonised writhing to nothing more than a simple jolt and blink.

If he were to let his failure with Dylan cause him to rob the others of the chance of that, he would be the cruel and selfish bastard he knows he is. He may not be able to escape from this flayed creature within him, but he will not embrace it. He promised Kaitlyn that he was going to drag it out into the open and make everyone see it. Ryan meant it. Except, with his tendency towards shredding apart the promises he makes in his claws, he reframed it to something far less delicate and removed it from his hands. He will become the rock against the hard place, devil against deep blue sea, Scylla against Charybdis and rest assured he will be the bite of the bullet. He is steadfast in this, he will be that choice, parallel to the fear and uncertainty, that they are caught between. Yeah, with Dylan he is evidently not the only one so steadfast. He may be Scylla, yet his Odyssus did make it through that narrow strait. With a glance to his side, he thinks to himself, not before he lost a few sailors' first.

He’d like to think that maybe this is his chance at a lucky break anyway. It’s like cheating almost. If he’s right, which he does feel fairly confident that he is, then what Jacob needs is connection and it is his struggle to hide away his life which prohibits it from forming. Well Ryan can testify that becoming a part of the pack created bonds stronger than family. It would be what he needs, without having to first painstakingly and slowly untangle those iron links. If Ryan is right and it is solely the foundation of trust he needs first, then if he becomes pack and that basis is established, maybe he’ll be able to find himself opening up. Or not, if he doesn’t want to. He deserves his privacy and Ryan gets it, he really does. Either way, it will become his choice and that is what’s important.   

So yes, Ryan is still steadfast in this. It is hopefully pretty straightforward. The only thing is, he hates how he’s going to have to do it. He’s going to have to throw out some dirty laundry of his own. He thinks for a moment. Tries to weigh up what he’s willing to divulge and how to do so in a casual manner. Honestly, he’s drawing a complete blank. What could he say that doesn’t come across like, hey Jacob, when he saw how his dad threw a beer can at his head, it actually really reminded Ryan of when he was a kid. Yeah, back when his mom would drop every plate she grabbed in the kitchen, crying and proclaiming what a terrible mother she was after realising she hadn’t fed them, even though he’d made dinner for himself and his sister hours ago. Crazy right? Guess it just sucks to suck. Anyways, come to the island, it’ll be great. Yeah. Nothing is really coming to mind.

Eventually he settles on an olive branch. He breathes in deeply before he can bring himself to pluck it off the tree and hold it out. “You play the Silent Hill games? Saw the case in your room.”

Jacob barely turns his head to look at him, giving him a reproachful glance from the side. He still takes it though. Kinda. “No. It was my birthday but a gift from Kaitlyn to Kaitlyn. It was one of a few though, so.” He shrugs a shoulder.

“Right, yeah, I don’t think I ever played any. Y’know, I’m not sure even Dylan with all his ga-” He cuts himself off, clears his throat, gets back on track. “Uh, on PS2 I remember playing- God, what was that game? Top down, you start in a dungeon, think I was like a lizard guy or something… oh yeah, yeah, I think it was like Champions to Arms or something. You ever played that?”

Jacob shakes his head. Ryan pulls in a deep breath. “Yeah well, don’t know if you could still find it these days. I was glad I kept the disk, even after my PS2 died. Yours seems like it’s still kicking strong though?”

“Have to replace some stuff now and then. It’s not too bad, mostly just chugs along fine.” Jacob shrugs. Ryan thinks about asking why he wouldn’t get a secondhand PS4 for less than a fifty and decides against it. He nods along instead. 

“Mh, guess we never tried to fix it. I got a PS3, about a year after they came out, when they dropped the price. God, that would have been the last gift my-” There’s a sudden sharp tug in his chest and Ryan’s teeth snap shut. He doesn’t know what depths that memory dredged up from or how it moved his tongue before he could realise what he was saying. He almost wishes that the flayed animal within him was a real physical thing, so he could roll up a newspaper and whack it back into its cage. 

Jacob says nothing back. He does see his face twitch. Ryan tries to loosen his jaw. He does a single nod of his head. Summons the willpower to push on. He tries again. “So are you more of a FIFA or a Madden kinda guy or-”

“This is a really shitty first date.” Jacob tells him flatly. 

Ryan gives a second, now resigned, nod. This is going nowhere. The one thing he’s usually got going for him is useless in this particular attempt. Ryan may have protested Emma calling him on it, but she’s right of course, he has a tendency towards lectures. It’s all thanks to that pesky little neurodevelopmental disorder of his. The speech therapist he had as a kid did what she could, but it was her main priority to get Ryan speaking at all. Nowadays, he can do casual, sure. That is, when he can stay quieter, to listen and observe, interject without the pressure of being forced to. When he’s heading it, that’s when it becomes clear it isn’t his forte. Despite all efforts to be casual, there’s this monotone undercurrent to his voice, even at his most animated. He’s been told it always sounds like he’s layering tone over or under his voice, instead of making his voice become the tone as others apparently do, whatever that means. He also doesn’t hold expression well, between specific and always purposeful twists of his features, he’s blank faced. He’s perceptive and straight to the point, in his wordy, pedantic way of speaking. It’s a terrible concoction for small talk, at least he’s self aware about it. Does mean however, if he’s decided he’s Scylla, then this is the triple rowed teeth within one of his many serpent necked dog heads, making the choice he’s hedging towards that much more unappealing. He can’t give up and talking isn’t working. 

Third time’s a charm. He nods to the road ahead of them. “You mind if we take a detour?” 

Another shrug. It’s not a no and it wasn’t really a question anyway. They continue on in silence, crossing through Albany and driving through the mist hanging over the highway. Ryan twists the wheel and pulls them off track when a gap in the fog grants sight of the lake. Along the lakeside they go, past a town and a hamlet, until he’s back in his own home town again. His home town, which is no more than some buildings and houses scattered around some roads, the only four traffic lights here all concentrated in a single crossroad at its center. They drive right past his dingy little apartment without a word and head further through town. Ryan’s hands curl so tightly around the wheel it almost aches, but he doesn’t question whether he wants to do this. He already knows he doesn’t, but he’ll do what he has to. Jacob might, he does roll down a window despite the chill, his nose twitching. The truck pulls to a slow stop in the outskirts, which still isn’t exactly far from the center anyway. Ryan kills the engine, grabs his keys, ignores Jacob’s expression and steps out onto the road.

He walks up to the mailbox and rests his hand atop the For Sale sign hammered into the dirt beside it. He’s never seen it before, has no idea when it went on market, wasn’t aware it was even going to be put up in the first place. It’s not a surprise and yet there’s still a tug of emotion in his throat. There’s no point mourning about it now, he tells himself, one look at the house is assessment enough that it won’t be brought for a while. If Jacob’s house looked run down, then this house looks abandoned. After all, it is. The brick foundation is hidden behind the overgrown lawn, the front step is smothered beneath rotting leaves, the concrete path up has cracked from a fallen roof tile, the curtains are all pulled tightly shut. The lights inside haven’t been on in probably about a year now. He waits until he can hear the truck door close behind him and the final step Jacob takes to stand beside his shoulder.

“Is this your house?” He asks. For all the nervousness and insecurity he had about someone being within his own home, he doesn’t hide the surprise and unease from his voice at the sight of someone else’s.  

“No.” It isn’t. He’s not breaking in anywhere else today, either. 

He can’t see it, but he feels the long look Jacob gives him. “Then what are we doing here?”

“Getting you that game and stealing a tv while we’re at it.” Ryan tells him and he hates how even he can hear how tired his voice is. Then, he walks up the path. 

The door swings open with a creak of complaint. He clips his keyring to the carabiner on his belt loop and steps over the threshold to look around at the still painfully familiar sight of it all. The lounge is cold and dim, the whole house will be. The dust unsettled by his entrance dances in the light coming in through the door and the rest of the room is swathed in the greytones of his mutated vision, making it look even colder still. It’s in this surreal space between just how they left it and stripped bare. The furniture has mostly been left behind and the etches of black marks denoting his height over the years are still on the wall. The wine glasses have been cleared from the coffee table and there’s no longer any scattered books left on the various surfaces. It’s as frozen in time and temperature as the pit sitting heavy in his stomach. It grows, he thinks. If that’s possible.

Each step through the lounge feels like a soldier through a minefield. It changes nothing whether that is through the beeping beneath grass or through the scorched dirt. The feeling invokes the image of both. In one step he hears the landmine beeping in how the couch makes a hazy tug at one specific something that he can no longer remember, amongst the grass of all the memories he does. In another he sees a ghost of the past come running by giggling and squealing from the chase of someone he can no longer picture quite as vividly. His boot hits the carpet and echoes of memory ring through the room. Ryan runs his eyes over the couch when he sees him, smiling and with a crooked party hat atop his head. He looks away when he sees her, passed out on the cushions and oblivious to the kid in the kitchen trying to put the frosting on his own cake.  

Head down, trek through the hallway, yank open a door. At a first deceptive glance, this room has been stripped completely bare. It’s quieter in here. All that’s left of him is the signature he left on the wall behind the bed now in his apartment. Ryan watches himself dragging the pen over the bumpy plaster. He walks through the memory dissolving into colorful dust drifting through the gloom and ignores the phantom sound of loud chatter, thumping music and the scent of smoke drifting beneath the door from down the hallway. What was his bedroom for many years is now no more to him than a damp room in an abandoned home.

He hears Jacob follow in behind him and wander over towards the graffiti. Ryan himself goes to the closet, scrunching his nose at the year worth of actual dust suddenly filling it and flinches on instinct. The pain is long gone though and at this point, all he has to do is avoid any mirrors and in his mind at least, everything’s all healed and straight. Pawing a hand out to disperse the dust cloud, he looks down at where, sure enough, the old tv and console remain. Sat on the floor inside and stuffed beneath other abandoned storage, it’s an old box JVC-TV, over thirty inches and too heavy for the shelf above. It was a monster back when he was a kid and even marked down over half price it was fucking expensive for them, they paid it off for years. Also, technically not really his per say, just shoved in his closet when they finally upgraded after tv’s became a cheap commodity. Not like anyone else he knows would want it, this is ancient tech nowadays. If he doesn’t take it, its next destination will almost certainly be the dump. He’s fairly confident it will still work though, he kept dragging it out and using it when he was a teenager, only stopped when it became far easier to watch movies on a shitty laptop instead.

He’s certain all his DVD’s and games will be here too. Unlike him, his Mom wasn’t in the habit of throwing anything away. Well, nothing that was inanimate or tangible. Somehow, she got those priorities mixed around. Wouldn’t be the first time. With that in mind, he’ll guess it does make sense the house is abandoned and on sale, while all the useless junk inside has been left to rot. He tries to ignore the bitter thought that maybe she is a little like him. A box beneath his bed, the truck parked outside; his name never spoken aloud, his face growing steadily blurred at the edges. She placed the house on sale without checking to see if the closet is full and Ryan moved out from home with the knowledge that it was. In the end, they both packed their bags to leave it all behind and they both left it all behind without daring to touch it to throw it away. Maybe the flayed creature is hereditary, crawled from her chest to his, it’s howling keeping them both awake at night. His throat feels tight at the realisation. The retreat under the porch and the blood beneath claws. She’ll be back for it all, just like he finds himself standing here now.

He turns his attention back to the closet before him with force, blotting out all other thoughts on the matter from his mind. It is full. There’s a reason growing up his clothes were either in his dresser or on the makeshift clothes rack bolted to his wall. From top to bottom there’s cardboard boxes, notebooks, bags and a familiar brown leather jacket hanging on the side. He looks away, starts grabbing for the boxes, ignoring the phantom sight of claw marks carved into it all. He doesn’t want to wonder who left them. It still doesn’t stop the wave of something sore and bitter rolling through him as he reaches up to the shelf without needing to grab a chair. He pulls down a box, lifts the lid to find it filled with musty blankets. Shoves it aside, pulls down another. It’s heavier and sure enough, filled with cases. Rooting around through the plastic until he clutches a familiar cover in his hand, Ryan stands and holds it out to Jacob. 

“Here you go. This’s the one for you.” Ryan then turns and motions towards the tv, with a specific wave to the console, controller and remote in the cardboard box sat atop it. “Might be a piece of shit these days, but also might as well drag it to the lodge anyway. If you’ve had to fix up your PS2 then maybe you can get it working, if it does need some tinkering.”

Jacob just looks down at the game extended out to him. He has this blank look on his face, one that isn’t really blank. Ryan doesn’t know exactly what it all is, though he can pick out something a little bewildered and a bit frustrated in there. Ryan sighs and lowers his arm. “Do you need me to show you the chip in the bathroom sink?”

“What?” It comes out muted and frustratingly, genuinely confused. Somehow he’s still not getting it. 

Ryan’s jaw grinds and his teeth give an audible scraping sound as he prepares to all but shove the intention behind this into Jacob’s hands. “Do you need me to show you the chip in the bathroom sink from my drunk Mom falling over and hitting it with her wine bottle, or do you get the point?”

“I don’t know what the point is!” Jacob throws out his arms in an agitated and, as usual, defensive shrug. “I don’t know even what the fuck you’re saying, it’s not your house, it is your house, the tv, the sink?”

Ryan can’t even find it in himself to give rise to it. This house has always made him weary. “The point is, I don’t want to talk about this shit, alright? And I don’t expect you to either. You don’t want me at your house and I don’t want you here, you don’t want to talk about your shitty dad and I don’t want to talk about my shitty mom.”

“But you’re-” Jacob barely gets out before Ryan cuts him off and keeps going.

“So the point is, I’m saying you don’t have to. I’ve already seen it and now you’ve seen mine. Alright? Here we are, I’ve made it even and neither of us want to talk about it, so there, we won’t.”  

Jacob throws his hands out in front of him. “Then why the fuck are we here?”

“I’m literally reaching out to you, dude.” Ryan lifts his arm out again and gives the game in his hand a little shake at him. “I’m trying to be a friend and I'm telling you I won’t ask about any of it or look at you weird when you let something slip. And- and if you need to be pissed at me for making you call your therapist first, fine. Go ahead, it’s probably deserved, I probably did it like an asshole. But no matter how pissed you’re at me, I don’t hate you, I get you. Be pissed about that too if you want, won’t change that it’s true. If I hated you, I wouldn’t have said a thing and let you go down that road, because I know what a shit fucking life it becomes. We’ve been through the same shit, us and all of them too, we all went through that night.”

It might be the wrong thing to say, but Ryan isn’t trying to do this the right way and it’s finally something Jacob latches onto. His face screws up and his shoulders rise impossibly higher, body strung tight with defensive tension. “Yeah, because of me! Yo do, you do hate me. I know, because I fucking ruined everyone’s lives and you all hate me for it. I know alright? I ruined my own life and I hate me for it! I can’t even go home, where the fucking park and RV is better than this, this fucking sucks! And it’s my own fault, and I get it, and you- you clearly don’t!”

“Jesus Christ man, that’s stolen valour.” Ryan says and he lets the roll of his eyes slip into his voice with honest disdain towards sentiment. It actually shocks himself how much he believes his words, he has to try not to feel like a hypocrite about it. “You think I hate Dylan for pitching the party? You think I hate Nick and Abi for storming off, or you and Emma? None of you assholes listened to me about staying in the lodge and we all chose to go wandering through the woods. The lot of us. We’re all idiots and we all made a dumb mistake and it still wasn’t any one person's fault. So, get over it.”

“You were all upset and- and you were all mad at me. I was in the room, I was there, don’t tell me you weren’t!” Jacob stutters out to think for a second before he quite literally points a finger at Ryan to accuse him, “You’re gaslighting me!”

“Oh my fucking god, that’s a dumb, made up word.” Ryan groans and if that isn’t just a pin in the fact Jacob had been attending his therapy sessions before skiving off. That or he’s used the internet a grand total of once before. “What, what is this? Do you want me to hate you? It was a shock you’d do something so stupid and in the moment I was already pissed, yeah. What does it change though? We’re still here, hating you for one of the many dumbass decisions made that night doesn’t make me feel better. And if this is fuck- fucking self flagellating with our hatred, it won’t make you feel better about it either.”

“I don’t want you to hate me!” Jacob protests. “But I don’t get how you don’t or how you’re acting like you didn’t see my house or how you’d want to-”

“I don’t care if you don’t get it.” Ryan tells him and looks pointedly at the case he jabs out again after he’d thrown his hands up in exasperation last he spoke. “So just take the bloody game. Get over it. Take the friendship I’m offering you, let someone else be in your corner and give Kaitlyn some company. We’re even, you’ve got jack shit to lose.”

Jacob looks down at the old game. His eyes flick to the bumpy knock down drywalls, the scratchy carpet, the permanent fogged windows from the broken seal. He looks back at Ryan, pinches his brows together and bites the inside of his cheek. He takes it. Draws it in towards himself, smoothes a thumb over the wrinkled plastic, reads the title. 

Then he looks up again and Ryan feels an inward sigh starting before Jacob even begins to speak. “Yeah but you’re all going to go to the island without me again because even if you don’t hate-”

“Jesus Christ, I was getting to it dude. Yeah, come to the island, I’m sure Kaitlyn’s already told you to let yourself transform?” Ryan finally gets to shove his frostbitten hands in his jacket pockets as he waits impatiently for the tentative nod from Jacob. “Cool, so do it. Come to the island, let yourself transform, join the pack. Why haven’t you already?”

“Emma, she-” Jacob wavers. “She does hate me, she wouldn’t want me to-”

Ryan knows he’s barely letting the poor guy speak at this point, but he’s cold and sore and he really wants to leave. He doesn’t care how he sounds when he tells him, “Good thing Emma doesn’t make the decisions then, isn’t it? Just leave her alone, don’t drop any more bombs on her and she’ll move past it.”

Jacob’s brows scrunch even tighter and he keeps his eyes glued to the case in his hands. Finally, he nods. “I- yeah, okay.”

There’s nothing more to say than the essence of alright, good, glad that’s settled. Ryan turns around then, motioning towards the necessary boxes and the tv. He wants to get out of here immediately and with Jacob agreeing to tag along to the island, he’s more than ready to do so. Job done, Kaitlyn-themed conscious shut up, choice made, time to get the fuck out of this tomb. He clears off the top and sets out the boxes they’re taking, sending Jacob off to load them into the truck bed while he shimmies the tv out of the closet. Ryan pauses, feels himself eye the door, as if Jacob or an echo from his past will come and catch him. He steps forward and snags the jacket in the corner off its hook, throws it over his arm and tries to ignore the clawing sensation rising steadily higher up through his throat. When Jacob returns, even with all their souped up strength it’s still easier to have the both of them lift the huge box tv up and out of the house. Using one of the musty blankets from the closet to protect the screen, Ryan secures it into place with the faded tan straps on the truckbed walls, tossing another blanket over it to give some measly protection against the fog. 

Ryan knows he’s fleeing like a dog with its tail tucked between his legs and it still doesn’t stop him from pressing his foot flat against the pedal. They drive through town and along the lakeside until they’re back on the highway and making headway in the right direction at last. The fog envelopes them soon enough and the further north they drive it becomes ice filled, the small water droplets crystalizing within. The cab is filled with noise over the rest of the drive, in the first quarter it is teeth chattering and leather squeaking, until the heater chases off the chill. Then it is just the rolling of tires on asphalt in every minute passed. The silence between them no longer holds the tension of earlier. It’s not exactly comfortable, more thoughtful maybe, for Jacob that is. Ryan just focuses on his hands moving the wheel. The warm air takes the cold clinging from his skin, but the frozen shards within are like shrapnel and the haunting of the house trails behind him in the rearview. He’s exhausted and if he let it, his mind would disappear into itself, to replay memory and emotion like watching a movie in the fuzzy graphics of the JVC-TV. So he just tightens his grip and focuses on his hands moving the wheel as they draw onto the backroads around the Hackett property. 

“You really think we’re actual friends? Emma said we could be friends, but I don’t know if she really meant it.” Jacob breaks the silence suddenly but hesitantly, in an obvious prelude to wherever he’s going next. Ryan braces for it. “That was before, y’know. I fucked up telling only her, I was just- I thought she’d tell everyone else immediately.”

“Yeah, we are. We’re not the kind of friends who talk about dating though.” Ryan says simply before it becomes a sour note even he could hear. It’s an obvious joke and hopefully a less obvious deflection from the tone, when he continues on with, “You’re not so bad.”

”No, I’m the worst.” Jacob laughs but he knows he means it. “I was just going to say it would have been better, if we’d been friends from the start. And I mean, Kaitlyn’s started to- nevermind.”

”I think that’s ranking yourself a bit high.” Sticking to his word by ignoring the second half completely, Ryan says tiredly, “I’m pretty sure we could both think of someone worse. You don’t even make the top five, trust me.”

“You think?” Jacob asks and it’s kind of sad how much he has to quite obviously tamper down the hopeful lilt to his tone.

“How many dictators have there been?” Ryan asks with a shrug. It leaves him feeling a little off kilter, someone acting like his care isn’t this disgusting thing, who is actually seeking out confirmation of it instead of cringing away. He doesn’t know what to do with it. He deflects again. “Y’know, when I talked with the girls about this stuff, I held both their hands.”

It does its job, wiping the obnoxiously pitiful puppy dog eyes from Jacob’s expression and making him laugh instead. That he can deal with. “You’re not holding my hand bro.” 

Ryan pulls his hand from the wheel to hold it out at him, knowing he won’t take it. “You sure? Offers going, goin’, gonnn-” 

Jacob grabs his hand. He shakes it, in a solid grasp and a hefty downward shake. When he lets go, his voice has taken on this near to serious and genuine quality that Ryan has never heard from him before. “Thanks man, for picking me up and making me call and- and y’know. I’m not pissed at you about it. I’m- yeah. Thanks.”

Ryan places his hand back on the wheel and nods, a little shocked. “Yeah, yeah, anytime man.”

Jacob clears his throat and either in his own form of deflection or just as likely in genuine worry about it, he asks, “How pissed do you actually think Kaitlyn will be though?”

Following down the road, the driveway up to the lodge is finally only one more turn of the steering wheel away. Ryan waits to answer and when he does, it’s with the lodge and a foreboding shadow in sight. “Considering she’s sitting out on the steps right now?”

He pulls in to park beside the van and both of them twist beneath their seatbelts to glance out the window behind them. It would be funny, if it weren’t so full of trepidation. Turning back around, killing the engine and clicking the seatbelt release buttons, neither of them move. They look at each other instead. Jacob groans. “I've already got a headache and she’s not even going to care.”

Ryan gives him an unimpressed scrunch of his face and reaches up to tentatively touch the side of his nose. It’s pain free, but that wasn’t what made his fingers hesitate before smoothing over the bridge. It’s the crooked bend at the top he's now confirmed to himself still remains. “My heart bleeds for you.”  

“Hey man, I offered to set it.” Jacob throws up his hands, guilt free. So guilt free, a thoughtful look crosses his face. He shares his scheming right out loud for Ryan to hear. “She’s already pissed at you. I bet she’s so pissed at you, I can make it worse and she’ll forget about me completely.”

Jacob has opened the door and hopped out the truck before Ryan can say a word. He even forgot to take his bag, or actually, more likely he purposefully abandoned it in favour of getting the first word in. With a sigh, Ryan grabs their bags and follows after. The only option he’s left with, needing to round Jacob back up, as he still needs his help to move the boxes and tv. Beneath the slam of the truck door he hears the execution of Jacob’s grand plan.

“Ryan called gaslighting dumb and made up!” He’s able to see the arms waving around to accompany the accusation even with no sight of them. “And I was like wow that’s really toxic Ryan and he said he loves being toxic and breaking people's hearts and-”

“Then you’re both dumbasses, all words are made up.” Comes Kaitlyn’s interruption. From the tone of her voice, it doesn’t seem like Jacob’s plan has any chance of working. 

He was right in that she sounds pissed at just the mention of his name. He’s not eager to go sauntering on over to face that, not at all. Ryan drops the bags on the gravel beside the back tire and climbs into the truck bed, to start unpacking it all instead. He glances to the lodge as he unties the straps around the tv. It’s glowing light from the windows that cuts through the cold dim of evening and inside will be the scent of warm honey fogging up the windows. The freezing void in his stomach sits heavy. His bones feel weary. Ryan wants to go home. Not to his apartment, not to the abandoned house they just left, not the couch in the attic and not to the island. He’d like to think he doesn’t know then, where home is. He does, he’s homesick for a place he barely knows, with a warm bed, a leg in his palm, a quiet voice and the feeling after a long night of sleep. He blinks. Looks away. Picks up a box. Sets it near the edge. Undoes a buckle. Another. One second at a time. God, he just needs some sleep. 

Chapter Text

The day began grey and now towards its end, it remains so. Almost as if the world has warped in a refraction of his very thoughts, the sun’s light is dim and cold. With the wind whistling through the trees and the screech of crows joining the cacophony from their branches, the silence biting at his heels in chase today is a deafening sound he has been unable to escape.

He’d fled all the way to North Kill and finally discovered what he now knows is a small library and archive. Inside the silence was a little less loud. He sheltered there with a pile of books stacked beside him in the scratchy and threadbare chair tucked in the corner. The librarian, an upper middle aged woman who introduced herself as Julie, was initially intrigued by the new face. She left him alone quickly enough, though not before unsubtly asking if he’d seen the job posting on the door, or more specifically yet even less subtly, displayed her shock when she realised just who he was. Local legends are what they seem to be in this town, though of an unsure sort. 

Ryan can’t hide it from himself however. The loud silence might be the bite at his heels, but it’s the lodge he was truly running from. In fairness, that is where the silence has made its home. He’s barely halfway back up the front steps and he can already feel it. He’d been wrong last night, there was no yellow glow or warm honey inside. Instead it was washed in tinges of grey and blue, with dust pouring down through it and looming shadows eating up all the light. Where behind wooden walls no voice rose above a muffled sound and the only sight of anyone was a flash of an arm as they disappeared around a corner. Then there’s the stink of it, something rotten stained into the floorboards. The lodge has grown more eerie than he could ever have imagined it. Maybe it was always this way, when the children's delighted screams, summer sun and the warmth of both weren't there to chase it away. Cold and lifeless, filled with nothing more than spectres. 

So, it wasn’t difficult to flee and he did so early. He arrived last night when most everyone was asleep and left much the same. It’s only now that the sun has begun to dip low he returns. He might’ve slept in his truck if it wasn’t so cold or maybe the hotel if he could’ve spared it. Instead, he’s forced to return with his tail between his legs, hoping to slink back to his ratty couch in front of the fire without being noticed. It won’t be a restful sleep, not with how his eyes will drift and stay glued to the door to the library. That is, if he even gets any sleep. All night it will reek of something rotting behind that door and all night he’ll feel sick with it. He’ll sink his nails into his hands to keep himself from wandering over, he’ll toss and he’ll turn. If he catches sleep, it will be to dreams of a warm corpse that spills out the scent of its rot. He won’t budge either way and morning will come. Morning will come and he will be able to flee again, the dim light of day unshackling him. He’s no less exhausted than he was yesterday and doubtless he will be no less exhausted for all forthcoming days.

Reaching the top of the stairs, he pushes open the door. Graciously left unlocked, at least they’re not at the point of barring him out. Yet. From the looks Kaitlyn gave him before she took herself inside without sparing a single word to him, she was likely considering it. He gets it, he does, although he is a little vindicated at naming Dylan pack. Considering that for all she protested it, she’s still clearly chosen his side over her packmate. Deeper than family his arse. Maybe that’s unfair. No, no it is, it’s unfair. Ryan knows those two grew incredibly close after that August night and there isn’t really sides at all, just his own fuck up to cause Dylan’s feeling of betrayal. Still, it stings. His assumption that the others surely must hate him too which stems from that may be a little unreasonable as well, but he’s avoiding everyone regardless. For all their pretending and the distance between them, word no doubt travels fast in as little a group as theirs. 

Selfishly, he’s also a little glad for another reason to avoid them all. His jealousy was unreasonable then and now even just a day nearer the moon has it twisted into a bitter and uglier thing. He irrationally distrusts them all and he knows even a glimpse of any smile would have him wanting to pluck out their teeth and measure it against the scar. Irrational as it is, considering he knows at least half of them could not have done the bite that drives him so mad. The bite that should be no business of his, no matter who did it. Yet it’s not knowing that gives it the chance to make him so paranoid. Yeah, it’s best to stay away entirely until he can force some control over the howling beast in his chest.

All his hopes are crushed when Ryan only gets the chance to shrug his boots off and pad a grand total of four steps before he’s ambushed. Ambush would possibly be too strong of a word for how Laura and Max simply sit at the sole table left out in the otherwise empty great hall, if not for the time or the expressions on their faces. They were waiting for him, specifically, and that never bodes well. He approaches hesitantly and wishes he had decided to brave the frostbite from sleeping in his truck over what awaits him here.

“Looks like you didn’t want to be caught, but uh,” Laura scrunches her brows at him in this look he finds himself unable to read, “We should talk. Mind sitting for a bit?”

Ryan doesn’t know where this is headed but he does know he’d rather shake his head and walk away. Yeah, he’d just rather not find out at all, actually. Probably wouldn’t be received too well if he told them that. He finds himself sliding onto the bench opposite them instead.

“This is the last time we’ll be coming back here.” Laura tells him without further preamble. 

The brakes slam. No amount of bracing could have prepared Ryan for that. He thinks he might be gaping like a gold fish but he hasn’t the mind to spare it, with all the pointed and necessary questions filling his head. Too many, that in the end, all that comes out is an indignant, “What?”

“We’ve found a new solution for the months.” Laura barely elaborates, though he gives her the benefit of the doubt that she’s trying to let it sink in.  

‘For the months’, she says, Ryan thinks scornfully. The downplay of the century. She won’t directly say it, so he does it for her. “For the full moons. When you turn into werewolves.”

Her lips purse. “Yes.” 

You promised you wouldn’t do this, is his first thought. Please don’t make me argue about this right now, is his second. Next month, or the month after, wait until then, please. Ryan is too exhausted to really try and argue against setting the precedent for dangerous and doomed ideas like this. He should have known this was coming, and he had in some vague sense, when Travis first announced they could go home. He’d thought to worry over Abi or Nick and well, he likely still should. But Laura and Max? The two who have been infected the longest and were so steadfast in sticking to the cages just last month, really? Who live on their own and already rent within the state? It was everyone’s parents he worried the most about, contending with their decrees would be much more difficult than talking through otherwise vague and impulsive notions. Clearly, that was his blindspot with these two, who have not only made the decision all on their own but have certainly also actually thought it out, and he doesn’t even need to have heard the plan yet to have no doubts on that.    

Still, in one sense, it doesn’t matter just who sits before him now. All worry he’d thought to spare it was drowned beneath the month he’s had since anyway. He’s left himself woefully unprepared for this conversation while moping about his apartment. To make it worse for himself, instead of going ahead with his vague plan to make them all renew their vows of returning here, today his priority of hiding away in North Kill has left him too late for even that. 

In another, he then thinks, it wouldn’t matter if it were not you. Not Laura and Max, out of anyone else. It can’t be them and not for all their good planning or determination. He doesn’t want it to be them, because the very worst thing is that he is glad it’s them. Rather, to be precise, he’s terribly relieved it’s them who have come to him, while he is so exhausted and pessimistic enough to only be able to summon care for his and his own. With it all culminating together, it’s hard to feel hopeful over the prospect, even as Ryan supposes now he should still give some arguments a try. Especially with how, if anyone were to be impossible to argue with, it’d be Laura. Her stubbornness is admirable and certainly courageous at times, but for Ryan, all it usually ends up is a pain. With her, he needs a groundwork of understanding over the situation first, before he does bother an attempt. 

Tiredly, he asks, “Right. Okay, and how will you do that?”

Laura however flicks her eyes to her boyfriend and it’s Max that leans forward on the bench and places his elbows on the table to explain with some small enthusiasm. 

“My Aunt has some land by the mountains. I’d spent some of my tuition money to get us a shipping container and she’s let us keep it in a far corner there.” Max tells him, before his nose scrunches. “And then some more to make the door lock and open from the inside. Not keen on buying my own tomb just yet.”

“It was expensive, but it’s secure.” Laura adds.

“I can show you pictures if you’d like.” Max adds atop that too.

Ryan sighs and waves a hand in agreement. He takes the chance to think while Max brings up pictures and screenshots of maps, to show him the container and land it’s already set up upon. The operative word there is ‘already’ and although the pictures aren’t dated, the bright sun in the cloudless skies is timestamp enough. This is no new plan, they were waiting to be released from the travel restriction. Kept that one hush, didn’t they? He can’t quite figure out if they’d initially meant it as a backup plan or if it even matters if they didn’t. What he really worries about is that maybe he does know the last straw to topple the heap, in a memory of Laura giving a heavy shrug and roughly pushing herself away from this very same table. With a backup plan in place, if there remained any reason for her to keep returning to the quarry, it was the information used to fix and manage this for herself and her boyfriend. Through Ryan’s own interruptions, Kaitlyn’s agreements and the new realisation last month they’d both hastily explained before the discussions of heading home, it was proven to her that for all her research, she was unable to grasp the information they could. His choices are becoming far too acquainted with their consequences, he thinks dryly.     

However soon they’d planned it, admittedly what they have set up does look secure enough. The wolves have incredible strength but they are still animals nonetheless and unable to piece through unweathered steel. Yet there are a million more concerns than simply that. Here it begins, Ryan thinks with a sigh that forms into his first words. “You’ll be days away. There’s no one to help you, no one to stop you. What if your car breaks down, what if you get out?” 

“We're not that much closer to any town than we are here.” Laura says, while Max swipes along to a screenshotted map and zooms in to where the nearest town sits some short miles away. “There’s a stream through the paddocks that way too and the container is in the woods off the far side of them, so no one will hear us or come our way.”

If they get out, it’s a short run and no small stream will stop them. The wolves don’t like touching it, but they’re not faeries or vampires unable to cross running water, they’d jump over it easily as that. True enough that the distance from the town is not so much smaller to count as severe. Although, it’s true also that those are small woods and only empty grass paddocks lay between farm and town. If no prey was to be found in the woodlot and the paddocks remain barren, even to a feral wolf the next destination would be obvious. He supposes that risk is immutable to any plan. For this one, it’s the container which that and everything else is entirely contingent on. “What happens if your Aunt makes you remove it or if, sorry to say it, if you break up?”

Laura gives him a flat look. “I’d like to think if we ever did, we’d be amiable enough to share the box in the short time before we turn into monsters.”

“Hey, maybe then we’d even duke it out as werewolves and it’d be good enough couples therapy to get us back together.” Max chimes in with an impish grin, a clear expression of disbelief that it would ever come to that. “You’d kick my ass every time though.”

“Yeah, we agree on that. Oh look, it’s working already, we’re not even there and we’re one potential argument down.” She quips in agreement with a small and private smile, before looking back to Ryan and answering the question more sincerely. “Either way, then we’d have to find a new solution or come back here, if really necessary. Yeah, we can’t see the future, but we can plan for it and put safeguards in place.”

“What safeguards? This all sounds like a bunch of hope and prayers. There’s people's lives on the line here. If anything went wrong you could kill someone.” Ryan frowns back at her. He looks at Max. “Your aunt could get hurt or she could find out about you both. Then what happens?”

Laura’s words come out hotly as her patience slips. “We know that. Do us the small courtesy of not assuming we want blood on our hands. You act like we’re so safe here when we’re only here in the first place because it wasn’t safe or secured at all. A steel box out in the middle of nowhere is no less secure than some rusting bars beneath a crumbling house.”

She has got him there, he wasn’t giving her that courtesy. All of them are well aware it is not themselves who are likely to be in danger, only a silver bullet will do any lasting damage to them and those aren’t commonly found. Was it merely his concern that made him speak as if he believed she would value her own life over those within the town or was it that he did truly believe her to have such an apathetic disregard for others? With the question now posed to himself, he finds he already knew the answer. He knows in how his first thought at her words was a correction of more, more blood on her hands. He does believe it of her and it doesn’t even feel unfair or unfounded. Ryan’s hands are caked in the stuff and yet Kaylee’s blood is a thick coat over Laura’s too. He can’t find it in himself to grant her that courtesy and he suddenly can’t meet her eyes either. It isn’t due to the loss of one manner making him forget all the rest. It is because he knows that it isn’t actually more blood on her hands at all that truthfully concerns him, than what it led to in his last question. What happens then, selfishly not for either of them, but his own pack and territory. They can move and move again, it’s the island woods and wolves within it that will remain easily traced.

“It’s the fact you’ll be alone. There’ll be no one else to get you secured other than yourselves.” Ryan stresses instead. “We all promised it was here we’d turn, to keep each other in check.”

“You broke that promise first.” Laura’s voice has cooled now. “And a fat lot of good it was having us there to try and stop you.”

Ryan grinds his teeth. That was different, they were barely ten minutes away, secured by the lake around them and Travis watching over them. Laura had spat fire at the idea of it too, only now to turn around and do worse. If the two of them had already set down the container as well, then her entire argument last month is extremely hypocritical and sanctimonious in hindsight. Though, that might be unfair. They all get unreasonable and unstable near the moon. Not to mention, she is admittedly right. Even if it was already set up, it doesn’t change that it was still Ryan who broke the seal. With the worst timing too apparently, since all of them were freed from the state the very next day. 

“We had reason.” Is all he can think to say in defence and it's as weak an argument as it sounds.  

“No good reason.” She sombers somewhat as she continues. “We do. I want a life, Ryan and I’m not going to let this consume it. I’m going to study and I’m going to have a career and I’m going to have a home and I’m not going to throw everything away for this.”

Ryan goes to argue that they all feel the same and is only halfway through realising his argument wouldn’t even be true, when Max saves him the trouble by speaking up instead. Surprisingly for him, as other than some casual conversation or attempted jokes with the others, he most often seems to fade into the background. Even with his phone held out and his hands gesturing to their preparations that he had paid for, it was Laura who Ryan was speaking to. It’s only now that Ryan realises he has a terrible habit of seeing Max as an extension of Laura, rather than his own entire person. A terrible habit and a terrible blindspot, that leaves him unprepared for what follows. 

“I miss my brothers.” He says and the sadness carried in it is at odds with all Ryan has ever seen come from him. “And my Mom. My brother, Liam, his girlfriend has a baby on the way and last week he showed me the ring he’s gonna give her. I gotta go home, dude.”

“Now, this was a courtesy, Ryan. We’re not here to argue over it, it’s happening. We’ve talked to Travis already and since he’s clearly realised he can’t lock us in cells for the rest of our lives, he’s helped some.” Then, with a note of finality Laura tells him, “We are going home.”

Ryan doesn’t have anything to say to any of that. He tries to come up with something, any argument more despite the finality, but it all pales in the face of family. Laura's determination alone is a formidable force and now Max’s quiet and somber dedication has secured it. Any hopeless attempt and prospect that Ryan had of changing their minds have all reached the end of their line. At least it isn’t a surprise. He’s only managed to stop Laura from doing something only once and even that was likely due more to her realising it wasn’t in her best interest to start anymore fights in the group. They are older than him, there isn’t even a light sense of friendship between them and frankly, he doesn’t have enough emotion towards it left in him to bother trying growls or threats. He thinks that makes him feel worse. Relieved it’s them that came to him today and relieved the argument over it is so obviously fruitless it’s done already. He didn’t know relief could feel so terrible.

A sigh falls out of him and a weary acceptance nods his head. While his arguments may fall on deaf ears, he can still give them as much information and truth as they’ll hear. It’s the most and least he can do. As for all the physical aspect of their plan has been admittedly well rust proofed, it was always going to be their resolve that must be steeled. 

“You already know that you’ll get chronic aches and pains soon enough, from the confined space when transformed. It will follow you through the month and after a while, I don’t know how much of a dent Panadol will make in it.” Ryan tells them plainly, rubbing his fingers over his brows tiredly. “But if you’re doing this, you can’t spend even a single night outside that container. The woods will call to you, it’ll feel impossible to get yourself back into it once you have.”

He watches Laura give a lingering side eye to Max as they realise he won’t fight them further. After a moment, she looks back to him and nods with all that stubborn determinedness. “We won’t, I’ve got at least ten separate reminders in the calendar for it. But, maybe we’ll look at expanding the space eventually.”

“That’s not all. I want you to know that letting yourself transform will change everything. I’ve told you how it makes you remember the night. And that it also… fixes something inside of you, melds it all back together. You stop feeling so disconnected from yourself, you feel like yourself again. But…” Ryan weighs his next words. “It changes everything. Even the void becomes far worse when your away from your-”

Ryan cuts himself off. He was about to say ‘territory’. Suddenly, he realises how untrue that is. He’d known that being around Kaitlyn, around his pack, had sealed up the last edges of it before returning home tore it open all over again. Or so he’d thought. He’s back in his territory now, not standing on the island at the center of it, but well within it all the same. He can feel it, the sense of home. The void remains and it isn’t just frigid edges remaining. There’s a dark cavern within him, the edges of the glacier cracking and splintering up so far as his fifth rib. His chest is near to concaving he thinks, should something not melt it soon. It isn’t territory that has enough warmth to bring light to that deep pit of darkness, it’s his pack. He had vaguely presumed this, but he hadn’t truly known it until now. He thinks back to his phone calls with Dylan, where the warmth of sunlight beaming through the receiver would remain long enough for him to finally get some sleep. He thinks of Kaitlyn standing just off behind him, the security of it like steel support beams over the once empty crevice. He thinks of the small laugh Emma managed to draw from him, her pestering dramatics somehow able to worm their way through all his worries and hurt for even just one well needed moment. No small wonder he’s so miserable this month. With all his pack shunning him, his only hope left is the island.

He clears his somewhat tight throat and continues. “- your pack. Which the two of you would no doubt form if you were no longer feral. At that point, your mind has changed. You think about everything differently, your values and priorities change, all your instincts, behaviours and senses become truly your own. I know and if you don’t trust it just from me, then look at Caleb and Kaitlyn too. All the calendars and promises in the world won’t mean anything when the grey dark of night and the pit black of containment take different shades. And I am telling you now, standing there between the open woods and the closed container door, you’ll go to what you can see.” 

They both listen and let him speak, but he doesn’t know how much that is worth. His words seemed to only further spite Laura against the idea, even if he spots a waver to Max’s expression, where something in there must have struck a chord of familiar feeling. He quickly realises it wasn’t worth anything at all, when despite their different reactions, they both dutifully nod in supposed understanding. They took it all for a warning. It was and it wasn’t, the one they didn’t hear and the one they did. Everything he said was, in no few words, to caution that this plan hinges on their continued struggle and at such a detriment to themselves it will be difficult to sustain. Somehow from that, all they heard was the threat awaiting them should they falter and what they must do to protect themselves against any chance of it. He’s trying to explain what only experience can give understanding. The width of the table has never felt so wide and words are not enough to bridge this gulf of understanding that lies between them.

There’s a short quiet then, where Ryan has the chance to continue. He nearly does. He could invite them to the island tomorrow night. When words fail, it’s the last and only way to provide them the chance to make a truly informed decision. If he did, in the night there’d be limited outcomes. Fished from the lake or found a place in his pack. In the days afterwards, there could be chaos. They would be forced to return here each month if they woke up, for he does trust a human's nature to cage itself, from the fear of the feral wolf it will become. A wolf that has awoken beneath the moonlight and tasted freedom, however? That’s of another nature, one he would not demean to believe could betray itself so. Ryan does not doubt it would heal them to coalesce these natures and yet, does he trust them enough to believe it would sway them from their plans? Perhaps once more he is failing to grant them the barest courtesy. He doesn’t offer any invitations regardless.

Ryan won’t argue against the plan itself and he won’t even go so far as to give them the chance to wake up before they go through with it. This is why he did not want it to be them. Where his effort made is rather like a common regard all wolves are owed than the same to his resolution and where then it doesn’t feel like his resolution has broken even momentarily. He cannot blame his exhaustion for all his hopelessness through the conversation. The truth he knew, is it’s just too different with them. Laura and Max are separate from the rest of the group and always have been. His resolution for the counselors can remain, because whether it formed over the course of camp or on that August night, it doesn’t matter, not in either sense. 

Laura and Max were not counselors, they were not there over camp and Ryan didn’t even meet Max until the day after August’s full moon. In September they were a room apart from them, Ryan neither helped them to their feet or gave them his jacket to cover their bloodsoaked skin. If it were Nick or Abi sat across from him and telling him of the same plans, he’d put his foot down. He’d argue tooth and nail until he won through simply, but relentlessly, wearing them down. That may be unfair and perhaps too, letting Laura and Max go without the same fight will make it harder should Nick or Abi try the same. Nonetheless, he finds himself across the gulf between them now and he’s without a bridge, the responsibility to try throwing rope across or the trust they wouldn’t just take it and run even if he did.             

However, it feels a step further to say what he has to instead advise next. He struggles to find the words that are so against everything he now knows and believes. “If this is the plan, then- I don’t know if it would be best for you to let yourself transform or return it back to a part of yourself. I don’t think it is the r- No, I won’t tell you what to do. But, for everyone’s sake, I hope you know you can always come back here, if you don’t want to live the rest of your life in a cage.” 

“Well, let's hope it doesn’t come to that.” Laura says to the last part. She doesn’t need to say anything to the advice, he knows, as it was the most straightforward and unquestionable piece of her plan already. It could’ve been left at that, before she hesitates and continues. “Though uh, we also talked to Travis. And I- well, I told him if Silas is spotted near again, I’ll come help.”

Ryan head gives an unconscious and minute sideways jerk at that name. He hasn’t thought of Silas much at all, not since they were unable to find him that night. Well, Travis was unable to find him, while Ryan ran havoc doing god knows what in the woods, after it was SIlas who had already bitten him. It’s not like they’ve heard any mention or likely sighting of him since. What good would it have been to dwell on the source of it anyway, when they’ve instead needed that energy for dealing with the curse itself? He hears her words again then, repeats them over in his mind. He almost scoffs aloud then. Leave it to Laura to ask for the common courtesy of not assuming she’d want anymore blood on her hands, only to turn around and say something like this. He hadn’t missed the switch either, from speaking for the both of them to only herself. The pursing of Max’s lips proves that was no misspeak.

“Help?” Ryan repeats, his emotions roiling with turmoil and finally this, his weariness cannot contain. “You mean hunt him down and kill him.”

Now with it out in the open, Laura seems to have lost all her hesitation. Though she does spare a look over to Max. This is a point of contention between them, then. The only question is where the disagreement truly lies. “Yes. If we captured him and kept him until the moon… When he dies, we’re all freed.”

“You don’t know that.” Ryan says and he doesn’t know what he’s feeling, if he’s shocked, disgusted, filled with pity or shame. He thinks he just feels sick and tired of gunpowder and bullets still being considered a genuine option even after all the devastation they’ve seen them capable of. 

“The poem-”

He cuts her off and fails to not sound so scathing when he says, “The poem was wrong and you proved that.”

It was, or at the very least they’d misunderstood it. Chris, Kaylee and Caleb, all dead and here they are regardless. They have more proof that killing Silas wouldn’t cure them, then they do against it. “He’s a kid, Laura. You’d lock him up while he’s confused and afraid, to execute him the first chance you got?” 

“He wouldn’t be a kid when that moon is up. What, you’d rather we left him in the woods, slaughtering innocent hikers every month?” Her tone is unwavering. “What makes his life weigh so much more than theirs?”

“None less or more until you make that choice.” Ryan’s answer is instant. 

“He’s feral, probably diseased and starving. It’d be a mercy.” She tells him with just as much persistence.

“Mercy?” Ryan spits and it’s this that flattens his toiling emotions to utter disgust. He stops himself from telling her she does not know the meaning of the word past her own self interest and instead grinds his jaw to push out between teeth, “This isn’t mercy and it’s hardly justice. You think the right should be yours, to be his judge, jury and executioner?”

“There has been no justice in any of this! Why should all of us suffer for one wild boy who’s forgotten what it means to be human?” Laura is talking faster than her mind has the chance to comprehend her own words it seems, when she steams ahead to say, “We put down dogs when they maul people, this is no different.”

The ensuring silence that engulfs them is thick with those heated words. Max blinks at her, as if just for a moment, he couldn’t recognise her. When it clears his vision, he returns it to her in loving concern and more notably, to the words she’d actually spoken he barely spares an indifferent shrug. The question of their disagreement is about as good as answered then. Though Max may not need to, Ryan himself almost tries to purposefully misunderstand the meaning of what she said. In a discussion of philosophies, he’d easily agree. It’s what he understands most truly, there is no greater difference he has to any other wolf and with no difference they all are animals just the same. Unfortunately, despite her request for courtesies, this leaves him with a sour taste in his mouth and a refusal to feign ignorance. What she said was no statement of morality or philosophies, it was callous and lacking any of the mercy she’d spoken of. She knows it too, Ryan can see the regret on her face and the confused discontent towards her own words. She doesn’t even believe it herself, he can plainly see. She’s angry, scared and much like her research, she clings to this as her salvation. It’s in her absolute determination that Laura speaks with less humanity than she accuses Silas of having.  

“It’s really fucking different.” Ryan tells her cooly, thinking of the contrast between an aggressive pet Rottweiler and a wild wolf. “And I’ll have no part in it.”

“She didn’t mean it like that.” Max defends and Ryan doesn’t care how rude it is that he’s ignored completely. When his only stance on the matter is concern for his girlfriend getting caught or whatever else similar that it is, his input has little value.  

“I didn’t. Okay? I know, it is different.” She amends, chastised and ashamed enough to admit it, though doubtlessly not for the same reasoning as Ryan. “But I won’t baulk. You can stay in the dark about it if you want. Well, until the night when the full moon lights it and you’re the same man on your same high horse now that is looking at it.” 

Yeah, alright. Ryan would grant her that last point, he’d rather be self righteous than ever pick up the headsman's axe again. And, for all his supposed fall from humanity, he does think there is a notable lack of honour in any of this. Not in any traditional sense certainly, there are no chivalrous knights or sense of valour to be found here. Ryan himself does not claim to wear any plate armour or wield any lance. So far that should Silas ever manage to bridge over to Ryan’s territory, he fully understands it’d be on him to bite and rake claws until one of them lost to a torn out throat or drowning gulp of lakewater. He has an easy and simple acceptance to that. It isn’t the death of him that grieves Ryan. It’s the necessary superiority and underhanded cowardice for it.

Now, this he would not dare say aloud, too aware of just how distant it is to those civilised values. However, with coalescence dropping him right through the illusion of unique separation of humanity, he can respect the hunt. Silas has no territory, he hunts to feed and only hunts what he is able to beat. There’s of course no honour in that either, but why would there be? It’s survival. He wouldn’t even argue it’s fair, not when Silas is a near invincible wolf against unsuspecting and toothless prey. When has hunger ever cared about what is fair? There is nothing fair about a bullet striking the skull of a deer and there’s nothing honourable about stuffing birds in a cage to eat their young. There is something distinctly dishonourable however, in locking up a scared boy while the wolf sleeps and executing it from the safe side of the bars, all before it even has the chance to blink.  

He would agree to self righteousness, except it isn’t him sitting on a high horse here, is it? They both know the weight of death. Ryan will never again take a life he cannot bear atop his shoulders. As is his station, there’s no weight in what death needs comes from him to protect and feed his pack. When his teeth sink into the flank of a deer and his claws rip apart a squealing pig, he does not shrink from the sight of their glazing eyes. It isn’t that he recoils from what comes at the end of a hunt and it isn’t that he holds anything near disregard for those killed out in the woods; far from either. Rather, what he feels for it is the same cause of why he hadn’t thought of it, the same he feels for and thinks about all the deaths caused by mountain lions or brown bears- not much at all. 

Although Silas has no set territory, the deep of the woods is his home all the same. No different than a shark in the ocean, he does not believe in marked culling so far out in the animal’s own wilderness. Those hikers, or divers, entered what they do not own and swiftly discovered that out there they are the prey. He very well knows it is common practice for the rangers to go out in the aftermath and no matter his own thoughts on it, there will be retribution in the shape of a bullet. That is not survival or hunger. In all its names of prevention, from the animal taking to the taste of human flesh or migrating nearer people after losing fear of them, it’s all the same. It’s the offended discomfort at finally being dislodged from atop the food chain and the staunch refusal to accept it. He understands too, and it’s this very realisation they are all animals for why he even does, that just as he now values his pack over humanity, humanity values itself highest and does enact this retribution to protect itself. But that’s just it. Laura herself is neither a part of it nor to be dislodged alongside it and if Silas is such a wild animal, then what difference is there to her? Proximity, for one and she’d never forget her own self interest too. 

What it really comes down to is in a stray question she posed to him and where from the root of it out stems their every disparity through to all their thoughts in entirety. When she asked him what life weighs more than the other, he told her in nature they weigh neither more or less until judgement is imposed upon it. Although he knows it was actually just a reconfigured accusation and meant to entrap him within an impossible answer, the intent of it would have failed regardless, when Laura answered it herself in just a few short words to come. For all she spoke of innocents, from within those words it is only the sound of vengeful disdain and hurt that remains when her true reasoning is reached. Why should she suffer for a boy who has forgotten to be human? Laura has not forgotten. And there it is. The crux of it all. No, it isn’t her concern for all of humanity that has her calling for his head. It’s only the concern for her own.

He realises that is what makes him truly bristle at this. If indeed Laura is, at the very least feigning to be, the height of humanity, it does not change what they are. Himself, his pack and the animals they all are now. He has no love for Silas, he isn’t pack and there’s no sense of responsibility there. He is one and the same in nature however. The same kind of wolf Ryan is, with the same sharp teeth. If the worst were to happen and someone stumbled upon them, Ryan would defend his pack with tooth and claw. For all he prays it doesn’t, should that ever happen, would she then think he’d deserve to be impounded and destroyed? He’s forgotten to be human, she’d said. How loose the memory and how far the distance must be, he wonders, before that line is reached for her. When, if not already, should he begin to worry about finding his own head filled with silver?  

A pointless concern he knows and that irks him too. Though it seems she herself is confused on the matter, Ryan still knows what he is and what he believes. In this at least, what it isn’t and where they still differ, is hypocrisy. No matter what happens, he does not have to set aside his beliefs to deem his head undeserving of silver and nor would he need to argue he should be spared either. He is no dog and he does not beg. For Ryan, that is the only difference there is and it lies in the contrast between Rottweiler and wolf. The dog, living amongst and in symbiosis with man; the wolf, wild in the deep woods and needing no more than to be left alone to its freedom. When one bites the hand that feeds and breaks the mutualistic contract, of course he can understand its culling. Which is exactly why he hasn’t spared thought to Silas hunting and yet did stress what would happen if Laura herself were loosed upon the farm. There has to be a reason why Silas and Caleb never ravaged through North Kill, while it was every one of their attacks that is why they’re here and so it is not simply territory. The wolf in the forest or the dog amongst men. The choice is her own. Were it his indifference she was after, Laura could stay here and hunt whatever she pleased beneath the moonlight. She’s made it rather clear it isn’t.

Instead, it’s amongst humanity she sees herself and it’s those same standards they should both hold her to. Frankly, that’s a laughable notion. Ryan knows her better than that. There exists another path untaken in the world that fortunately is not their own, where Emma did not manage to escape from the island with a shallow bite wound and she was instead mauled to death by Max that night. However it is in no world that Laura would ever call it a mercy to put him down, of course not. She’d call it no more than a tragedy or accident, outside of his control and of which he is innocent. In all the distinctions she can try to make, it remains arbitrary differentials at most that separate them. She either can’t see that or doesn’t care if she can. Some animals are more equal than others, indeed. 

Laura would posit herself up alongside humanity and name herself exempt from the standards of it. To go so far as to believe it’s at her whim to decide who else may be allotted the same pardons. Well, think herself beside them and beg for scraps beneath their table all she may, it won’t change the truth. She isn’t human either, not entirely, not anymore. So above them, mere animals that they are, she can’t even see it. More than grant her meaningless exemptions or just merely endorse it, she intends to help bring another wolf to heel herself. Because when that full moon rises, subconsciously or not, she still believes it’ll be her with the gun in hand. It wouldn’t. She’d be in the cage beside him and she hasn’t even thought to consider that she too should pray the barrel is not next turned and pointed at her.  

It holds absolutely no bearing to her, who or how many Silas has killed. That crime is certainly not one of which he is innocent and yet it is also not what she would actually sentence him for. His crime is theft. What Ryan thinks she might need to ask herself is if the restitution would really be worth the price of its return. Does she comprehend what the cost would be, has she even thought of what it would entail at all? The poem, if true, states he must be slain beneath a full moon. He’d need to be cared for until the time came, all her hopes and efforts ruined if he starved. Would she feed him every day, clothe him and wash him, look him in the eye, speak a single word to him or call him by his name? When the sticks were pulled from his hair and the mud doused from his skin, it’d be a boy in there. Could she still do it? Would he be human enough for her then, to finally baulk? Or worse, would she still pass the sentence, only to shirk off from both standing guard on death row and the headsman's heavy swing too? When he is put to death for being the same animal she is, his humanity is sacrificed to restore her own. It’s left only then to be seen how much she’d really be left with. 

And yet, even now when it is brought down to a simmer, her determination is not something that will ever be snuffed out before it forces its own conclusion. It will likely only die alongside Silas, or Laura will die with it. He will not sway her from this path. He could try appealing to her love for Max or to that precious humanity of hers. Ryan does not doubt she isn’t the only one who feels the same way either, well aware it’s his own stance that deviates from the common moral compass. Wasted words and wasted effort on any of them, since he knows what she is unable to acknowledge. Should the night ever come, the white wolf will awaken beneath the earth and a red glow, encased by concrete and iron bars that burn to touch, amidst rotten flesh scraps and foul dead scents. And Laura will have no more choice or control over whether he lives or dies than any of them. Once more, the role of jailer and executioner would be Travis’ duty. At some point he must tire of that, but regardless, the question is for him to answer. What is mercy to him, to pull the lever or let nature take its course? 

Weary beyond belief, after all the dragging silence, Ryan merely echoes her own words back to her and puts the matter to rest- with any luck, permanently. “Well I hope it doesn’t come to that.”

Laura gives that all the consideration of a single slow nod. The acknowledgment is at least better than further argument and if she’s surprised that he did not rise to the provocation then she does not show it. Ryan knows he looks worse for wear, his exhaustion visible in the grey shadowed within the bags beneath his eyes and the hunch of his spine that makes his newfound lankiness negligible. She’s taking it for concession and he’ll gladly let her. Either way, the fight for it was and will remain, left to a stalemate. She knows he is unable to stop her and he knows the final choice won’t be hers regardless. In the end, all there’s left are his well wishes.

“Well, I’m sure we can say our proper goodbyes on Tuesday, but I will just say-” There’s everything and nothing to say. After everything they have been through, then apart but alike, then together but disparate, there should be more to this. Shouldn’t it feel like he’s mailing off a lead box and only when opened will he know if the ticking within it came from an unstable biological nuke or just two people doing their best with their burden? How ambushed he is to find there is not even a speck of uranium caught dusted into the blood on his hands. Without it, now he struggles to find any words at all. It has not quite been five months that he has known them and within each the time passed is both long and small. Come two more days, once he’s watched their car off down the dirt road of the drive way, he may never see them again. 

From then, to now and to come, maybe it is all true. And this is it, that is all there was. He lifts his hands away from the lead box left unclosed and finally offers them all those courtesies they were after. They’re stiff, awkward and filled with far too much left unsaid. “Well, it must be a relief to be going on home. I mean, I’m sure everyone’s missed you and will help get you settled soon enough. So, yeah, I really do hope you can make it work long term. This is your decision, so- I guess you’ll just keep an eye out for rust. Though, you know you can still contact any of us any time and well, especially if you need help. Please reach out if you do, I- you know how vital that is.”

“Yeah, yeah we appreciate it dude. Oh and trust me man, you have no reason to worry, I’m going to be the face of responsibility now.” Max grins at him. “I’m off to be an uncle.”

Laura echoes the sentiment with an added pointed pleasantry about the late hour and just like that they stand. The weary part of Ryan concludes the entire conversation was pointless and they might as well not have had it, since they both knew so from the start. The incited part of him would rather uncharitably believe they only actually sat him down for the end there and were just getting the arguments about it out of the way. In a much more reasonable part between the two, he thinks they all know that despite how sudden it all feels even with the three days left, there will be no true goodbye. There was never going to be group hugs, tender farewells or teary waves in the rearview mirror and this does not take its place. This was merely, as Laura said herself, a courtesy in the form of a headsup. It was for a reason, that although they may have mentioned it to the others, they sat down to discuss it with Ryan specifically and the reason itself is just for exactly that. For when the others come, from the mention they heard or the sound of their same own, it always was and always will be Ryan sitting across the table.    

“We don’t have to be like this forever.” Laura says just before they turn to leave and her words, though no less determined than ever, come nearer to hopeful, “But I won’t waste my life waiting for it here. This is the only one I’ve got and it’ll take more than a tooth in my arm to make me waste it. We’re going to make it work. We can move past this- I- I can be more than this. And- I hope you can find that too.” 

And that’s that. He stays seated as they head off for bed and where his eyes find one chip among a million on the wood of the table, they stick there. It is through the sound of their footfalls he tracks their retreat across the hall, over to the creak of old hinges, then to the quiet whispers muffed to unintelligible behind closed doors and until finally, it is just those last words left, ratting on each syllable. With it said in such a heartfelt and somber tone, the scorn of thoughts abandons him. For all the uncharitable and disparaging thoughts he’d silently levied at Laura, there is no one right choice. There never was, not in any of this. There may seem to be the choices known, trusted, hopeful, or daunting and for each the opposite. In truth, there is only the choice that was made and the one that wasn’t.

Ryan finds himself feeling sorry for them then. Quite genuinely, he does want the both of them to succeed, to get the life they’re clearly willing to fight for. This is their choice and when there is no right single one to make, he hopes it is the best for them. It’s a hard thing to hope for, when he knows what it means and he hopes it won’t be hard for them, but he knows it will. They don’t need to be told that, they’ll have thought of countless struggles only they could consider and it hasn’t dissuaded them in the slightest. Still, he can no longer comprehend it. The perspective they hold, not what leads them to the decision but what comes with remaining forever feral, now others them to him.   

However, it was not the creaking hinges, the words just spoken, or the scorn he’d held, where they became no more than strangers. Strangers, who are suddenly far too known to him, with Chris’s venom in their veins and the blood of his blood on Laura’s hands. Far longer has she been this flickering shade to him, where in one blink there’s the determined and intelligent, but altogether plain and normal girl; then in another, there’s the one-eyed scar on a cold rampage, with a shotgun in hand and no mercy left within her. It’s much like meeting his own eyes in the mirror and it makes him just as sick. He doesn’t hate her, that’s the only difference. Yet, he would be lying if he told himself he didn’t blame her either. Not when it was always true- in all the choices she’s made since the fall of dusk that night, she hasn’t changed at all.  

There was no becoming. To even herself, Laura was already yesterday’s stranger when he met her, and has remained so, in a purgatory of her own choosing. Ryan can see it now, how just like his own gradual coalescence changed him so intrinsically, within her it has made any change draw to a sharp and sudden halt. She was fractured the same as he was. Still is, while he’s no longer. It is so suddenly clear, that he realises it was not solely his relatability to Jacob’s situation that had him drawn to understanding so quickly. He spots it easier than he once had, in coalesced eyes. This, all of this, comes from the jagged edges where it lays within her. He was only wrong to see it like a leash placed in his hand. Too belittling an image, for what it really is. Shattered ice and bloodied hands. 

The bite itself is what ripped deep through the ice and tore the glacier apart within them both, but it was his own misunderstanding of how this gulf of understanding does separate them. Ryan himself is not standing on one side, at the crumbling edge of the deep dark ravine beneath, mirrored across from her. No, when he let go of control and accepted his changing nature, it was more like looking down at the darkness below and still choosing to tilt forward to fall down within. What led Ryan to fall into it and what leads Laura to grip the jagged edge even tighter; it’s all the difference and none. The life they’d each lived to get them there. 

He always was what he became and she will always remain what she was, for that difference. In his scorn through the thoughts of the humanity she still proclaims, it was the pride of it he found. With it now faded, he’s aware he is likely harsh on her, with what a complicated figure she is to him. He has to admit, it’s doubtful she’d that plainly think herself oh so civilised and high above everything considered animal. That perspective is probably incidental and assumed to the point where it’s entirely unconscious. No, beneath any of the conditioned pride, he understands it is truly fear that keeps her stranded at the top.

Even if he didn’t have it himself, he of course knew of it, in whatever vague sense. Through his conversation with Kaitlyn and Emma it was there, in varied shades. He’d guess from their reactions last month too, that it still takes some way down until they do internally connect man and wolf to one in the same, considering only Kaitlyn has also seemed thoughtful to it. He won’t be testing that theory, though for his own entertainment he’d like to be there should someone else try to call Emma a wild animal, to see just how terribly it goes. Regardless, the lean off the edge doesn’t begin with a lack of fear, or the knowledge of what will come from it, or some new immutable sense of self, or anything near his own philosophical musing, which instead all comes during the fall. It’s also unfortunately, or fortunately depending on perspective, proven that it’s not from just staying out beneath the moonlight either, despite how difficult it still then seems to make it for even a feral wolf to be caged again after.     

Well, it’s all good and fine to know what it is. Which, as he has told them and is true in every case thus far, is simply the acceptance of change. Though, perhaps if anything else is indeed possible, though it remains to be seen, then it may also be trust. The trust enough to willingly drop into the deep dark, to be caught in hand before hitting the ground, even when both were unseen. Sure, he can acknowledge it might not be so simple as that too. Extensively he has considered what keeps the others from acceptance, in all its different names for the same fear. What he himself may have taken for granted, is not the cost of coalescence, but the means of it; acceptance of change is still not irreducible itself when reached. The immutable part of each acceptance and change, and actually trust too, is the willing and necessary dissolution of control. There it is, good and fine.

He does not need to go over and concern himself with what he already knows. The minor details, like why exactly she’d clutch the ice through frostbitten fingers, does not negate what is necessary enough. And it is all the fracture, that he is sure of. The cause of her discordant identity, the throughline from there it takes to shape her every thought, to the culmination of each choice into one. Even the outcome of this was already explicitly stated and is unchanged by specifics. On the top side of the fracture, another nameless and blurry face in a crowd of strangers is no different to the other, each yesterday’s stranger. She is choosing the cage and it is not one used exclusively on the full moons. 

No, it is not a question that begs if their perspective can be reconciled. It is not really for her that he thinks about it at all. If it was, he’d feel particularly guilty for not sparing any thought towards her boyfriend, who’d sat right there beside her. Max has chosen no differently and, though absent from his earlier scornful thoughts, complicity does not discount consequence. Even his pity for them is irrelevant. No one can forcefully push them. Laura and Max have always been separate and above else, Ryan’s concern still lies for himself and his own. 

That’s where it comes to settle and remains. If Laura does pay the price for her humanity, Ryan worries for them all. It is not only her or Max who would be freed from this curse. She’d make her own choice for the lot of them. With the death of Silas removed from the equation, if it were as simple as willing it so, would Ryan still choose to free himself of this affliction? He thinks he knows the answer, when he still struggles to even think of it as a curse or affliction at all, even the void is his own doing. The idea of it is actually enough to frighten him in a way. And it’s here this gulf of understanding between them becomes more than a difference of choice. 

The Ryan of a summer ago was a different man to the wolf he is now. Although the difference in the fracture of the bite between them is like a glacier ruptured in half, he’d be misunderstood if he tried to describe coalescence through the fall. When he woke with a howl the next month over, a mallet was dropped on the fragile glass of his mind and both of halves were fractured further into immeasurable shards. Through the months he picked up the pieces, beginning from when the man of him first let his teeth snap through the air; to when the wolf of him heard the sound of his own name within its thoughts. To his coalescence, where the shards were all laid in a mosaic and the glass shattered to dust between them was melted down into viscous oils that seeped and blurred into one, glazed over its surface like the marbling of paint spread upon water. Where the oil dripped through the mosaic's jagged cracks to meld the pane back together, the red blood of the man and the red eyes of the wolf are now the same shade, one he thinks could almost look golden.

If the curse which created this coalescence within him were suddenly cut from him, Ryan fears it could be worse than a mallet to his new stained glass mind. Nothing was taken from him when he was bitten. It would be, if the venom were now purged from his veins. Two colours can make a new, but although each prior colour is fundamentally unchanged within it, they also become bound to each other by the very particles that make them. When change becomes creation, separation requires destruction, to old and new. Gold cannot be unmade and red cannot be torn from red. The mallet would not fall, it would have to strike repeatedly and with force against the chisel. Its blade stabbing into the sealed cracks, gilded red oil violently chipping and gouging away, each scrape a sickening and grating screech. The chisel can draw back once all the oil crystals are gone and still shard after shard must be taken from him, scrubbed of all colour or destroyed along with the rest of him. When Laura and whoever else gets back whatever meaningless crumb of humanity they're left with, how much of Ryan would even be left at all? 

Those are his own selfish concerns. He could bear the unknown and renewed shattering awaiting him, if it was necessary for the good of his pack. His pack, and that’s rather his point exactly. Sure, he could do the heroic thing, for this blood bond between them, he’d do anything to protect them. It’s brought both and still it’s not his responsibility he’d exclusively do it for, but from how deeply he really does care about them. Why ever would he, when it’d only be the very same to what would then suffer them too? Where the very bond is the only thing that could make him endorse it, what- would it just crumple apart too? He can barely fathom how that would feel, another and another part torn from him. Before this, coalescence has been the glue to mend them back together. This- this would instead turn it into a weapon placed in his hands and he’s already unwittingly used it against them. Is that how she sees it, that all this time he’s been maiming them?     

It’s this fact, that he could never explain otherwise to her, that disturbs him. He won’t beg for his life and the gulf will never be scaled. Ryan doesn’t believe in prayers and his hopes seem wasted effort, so it’s chance he’s left with. Those chances lie in Silas never being seen again, succumbing to the infectious mange that Laura so insists he has, or tripping over a root during the day and fucking- like- breaking his neck or something. Literally whatever else there is, anything other than putting stock in the cure itself, which will just circle him right back around to prayers for deaf ears. 

It’d be the first case of negative chance otherwise. What, when everything he has that is solely human now remains nothing more than memory. For all he is able to remember, even that exists only in the form of a raw animal. A mind which is not animal is no mind at all- and… the thought gives him sudden pause. Oh and how he hates the emotion that wells within him as the connection forms. The sense of sympathy, for it- for himself, he’s sure has never felt so rotten before. So rotted that the justifications he raises are unable to withstand it. He always was what he became, but well, the flayed animal within his chest was no more than metaphor, obviously. Yes, and it isn’t actually in his chest or separate from himself either. Then, in equal measure, no. Not if it was always just him, this something ‘off’ within him. Which indeed it is, there before his infection and here after his coalescence. If he knew that, from animal in animal, to animal in animal, it was both. An animal’s metaphor made in its own image. 

Yet… Well frankly, he doesn’t really understand what his own realisation here means. What, it’s his single point of hypocrisy? So what if it is, he can accept the nature of any mind is always fundamentally animal and still disavow the nature of this- of- of this- uh. Ryan blinks tired eyes and squints at the table. Whatever, he decides, it doesn’t matter. Never in his arguments internal or otherwise has he proclaimed behaviour is above reproach an- well, it isn’t really a behaviour, is it? It causes behaviours certainly, but much like all his musing on love, it’s more than what comes of it. But… this feels much less ineffable and kinda more like he’s just missing something. Seriously, for all that he’s pictured it and all the however many years he’s lived with it, how does he not know what it actually is? 

He can feel how much he’s derailed himself and he can’t stop it. As suddenly, he thinks it does matter, in fact it matters quite a lot. A suspicion creeps up on him that this piece, which he hadn’t even realised was missing and he’d assumed was entirely unrelated, might unexpectedly fill out some of the narrowing gap left in their knowledge on the curse. That, or he may have to concede he isn’t so different to Laura after all and great news, the choice is meaningless, it’s just full of hypocrisy either way. He could facetiously think that isn’t such a terrible option, but he can already feel how untrue it’d be if he did. Still, his genuine bafflement and frustration now is unable to stop it from eluding him. He sits there, trying to summon the word, asking himself twenty times over just what the fuck is wrong with him, until eventually the frustration fades. 

In its wake, Ryan finds himself disquieted instead, which is directly worse. All that pointless discussion and his own pointless thoughts, just for it to lead him to unlikely chances and a question he can’t even answer. Screw their courtesies, he didn't need this, what- what is he even meant to do with any of this? Very polite of them, to catch him sneaking in and drop a new heap of worries on him to harbour, before heading off for a good night's sleep in each other's arms. Seems fair, yeah, great, he’s really looking forward to his own. He’d laugh at the thought, but ironically, he’s too fucking tired for it. It actually bothers him enough that he abruptly pushes to his feet. He doesn’t want to think about it anymore. 

Ryan throws himself on the couch at long last and it creaks under his weight. A huff of breath leaves him on impact and before he can begin to fret over the loss of necessary air, he manages to draw in another. Broken from his consuming thoughts, he finally notices how his breath comes a little less tight, with the smoke on the summer wind tumbling down from above. Even now, in spite of his attempts to flee and how little they care for him at the moment, just the presence of his pack in the vicinity still soothes him somewhat. He ignores the inkling there, determined to shut out further stewing over this new unknown for the night before he twists it into incomprehensible knots in his mind.   

Instead, he lays a hand on his stomach and the freeze ruptures cracks along the arches of his fingerprints. He can’t catch sleep and he can’t outrun all his thoughts. He can indulge in the ability to sigh at least, with some reprieve from the suffocating pressure in his ribs, and he does. The fire died in the time taken for his musings and he doesn’t bother stoking it. He’s freezing from within all the same and there is one thing that could warm him now. Just thinking about it will only make him colder. Maybe there’s no shame in crying, but he doesn’t think the others would appreciate the harsh awakening from sobs of the cold empty dark. He squeezes his eyes shut to ward it off and prepares himself for the restless night remaining. 

The hour is late, the hall is grey, the rot seeps beneath the door and his mind shifts to wonder where in the woods Silas has run too. Silently he hopes that wherever it is, it’s somewhere far on the other side of the mountain. Dawn takes long to come.

Chapter Text

Where the bitter wind pushes mist over the water's surface and each small tide laps against the rocks, the world seems to enclose within the lake's jagged circumference. The tall trees lining its shore block sight of the woods beyond and the mountains are lost with westward laying at his back. In summer calm, within this small encased world, the still lake becomes a mirror. Where the shoreline trees melt inward and either side of their pointed tops pierce the bright blue sky. It’s winter now, the wind forceful and the sky shrouded. The mist slices through the bark of trees before any reflection can reach water and the low hanging clouds engulf the higher branches. With nothing to refract, today it is all just grey. 

It was the break of dawn again when Ryan headed out, before anyone else had woken. He didn’t put much thought into where he would go, though the little library and archive in North Kill was off the table. A precaution, mostly. It’s the daylight hours before the full moon rises and although furthering the pattern he feels more collected today than he ever has, he won’t push his luck. Alone, there is none of that short tempered irritation or rumbling growl in his chest. He won’t subject the librarian to the test of whether it’d remain so around strangers, better to leave that an experiment for another day. 

Instead, he walked out the lodge and his boots took him here. To the pier, aching at this sedentary post and trying to find some peace of mind, harboured away in this illusion. It’s the first day of the full moon since his coalescence. He didn’t have many expectations, frankly in his exhaustion he hadn’t really managed to muster any prior concern for it. Fortunately, he seems to remain steady atop that newfound plateau. There’s still a heightening, loud sounds louder, quiet sounds pronounced, the dragonfly darting past the dock easily tracked through the mist. It’s more as if he’s taken half a handful of nervous system stimulants, in a sharpened focusing of his naturally potent senses, rather than an overload that his body cannot effectively process. If that’s become so unexceptional he spares no thought of celebration, the total lack of that incessant itching and bone to pick with the world are a notable improvement, at least. 

His body has acclimated to itself through coalescence. His mind however, well he supposes it technically has too. Which is the problem. Oh there’s no short tempered irritation and he feels collected indeed; to that cracking reservoir of shameful viscera. All the guts and entrails are there, of his emotions raw, the animal flayed, memories hoarded, sentiments exposed, bloody chunkfilled soup that it is. He’s aware that he can’t exactly cherry pick, in coalescence the restoration and releasement is for everything. Just well, doesn’t mean he much appreciates that part of it, no definition needed to know that. And God, just waking up to the scent of honey was more than enough for him, he could drive far as Houston today and it’d still be merely playing it safe. The literal itch is gone, but there’s a pang and twitch in his fingers that remains, for his craving of just any small touch to honeyed skin. 

That which of course he can’t, so poor substitute that coming out here to the boathouse may be, it will have to make do. Albeit helplessly, Ryan has tried to get a handle on it, if not the memories then at least his emotions. He kind of has to, in not so many hours they’ll all be together on the island, there’s no fleeing he can do to escape from that. Okay, kind of has to and would that he could, but he’d turned ‘trying’ to past tense pretty quickly. When it was already the brown leather jacket that he’d tug tighter around him in the cold, still covered in dust where he’d snagged it from that abandoned house, there wasn’t much else to do other than give up. And so in failing that, even with his hands stuffed in the very pockets damning him, he’s elected to just refuse thinking about it entirely. A bandaid stuck on the dam wall holding that lake of guts, yeah that’s his best attempt. 

He pries it off to slap it right back on, slogging his thoughts in another direction, in the ceaseless dodge and evade of the flayed, off-animal, clawed creature thing. It’s already wearing on him in the short span of today. Though, he doesn’t know exactly how long he has been out here, just that it’s enough for the dim to have lightened and not enough for the day to have moved past early in any significant way. He’s only biding time anyhow, aware his retreat won’t last. A scoffed down breakfast can’t sustain him and his nerves will continue to wear away until the urge to flinch back from the water wins out. He’ll keep his eyes on the island for now, while he can. 

Not that he has much reason to. That’s the worst part of all. Tracing the outline of the island has done little for the pit in his stomach. At least the winter chill is easily tolerated, when the freeze comes from within regardless. He probably could have found somewhere better to stow himself away, though. The steel cap of his boot skims the lake surface on each wind-made swell and the water swollen wood of the dock groans along in time with it, from the movement of both. Where the reverberation carries up through the damp board that his hand rests on, his fingers curl tighter around it and not for the first time. His faith in the boat house’s sturdiness is slim. Which does make it somewhat of a kindred spirit today. 

Sat on its edge, the frigid wind passes right through his coat and whistles through its walls, while the ache of unmoving takes root in what they each have for pillars to hold upright. And the cold he now knows, that was already buried deep within them both. He sat here in summer too. Back then, Ryan never thought about the rot in either of them or considered how there was likely a corpse in the sediment. He does now. It’s better than thinking about the approaching night to be spent with a pack that hates him or the unknown definition he refuses to stew over until he has a clearer head. 

In the rum and tear stained journal, Ryan had read about that hiker bitten, shot and tossed in the lake. A later entry, one made not long before the pages turned inkless and empty. Jacob had also told them about the corpse in the lake, he recalls detachedly. With no fish to pick it apart, he wonders how long it will remain down there. His eyes flick down as if he’ll be able to catch sight of bloated flesh and tangled chains. Unsurprisingly, he’s unable to. It is there nonetheless and it makes sense now why Chris was so against them swimming this past summer. He’d kept on, carrying on and still, what a mess it became for him. What a mess Ryan himself is mussing it all up into now. 

He wishes Chris was there sitting beside him, then. Another reslapping of the bandaid, a quick and harsh chastise to himself, sloughing off the thought. It’s selfish, come of the flayed beast within, to miss the man he murdered. He’d be here now, if not for that. If he was though, if it could all be taken back and he could sit next to him one last time; the worst, most simple truth is that Ryan would have nothing to say. The cruel and selfish bastard he is, he wouldn’t even mention the bloated corpse floating through the sediment or anything of the curse at all. So hurt was he that Chris never confided the truth to him, and yet he’d make no mention of it either. If he did get that one last chance, he would only want to sit there, silently, looking out over the lake with maybe a drink or- or some soft tune playing and the cicadas buzzing- Fuck. The flashbang hits, his sight and hearing robbed from him, unaware he ever was lost in a blank stare until he finally does blink it away.  

He drags his eyes to the island at the center of this small world, swathed within the mist and decides then that any direction he slogs, his thoughts will merely lead to further viscera today. Right, back to no thoughts it is, nothing but the mist, oaken bark and grass in the shallow air barely reaching his lungs. Just the morning and minutes passing, a second at a time. God, is this winter cold.  

Ryan hears the footsteps long before any voice speaks. And he outwardly ignores it, in the hopes his unturned back speaks for him and he’s left well alone. The steps merely draw nearer and somehow the gruff tone is unexpected enough to still make him jolt. “Bit cold out, to be sitting here.”

Ryan twists to look up at Travis, standing a meter or so away. He almost has to contain another startle at the sight of him. It’s a shocking realisation, but this is the first time he’s ever seen Travis out of uniform. It’s strange to see him out of the dark blue shirt and pants, wearing these plain jeans and tanned coat instead. It makes him look like a normal man, not just contained within the title of police officer that Ryan has only yet known him as. In the short moment for that to sink in, Travis takes his silence for a lack of answer and continues on without seeming to need it. “Your friend told me where to find you.”

He can’t help how that catches his attention. “Which one?”

“One of ya’s, the uh,” His mouth and nose twitch as the name clearly slips him by, “The blonde one- not Laura, y’know the one. Her and that boy of yours, uh, Dylan, yeah?”

“He’s not-” The fire in his words is sodden beneath his weariness and he gives up before he’s started. Travis doesn’t even remember their names, so Ryan’s immediate assumption of antagonism feels like worthless defensiveness. “Emma and Dylan, yeah.”

It makes him feel something funny and confused to hear it was them who knew exactly where he’d be. It probably shouldn’t make him feel anything, it’s not exactly an inventive spot he’s found, if he really was trying to hide from them. It still does. However much she dislikes him currently, he’d still count on his beta to judge his whereabouts, regardless of whether that's from knowing him or due to her own similar instincts. Instead it was Emma and Dylan, who found him by proxy on assumedly the first try. He doesn’t know what he’d thought, what, that fleeing off meant he’d just disappear from memory too? Of course they still know him, unwillingly or otherwise. 

Though, from the sounds of it, they’re spending the day together and that does admittedly surprise him. On a day like today, everyone tends to scatter around the lodge, even more than normal. He’s glad to think his pack is looking out for each other, despite the guilt accompanying it, from how he’s run off when he should be doing the same. Then, he feels worse to realise only one half of the pair are actually even pack at all. His hand clenches around the board as his mind flickers back to the outline of a scar. 

“That’d be them.” Travis agrees with a nod, as if to commit the name to memory. Ryan can’t fathom how he’d forgotten, considering he harbours them on his land each month, but he isn’t about to ask.

“What did you want me for, then?” He opts for instead. He’s too exhausted to beat around the bush- if he’s about to be told the island was a one and done deal, he’d rather get the argument over with quickly and sooner rather than later.

Travis doesn’t answer him immediately. He takes a good few dragging seconds to just look at Ryan. Studying him, clearly. What he’s looking for, Ryan has no clue and at this point he has nothing to hide, so he doesn’t tense up or shy from it either. There’s nothing more than what's plainly on his face, in eye bags and in his posture’s weary slump. If Travis found whatever it is, he doesn’t show it, but he does say, “Wondering if you’d mind accompanying me.”

“Where?” Ryan asks, but he’s already straightening his stiff limbs. The man isn’t interested in Ryan’s sparkling company for no reason, that he’s sure of.

“In the woods out back behind home.” He’s told. “S’not far.”

What no one could ever call Travis, is ominous or lacking in elaborations, Ryan thinks to himself dryly. He tugs the sleeves of his coat down from the rumples caused by standing and doesn’t miss the glance given to the fabric. Thankfully for them both, there’s nothing to see. His clothes remain blood free this month, with not a single laceration torn along his seams. With as little acquiescence needed as that, Travis turns and heads back through the boat house. Ryan trails after him, scuffing his boot on the wood as he goes, trying to work out the actual reason why he was requested to tag along. With it both a new concern and fresh in mind, his only likely idea is also exactly what he hopes it isn’t. Nothing else really seems able to provide a reasonable explanation or be of equal importance to warrant this unusual request.   

In silence, they hop in the cruiser and pull through the grass field, instead of retracking past the lodge. The woods unfold out alongside the road and in turn his illusion of a small world contained within the lake’s shoreline is burst. With a wide curve around, a sharp right turn and ahead on the narrow backroad, it doesn’t take long before they come up behind the Manor. For the short drive that it was, his nerves have managed to fray into an agitated restlessness just as quickly and so he takes the chance to get himself moving when Travis pulls up short at the chain link fence. After hopping out to open the rattling gate, Ryan waves him on and follows on behind, with the dust kicked up by the tires coating into his jeans. 

While the backroad leading to the gate runs along north on the western side, the only distinction from road to driveway is that gate struck over it and that came long after the Manor was built for its entrance to face east over its lands. In essence, the back is the front of the Manor, backwards as that is. So, back to the front he goes. Along the side of the south wing, past boarded up windows and the shadow cast by the spire atop the tower ahead, dragging his boots through the crushed rock driveway. 

A fittingly bleak sight, he’d concluded of the Manor last month. That it is, neglected to disrepair and essentially abandoned, despite its remaining occupant. It still admittedly maintains that old buildings such as this were crafted with a beauty that endures through deterioration and especially for one so grand, it does even to the extent reached here. It’s not the architecture of the Manor he looks at now, however. The rusted fortification around it does not share the privilege of beauty or antiquity. In each twist of the steel, every loop of barbed wire, all the nailed wooden boards and in the warning signs declaring against trespassing, it is ugliness in service to desperation. The thought makes his skin crawl as if the steel held a current. His fingers buzz with the remnant sensation from his fleeting touch of it too and he helplessly tries wiping his hands on his jeans to scrub it off alongside the thought. He only adds the scratch and grind of grit caught beneath his knuckles to the feeling instead.

Ryan doesn’t want to think about it. An often made verdict for him these days, ever since the dam broke. If he lets himself linger on it for any small moment, his memories and emotions will attempt to consume him. Will consume him, he’s certain. It’s more exhausting that for each stream he blocks, his mind surges up another four. Ryan swears that out here, the deafening silence chasing him must have risen in volume, enough to induce this pressure he feels pushing out from deep within his skull. The woods surrounding here are filled with the same sounds at the lakeside, so it has to be the creak of old support columns, the rattle of the windows in their frames or the incessant clinking, clanking, clanging, ceaseless fucking sound of the chainlink fence.  

Shaking hands out at his sides as he goes, he rounds past the tower, to where the patrol car has parked. It’s right where Travis seems to always leave it, although now that they’re here, Ryan’s not sure why he’s bothered sticking to the habit today. If they’re headed out for the woods, they’ve merely placed themselves in the center of the perimeter and it’s rather purposefully intended to keep itself separated, with only two ways out. 

Actually, to that point, the vague location he gave of somewhere in the endless woods is narrowed down significantly when placed around the Manor; considering the stone root of the mountain to the north and the steep cliffs to the south. For a second he worries that maybe he was wrong and Travis has just lured him over to lock him up early, for his supposed own good. The second passes when Travis, standing at the taillight with a bag hooked over his shoulder, nods for him to follow away from the Manor. Back east and towards the lake they go, it seems. 

They head for the fence, over to the small iron gate Ryan has only used once before, on that very first month back. Through to the other side and instead of the straight trek to the river bridge, this time they turn a sharp right. They’re on a path he hadn’t noticed at all beneath the evening dim or the palpable fear back in September. It’s unused enough for grass to break up through the rocks, narrowly winding between the trees and so tightly that any sense of cardinal direction is lost. Ryan bats branches out of his way, forced into a pace that keeps him much closer behind. At least that slows them both somewhat, now that he alone is unable to stall their approach through the drag of his feet. 

He tries to mentally prepare himself for what he’s certain can only be awaiting him, but he doesn’t know how. He has no arguments or words scripted for what comes and the constant stream of words running through his head has become suddenly blank, in an eerie similarity to the fishbowl of September. His mind fills in the empty space with images of some nondescript pale child, his ankle crushed in the jaws of a bear trap or tangled in rope stringing him upside down in the air. Then, the broken dam to be blamed, the visual is accompanied by other senses plucked from his memory. Dried blood, dirt and mud, creaking rope, fearful whimpers, heavy breath. Ryan imagines it all and feels no more ready for the actuality of it. The pressure to build a wall of stoicism within himself in time, compresses in harder with each step forward. He’s unsure how long he’s got and he’s acutely aware that however much it is, it still won’t be anywhere near enough. 

There’s nothing to do but walk. The buzz remains in his fingers, the dust grates against his skin, the silence rings and the suffocation of his drowning returns anew, spited by his small reprieve last night. The path bends and twists around trees, until far too soon, he rounds a curve to find Travis missing. There before him, the final stretch of path thins to a scatter of rocks in the grass and the dense line of trees to the right breaks apart, into a clearing out to the side from this corner edge. With the short span still to go, the curved tree line and narrow patch of grass is all he can see of it. Any further in and where Travis has gone, will remain hidden until he follows. 

Incapable of drawing in a full breath, Ryan gives a dry swallow. He can’t hear any cries of pain or whatever noises a feral child does make. A terrible thought comes, where he almost hopes they find the kid dead. Jesus. At least, even if he is unsure whether it’s fortunate or not, that chance remains slim regardless. He considers then perhaps closing his eyes upon entrance instead and just as quickly casts the idea aside. He can, just, only, walk. The rock becomes grass beneath his boots and in the dreaded step out, a crescent in the dirt is gouged by the twist of his heel rounding him toward the right. 

His eyes flitter and blink. Amidst the rocks smattered sparsely in the corner, he stands at the base of a rounded arch carved into clearing, drawing his eyes past arrowline sides to its curved peak. In the grass cradled there first, sits alone a wooden memorial bench covered in pine needles and maple leaves. Then, rising with the roots threaded in the earth, up the column of notched bark, to the highest leaves fanned in a domed trim around the hollow of sky. Where above the branches are free of any creaking rope and below the wind carries along no pained cry, only the two of them and the jarring absence of the pale boy remains. Ryan’s gaze falls in return, aside the tattered leaf drifting in a spiral below, to skitter over the dew drops, tree stumps, overturned soil and tamped down dirt. Leaf and eye both catch against laces corded around leather and ankle.

Travis kneels at the foot of a grave. One among many. In crammed rows along the sides, lined three to each, with the exception of one; in the far left corner, the sole grave to be laid both downwards from and against the arch’s peak. There beside the bench, that grave has an old but polished headstone and that too is the only to be seen in the clearing. Wooden, hand carved crosses mark each of the others, names etched in jagged script. Ryan already knows the names. 

His eyes close and his chest expands. Here at last, the silence catches him and for a moment it swathes in on him. A dull ringing fills his ears, the pressure in his skull swelling. Then it erupts. Crow calls, violent wind, rustling leaves and in the center of it all, his own trembling exhale. In the dirt beneath his feet, the Hackett family lies interred. A short walk from the Manor, in the soil of their land, within the bounds of his territory. Here, brought and buried by Travis alone. It would have taken hours, long exhausting days. Ryan hadn’t known. There was no funeral for him to have missed and there are no flowers clutched in his hands now. He would have gone, he would have held some and he would have shovelled the dirt too, no matter how long it took. That was never his right. It is for him instead, to only feel the sticky tack on his hands, in the wake of what he has done.  

Ryan was led here after the months have passed, past the close of summer and on through fall. For the winter now, here when the dirt is hard and cold. He was not meant to bring flowers. They both know the petals would only crumble and rot at his touch. His fingers curl to loose and useless fists at his side. In the erupted silence, there exists no words for him to say and he no longer tries bracing himself for what comes. The words soon spat at him will be no more than what he deserves. When the sentence is merely truth spoken, even with the intention of a cruel and unusual punishment, merely subjecting himself to listen is still an escape of justice. 

His head bows beneath the crushing ache pressed atop his spine. Waiting, while the moment warps around him. A fissure has cracked up from the frozen pit in his stomach and at the center of his chest there he can feel the heavy force. It is a pull in each side of his ribcage, slowly splitting it apart and his shortness of breath worsens to the shallowest of draws, barely passing his throat. He can hear it, that quick sound and can feel it too, the lightheadedness it brings. The fissure just widens and the weight bears against it all the more harder.     

The sounds and scents become lost beneath the rising buzz. All there is for a minute and then another more is the pounding in his head. Ryan only opens his eyes when at last, Travis speaks. “Thought you’d want to know it’s here. I know- Well, I should’ve dunnit sooner, I know that.”

Where Travis stands before him, his jaw jutted to the side, dirt on his knee, the gruff sound slices through the ricocheting thrum in Ryan’s head. The awaited scathing tone wasn’t there. His voice does sound unmistakably different, filled with elision and intrusion between his words, in a way his usual stiff speech does not have. It’s an abrupt slip in his usual accent and Ryan vaguely recognises a similarity there, to what little he’d overheard of his father. He’s never spoken like this before. Ryan blinks, certain he actually did mishear through the reverberating static. He says nothing and waits on. 

“When Amelia died, Chris and the kids were here so often, what with camp and they- he wanted her close. He did. I think he’d still want to be now, so-” Travis trails off and after glancing over his shoulder, he lifts a hand to drag fingers beneath a dry sniff of his nose. “Our uh, grandparents and all them are in the cemetery there, so I s’pose I could’ve- maybe I should’ve- Ah. I’d just thought that Ma, she’d want the same, maybe. Then where else would the boys go? I know it’s not- Mh. I know. Even then I should’ve.”

Where the rest of him feels cemented still, Ryan’s eyes jitter in their sockets, over the unreadable face twisting this way and that in front of him. He’s not understanding what he’s hearing. The words he gets, somewhat. He knows what each individual word means at least, for all he’s lost to where any next lead. How it’s said though, it sounds almost trepid or-or shameful, that which it can’t be. The tone of his own thoughts echoing, perhaps. Wait no, if the ink has run dry and no thought forms to words, it can’t be. That isn’t right either, he thinks, in the very proof of it. His mind has begun to stutter. It’s the pressure on his chest, the static in his head, the shallow breaths clogging his throat, the ringing deep in his ears or it’s just the whole lot together. 

“Well, no changing that, y’here now. Mh. Right, then, uh,” Travis clears his throat and runs his tongue behind pursed lips. A look off to the side, stiff jaw, exhale to the dirt. Finally he throws his hands out sidewards from his shoulders. “Damnit kid, will you say anything? I’ve explained it to you, so?”

Through the tangible whirl of pins and needles within his brain, he tries to think. It takes one form. When he tries to speak it, his tongue feels leaden and numb. All his bones and flesh and sinew does, it seems. Mind and body, grounded and distant all at once. Rasped from throat to teeth, loud and whispered, Ryan tells him, “I’m sorry.”

“Well not that.” Travis heaves out on a thick exhale. 

“I know, I know, but I-I,” Comprised of such little air, the words come out half formed and lurching. He barely recognises it for his own voice, even with it strangling him to just get it out. “I am. I didn’t want to- but I- I did- I-”

“Can’t you just breathe, Jesus Mary and-” He doesn’t exactly snap it, almost striking it out in a genuine question, before trailing off in low grumbles. Ryan might shake his head in answer, but he isn’t sure. And when the hand raises, he doesn’t flinch. His vision is blotted in the corners, he barely even sees it coming before it’s already there. It hits his arm in a firm grip. “Fuckin’... sit down.”

His boots knock through the grass and dirt in staggered steps, as he’s led through the clearing. Down the center line, between feet in the earth, past grave, and grave, and grave. Ryan blinks and the memorial bench is beneath him, hands gripped against it, wood digging into the backs of his knees. With his head drooped forward, when he blinks and widens his eyes, it’s to a blur of green. He feels about to tilt forward and fall right into it, when an elbow knocks his shoulder back. A black splotch and weight is hefted down beside him. Spine against the bench, grip torn from its seat, something cold is pushed into Ryan’s palm. Where his vision keeps it fuzzy and out of focus, it’s the smell that places it.

“Terrible idea… Tch, seems you need it. Drink.” He’s told, with a knock of a knuckle against the glass.

The bottle is somehow trembling and it scrapes against a tooth when Ryan brings it to his lips. His rapid and shallow breath is sealed beneath the upwards tilt and swig. The rum that spills down his throat doesn’t make it much further than that, pouring right back up to pool over his tongue and he presses the back of his hand to his mouth, choking, spluttering and coughing. The reflex against it, has him drawing a deep breath through his nose and fills his lungs with the necessary air at last. It’s the fire left engulfed in his throat however, that razes through the static and alights the narrowing darkness. He keeps breathing, steady and chest deep, to feel its sting. The rum between his teeth burns whitehot and clear, a torchlight to his focus, drawing his mind out beyond the nettles stuffed in his skull. When the lightheadedness, blurred vision and numbness fades, he swallows the remnant dregs, wipes the overspilled rest from his chin and then takes one full swig. Ryan extends his arm across the bench and hands it back to Travis, who gulps some himself before clutching the bottleneck in both hands, resting forearms on knees.

They sit there unspeaking for some time. He picked up enough to know his apologies are unwanted. They just look out over the clearing and at least now Ryan can bring himself to truly see it, or rather, the graves lining it. There’s dog tags hanging over the beam below a baseball cap hooked atop one cross. Across from it, there’s dice scattered at the base of another and the next beside it small animal statues. The cross staked into the earth for Chris has only some loose flowers, weeds really, laid beneath. He’s the last of the row, nearest to Ryan and more importantly, nearest to where that first grave was dug separate from the rest. Through the years, the grass has grown over her and some of the wildflowers still bloom through winter now. He may not lay beside her, but if he reached out through the soil, Chris would be able to grasp a hand around her ankle. A lump comes to Ryan’s throat. With the memory of his own palm molded to shin and the vestiges that will be left when the worms consume him too, he understands. It’s no good thing. He understands Chris better in death than he ever did in life, so what does that really say about him? Yeah, no good thing.

The silence remains deafening and the liquor’s warmth did not reach the frozen cavern in his gut. In his wait, Ryan keeps his mind solely on breathing steady, once the burn in his mouth fades. He still feels when Travis eventually turns his eyes towards him again and then a few moments later, hears the clink, lift and glug of rum. Holding it out in front of him between his knees, Travis pins his sight on the bottle’s tilt back and forth, as he says, “Didn’t bring this for you, y’know? Or me. Chris always loved his rum, all the way back to when we’d steal it out the cabinet.”

Ryan swallows around the lump in his throat before he speaks. The waver to the first word lodged out past it, is at least his own, compared to the unrecognisable choked and breathless sounds he’d tried to punch out before. “I’m sorr-”

“Gh, stop with that. I’m not hearin’ it.” Travis cuts him off brusquely, with a guttural scoff to begin and a sidewards wave of the bottle to end. “I can’t forgive you.”

That, Ryan expected. The worthless apologies sit on his tongue all the same, but he bites them down. There’s nothing else to fill it with and no time to think of what else there could even be left to say, with Travis forging right on. Ryan wearily turns his head to look at him, prepared to finally end the dragging wait and take the brunt of what follows. 

“Now, that don’t- M’not sayin’ this right.” He makes a grunt of frustration and smacks his lips with a shaking head. Then in a sharp wrench of his chin to his shoulder, his eyes snap to Ryan’s, locking him in an unyielding stare. “I don’t forgive you, ‘cause there’s no place for it- or- or need, or whatnot. Erh, maybe there was and I’ve already dunnit. That night, cleanin’ the room, few minutes ago, doesn’t matter. Thing is, I have. S’cut it out.”

Where he cannot strike the mot juste, even through the fumble for words and the choppy elision of his accent made near slurred by this faster pace, the tone is unequivocally clear. Firm, almost harshly so, hardlined, blunt; a voice that brooks no argument. In all Ryan’s life, he has never heard forgiveness given in the form of a command. It is forgiveness, or as he said, the lack of it where none stands needed. His head cleared of static and Ryan still does not understand. 

“I- I killed him.” Ryan pleads his own guilt. It’s the first time he’s ever brought himself to say it aloud. It escapes out in a plume of black smog, the dust clogged gas of a coalmine, trapped within him for months. It may be a confession, but it rasps like a warning. 

“Y’think I don’t know that? Think I’d forgotten?” Travis scoffs with enough derision it’s almost his usual manner. It doesn’t last, left in the shade of a sigh. “Sayin’ it like it’s as easy as that. Yeah, bitter maybe, but I’ve never been blind. You don’t own the fault, can’t see that plainer than spit. Yeah and I’m looking at you now, ain’t I?”

He is, face turned and stare boring in. The slight jostles and juts of his head from conviction through his speaking did nothing to dislodge it. There is no intimidation to it and nothing searching anymore either. Merely an unwavering. The stare’s hold comes from below and above, aslant and across a meter of sodden wood, him hunched and himself ramrod. Forearms pressed to knees, neck wrought skewed, eyes strained to lid corners; spine flat to backrail, jaw parallel clavicle, eyes downcast to center iris. He looks on and Ryan looks away. The relief felt when the matched stare drops to the rum bottle in turn, finds it a small stone stepped to become bile. 

“And it was for nothing.” Ryan pushes on, his stained hands clenching in those useless fists and the scratch of the lump wedged in his throat sharpening. “I did it. I didn’t have to shoot and I did, I- I murdered him and-”

“Are you trying to piss me off?” Travis cuts through in a forceful shove of breath. Then a short, huffed laugh and smacked click behind his teeth, before he answers his own question left hanging. “Right. Yeah, y’are.”

If only. Ryan just has no idea from where or for why this sudden recantation comes, nor so little spine to unjustly seize it. Actually, Ryan knows the best thing to do right now would be standing up and leaving. This is the worst day possible for Travis to have brought him here, to try and have this conversation, when the creature is so near to the surface; and he does not mean the wolf of tonight. Instead exactly for it so near his skin, it only makes him want to hear the creature condemned that much more, so that it may even hear the scorn itself. Travis isn’t giving it- yet. A small push needed. The man is bitter, blind and clearly, forgetful too. This baffling and inane exoneration is beyond uncharacteristic, it’s a direct contradiction to what he’s said before. 

The very words Ryan now recounts, a push to remind him what he truly feels outside this fit. “You gave me his journal. So I’d know what he went through, that he wasn’t a monster, that he didn’t- that I shouldn’t have- have killed him for this. You said it, you know it’s true.” 

“Mh. Yeah. Can’t say I didn’t try warning you, right from the start I was. Waste though, with how quickly y’threw that aside- tch, no. I was too late already, wasn’t I? Yeah. You changed first that night, so I knew too, I just… I still just thought you’d be like him, I mean you’re quiet and… good; that’s what he’d called you. It was Caleb he saw, seems.” Travis waves a hand as if this supposed warning he gave to Ryan hadn’t broken bones beneath the added weight to his guilt. “Won’t pretend to know what it’s like, but I’d hear abouit from both’ve them, and uh, well. They stopped seeing it the same, after a time, you know that. Pft, and there I was, warnin’ you that he was scared just the same as you. And he was scared of it, mh. But you… you never had that fear, did you? Ah, so.” 

It was more than a warning, the bruises painted on Ryan’s temples for the next half month could’ve attested to that. Taking him at his word however, would admittedly connect a strand of sense through their otherwise disorienting interactions. It started with the journal that he’s told now was a warning given under the assumption he would be fighting against the monster, same to how Chris himself had. Then, through their conversation in the kitchen, to the implicit threats into the basement, to the tender admission disguised in a warning, it does lead through. An assumption, the spark of recognition, the realisation of misjudgement, the terminal rally attempt to halt recurrence, then weary resignation and reconciliation of it. He knew of coalescence from the beginning, even if not by name, he knew. That only makes this worse, if his forgiveness is somehow sincere. Paint the lens in any colour of intention over all they’ve spoken and there persists impervious, the vivid red dripping from Ryan’s every finger.    

“So?” Ryan croaks the word and shakes his head, lips twisting, eyes blurring again, stinging now. Though he keeps himself breathing, he uses the air to grit, “So it is my fault. He’d be fine- alive, he’d be alive if it wasn’t for me and I don’t need you to tell me it isn’t, because I know and- and you can’t- can’t a-”

“God, fuckin’ listen, would you?” He snaps. It’s a loud sound through the clearing’s hush and startles Ryan to silence in a crack of his teeth. Through shocked blinks he looks back as Travis blazes on and watches the tense shrug, shakes and nods of his head, to even his humourless laughter, all paced aside the twists of downturned lips. “Alright, you really want the truth of it? Fine. Yeah, yeah you pulled the trigger. Mh. Wasn’t your gun. Not bullet, not house, not your cross, not that one. God, not none of it.”

“You hear me? We dug our grave and well… Well, I’ll lay it in some day too. Don’t keep tryin’ to bury yourself in dirt you didn’t shovel.” His bitter hum is tailed by an audible slug of rum and then the bottles slosh as his flicked hand gestures toward the graves. “Each one of them, and me and that bat from the circus, yeah, that’s ours. This was a long time comin’ and we all knew it.”

“Yet only I pulled the trigger!” Ryan heaves another rasp of smog. “That’s it. Nothing else matters, nothing before, nothing that led me to that room, only what I did! You’re- I don’t- you can’t assuage my guilt of th-”  

“Oh, fuck your guilt!” His back straightens aside their rise in volume and the slosh becomes a spill of liquor with the force of his jabs; first toward himself, then back to the grass still growing through. “I don’t want it. Not then, not now. He’s dead. He doesn’t fuckin’ need it. So who’s it for? You, yeah? Y’know what, screw you, sayin’ nothing else matters before; he did! He mattered! Whole time I’ve been tellin’ you, he’s a man who deserves mourning and that’s what you’d reduce him to? A stain? Won’t leave even a memory of him left when I go. No, if it’s nothing before you pullin’ the trigger, then that’s not none at all. Tch.”  

“Now, more than any, that he don’t deserve.” Travis twists his scowl to the side and spits in the dirt. Through a scoff of anger, he stands. He drops the bottle in his clenched fist to Ryan’s fumbling hands before he makes to walk off. It’s the cold sneer that’s familiar at last, when he says, “Well, I apologise. God, s’pose I misunderstood, I’d just thought- well. I mean, you were the only one else who might’ve remembered him for more than that, y’know? That was my mistake. Keep the fuckin’ bottle, won’t bother you how memory tastes like shit.”

The footfalls of leather on dirt begin its trail away and on the fourth dull beat the words sink in. Ryan’s hand clinches around the glass and his deep drawn inhale comes barbed. The apology cuts sharper than any insult or expletive ever could. There’s an anger looming within him averse to the stinging implication, like the rush of blood cells to inflame a wound. He wants to hiss at the retreating form, how could he even suggest such a thing? 

As if Ryan has forgotten him so simply or his concern only lies in how he himself was affected, when either is impossible. To- to lecture him about how Chris mattered, when he knows, of course he- obviously he hadn’t meant it like that. Chris meant more to him than he knew and Ryan looked up to him so much it took a literal sense. Through the years and back to the beginning, he could remember all of it. And still, Ryan will have to remember him longer than he knew him; how long and how short that makes the time seem. Those seconds to minutes passed in over a decade, the years of memory an exact dozen, since he was only seven years old. Amid days left hazy in the July he first came to camp, Ryan had found a second home and a place that was almost family to him, when Chris had proven himself an unwaveringly safe and silent presence there for him through his Da- He cuts the thought off. The anger in his slash to silence echoes through the abrupt blankness he’s torn frayed within. And it’s in that, at last, he understands.

Where it was the carve of vacuous silence then, it’s the razor edge of his own anger and the shredded threads of his thoughts, which are the thunder to striking clarity now. In the light after the sudden crack, thoughtlessness sparks to methodical overanalysis, alit by the flash of foreboding. The guilt had risen and risen and in his resistance to the subvenient absolution, Ryan nearly missed entirely the besought recourse. This whole time it was threaded through and supervened upon Travis’ ascription of blame, the link by which the bid’s very dependence on the necessary change then brought its shift. Exoneration for exhortation. It’s truly not from the goodness of his heart or some meaningless appeasement. If it were, he’d be off to give the same stilted speech to Kaitlyn, who shot his nephew and then to Laura, who killed an entire half of his family. No, it’s only Ryan he’s brought here, for only is it in his capability. Travis wants Chris to be mourned; he wants his family to be remembered. He has never asked nor stated it directly and it is only for the resentment looming to eclipse guilt that Ryan can hear the unspoken at all. It is in one sole word flickering amidst the rest. Mourning. 

The thoughts pour in torrential, gathering storms within his skull, whipping through on breakneck winds. His fingers twitch; he ignores it. No, the logic follows through. The passivity of the stative condition is not equivalent to the correlated enactment of its dynamic action: Grief is not mourning and the capacity to remember is not remembering. What is then harder to admit, is the ensuring progression, in that a mere realisation of the distinction is not the rectification of it. His fists clench, the precision of the formulation and rationality to his thoughts stifle beneath their own conclusion. Spluttering, falling through, and- fuck. 

God, it’s- It really is true. Ryan has been sick with his guilt and grief for Chris, anyone could see that. He’s clutched hands to porcelain, spat vomit through teeth, reviled his own smudged reflection. For all the emotion has spilt out of him however, that is indeed all it was. Grief viscous, overflown and empty. Travis is only just late to being right. Ryan had thought he was protecting the memories from the beast’s claws. He was merely sheltering it all within the cave, hoarded in its grasp already.    

Therein this cold chill of winter, while the ice sheet thickened and spread inward on crawling spires, the frost wedging in the cracks finally ruptured the rock apart. The cave collapsed around hanging stalactites and all those hoarded memories have billowed up through crumbled fissures. The restricted few moments, those scathing flares allotted for his guilt, diffused to wisps in the roiling murk of all other. Where once he could, Ryan can not catch smog and ash in his hands, for all it can still smother and seize him. He never did choose to reach past and tear them free. Inevitable, perhaps. Immanent, presumably. At last he has been forced to face it. He remembers everything.  

The cascade of memories have come visceral, preserved and pervasive. In the voices, smiles, words, dread, touch and illuminance; in all of it that still remains. It brings a physical ache to his chest, serrated etches on his collarbones, a tremor in his lungs. When those moments and faces in his memory do come blurred, it’s worse yet. There at his fingertips, helplessly smearing at the blur, already beyond hope of restoration. He feels vivisected then, pieces of him hacked at, left disfigured, dismembered. There’s no more sophisticated explanation for it. It’s just simply hurt. Where he stood in the minefield of that abandoned home, Ryan’s boots had sludged through to the belated discovery, there is no release in remembrance.

He should have known. Ryan had barely thought of Chris even while retching on the grief of him. But it was right there already, in that guilt of his all along. He could always feel the cold metal of the shotgun trigger under his curled knuckle and see the swooping beam of the mounted flashlight reflecting off white eyes. To the taste, smell and sound of it, the moment of his guilt was fused to his memory from the beginning. It raked claw marks through all his senses and carved itself an extant form of life within him. Where it still lives in just the slightest crook of his finger, decay could never have truly threatened to claim it. Ryan not only knew that, he used it, taking the blood it left stained on his hands to wipe away every thought and memory elsewise of the men he’s killed.

He had willfully let guilt blind him, for so long as he was able. Where it then lost the capability, only now returned, he finds the knife for cut off thought isn’t wielded guilt. It’s his gnashing teeth, nearly snapping his own fingers off every time he’d tried reaching past it, all fear fed hostility. There was always more than a stain and he does remember everything. That is the very issue in itself. As admitted in his thoughts last night, the vivid imaginings and excessive layering of metaphors were merely his means to comprehend it and the palliative effort to detach himself of it. There is no flayed creature to rip the memories from or to then blame for their scars. It was always made in his own image. In his own hands, blood streaking his palms and flesh inlaying his claws, there the only vice grip is held in his each clenched fist. 

The ouroboros of it, encircling perpetual and intertwined destruction, is all the ‘off’ essence within him. Of course it is, it always is, it always was. Ryan flicks his eyes down to the stiff pry of his splaying fingers, where it looks like nothing and feels like everything. He thought he knew the distinction between blood and carrion, guilt and grief, love and hurt, memory and emotion. It does all still remain, while muddied it may be; in his stiff and cold, but dry and moreover plain hands, it all just feels the same. For this he still has no definition he can summon. When he has enough understanding to discern the snake devouring its own tail, how can he also clearly miss so much, as to be incapable of identifying the creature itself? 

“The guilt…” The words are an echoed outpour, drained from the battering pelt of revelation. Spoken low, where the sound rattles through the hushed clearing and he can barely hear himself, drowned in its wellspring. Ryan is looking at his hands but in the storm's eye, there are too many men he sees for him to regard in, “It’s all that’s left of him. Stains and scraps and grief and- and I remember everything, I do. I can’t reduce it, it- it’s everything and I still have all of it, it’s- for fucksake. He is gone. There’s nothing else left.” 

Halfway across the clearing, the footfalls stop. He wasn’t speaking to Travis, he doesn’t think- though he must’ve been, to have spoken aloud at all. He can hear the man suck his teeth and the ripping of grass beneath the twist of his heel. When a moment of silent thought passes, he speaks in a similarly lowered voice. “Yeah, kid. That’s death.”   

“No, you don’t unders- they’re not- I- I don’t let them die. I know they are but I can’t, I never do, it’s- it is on my hands, okay? And it’s beneath my nails and in my chest and it always will be and it’s everything, everything always is.” The sting of his own words is in his eyes and throat, the shame and bite of his own self. He wants to explain, but his tongue tangles and it comes out shaky. And it’s so frustrating, and he feels like a child again, struggling to form words that exist within so precisely but crumble apart between his teeth. He grits on and as he does, Ryan gestures down at the graves and then vaguely towards the lodge past the woods and then back to the graves. “They are more than stains and he’s in my bones and I never let anyone go until- even after this, and it’s always this.” 

“Okay.” There’s a beat. Travis sighs. A footstep, closer, another. “Alright. Good.” 

Ryan looks up through blurring vision, confused. There was nothing good about what he confessed. He just told Travis that he can’t do what he was indirectly asking. He’d expect him to scoff and keep walking. Instead, now only a few meters away, he stands there, bag hooked over shoulder and eyes squinted in a considering appraisal. Travis nods to himself and his voice has risen to a tone more firm and certain than it has been all morning.    

“Yeah, you heard me. Good.” He shrugs, spreading his arms out to his sides, head shaking. “I ain’t being cruel to you. That is a good thing. What, you want to be some ass who tosses everyone away and forgets?”

Ryan shakes his head, certain he’s being misunderstood. “That’s- I’m saying letting go, not tos- I mean, that’s what mourning is! And I’m telling you, I can’t-”

“It ain’t.” Travis pins his stare, brows furrowed and deliverance authoritative. The sudden combination of his backwoods dialect and imperious tone he uses for the register of his station, chords extremely poorly. That stiff and proper way he clearly learned and usually speaks does make sense then. This sounds much more fallible, vulnerable; truer conviction, than judicial imperative. “Now I don’t know who taught you that, yeah? But it ain’t true and if it’s more than guilt you’re carrying, which- mh. That it is, right?”  

“I- I bring them with me everywhere.”

“Then stop trying to put them down.” 

Ryan’s jaw clicks shut, his arguments wavering. In shock maybe, that Travis could say it in that pointed and flatly obvious tone, as if it’s so simple. Truthfully it’s the sudden self contemplation, a consideration that feels selfish to spare. He never fully has before, the notion so contrary to what he otherwise understands. No one taught him any of this, not really, certainly not plainly. Still, in his childhood, he learned that love means feeling its grief before loss strikes and growing up meant letting go, over and unceasingly over. That both, in the end, mean the same thing. Love becomes grief, love becomes loved. Well, learned, yet never practiced. To love is to mourn, to mourn is to let go, to let go is to forget. Ryan has always been incapable of tugging free his piercing grasp; for boy, man or wolf, it was never in his nature to have protractile claws. When for all he is unable; to let go, to mourn, to forget; then what is left? The snake coils tighter, the flayed animal growls and the indefinability of it grates at him.

Travis is seemingly willing to grant him the moment to dwell on it, at least. He wanders back over, retakes his place on the bench. It’s his glance to the bottle clutched in Ryan’s hands that does it, more than anything else. Ryan doesn’t even really like the guy and he’d be foolish to believe any of this comes from any feeling less than mutual. Unfortunately, it is exactly just that, which makes the underlying sentiment even heavier. 

Bloodhound that he is, Dylan has testified to his shame and exhaustion. He must reek a dead ringer to Ryan, in that case. None of this is empty words, the man knows what he’s talking about, and he means it. He’s told Ryan rather plainly to stop claiming the guilt for his own, while sanctioning away his clinging otherwise. It might just be for Travis that shared guilt is half guilt or Ryan’s own selfish animal leaping on it, but, well. There is truth in it, bitter taste it takes to admit that besides. He pulled the trigger and he’ll never lose the feeling of guilt for that. However, if grief is not mourning, then perhaps guilt is not incrimination and penance is not culpability. He accused Jacob of stolen valour, well aware he was being a hypocrite while doing it and hadn’t even cared, certain it was indeed his very own valour that was thieved.    

If Ryan could come to accept it, that he was forced to do what he did and it in fact does not lie entirely in the flexion of his finger, he’d be faced with teeth instead. He’d let it run amok, wild and free. He doesn’t want to know what it says about him, that for the pain he’s wary and well aware it’ll bring, it backwardly makes the notion less tolerable enough to actually swallow.              

Travis would absolve him and albeit conflictedly, Ryan thinks he could admit it wasn’t his fault. But- “But do you think he would forgive me?” 

“I know he would. He uh, he was a good man, my little brother.” Travis clears his throat and wipes a hand over his face. After a moment, long past when Ryan thinks he’s said all he will, Travis gives a vague, hesitating hum of a sound. 

Eventually he sighs and just says it. “Might be this is selfish of him, selfish of me for saying it for him, but… that wasn’t Chris. I know for you and Caleb and some of you other kids, it’s different. It wasn’t like that for him- it wasn’t him and was never goin’t be. Mh, he wouldn’t want you to even think what you shot was him at all. And he- he cared about family. So, I know I’m not who you’d pick, but you did save a life too, y’know? He’d hate to know he’d- well he wouldn’t have- I mean, it ain’t much comfort to you, but he’d have appreciated how it did pan out. Well, compared to how it could’ve. And I know you gotta live with that, so I know it’s- Ah. If you wanted to know, that’s how he would’ve seen it.” 

Ryan nods at his hands. He believes him, he does. It might make it easier. He isn’t sure. Mostly it just hurts. The claws scrape through his throat and his voice comes out tight as he says exactly that. “Even if I- if I admit it’s not my guilt or- or fault for doing it, even by the time it’s not mea- it just- it still just hurts.” 

“Mh. ‘Magine it always will.” Travis tells him bluntly, thickly, a stated, heavy fact. Ryan appreciates that. It’s true, so he’s managed to convey that much, at least.

He squeezes stinging eyes shut. Takes a swig of the bottle. Tries to step past the guilt he hadn’t sunk his claws into, never his to hold. Past to where the jaw does lay open, his heaved shaky breath and rattling chest an echo of what faces him. He opens his eyes to the sight of dice scattered under a cross and when the memory comes, he doesn’t try to shove it away. He lets it fill him, the sound of plastic rattling over wood, the sharp tug of grief through his chest and the inexplicable pain of pressing on tender fondness. 

“I mean I’ve always loved reading, in books or- doesn’t really matter. I’m just saying I did before I met him, but the uh, the way Caleb told stories? You know it was like… it was living and evolving between each word, it just… Well he’d said the dice meant anything could happen and even bad rolls make good stories, uh, that it was just what you made of it. Yeah, he still- I mean he had his lucky ones.” Ryan finds them immediately, amongst all the other dice from wood hand carved, smelted metal, sparkling gold or cheap red, most of which are six-sided. The colourful cubes scattered over his grave look like the pebbles on a riverbed, through his watery eyes and the sunlight streaming through the trees.    

“Mh.” Is all the noise Travis makes. It sounds strained. 

The words pour then, in a way he didn’t know they could. “His first D&D game was just me, him and Kaylee; we played it with only D6’s which uh, really didn’t work and I- after that we kinda just drew the stuff he described. I was too quiet for it, he- he didn’t mind though. He loved it anyway, he’d even switched game systems just so he could keep playing alone. He uh- he just liked having an audience I guess. Just always filled with heroes, and knights, magic and you know his hands flying everywhere. And yeah he might’ve said anything could happen, but uh, he had that soft spot too. So the monsters and- always the dragon, spared every time, any way he’d try to spin it. I mean he’d somehow cheat playing alone, to- just to make it end with wings in the sky, so...”

His low, dull laughter scrapes raw. In his own words, Ryan sees it, feels it in his every sense, so clearly. The dice scavenged from various board games, the coloured pencils in his hand, the story conceived through its telling, the blanket tugged over them and the fizzling pop of spilled soda. Character names, battles, monsters and landscapes, stories Ryan finds he could still recite or transcribe here and now. The first is also the clearest, low storm over ocean, spiralling lich tower, dragon on its roof, sirens song from down where the waves crash against the rocky shore. He hears her voice as he stutters on. 

“Me and Kaylee would sit there listening and drawing- and Kaylee- well uh, we were always out of blue. Yeah. She told me she’d only been to the beach once. Just once. Uhm. That she always wanted to go back, anywhere really, along the coast or some island that’s just… all beach. I- I’d known, her drawings were- or- or even just every time we swam when we were kids, she’d be a mermaid. Always the same tail. Teal, pearls on it and these extra fins, um. And she swore she’d remember it, no matter how long it took her to finally see the real thing. God, I- even I still do. Yeah, um. She never forgot and uh, I guess it was a joke, but even this summer she still…”

The memory ripples to her body in the pool, a red cloud around her, the beach so far away. The one time she had seen it was with her mom. All those years ago, before her paintings became full moons and splattered red paint, when they were both still alive. Their family didn’t talk about Amelia by name very often, but in every small and longing mention, her presence echoed so far even Ryan could hear it. He never met her and still he knew so much about her. She had a smile that crinkled her cheeks, made the best hot chocolates in the world and gave the warmest hugs. And she had blue eyes, like ocean waves. So far from the beach, but he thinks now, maybe a shoreline wasn’t what Kaylee truly wanted to see again. His eyes prickle in the flick of his gaze and then burn at the sight of still blooming, soon to be wilting, wildflowers. 

Ryan inhales nettles and squeezes a fist around the bottle neck. There’s a warning siren splitting through his skull and beneath it, a wailing howl. Another breath, steadying, another. He blinks and the cut off memory of before melds its tattered ribbons together and unfolds. Vibrant green of the grass, yellow clouds of dusk through the treetops, cicadas buzzing in discordant choruses, summer's warm breeze, cloying scent of endless pine, wooden boards against the bony bump of his ankle and a rum bottle just like this, sat on the side table beside Chris. 

“Wh- uh when I was a camper, we’d sit out on the lodge’s porch. At night, mh- most nights. After lights out, I could- I was never able to sleep.” Ryan wavers through, choked and tears now truly dripping. “He’d sit on that creaky old chair, holding his guitar. I’d have my cup of orange juice and he’d drink this exact kind of dark rum, in one of those stupid mugs we’d get him for his birthday. And he’d always say, we need it to oil the chords, pft. S’stupid joke, he’d strum the same old song but he- we never sang. We’d just sit there as it got dark out. Just… silent. Listening to him play and the cicadas turning to crickets and watching the lantern on the bottle’s glass. And…”

His throat closes and he has to stop, gasping in a breath. He coughs around the rising sob, blinking and shaking his head, rasping out the end, “The very first night I’d wandered out, he told me I could sit as long as I needed. And he meant it. He was always there. With his rum and guitar and the same song. Every night. And I- I really did need that.”

He can’t continue at all as he begins to cry in earnest. Fingers splayed over his brows, shoulders shaking, tears falling silently; like those summer nights, like he’d sometimes cried then too. And the cracked dam pours, his early memories of Chris and camp unable to be separated from the why of it, for the reason Ryan had found himself there at seven years old. Those silent summer nights he’d hear the tires screech, this silent winter day he sees his face again. Dark brown eyes, trimmed beard, thick expressive brows, well earned smile lines and that vivisecting blur at the edges. The familiar brown leather jacket and the still clear hearty, deep laughter. The muffled, indistinct voice, the whistled tune, the keyring spun around knuckle. To silence, of him and his breath then, to him and his own breath now.

After years of running, in the act of mourning for which it’s necessary, he finally comes to a skidding halt. It catches Ryan in the woodland clearing, where sunlight streams down through the trees and copper leaves coil in the wind. He never could contain it. This he knew would come, today so near beneath the surface, but always unable to be truly stuffed down inside. This is the clawing he cannot endure, the raking, painful, choking grasp of it. He cannot see the bloody hands, flesh beneath claw, sunk in and dragged through skin; his imaginings and metaphors scorched beneath just the raw burn of emotion. His fingers drop to clutch that damning brown leather jacket until the zip digs into his palm and his fist tightens until the glass gives a faint creak. His eyes squeeze shut, his head bows, knuckles press against teeth and the dusty, stale leather soaks with tears. He shudders and heaves and cries, in barely a sound. 

And then… and then he does endure it. As the pain eats him alive, slowly the clenching jaw snaps through shallower skin and the claws curl back out through their punctures between ribs. And despite tendrils of meat hanging off its jaw, the flayed creature does draw off from his chest and slowly, slowly, the sharp pain ebbs. His breath evens, the tears stop falling, his shaking bones steady. In its wake, a deep ache is left in a familiar place and still in its unrecognisable form. A mere endurable ache. Ryan opens his eyes, blinks. In that, the physical signs of it clearly do exist too, left behind in surely bloodshot eyes and his incessant sniffling. That will pass, when he wipes his cheeks and nose. 

It did not consume him entirely. Although, he doesn’t know what chased it off and staring at his wounds tear open had offered no assessment. To finally feel the warmth of blood out of severed veins and the slowing beat of a heart losing strength, pumping between his fingers; to only find it has not brought the catharsis he believed lay in weeping, mourning, and allowing himself to break. He sits through it and there is only the familiar pain, familiar shame, in the tensing to softening of his familiar, unrelenting grasp. After so many years, he let himself be caught. There should be more to this. He’s fled and hid and smothered and ignored and chastised and feared it for so long. He faced it, felt it, suffered its unbearable spike, endured through. There must be some change, revealed definition, understanding, anything. Alone, it remains, that mere familiar, endurable, deep ache. And Ryan suddenly feels quite awfully lost. 

That is, until a somewhat raw and gruff voice speaks beside him, again. “He kept the guitar, even after he brought that new one. Hooked above the fireplace in his room here. I’d uh- s’pose I’d forgotten.”

“Here-” His throat is so raw it physically hurts to speak, hurts more to then clear it, but does at least steady his voice after doing so. “At the Manor here?”   

“Well, ‘course. They’d brought everything and well, Amelia got him that, so-” Travis nods, though he also spares Ryan a bit of an odd glance out the corner of his eye. It’s a little red rimmed, a strange thought and a stranger sight. Then his brows scrunch as he notices the confusion, realisation hitting him. “Ah. You didn’t know. Moved back in- mh, s’pose about four years back?”

“Oh, I guess- uh, no. I hadn’t- I knew they moved closer, they just… never said it was here.” Ryan says flatly for the most part, if not for the beginning hitch where he forced himself to take the painful spear jab to his shoulder without a flinch otherwise. 

Himself and the kids, they were close friends in childhood. It’s only with his own infection that the timeline really straightened out to recontextualise. It was probably when Ryan was about thirteen they’d slowly started to drift apart, but the gap grew noticeably around three years ago. It seems Ryan was about a year late on the uptake each time. It’s easy enough to track now. To the year they first got infected and to the year or so when Caleb began to gradually coalesce. Ryan understands why. It still hurts they never told him- he lets himself take its jab and finally admit that to himself plainly. As then it only takes a second, for his shoulder to cease its bleed, for him to shrug as if it never had. It’s strange and unnerving and Ryan’s too tired to bite the hand that feeds, whether it has claws, flesh scraps beneath or so on or so not.

Travis meanwhile doesn’t offer any unnecessary explanations. Instead, he rubs a hand over his chin and nods to himself. “Mh. I- well, I can show you where to grab it.”

Ryan blinks at him. Sniffs, swallows, pushes a breath out his teeth and in a shock to even himself- he barks a laugh. An honest to God laugh. It’s still raw enough to rather sharply sting, but he barely notices it. His fists loosen, his head lifts and along wrist to knuckle he wipes the tears from his eyes. And for the first time in a long, warped and blurry time, something in him steadies.

Clearly, Travis does not particularly like Ryan. He never asked plainly for him to mourn and so he has not thanked him for the memories that tore him apart to share, much less for speaking them aloud at all, in the first time he has ever dared. Ryan does not particularly like Travis and so he didn’t expect him to. The note of grief, sincerity and resparked remembrance in his words was clear gratitude enough. This offer is even more than that. And simply for that, Ryan doesn’t decline it, though he doesn’t know what to do with it. The precious guitar left hooked above the fireplace; he too would probably just leave it to gather dust, his constant knowledge of its presence the sole difference. Would and only… except, well that would only be his declination, in and of itself.

His offer is not for Ryan to know where the guitar is, it’s for Ryan to grab it. And brick wall or sledgehammer, he’s hit with the stative condition against the dynamic action, yet again. It almost seems purposeful at this point. When the guitar is in hand, he’d get the choice there, for his own meaning to determine form. Take, keep, have, grasp and hold; all can be either. Yeah, clearly he hasn’t been handed anything, nor will he be. So to get it there, first hinges the swing over to getting it there. Then, obviously, also actually going and getting it. Action, his own, is required. Definitely a sledgehammer, he thinks. 

There’s a moment of chance here, to decline and recapture the creature, keep on trying to be better. He always was what he became and there is no flayed beast. His attempts at self loathing have been worthless, without even a shred of dignity in it; he doesn’t change anything and he never will. Travis may have been talking specifically about guilt, but he was right for all of it- who the fuck is Ryan still trying for? The worst has already happened. His Dad has been dead for years, his Mom is long gone wherever she’s ended up, Chris is dead no matter whose fault it was, the Hackett kids had drifted from him years before they also died and he couldn’t stop himself from ruining the little bit of anything he had with Dylan. Everyone he loves is either dead, gone or repulsed by him. Yeah, he never could contain it and taking the guitar can’t muss up the mess any more than he’s already done. 

At this point, he just wishes he could put his finger on what it is, ironic as that may be. This clawed grasp, flayed animal, off part of him. He actually feels kind of stupid that he can’t, though clearly not quite enough, far from calling up that court appointed therapist he’d quickly ditched. It’d just be so easy to name it grief, especially now. It brings all the emotional feeling and pain of grief along with it, certainly. There’s unfortunately no point in trying to lie to himself however, he knows it’s not so simple. He can feel the grief; he can feel the grasp. They’re separate, or merged or layered, whatever. It’s different. If it wasn’t, he wouldn’t have completely fucked everything up with Dylan. He could feel the anticipatory grief there and the lack of it, which especially freaked him out. Still he clung and still he clings. 

Frankly he might want to start considering rooting through a dictionary soon. What is it that can propagate behaviour, emotion, attachment, thought and okay at that point, he guesses that’s honestly just everything. This stupid fucking snake eating itself- genuinely what is he missing? In absence of any dictionary, he can feel himself staring at the bottle, as if the answer will be neatly spelled out in the labelling there. Lo and behold, it is not. Ryan sighs, intending to take the easy way out and just search it online next he can. It’s going to tell him something even more stupid than simply not knowing, like ‘oo get some therapy’ or ‘yeah that’s definitely cancer’. Alright, so that plan survives all of a second before he immediately gives up on it.

For now, though he doesn’t much appreciate that it’s Travis who echoes him, these sentiments are those he himself has spoken before. Just as he warned Jacob about stolen valour, he also suggested to Emma that the worst had already happened. Maybe Kaitlyn was right and he really does give good advice. Time might be for him to heed his own. He’s right, what is the worst that can happen, when the worst has already passed inconceivable depths? He’ll just have to keep that UFO on speed dial himself, to save face if his luck goes bad and he somehow trips, taking out Emma with the wooden spikes of the shattering guitar. Hm. He brushes a thumb over his still crooked nose, the evident result of the last time he put any faith in his luck and decides that okay, he’s actually a little too raw to find that particular thought amusing. He still doesn’t take the decision back. Fuck it. He wants that old, scratched up guitar.  

“Okay. Yeah. Grab the guitar, yeah- I’d uh, I’d appreciate that.” Ryan just shrugs, because he can. He doesn’t bleed from it. His shoulders drop. Then he wavers, and the rushed words of agreement stumble into tensely strung hesitation. Cave crumbled in, iron bars bent apart and claws let loose to grasp with abandon, the knowledge that Chris lays here rakes at him already. “I guess, just- can I- so uh, I can come back here? Right?”

“Why do you think I brought you here in the first place?” Travis scoffs, and although he’s no mind reader, Ryan is pretty confident the man had to make a conscious decision to not call him braindead stupid just then. His eyes flick to the bottle in Ryan’s hand, face twisting in the amusing mix of a scowl and guilty squint. “Givme that!”

When Travis whips up to stand in front of him, Ryan lets the rum be snatched, holding his hands up in surrender. He doesn’t feel it in the slightest, though admittedly, he’d had a good amount. Well, better to save them both the trouble of acknowledging either or anything of that, considering the guilty look implies Travis has in fact remembered his own laws again. When Ryan goes to stand however, the bottle is wielded at him like a weapon, motioning for him to stay right where he was. An ordered, “Sit. I ain’t done.”

Travis crosses his arms, taps the bottle top against his shoulder and shakes his head, thinking before he speaks. When he sighs, it’s to turn and ignore Ryan entirely, who’s stuck watching, waiting. The bottle is placed beside the nearest cross, twisted down, dug a shallow peg. As Travis straightens up, he gives the jaded line with his back still turned and only after that, does he face around again. “Now don’t you laugh at me. Ah, well. I'm getting old.”

His sight locked to the stiff reapproach, Ryan doesn’t laugh. Couldn’t, beneath the sense of foreboding. He nods, in tentative understanding more than agreement. Not that he disagrees, as such. The deep set lines and drooping eyelids are the marked signs of a man beginning to grow old. Although, even if he doesn’t know exactly how old Travis is, he’s far enough off elderly for the statement's genuineness to stick out a bit too uneasily. It would idly pass by flippant and banal if said self-deprecatingly. Instead, he said it like an old man too. In that uncomfortable way they tend towards, with the matter of fact melancholy and stoic, almost wistful resignation. He prepares for what that tone will certainly lead to. And well, it follows about how he’d expect.

“Yeah. I’m gettin’ old, I am. Now I- my whole life, I’ve done everything for my family and you best believe that. Mh. Well, truth is all my family’s dead now. Just me- just me left, hm? I never had much friends and none here nowadays. Eh, I-I’ve been livin’ my whole life in this town. Didn’t get to go far for training, no and I could count on fingers number of times I’ve left state. You hearing this, yeah?” Travis explains himself with a shaking head and an awful, imploring edge buried in it. As if the already uncomfortable tone somehow needed to get any worse. “There’s nothing here for me anymore, nothing to keep me here. You get that? And I know some of you will be off too, now that you can. Laura had me check her aunt's farm or whoever’s it was, so I’m sure she and hers will be headed. Yeah, but ah, you four in the backseat last month? You kids- those two girls, you and your boy, hm?”

Ryan’s chin gives a twitch to the side and stays there, head tilted. God, hearing that stings. He doesn’t bother trying to argue that last point though, and well, he’d probably not care to know his own reasoning for truthfully why that is. No, actually… Actually holy shit, Emma was right, again. Ryan is such a fucking liar; he knows, obviously he knows. He doesn't feel the defensiveness that he’d had earlier and clearly he has let the creature out on a rampage, because whatever, he’ll admit it. Yeah, he delights in the misunderstanding and has absolutely zero interest in correcting it, despite its sting. It really fucking does sting though. 

At least- oh. Uh well, it’s apparently enough to almost distract him entirely. The silence is a near miss from dragging on unnoticed and Ryan hurries to give the jerky nod, awaited expectantly of him before Travis will continue on. 

“Right… So, tell the truth of it then.” Travis returns to that pinning stare, which frankly at this point is becoming far too overfamiliar. “This here, it feels home to you now? Your uh- ah y’know- it’s your territory. Yeah?”

Ryan’s not sure how he feels about the rather good basis of understanding that Travis clearly has on coalescence and their general behaviours otherwise. In hindsight it makes obvious sense of course, but well, he supposes it depends on where exactly Travis is leading with this. There’s no reason to obfuscate yet and even if there was, he’s a poor liar already. In exhaustion like this, he’d be outright transparent. So Ryan shrugs tense shoulders and plainly admits, “Yeah. It is.”  

“Mh.” That short, sharp hum again. It’s a sound he’s stalled back to repeatedly today and used to convey so much, in all its slight tonal shifts of meaning. Although… that wasn’t the resigned, thoughtful or composing stopgap he’s most commonly made of it. This particular clipped interjection, wrung out tired and relieved there, had a new resonance behind chords. It sounded like the reprieve of letting go. There’s a pause left then, for him to elaborate past it. He doesn’t. Rather quite seems that was answer enough and if Ryan was on edge before, now he feels himself suddenly wound up and out strung.  

“Okay… The man in the suit- uh, your lawyer. That’s why he was here?” Ryan holds his gaze, while his teeth chew on a splitting lip corner. There’s blood in the breath he pushes out to ask, in the statement of confirmation layered beneath, “You’re going to sell the land?”

“Really?” The scrutinizing stare relents then, but only for Travis to look at him again as if his stupidity is genuinely baffling. “Listen, I know I ain’t the most gracious host, but I’d hope you don’t truly think I’d kick you off and leave you stranded. Not at this point. Don’t think that’d even keep you gone anyway, would it? You’ll stick near your territory, we both know that.”

“Sure,” Ryan drags out the word, trying to catch whatever it is he’s missing, frustrated that he may admittedly be giving the expression some justified grounds. “But I mean, obviously you are leaving… or I guess, planning to at least. What am I meant to be…?”

“I’m sayin’ I’m going, I am.” He actually sounds almost nervous to do so plainly, for whatever reason that may be. He’d almost seem to rush past it out of avoidance, if not for how his face goes visibly taunt with guilt and the doubt becoming far more audible, when he next asks, “And I’m also sayin’ you won’t be going, I know that too. And I still- I have helped you kids, yeah?”

Ryan hesitates before he says it, completely lost and dreading where this is headed. Still he does answer, forthright and sincere as deserved. “You have.”

“Exactly that.” Travis nods so confidently, as if he hadn’t needed to just worriedly check, especially egregious after how poorly he’d tried to hide that he was. At least he does seem to have built the conviction or found the assurance he needed, to finally explain it outright. “So, ‘course I wasn’t trying to sell it, I wouldn’t. Well, not the land around here. It stretches far, out to town and back to the mountains, y’know? And yeah, might’ve there if it really needed to be, though rather leave it till it ain’t my problem. Ah, but no, I uh… Well, I was trying to knock the Manor down.”

Ryan regards him with furrowed brows and allows himself to linger in the time needed for the information to really sink in. He’s relieved he did, the first question to his tongue better left unasked and indeed already answered. It’s unnecessary to press him for why he’d want to leave the Manor in ruins. Ryan himself has thought before it might deserve no less and he’s not even trapped alone, haunting through the halls within it. Yeah, Ryan understands why Travis wants out of the Manor, the town, the county and state. There’s a point to this yet to be made, however. So he doesn’t ask the expected, unnecessary question; he just again, wordlessly nods for him to go on.

“Uh, well. Can’t, turns out. Local landmark status prevents demolition and it’s on all those lists down in the city already, so no getting around it. We were in a rough patch, s'pose and now, costs more than need be to keep it all going. If I’m- Mh. I’m going, I am, and for some time. Now, I can still just shut it all off and avoid the fines when it starts to crumble. I’d thought I ought to, but… First, I want you to listen to this through, the whole of it, alright?” Travis pauses for his agreement, before visibly steeling himself to out and say it. “This ain’t charity. Just, I think you should move into the Manor while you’re here. It’s going to be empty otherwise and despite appearances, it’s better suited for livin’ than the lodge. While you’re here and uh, well however much you could want otherwise. Move right in or what have you.”     

When his words hit, Ryan thinks he should have possibly taken the chance to do the same and steel himself when he could. He blinks in shock and it takes him a long moment before he’s certain he didn’t mishear. Then slowly, he gathers the loose threads together, tying himself a chord of understanding; short on money, wanting to travel, expensive to keep the lodge functional. “You want to lease it to us?”

“You’d be paying yourself forward.” Travis scoffs, whatever that means. “No, you’ll need your money now. It’s just practical. Some of you are leaving; not you, said it yourself. Yeah, could keep to the lodge, I won’t stop you if you do. It is just a shitty old building. While the Manor, obligated for historic preservation and on all those lists? They’ve got grants to give for that, money for a group to fix it up. Wouldn’t even have to take ‘em, still just a good enough excuse to keep coming up here so much, isn’t it?”

“Ohh.” Ryan murmurs in understanding. The notion of switching over to the Manor for the moons does leave him a little off kilter, but well, beggars and choosers and all that. It’s just kind of weird, the way Travis had built it up and phrased it all, to be left almost anticlimactic. If he’s shutting the power and water off to the lodge, it kinda just is what it is, nothing they can do about it. If he was anticipating an argument or demands that he run the cash dry keeping the lodge functional for them, he’s soon to be finding this ending rather anticlimactically too. “Okay, sure. So like, same kinda thing, just… here.”

“Jesus Christ, kid.” And he’s back to looking at him like he’s dense. “It’s yours. Mortgage free. I don’t know how to be clearer.”    

“Uh… Uhm, yeah, no- no that wasn’t clear at all?” Ryan stares at him, disbelieving in half and otherwise just entirely uncomprehending. “Wait- wait. What? You’re saying- or you’re- I’m sorry. You’d just… give us your house?” 

As Ryan goes from spluttering to monotone disbelief, Travis deepens his scowl. It doesn’t truly hold any heat. If anything, he then sounds embarrassed and rather hypocritically, doused in guilt. “No, I’m sayin’- I’m not dead yet. ‘Course I’ll stick around for some years more. Just, y’know… I’m the last one left, I’m old and gettin’ older. I’ve had to think. Who would all this go to? And I got no one else. Mh. Your name’s already signed and witnessed. For now you can live in it and s'pose when I am dead, do with it what you like- what will I care?” 

The man doesn’t have any obvious tells for Ryan to pick out. Might be he wasn’t trying to hide it, might be it sticks out due to the waylaid course preceding it. But, Ryan does catch it and it’s the little lie at the end there, that has him certain. He had the right of it earlier, however much Travis may truly believe it, the direct declaration of blamelessness had an ulterior purpose. Actually, seems it had a few extra.

If not for specifically his own, here at the end of the line, there’s a turn to assure their trackmarks will be sealed. In short, Travis looked around, somehow decided Ryan of all people was the right pick, and is effectively shoving his entire family’s legacy into his hands. Which makes his insistence they’re not bloodstained go from plausible, to much more logical. And okay, so he did pretty plainly state why he’d make this pick, if nothing else. He thinks Ryan is his only option. The man doesn’t have children, the rest of his family is dead, the land and Manor would otherwise go to… where, escheated to the state? The government could make a museum of it, Ryan supposes. It’d leave him and his pack trespassing, though. And well, exactly.  

In the end, that’s what it really is. This choice to drop him into a house of cards wasn’t some eleventh hour stack, his bloodhound could attest to that. The shame, guilt, responsibility; there in his voice, there since August. God, they need this land, they do. It’s his territory, Travis was right to say it, nothing will keep Ryan from it now. He should be glad to hear this. Leap on it, alike to how his flayed claws pounced on the opportunity to sink into memory and the relief of inculpability. If just for the assets he’ll be assuredly granted, the sort his generation can scarcely dream of, he should readily bank the claim, say his thank yous and whirl himself in a celebratory dance. Ah, if only. The amount of land to be inherited does not feel proportionate to the guilt far sufficient. Ryan’s a terrible capitalist, unwilling to prey on the bereaved elderly, he silently scoffs to himself. That he can admit completely shamelessly, at least.   

“You have helped us, but surely this is…” He wavers, unsure how to express what he actually wants to say. When it makes sense, but just feels so… grim. A point Travis has already and purposefully beaten him to, leaving it a futile effort to try bringing up again. He warbles around it, “I just mean, as you said, what will you care at that point? Your guilt or this responsibility doesn’t- you’d really leave your family’s legacy in my hands? You can’t really- honestly, mine?”

“Huh, legacy? S’pose in a sense it might be.” Travis seems in part amused by the wording and evidently, he hadn’t thought of it in those terms. The humour is short-lived, before he clicks a tongue against teeth. “It’s not like that. Listen, I know it was my family that left you like this, I know you got- y’know, stabbed in there and you had to- never mind that again. It’s not for none of that I’m saying this, alright? It’s not some sorta… recompense. Might just be I’d feel better for it, what does it really matter? Already told you, you’re in there, it’s a done deal anyway.”

Somehow despite the guilt, Travis seems to truly mean it. An unexpected card on the table, and uh, if it isn’t guilt? Then yeah, this is worse, actually. He doesn’t even know what legacy really means, or rather entails. And yeah, okay he said it first, an apt usage, considering Travis agreed to it. While obviously Ryan understood the concept, he has never felt his youth more than now, witnessing it be brought materialized out of the theoretical. It’s a struggle for him, to comprehend the genuine and active practice of a man assorting his bloodline’s legacy. To be a part of it. The word honestly makes him a little uncomfortable. Legacy. It feels too- big. It brings figments to his overimaginative mind, of medieval lords or bureaucratic patriarchs. Already his pockets are too light and his politics are too leftwing, for Ryan to ever genuinely fill those shoes. He also thinks, just conversely, choosing him is akin to snagging a rat out the gutter. As in, give it a briefcase and tie, it’s still a rat. Ryan can be given the land and legacy; he still cannot fit Chris’ boots or footprints. It doesn’t matter how much he loves or remembers them or wished he was; he was never truly a part of them, not their small branch and certainly not the tree itself.

Ryan considers his hand and lays his next words out carefully. The essence of it is simple, captured in one fact and albeit perhaps tangential, any elaboration further is left redundant. “You know I can’t actually play guitar.”

“And? You’ll learn.” Travis says, pulling a face and snorting derisively. Alright, elaboration clearly is necessary. That was probably Ryan’s fault. His mouth opens and he gets half a syllable out, before Travis waves a dismissive hand. “I know what you meant. That’s exactly my own meaning. Jesus. Look, I can do it too; came a point, where Chris only played one song on that guitar. Yeah? You remember what it was?”

Ryan’s nod turns into a shake of his head. Where it’s leading is unclear, but he knows exactly the song that’s referred to. He can recall the tune, clear as he’d first heard it beneath that orange hued sky. The lyrics were never sung, the title never spoken, the slow chords strummed alone. In fact, “I think, he’d said… It didn’t have a name.”

“No, it had a name; it didn't have a known composer. In his hands, he made it a sad, old song. It didn’t have to be, wasn’t always, eh not when she’d sung it. Tch, I’m saying here kid, don’t play it again. At least, not like that.” Travis gives a handthrown shrug, curls his bottom lip to top teeth and gestures vaguely back through the woods. In the smack, scoff and sigh, he leads into a worn tone. “It was a real sight once, y’know? Warm and- I don’t know, loud or- or bright? Eh, the good kind. It was home once, long years ago. I’m the only one left who can remember it like that. Except, I’d just thought… Well if it isn’t home to me no more, maybe it could be to you kids. You could make something more of it.” 

“Fuck. You mean, really… Take the guitar, play a different song and…?” The words come to him like the rising of dawn and lift off his tongue much the same; slowly, hesitantly, a statement left unended to question. 

Travis for his part, seems about long past ready for this conversation to be over. In fairness to him, the man’s twice over broke any previous wordcount record that Ryan’s ever heard from him and also sunk to the Mariana Trench of emotional depths, all their previous interactions left paddling pools comparatively. He throws a hand around again, taking a tone of impatient affirmation. “And the Manor too- yeah, yeah you get what I’m saying. Make it yours, new, warm, whatever. Whatever, yeah? Just… well just try not to forget none of it neither, for old times sake and all that.”

And that… Ryan merely nods where he can’t find the words deserving for a response to that. It’s hard to believe he’s heard any of this at all. Ah, it was said in a voice rough, demanding and awkward as ever. That doesn’t change the meaning, tender and earnest, of a frankly startling vein. For old times sake, yeah. The love that was once there, he means. It hits Ryan like another sledgehammer, knocking loose his connotations of cold businessmen and grimy ratpaws. It actually kind of knocks everything into place. The whole day suddenly threads that missing throughline and well, it’s a little obvious in hindsight. Ryan thinks, yeah actually. Travis is being honest, it’s certainly not charity. It’s also the kind of self serving gesture that’s pretty hard to disparage. Grief, mourning, memory, legacy; his sole request has been fairly consistent.  

It’s all true, all at once. Travis wants his family to be remembered when he goes- evidently now, he means that in varying degrees of permanence. His chance lay alone, for the only other person who may have also loved or remembered them the same, through Ryan. He just couldn’t bring himself to so rawly ask. Then, he didn’t have to. All grave markers stake another question, if the life above indeed knows that those buried below were once here too. In this secluded forest grove, for the crosses Travis had carved by hand, he’d heard his own answer echoed anew. That was undeniably the crux of his intentions, he’d worked that out early enough. Just kinda turns out, while Ryan went on making and marking distinctions to it, that was… it. All was, all ways, always was- when it goes around in circles like that, no small wonder Ryan got a little disorientated.  

Maybe he did it to himself. Ryan thought legacy meant lacing on those inherited boots, unfittingly large and bitterly heavy, needing cement poured to ankle for the barest hope it’d stick to foot. How Travis drawled the word, previously unconsidered by him and then spoken of blithely, drew it in an overtone lighter. It is still legacy, to be sure. The same concept of creating a lasting presence from the past, through the present and to the future. Just, more human. In the sense of that almost desperate attempt to leave something behind, by people so far back as thousands of years ago, to show those even after all this time, that they really were loved.

It is that very same question every grave asks; to just prove they were once here too. Travis has only asked for assurance that an echo, recited proof, active remembrance, will remain. Legacy, not to be preserved, but to be recomposed. Memory, not for cement sealed in boots, but for familiar chords in new renditions. In that, he makes the words sound synonymous. He was right. It is Ryan alone, who has that tune in mind, could transcribe stories only spoken, holds an attachment that’s ceaseless and who exists uniquely as the affected life still able to bear meaningful witness. It was never on the cards, a landmark museum with his family’s history held in polished glass cases, nor was it meant to atone for guilt. History is past, remembrance is alive. The sole card was Ryan’s sentiment and affect; an intentional exhumation of the closefisted animal, for that extant form of life carved within him. He said they could stay in the lodge, because at the truth of it, Ryan doesn’t have to do anything. Already and irrespective of answer, he’s been rendered a walking, breathing memento. Yeah, selfish gesture indeed. And so painfully understandable, come of that tender, mortal impulse. 

In the end, Ryan merely nods again. There’s no dance for him to do, no further arguments to push, no grateful avowal of acceptance. It’s a stalemate for both, of grim concessions and pyrrhic victories. He asks instead, “Where will you go now?”

“Oh. Well uh, Amelia had a brother, name’s Byron.” Travis explains, almost like he’s surprised to be doing so, caught off guard by the question. “He heard what happened, offered to talk and then, well- offered to host me for a time. Also have a guy I went through the academy with, nearest thing to an old friend s’pose I still got. He’s out Kansas these days, and uh he’d called, said the same. Figure I slowly make my way down.”

He hasn’t told this to anyone, Ryan realises. And, oh shit. He’d been so distracted by the sting, and admitted delight, of his misconceived relationship to Dylan, he’d barely heard the actually rather significant admission preceding it. More than that, he’d completely forgotten the fear that had led him here in the first place, once he’d stepped over the path’s end into the clearing. And now there’s no need for it. Travis is leaving, travelling states away, for some time he’d said. Might be that Ryan himself had misunderstood their standings, but despite becoming the delegated liaison, he’d assumed it was Laura who still had the most open communication with him. Except, while it was said that she talked to Travis, Laura only told him that she’d help if Silas was spotted. There’s no statement or even implication in that, of Travis indeed continuing to look for Silas himself. He can’t if he’s not even here. Whether that lie of omission was from either of them, Ryan doesn’t really care, the relief is the same sort of palpable.

“You’re going when- now? And after that, you’ll be coming back? I mean, guess I’m just asking if this is retirement of… all of it.” Ryan fades to a prodding end with a slight twitch of head and hitching shoulder.   

“I’ll be gone by year's turn. Tried to keep you down in the cages, but the island ain't terrible either and well, the time was coming regardless where I won’t be around to keep an eye’onya.” Travis confirms, shrugging, before clearing his throat. “I- well, I’m tired of hunting. Uh, s’pose you won’t, but y’know I’ve always liked fishing? So, I’ll… Go along bottom of the Great Lakes, drop down the Mississippi and uh, drift west through all those river valleys. Mhm. Find myself the bait shop, buy a license at each state line, yeah that’s the plan. I’ll be back sometime, might end my days in the shack up river here. I’ve done all my hunting though, I have.” 

“Okay. Alright, yeah.” Ryan puffs a breath out through his lips, turning the whirling sound into all that’s left to say. “We can switch over to the Manor, if that’s what, I don’t know, works. Um. Yeah. Enjoy your fishing, Travis. I hope you catch- uh, many, lots of things, fish. Yeup.”

Right, so Ryan doesn’t know the first thing about fishing. The awkward stumble is still more for how, it feels wrong to not say thank you and it'd feel wrong to have said thank you. Really no winning here, though it seems to have amused Travis at least, so there is that. “Certainly I will. Meantime, I’ll sort out cuttin’ off the lodge and you can make sure the rest of those kids know. It won’t be me taking any complaints, alright? And you might not be wanting it right now, but time’s here- let’s get you what papers you may end up needin’.”

For however straightforward and streamlined he states it, the man sounds as if all the weight of responsibility, expectations and service that’s been held within his lifetime has finally, in this moment, dropped from shoulder to foot. Where the old dog near about has a pep in his step as he starts back, Ryan wearily stands to follow more exhausted than ever. He takes one step, two and another, before he stops at the edge of Chris’ grave and crouches down. There’s nothing for him to say, Ryan merely reaches past the fistful of wilting flowers, to the bottle dug beside. He lifts the glass and tilts it, sloshing what dark brown rum was left over the dirt, regrowing grass and flower stems. His hand touches the dirt and he knows he’ll be back before the grass manages to grow another inch. He turns back to trail after Travis, waiting for him and giving an approving nod, at the clearing’s edge.

Along the winding path and through the chainlink fence, they return back outside the Manor. Ryan looks at it, really looks at it. The paint is chipped, windows are boarded, vines climbing over walls, a room washed of blood inside. He tries to find that angle, where the light scatters to reveal in slivers of sunbeams, a wavering glimpse through to another potential. Ryan can’t see what’s not there. If this decaying Manor was once more, it will never be again, left an extension of its history. He knows that home is only ever a reflection, homesick himself for a place he barely knows, both so far and so near to here. 

It’s exactly for that, the memory overlaps in a suffusing refraction of past and potential together- to a warm kitchen, with warm food cooking, warm laughter in his ears and a calf in his palm. Then to the smell of smoke, taste of honey, the people he can be in the kitchen with and a dream so large he could only allow himself to live it for just an afternoon. He did live it though, even for just that one moment, he did. And there, Ryan finds the angle, catches the sunbeam, sees the warm glow. That golden aglow, of a home imbued with warmth, loud with life’s noises, thawed from this abandoned old woodpile left frozen in place. For if it’s a refraction, the past, present and potential are all cradled there within. Memory is an echo, home is a reflection, potential is a choice and as Caleb once said, it’s all only what he makes of it.

A rusted brown leaf swirls by on the wind, slipping through the ray and dissolving the light apart, as it’s carried off towards the treeline again. To within the murmuring forest, the wild grass, spreading roots, filled with scent and teeming with life. This forest for which he’d agreed that in his territory here, already it feels like home to him. That wasn’t quite true, though neither was it a lie. Those same broadleaf trees in his territory, to down south in Tennessee or up north so far as Canada, are all of one boundless and amorphous forest. There should be no difference between where that rusted leaf fell, here or there. If that were so, Ryan could be wandering nomadic through the hardwoods anywhere within, like the white wolf himself does. 

No, the forest isn’t his home, no more than the tiny, cold apartment a town over. Except here, it could be. It has before, he knows it can feel like it; like something deep within his skin, like something within his bones recognising it as his own. He feels it only in the absence of the pit in him, the void that consumes him when he leaves, freezing cracks splintering beneath its frozen maw even here and now. It is not the forest, the trees, the lake, the land. And yet it is only here, in these hectares of land, he has felt it found and staked for home. It was these blades of grass rolled over in hysterical laughter, this small pond’s water dripped off hands cradled to face, their walk along dirt paths, beneath the windswept canopy and slow setting sun- here. It was all here. In the link, binding, draw to his territory; it’s his pack that fills the void, his pack that makes this land his home.

He decides he won’t miss the lodge then, trailing up the porch steps. It doesn’t matter where he is, if it’s his apartment, his abandoned childhood home, the couch in the attic, the island or Maine. Home to him is not where, it’s who. A beautiful thought perhaps, ignoring the straightforward and miserable conclusion then drawn; that his pack would rather see him attempt a midnight swim this evening or that there’s been an ice sheet separating him from everyone else his entire life otherwise. In the formulaic pattern of Ryan failing to ever truly feel at home through his life, the common denominator is of course, none other than himself. Everyone he loves is either dead, gone or repulsed by him, indeed. So, he’s not sure what will be made of the Manor now, what his hands will be capable of carving for himself. Just that to keep it realistic, his hopes aren’t high. The hope of ever feeling warmth in this winter specifically, is slim to none. Reflections have never shown Ryan much of what he wants to see. 

In and through the dusty hallways they slowly tread and to his own surprise, the Manor has already begun to trace a familiar layout. Well, this short walk directly to the kitchen he could lead himself, the maze of the sidewings and upstairs floors are another matter. It does mean he knows exactly when to turn his tilting head, shoulders hunching, stomach dropping, peering through the ajar door. The room’s darkness hides nothing in the greyscale and his steps falter, head jerking back, eyes blinking, squinting. The burning lance of chemical scent rams against his nasal bone and ricochets to splinter a painful spike back through eye to skull. 

Within, all the gore has been scrubbed clean, the ceiling’s breach roughly patched over, wallpaper torn down, furniture mostly cleared and even the small tatter of yellow police tape removed. In memory he can still see the bone fragments glued over the room by tacky blood and the glass shards from the broken mirror scattered across the floor. The only proof left now of what transpired here is the dark stains in the floorboards and the small holes punctured in the wall. He doesn’t know what he feels from that. Ryan wipes a hand beneath his scorched nose and chews a pointed fang at his lip, before reluctantly tugging his gaze away and forcing himself onwards.

At the turn waylaying his straight shot to the kitchen, Ryan’s a slim second off missing the sudden veer right and his spindly legs swing a longer stride to keep on this new trail. Through the hallways, in this decidedly unfamiliar labyrinth and a considerable span of walking that no house has any true need for, they do finally come to a stop before a closed door. The scent creeping out beneath it, molasses blended to sickly sweet venom, gives him a second to prepare. It’s all he gets. The door swings open by a twist of its handle and Travis steps on inside. The curtains are drawn open, the dust hefted by their entrance into the rays of sunlight streaming in. If his bedroom in the lodge was where he stayed in the summer months, this room here was Chris’ home. From those stupid mugs they got him on birthdays placed like trophies on a wall shelf, the deep set indentation in the office chair’s leather, the rumpled cotton sheets on the carelessly made bed; his presence is so imbued here it’s almost as if he’s just a step outside the doorway.  

And there indeed it is. The open hearth fireplace and hooked above the mantle, the old, scratched up guitar laid on its side. It’s a familiar sight, all those finger gouges along the board, raw scrapes over the upper body, worn away finish on the neckback and every other notch in the wood. Ryan doesn’t say anything as Travis carefully pulls it down and places it in his hands. It’s heavy, though it doesn’t feel like it, not to him. Gingerly, he runs a thumb over the strings, the thrum reverberating beneath his hands and echoing through the room. In that one strum, it sounds like all those nights and rings an entirely new chord, both in tune.     

He looks up at the sound of Travis hoisting up the case leant against the wall nearby and then steps aside as he sets it back down on the bed, for Ryan to place the instrument safely within. The clasps fastened, Ryan traces fingers over the small flowers carved into the leather. There’s claws in his throat, tightness in his chest, a swirl of complicated emotions that are so tangled it’s pointless to try unravelling any. And yet, his hands aren’t stained, he leaves no blood on the wood. Animal to animal, a metaphor made in his own image. It will not consume him. It just hurts. He can endure this, he has already, he does every day. So, Ryan does. He draws in a deep breath of dust, sunlight, molasses and the cloying, dead venom. Closes his eyes. Breathes out. Slings the case over his shoulder, nods, turns and pushes on, in one step, another, now a little more than just merely one second at a time.

Chapter Text

Along the labyrinthian hallways, over the narrow threadbare rugs, past shredded wallpaper and beneath dust falling from cavities in the ceiling, they wind back through the Manor. Last he travelled so far in, Ryan was scrabbling in the walls with the rats. Now, like a terrier, he needs no sight to hear the infested colony within, hundreds of scratching nails the only sound above boots on carpet and wood, taking them to the kitchen without another word. 

Travis busies around, rooting through drawers and biting at a pen cap to jot down numbers. In a small patch of light, Ryan stands waiting by the island cabinetry, hand clutched stiffly around the strap on his shoulder. He’s exhausted after the emotional whirlwind of a morning and it must be nearing close to midday, his stomach starting to protest against the neglect. At this point, he’s long ready to trek back through the woods, sneak into the lodge, scrounge up whatever looks even marginally edible and finally return to his look out at the pier. Or not, he’d rather avoid facing the temptation laid in wait there. He’ll just take all the leading hours he can get, for some necessary peace and quiet, before the awkward tension and unavoidable scrap awaiting him tonight. Then, even worse, where the day after holds the conversations Travis has saddled him with and the bleak prospects there.

As Travis shuffles through the collection of papers, Ryan’s brows dip and his head tilts. In the clearing, beneath the rattle of leaves and sharp noted birdsong, he hadn’t once felt his senses overwhelmed. The sudden grating crunch of tires on the driveway however, hits like a nail driven in his ear. He thinks wryly to himself, ah, so coalescence allows for the lovely sounds of nature, but not the apparently horrible sounds of prodigious innovation. Yeah, alright, duly noted. If the lights were on, he’s certain the bulbs would also have an audible buzz and although blindly accustomed to the acuity of his senses otherwise, evidently the heightening of some sounds remains a bit grating. At least inside, the chainlink fence is dulled enough through the walls to no longer put his teeth on edge. Small mercies, and all that. 

A van rolls on past the kitchen window, driving around to the back, a short flash of gold at the wheel. Ah. There goes all the mercy this world holds for him these days, clearly. No seriously great, fuck his peace and quiet, getting chewed out some more is just what he needs. Lest he just earns himself more however, Ryan nobly keeps his whinging silent, pursing his lips. While he hears the tires grind to a stop and the rumbling engine cut, it isn’t until the horn is slammed that Travis seems to notice anything at all. Ryan merely offers a shrug at his questioning squint and to the second blasted horn, the man huffs out a half groaned sigh. He tugs the pen cap from his teeth and grumbles to himself beneath his breath, “It’ll be that blonde one, I’m telling you, I already know it.”

Another grumble and the papers are lifted and shook at Ryan, in an offhanded and apathetic gesture. The gruff exterior has begun to calcify again, except notably, the backwoods accent stays. “Arh, well s’pose I can get these to you tomorrow, fish you kids off the lake one last time. You head off now though, save me the bother.”

Ryan’s actually not quite sure if he’d rather hide away in the delightful company and starvation here, or indeed go out and face the music that awaits him in the van. When he hesitates, Travis makes another disgruntled shooing motion at him, so the choice it seems isn’t for him to make anyway. In a sigh, he says “Guess I’ll see you tomorrow then.”

Travis just grunts and goes back to his papers, the epitome of dismissal. Jostling the case to get a better grip on the strap, Ryan takes his leave and retracks the only familiar course he has to get back outside. In the steadily rising wind, the heavy door forcefully swings behind him and he narrowly avoids severing fingers, in the quick catch to soften its slam. It’s an excuse to linger, but only lasts a second or so, before he reluctantly turns and looks out over the porch. Through the passenger window, he finds Emma has clearly given up on the horn, reaching for her seatbelt instead. A longer, wearier sigh leaves him and Ryan skitters down the stairs two at a time, hurrying his approach before she can come storming out. He doesn’t quite make it, pulling up short about half way across the forecourt, at the click of the van door opening. 

In just a single step Emma’s head tilts, likely catching the crunch beneath his boots or the rattle of the guitar case. After first ducking down to squint across the front seats, she steps onto the doorframe and for a second, disappears from his sight. Then fingers clasp the metal edge and springing up again, she peeks eyes over the van roof. 

“Thought you might need saving.” Emma calls over to him, a light wisp of a sound under the heavy rushing wind, “Come on.”

Her tone is more bossy than welcoming, but once again he’s shocked to find himself spoken to without the scorn he expected. It still doesn’t lower his guard by so much as an inch, walking forward at a measured pace and warily eyeing her swing back down inside the van. Hefting open the sliding door, his movements suddenly pivot to tender, carefully placing the guitar case in the footwell and feeling eyed all the while. A drag of his fingers from one handle to another, Ryan slips into the passenger seat beside her, sealing himself inside with a tense exhale. In the fully airlocked confines, the winter winds are smothered beneath the warmth of golden sunlight. As if pouring over boundless yellow wheatfields, summer air has filled his lungs before his fingers have even lifted from closing the door. Admittedly that does crack through his defenses, the instant relief in just any sort of nearness to his pack hitting stronger than he could’ve anticipated, leaving him quite unsure how he’s gotten through today at all without it. 

“I mean, maybe you didn’t need rescuing, not like he exactly said why he was looking for you. And yeah, you could’ve taken yourself back into hiding, but… I don’t know, it’s been like hours, so I just thought, might as well mak-” Emma has already begun talking away before he’s even turned around and somehow, she doesn’t sound anything other than a little rambling in her explanation. Almost nervous in fact, which is a pretty far leap off hostile. Then he does turn, and she cuts right off. 

“What the fuck happened to you?”

“Oh nice, you did it.”

They speak at the same time, finally getting a near look at each other. If tones are anything to go off, his pleasantly surprised and her alarmed concern, the sight greeting them is remarkably different. He immediately spots the blonde hair flowing unstraightened over her shoulders and trimmed just barely above her eyes, in those bangs she’d been considering after their last conversation in the van. However, of Ryan himself, she’s likely staring at his bloodshot eyes and the dark circles beneath. He’d be apologetic, if it wasn’t literally just his own face alarming her. 

“The fuck happened to your nose?” She asks, stare breaking in a flick past him and back towards the Manor behind. “Holy shit, are you okay? Did Travis punch you or something?”

“Oh. That, yeah.” He keeps forgetting about that. “Uh no, he didn’t. That was Jacob. Is it bad?”

“Seriously? Oh, that fucking asshole, I can’t- oh my god? Why would he do that, like wh- what happened? When did- oh shit… You had to like, fight to bring him back here, or what?” Emma hurtles at him, completely ignoring his own question.

“Yeah, picking him up. Ah but no, no it wasn’t a fight. Had to climb through his window and wake him up, so, yeah. My bad, I guess.” He explains and secretly, he’s a little tiny bit pleased to get fussed over by someone other than his Nana. Who… shit, who he just realised will probably never let this go. First his ear, now this. Shit. “Is it really bad though?”

“Yeah Ryan, it looks like you got your nose broken, like what do you think? I mean, well I guess it is pretty high up but… no, that just means it was literally the bone that fucking broke; it’s bad!” Emma finally answers with a face of bemused shock, as if the question is truly so insane that her mind has defaulted to amusement from sheer disbelief. “You climbed through his window? God. I’m sorry this is kinda insane. What the fuck? But what- okay, why hasn’t it healed then? That was like, days ago now.”

He ghosts fingers over the slight crook and groans. “Technically it did? Just uh, obviously not straight. Do you think it’ll, I don’t know, snap back into place tonight?”

After the way her face scrunches up, all rounded cheeks, pursed lips and inwards dipped brows, it’s an unnecessary nail in the coffin when she hums, trying for supportively, “Welll, you know? I mean maybe?”

“Sure.” A petulant, sour word. “Great.”

“Okay, no listen, it really doesn’t look- visually terrible, okay? Like it’s there but it’s not bad looking, it’s just… Well, it was clearly broken. So uh, yeah, okie. And… what about the rest then?” Emma hurriedly assures him and she does sound like she’s speaking honestly, at least. He’ll take it, even if it is merely a segue to her resurgent prodding, so far as to wave dainty fingers through the air, tracing the outline of his face. “You’re a mess.”

“I’m not a mess.” He scoffs, adding sarcastically, “Thanks, though.”

“I can tell you’ve been crying.” Emma states, straightlining to point out the obvious. “Deal’s not over, hello? This is your own deal here, too. You know the rules, tell the truth or I’m calling for instant death.”

Okay fine, he is a bit of a mess, she’s got him there. What is there to even say that could ever sum up ‘the rest of it’? Wryly he thinks, well that depends on how far back she’s willing to go or how long she has to get through it all. If he did give the full truth, Emma better be prepared to get trapped in his convoluted and contrived dissertations on the philosophies he keeps faceplanting into himself. All those sledgehammers and brick walls within the theory of self, mind, language and epistemology. A surely insufferable monologue, and he’s well aware it’s his own illusion of explanatory depth that would make it so. The abridged truth is much simpler, along the lines of an obvious look and gesture towards himself, to draw the plain conclusion. It’s just him, and that she must know already, as everyone seemingly does. 

At his huff and vaguely swooping hand, Emma’s lips pull sidewards and she gives a pitying sigh. “C’mon. Seriously. What happened?”

After this morning, Ryan thinks the worst part isn’t even how he’s left drained physically, mentally and emotionally. It’s that the flayed creature was already near the surface at dawn. Now, closer to noon and freed since then, it’s embodied to share the wearing of his skin. He can’t stop himself from answering, even though he knows keeping his mouth shut is the sole path guaranteed regret free. “You mean today, or?” 

“Either. Both.” Emma says, confirming in turn what he’d known to be true. That she’s definitely aware of what happened in Maine. She prompts first however, “What did Travis want? And what’s with the guitar?”

Emma doesn’t rush him past that. Shifting to face forward, she twists the keys in the ignition and pushes the van lurching onward. As they roll around the loop of driveway, out the open gate and through crunching tires onto the backroad, Ryan weighs his answer. He was planning to give himself until the day after, before attempting any conversations about moving over next month. If he did some outsourcing, however? It’s truly nothing near an insult to acknowledge that Emma both likes being the first to know things and the attention she then gets for the secondary relaying to others. Actually, it’s rather fortunate for Ryan at this particular moment. The bomb may have his name on it, but he’s more than happy to let Emma skip off, flaunting it in hand, dropping it on anyone and everyone she may hopefully find. At the very least, some of the potential immediate fallout would be avoided, hidden down in his makeshift bomb shelter at the dock.

There really shouldn’t be much reason for complaints however, at least none of genuine significance worth bothering about. All the apprehension worthy of consideration belongs purely to Ryan himself, as Laura’s leaving anyway. If anyone else is reluctant due to the cold draft through unpatched walls or the rats in there, well sad as it is to say, that’s just tough luck. He’s never heard it suggested that being infected with a curse was a grand old time. God, and everyone can scamper off to avoid each other even easier in that endless labyrinth. It's good news for them really and if it isn’t, then Emma can send them his way; he’ll take those complaints in some undisclosed amount of business days. When his head is finally clear and exhaustion doesn’t tug at him, so, well, hopefully within the timeframe of a scant few years.         

So, he tells her. About their upcoming move, Travis heading off, the will signed over in his name, all prefaced by perhaps overemphasised permission of her complete and total freedom with this information. Although he omits mention of where he’d been when told all this himself, with eyes fixed on the green blur out past the windshield and beneath the sound of tires over rock aggregate, Ryan even quietly admits the guitar’s origins and significance. At first she whistles, which of all reactions, he can safely say is one he hadn’t anticipated. Then Emma absorbs the initial blow of shock, sooner than expected, and the questions begin. As they parse through dawning understanding, blithe complaints, bored critique of ‘lame’ retirement plans and along to mulled acceptance, altogether her responses are given shockingly lightly. This strange little astounded giggle threaded through her words, the table is flipped and it’s Ryan himself who’s taken aback. Especially as she notes offhandedly, with how they were informed of Laura and Max’s near departure this morning, seems a bit like everyone’s splitting for the hills now, doesn’t it?

“Yeah, actually, about that.” Ryan starts, suddenly reminded of that particular and rather significant concern. “Do you know if we should worry about Abi or Nick doing the same?”

Emma hums and from the corner of his eye, he sees her head shake. “Mm-mm, no. She has like three baby siblings. She wouldn’t put them at risk like that and it’s not like she has anywhere else to go, sooo she’s stuck with us. Uh, Nick? Hm. I mean, he’s in the city right? Unless his parents take him back to Australia or whatever, he’s just in their apartment from what I’ve heard. Nooo, I don’t think there’s anything to worry about there.”

“There’s that at least.” He mutters to himself more than anything. Huh. He’s underestimated the power of gossip it seems, because that was more helpful than any amount of stewing he’s done. She doesn’t respond, and he knows, well and acutely aware, she’s waiting for him to go on.

Along the smear of trees curving around the lake, Ryan flicks a glance to her again. The hair wasn’t the only change she’s made through the month. Emma’s dressed in a new style, of looser fits that however much do indeed complement her, more importantly have an authenticity that she’s finally, visibly comfortable in. He supposes it is likely easier to find and remake oneself when money is barely a passing concern. He’s glad for her though, relieved to see it’s still those brown eyes that she peers over the wheel, contact free. He’s certain too that she’s dared to make more changes than just what he can see now- in fact, he’s banking on it.

“And you too, yeah? So you’re feeling a bit better now, after what we talked about last month?” He asks and while yes, it is self serving, it’s also out of completely genuine care. Two things can be true at once. “Did you- Oh, first I probably uh, I should let you know-”

“That you told Jacob to tag along to the island tonight? Yup, already heard that.” She cuts him off, surprisingly flippant. 

“Oh, uh… okay. Is that- feels like you’re breezing past that a little bit.”

“Yeah, so that would be because I am. Look, I can do it with pretty much everything else too.” She pulls a hand off the wheel to count down on her fingers, “Yes I told my Mom I broke up with him, yes I threw the contacts out, I also donated all my wire bras because fuck those things, told my parent-approved friends where to shove it and I ate an entire bucket of fried chicken by myself, but no- I don’t want to start being called Emmaleigh. And look at that, we even overshot; over five stars and I’m doing great, thank you!”

“Uh.” Ryan blinks, mind a bit too sluggish in his exhaustion to really keep up with her. She does sound perfectly fine, said not even in a short or snappy way really, more like she’s sprinting through the key notes. “I mean, that is good…”

Her hand falls again as the road straightens out northward and next he knows Emma's swerving the van, by a tight clip of scraping branches, hurtling off through the grass field. The brakes screech painfully loud, the tires skid to a jolting stop and she’s cut the engine, all before he can even brace for the fast approaching dive ahead, near sending them headlong into the lake. His spine whipped flat to the seat and the belt pulled taunt over his chest, he stares at the lake still half the field across and slowly comprehends he just got punched in the back of the head by his seat. It’s a pretty fast track to indignation and Ryan twists his whole body to snap wide eyes towards her. He can only blink at how she’s somehow innocently tucking back strands of hair, completely unbothered and totally unconcerned.   

“You know what, yeah it is!” Emma smiles at him, and in that evil, oh so sweet tone, “But nice try. Now spill.”

“What the fuck was that?” Ryan demands through a heart thudding loud enough to hear and the lingering force of motion sizzling out of his veins. “What the fuck is any of this?” 

“You’re fine.” Emma rolls her eyes at him, as if he’s being dramatic, which thanks a lot, but he very much isn’t. If she’s in the mood for a joyride, on a day like today he’d rather the risk being wrapped around a tree, instead of diving in all that water. Actually, better yet, she could warn him, let him get out and clear far, far away first. A crazy idea and one she doesn’t care for in the slightest, breezing past her reckless endangerment entirely. “You’re also not leaving until you actually tell me what the fuck’s going on with everyone.”  

Although pushing the issue of his threatened drowning is clearly a futile effort and Ryan drops it despite himself, his words are left a bit more caustic than strictly necessary. “What do you want me to say?”

“Literally. Anything.” Hers bitten out, matched to his own.

An audible, rattling groan churns out from the back of his tongue. There’s no sneaking by a topic when it comes to her and in fact, he doesn’t put it past her to flick down the lock on his door. He’s dumb as a fly walking right into the venus flytrap; c’mon, it’s right there in the name. Just as it was in his own stupid deal, his billionth faceplant of the day, a record score. Ryan glares at the reflection in side mirrors, of flattened grass leading to their stop at field center, hardly caring how moody he sounds. “Well you’ve been with him all day, haven’t you? Kinda seems like you know all there is already, not really sure what else you could possibly want.”

“You make it sound like he told me.” Emma retorts a little primly, shifting around to face him, despite the courtesy met only by his shoulder- he’s rather committed to shattering the glass of her van through pure spite of will. “I mean he did when I asked this morning of course, but he wasn’t the first.” 

“Kaitlyn?” It’s said particularly flat, as Ryan’s not really asking.

“Mhm, she’s kinda put a hit out on you, I’m afraid. That spiel went on for a while.” Emma agrees in a hum, sympathetic at least. Well, there you have it. Ryan makes a gesture conveying exactly that, only to promptly shoot himself in the foot with it, apparently. Her agreement curdles to a scoff, bleeding into her tone. “And obviously I didn’t believe a word of it. Not for a second, I mean, hello? You like him, you like-like him, oh my god, you lovvve him. Like, obviously? So I’m really fucking confused what happened?”

Ryan’s commitment shatters before the glass does, slowly turning to pin her with the most unimpressed expression he can possibly make. The animal, raw and flayed and so near the surface today, lashes out in a bitter tone. “What happened is he doesn’t feel the same. Which I knew. Now he knows. I fucked it up. I- I really fucked up, Emma. And I probably should’ve expected that, I guess- I just… Yeah, I don’t know what the fuck is wrong with me. But that’s it, there’s not a lot to it. Okay?” 

“Alright, chill. I don’t think it’s that bad. At least, not from what I’ve pieced together. I just don’t really get why you’d lie to him? That’s what I’m asking.” Emma settles back on the outright pestering, but still by no means far enough to leave off entirely. “I mean you’re shit at lying, for one. And said with love, that explanation is the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.”

“Panicked.” Ryan shrugs, the movement heavy and far from casual. He pushes through to the tightlipped explanation and ends on the understatement of the century; but rules are rules and it’s not untrue. “He asked me out of nowhere if I was into him and I had to say something. What does it matter anyway, I could've said anything and it was lose-lose already. I mean he’d obviously worked it out. And so, yeah he kicked me out, which, fair. Now I’m just… sulking. There. God, it’s all just really exciting stuff, isn’t it?”

“Seriously? Oh my god. Okay so, you’re both just really, really, dumb. Wow. No, like you’re genuinely as bad as each other and I guess that’s kinda a match made in heaven if you think about it. Fine. In that case, I actually have some really, super great news for you.” Emma says, tone springing and crashing, up and down, each new sentence bringing a new inflection. “Since you know, the cool thing about Dylan is that he doesn’t try Saw trapping our conversations. Yeah, so because there’s no risk of instantly dying, I can pretty safely tell you- Ryan, seriously. He feels literally, exactly the same.”

Ryan doesn’t even blink at that. For the deaf ear he turns to her, to all intents and purposes, it may as well have never been said. He has to ignore it, lest any stray thought wanders back and wistfully attempts to convince him the prospect could have any credence. He doesn’t want to ignore it, though. So Ryan really must then lift a hand and say, “Seriously, just don’t. Please. I’m telling you, he wants jackshit to do with me now. Which is fine, it is. It’s just that Kaitlyn’s pissed on his behalf too and- and I’ve got this fucking void in my gut and I can barely sleep. So, I’m really not in the mood. It’s fine, it’s just kinda lame and embarrassing. Okay?”                  

“Ohh, huh. Hmh. Gotcha. Yeah, so that’s complete bullshit.” Totally skipping any explanation or warning then, Emma switches topic in an abrupt one-eighty and leaves him jostled all over again, as if the van’s brakes were pulled screeching anew. “Fine, whatever. Have it your way, be miserable. That. Yep, sure, let's talk about that. You’ve been really fucking hard to catch this month, you know that?”

“Uh yeah, kind of the point.” He snarks, though it loses some pointedness in his disconcertion. Although he almost starts wondering if he’s contracted some sort of auditory dyslexia at how jumbled and intelligible those words seemed, in contrast her tone stands out far too clear, in all its stiffly restrained sharpness. It’s not like he was expecting sympathy or anything, but he watched her look of pity transform as he spoke into a tightened pinch. It was definitely something he said and foolishly he takes the short second trying to work it out, instead of bracing himself for the leading course.  

“Oh, Laura and Max could though? Them, out of everyone, I mean, hello?? Like sorry, I didn’t realise I had to wake us both up in the middle of the night, literally just so I can ask if you’re okay, or I don’t know, like see you at all?” Emma has to take a second, forced to suck in a breath that visibly expands beneath her collarbone, before she can continue. “You weren’t around at dinner, not any reasonable hour after and in the mornings you’d already gone, off to fuck knows where the entire day. I mean obviously you were here, even if the only reason I did know that, was because you fucking stink!” 

As Ryan listens, he becomes quickly and acutely aware this isn’t the chewing out he’d anticipated. This is spontaneous, terribly honest, completely genuine and brought entirely on himself. The tone of her words, a lifted and pointed intonation, is a distinct kind of girlish incredulity. He thinks a bit guilty, it’s an unconscious attempt to soften her indignation. That does appropriately have its own spotlight, in the rapid gesturing fingers of an upfaced hand, arched back at the wrist and over the elbow she’s propped on her hip. Accompanied by a snarky, yet composed sternness and altogether, he’s put in place firmly enough to cork silent throughout. At the end she gives a final scoffed huff, yet just in case, seconds tick by with Ryan still biting his tongue.   

The sudden admonishment has taken him by complete surprise, his spine left straightened like a soldier to attention or mortifyingly, rather like a scolded child. He inwardly cringes at the comparison, however for the words actually spoken and where the emotion almost seems to come from, it does bear an embarrassing reminiscence to maternal judgement. Well, nothing like the kind of delivery his own deadbeat mother ever bothered to attempt. So perhaps then, it’s almost rather how he might’ve imagined it would sound like, for those who did get care leading the throughline beneath. Well, it is decidedly feminine and chiding at any rate. Ryan’s left sorely underprepared for how to deal with that. He’s of course had girl friends and girlfriends before, but where they’d mostly leant a more tomboyish direction, he’s never really heard disapproval aired out this way. Certainly not so unavoidably and directly to him.

“You knew where I was.” Ryan doesn’t know what to say, so apparently, he managed to settle on the most assholeish response he possibly could. God, he really wishes he knew what the fuck is wrong with him. 

“Yeah and you really wanted me there, right?” Emma snaps right back. Honestly, he can deal with that. Actually prefers it, enough he doesn’t even correct her. Then she continues on. While the short snip of bitter tone just then and her initial lifted intonation both still drag through somewhat, she becomes far quieter and softer. And yeah, he can’t again, nevermind. 

“Fine, whatever. I know I’m being like, weirdly clingy or something. I just- you were really there for me last month and then I heard what happened, so I was like kinda worried? And I thought to myself like okay, you obviously want some space to mope, so that’s fine, I’ll give you that.” It starts with her hands flicking out at her shoulders in a bit of a theatrical sign of defeat, but as she goes her wrists arch back again, a pretty overt tell if her matched tone was somehow not enough. “Except it wasn’t fine, like at all, because today that fucking gross ass feeling in my stomach came back, after I thought I’d got rid of it. You’re saying you have like the void or whatever- yeah okay? I do too. Like oh poor you, but that’s exactly my point, right? I was feeling so unsettled and shitty, then Kaitlyn also told me to piss off because she wasn’t in the mood, so like? Actually fuck you guys? And now I have this like- I don’t- it’s your stupid pack shit and freaky werewolf feelings. Making me join your psychic fuckery and then literally just ditching me, like honestly you’re both assholes.”       

Emma turns all accusatory and jabs a finger at him towards the rapid end there, but the damage is already done. Ryan feels really, properly terrible. God. The jolting topic switch into sudden dressing down is almost an impressive feat and rather testament to his precise aim with a shovel. He dug his grave with the self pitying mention of the void, then hopped right down and lay in it, with that particular comment on not being in the mood. Well aware he was acting moody, petulant and needlessly rude; his first time getting told off like a wayward teenager comes a year late, fully deserved and lands to shamefaced efficiency.  

It doesn’t even take much reflection to know it. He’s long informed at this point, well and truly, it’s the presence of their pack that thaws the frost splintered void. He felt it last night and he felt it again not fifteen minutes ago. While he wouldn’t necessarily mark out an increased degree of severity, bad enough that it is alone, the void is uniquely partnered on full moon days. In both two months past, he’d found it hard to let Kaitlyn out of his sight and that antsy feeling was mutual, always lingering nearby for the security of having each other's back. It was, quite genuinely, good and fine when they did. Well, clearly that has not been the case this month and this was Emma’s very first experience of it, just to make it that much worse. 

It’s bad enough to realise she’s right and he has ditched her, especially after it was Ryan himself in the very first place who did lead her into incurring the antsy feeling at all. It’s another thing entirely to then also be the cause of the void returning for her, when he wouldn’t wish that on his worst enemy. If it’s too harsh a punishment for someone he hates, then for Emma? She is such a far shot off anything near that. He cares for her incredibly now and more than some typical friendship, she’s like- well, the closest fit maybe, but an older sister still isn’t quite right. There’s just no stronger or better word than for what it already is. She’s pack. And, yeah. He is an asshole. A terrible pessimist, selfish bastard, sorry excuse for pack alpha, and an unbelievably shitty friend. 

What truly makes Ryan’s skin crawl in discomfort is that, even putting aside the fact it’s all merely excuses buried in metaphors, he still can’t tell which tracks left by his missteps resemble paw prints or leather boots. Ryan withdrawing himself off to solitude has, to his surprise and yet clearly so, affected her adversely. While this here, feels like he really is letting it run rampant, taking the olive branch in a clawed hand. His every step has become wrongfooted and he’s at a loss with it all turned around. It should feel familiar. The failed ice sheet of separation and the grasping desperation of loneliness. The crawl beneath the porch, the licked wounds, the crawl right back out again. To that end, there’s at least a month or so more that he does still have left- about the extent he can manage enduring through his self imposed isolation, before his will falters and his spine breaks. There should be, rather. The vertebral snap comes now instead, Emma all but dragging him out by the ankle, leaving even Ryan unable to reasonably blame himself for it. 

Try as he might, he’s not so deaf in the ear he’s turned to them that he cannot truly hear. Well, ignoring Jacob through the final stint of driving here was easy and ascribing motives to Travis all morning long felt justified. Maybe third time’s the charm after all or her scolding is effective to an uncomfortably weird degree, but at last, Ryan can’t just handwave it away. In short order and swift succession it’s been reiterated to him that in various forms, his care is wanted, somehow without regard to the visceral disgust he’s imagined it invoked. And he’s so tired, completely drained of everything he’d had left in reserve after this morning. Ryan can’t handwave it away, and he can’t even find it within himself to care. God, suppose at least he hasn’t tripped and skewered her with the guitar just yet.

If it was the same old drill in any case, he doesn’t even know what else he could possibly do, other than march along in practiced order. He really does mean it though, when he says, “No, okay, I- yeah. I’m sorry Emma. You’re not doing anything wrong, that’s- you’re right, that is part of it and I knew that. I mean I really did. All of us, well us in the pack, we all feel it now. We- uh, I shouldn’t have- we shouldn’t have bailed on you. Yeah, Kaitlyn too. 

He cuts out. It doesn’t matter how hypocritical it is or that it’s an abject double standard, Ryan’s cheek twitches in tetchy disapproval when that part finally sinks in. It’s not that he’s trying to shift the blame, he’s got his own poor excuses for sure; but in his stead, his beta should be stepping up to look out for the pack. “Actually, wait, you said she told you to piss off? Hang on, what the f- sorry, I’m not trying to, y’know. Just why did she…?”

Emma’s lips press together and push out forward, brows flicking up and eyes rolling to briefly look off. An effective depiction of wordless, yet blatantly unimpressed chagrin. That is, until her tone somehow does manage to overtake it in cattiness. While the attempt is admirable, playing it off and acting oh so aloof, it’s not particularly convincing. Her scent gives her away, irritated sure, and genuinely hurt. “According to her, I stink out the whole lodge on a good day and apparently she just ‘wasn’t in the mood’ for how it’s like 'oh my god ten times worse’ today. Apparently. Which is bullshit and really ironic, considering she’s the one that makes it smell like she’s burnt literally half the building down. Uh yeah, that’s actually impossible to escape, but at least I have some decorum and I’m not rude about it? Like- ugh.” 

“Uh… Huh. Yeah, uh, okay. You don’t say.” Ryan catches on the triple pinged ding-ding-ding of a realisation adding up. He’d heard Kaitlyn state the same sentiment last month and at the time, his first thought was an inability to relate, due to Dylan’s scent overpowering all others. In fact, he distinctly recalls what Kaitlyn had to say about the meaning of that, when he’d dared ask about it. Oh, no doubt she was right. Holy shit. The full moon last month, Jacob’s cut off words the other day, yeah it adds up. She was speaking from experience, the total asshole. 

Well, rules are rules. “I’ve never thought so. No, that’s a uh, that’s a Kaitlyn problem. Yeah, I’ll let you take three guesses though, for whose scent’s like that for me? Pft. Think you should uh, maybe ask Kaitlyn what she’d made of it, back when I told her pretty much the same thing. Went something like, something, something, love drunk, something, something, massive crush… mhm, you get the gist.”

“Don’t be mean.” Emma outright whinges and pouts at that, crossing her arms and turning her nose up. The way she then ever so slightly creaks one eye open to peek at him, as if it was subtle and he wouldn’t immediately notice, is admittedly a tad entertaining. 

“To you or her?” Ryan asks, because only one of those options has any possible chance of moving him. Still, he holds his hands up in surrender. “I’m not having you on, swear. Really just trying to avoid the instant death thing here.”  

“Me, obviously.” Then she peers at him, one eye squinted above an ever so slightly lifted lip, the preppings of a scowl. Instead she clearly decides to believe him and blooms into a smile, equal parts self satisfied, and surprisingly shy. “You really mean that, really-really? You mean she might, maybe…? Oh? Oh! Okie... Okie, well hm, that’s interesting, isn’t it?”

He returns the smile aside a shrug and raised brows, a smug gesture for how it’s out of his hands, and a clearly feigned act of unbiasedness towards that fact. There’s a short second where they just share their own sort of evil smile, one glowing sweetly and another triumphantly vindictive. And just like that, he is smiling. A real, genuine, amused smile and since Maine, the first of its kind to not feel plastered on. To be able to do so brings a relief he couldn’t put in words and all at once, it’s suddenly inescapable from his notice how settled and just that much more alive he’s become. It only took a meager fifteen minutes around his packmate and an admittedly rather lame apology, to find himself on at least marginally steadier footing. Ryan actually swerves them right back around of his own volition then, in a suddenly vital attempt to explain himself.   

“I am sorry though Emma, really. I am, I-I just couldn’t be in the lodge this month, it’s- I feel pretty fucking shoddy at the moment, so I saw myself off. And I guess I’d just thought… you’d, well, be a bit pissed with me? So I didn’t even consider you’d, or uh anyone really, would want me around either.” As he’s saying it, Ryan can hear his own reasoning fall apart and fail to make absolutely any sort of sense. It’s pretty plain she wasn’t even mad at him to begin with and frankly, why would she be? In hindsight, the notion seems irrational at best and paranoid at worst. Sheepishly, he tacks on, “I don’t know why I thought that. I probably- I know I would’ve felt better if you’d been around, so… guess that was a bit stupid.” 

He’s suddenly rather confused at it himself. It’s been a miserable few days certainly, or rather the whole month was, but specifically new lows were reached here. Well, that so, and yet it’s looking a little bit now like Ryan half designed it that way himself. And entirely on his own, didn’t even have to; just did, for some reason. When this whole time, Emma was likely willing to sit around and quietly join along for his moping. Which that alone is all he would have really needed to soothe some of his misery and he’d have taken even the slightest scrap of relief. God, is it worse that apparently he’s not even good at being selfish and only ended up screwing himself over too, or better? It’s certainly embarrassing, either way.    

“Uh, neither? And uh, ya. It was.” The ‘duhdoy’ isn’t said aloud exactly, but neither is her eyeroll and somehow both are equally audible. “Honestly though, it’s whatever, okay? It’s fine, I get it. Like thank you, obviously for, well, saying sorry. I do- yeah. I mean we’re cool, you were just moping and like Kaitlyn literally told me to piss off, so, I was more pissed at her anyways. I’m just like seriously, what is going on with everyone? I thought it was all sunshine and rainbows now.”

Ryan finds himself genuinely laughing out loud at that. And just like that, yeah actually rather exactly, it really is just as easy as that. A stakeless deal, a lowered guard, an apology, an escape from winter’s cold and the reprieve of summer air. He can laugh and he can breathe. “Alright, sure. I mean, look, I might not go that far, but uh… you know I am glad that you’re at least doing well enough to think so. Are- or, I don’t know, were.”

While okay, it is a bit of a sarcastic joke sure, he also does mean it. Likewise, Emma clearly meant her own part of their olive branch exchange and stated amiability, as she shrugs it off with a staple eyeroll. “Well now I’m feeling all left out, since apparently I’m the only one. So like- yeah fuck it, I want to add another deal. Up the stakes. I mean, at least personally, I do prefer staying all sunshine and rainbows; so kinda ironically, if you want to go off and be all miserable, I need an invite. Avoid the van if you really want to, you know? In here deal’s to talk, out there you can mope silently. Just let me join. If it has to be, then agree to it for the full moon days, at the very least.”

It would be incredibly condescending to question if Emma genuinely knows what she’s saying and so even internally, he doesn’t. However, well, he didn’t expect that from her. Despite the struggles she spoke of last month, it remains that Emma is a direct and assured person, regardless of whether that’s learned or inherent. Ryan perhaps should have expected that would extend to the way she cares about people, but he didn’t. For all he knew the link of their pack is a two way street, in some strange and unexplainable sense, he still hadn’t truly felt it was true. Ryan didn’t expect her to truly care and it’s almost surreal that she does. He’s aware it’s a little egocentric of him to easily comprehend the pack binding creates a care within him, yet stumble at extending that to his packmate and in doing so, clearly he has made her feel the exact same way.   

At a certain point, even Ryan can only run into the same wall so many times and take so many sledgehammer hits, before the intention is well and truly driven home. Turned around, waylaid footing or not, his two paths have not truthfully been changed. He can isolate himself behind the ice sheet, in an interim attempt he already knows is futile and as he now also knows, freeze her out just for the splintering ice to hurt her anyway. Alternatively, as he did this morning, he could give up his attempts completely and at least get to selfishly indulge in it. When both options feel equally and awfully guilt inducing, it becomes far easier to pick the choice where some gratuity still lies. And hey, at least if he does trip, the shattered guitar and its lethal splinters aren’t merely abstract, compared to the metaphorical ice. It’s hard to call that a bright side, but it might be marginally better in contrast, if just for how it should be obvious enough to actually notice the harm left trailing after him. Ryan decides once more today, to let it go completely.

“If you’re sur- no, sorry. You obviously are. Okay. And I mean, with talking about, uh- well you know. It’s not even that I can’t, I just don't know what I’d- or what there is to… say? Ah, but listen, I’ll- I’ll mull it over and maybe then I will, okay?” Ryan tells her, even just the thought of truly talking about all the hurt left after Maine moving him shortly along. “Your deal though, yeah. Alright, I guess I’ve just got two things first? I have to add, if they vote me off the island tonight, you’ll keep your immunity to sneak me back on?” 

“Okay, so that’s definitely not how Survivor works.” Emma corrects him. “And I’m not getting in one of those boats by myself. But sure, I’ll veto any attempts to exile you. Issue two?”

“You said the stakes are upped, so if the rules are broken, what am I looking at?” Ryan asks, spreading his hands out and feigning a worried expression- well, partially feigned. “Not sure if you really can beat instant death, but uh, still feels a bit necessary to know exactly what I’m risking here.”

Emma hums in approval, clearly rather pleased to explain. “Oh great, yeah no, no I can definitely make it much worse. Okie so, because lying is insta-death, right? I’m thinking we keep on theme and ditching should be an agonisingly slow, painful and honestly like super messy death. Mh, you know, like almost in a Saw trap kinda style? Actually exactly, yeah. That vibe work for you?”

“Ah- yeah, sure. Makes sense, ‘course. You know, staying on theme, definitely important. Uh, I will say though, it seems like it was kinda on your mind already. Like you didn’t really have to think about that, at all. Actually mentioned Saw earlier, as well. Um. Guess I didn’t realise you were such a horror fan?” Ryan squints at her and tacks on, “Yeah… so this is still just totally figurative, right?”

“Suppose we’ll find out, won’t we? Actually-” Her sweetly evil smile falters then and with a glance down at the finger tapped to phone screen, slips into a pout beneath her scrunched nose. “Urgh, great, of course. Shit. Ah okay, so, seriously promise I’m not trying to put it to the test already, buttt, we just missed lunch and I swear I’m literally starving. Assuming you don’t want to tag along though, and- hang on. Yeah, so we definitely need some rule clarifications here because like if I go, I don’t wanna be the one who gets Saw trapped.”

Ryan’s neck barely avoids snapping at the whipped turn to attention. Though it was easy enough to ignore until now, his steadily risen hunger has nearly reached the point where he’s left feeling as if at genuine risk he might throw up. He can’t tell if he sounds more offended or jealous as he asks, “You guys were doing lunch?”

“Not everyone, but I was promised something.” Emma rather unhelpfully fails to explain, in any meaningful sense of the word. He starts to grumble at that, complaints about the food he brought himself likely pilfered and some vague insults towards the other curs, frankly he doesn’t even bother listening to it himself. He’s spoken over soon enough anyway, “Jesus, stop the grouching. Is this where half your moodiness today has come from? I swear to God, fine. I’ll save us both the misery. I’ll be quick, okay? You’ll survive. Hopefully.”        

With that, she swings her legs off the seat, lifts a hand to the wheel and twists the keys hanging in the ignition. The van rumbles back to life and at a marginally less panic inducing pace, lurches forward to start for the lake ahead. All the same, he hastily grasps for his seatbelt and Emma scoffs a laugh at him, turning her head to make certain he’ll catch the eyeroll. 

He’s probably proving her point by snarking at her, “Should do, if you don’t crash right into me on the way back.”

“I love how grateful you are, truly.” As if teaming up to spite him, she spins the wheel in a precarious swerve around the shoreline and the van makes a suspicious clunk along the way. “Yeah, you wanna put in an order as well, make any requests? I’d so love to hear them.”

“Think I’m fine, thanks.” Ryan snickers. “You know, after how describing Saw traps was what made you hungry, I’m not sure we really share the same taste.” 

“And you ate bambi. Can’t be that far off.” Emma stamps a foot on the break and through a breathless laugh at his gall, jabs a finger at him. “Get out of my van, asshole.” 

Ryan goes to great lengths to slowly, cautiously and pointedly unbuckle himself. Well, that is until Emma starts lifting a knee and he realises that depending on her flexibility, he’s still within kicking distance. That’s all the motivation needed to find himself suddenly and miraculously capable of scurrying up and off. Hopping out just in front of the boathouse, a few steps trudged and a heavy thud down, he’s right back in place. The trees still sway, the water still rolls in the bitter wind and although the mist has lifted, the clouds gathered overhead still mar the lake’s mirror surface of summer. If not for the sun now directly above, it might almost be as if he’d never left. That, and how his exhaustion has impossibly thickened, bone deep and blood drained. 

In solitude again at last, the true brunt of it washes over him and weighs his flesh down more than he can uphold, his weary slump giving way to a backwards collapse. Ryan’s head thumps against the wooden boardwalk, the breath knocked from his lungs and by his next leaden inhale, his eyes have sunk closed. Memories swim through the dark of sightlessness, vague and rippling, blurred and gold tinged. Where the forest’s ambience hazes to static noise however, in this sheltered world and his thoughts within, all of it stills to a muted hush.  

Adrift in a murky rest, his mind dissolves to a vacant state, preserving through dormancy where sleep remains unobtainable. He’s fallen so distant, the passage of time has once more eluded him and he doesn’t even hear the van’s approach over gravel, unaware of Emma entirely until a shoe lands a mere half inch from his head. With a startle, Ryan’s eyes snap open and after a cluster of blinks, he’s groggily squinting up at her. Although Emma towers above him so closely that her shoe is almost scraping his temple, the large tray she holds forces her to lean over it and cascade a veil of blonde hair down, blowing in the wind to obscure her peering down over him. Ah, that impish smile would be impossible to miss, however.

“Oh, he lives! Hey old man, want me to go grab a newspaper too, maybe a walker while I’m at it? Purely out the goodness of my heart of course, because uh, when I said Nurse Emma had a ring to it, I didn’t mean the kind inside retirement homes.” The tray rattles in her hand as she adjusts to rest it against her hip. It’s cleared away solely for her performance, disappointedly shaking her head and tsking at each sentence’s end, both convincingly feigned to a concerning degree. “I would’ve left the van here if you’d told me, you know. My youthful knees can still take the walk over, so you could’ve had your little nap on the backseat and saved your poor, frail, frail spine. I mean the elderly really shouldn’t be sleeping outside, on the literal ground, in winter.” 

Ryan really hates to admit it, but when he lifts up hands to rub his eyes and heaves out a groan at the ache of stiff joints, he’s unfortunately aware that probably turned her joke into sound advice. Instead of arguing that point, he tries to insist on another; it’s a particularly short effort, before his attention is swiftly captured by a drifting scent, “I wasn’t asleep. You brought food?”

“Uh, okay. Agree to disagree, I guess.” She scoffs, before giving his shoulder a nudge with the point of her shoe. “And yeah, obviously? Hope your back hasn’t given out completely, because I’m definitely not going to hand feed you. Sit up and take the tray.” 

A series of huffs, groans and a shamefilled moment of genuine concern that his back might actually indeed give out, eventually Ryan does make it upright. The overstuffed tray dropped in his lap barely lasts half that time. It isn’t until only a scattering of crumbs remain, he even thinks to consider he should have possibly asked if it was meant to share. Thank every god he doesn’t believe in, as it doesn’t seem the case. Emma makes no comment and merely sits down nearby, tucking her arms under the blanket she’s brought wrapped around her. 

Shaking crumbs off his hands and pushing the tray aside, he blinks and looks around. It leaves his brows furrowed, “How long did that take?”

“Way longer than it should’ve.” Emma admits, before tilting her head at him. “So luckily you were asleep, or you’d probably be down an arm right now. Uh, I kinda got to chatting about our big move.”

“How’d that go?” 

“Well, differently, depending. I literally was just going to mention it to Dylan though, but then Kaitlyn was there, so she dragged along Jacob and along the way Nick overheard, so at that point I was like I have to go grab Abi too, then with us gather-“

“Okay, so everyone knows.” He cuts her off, if only to avoid the risk of Emma suffocating herself, after she’d already run out of breath three people in. 

Emma immediately wastes the chance given to her, the breath caught between explanations near exhaled entirely by her very first next word. “Yeahhh… I’d apologise, except it kinda seems you wanted me to be a messenger pigeon, so actually, you’re welcome? Anyways, they were mostly just like, oh okay. I mean like, exactly, you know? What else can you do? Uh, in saying that, Laura did have this look? And then asked where you were. I don’t know, just thinking of your health and safety here, me personally- I’d avoid.” 

“Right.” Evidently Travis had not informed Laura of his plans. Ryan’s not sure what she could want with him now, but when nothing can be done at all, then it won’t be anything he’ll likely much want to hear. He’s probably going to take Emma’s advice on this one. A bitter thought, considering that for a while at least, tomorrow is the last time he’d see her again otherwise. “Well, thank you. For the food, and the pigeoning. And uh, hanging around too.”

 “You’re very welcome.” Emma forgoes any further attempt at snark and from smile to speech, she genuinely beams through her reply. “Here, this too.”

Ryan can smell the coffee beneath layered steel, splashed up droplets caught and leaking along tight lidded seal, in the thermos nudged towards him by toe tip. He can already tell it’s pure black, yet to make certain he won’t be betrayed by Emma and his own scent both, he distrustfully asks, “This isn’t one of your monstrosities, is it?”

“You wish-” “I really don’t.” “-but no. Actually, ignoring that he told me not to mention this, Dylan made it. Said you’re fussy, uh except if I remember right, your order’s pretty simple, so- wait, let me guess. It needs to be made with love, urgh how could I forget. Hm well, thank God he stepped in, huh?” It’s nudged another inch and despite his scowl towards her, the thermos is snatched up by a whipped out hand. 

Ryan sips his coffee and scowls. He doesn’t dignify any of that with a response and instead puts all his focus in ignoring her, along with each and every thought or emotion her words tried to bring bubbling up within him. Still, he’s got thicker skin than that and after a moment of silence, he’s almost grateful for Emma speaking again to perk his ears. 

“So, do you still wanna mope in silence, or you down for listening to some opinion pieces? If not uh, maybe just talking?” She sounds almost cautious and hopeful in a way that makes him feel just a little terrible and pleasantly surprised in equal halves. 

After the chance to rest his eyes, the summer breeze returned through the sharp wind and a well scavenged lunch, he does feel miles better than this morning. Even if Ryan remains certain that he didn’t really sleep despite her insistence, if the cold bites at his skin, if the ache of heavy emotions still lingers in his chest and truly even if nothing has quite sealed the void’s open fractured maw- for just merely how it’s been halted off splintering any wider, suddenly all of it feels manageable, survivable, impermanent. As dawn broke this morning, he wanted to get out, to be alone, to cease thinking in entirety. After his weak points have been needled at and all left crumbled from reservoir to armour, he can’t imagine a fate worse now.     

It feels… just frankly good to have a friend again. After the axis tilt of his last night at camp, he’d already lost two friends by morning and then in near days, fallen out of touch with any others. All those who are no longer at home, grown up and gone off to college, while Ryan remained, held there by court order. He hadn’t been alone however, where his scars mark a mirrored kindred and he’d discovered the terrifying permanence of love beneath friendship, closeness became tangible. Then an inevitable misstep, one fell swoop and his only two remaining closest friends have barely spoken a word to him since. While it hurt to realise that beyond merely the endurable fate of unrequited, his festering love rotted through the little bit of anything they had- it’s even more than that. Here in the aftermath, Ryan just misses his best friend. 

It might not be the first word that comes to mind when he thinks of Dylan and no doubt that sentiment was every bit unreciprocated as the rest. Still doesn’t make it any less true. Then to lose Kaitlyn too? His second in command, his second closest friend and then taking first place, his biggest ally through this whole mess. Thinking about it now he can admit, man yeah, he really is having a rough go of it. In the end, Ryan has just really fucking missed having a friend, any at all. He’s been so incredibly lonely this month, barely speaking to anyone and hiding away with arms wrapped around his stomach. Through all the lack of sleep, the cold, the freezing void, he’s just been so-

Ah. God, how suddenly obvious it is. Ryan was so incredibly, blindly wrong. Has been, right from the start. All the way back to the first month of his infection, in a measly glimpse at the void’s inception and before the months passed for it to worsen, he’d conclusively determined it wasn’t loneliness. A poorly judged verdict that stuck, even upon realising his pack is the thaw, he still hadn’t given a paltry consideration to the implication there. The truth was right there in front of him, maybe he just didn’t want to see it. As a lifelong plague, loneliness is a familiar feeling to Ryan, distinct and different to the void. In the struggles to pick out his own emotions, it’s that alone and of any other, he can recognise in every taken form. Well, so he’d thought. His senses have changed, behaviours and beliefs, of course his emotions must have too. An emotion transformed by the curse to be a physically cold and empty pit in his stomach isn’t such a far-fetched notion, if he considers the impossibility of how in some hours the moon will rearrange his bones and explode his flesh. Honestly, of course it’s loneliness. It all and always is, feels like.   

He looks over to Emma then, another light shining down over her, tinged in all the colour of his gratitude. Not so long ago and perhaps nearer than the time feels, he’d have never considered that of all people, it might ever be found in Emma. Actually, she did more than become a friend or merely follow along out of those antsy pack feelings. If solely based on instinct, she’d have stuck beside the packmate smart enough to keep warm indoors, Kaitlyn’s hit out on him would be called to pause and Ryan wouldn’t have a two day streak of pissing off at dawn to avoid any sight of them. Instead, Emma sought him out herself and held him captive, entirely of her own volition. It means something to Ryan that she’d sit with him through the winter cold and it means something more that she’d so much as threaten him for the chance. To be willing to sit in silence, and despite the option there… he really doesn’t want to anymore.  

“Yeah, no I- I’m down,” He tells her, passing the thermos hand to hand, back and forth. “Actually I was going to say, about how you know, I never realised you were into horror movies. At least, I guess enough to know references like that.”

Emma shrugs and her lips quirk, betraying an almost sudden shyness that he’s absolutely certain she’d never admit to otherwise. “I dunno, kinda a recent thing? I’ve just started giving them a go.”

Although he tries to stay deadpan, Ryan’s eye twitches in a fleeting squint at her. “Nice, yeah. I know someone else who’s a massive horror fan, come to think of it.”

“Yes, exactly- you are, aren’t you?” Emma swiftly concludes the line of thought for him, the squint caught and returned right back, an added sternness on the rebound. Accepting his hands held up in surrender and at his coerced nodded affirmation, she continues on in a tone of far more genuine interest than her initial answer led him to expect. “I’m sure you have plenty of better recommendations than what I’ve found. So far, I’ve only really…”

As unexpected it may be for the both of them, in the end it takes a short back and forth before they’ve quickly found movies are the clearest bridge between them. At first it’s horror, a favoured subject of his to easily speak on and take for the leading step to pave the way forward. There’s some discussion on the genre, some recommendations and without even realising it, soon enough they’ve sunk into the first peacefully trivial, carefree and flowing conversation marked in their friendship. It carries along until Ryan ends up explaining how he’s always had an intrigue with myths, folklore and the supernatural. That since he became a part of it himself, all his intrigue has turned to belief- if he’s a werewolf, who is he to say wendigos, ghosts and chupacabra don’t also exist? Still, he only knows of the group themselves here, despite various podcasts claiming proof otherwise. At the connection sparking off that, Emma’s set down a track of some hard to follow internet drama around this girl she vaguely knew, which somehow circles them right along to movies all over again. 

Although the passage of time feels disconnected from their meandering conversation, Ryan watches the hours pass through his nails steadily thickening to claws. He ignores when his tongue starts catching on a pointed fang, but doesn’t bother deluding himself otherwise when the time draws near, aside a black sludge visibly creeping along veins in his wrist. The dim overcast had grown so gradually darker through the hours, he’s midword when Ryan’s head tilts at the patchwork quilt wrapped around her and finally takes notice of the soft pastels seeped to greytones in his vision, jolting in sudden realisation that it has indeed fallen dark out. Its adjustment to the dim is almost too effective, a necessary internal note made to be mindful in the months going forward. He’s a half second off resuming after his pause, for a tongue now leaden with concerns on the other’s absence and though it won’t be himself, perhaps a humble suggestion one of them should volunteer to go hound everyone up. A loud, yet distant crunch has caught his ear before the attempt needs made. 

Craning her neck to follow his gaze tugging pointed behind her, Emma asks, “Can you hear them?”

It’d be dishonest to call it language, but the vague grunt he gives in response is agreeing enough. After the early morning was spent pushing all thought from his mind, midday consumed by staring down the crushing jaw of grief and his afternoon to evening passed in surprisingly fortuitous distraction, Ryan hasn’t found much chance to stew in worries over the night ahead. Well he’s fucking worrying now, isn’t he? And he’s only left himself about five minutes at most to do it. He gnaws an inner scrap of lip between teeth, a pointless habit these days, his fangs left empty after shredding right through. He goes to substitute it for a nail- talon rather, and makes himself shove hands in pockets to avoid the same fate. 

Ryan hasn’t laid eyes on Dylan once since he left Maine. He doesn’t know what to say, if he should speak at all, how to endure the near scent of honey, to meet his eyes or deal with whatever emotion he’d find there. He wants so desperately to see him, to speak to him, to touch and be near. God, maybe he should row himself over now and head off into the island’s thicket before they approach? If only he hadn’t agreed to death by way of saw trap, he undoubtedly would. A short glance at Emma firmly planted on the floorboards and despite the pity filled look she returns back, he wouldn’t exactly proclaim himself an empath for intuiting how she seems rather unlikely to participate in any sudden escape plans. His shoulders slump and a heavy sigh deflates his lungs.

“The worst part is there’s literally no need for this. I get you don’t want to talk about it, just-“ Emma’s sadly sympathetic, yet equally exasperated tone cuts out as she wavers. In the pause, she discreetly runs a thumb beneath her nose and yeah, Ryan doesn’t even want to know how rancid the air must have become. A delicate sniff almost seems to be the steel for her resolve however, ending on a plainly stated, “I’ve never broken our deal, you know. Truth, whole truth, nothing but truth, and all that. Really, promise.” 

Tiredly, Ryan presses knuckles into eye sockets. He hates how honest she sounds, how much he wants to believe her, how he doesn’t have the chance to dwell on it either way. “I know you… definitely believe that.”

Her lips twist as if she has a few choice words for that, but fortunately, she drops it. Emma wraps the quilt tighter around herself instead, all tucked up to say, “Raise a hand if you’re emotionally prepared for our impending doom?”

A short, silent moment passes where they just blink at each other. Wry smiles are spotted before any sign of hands. It does give Ryan pause enough to knock sympathy back into him and avoid returning to recent selfish habits. “Not saying I can kick him off the island at this point or anything, but you really think you’ll be okay with Jacob joining the pack?”

“It’s whatever. I mean, it’s not like I’m going to sit around chatting about football or anything, but,” Emma shrugs and purses lips in a gesture of indifference enough; not enthused, but not too worried. 

Ryan won’t make issues where there aren’t any, though he can’t say the potential to fan the flames stops him from dropping a little fun fact, “You know, he doesn’t actually play football.” 

“Would I be a worse person if I admitted I didn’t know that, or if I pretended like I did?”

“I dunno, might be safer to double it, make it twofold and you’ll at least know what you are.” Ryan shrugs. 

“Hmm, good idea.” Emma flicks her hair over her shoulder and as to be expected, assumes the role with startling believability. “Well sure, I was fully kidding- you didn’t know that? I totalllly knew that, kinda messed up you didn’t, honestly. Wait- oh my god, does he play hockey like Kait? Duh. Shit, yeah I really should have known that, that is pretty bad.”

“The fact you knew that but not-” Ryan scoffs at the sudden break in character, before the motive behind it sinks in, leaving him grinning at her. “Right, so you won’t chat about football but it just happens you’re a big hockey fan now too, huh? No correlation to the horror either, I’m sure.”

“No, okay, I’m sorry- can a girl not have hobbies without ulterior motives? Now that’s genuinely really fucked up to say, Ryan. I only knew, alright, ‘cause her mom has posted like twenty different photos of her playing or like,” Emma lifts hands up to her mouth and clenches teeth behind her scrunching fingers. “Her standing there smiling and looking absolutely crazy because she’s wearing these like neon mouthguards in all of them. Looks literally insane.”

“Dude…” Ryan draws out slowly, forgetting who he’s talking to and earning himself an unimpressed expression for the moniker. “I don't know how to explain to you, just how much worse that is. That’s worse, that’s so much worse, you’ve seriously been stalking her mom online?”

“Okay, no! I haven’t, it’s a public account and right there in her friends list, she posted them for people to see, like that is the whole poin-” Emma hastily starts to defend herself, before she catches the humour tugging at the corner of his lip and gives up with a- right, so usually he’d think of it as a huff, and usually, it probably would’ve been. This close to nightfall, the sound was closer to a shallow, quiet growl. To his amusement an absurd clash ensues, through her fingers daintily touching to lips in embarrassment and her stern tone then returning, sharply pointed at him. “Yeah okay, no. You’re in absolutely no position to be acting like this and I think we should remember that. I’ve been so nice to you about Dylan, but like I really don’t have to. So, ah, maybe let’s be nice?”

Alright well nevermind, fun’s ruined. Which is probably for the best. To that point actually, Ryan can’t tell if he is quite so incredibly grateful for Emma managing to distract him again, or if there’s a shared fault to be pissed about instead, for his regretfully lost chance to get some worrying out beforehand, in hopes of lessening impact. Might be both, though it’s too late to matter much either way. At the flick of his eyes the panic strikes all the same for their suddenly visible approach. In the short couple of minutes left before soles hit wood, his mind draws to a near blank and wastes the last scrap of time anyway. His only clear thought left is the awareness, that in itself, is undeniable proof the fault’s entirely his own. Well, his apologies to Emma then. He'll have to scrape up the gratitude later, unfortunately it’s rather pushed beyond concern’s reach at present. As standing before him now, he’s lifting eyes to the unholy trinity of all his current major concerns. 

And there he is, at first sight of him and all his flickering visages in duality. After Maine, this month he’d broken apart to take in seconds has changed nothing. Ryan looks at him and still sees sunglow. As if clouds may break only for him, for crepuscular rays to seek the light returned and incandesce where his own aglow radiates through skin, to create of him a pillared flare in diffusing twilight. Well, rather would that it could, perhaps. Instead it’s winter, evening's murk is thick and dark overcast skies are unmoved by any bitter wind. While alit in darkness around him, there’s no heavenly sunrays, nor warmth left. Dylan stands illuminated beneath the beam of an industrial bulkhead, haloed by gnats and moths drawn to flitter in the light above. An olive corduroy jacket to coat a heavy woolen sweater, yet winter’s cold has still bridged red bitten over nose to cheeks. Fingers tug at the zip, chewed and bleeding, pallid skin turned sickly in yellow artificial light. 

Dylan has always been like the sun to him. Tonight, all that swallowed sunlight has oxidized to white phosphorus. He looks to have become it, waxy and sallow, emitting his light without warmth. Toxic to inhale, Ryan can already feel the necrosing of his jaw, aside the vague recognition his teeth have taken to grinding. Amid the hardwoods and pines, through grass and soil, over rotten floorboards and bloating corpse in the lake, ignites a sting, serrated and metallic. All those needlelike spikes in the air, a sightless consumption of any scent less than his own. He glows, phosphorescent in the dim and the mere sight of him burns, the very presence of him rots through. Their eyes do not meet; Dylan will not look at him. And yet Ryan can’t look away, breathing in splinters, rotted toiling in his gut. 

Moth drawn to light, fly to sweet leaf, scorching glass or carnivorous plant. The snap and seeped acid to break his twitching legs for erosion, is expectedly a trap laid in eager wait by Kaitlyn. He wouldn’t give her the satisfaction of admitting so, but it’s perhaps for the best when she purposefully steps in his sightline and directs a curled lip at him. Acidic as her glare may be, Ryan merely shrugs at Dylan’s self appointed guard dog and takes small revenge in incensing her further, where he’s capable of not rising to that particular bait. He instead uses the distraction she provided to flick an eye over and confirm Jacob has indeed been dragged along. The guy is here at least, although in a hand raising to his scrunched up nose, he looks to be half regretting it. After how the crook left in his own would distort a mirrored gesture, Ryan has considerably low pity for him in this particular issue. 

There’s an awkward moment of tension, silence over a few seconds that seem to drag, his eyes unsure where remains safe to fall. Emma breaks it, through a tightlipped, “Fancy seeing you here.”

“Would prefer if we didn’t.” Kaitlyn is glaring right at Ryan as she speaks, but her words point a cold sharpness to them both. She’s visibly keyed up and even with current sentiments considered, the outright hostility radiating off her still strikes as disproportionate. He’s certain it’s self inflicted in part, owed to her day spent separated from her pack. “Guess we’re lucky Captain Oblivious over there got himself just the cutest little guide dog to point out the obvious, huh? And all it took was a pat on the head.”

“Yeah, you’ve already made that pretty clear. Honestly, you’re getting boring at this point.” Emma’s returning hiss is lightning fast and God, he’d forgotten how incredibly scathing she can sound when really wanting to. Actually makes him realise how truly coddled he’s been throughout his own back and forth with her today. “And oh, my poor feelings, calling me a bitch. Never heard that one before, so original. I mean c’mon, you’re really not gonna try harder than that for little old me? Hey, I’m sure it’ll land the second time. Be my guest. Then I'll show you what that really means.”

Quite obviously intended to be simply derisive now, yet just like him before, for a moment Kaitlyn seems chastised nonetheless. The tone does scrape against her stubborn streak however, where provocation unavoidably rises and a short indignant expression later, the bickering is well underway. Words blurring in a trivial buzz overhead, through hands flying and bystander eyes tracking, attention is captured as if to a grand finale tennis match. While Emma and Kaitlyn may have varying deliveries, in snark they’re evenly matched on a good day and reach a whole new degree with venom slugging visibly through their veins. Under normal circumstances, though he’s not sure those can truthfully exist for them anymore, Ryan is definitely nosy enough that he’d be just as engrossed. If he wasn’t so preoccupied with self centered moping, then ideally past mere eavesdropping, he might have even stepped in and stopped this risky timed argument. 

Although perhaps smothered beneath all consuming nettled sugar, neither of their scents raise upset alarm bells. If anything, their bickering has this weird… fire. Might all just be ire, but it’s almost hard to tell if the words are flirtatious and the tones are vicious, or if the words are vicious and the tones are flirtatious. Weird, and confusing, and really best left for them to sort out, either way. He doesn’t question it. Instead, it's a chance for him to fade back in shadow, granting himself a final steadying breath amidst the darkness swarmed near sunset’s end. Well, the breath is drawn, but not without notice. 

At the feeling of eyes on him, without thought, his own lift and catch Dylan’s gaze. To a startled blink, awkward smile and quick look away. That’s the limit for him. Not the closing dimness of evening, but the winced attempt at a smile. Ryan can already see the mask slid in place, each pore smoothed over by porcelain, every chip painted over, all the real and honest pieces of him enamelled. Dylan will play nice and amicable, act like he’s forgotten anything happened, as if leather boots and truck tires had never even crossed state line. Ryan would rather take the fire of him seething and hissing, over the cold and stilted pleasantries. He’d still take the little bit of anything in his stilted pleasantries, over desolate nothing. There’s a reason he’d tried so hard to stay away.  

In abrupt restlessness, he hefts to foot and snaps end to argument, any further hissing gone ignored while Emma is yanked up standing alongside him by a scruffed handful of blanket. A gruff reminder of the time gathers everyone in order, complaint filled yet trekking down the short pier and piling in the dinghy. The oars fit a familiar grip in hand, slicing through the surface and dragging against the weight of lakewater, easing a steady motion after his still unexpected strength had admittedly set off lurching. The only sound is the wind encircling a tight whirled noose, his own even breath and lake churning beneath, all matched in rhythm to his arms pulling catch through draw. Ryan keeps his eyes on the oar’s push and pull, telling himself there’s nothing more to see. The lie is scorched through nose to throat to void, frostbitten burn trailed jaw to navel. He’s glad for the new ease in rowing so fast. 

He makes up for that rough tug to get Emma up standing, by sticking out an elbow once his own boots hit the dock and helping pull her from the precarious teetering boat. Well, Jacob actually invites himself to take it first, scrambling up and throwing gratitudes over a shoulder along his dart to solid earth. Ryan would have squared his shoulders and offered a hand to them all, but Kaitlyn and Dylan have already made it up by the time Emma’s shoes lift scraping over wood. The amended gesture is met by her amusement, revived all over again at how the second she’s steadied, Ryan hastily retreats a solid few steps back. The sharpening sting of nettle and sear of smoke has summoned the distinct premonition it’s in his best interest to clear himself far from the edge. In his heel turn around inward to the island, he catches Kaitlyn’s withering glare and the decision cements as necessary, his steps leading just a little quicker away. 

At the path edge, he pulls in line beside Jacob and somehow earns a hand shortly clasped on his shoulder. After no explanation is offered to the cause of this vaguely supportive gesture, he doesn’t bother asking. His brows knit however, as it reminds him that he should probably say something. It’s short notice for a warning, but it’s all they have left. 

“You know what to do, yeah, man?” Ryan asks, flicking a nervous glance at the shoreline far too near behind them, while Jacob nods. “Right. Uh, and you know we’re going to fight? You’ll be fine in the morning, but there’ll be a scar. Shoulder or ankle, probably, seems to be the spot. Guess, sorry in advance.”

“Yeah, I know man, you’re all good.” Jacob shrugs off his concern with a reassuring indifference. Except, his face grows a little tight and the nerves instead creep through where he asks, “But uh, if I do remember it, does it… I don’t know. Hurt? ‘Cause if I’m awake and stuff…”

He almost wants to lie, after seeing how just the idea of it has paled him. While he doesn’t, little point that there is, his explanation does remain clipt short. “In the moment, I mean yeah, but it’s ah, different. Your memory after and stuff, it’s blurry and- try not to worry about it. Few hours ‘til morning and you'll be fine.”

“What if I don’t know how to- do stuff. Like run on four legs and fight-” Jacob says in a burst, all these worries he’s apparently been harbouring, now spilling out while he still can.

“You will. You just do.” Ryan holds his eye, nods slowly until Jacob mimics him. “It’s instinctive. And that’s all any of this is. To turn, then through the night, just follow your instincts. Yeah?”                

Another nod, and their focus switches on trudging deeper inland- Ryan at lead, hastened to where at the very least, he can’t be pushed in the lake. Along the path, Emma jogs to catch up and the other two trail behind, each of them in terse silence as they return beneath the treehouse. They’ve left themselves little time for discussions, though fortunately if they stick to the drill previously rehearsed last month, then it shouldn’t be necessary. Dylan sent up the ladder, while the rest head off through the thicket. 

Ashamed as he’d be to admit, it’s only in coming to a standstill here, he registers that of the councillors merely Nick and Abi are missing now. He doesn’t know if anyone tried to extend an invitation to them and although it’s not exactly some happy go lucky party they’re missing out on, he still feels a bit terrible to realise they’re off spending the night alone underground. Especially after Nick had spoken oh so solemnly of their first absence, then last month with his look of abandonment and shit, Ryan can’t recall if the next morning he’d even talked directly to him at all. Worse, it’s an assumption without certainty, if they were seen off to the Manor; it isn’t really his responsibility to do so himself, but also, it really is. He hasn’t once thought to spare it even a paltry consideration today.  

His abrupt and concerned questioning towards it now is barely granted a scoff in return by Kaitlyn, before Jacob takes it on himself to assure he’d watched them get corralled into the patrol car. He gets an elbow in the ribs for the trouble, much to Ryan’s sympathies and gratitude. Hand rubbing at his side, after nearly snapping teeth at her, Jacob forcibly reels his head back and shakes the instinctive reaction off. Then, somewhat amusingly, he seems to recall his plan, furrowing brows like he may be half wondering if it means he should try biting her now, in retrospect. It pulls him from the moment enough he’s lost the driving fire anyway, but that sort of control won’t last for long, Ryan thinks wryly to himself. 

As if Jacob heard and agreed, he asks through a gritted jaw, “Do we just stand around here until we turn, or?”

“No.” Ryan glances futilely up at the sky, unchanged and darkened grey, mind replaying last month’s warning towards their transformation lacking place at a definitive shade of night. “But we will, if we don’t start moving.”

“Yeah. No point in wasting time.” Kaitlyn limply throws a hand towards the overgrown remains of the path lying behind him, that they’d torn for themselves last they were here. “Lead the way, Captain.”

Everyone takes an expectant step forward- everyone. Ryan’s head crooks to the side and his boot scrapes back, pressing weight down on a heel ground down into the dirt. He doesn’t ask, it isn’t a question. “We’re splitting up again.”

Kaitlyn doesn’t argue either, and actually visibly forces herself to cool off for her tone to hold steady, as if the sound of confidence and composure will sell an authority to bypass scrutiny. “Alright. We’ll head up then. Sure I’ll find you soon enough.”

“No.” Ryan says again, far more forceful than before. “It worked fine as it was. He turns in the treehouse, alone. You take Jacob deeper in, give him the chance to breathe before I-”

“You can’t just-” “I am right here, I can speak for-” At the same time, Kaitlyn starts and Dylan tries as well, in a voice quieter, collected. While Ryan’s attention is drawn to him immediately, he’s just as quickly bowled over.   

Kaitlyn’s hand sweeps out for Dylan to hold on, but little more of her attention is given towards the argument’s topic than that, continuing over him without a glance his way. “Hang on. No, because you’re acting like that was a set thing, when it wasn’t. We’ve been here one time, he ended up joining us anyway and-”

Although he cut himself off from acknowledging the bloodshed awaiting them as a small favour to Jacob, he slices right back in and bisects the sentence left half lifted from her tongue. “I don’t care.” 

He really doesn’t. Not for any arguments, not for how this makes him look. When there’s soon to be a lone cur roaming his territory and a scar dug in Dylan’s neck by teeth of a still unknown maw, it isn’t a discussion. They will stay far away until each wolf on this island is securely in his pack when, and only then, they do find him. It may be his main concern, but he knows better than to state as such. There’s still a lengthy index of others, anyway. “It’s cold out, and- uh- and it takes longer for him to turn, there’s no reason for him to be standing around, fucking dodging teeth and claws while we fight. Which we will. Why would he be there? Why? When he’s fine and safe in the treehouse, this is fucking stupid.”

After stumbling at the overt care slipt in his first point, Ryan forced on through a temperature steadily rising as he spoke, hotblooded and scalding by end. Kaitlyn’s tone sharpens to match, in whatever short time she has before he cuts in again, “We won’t hurt him, you know that, we all know that. Doesn’t even make sense- What, don’t give a shit about Emma, in the exact same position? He should be able-”

His jaw clenches, aches from the force of it. “I said I don’t care, guess what? Still don’t. I’m not listening to this, we’re not changing shit around for your pettiness. And there’s not a lot of time left, so think you’d better go. Now, clocks ticking. You’re just fucking Jacob over at this point, you know that right?”

Her eyes squint in an expression that he almost wishes was solely anger, unreadable as it otherwise is. Yet nothing can sway him from this hard stance and he swings an arm out towards the undergrowth behind. Kaitlyn’s head shakes and turns the growl rumbling in her chest into a choppy sound, hands bunching and nose screwing. The choice is a thin line of equal likelihood between concession and caving another crook in his nose, her hand lifting to no surprise. The duffel bag that thuds against his chest and swings his arm back to be caught in a fumble against his knee, is, however. He looks at it confused and back up again, just in time to see the approach, left no chance to sidestep it, of her shoulder checked against his own as she passes. 

“We can all smell that, right? Everyone take one big breath and try telling me I’m wrong. Yeah, I swear to God, this is...” While it doesn't make sense as to why, Kaitlyn’s scoff is less scalding than it has been for a while now and the look she levels at him then is accompanied by a sigh of simmered down irritation. He still wouldn’t call it an improvement, the opposite if anything, as puffed up anger turns to genuine sentiment. “You’re worse than a dick. You’re a fucking idiot, Ryan.”

With those heartfelt words of wisdom, she’s gone. Jacob trails after her, granting another short clasped hand to Ryan’s shoulder along the way, once again for reasons still unclear. Emma flicks wide eyes between him and their departure, until a beckon is thrown back to her by Kaitlyn. Indecision wars over her features for a comically short time and she doesn’t even bother to give him an apologetic look as she scampers on after them. Her loyalty doesn’t cost any meager pat on the head, but rather a weirdly charged argument, apparently. Ryan’s head tracks after her, but she’s quickly lost from sight. He supposes it’s not like he can be too upset, considering he didn’t pay in either, nor is he actually wanting to bride her at all. He sighs, squinting at the brush they’ve suddenly disappeared through, then at the mystery bag in his hands and finally, slowly, up and over, his eyes lift to Dylan still standing there. The two of them, alone. He blinks. Fuck. This was not Ryan’s intention. 

He should turn tail and go. He nearly does, heel pivoting and shoulder dropping, joints starting to twist- stopped in place by a fleck of gold. In iris darkened beneath the shade, a blink swirls the metallic radiance into curls of ribbons, gold whirled to dance in every slight flick of his eyes. It’s beautiful, he’s beautiful, his doe eyed fawn, yellow glowed wolf. And the flayed creature is loose, free. His hand moves separate from his control. 

He reaches out and grabs Dylan’s wrist, an uncanny imitation of the month before. It doesn’t burn, doesn’t leave sparks flying in the air. It’s tangible, real. Skin pulls taunt along the dragging friction of his fingerprints, tendons slip off to the side beneath his thumb dug in, bones roll under flesh and their pulse matches an echoing thud, a drummed beat rushed through veins. The closest they’ve been, since they woke in the same bed, beneath the same covers, shinbone held in palm. Only, the meeting of their skin feels so much colder now. 

How he’d dashed forward, to catch his wrist and then frozen in motion there, as if his touch was the gaze of Medusa; arm locked outstretched, Ryan is stooped over himself, stood upright, yet rooted on knees bent midstep and spine cowed below hunched shoulders. His eyes do not lift; his other hand does. A slow rise to gentler cradle the radial side, where the artery lays nearer the surface for blood’s threaded heat to escape in the cold of night, now ebbing warmth within his thieving palm instead. Warm, the light of him always so warm, and cold too, shivering in the cold as he always does. Sunlight swallowed, skin moonlight pale, swirling gold through eyes and numbing bitter spiked scent. It’s all him. To the star, the moon's reflected shine, surrounding deep space, phosphorus forged within and stellar remnants become black hole of impossible escape. 

In the slog near moonrise, his thoughts cave in, senses trickling to a narrowed world. A touch is all it takes. A touch, a wintermonth, a conversation, a sledgehammer, or two. A hacking clawed, frenzied slashing, unchained and howling flayed animal. A sun, a star, a black hole… a frozen pit, a fractured cavern, the void within. And like shards of glass scattered at his feet, catching the near gone light, all reflections of Ryan’s own bitter loneliness are mirrored, there within him too. In the emotion that’s remained buried in his honeyed scent, constant, sombre, heavy and so very familiar. Gnawing at Ryan for months, aware of its presence and yet lost to define it. Only now, does he see why- hidden, lapsed into his own. Yet to realise what it is, is to realise as well, the dull ache of loneliness has never once left Dylan’s scent. All in a conflicted and confusing dredge of emotions, he finds the worst part of himself echoed in the person he loves, and where mirrored, looks nothing like how he’s seen within himself. Where’s the teeth, the disgust, the cruelty? That either says something about him and his flayed animal, or about Dylan, or if indeed, the animal perhaps within them both. And that terrible sympathy, another echo, bubbles up, for him, for himself, for them.   

Ryan could change that, he thinks to himself. He could be there, replace where loneliness resides. His coat to bundle him, warm shivering hands in his own, wake beside him through the seasons, listen to any thought wanted spoken, press lips to dimpled smiles, take and follow anywhere. Ryan might not offer much, but he does not ask for much. To give and be given presence. As each a half of together, they won't be alone any more. He could. If he could, if only he could. And the gold swirls in doe eyes, and the porcelain shines in dusk light, and the howling persists in desires resolute. All Ryan truly ever wants for him, is to be okay.        

He could fix that, he thinks firmer- not just through those means come of his selfish desires. Already should have, if Jacob proves his strongly held supposition tonight, that to bite and be bitten, forges connection without need to untangle iron links. But he’s tried, and tried again, to no avail. All it should take is acceptance- or trust. Dylan could likely list his instructions off by heart, had said so himself, he’d ticked off each bullet point to try. Words have not failed him. When dawn breaks and new scars adorn skin, there will be no satisfaction in his theory proven correct. Ryan will be forced then to admit fault lies in the messenger. A cinderblock is wedged between them, stuck there long before Maine. Either Dylan always knew behind a tongue bitten until forced into confrontation, or he did not have to so specifically, could feel Ryan’s steady grown rot beneath the floorboards of friendship’s shambles, long before realisation gave way. He doesn’t trust Ryan, didn’t, hasn’t, likely not ever. Yet he did, he must have. 

Meanwhile, Ryan’s trust is held in his senses and instincts to a fault. The scent made heady at peace, sugar fruit and honey suffusing anxiolytic sedatives from lungs to fingers, exists only as an overflow of settled content. Most often found when they were alone, together. It is not phantasmal, nor Ryan’s own emotions mistaken for it, he’d felt the quiet comfort, a kind which does not form without trust. It was there and it was real, before he shattered it to the needlelike spikes piercing him now. Split down the middle, each side wars for Ryan’s placed belief, if the trust was truly ever there or not. It does not resolve his questions, nor comfort him, either way. It merely leaves him willing to plead. He is no dog, he does not beg, not for himself, not for anyone; none except the sun, clutched in hand, for a howling desperate and distraught, in the resolution to do all he can to make sure Dylan is okay. That soul bound instinct for which he’d do anything, in the same honeycomb hollows where Ryan keeps him bone deep.                                   

And beg he does. Again, as he had last month, as he will every month, every season and every year, if he must. It spills from his mouth, blood from a broken tooth, forming true only in the air, beyond where he’d be able to think better and chew any of it back down. In each word his skin crawls, leaves it shredded, carves it from him. He begs flayed, eyes cast down, spine cowed, hand grasped tight, unable to let go, he never did, never will. “Endure it, please. You know what I’m going to ask, and I am asking you, just please, keep trying. Push through it, let it happen, let yourself turn, until it works and- you have to choose it. And things will get better. I know I can’t ask, I know it’s selfish to ask at all, I- I won’t argue it isn’t. But I really want you to. To be okay and, well this is all I can do, so I am. I’m asking. Please.” 

Those golden brown eyes flick over his face, down to his captured wrist and settle off somewhere in the woods behind. Tired, flat, the very first words directed to him since fleeing Maine are short, unmoved. “Right, that’s what this- Yeah. Sure.”

Then however, his face changes. After a breath taken, brows furrow above cheeks lifted, creased by eyes’ narrow squint, all drawn inwards to center his scrunching nose. Those first words lead into the most hurtful accusation Ryan could ever dread to hear, filled with an overt concern that softens it none. “Is that- have you been drinking?”

It’s an unexpected and precise aimed jab to his chest. Skewers right through to the ugly, green and muddied vault, down in the depths where memory becomes fear. All the years collected, for the horror at ever being seen as anything like her and his staunch refusal to give any reason why he should. Is that how he looks right now? Drunken and demented, grabbing at him like a raving preacher proclaiming salvation on the street or some frathouse boy on one too many ignoring refusal? Ryan drops his wrist as if scalded, feels the temperate drop to freezing for it, rearing a few steps back. 

He can taste only coffee and cottage pie on his tongue, as he starts towards earnest denial. And reaches a slightly scratched raw throat, just to realise that indeed, he had. This morning feels like days ago, yet drags on all the one and same. Fuck. Although he’s shocked Dylan could still pick out what no one else seemed to, a thumb run along small droplets splattered over leather provides the reason of proximity. Gave himself up, forced now to give more. As little desire he has to explain, desperation to not be seen as anything like his mother overwhelms him. 

There’s no excuse he can summon that’d do any better than truth. Mostly. “Not uh, I mean not really. I guess hours ago, kinda. This morning, we uh, well Travis he- it was for Chris. At his grave, all of their- um. Ahm.” 

Again, Dylan’s face shifts, reamended concern and sympathetic understanding. Ryan stares, devours, paints it to memory, this barefaced kindness, here in the wake of it all. Stock still, unmoving, eyes flick to the hand Dylan reaches out midair, to the falter, to the withdraw and drop. To his lips, bitten then parted, to breathe, “God, that’s why- here? And all morning you… oh. God, dude. I uh, I’m… shit, I’m so sorry, Ryan, I really am. I know how much he- Are you okay? Genuinely. I-I don’t, um, I mean, just. Are you?”

“Fine.” He says. He wants to tell him everything, this broken bloodied tooth of his. That he stood sobbing at those graves, this month was so miserable he only pushed through in seconds, the bent telephone pole he’d crumbled beneath, why he hates the cold of winter, where he’d left his lungs in Maine, all the sleepless nights, how much he misses him, that he loves him more than he can plainly comprehend. “I’m fine.”

Even Dylan has nothing more he can say to that. “Okay.”

“Right, yeah.” There really is nothing else to say. Time now draws slim minutes near its end. He still remembers those quieter, overspoken words of earlier however, and hesitates again before he turns. “Listen, man, it is up to you. If you want to go after them, or stay here. Just, I know I can’t, okay? But I am. I’m asking, and you can ignore that it’s me doing it. Trust in Kaitlyn or Emma if you need, go or stay, just please. Try again, keep trying, I know I’m not who- just, if you’re lonely, and I mean you are, uh. And if you don’t want m- oh fucksake, man. What I’m trying to say, I just know this can help. So please, that’s all I wan- ask. Jesus, sorry, okay I gotta, I’m going.”

His tongue tied and his head shaking frustratedly, Ryan looks away, unable to face the reaction towards his stumbling, escaped honesty. At last, he scoops up the bag and turns to leave, a dragging first step left for response. It comes in the strangest mix of taken aback, touched and confused, “Um, yeah, okay. I’ll stay here, I mean not like I didn’t want to, think Kaitlyn was just trying to prov- uh, nevermind. I’m so, uhm, might be stupid again but I don’t understand how y- I feel like I fuc- uh. Sorry. No, I-I know you have to get going. Uh, guess I’ll just… yep.”

And that’s that. Has to be, after how that was so awkward, endearing, intriguingly confusing and if he let it, ensnaring. Ryan walks away. He’s at the treeline, not so far off when somewhere behind, Dylan calls after him in promise. “I will, okay? I’ll try again. Because I- it might not work, I mean, probably won’t. It doesn’t matter if it does or doesn’t though, right? I just- I trust you, Ryan. And I’ll- okay. Yeah, see you in the morning. Night, Ryan.”

A declaration of trust, a return of farewells, a trace of hope, a little bit of anything. He doesn’t know where that came from, if said while aware how much it’d mean to him and then in a literal sense as well, doesn’t trust himself to know where, either. Ryan can’t respond, can’t look back or his legs will take him crawling along behind. Leather boots falter in the overgrowth all the same, steel cap digging through dirt, snapping a twig, ripping up roots. Steadies a deep breath, fills with sentiment, exhales relief. Flicks out two fingers by his temple in salute, forces himself onward. A second at a time. Complicated, unidentifiable emotions toil, slosh and churn in each step. Acid does too. It’s dark enough at this point, each forced pace is a risk and his stumbling won’t take him very deep through. He must look animal already, in these shadows. 

When there’s only trees, dirt and wind surrounding him, Ryan has to let himself stop and collapse back against the nearest trunk. He can’t have walked for more than a few minutes, and leaden steps forging through the underbrush don’t exactly travel great distances in slim time. However his breath has grown ragged and the shove of determination to go off alone has drained alongside sweat rolling in beads down his ribs. The best he can do now is not turn right around back. The brown, dustcaked leather is his sole focus point to ground him, motivated by attachment to save the jacket before it’s soon torn to shreds. He finally considers the duffel bag thrown at him, unzipped to the tender realisation that without being asked for, she’d still put together his very own morning-ready pack. Touching, if perhaps somewhat undercut by the sticky note slapped on a water bottle, its terribly drawn stick figure giving him both middle fingers.    

He unlaces boots, skins off jacket arms, strips top to pants, tucks it all safely in the bag. Hooks that on a low hanging branch, and breathes. Waits, though not really, lacking the chance. Logically, for the descending night to be felt, symptoms must have been present enough. There if he does focus on them, the light prickling beneath skin, slight rolling stomach, rising fever warmth, aching, straining, chafing bones and teeth. It’s become almost too easy to ignore, before and up to now in these last little seconds, further muddied by winter’s dark obscuring exactness. In one blink he’s standing there. In another, blood splatters. A crack of bones, slough of flesh, plain fleeting and sharp, almost gone unnoticed entirely. As pupils expand and eyes open to grey woods, he keels forward and claws drop to the earth. His fangfilled maw swings a curve upwards, howl piercing through the air, to a moon unseen. 

Arms to shoulders and down his spine, an electric zap jolts muscles tensed then relaxed, shaking to both clean and ground himself. A flesh scrap slops to the grass, blood rolls in drips off his pelt. It’s sticky and vicious and spared barely a thought in the sudden recognition he’s alone. He shouldn’t be. Already, he moves. Through the viscera splattered over grass and seeping off the branches cratered around him, retracking back along his path, claws scraping apart bootprints in the dirt. Until a long and jagged sound rebounds off the canopy, his ears perking above throat tilting, his answer returns. Twin howls lift, split across the island, birds scattering above. In the fading echo, a stranger calls. 

Eyes pointed warily at his path end ahead, his lip curls and head jolts, twisting with a snorted growl. Indecision is short, though frustration filled. Dylan has not yet woken, won’t for some time. Later, he will find him later. There’s another cur in his territory tonight, a friend, he knows. And yet as it stands, a threat to him and his pack. He made sure his fawn is safe, tucked away within shelter, for this to conclude first. Still, he’s antsier for how it’s a cur, will be soothed only after the fight. Must better end it quick, then. Turning, hands pummel the dirt, breath fogs the air, weaving through trees and torn up evergreen. 

Although he had not come in far from shore, his pack had travelled deeper, towards their clearing on the southward side. He shouldn’t have parted from them. Where his mercy waylaid him before, return is not deterred enough to take long now, slowed by neither distance, nor the dense thicket through tightset trees to get there. He knows course end is close, as scents fill snout to skull, closer still as another howl shatters apart air, notably sooner than last she woke. At the sound of short warning barks and low thrumming growls however, his ears flatten back and legs spur quicker. He swallows his howl to linger silent in return, head bowed and joints crooking, he keeps pace low to the ground on quietened footfalls.

By heartdrum beaten leaps and bounds, Ryan crashes through branches and twists into a balanced skid over the grass. Another clearing parts the forest here, smaller than their marked haven, barely thinned enough to sever a hollow to the sky above. Blood drips off leaves, stains trail after chunks sliding down treebark and three sets of eyes turn to him. White sheened iris beam like foglights through the dark, amidst sunken pools of oil and tar. Within this small woodland clearing, enveloped in the scent of a warstruck village, smoke curls over golden wheatfields put to the torch. His beta holds tense, her warning growls a loud echo through the woods, above the summer wolf tucking a head against her and appearing to cower- protecting her throat, in truth. The reaver, a cur, a friend, stood there covered in blood and soot. A stocky frame, larger than his own, coal eyed and woken from ferality, yet as of now, still thin pelted and withered. It’s those eyes, black snapped to red, for that he’ll lose. Alone, surrounded, outnumbered, weakened, but unwilling to flee.

His steadying breath of waking is cut half drawn, Ryan gives no warning. Taken off guard by the hidden approach, poor positioning at clearing center leaves the cur’s side open to his ready tensed pounce, claws sunk into flank without defence. Although hazed and hindered as he is, the wolf startles to turn and fight in all the vicious effort he’s able. Head twisted, Jacob’s teeth clamp down on his shoulder, immobilising his arm to hang limp and useless. Ryan’s other claws rip free for a hard lashed swipe, the weight carrying along arm to spine, using his entire body followed through to twist himself loose. Blood drips and patters already, yet limbs flurry in movement unbroken. As legs coil in tandem, leaping through breath misted air, claws rake in a thudding collision that drops them crashing down against the earth. Each talon rips deep as it can, shredding gashes in skin, limbs tangling to reach. 

The fight goes longer than it should. The cur is larger, has strength and bulk enough to hold his own. Able only by exploiting the sluggish haze of Jacob’s freshly woken mind, Ryan uses his size against him, springing in and out, nipping at supportive tendons and skittering away before chunks are carved, should any heavy weighted swings land. It saves him taking the brunt of deeper injuries, but tires him sooner. Even in the havoc, it’s clear there’s no guarantee this is a fight he’d win. If he were alone- Ryan has a pack. 

His beta, skirting around the edges to swipe out where she can, lands a well placed claw hooked between tendons and forces an awkward twist needed for Jacob to yank free. In his distraction, a sudden blur darts forward, slicing another leg out from under him. Ryan presses in on his struggle to rise, pouncing on undefended ribs. Trailed by dangling strips of skin through the air, caught in thickening heaps beneath claws, his arms swing down over and over. He digs through flesh as if burrowing in dirt, shredding skin to tatters, scooping up handfuls of wet meat, scraping against bone, scattering chunks over grass. At last, displaced by pained writhing, he’s knocked back to stand above, looking for admitted defeat. After a moment where only heavy breathing and rapid pulse fills the clearing, the cur slowly manages to rise. Jacob forces himself up, head ducked and breath rattling, back on shaky legs despite the gaping hole left in his side. 

The moment stills, pained whines fading to that ratting pant and deep rumbling growls easing off. In the quiet, a distant howl calls through the air. For all the thicket that keeps sight from him, even blinded he’d know where to look. Affection does blind him. A strike bursts forward, bloodstrained maw opening to bare sharp lined teeth, jaw snapping high on Ryan’s side, another tight clamped bite. Widened jaw, sunken deep, well aimed in ambush. Kaitlyn darts forward too, her own bite clamping on Jacob’s ankle, head jerking and leg shaken, side to side in an attempt to shake either free, though difficult to tell by whose lead.   

The pain alights desperation. The fawn is awake, neck scarred and scarable, not by mark of the teeth bitten here in flesh, not if his own fangfilled jaw still ever hinges. To break free, Ryan twists, strikes at the clearest weak point there is and when loosened, bites without regard. An even lined slash from beneath an ear to temple, before neck wrenching in a snap, his teeth clamp down, hard- over a snout, locking a jaw shut between his own. Teeth scrape bone, blood pours within his mouth and spills an overflow splattering down beneath them. A rapid shake of his head, jostling the skull and jolting the spine, limpens the cur stunned. There is no fight left able beneath torn up flesh, and with a sickening crunch his teeth pull free. The few droplets left spilling out from the rest of his viscous swallow patter over Jacob as he falls.

And with that, as bonds quicken waxlike in blood, the fervency and desperation wanes. Although no posture of deference is offered, mauled to lay there breath ragged and heart rapid, his collapse on the ground is surrender manifest. Ryan steps away from the body at his feet. While in the midst of their fight, the burning pain slashed and bitten through his skin had blurred with the exertion seared along muscle. Here in the aftermath, sharp pain alights over ribs to shoulder to flank, blood still seeping, sizzling, scorching in each movement’s twinge. The damage is deeper than skin, blood spilt in glugs enough to leave him sluggish, but unlike Jacob, in all the pain, he can still move. It’s all he needs. 

As the girls nudge curious, and certainly unappreciated, noses against their pack’s new addition, he spares a short pause to favour a leg and catch his breath, checking over them. The fight was scrappy, frenzied claws and limbs thrown out leaving even Kaitlyn bearing wounds. All seeping shallow, she doesn’t seem bothered wasting any concern towards it. He can see in her eyes now, the presence in herself. Coalesced, whole, it is truly Kaitlyn standing here, beta of the pack. As only for her own that she’s still spurned by instinct alone, the clearly deep rooted part of her now able to remain worried over Jacob, comes through rough pawing at his shoulder, incessant sniffing at his wounds and entirely ignoring the growls to back off earned in response. Not in gentle hands perhaps, but he’s rest assured their new pack mate will be looked after in his absence. He lets out a harsh snuff and shakes his head in a directionless command, understood all the same. 

Then off he goes, his path back through the underbrush stained behind him. He finds Dylan out beneath the slivered moonlight, chasing a rabbit through the woods. At his approach, the fawn spooks, kicking out a step readied to bolt, flattened down blindly on his prey, hunt brought to swift end by more of a loud squelching than any dying squeal. Feral, still. And yet, somehow recognition strikes even so, lighting up those golden eyes. Muscles loosen from readied, his footfall lifting with strings of sinew clinging to palm heel, pulled taut by a nearer step and snapping apart, drawing his notice at last. The half mashed pulp of a rabbit scooped up in teeth, brought and dropped at Ryan’s feet, is a gift offered by a head tilted expectantly. 

He almost hates to be shown that, no matter how fraught sentiments may be in daylight, there must still remain an undeniable fondness held steady and deep within, for it to then emerge so plainly when night is dark and moon is full. The sorrow in that won’t find moor until dawn, when his mind driven solely by instinct is fixed to the present, he feels only smitten affection at the overt caring attention. Nosing at his throat, licking a stripe from up past jaw to ear, he’s just glad to have him near. He then happily takes the kill, in half a mind to go find his pack and show off, exceedingly proud over his fawn’s gifted trophy. All the proof of his successful hunt, capability and favour- admittedly ignoring the poor state of it half minced. The idea doesn’t quite make it to any step taken, the sounds of loudly crunched bones and wetly scoffed meat filling an empty stomach and woods. 

The night settles after that, by blood split and bonds sealed, all his pack now found. Along their return, a lone deer lifts its head off the grass, ears flicking and eyes widening, thudded lightless against earth once more. The effort to drag the carcass back pulls at deep bitten wounds on his side, his own blood mingling in the smear of its torn out throat raked behind. Together they pass by the small, stained clearing, tracking after the pack and soon return to their center marked territory. The wolves are lounged around in wait, Jacob laying exhausted by the short trek he’d managed, while Kaitlyn looks out from her claim over the rock and Emma flitters around in protesting whines. His entry into the clearing does have the two of them bounding over, though Emma comes to him with all sorts of noises trying to snitch and Kaitlyn pushes by in eyes set only on the food he’s brought. Ryan drags the carcass further in, set down to free his dart forward, for a shallow, yet skin breaking nip to his beta’s upper arm. The scar certain to be left will hopefully serve as a reminder of the fight she lost and her place, where she’d best stay mindful it’d put her, if the gnarled skin of her shoulder in daylight isn’t quite enough. While Jacob gets up to hobble over, she whirls a step back and growls low under her breath, but by the time he joins them, her rumbles have already guttered in acceptance to the undeniably deserved reprimand. 

While order around moonlit feasts always held consequential choice, the pack has grown to the point there are now too many bodies for them to descend all together regardless. He eats his fill, starved and willing to go hunting for boar, if it means he does not have to ration. As his beta goes to eat, and the coal eyed wolf goes to join her, teeth snap him off. For all his strength, size and instinctively fight set nature, this choice stands to the betterment of them both, soothing down emotions from that defensive fear made aggression of his, to even selfishly, Ryan’s own threatened jealousy. And despite her current attitudes, he has faith in his beta, he doesn’t need two. Jacob is too battered for any attempt at fighting it, so he merely takes his new place when her hunger is sated, Emma rushing up beside him. It isn’t only Kaitlyn who growls her away now, the order she was bullied into last moonlit night, by his bared teeth set to remain here out. At last, she’s left the remains to share alongside his fawn, still feral, yet welcomed regardless once again.

The darkness thickens and ebbs, sunken beneath grey clouds blackened by inky sky, the winter cold rising aside moonfall tilting over. In the final push of aching muscles and seeping wounds, Ryan hauls himself atop the rock and settles down in the calm lulled at last. The ribboned meat stripped off deer bone did much for the claw slashed lacerations, but his deeper wounds can be left only time. He’s joined shortly by Dylan, who’s seemingly content to watch the clamour below while cleaning off paws, until he nudges closer, licking at open wounds for him instead. Ryan bathes in every sense beneath his attention, despite the futile effort bringing only a sting, wounds marginally cleaned and no more healed.            

After watching her bother the pack’s first dealt omega for some time, Ryan sends Kaitlyn off hunting. Although Emma had seemed to lap up the attention of her pawing nudges and light nipping, enough to be successfully distracted from the scenting carried out beneath, their rowdy circling disturbs Jacob’s rest. While his wounds are still healing, she’s better put to use helping regain his strength, rather than trampling right over him. Easily done, should any deer or boar herd still remain on the island. There does, if a few less than before, by her stain covered maw and claws hooking along a large pig on her return. Half the carcass goes to Jacob alone, the hole dug in his side by Ryan’s claws so severe, it is only after his second feast the skin begins knitting closed. Once they’ve left only discarded bones and chewy sinew, Ryan takes post at his watchtower alone. The omega and his fawn off running in circles around the clearing, while his beta finally settles enough to laze and the delta continues his rest.    

As Ryan watches throughout the night, white sheened iris fleck gold in emerging aglow and black tar pools marble ivory veins, the softening foglight beams relighting in another. By dawn’s approach, all that remains of golden wheatfields is the shine gilding Emma’s eyes, wispy summer air blooming in a warmth now sweetly spiced. Where solid black paled blinded white in turn, Jacob’s scent of coal and charred pine lifted spiralling apart, an airy breeze cooled beneath the sharper winds of true winter. Then at the end to howls led in rising chorus, night gives way to early morning and there’s only the scent of blood misted red in the air.