Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 17:56:29 -0700 (PDT)
From: CloseTheCellarDoor <closethecellardoor@yahoo.com>
Subject: Evil is a Man:    Dog Eat Dog No More  ---- Chapter 16

Send comments or suggestions to "closethecellardoor@yahoo.com."

CHAPTER SIXTEEN


By the time I went to bed Friday night, once again in Will's arms, the
other wolves had all switched rooms.  Russ would have his double bed back,
and Cougar would sleep in a real bed again after only one night on the
couch.  Case had filled up the office with his many things and transformed
it into his bedroom as much he could manage, sensing perhaps the permanence
of the situation.  I wondered if he would still try to play the alpha to
the others as he always had done now that he would be doing it from the
bottom.  I hoped that he wouldn't even try, and if he did, I hoped that he
had lost enough respect among the other wolves so that they wouldn't follow
any of his commands.

My argument with Will over who should get the bigger bedroom ended without
any more discussion.  That first night we lay together in his bed, the one
that didn't remind me of Case.  We lay in the dark holding each other,
naked.  I pressed my lips to black hair above his right nipple, still
unable to believe that he was once again mine, and more than ever before.
I wanted to know every inch of his body, to worship every perfection and
imperfection alike.

"Just a few hours ago I was sure that having you as my partner would bring
this house to the ground," he said, kissing the top of my head.  "Now, I
think maybe we'll be able to compromise."

I looked up at him.  "I have a different idea about how to be alpha than
you," I admitted.  "Sometimes I think you're too laid back and distanced.
I had planned on changing your laissez faire policies when I became alpha
into something a little more involved."

He sighed.  "How can I be involved in a pack if I don't like any other
member `cept the one in bed with me now?"

"I understand your perspective, Will, and I don't hold it against you," I
reassured him.  "But you should know that ever since you became alpha, Case
has been calling a lot of the shots behind your back.  All of those issues
that you refused to concern yourself with went straight to Case.  Now's our
chance to really earn some respect from the wolves.  I'm going to take a
page from Case's book and be available to them when they need me."

"Fine, you buddy up to all of them assholes.  I'm not.  We'll play good
cop, bad cop.  You give them sensitivity, you're good at that, and I'll
bust in to kick some ass when needed."

I chuckled.  "Okay, that'll work for me," I said.

"What about the house money?  You want to be in charge of that too?  Want
me to put half of it into your account?"

"Sure," I said, really never thinking about the money.  "Now, most
importantly, what should we do about the vampires?  As far as I know,
you're the only one of us that hasn't been attacked here in Philly."

"That's because I don't go out much," he said.  "And when I do, I'm
careful."

"There's been so many close calls with the vampires," I said, shaking my
head.  "I'm worried that next time, somebody's going to end up getting
killed."

"We'll have to stay indoors then," he said.

"And what's stopping them from just breaking the doors down and coming in?"

He shrugged.  "They must not know where this den is," he said.  "Or else,
why wouldn't they have come at us when they killed all the others in the
city?"

"But that doesn't make sense," I told him.  "Hadrian told us that the
vampires had gotten a hold of a list of every den in the world, including
ours.  He speculated that the pack was so small it wasn't worth the trouble
of taking out."

"Maybe he's wrong," offered Will.  "What if the copy of the list they have
doesn't have this den listed?  Who knows?"

"Maybe that's it," I said, but wasn't convinced.  "I don't know, none of
this really seems to make sense.  I just feel like it's unsafe for us
here."

"It is," he said.  "It's unsafe for us anywhere these days.  I wish you had
come along sooner, before all of this shit with the vampires started
happening.  Back when us wolves ruled the cities.  If we'd smell `em come
round, if they got in our way, we'd kill them--get the jump on them and
kill them.  That's how it was meant to happen, or else vampires would be
able to smell us like we can them."  He squeezed me close against him.
"Now, everything's so fucked up for us. You'll never be safe from them now.
I have this awful feeling, you know, like something's gonna happen to you."

"I'll be fine," I said.  "We'll be fine, we're strong, Will.  It's the
others I'm worried about."

He shook his head.  "I wish we could just comb through the city and kill
the vampires like before, but they're too many for us now."

"And worse than that, they're so well organized," I said.  "That's what we
need to do, Will, we need to organize.  Not just this den, but all wolves,
everywhere.  We need to communicate freely and make decisions together.  We
need to help each other."  I pulled back and looked into his eyes.  "You
know Cougar was almost killed by a pack in Florida?  Just went seeking
shelter and support and they tried to kill him for it."

"That's not unusual," he said.  "That's just the way it is."

I laughed.  "Matt said the same thing.  He said wolves usually don't think
twice before killing a wolf from another pack.  But regardless of whether
it's normal or not, it's wrong and it's stupid.  We don't have the luxury
of fighting amongst ourselves, not when we're at war with the vampires."

"You're right, of course," he said.  "I often think the same thing.  But
there's nothing we can do about it.  The only person who has any control
over the other packs is Hadrian."

The mention of that name sent a fresh wave of negativity into my head.
"Hadrian wants to do the exact opposite.  He's trying to reduce the
communication between the packs to protect our identities and our locations
from prying eyes.  It couldn't be more irresponsible of him."

"That may be true, but there's no way you'll convince him of that.  And the
other alphas go along with what he says."

"Why is that?" I asked.  "Was he elected leader?"

"No.  He's just an old, strong wolf who's earned a lot of respect over the
years."

"I think it's time he stepped down," I said.  "Let somebody younger and
more in touch with reality take over."

"Who, you?" he asked, smiling.

I grabbed his shoulder.  "Us.  Both of us.  We're a team."

He had a wry smile on his face.  "Uh-huh.  Is this really about doing the
right thing, leading the wolves of the world in the right direction, or is
this about glory?"

"It's about both," I admitted.  "I just know that we'd be good for this,
uh, this species.  Come on, Will, don't deny it.  We could be all that
stands in the way of the vampires making our kind extinct."

He laughed.  "I think you're power hungry.  You've gotten a taste of it and
now you don't know when to stop."

"Oh, come on.  You're just as power hungry as I am.  As soon as we got
here, you wouldn't take a breath until you were alpha of the house."

"Being alpha satisfies me," he said.  "I don't need anymore responsibility
than this."

"You don't think we'd be better leaders than Hadrian?"

"I do think we'd be better," he said, "but that means nothing.  There's no
way we can replace him, so there's no point in talkin' about it."

"There has to be a way," I said.  "We just have to think about it."

"You go ahead and think about it all night if you want.  I'm tired, I had a
hell of a fight today.  I'm going to sleep."

"Alright, me too," I relented.  "Goodnight."

"Goodnight," he said, kissing the top of my head.

I settled me face against his chest again and reminded myself that Will was
all I really needed to be happy.

*****

How can I describe the next few days and possibly do them justice?  In a
matter of one night everything had changed in my life.  The house seemed so
much brighter and more alive than it ever had before.  I stopped resenting
the fact that I couldn't leave it, instead counting every minute Will and I
had together as sacred.

We did everything together, mostly staying in his room, talking, watching
movies, rough-housing, and of course, the sex.  There was no trace of the
resentment that had always been at the back of my mind during the first
incarnation of out relationship.  Now, we were equals, sexually and
otherwise.  Will fulfilled every need I had--I could talk to him openly and
freely; he wasn't as sensitive or as eloquent as Case had been, but he had
a modest wisdom that only someone his age could accrue, and I found this
extremely compelling.  The sex was the best I had ever had, with the
pretensions of dominance and submission thrown out the window.  We weren't
fucking--he wasn't willing to bottom at all and I wasn't willing to do it
without reciprocity--but other than that the sex was very imaginative and
incredibly satisfying.

Perhaps best of all, I had more fun being around Will than anyone else.  He
never failed to make me laugh--a trait Case was seriously lacking.  I
didn't need to run off to Matt and Cougar to have my fun; Will would
provide it for me.

I realized this was leading to a problem for me.  I was so happy with Will
that I had started to neglect the rest of the pack.  While Will was
perfectly content to shut the world out and spend every moment with me
alone, I meant what I said about the value of an alpha to being more
connected to his pack, and I was going to act upon it.

Even more importantly, I valued my friendships with Matt and Cougar
immensely, and I refused to be one of those people who neglects their
closest friends whenever their romantic life is going well.  So, when
Wednesday came around, I devoted my day to hanging out with my buds.

"Look who's finally coming around to pay a visit to his lowly subjects,"
Cougar teased when I told them of my plan to stick to them like glue that
day, but he was undeniably pleased.

We couldn't leave the house anymore (meals consisted of anything that could
be delivered--we even started getting our groceries delivered), but we
managed to entertain ourselves nonetheless, mostly by playing videogames.

Matt laughed suddenly when I picked up my controller.  "What?" I asked
self-consciously.

He raised his eyebrows.  "It's just that I've never seen an alpha play
videogames before.  Doesn't seem right somehow."

"How is it that he can kick our asses in a real fight, but when we fight
electronically, he always loses?" asked Cougar as he once again ripped my
virtual character in two on the screen.

At that moment Case walked out of the study (which he had enclosed earlier
by hanging sheets over the entrances) wearing just a pair of jeans and
work-boots.  I didn't look up as he walked behind us.

"Hey guys," he said.

"Wassup, man." said Cougar.

"How's it goin, dude?" asked Matt.

I said nothing.  I had steadily ignored him since Friday.

"I just thought I'd go out back and fix the yard up some," he said, then
sort of hung around as if he was waiting for me to say something.  I
didn't.

"Alright, take it easy, bro," said Matt.

"Yeah, later," said Case, finally walking away out back.

"That was awkward," I said when he was gone.  "He always has to be working
on something, doesn't he?"

Matt shrugged.  "The poor guy's been a bit lost since last week.  He
doesn't know how not to be in charge."

"Have you guys been giving him laundry to do?  Making him clean up?"

"No," butted in Cougar.  "They still make me do all that shit."

"Case being our slave is like an alpha playing video games.  It just
doesn't seem right somehow," said Matt.

"Damn right its right!" I yelled.  "He's at the bottom and he should be
treated like that."

"Rick, you know you're my bro and all," said Matt.  "But sometimes you can
take your vendettas a little too far."

Now I was getting mad.  "Too far?!  You think demoting him is too far?  I
could have killed him!"

"No," said Matt, shaking his head.  "You were right to demote him.  But now
that you've done that, what's the point in carrying this around with you
anymore?  You should let it go and move on."

I didn't say anything, but looked at Matt obstinately.

"Look, do you want to be a good alpha or not?  `Cause you'll never really
have control over this pack unless Case is on your side."

I looked towards Cougar.  "He's right, man," he said.

I never agreed, but they're advice hung around in the back of my head all
day.

I decided that they were right; it would be in my best interest to get rid
of the bad blood between Case and myself.

Later that night, I asked Will if he approved.

"Are you going to fuck him?" he asked.

"No," I assured him.  "Him and I are through, permanently."

"Then I don't give a shit what you do.  I thought you should have killed
him."  He shrugged.  "If you're going to keep him alive, might as well make
him an ally, right?  After all, you're supposed to be the one who the pack
trusts and responds to.  How can he trust you if you hate him?"

So with that, I approached Case the next day, knocking on the wall outside
the study politely instead of just tearing through the curtains.

"Come in," he said.

I went into the transformed space of the study.  The computer had been
disassembled and the desk now served as a make-shift dresser.  All of
Case's things were set around the room, and the couch had sheets upon it
and a nice bedspread.  Clearly this was no longer a public space, this was
Case's room.  My first instinct was to yell at him for his arrogance and
make him put all his stuff away.  But I suppressed it.

He was reading the newspaper when I walked in.  He set it down and looked
up at me.

"What can I do for you?" he asked me somewhat apprehensively, as if he
assumed I must have some burdensome task to appoint him.

"I just wanted to talk to you," I said.

He motioned to the couch seat beside him.  "Have a seat."

I sat on the other side of the couch as him, facing him.

"Case," I said, not exactly sure how to put this.  "I want us to be friends
again."

He seemed startled.  "So soon?  Aren't you mad at me still?"

I looked up, thinking about this.  "I should be," I said.  "But, no, I'm
not."

"Shocking," he said.  "You, who collects grudges and wears them like shiny
badges, you're not mad at me anymore?"

"It's unlike me, I know," I said.  "I think it's because I'm so happy with
Will now that there's really no room left for all that anger."

"Wow," he said.  "I figured it would take months, years maybe, for you to
forgive me."

I flinched.  "I'm not forgiving you, Case.  I don't think I ever could.
And my order stands.  But I just want to forget about it and move on."

"Okay.  Agreed."

I smiled at him.

"Now, perhaps, we can get back to where we left off."  He smiled and moved
towards me, pressing his hand against my thigh.

I got up quickly and moved to the desk chair.  "No, that can't happen,
Case," I said.  "I have Will now."

"That's fine," he said, smiling brightly.  "I don't mind Will.  You can
fuck both of us if you want.  Maybe Will can accept me into his bed as
well.  What a threesome we would make--three of the mightiest wolves on the
planet in the same bed."

I shook my head.  "No Case.  It wouldn't be fair to you.  My feelings for
you pale in comparison for what I feel for Will."

He seemed doubtful.  "You seemed pretty damn happy when we were together,"
he said.

I nodded.  "I was happy, yes.  But now I know you're not the man I thought
you were.  And even when we were together, Will still constantly occupied
my thoughts."

He sniggered.  "Yeah, because you wanted to kill the guy," he said.

"Yeah, but don't you get it?  I was so furious at Will because he meant so
much to me before--his betrayal felt far worse than anyone else's could
have.  And now that we're together again, I don't need or want anything
besides him."  I stopped, looking instead at his face.  He seemed so
distraught--had he really been hopeful that we might resume our
relationship someday?  "I'm sorry," I said.  "I hope we can still be
friends."

The sadness left him and he regained his composure.  "Of course," he said.
"Of course we can be friends."

I smiled wide, truly pleased.  "Good.  I hope from time to time I can call
on you for your advice too," I added.

"Yes, my advice is here for your taking," he said.

I stood up.  "Thanks, Case," I said.

He nodded, and I started to walk out.

"Rick?  Can I ask you one question before you go?"

I turned around and nodded.

"Do you think perhaps the reason why you're no longer angry at me is
because you know I was right to do what I had done?  Here you are, happier
than ever and in charge of the pack.  Can you really doubt that, in spite
of all the hardships you faced, you were meant to be here all along?  To
become a wolf and live this life?"

I knew he spoke the truth.  As clearly as I knew I was meant to be with
Will, it also must be true that I was meant to become a wolf all along.
"You're right about that," I told him.  "But that doesn't make your action
any less selfish or wrong."

He gave a slight nod.  "I can agree with that," he said.  "Later, kid."

I walked out through the curtains feeling so much lighter than I had felt
walking in.

*****

"I want a bike," I told Will Monday afternoon.  "All the rest of you have
bikes--why not me?"

"Do you even know how to ride one?" Will asked.

"No.  But I'll learn, right?"

He nodded.  "First, you learn how to ride.  Then if you still want one,
we'll get you a bike."

I stood up off the couch.  "Alright then.  Teach me.  I'm ready to learn."

"There's no place to teach you how to ride here."

"Let's do it out on the street."

He shook his head.  "I have a better idea.  We'll ride out west, outside of
the city.  Vampires never leave the city, we'll be safe there."

"What if they notice us riding and follow us?"

"We'll have our helmets on, they won't be able to see a damn thing."

So, not long after we were on Will's bike leaving the city.  Riding behind
him on the noisy machine, holding his waist tightly--it reminded me of the
day we had met.  Only this time, there wasn't any awkwardness about our
proximity.  I pulled my body tight against his, letting the crotch of my
jeans playfully rub against his denim-covered backside.

We drove east until we had left suburbia and entered a rural, forested
area.  It seemed like Will knew where we were going--he ended up taking us
into an abandoned dirt road shaded by the trees that didn't really seem to
lead anywhere.

He stopped the bike and turned it off, pulling off his helmet.  He smiled
wickedly.  "Holding me a little tight, wouldn't you say?"  He dismounted.

I took off my helmet as well and set it on the ground.  "I didn't want to
fall off," I said jokingly.

"Yeah, right!  If you're dick had been any closer to my ass it would have
been inside of it."  He motioned for me to scoot forward in the seat.
"Alright, you're turn."

I slid up in the seat and firmly gripped the handlebars.  Will sat behind
me and squeezed me so hard I thought I would choke, ramming the bulge of
his crotch into my ass.  "Jeez," I said.  "I wasn't that bad."

"Sorry," he said, loosening up.

"So," I said.  "Where's the gas?"

"The throttle," he said.  He grabbed my hand and placed it upon it.  "It's
here," he said.

"And the brake?"

He showed me where that was too, along with a quick tour of the rest of the
bike.  Then he kissed the back of my neck.  "You ready to give this a
shot?" he said.

"As ready as I'll ever be, I guess."

Following his instructions, I got the bike started and soon I was riding,
very slowly, along the dirt road.  I felt unsure of myself, as if the bike
could at any moment break from my control, so I kept the speed low and
manageable.

"Good," yelled Will from behind me.  "Don't be afraid to kick it up a
notch."

"I'm fine with this notch for now," I said.

I drifted around some more, practicing some wide turns before bringing the
bike to a stop again, and turning it off.

"Don't stop now," he said.  "See what this baby can do.  Let's take her
back out to the road so you can tear up some pavement."

I shook my head.  "I'm not ready for that," I said.  "I'll fall over."

"You won't fall over," he said.  "Don't be afraid of the bike."

"I'm not afraid of the bike," I said.  "I'm afraid of myself.  I don't want
to get us killed."

"You're not going to kill us, Rick, were fuckin' werewolves."

"Well, I don't want to kill your bike either.  That's enough practice for
right now."

He sounded annoyed.  "Yeah?  We came all the way out here and now you're
just ready to quit after just going half way?"

"Ah, come on," I said, lifting my legs up and spinning around on the seat
to face him.  "Don't be mad at me.  We can make this trip worthwhile in
other ways."

I sat on his thighs and pushed my body into his, pressing my crotch into
his pelvis and reaching under his arms to hug him.  With one touch of my
lips against his and his angry face had turned into one of sexual hunger.

He met my kiss with power, putting his tongue inside of me as he leaned
into me.  I leaned back as he pushed me, and I thought I was going to fall
over backwards, but he caught my back with his hands and supported my
weight as we continued to kiss.

He lowered my back against the handle bars, and then, his hands free, he
hastily made a dash for my crotch, massaging my hard dick firmly through
the denim of my jeans.  It felt so good I forgot about the kissing for a
moment and let my mouth go limp as I concentrated on his touch.  His
frantic tongue reminded me, and I returned his kiss once again with fervor.

His hands pulled at my waistband, bursting the button of my jeans open.  He
unzipped them and pulled them down to my thighs with one hard shove.  I
thought he would do the same with my boxers as his eager hands went for
them, but he didn't, he grabbed onto the fabric and ripped my boxers wide
open.

He pulled his mouth away from me finally.  Then he spit into his hand, and
wrapped it around my dick gently, slowly starting to stroke.  A moan
escaped my lips as I leaned back into the handlebars, looking up at the
darkening sky, feeling his rough hand manipulate my cock.

I wanted to reciprocate.  I scooted back on the seat, sadly pulling my dick
away from his hand, and grabbed at his cock through his jeans.  It was
totally solid and poking out above the waistband of his jeans, an angry red
head demanding attention.  I opened his fly and he pulled his jeans eagerly
down his body.  Of course I ripped open his boxers as well, even though I
could have easily pulled them down.  I wasn't going to be the only one
riding home commando tonight.

His dick lay in front of me, unobstructed, perfect.  I spit in both of my
hands and placed them upon his tool, wanting my fingers to cover every
inch.  He grunted as I started to stroke him.

He reached behind me and grabbed my asscheeks, pulling me towards him until
our dicks touched with a sudden burst of electricity.  He spit in his hand
again and put it on my cock and his cock at once, touching my hands as
well.

As we started stroking ourselves together, simultaneously, Will leaned
towards me and our mouths met once more.  I felt his other hand snake under
us, grabbing onto both of our balls, rolling both pairs together as his
other hand and my own continued to stroke our cocks.

My breathing became erratic as the feelings intensified.

We came almost at the same time.  He started a little before I did.
Feeling his shaft against mine--that twitch and spasm as the first burst of
cum came through--that was enough to send me into orgasm as well.  I gasped
as the pleasure took over my body, and started to shoot my cum into his
waiting hand.

He milked both of us completely with his two hands, not spilling a single
drop.  As I sat back, panting, he raised his cupped hands upwards.  They
were filled with our mixed seed.  He smiled devilishly and brought his
hands to his lips, taking a major slurp.  This shocked me; it was one thing
to swallow cum when sucking me off, as he had done numerous times, but this
was the first time I had seen him drink spilt cum.

He swallowed most of it quickly, and then licked his hands clean.  "Didn't
want to make a mess," he said afterwards, still smiling.

He moved forward and kissed me again, only this time the taste in his mouth
had changed completely.  We kissed until we were both soft again.

Finally, we pulled apart from each other, taking off our torn boxers and
zipping up our jeans.

"You ready to head back?" he asked me.

I peered towards the woods.  The trees were starting to darken in the
twilight of dusk.  "Yeah," I said.  "I just got to take a leak."

"Mmm-hmm," muttered Will behind me, getting on the bike.

I stepped off the road, walking through the trees.  When I got to a large,
round rock, I unzipped and pulled out my dick, and started to piss.

"Hey!" called out Will from the dirt road.  "You smell that?"

"What?" I asked, sniffing the air.  There was only one smell apparent to
me.  "My piss?" I asked.

"No.  I thought I smelled--wait, now it's gone.  Never mind."

I took a deep whiff of the cool night air.  Besides the urine, I smelled
the trees, the moss covering the rocks, and some animal smell--probably
squirrels.  I finished up, and shook off, and then I did smell something
peculiar.  The smell got stronger very suddenly, and I realized what it
was.  A vampire.

I yelled out to Will, "I smell vam--"

There was a jolt, and the next thing I remembered I was on the ground,
although I had no memory of falling.  I felt pain in the back of my head;
someone had definitely hit me there.  I opened my mouth and groaned,
getting dirt inside of it in the process.

There was a whishing of movement through branches around me and quickly I
rolled over onto my back.  Above me there was a dark figure in a suit, and
then another, both of them with swords in their hands.

I made to get up, but one of them caught me and held me down with all of
his strength.  The other, acting quickly and completely in accordance with
the first one, lifted up his sword and meant to drop it upon my throat.

Will appeared from behind the one with the raised sword and kicked him hard
in the back with the heel of his boots, causing him to fall forward.  Will
grabbed him by his suit jacket and launched him away into the woods, where
he soon collided with a tree, face-first.  As the one that was holding me
down turned towards Will, he received a kick to the face and then he stood
up and backed away.

Will pulled me up to my feet.  "I just saved your life," he said, quite
proud of himself.

"No you didn't," I said.  "I would have been fine without you."

He was unconvinced.

The vampire that had hit the tree was walking towards us again, his blade
pushing braches out of the way as he moved.  On the other side, the second
vampire was moving towards us with the same speed.

"We should get out of here," I insisted.

"No," he said.  "They need to learn that if they fuck with us, they pay the
price.  There's only two of them.  This shouldn't be a problem."

A third one appeared from the darkness, walking towards us.

"Okay, three.  We can handle three," he said, and he was already started to
transform.

I did so as soon as I saw this, feeling my body burst through all of my
clothes.  As Will ripped through his clothes I wondered briefly what we'd
be wearing one the trip home, then realized that we'd probably both end up
wearing suits.  That is, if we could kill these guys without destroying
their clothing.

All three of them reached us at precisely the same instant.  One of them
ran at me with his sword; I dodged and bit his hand until he dropped it.

Behind me, the other two were ganging up on Will.  He ran deeper into the
woods, trying to separate them, but they were quite strong and I wasn't
sure if he'd be able to handle two on his own.

I, myself, just barely had the upper hand on one of them.  He was fast,
faster than any wolf, and it seemed like I could never get my claws into
him or deal him a significant bite.

Finally, he backed up against a tree, and I charged with all my weight,
smashing him against the trunk.  I bared my teeth and opened my mouth wide,
ready to strike at his throat.

Before I could make the kill, however, one of the vampires fighting Will
had switched targets and came running at me instead.  I moved back, dodging
a sword blow that could have killed me, but in the process released the
vampire that I had been holding against the tree.

Then I was the one trying desperately to fight two of these monsters at
once.  Just like Will, I found I could hold them off, but not really make
any progress towards killing them.

By this time I had started to lose sight of Will in the dark trees.  I was
starting to worry until I heard a distant scream--one that sounded more
human than wolf--and I knew he must have been victorious.

Once again he came through the trees to my rescue.  We each concentrated on
one of the remaining two vampires.  I killed mine first, grabbing his arm
in my hand, pulling him sharply towards me, and biting deep into his throat
with pure carnivorous rage.  I sunk my teeth deeper and deeper into his
flesh as he screamed until I hit bone, then, with a sickening crunch, I bit
through his spine as well.  He stopped screaming.

Will made his second kill soon after I had made my first, but I noticed
unhappily as I transformed back that the vampire's suit was shredded and
bloody.

"See?" he said, panting as he turned back into a very naked man.  "Nothing
we can't handle."

I kicked the headless vampire by my foot.  "I hate these guys," I said.
"Why can't they just leave us alone?  Why is it that when everything else
seems perfect, these guys have to come and mess it all up?"

Will turned towards the dark woods and started to shout at no one but the
darkness.  "Leave us the fuck alone, or end up fucking dead!"

The darkness didn't respond.

Will walked over to me and put his arm around my shoulder.  "Let's go
home," he said.

Just as I had turned my back to the darkness, the darkness finally answered
Will's threat.  Shuffling everywhere, all around us, of branches and leaves
being shook.  I turned around, but I couldn't see anything.

I looked at Will and he looked at me.  Then, I smelled it.  Vampire,
overwhelmingly potent.  There were vampires all around.

They started to emerge from the darkness, all the same--handsome,
well-built, in the same dark suits, and all of them holding sharp weapons.
They were coming from the direction of the road, cutting off our path to
the bike.  They were coming from the woods as well, and there must have
been fifty of them, and the number was growing.

Needless to say I was scared out of my mind.  Obviously there was no way
out of this.  I was quite certain that we were both very quickly going to
be dead.

Will grabbed my hand and pulled me into a run.  "This way," he said, moving
towards the only direction that they weren't coming from.

We were running as fast as we could, moving along a parallel line to the
dirt road, away from the bike.  Even though I had to navigate through trees
and shrubbery, I had never moved so fast ever in my life.

"We can't outrun them," Will said to me.  One glance back was proof enough
that they were gaining on us.

We ran up a little hill, picking up speed as we came down.  Breifly, before
they reached the top of that hill, we would be out of sight.

"Go," he said, pushing me towards the dirt road.  "We have to
separate--we'll die if we stay together."

"But--"

"Go!"  He pushed me hard again, almost knocking me over, and I did as he
asked.

I ran out onto the road and ran across it as fast as I possibly could
before any of them came over the hill.  By the time they did, I was on the
other side of the road, hiding behind some bushes in the darkness, holding
my breath.

I knew they wouldn't be able to smell me.  I knew with the supernatural
powers of my own ears that I was not making a sound.  Would they be able to
see me?

A bunch of them got to the top of the hill and stopped, looking down
towards the other side.  Dozens of eyes, moving around, searching
everywhere.  I was certain that I would be discovered here.  They were so
close to me now that there would be no chance to run.

Just as the one closest to me started to examine my side of the road, they
all turned in unison towards the other side of the woods.

Then, all at once, they were running towards the same direction, leaving me
behind.  I knew they must have seen Will.  I realized he must have
purposely led them away from me.  I cursed myself for not being the one to
think of something so noble.  Why had I just followed his orders instead of
thinking things through myself?

I wasn't just going to let him die here.  I just needed to think of a way
we could outrun them.

I made my way to the dirt road and took off at a run back towards the bike.
The road was covered with countless tracks of large dressy shoes, but it
was otherwise deserted.

I got to the bike, knowing I didn't have any time to waste, wondering if it
was already too late, and jumped upon the seat.  As I went to turn the key,
my heart sank.

The key wasn't in the ignition.

Where was it?  I never had it.  Will must have taken it.

I ran into the woods, looking for his discarded clothing in the dark, but
not finding anything and not remembering exactly where he had left it.

I smelled vampire again.  Out towards the woods I could see several more of
them walking towards me, searching carefully.

I ran forward anyway, stopping when I smelled my own piss.  It couldn't be
far from here...

The group of vampires spotted me.  "There you are," said one of them (or
was it all of them in unison?) and they started to run towards me.

Finally I spotted my clothes, and then his beyond them.  I ran towards his
jeans, my fingers desperately searching his pockets.

As soon as they made contact with metal, I turned and I fled.  They were
fast, though, as they ran behind me, and I thought I wouldn't make it.

I jumped upon the bike and stuck the key into the ignition.  Just as I put
my hand to the throttle, one of them had grabbed a hold of my arm and was
pulling me off the bike.

I was furious.  I turned, knocked the vampire's nose with my bare fist,
breaking the bone underneath.  He doubled back, and I took off on the bike
before the others could stop me.

I wondered momentarily if I should even go back for Will; it was in the
opposite direction of the main road.  Going back might ruin my only chance
of escape, and he was most likely dead by then anyway.  How wasteful and
unappreciative would I have been if I was to go back for him, getting
myself killed in the process, after he had died to save my life?

But I didn't care about being appreciative.  I couldn't leave him, even if
it meant my death.

I tore off down the dirt road, not even thinking about the fact that I was
riding at a speed that I had been scared to attempt not long before.

There seemed to be no sign of vampires for ages, and I worried that they
had retreated into the woods, where the bike would not be able to follow.

At last, I saw them.  Running fast through the woods along the road.

I sped up, passing some of them as they tried to dart out into the road at
me.  They were fast, but the bike was faster.

Then I saw Will, running naked through the trees, still alive and in one
piece, thank god.  He had turned inquisitively at the sound of the bike,
and looked shocked to see me.

The vampires were right behind him, and they almost had him.  He darted
towards the road, and kept running upon it.

I knew there wouldn't be any time to stop the bike; if I stopped, they'd
catch me.  I pulled up beside him, and slowed the bike to his running
speed, about 30 mph.  Effortlessly and gracefully he jumped on behind me
and clutched my stomach.  I accelerated hard before any of the vampires
could grab the bike.

"Jesus Christ, thank you," he said to me.  "I was sure I was a dead dog."

"How fast do vampires run?" I asked.

"Forty miles per hour I'd say."

I kept us going at about fifty.

"Where does this road lead?" I asked him.

I heard him laughing behind me.  "Nowhere.  It's a dead end.  We gotta go
back."

I couldn't believe this; I was absolutely not turning around.  Perhaps he
was mistaken.

Right when I had made up my mind to keep on riding in that direction, my
headlight illuminated the impossibility of that choice.  A dead end, and
nothing but trees beyond.

"I'm turning around," I said.

Quickly, and a little awkwardly, I slowed and spun the bike around 180
degrees.  Now, on the dirt road in front of us, there was a dead end of
another sort illuminated by the headlight.  So many vampires, running
towards us on the road.

I stopped the bike.  "What should I do?" I asked.

"Go through them," he said.  "Try not to hit any of them directly."

"You should be driving," I said, considering switching places with him.

But there wasn't any time.  "Go now!" yelled Will as the vampires started
to reach us.

I accelerated fast towards them, using my superhuman reflexes to turn this
way and that, dodging one after the other.  I hit a good many of them, but
not head on.  Their bodies flew out of the way as I clipped by them, and we
continued unobstructed.

Will was shouting excitedly as I passed the last of them and continued at
full speed down the road.

"That was fucking beautiful!" he screamed, squeezing me from behind.

I smiled happily.  "This time, I saved your life," I boasted.

"Eh... I could have handled them without you," he joked.

As we got to the end of the dirt road, we passed many empty, parked black
cars.

"There's so many," I said.  There must have been twenty vehicles or so.

"They sent an army after us and we still live," said Will behind me.

I drove out onto the main road.  It wasn't until we had put some distance
between us and the vampires that it really crossed my mind that we were
both naked, riding together on a bike down a public road.

This realization didn't come, in fact, until Will made it very clear.  He
squeezed his arms around my chest, twisting at one of my nipples while at
the same time biting playfully into the back of my neck.  I could feel his
cock harden against my ass, and he stuck it brazenly into my crack.

I turned my head back slightly.  "Holding me a little tight there, aren't
you?"

He removed his lips from my neck.  "I know it's crazy," he shouted over the
wind, "but I could fuck you right here, right now."

"Not unless you want us to crash," I warned him.

That seemed to settle him down.

After we had ridden for fifteen minutes or so, passing only the occasional
car, Will told me to pull over into a bank under a streetlamp.

I did so, coming to a stop under the light even though I knew it would make
our nudity only more obvious.

He got off the bike immediately and started to comb his hand all over it,
slowly and carefully, in an almost sensual way.

"What are you doing?" I asked him.

He didn't respond, his hands moving all over every surface of the bike.

"You're making me a little jealous," I said.

Finally, he pulled off something small and showed it to me with disgust.  A
tiny chip, secured to the bike with a small strip of black tape.

"I figured there could only be one way they could have known where we
were," he said.

"A bug?" I asked.

He nodded.  "That means they know we're here.  They can't be far behind."
He dropped the chip onto the ground and lifted up his foot to smash it.

"Wait!" I said.  I grabbed it from the ground and threw it as far as I
could into the woods beyond.  "That way they'll think we've gone into the
woods."

"Good thinking," he said.  He got back onto the bike, this time taking the
front.  "I'll drive," he said.

"Where are we going?" I asked as I jumped on behind him.

"Home.  It was stupid of me to ever suggest leaving the house in the first
place."

"Shouldn't we try and find some clothes before we get to the city?" I
asked.

"We'll take our chances with the cops," he said.  "Getting stopped for
indecent exposure is a hell of a lot better than getting killed by
vampires.  I won't feel right until you're back in the house, safe."

I grabbed his chest and he pulled back onto the road.

Now that I was sitting behind him, I started to get my revenge.  I planted
my body against his, taking in his naked warmth.  I rubbed my hand through
his chest hair, found his nipple, and pinched it.  I thrust my crotch
against his ass, getting turned on immediately.  As I bit and nibbled away
at his neck, I stuck my own dick teasingly into his crack.

"You know," I said to him.  "I could fuck you right here, and I bet,
considering your experience as a biker, that you wouldn't crash."

He laughed heartily in front of me.  "I can't believe you're thinking about
sex when we're running for our lives."

Suddenly, Will passed a car on the road and I was lit up by its headlights.
I quickly stopped the nibbling, the nipple-play, and the pelvic-thrusting,
figuring our nudity would attract more than enough attention as it was.  I
prayed no young children with innocent minds were in that car to witness
our behavior.

My embarrassment worsened as we got to the city, passing car upon car and
always lit up by the numerous streetlamps.  Some people laughed and
pointed, others turned away in shock.  Obviously it must look like we were
riding naked together as some sort of statement.  I cowered and hid my face
behind Will's broad back.  In front of me, Will just laughed at my
embarrassment.

Thankfully, we got back to the house without being pulled over, and parked
the bike in the garage.

"I thought we'd never get home," I said as I got off the bike.

Will looked around at the other bikes in the room.  "If they've been
tracing my bike, I bet they've been tracing the rest of them too."  He
turned towards the Chevy and started feeling it up as he had done with the
bike earlier.

"I'll go get the others," I said.

He gave me a sharp look.  "We can handle this ourselves."

"We'll do it faster with the others' help."

I ran into the house.  Cougar, Matt, and Case were all sitting in the
living room, watching TV together, and must have been a little surprised to
see me naked.

"Wow," said Case, glancing down towards my dick.  "What an entrance."

"We were attacked by vampires," I said.  "Dozens of them at once.  We lost
our clothes in the fight and had to ride back naked."

Matt laughed at this last part.

Cougar made a disgusted face.  "You two had to ride together on a bike,
naked?  Oh man, I feel sorry for you."

Matt's laughed turned into an ironic one, as he, of course, knew more about
my sexual tastes than Cougar.

"Better to ride naked than get killed, right?" said Case.

"That's doubtful," answered Cougar.

"Listen, go outside to the garage, all of you," I said, running up the
stairs as they got to their feet.

I passed Malcolm in the second story hall, coming out of the bathroom with
a towel around his waist.  "Go out to the garage, quickly," I said.

He groaned unappreciatively, but walked down the stairs just the same.

I knocked on Russ's door and then let myself in before he could answer.
"Go out to the garage, right way."

He looked at my nakedness, and then flipped the page of the book he was
reading.  "Why the hell should I?" he asked.

"Because I'm giving you an order, and I'm not playing around!  Get up and
get out there!"

As soon as he started to rise off his bed, I ran upstairs and into the big
room.  I put on a pair of shorts, grabbed a pair for Will, and ran back
down.

When I got to the garage, the others were all assembled, listening to Will.

"...they used the chip to track us, that's how they found us out in the
woods," he was saying.  "I have a hunch that all of the bikes are bugged."

I tossed him his shorts, and he put them on quickly before returning to the
Chevy.

"So, get searching, all of you," I said to the rest of them.

They all went to their bikes and started to inspect them carefully.  I went
to the Chevy and helped Will, who had already gone underneath to search the
bottom of the truck.

"Yeah.  Got one," said Malcolm, holding up a chip from his bike.

"Me too," said Matt.

A couple second later, Cougar had found one on his bike as well.  "Those
assholes must have used this to track me when I was riding home from
Florida."

"Yeah, got one too," said Russ, holding up a chip of his own.  "Can't
believe I didn't find this sucker before.  I clean my bike weekly."

"What about your bike, Case?" I asked him, stepping away from the Chevy.

"I don't think I have one," he said.  Then, "Oh no, there it is.  I have
one all right."

Will popped up from under the Chevy with another chip in his hand.  "That's
all of em," he said.

"What should we do with these?" asked Matt.

"Think we could get any use out of them?" Will asked me.

"No," I said.  "By now they've found out that we've removed the bug from
your bike.  They know it won't be long before we've removed all of the
rest."  I turned towards the others.  "Might as well destroy them," I said.

"Gladly," said Case.  He and the others dropped them to the ground and
stomped them to pieces.

"What does this mean?" asked Cougar.

"It means that they were in our fucking house," answered Malcolm angrily.

"Probably when we were sleeping," said Russ.

"Not necessarily," said Case.  "They could have put these on our vehicles
individually out in public."

"Either way, it doesn't matter," said Will.  "There is no doubt that they
know where we live."

I shook my head sadly.  "We can't stay here anymore," I said.

"Now, hold on there," said Russ.  "They've probably known we've lived here
for weeks, and they haven't yet attacked us."

"What's stopping them?" I asked, not really expecting an answer.

"I don't know," said Russ.  "Could be that they know we're some of the
scariest goddamn wolves in the world.  That's why they bugged our bikes.
They've been attacking us in small numbers, trying to pick us off one at a
time.  As long as we stay here together, we got strength in numbers."  He
looked around at us commandingly, like the alpha he had once been.
"Leaving this house will give us nothing but a bunch of dangerous
uncertainties.  We're safest right here, where we stand."

"Yeah," chimed in Malcolm.  "He's right.  Here, we've been safe.  What's
changed?"

"What's changed is that tonight we pissed off a whole army of vampires,"
said Will, "and now we know they got our goddamn address."

"Will's right," said Matt, shaking his head sadly.  "We aren't safe here."

"Where would we go?" asked Cougar.  "The vampires are all over the country,
trust me."

"We could go to London," said Will.  "Hadrian accepts all lone wolves into
his pack."

I made a face in disgust.

Malcolm reacted similarly.  "We're not going there," he stated.

"It's only a matter of time before the vampires take out Hadrian's den,"
said Matt.  "I say we go somewhere unexpected, somewhere totally remote.
The vampires won't look for us if we leave civilization behind."

"Come on, men," Russ was saying.  "This is our home.  I built this house.
We'll stay here and fight, or we'll die here together."

"It's just a house, Russ," I said.  "It's replaceable."

"That may be, but our honor's not.  How's it gonna look if we turn our
tails and run?"  He turned to Case.  "Case, you've been unusually quiet.
What do you think we should do?"

He shrugged.  "Honestly, I like Will's idea.  If we go to London Hadrian
will keep us safe."

"Well, it's not your decision to make, is it?" said Russ, nodding towards
me and Will.  "These two punks gotta decide."

I was surprised that Russ was offering Will and me any amount of respect,
but I wasn't yet prepared to make such a weighty decision.  "We need time
to talk this over," I said.

"Right," said Will.  "We'll stay here for tonight.  Rick and I will have an
answer for you by morning."

The group broke up and started to head back into the house.

"Assuming we're still alive in the morning," Cougar said to Matt with fear
in his voice.

Will and I had a late dinner and he went upstairs to shower.  A few minutes
later I headed towards the stairs myself.  On my way through the entry way,
I pulled aside the curtains of the study and went inside.

Case was standing in front of the desk, his back turned to me, wearing a
black tank-top, sunglasses, and nothing else.  He turned to face me as I
walked in, his dick bobbing around in front of him.

"Oh, sorry," I said, stepping back and averting my eyes reflexively.  "I
should have knocked."

"Rick, it's okay.  Nothing you haven't seen before, right?"

"Right," I said, turning back to face him.  "I just wanted to tell you that
I'm concerned about you being all alone down here at night."

He shrugged.  "I'll be fine.  I'm a tough guy."

"Toughness won't help much against an army of vampires.  For now, why don't
you sleep in my bed?"

He perked up.  "You want me to sleep with you tonight?"

I shook my head.  "No, not with me.  I sleep in Will's room.  The other
room's really just vacant.  That's where I think you should stay for now."

"Sure thing," he said, smiling.  "Thanks, Rick."

I nodded and left the room.

When I got into the bedroom, the first thing I did was close the vent.
Then I stripped my shorts off and went into the bathroom for a shower,
eager to wash off the layer of dirt and dried blood that caked my skin.

The bathroom was warm and steamy; Will had recently finished his shower and
was standing naked in front of the sink, shaving.

"You look better," I told him.

He glanced at me through the mirror.  "You look like shit."

"Thanks," I said, and walked into the shower, turning on the hot water.

"We need to decide what to do," he said as I started to lather my body.

"What are you thinking?"

"That we can't stay here," he said.  "We stay here, we die.  Russ may be
ready to face death with a brave face, but I am not.  Not with everything I
have now."

"I agree," I said.  "But where should we go?"

"I have half a mind to listen to Matt," he said.  "Go somewhere remote,
where they won't look for us."

"They might find us eventually," I said.

"Eventually.  But until then we'd be safe."

I nodded, but I was not convinced.  "Go into hiding and let the vampires
pick off all the other wolves of the world.  And what would happen if we
joined Hadrian's pack?"

He sighed.  "We'd be at the bottom again," he said.

"We'd work our way up."

"But it would take months with all of the wolves in that den," he said as
he finished his shave and rinsed his face.

I considered this.  "Will, do you think you could beat Hadrian in a fight?
Think carefully about this."

He wiped his face off and then turned to look my way through the glass
shower wall.  "Honestly?  I think I have a good shot.  Hadrian's alpha, but
rumor has it that he doesn't have any really strong wolves in his pack
besides himself.  If that's true, then he probably hasn't fought a powerful
wolf in years.  I'm strong, always have been.  I bet I could beat him in a
fair fight."  Then he shrugged.  "But there's no way to know."

This excited me.  "Then in a few months we could take Hadrian's position
from him.  We could rule the wolves, don't you see?  This is our way in."

"Yeah, but if I lose, it'll all be for nothing."

I shook my head.  "You won't lose.  I know you can beat him."

"Of course, if I can beat him, so could you."

I shivered.  "Hadrian gives me the creeps.  I know it's silly, but I'm
still scared of him.  He traumatized me I think--the fear will never go
away."  Then I smiled.  "Well, maybe it will once I'm his alpha."

"So, you're sure then?  This is what you want to do?  Go to London?"

"I'm sure," I said.

"Then that's where we'll go," he said.  "I'll call Hadrian in the morning.
Unless you want to?"

"No way," I said.

He laughed.  "I didn't think so."  He turned and walked towards the
bedroom.  "You coming to bed soon?"

"Yeah, soon," I said.

As I finished my shower, I couldn't help but feel doubtful about our new
course of action.  What if we were making the wrong choice?

No, I was second-guessing myself for nothing.  This was clearly the best of
all the possibilities.

*****

I awoke the next morning to Will's telephone call to Hadrian.  He had left
the bed and gotten dressed without ever waking me.

"Hadrian? It's Will, from Philidelphia."

"Will?" came Hadrian's gravelly voice that still made my hair stand on end.
"Good god, I thought for sure you were dead."

"Dead?  Why would I be dead?"

"Because everybody else is over there," he said.  "The vampires have been
working real hard over in the Americas."

"Yeah, we've noticed," said Will.  "But we're all still alive, thankfully."

"If I'm right, you are the only pack left in the New World."

"Are you serious?" Will asked, stunned.  I sat up in bed, shocked as well.
"All the others, they're dead?"

"A few of them escaped and came here.  The others are all gone.  The
vampires own your side of the world nowadays.  How is it that you still
live?"

"I can't say," he said.  "They know where we live, but have never attacked
the house.  They only stike when we leave it."

"Very odd," said Hadrian.  "You still got that boy around?"

"Rick?" asked Will, looking at me in the eye.  "He's still here.  He's
alpha now."

Hadrian grumbled.  "Mmm.  Not surprised.  And you're beta now?"

"Alpha.  We share rank."

"Yeah, well, you keep an eye on that one.  Wouldn't surprise me in the
least if he's in league with the vampires."

Will rolled his eyes and looked at me.  "He's not, believe me.  He's been
attacked more than anyone."

"Well, you can never be sure, can you?"

"Sometimes you can be sure," he said.  "Anyway, the reason why I called is
because, well, this city--this country--isn't safe for us anymore.  We're
leaving, and we want to come to London and join you there."

There was a long silence.

"Hello?" asked Will.

"Yes, yes, of course you are welcome here.  How many are you?"

"Seven."

"Fine.  I'll make some arrangements for you.  When will you be arriving?"

Will shrugged.  "I'm not sure.  I'd like to leave as soon as we can."

"Sure.  Give me a call when you know when you'll be arriving.  I'll send a
car to pick you up at the airport."

"Great.  Thanks, Hadrian," said Will.

"Yes.  If you make it hear alive, you'll be safe here.  Bye, then."

"Yeah, bye."  Will hung up the phone and then smiled at me.  "He didn't
seem all that pleased, did he?"

"He doesn't trust us," I said.

Will shook his head.  "That's not the reason.  It's called fear.  He's
scared of how strong he knows we are.  He knows we threaten him."

"He's right to be scared," I said, getting out of bed and moving towards
the bathroom.  "When should we leave?"

"I say today.  No point risking staying around here for any longer than we
have to."

"Alright," I said.  "We just need to give everyone some time to pack."

"I'll call the airlines and get us tickets," he said.

*****

Will scheduled us to fly out that night, and I delivered the news to the
others, which elicited a wide variety of responses from the others.  Case
and Cougar were mostly pleased, Matt and Malcolm considered our destination
a mistake, and Russ was just plain mad.  But, I wasn't up for a debate; we
had made up our minds and now we'd carry out our decision.

The rest of the day was spent packing.  We only had one suitcase, which
Will and I shared.  The others had to pack their things in boxes.  I
reminded them that the airline would only accept two checked packages per
customer.  Everything else would have to be left behind.  I knew it was a
difficult task that I asked of them; that they fit their whole lives into
two boxes.  Case had memorabilia from many decades to consider.  Russ would
have to leave all his books behind.  And Matt left out much of his clothes
in order to fit in his game system.

Worst of all for most of them was the thought of leaving behind their
bikes.  Will spent at least ten minutes saying goodbye to his, and came out
of the garage looking absolutely heartbroken.

"We'll get more bikes," I tried to reassure him.

He shook his head.  "That one is irreplaceable."

Will arranged for the power and utilities to be shut off, and after we had
eaten our last meal in a sad silence, the airport shuttle van came to pick
us up.

Everyone was sad to go.  Looking around the house as we left, I couldn't
believe how many intense memories I had of this place.  It seemed
impossible that it had only been a few months that I had lived here.

Russ was the last one to leave the house.  He stood in the entryway,
staring into the darkness, while I waited at the doorway to lock the door.
He remained as stiff-upper-lipped as ever, but I could imagine the loss he
was feeling.  I wanted to reach out to him, to tell him that there was
always a chance we'd be back here, but I said nothing.  He turned around in
his time and left without a word.  I shut the door for the last time.

When we were driving to the airport in the van, Matt broke the thick
silence cheerfully.  "Shit," he said.  "I haven't been on a plane in
years."

Nobody responded at this pitiful attempt to get a conversation going.

He turned towards Cougar, who had been anxious and fidgety ever since we
left the house.  "How `bout you, dude?"

Cougar glared at Matt as if he just asked the most personal question
conceivable.  "I've never flown before," he said sharply.

Matt laughed.  "No shit?  Not even when you were a kid?"

"Nope," he said.  "This is my first time."

Matt seemed to take this news gleefully.  "Oh, hope we don't crash or
anything, dude.  That would suck."

Cougar's face turned white.

"Don't worry, Cougar," I said.  "You're more likely to crash in a car than
in a plane."

"Yeah," said Matt.  "But if you crash in a car it doesn't involve falling
thousands of feet to your death."

"Shut the fuck up, man," said Cougar sharply, but there was fear in his
voice.

"Cougar, why don't we sit together on the plane?" I suggested, wanting to
provide him with some support.

"Sure, whatever," he said nonchalantly, but I knew he was thankful for my
offer.

"Actually, I don't know if that will be possible," said Will.  "The flight
was mostly full when I booked us so I couldn't get many seats together.
Everyone will just have to check their ticket and find out where they're
seated."

That's exactly what we were doing when we boarded the plane two hours
later.

"I'm 24B," said Cougar, reading his ticket as we walked into the aisle.
"Anyone sitting by me?" he looked at me hopefully.

I grabbed for my ticket as others yelled out negatively.  "No, sorry," I
said.  "2A."

"24C!" yelled Russ from behind us.  "I'll be sitting next to you, pal."

"Oh, great," said Cougar, giving me a pleading look.

As I continued to follow him down the aisle, Will grabbed my shoulder and
pulled me to a stop.  "You passed your seat," he said.  The others scooted
passed me.

I looked at the huge leather seat in front of me, and then shook my head.
"But these are the first class seats."

He had a huge smile across his face as he put his carryon above row number
two.

"You got us first class seats?"

"Hey, it's a long flight.  I've never flown in anything but coach, and
that's fucking uncomfortable.  I thought I'd splurge a little."

"What about the guys?"

"You think I want those assholes up here?  Just forget about them and
relax."

I sat down next to him in our row.  "I've never gone first class either," I
told him.  "This is going to be fun."

*****

I woke up sometime in the middle of the flight.  Will and I had been
treated to fully reclineable seats, foot rests, slippers, champagne, and
strawberry cheesecake, and had quickly fallen asleep afterwards.

I looked to Will.  His handsome face looked utterly relaxed as he slept.  I
wouldn't disturb him.

I got up and walked down the aisle towards the main cabin, curious to see
how the rest of my pack was doing.  When I passed through the blue curtain
that separated the two cabins, I moved from tranquility into noise.  People
were chattering back here, some were even arguing, a baby was shrieking.

Matt didn't see me as I walked by his seat.  He was sitting next to a very
attractive brunette in a very tight top.  They were laughing and chatting
happily, and he looked absolutely overjoyed.

"So you're from London then," he said.

"Yeah, that's right," she said in a working-class English accent that was
almost painful to listen too.

"What a coincidence--that's where I'm moving," Matt responded happily.

"No shit?  Then we should look each other up sometime."  At least, that's
what I thought she said.  Her accent was so thick I couldn't possibly be
sure.

Matt flashed his beautiful white teeth.  "Have I told you yet how beautiful
your accent is?"  I almost burst into laughter.

She seemed shocked.  "You think so?"

Matt hadn't noticed me, and I didn't want to disrupt his conquest.  I
walked on.

I spotted Case sitting in the middle of a row of three seats.  A frail,
elderly woman slept in the window seat, and the aisle seat was empty.

"What's going on?" I asked him quietly as I sat down in the aisle seat.

"Rick.  Where have you been?  You have to help me."  He seemed completely
frazzled.

"Help with what?"

"The woman sitting next to me.  She won't stop flirting with me.  She's
been touching me inappropriately ever since we took off."

I looked at the ancient woman sleeping next to him in disgust.  "Well, you
obviously wore her out."

"No, not her!" said Case angrily.  He nodded to a woman coming up the
aisle.  "Her!"

"Somebody's in my seat!" came a perky voice from beside me.

"Oh, sorry," I said, getting up.

A skinny woman in her thirties sat down in my place, reeking of perfume.
She grabbed Case's thigh as she sat.  "Oh Casey, how could you give my
precious seat up so easily?" she asked in baby-voice.

"I don't know," said Case, forcing a laugh through clenched teeth.  "I must
be completely insane."

"Well, take it easy, Case," I said.

"You're not staying?" he pleaded.

"Oh, let the poor boy get back to his seat," said the woman.  "I put more
of that perfume you said you liked on in the bathroom.  Here, smell my
neck."

I got the hell away from there, ignoring Case's imploring eyes.

I passed Malcolm next.  Like Case, he was seated between two other
passengers, only in his case they were men.  His huge frame filled up his
seat completely and was pushing against the businessmen on either side of
him, both of which looked quite uncomfortable.  Malcolm himself had his
head back, asleep.

"You know," one of the businessmen said to the other in a hushed tone of
voice, "America Airlines makes overweight passengers buy two tickets if
they can't fit their fat asses in just the one."

Both men chuckled.

"I'm not asleep yet, motherfuckers," said Malcolm without ever opening his
eyes.

The businessmen both turned bright red as I walked by.

Finally I came to Cougar, who was sitting on the aisle seat, flipping
through the in-flight magazine.  Russ was sitting at the window, reading a
book.  Cougar looked up at me pleasantly as I approached.  Russ did not.

"Hey, how's your first flight going?" I asked him chummily.

"It's not so bad," he said.  "Whoever else was supposed to sit in our row
never showed, so we have an empty seat between us."

Russ had several books stacked neatly on the half of the empty seat that
was closer to him.  Cougar tossed the magazine upon the seat distractedly.

Russ eyed the magazine angrily.  "I told you, keep your shit on your side
of the seat," he growled.  "I don't put my things in your territory, do I?"

"No, sir," said Cougar sheepishly as he moved the magazine to his side of
the seat.

"Alright," I said.  "Just wanted to check up on you."

Cougar laughed.  "You don't have to check up on me."

"I know," I said. "Obviously you two are having a blast together.  I'll
leave you to it."

I headed back towards first class, leaving the zoo of coach permanently.  I
settled down in my seat-bed, with my pillow and blanket, and looked at
Will's face fondly before falling back asleep.

*****

A large black van that was as large as the airport shuttle had been in
Philly picked us up from the curb of the airport in London.  The driver, a
dirty-looking English wolf, didn't offer us any sort of greeting and didn't
offer to help us pack our boxes in the back.

Everyone was yawning and tired as we drove to Hadrian's den; London's
morning was garish and came much earlier than we were used to.

When we pulled into the warehouse, Matt and Cougar started to look around
excitedly.

"The den's in here?" asked Cougar.

"It's underneath," I told him.

The wolf told us to leave our stuff in the van for now.  We followed him to
the floor grating, which they opened from the inside, and we followed them
into the dark, damp interior of the London den.  None of the guys
complained about the dismal surroundings, but I knew they had to be at
least a bit disappointed.  This den was huge, but it couldn't compare to
the comfort of what we had left behind.

The wolf led us to Hadrian's bedroom, after turning this way and that
through the dank corridors.  We got glimpses of their bedrooms, open spaces
filled with bunk-beds--some only had cots.  Their living spaces were
equally dreary.  This was an unpleasant place to visit, let alone living in
long term.

The wolf knocked on Hadrian's door.

"What is it?" came Hadrian's voice from inside.

"The American wolves are here," said the English wolf.

"Let them in," he said.

All of us stepped forward.

"Just the alpha," said the wolf.  "Hadrian only sees alphas."

Will stepped forward and pulled me along.  "We're both alphas."

"Both of you?"

"Yes."

The wolf opened the door, and we stepped inside the room and into another
world.  Hadrian's room was ridiculously lush, shamefully so compared with
the living quarters of the rest of his den.  The walls were finished and
painted; the floor was tiled.  He had a huge king-size bed in one section
of the room, a very nice kitchen in another side, an expensive
entertainment center in another.  In the middle of the room was a steaming
hot tub, and inside the hot tub was Hadrian.  Looking at him again had a
physical reaction on me; I started to sweat, my heart started to race, and
my flesh seemed to remember the pain he had inflicted so ruthlessly upon
it.

"Will, there you are," he said.  "And you've brought your young friend
along.  How spectacular," he said with obvious sarcasm.  "I'd invite you in
the water, but I'm suitless in here."  I knew somehow that he would never
have invited us into his hot tub regardless.

"We need to know where we're bunking," said Will.  "I'm guessing you'll be
putting us at the bottom of the den hierarchy?"

He peered over at Will like he was insane.  "You must be confused, son," he
said.  "I have no intention of accepting you into my pack."

My heart leapt.

"But you accept all wolves in need into your pack," argued Will.

He smiled creepily.  "I accept the occasional sole refugee.  Sometimes I
take in two or three that come together.  But yours is a whole pack,
completely intact.  I would not dream of disintegrating your men and
adopting them for myself."

This was outrageous.

"You told us you would provide us lodging," said Will.  "I had expected to
stay here, with you."

"But I can do far better, my friend," he replied.  "I'm lending your pack
the use of my old den."

"The one that burned down?" It was the first thing that I had said and
Hadrian shot me a furious glance, apparently a reprimand just for talking.

He turned back to Will as if he was the one who had asked the question.
"No.  After that one was destroyed, me and the small group of survivors of
my pack built a modestly sized interim den.  We soon outgrew it and came
here, but it should serve your tiny pack just fine."

This ruined our plans completely.  I nudged Will, urging him to say
something.

"That's quite generous of you, Hadrian, but unnecessary.  We are no
different from the rest of the wolves in your den and ask for now special
privileges."

"Ask or not, they are yours," he said.  "Nathan!" he yelled out.

The wolf driver opened the door from the outside.

"Show Will and his pack to their new den."

The wolf pulled us firmly out of Hadrian's room and shut the door.

"What's happening?" Case asked as we started again down the hall.

"Hadrian's giving us our own den to stay at," I said.

"Awesome," said Matt.

We went back upstairs, got in the van, and drove off.  The other den was
just a couple blocks away, easily within walking distance.  The driver
pulled the van up to a shut garage door and rolled down his window.  He
stuck his hand out and pressed several buttons on a digital keypad, and the
garage door manually opened.

"No way in without the code," said the driver.

"And what's the code?" asked Will.

"1897.  You can change it if you like, it's not all that difficult.  But
don't forget your new code.  That garage door looks weak, but it's as
sturdy as they come.  No other way in, neither."

We pulled into another empty warehouse type room, only this one was much
smaller than Hadrian's.  We got out of the van and grabbed our belongings.

"Down the ladder?" asked Cougar, who had already discovered the ladder
leading underground, as it wasn't at all concealed as the one in Hadrian's
den was.

"Right," said the wolf.

Underneath, the den had much of the same ambience of Hadrian's den (which
is to say, very little).  We stood in about a half inch of standing, mucky
water that was slowly making its way down a small tunnel-like hallway.

"This way," said the wolf, leading us down the tunnel.

Shortly we had come to a wide open room that was thankfully much drier than
the hall, although certainly no cleaner.  There was a small kitchen with a
stove, microwave, and refrigerator.  Plastic lawn chairs where arranged
around a square card table next to the kitchen.  And on the other side of
the room were an assortment of beat-up chairs, none looking at all soft in
any way.

"This is the main room," said the wolf.  "Electricity's on, and the water.
There's some staples in the frig but feel free to come over to our den and
nab any food you need."

"No TV?" asked Matt pitifully.

The wolf didn't even answer this question.  He showed us to a door on one
side of the room.  "Here's the main barracks," he said.

It was another large, dirty, dark room with four sets of bunks beds, all
with paper-thin mattresses and dingy sheets, no pillows.

"It's shit," said Malcolm.

"But at least it's our shit," said Matt.  "At least we don't have to share
it with forty other wolves."

"It's nice compared to what I got," assured the English wolf.  He led us to
another door in the barracks.  "W.C.'s in here."

It looked like a public locker room in the oldest, dirties gym on earth,
complete with an open shower that I would have never set foot in without a
pair of flip-flops.  I wondered then if wolves were susceptible to foot
fungus.

The wolf led us back into the main room and opened another door.  "Kennel's
in here," he said.

"Weird," said Cougar.  "I've never seen one like this before."

I followed him into the room and noticed what he was speaking about.
Instead of one large cell, as ours had been, this kennel was made up of
many small cells, all with their own doors and locks.

"All of our kennels are like this," said the wolf.  "Each cage is big
enough for two wolves."

"This was how the kennel in Baltimore had been," said Will.  "For larger
groups, it ensures that every wolf gets a meal."

The English wolf led us out of the kennel and through the last door leading
off of the main room.  "This was Hadrian's," he said.

Again, it was like stepping into another world.  This was the only room in
the den that looked to me like a real room, instead of a makeshift bunker.
It was brightly lit, clean, and warm.  A large bed, a desk with a computer,
a dresser, and a couch were all situated around the Hadrian's private
quarters, making it quite cozy.

"Hadrian is one greedy alpha," I said.

"I'd say it's big enough for the both of us," Will said to me.

"Shit," said Cougar.  "This isn't fair.  How bout I push one of those bunk
beds in here and the three of us can share the room?"

"No fucking way," said Will.

"They have a bathtub," Matt reported from inside the room's private
bathroom.  "And it has jets!"

Case turned to the English wolf.  "Is it safe to leave the den, or should
we stay put?"

The wolf shrugged.  "Not many vampires in the city, so it's pretty safe.
If one of them does see you, though, well then..."

He trailed off, but the implication was clear.

The wolf left as we started to unpack.  As Cougar carried his boxes into
the barracks, he cried out, "Ah, man!  There's rats in here!"

*****

Regardless of how scummy the new den was, the guys settled in rather
quickly (albeit with a lot of complaining), and seemed to be in good
spirits.  Here, if one got sick of the grime and the dripping water of the
den, they could leave and explore the city--we had lost that liberty in the
states.  Since our arrival, we had gone out several times and had yet to
smell a vampire in London.  All of us were excited to have some freedom
here instead of being trapped in the prison of our Philadelphia den.

The guys even adjusted to sharing a room.  After the first night together
in the barracks, they discovered that Malcolm had two very uncomfortable
sleeping habits--he slept naked, and he snored like a freight train.  There
was some whining and complaining about Malcolm the next day until Russ
banished Malcolm to the far side of the barracks, completely ostracized
from the rest of the group.  Russ also had Malcolm, Matt, and Cougar
attempt to clean the bathroom, buying them all sorts of cleaning supplies
to aid their quest.  They soon discovered that no matter how much Lysol one
scrubbed into the shower floor, there was no end to the dirt underneath.
Russ let them off the hook and dropped the matter, saying that the dirtiest
shower on earth was still better than no shower at all.  Even Russ was
starting to acclimate to our new surroundings.

But as improved as our situation had become, I still felt like it was a
dead end in terms of my ambitions.  We had come to London to try and
dethrone Hadrian, and now that seemed completely out of reach.  Was this as
good as it was to get for me?  Alpha of a seven wolf pack living
underground in London?  I wanted more.

Not that I wasn't happy, because I was.  Will and I were doing great; our
mutual attraction for each other certainly wasn't left behind in America.
But the perfection of our relationship wasn't enough for me; I wanted us to
be at the top as well.

"If we could just contact the other alphas," I said to Will in bed one
night, "we could convince them that Hadrian is leading the wolves in the
wrong direction."

Will sighed, obviously tired of my occupation with a goal that he
considered virtually impossible.  "We can't contact the other alphas," he
said.  "Only Hadrian knows who they are, and he won't give out that
information anymore."

Will was doing nothing anymore except shooting down my ideas.  Obviously he
didn't have the same upwards drive that I did.  It was clear to me that now
that I was his, now that our pack was safe, he was perfectly content where
he was.

So I went elsewhere for advice, and told Case, Matt, and Cougar my
intentions.  Cougar thought it was a cool idea to try and steal Hadrian's
position, but had no advice to offer on how to do it.  Matt was adamantly
against it, saying that what we should be doing now is lying low, not
making any such waves.

Case was the only one who was both supportive and able to offer some
advice.

"Talk to Hadrian," he said.  "You have good reason to be concerned about
his leadership.  If you can't take his position by force, what else can you
do but try to reason with him?"

The idea of having a heart to heart with Hadrian made me feel like
vomiting.  So, I presented this idea to Will, hoping he would agree to do
the talking for me.

"You want me to talk to Hadrian?" he asked me.  "Try to settle our
differences, all nice-like, with words instead of violence?"

"Why not?" I asked.

"I got to hand it to you, kid, you never give up.  This talk shit is a nice
idea, but it's never gonna do us any good.  Hadrian isn't going to give a
fuck about our concerns.  He's got the power, we've got none, and he knows
it."

"Even if that's true, it can't hurt to try, can it?"

Will looked at me, annoyed and defeated.  "Okay, I'll give it a shot.  But
don't expect any miracles here."

Will called Hadrian soon after and asked if we could meet with him.  He
begrudgingly told Will to come on over.

When we were about to leave the den and walk over to Hadrian's, Malcolm and
Cougar were the only ones in the main room.  As Will and I left our
bedroom, Malcolm's head was lost in the refrigerator, as often was the case
with Malcolm.

"There's nothin' to eat," he said.  "Nothing in here `cept ice and baking
soda.  Who ate up all the food?"

"I think you ate like ninety percent of it, man," said Cougar.

"We're going over to Hadrian's den to have a talk with him," I told Cougar
as Will and I went for the door.

"Hold up," said Malcolm, leaving the refrigerator behind.  "I'll come too."

Will scowled.  "This meeting doesn't concern you, Malcolm."

"You think I'm going for the fuckin meeting?  I'm gonna go get some food."

"From Hadrian's kitchen?" I asked.

Malcolm nodded, smiling.  "Yup.  The guy said we could take some of their
food if we needed it, remember?"

That I did.  "Okay, let's go."

When the three of us got to the den, Malcolm headed off to find the
kitchen, while one of Hadrian's lackeys led us to the big man's bedroom.

Hadrian was sitting on his couch watching TV when we came in.

"Will, come in," he said.  He pointed to a chair beside the couch.  "Sit."

Hadrian didn't greet me or acknowledge my presence.  When Will sat down in
the chair Hadrian had directed him towards, there was left for me nowhere
to sit except for Hadrian's couch.  There was no way I would voluntarily
put myself in close proximity with that beast.  I remained standing, a
little apart from them--clearly safely outside the conversation.

"Hadrian, we need to talk," began Will in his best diplomatic tone.  "Alpha
to alpha."

Hadrian laughed slightly, not moving his attention from the TV.  "Talk
then, my brother, and do it quickly."

Will sighed.  "Rick and I think you're mishandling the affairs of the
wolves."

Hadrian finally gave his attention to Will, raising an eyebrow.

Will continued in a calm voice.  "You're being too secretive.  Too
divisive.  You're the only one who knows where all the dens of the world
are, and you keep our dens from communicating with each other."

Hadrian looked displeased.  "You want information but you have no concept
of what price you pay for it.  As wonderful as it would be to have every
alpha on each other's speed dials, any information I give out to the rest
of the wolves is information that could be overheard by vampires."

"Regardless of everything you're doing to keep our secrets hidden, Hadrian,
the vampires are still beating us in this war," said Will, his voice
starting to sound heated.  "You can't argue with that."

"The vampires are sure to kill off a few dens here and there," said
Hadrian.  "But as long as we stay in the shadows they'll never completely
destroy us."

"We don't want to hide away in the shadows," said Will.  "We never had to
before and we shouldn't have to now."

"I've been doing this for decades and you're just an outside observer,"
Hadrian snapped.  "You will not tell me how to run the show."

"You don't deserve the authority you have, Hadrian," said Will firmly.
"You haven't earned it.  Nobody voted you in, you just crowned yourself
king."

Hadrian smiled sinisterly.  "You should be thankful that I did.  If I
hadn't, you and your pack would be lying in pieces in Philadelphia by now.
And if I wasn't here, who would take my place?  You, Will?"  He seemed
totally pissed.

"All we want is for the alphas to get a chance to elect a leader
themselves--"

"No way in hell will I even consider this," he yelled.

Right then his cell phone rang.  He jumped up, retrieved it from his
computer desk, and answered.

"Yeah," he said.  "Sergio, what can I do for you."  He sat down at his
computer.  "Hold on," he said.  He typed in a password, logging on, and
opened a document.  "What's the new number?"  He began typing a telephone
number into the document.  "Okay, got it," he said, exiting the document.
"Oh yeah?  How many are you now?"

Hadrian got up hastily.  "Sergio, I'm losing you.  These fucking cell
phones don't get any signal down here.  Hold on, let me get to higher
ground."  He rushed for the door before looking at us.  "You two better not
fucking move," he said, and then exited.

"See how much good talking does?" Will asked me once he had left.  "All
that diplomacy, and all that's changed is that now he hates our goddamn
guts."

I watched the door, ignoring Will.  I had a wild idea.

I ran over to Hadrian's computer.  He had forgotten to log off.  I looked
in his recent documents folder and opened up a file called "A-list."

"What are you doing?" asked Will.

"I'm getting the information we need."

"You're fucking crazy sometimes, you know that?"

"Just watch the door, okay?"

The file opened up, containing a list of every location of every new den in
the world, along with the names of their alphas and their phone numbers.  I
hit print.

"Got it," I said.  "If Hadrian refuses to compromise, we'll call up the
alphas ourselves and stage a mutiny."

"He's coming back," whispered Will.  "Hurry up!"

I quickly grabbed the list, stuffed it into my pants, and exited the
document on the screen.  I rushed away from the computer just as Hadrian
came back.

"You two disrespectful fucks have anything left to say to me?" he asked as
he walked in.

"Yeah, Hadrian, I do have something to say to you," said Will aggressively,
taking a step towards the man.

I grabbed Will and pulled him towards the door, not wanting him to create a
problem after we already had what we needed.  "No, there's nothing else to
say," I said, smiling at Hadrian.  "We'll see you later.  Come on, Will."

We left his room and found our own way back to the ladder up.  I stopped
Will as he started to climb.

"Malcolm!" I said.  "We need to go find him."

"I say we leave him here," he said, but I disagreed.  "Fine," he said.
"You go find him.  I'll be waiting up there."

I walked off into the maze in search of the kitchen.

It seems I found it just in time.  Malcolm was surrounded by six angry
English wolves, looking at him accusingly.  Clearly this exchange was about
to degenerate into violence.

"Hey guys," said Malcolm, outnumbered and concerned.  "Back off.  Your bro
told me it was cool to help myself to the food here."

"Yeah, sure," said one of the more angry-looking wolves.  "But you didn't
just have a snack.  You ate our whole fucking pizza and drank three of our
beers.  You think you American shitheads can just come around and take
whatever you fucking please from our den?"  He shoved Malcolm backwards.

"Hey, get away from him!" I yelled as I walked into the room.

"Who the fuck are you?" one of them asked me.

I walked to them and opened my eyes wide, mimicking Malcolm's signature
look.  "You don't know who I am?"

"Smells like another goddamn American werewolf in London to me," said the
wolf who seemed to be doing most of the talking.

"He's no ordinary wolf," said Malcolm.  "He's the next gifted."

"That's right," I said.  "I'm strong.  Real strong.  So strong even Hadrian
can't touch me," I boasted.

"Bullshit," said the wolf, not budging.

"It's true, man," said another wolf.  "I heard about him.  He's dangerous."

"Yeah?" said the wolf between me and Malcolm.  "Even so, it's hardly likely
you can take on all six of us," he said.

I shoved him a little.  "You want to test that theory out, man?  You and
your friends here ready to die over a pizza and three lousy beers?"

The wolf stared me down.  I stared right back.

"Fine," he said finally.  "Just remove your dog from our kitchen, and we'll
forget this ever happened."

The wolves backed off from Malcolm, and the two of us left the kitchen
together.

"Thanks, bro," Malcolm said once we were moving through the hall.  "They
would have tore me up in there if you hadn't stopped them."

For some reason, his gratitude touched me.

"No problem," I said.  "But next time, try and stay out of trouble, okay?"

"Okay, boss."

He had never called me boss before.  He reserved that title for Case alone.
Even though Malcolm was most often a dishonest prick, I still felt honored
by this gesture.

Nothing more was said as we rejoined Will and walked back home, but I had a
feeling I had finally earned Malcolm's respect.

*****

Will and I ripped Hadrian's alpha list in half and started making phone
call after phone call.  Including Hadrian, Will, and myself, there were 61
alphas in the world--that meant that Will and I had 28 alphas to call each.

Even though these alphas were from all over the place, surprisingly most of
them spoke at least some English.  The ones who didn't usually put on
someone from their pack who did--apparently they were quite used to
receiving phone calls from Hadrian from time to time and Hadrian didn't
speak anything beyond English.

Some of the alphas I called were receptive.  They agreed that Hadrian had
not earned the right to be leader, and were troubled that under Hadrian's
rule, the wolves constantly dwindled in numbers.  It was time for all of us
to step up, I would say with ardent passion.  It was time for a change.
And they would agree, sometimes adding that they had had similar thoughts
for quite some time.

These concurring alphas were the minority of those that I contacted.  Most
of them were not at all willing to listen to what I had to say.  Some of
them thought I was some sort of insane or blasphemous dreamer to betray
Hadrian in this way.  Others seemed not to believe that I was a wolf at
all, and if I was, they thought it unlikely that I was an alpha.  They
would end the conversations quickly and rudely, often hanging up while I
was still mid-sentence.  I felt as low as a telemarketer.

"Never call here again, you fucking moron," came the squeaky voice of a
Ukrainian alpha.  I hung up, resisting the urge to smash the phone in my
hand, and crossed another name off the list.

Will came striding into the room with his phone in his hand.  I was about
to apologize for my apparently idiotic idea of calling all the other alphas
when he said, "This was a brilliant idea of yours.  I can't believe how
many of these alphas are so supportive."

I wrinkled my brow.  "I'm not having that experience at all with the ones
I'm calling," I said.  "Most of them won't even listen to me."

"Well, maybe you're delivery's a little off?"

"Maybe so."

He put his phone to his ear.  "Here, let's do a practice call.  You call me
and give me your spiel."

I picked up my phone and put it to my ear, playing along.  "Ring, ring..."

"Yeah?" said Will in a disinterested tone of voice.

"Hello there.  My name is Rick, I'm co-alpha of what used to be the
Philadelphia pack, although we now reside in London.  I hope I'm not
disturbing you, sir, but my call is of a very important nature."

Will put the phone down and started to laugh.

"Great, you're laughing," I said.  "I suck at this."

When he stopped laughing, he was able to give me some pointers.  "You're
WAY too polite.  You're not calling for a job interview here.  You're an
alpha calling another alpha.  Don't be so deferential, you have to assert
yourself or they'll never take you seriously."

I sighed.  "Okay," I said.  "I'll try to be more of an asshole next time."

Suddenly Will's cell started to ring.

"Yeah, Will here," he said into it.

"Will," came Hadrian's snake-like voice.  "Perhaps you can explain to me
why I've gotten a series of concerned phone calls from alphas telling me
that your partner has been trying to convince them to support a change in
leadership?"

I looked at Will, concerned.  "Because the wolves need someone else in
charge if they're going to stay alive.  This is something every alpha needs
to take part in."

"After all I've done for you and your pack, all you offer me in return is
cold betrayal."

Will laughed.  "Stop being so dramatic, Hadrian.  I don't have anything
against you, I'm against your leadership.  You may have gotten a few
supportive calls Hadrian, but that's only a few out of fifty.  Most of them
agree with us, Hadrian."

"I'll never just step down.  You know that, Will.  You're not a complete
fool of a wolf."

"How will you be able to lead if none of the alphas listen to you anymore?"

There was a long silence.  Will and I traded anxious glances.

Finally, Hadrian responded.  "Fine.  You want the alphas to pick new
leadership?  I'll go along with that.  But it's done on my terms."

"Which means?"

"Which means I'll summon all of the alphas here, to London.  I'll host a
meeting.  Then we'll decide how to pick our new leader."

Will looked at me questionably.  I nodded excitedly.

"Alright, Hadrian," he said.

"Until then, no more phone calls," he said, "or I'll evict you and your
pack out onto the street.  And I don't know how you got the numbers you've
been calling, but I want you to take whatever information you have and get
rid or it before anyone else sets eyes upon it.  Burn it, in fact."

"Fine," said Will.

"Damn right it's fine," said Hadrian, and he hung up.

"I don't know," Will said to me.

"This is good.  This is fine.  When the other alphas get a chance to vote,
they won't elect Hadrian."

Will rubbed his eyes.  "Yeah, but Hadrian's too much of a bastard to hold
this meeting in an honest way.  He thinks he can win here, I can tell by
the tone of his voice.  He has something up his sleeve."

*****

It took a week for all the fifty-eight alphas to arrive in London, most of
them alone, some of them towing along their translators.  Hadrian was
putting all of them up in his den, all in the same large room, and all
sleeping on cots.  I felt bad for their uncomfortable living situations,
but figured it would probably decrease Hadrian's popularity.

The meeting was held in the warehouse portion of Hadrian's den, and only
the alphas and the translators were allowed to participate, much to the
distress of the other members of our den.

When Will and I walked into the warehouse, the smell of wolf overwhelmed
me.  I had never seen so many wolves together at once.  Wolves of all
different races and manner of dress, but the one trait that was common to
everyone was a rough, edgy appearance.  There was no trace of opulence or
elegance here; these were the tough working-class men of the world.

"Hadrian's not here yet," said Will as we made our way to the center of the
crowd.  He upturned an empty bucket and stood on top of it.  "Might as well
start things out right," he said to me.  Then he turned to the crowd and
put his arm into the air.  "Listen up, everybody!"

The low rumble of chatter died down as people focused on Will.

"It's because of me and my co-alpha that you've been brought here," he
began.  "It's time for all of us to work together to destroy this vampire
threat.  I, like all the rest of you, have witnessed countless wolf deaths
at the hands of those demons.  When the army of vampires came to my den, I
was the only survivor.  I was damn lucky to escape with my life.  Now that
I joined a new pack, now that I'm once again alpha, I have been forced to
flee my home once again to save my own life and the lives of my wolves."

Will continued, the passion in his voice escalating.  "The vampires are
gaining on us, slaughtering the wolves that have slipped through the
cracks, and making wolves extinct in one part of the world after the other.
It's only a matter of time before there's nothing left of us.  And Hadrian,
who we alphas have unquestionably followed for decades, is leading us to
our destruction.  He asks us to disorganize, cut off communication between
us, and go into hiding.  For centuries the vampires have been the ones to
hide from us--are we going to let fear change that for us forever?  Because
if we are to go into hiding now, we'll never again come out."

Hadrian had come up the ladder, took notice of Will, and now was walking
towards a large crate against the wall.

"No, this is not the time for cowardice," Will continued.  "This is the
time to organize and strike back.  This is the time to take back our homes,
avenge the death of our brothers, and to kill the vampires once and for
all."

There were some cheers among the crowd at this, including my own cheer at
Will's heartfelt words.  I glanced worriedly at Hadrian, who was climbing
up the crate.

Will nodded at the crowd with a slight smile and continued.  "It's time we
stop blindly following Hadrian towards our destruction.  Here, today, we
shall elect a new leader, take a vote, and--"

"Thank you, Will, thank you so much for that sentimental introduction,"
Hadrian interrupted from atop his crate, towering above all of the rest of
us.

"I have more to say--" yelled Will, but the wolves were all turning their
attention to Hadrian.

"You all know why you've been brought here," continued Hadrian, completely
ignoring Will.  "Some individuals among you are displeased in my
leadership.  Or perhaps they are just power-hungry, petty fools who mean to
take my place, to take my glory, no matter what the consequences for our
kind.  These people would have us vote for a leader, majority rules."  He
shook his head, showing disgust.  "What have we wolves come to?  Since when
is the wolf network a democracy?  Are we to become completely soft, then,
and vote which pack members should be alpha?  Will we forget what our kind
has always been based on--fighting for dominance?"

He was causing a stir.  Many of the others were shouting encouragements.

He went on.  "These soft wolves would have you vote your leader in.  I say
we have a vote of a different kind, right now.  And hopefully it will be
the last vote us wolves ever take.  How many of you wish to vote our leader
to power like a bunch of fat, old politicians?  And how many instead want
us to settle this matter of leadership like wolves--fighting for it?  All
in favor of voting, raise your hands!"

Will and I raised our hands, as did a number of other wolves, but not many.
I was extremely disappointed.

"Pitiful," said Hadrian, smiling.  "And those in favor of fighting?"

An overwhelming majority raised their hands.

"Right, just as I thought," said Hadrian.  "We'll settle this matter with a
simple tournament.  Any alpha may enter.  The winner will be granted
uncontested leadership over all the packs from here on out.  Agreed?"

The wolves were nodding their heads enthusiastically.

"Good.  Alright, fellas, who's going to enter this tournament besides
myself?"

Will raised his hand and I followed his lead.  "You know we will," he said.

"The ex-Philadelphians.  Both of you separately?" asked Hadrian.

"As one alpha," he answered.  "We share rank.  We know we fight equally
well.  You make us both enter separately, we'll end up in a draw when we
fight each other anyway."

"Alright, you two count as one then.  Who else?"

A tall Asian man with tattoo's covering his face raised his hand.  "Me," he
said.

"The alpha from Hong Kong.  Next?"

A dark Caucasian man who had his straight black hair in a pony-tail raised
his hand.  "One for Barcelona," he said with a thick Spanish accent.

Another man raised his hand, a dark Indian-looking man.  "Mumbai," he said.

"That's four.  Anyone else?"

A huge looking Caucasian raised his hand.  "I'll enter," he said.

"The alpha from Saint Petersburg," said Hadrian.  "Who else?"

"Ah, what the hell, I'll enter too," said a stocky wolf with an Australian
accent.  "Don't much want the responsibility, but I can tell for damn sure
I'm stronger than any of you."

There came a mixture of cheers and boos after this comment.

Hadrian nodded.  "Big words from the alpha of Brisbane.  My guess is he'll
be the first one out."

More cheering.

"Anyone else?"  Nobody raised their hand.  "Come on, fellas, that's just
seven.  We need eight to have a decent tournament.  Who's going to step up
to the plate?"

Nobody answered his request.

Hadrian pointed to a smallish Asian wolf nearby his crate.  "You, I'm
entering you," he said.

"Me?"

"That's right.  Where are you from?"

He looked around nervously.  "Taipei," he said.

"Right then.  That's eight.  A schedule of fights will be posted tomorrow.
I'll put my den in charge of overseeing the details, without my
participation, of course."

"He's lying," Will said to me.

"In the meantime," he went on, "I ask all the rest of you to stay as
witnesses to this tournament.  I have a large enough kennel for all of you
come full moon, do not worry."

Hadrian dismissed us, and Will and I left the building quickly as the other
alphas chatted excitedly.

"I fucked up," said Will as we were walking down the street back to our new
den.  "It was my speech," he said.  "I've never been a good speaker."

"Your speech was good, Will," I said.  "It wouldn't have mattered if you
were the best speaker on Earth, they still would have supported a
tournament.  Fighting is all they know how to do."

Will nodded, squinting into the sun.  "Fighting is what a wolf's designed
for."

"We still have a good chance here, Will.  You said you thought you could
beat Hadrian."

"But who knows about any of the others," he said as we approached the
entrance to the den.  "I have no fucking clue how strong they are."

I entered the new key-code and the garage door opened, letting us through.

Matt and Cougar were playing cards on the card table when we walked in.
Will sulkily went straight into the bedroom.

Matt looked from Will shutting the door to my disappointed face.  "I take
it the election didn't go well," he said.

"The election never took place," I said.  "Instead, a fighting tournament
will decide who leads out of nine of us fighters."

"Oh, that's much more exciting," said Cougar.  "Sounds sorta like the
premise of a videogame."  He spun around in his chair to face me.  "Are we
allowed to come watch the fights?"

"Yeah, I think so," I said.

"Awesome."

"Where are the others?" I asked.

"Went out for lunch," said Cougar.

I set my jacket down on one of the chairs and walked over to the card
table.

"Look guys," I said.  "I have a request of you."

"Yeah?" asked Matt.

"Instead of hanging around here all day, why don't you go hang out over at
Hadrian's with the rest of the alphas?"

"You sick of us, man?" asked Cougar.

"No.  But I want you two to do some reconnaissance work.  Find out
everything you can about the six contestants that we don't know.  Find out
who we should watch out for."

"Ah, why don't you send Malcolm and Russ instead?"

"Because Malcolm and Russ antagonize everyone they meet.  You two make
friends easily, and you know how to listen."

Cougar frowned at me.  "Why don't you go yourself--"

Matt hit him in the back of his head.  "Stop complaining," he said.  "Of
course we'll go."

"Fine," said Cougar throwing his cards down and rising to his feet.

"Thanks, guys," I said.

*****

The next evening, Case and Malcolm were sitting with me in the main room
giving me fight advice when Cougar and Matt came running in after being
over at Hadrian's all day with a flier in hand.

"Look at this," said Cougar, thrusting the flier into my face.  "It's the
first fight."

Will came out of the bedroom upon hearing this.  "The first match of the
first tier of the tournament will be held tonight at midnight on the ground
level of Hadrian's den," I read off.  "The details of the next fight will
not be released until the first fight has concluded."  I read on.
"Tonight's fight will be--Mumbai vs. St. Petersberg."  I lowered the paper
and looked at Will.  "Good, we don't have to go tonight."

Will nodded, grabbing the flier to look for himself.  "There's no way that
Hadrian is letting his pack pick the locations and contestants of each
fight," he said.  "See?  He's putting the Australian in the first match.
He wants him out quick."

"The Australian," said Matt, "Watts is his name.  He's good--real good.
I'd say he's the best of this six of them.  One real tough motherfucker."

"No fuckin way," said Cougar.  "The guy from Hong Kong is the best."

"The guy with the tattoos?"

"Yeah, that's him," said Cougar excitedly.  "His name is Leung.  Everyone's
terrified of him.  He's supposed to have studied, and mastered, every
discipline of combat.  They say he's killed over two hundred vampires in
his lifetime.  The Asians say he's the greatest wolf fighter, ever.  They
say he's the only one Hadrian fears."

"It's true," said Case.  "I've heard of that guy.  He's supposed to be
indestructible."

"But he's still a pansy compared with Watts," said Matt.

Cougar eyed Matt annoyingly.  "He's biased because he thinks Asians can't
fight."

"I'm just going by the evidence you've provided," joked Matt.

"Well, what about this Russian guy?" asked Case.  "That's the one who's
fighting tonight."

Matt shrugged.  "He's a huge motherfucker."

"As big as me?" asked Malcolm.

"Not that big, but big," said Matt.  "And he's a real jerk, as far as I can
tell.  I went to meet him and he told me to fuck off."

"What about the other fighters?" I asked them.  "Anyone else we should be
worried about?"

"All of these guys are fucking fierce," said Matt.  "Well, except for the
Taiwanese guy."

"Enough with the racism, Matt," reprimanded Case.  "Some of the strongest
wolves in history have been Asian."

"No, this time he's right," said Cougar.  "The guy from Taiwan isn't all
that strong.  His pack only has four wolves in it, and all of them have a
reputation for weakness.  I don't even know why he entered this
tournament."

"Because Hadrian volunteered him into it, that's why," said Will.

"Alright, thanks to both of you," I said to Matt and Cougar.  "You've
helped immensely."

"Sure dude, no problem," said Matt.  "We just want to make sure you win
this thing."

*****

At ten to midnight our whole pack went over to Hadrian's den to witness the
opening fight.  The warehouse was filled up with all the wolves of the
previous day's meeting, but added to that amount was all of the London
wolves, anxiously awaiting what promised to be a good show.

"I've never seen so many wolves," said Cougar in awe.

"Nobody has," said Russ.  "There's never been anything like this before."

Before long Hadrian took his place on top of his crate once again.  "All
right, boys," he said.  "Time for the first fight of this tournament.  I
need everyone to stand back against the edges of the wall."

Everyone pulled back, until all four walls were lined with wolves, and the
massive room within was starkly empty.

"Now, St. Petersburg and Brisbane, step forward."

When Watts came out of the crowd, there came some cheering, which he didn't
seem to acknowledge.

"The other Australian alphas really respect him," explained Matt to me.

When the Russian stomped out of the crowd, nobody cheered.  He glared
around at the crowd, as if he might attack anyone who dared to boo.

"Now for the rules," said Hadrian, adopting a smug grin.  "Fights, like
always, will be fought without clothing.  They will end when one of the
combatants is knocked out.  Of course, there's always the chance in fights
such as these that a combatant will be killed--if that happens, the
combatant still alive will be considered the victor."

These words chilled me, although I of course knew that every fight I had
ever fought carried this risk.

Hadrian went on.  "Interactions or exchanges between fighters and
spectators are never allowed.  Fighters are allowed and encouraged to make
use of the landscapes in which they compete, including brandishing any
objects within the arena as weapons."

"There's nothing to pick up or use in here," pointed out Watts.  "It's just
wide-open space."

"Thanks, Brisbane, for pointing out the obvious," said Hadrian rudely.
"These rules aren't just for tonight but for all the upcoming battles as
well."

"Get on with it," said Watts, "and just tell me what form to take."

"That's the final rule," said Hadrian.  "No form will be chosen for the
fight beforehand.  Contestants will be able to shift at will, as frequently
as they please."

There came a lot of murmurs over this last rule.  "This is never done,"
Case whispered to me.

"You're saying I can just shift back and forth regardless of what he's
doing?" asked Watts.

"Is that too difficult for you to get through your thick skull, Brisbane?"
asked Hadrian.  "Alright, get your clothes off, both of you."

I couldn't stop myself from checking the two guys out as they disrobed.

The Russian, in my point of view, wasn't all that attractive.  He was a
huge bear type, his stocky frame loaded with muscle and fair amount of fat.
His dick was like the rest of him; big and fat.

I much preferred to look at Watts, who luckily was standing not far from
where I was standing.  His face was handsome, that much I had known since
yesterday, with a cleft chin, squinty eyes, and short, light-brown hair.
He was built solidly, with lots of muscle, and covered with hair.  My eyes,
as they always did, focused in on his dick, a tasty-looking uncut morsel.

I felt an elbow in my rib.  "I see what you're looking at," Will whispered
into my ear.  I smiled and shrugged at him, as if it was completely beyond
my control.  "If it's dick you want, you'll have to wait until we get back
to the den," he whispered.

"Ready," said Hadrian, as the fighters took aggressive postures.  "Set.
Go!"

Immediately the Russian started to morph into a werewolf.  Watts, with a
furious yell, ran at him without morphing himself, and attacked him while
he was still transforming.  Watts had the Russian bent and bleeding until
the Russian finished his transformation.  Then the Russian attempted a
vicious bite (which Watts avoided) followed by a claw-swipe (which Watts
could not avoid).

Clearly out gunned, Watts ran off into a retreat.  His man form was no
match for the Russian's gigantic werewolf, and the Russian new it.  He
chased after Watts as fast as he could

At this point we were all wondering why Watts wouldn't just morph into a
werewolf as well in an attempt to combat the Russian's power.  But Watts
just kept on running around the huge warehouse, always too fast for the
Russian to catch up.

Finally, after the Russian was panting like mad chasing around the room,
Watts morphed into his Were form and charged the Russian with everything he
had.  Watts hadn't even broken a sweat with all that running, and now his
dominance was clear with his fight against the powerful but exhausted
Russian.

"He's damn good," said Will to me after Watts performed a series of
powerful moves against the Russian that created a torrent of cheers from
the crowd.

Soon, the Russian was on the floor, bleeding profusely, and unconscious.

"Match over!" yelled Hadrian.

"Yeah!" screamed Watts happily as a group of wolves surrounded him to offer
their congratulations.

"Alright, shut the fuck up, all of you!" yelled Hadrian, forcing the room
into silence.  "St. Petersburg is out, and Brisbane unfortunately moves
into the next tier."  There was more cheering.  "The next match will be
held tomorrow night, at 3am, on the 11th floor of the Hastings office
tower.  The contestants will be..."

I held my breath.

"Barcelona and Mumbai.  See you then."  He stepped down from his soapbox.

I took a deep breath, relieved.  I knew I would be fighting sooner or later
in this tournament, but the prospect of doing it in front of all these
strangers against a truly dreadful opponent was mind-bogglingly terrifying.

"I'm glad it's not us," I told Will as everyone except our group headed for
the ladder leading into the den.

"I wish it was us," he said.  "I want to get it over with.  With Hadrian
picking our opponent and our location, the odds are probably always going
to be stacked against us."

"Are you saying we're going to lose?" I asked him.

"No," he said.  "I'm saying we'll have to be that much better than the rest
of them to make sure we win."

*****

Twenty-six hours later all of the wolves were reassembled on the 11th floor
of Hastings Office Tower.  I didn't know how Hadrian's den had gotten
access to the building, but they had led us in through a back entrance and
up a service elevator, telling us to disregard the security cameras as they
had all been shut off.  Obviously Hadrian had some real connections in this
city.

The 11th floor of the building had an outstanding view, but wasn't
otherwise all that nice.  It was filled up with nothing but a maze of gray
cubicles which served as tiny little stations for all of the grunt office
employees.  The big wigs' offices were apparently on another floor
altogether.

Hadrian once again had all of us spectators back up against the walls (only
this time they were windows) before having the two competitors undress.

Both the Indian and the Spaniard were attractive individuals, with smooth,
elegantly handsome faces and powerful bodies filled with lean muscle.

As soon as Hadrian gave them the go-ahead, they began to fight man to man,
learning from the mistake the Russian made of morphing too soon in the
start of the battle.  They were well matched and quite remarkable fighters,
although the Spanish wolf moved with more grace and elegance while the
Indian was a little more rough and forceful.

Soon, however, they were completely out of my view as they weaved in and
out of office cubicles.

"Can you see them?" I asked Malcolm who was standing beside me, and, if
anyone, had the height to see over the cubicles.

"A little," he said.  There was a loud crash.  "Ouch," said Malcolm.
"Spain just dropped a filing cabinet onto India's foot.  Now Spain is
morphing."

I heard the familiar growl of a werewolf.

"Spain is tearing into India," said Malcolm.  "Oh, but there goes India,
running off.  And now he's changed into a wolf.  Damn, I can't see him."

Then I saw the Spanish werewolf, ripping apart cubicle after cubicle,
obviously searching for the Indian wolf who by then must have been pretty
well wounded.

"There's India," said Malcolm, nodding towards the black wolf who was
hiding in a corner cubicle.  I watched as the Indian turned back into a
man, grabbed a computer monitor, ripped it from its desk, and went running
out of his hiding place.

The wolf from Barcelona barely had time to turn around before his face was
embedded into the screen of the monitor.  He stumbled out of sight, and the
Indian leaped upon him.

"What's happening now?" I asked Malcolm.

"It looks like Spain is going to make a comeback."  There came a loud,
anguished scream.  "Oh, I guess not," said Malcolm.

"Mumbai wins!" yelled Hadrian.

Some alphas went to congratulate him, stepping over the ruins of the
wrecked office.

Hadrian went on.  "Next fight will be tomorrow at midnight.  The fight will
be held outdoors in a forest some distance to the northeast of here.  My
pack will provide the transportation for all of you.  We encourage you to
bring flashlights.  The fighters are..."

Once again I held my breath.

"Hong Kong and Philadelphia.  See you then."

"I knew it," Will said to me.

>From across the rubble of some cubicles, Leung moved his piercing eyes
towards us, his face rigid, as he looked back and forth between us, sizing
us both up.  Then, he turned, and rejoined the crowd that was fast exiting
the building.

"I knew that son of a bitch would do this," said Will.  "He's making us
fight the strongest enemy, and he saves the weakest one for himself."

"Which one of us should fight tomorrow?" I asked, swallowing my
nervousness.  "Perhaps I should," I said.  "People tend to underestimate me
because of my youth."

Will shook his head adamantly.  "No, I want to fight tomorrow," he said.
"I'm anxious to do someone damage."

I wasn't going to argue with him.

We followed the other wolves out of the building, leaving the 11th floor
looking like a hurricane had blown through it.

*****

The next afternoon Case came into the den carrying a bag full of
flashlights and batteries.

"What's all that for?" asked Russ as Case unloaded the bag onto the table.

"Hadrian said he recommended that we bring along flashlights tonight," he
answered as he started to install the batteries.  "I got one for
everybody," he said, pleased with himself.

"Oh, thanks Case," I said.

"What's the point?" asked Russ, grabbing a flashlight for himself and
testing it out.  "We all have wolf eyes, don't we?  We can see alright in
the dark."

"I don't know, Russ," said Case.  "Hadrian said to bring them, so I suppose
it's going to be pretty damn dark."

And so that night, as Hadrian and his den led the large group of wolves
into the forest, each member of my pack had a flashlight in hand.  All of
Hadrian's men had flashlights as well, while not many of the other alphas
did.

It took us a good twenty minutes of walking until we came to the spot where
the fight was to be held.  Will hadn't said anything on the entire trip
here, in fact he'd been quiet all day.

"You okay?" I asked him as we hiked.

"I'm fine," he said.

"You're not scared?"

"Not scared."  He pointed his flashlight at his face and gave me an
intimidating look.  "See?" he said.  "Not scared, scary.  I'm ready to do
this."

"Good," I said, and again I admired him for his unshakable courage.

"Here we are," said Hadrian finally, stopping in a part of the forest that
looked no different to me than any other part we had been walking through
for so long.  "I want all of you to spread out and create a perimeter for
this arena.  Go ahead."

Will handed me his flashlight.  "Here I go," he said.

"I'd wish you luck, but you don't need it," I said.  "You'll win,
definitely."

He smiled doubtfully as I moved back with the rest of the wolves, leaving
him standing alone in the dark trees.

Once we had created a perimeter so wide that I had trouble seeing the other
side, Hadrian told us to stay put.  I could see Leung standing not far from
Will, his face barely visible in the dark because it was covered in
tattoos.

"Alright, contestants," Hadrian said.  "Time to remove your clothing."

As Leung took off his clothes, I was surprised to see his whole body was
covered with tattoos as well, putting Will's meager two tattoos to shame.

Everyone turned off their flashlights or turned them away from the
fighters, and I did the same.  I realized that I could barely see Will and
Leung without the help of those lights.

"Go!" yelled Hadrian.

My heart started to race as the fight began.  I tried to focus onto the
fighters as they attacked each other, but try as I might, I couldn't see
much of them in the dark.  I could hear them hitting branches and stepping
on sticks, as well as the occasional grunt or yell, but I had no way of
telling which one of them was winning.

"Can you see what's going on?" I asked Case who was to my right in the
circle.

"I can't see anything," he said.

I guessed the other spectators were as frustrated at this blindness as I
was, because all at once, just after I heard Leung cry out in pain, a whole
bunch of flashlights turned on and started to search through the arena.  I
thought that this action was pretty rude, since the bright lights had to be
disturbing the fighters, but what could I do but hope Will wouldn't lose
his concentration?

I realized that all the flashlights were searching for the fighters.  Then,
one or two of them came across Leung's form through the trees, and I could
see he was bleeding pretty bad.

As quickly as the flashlights found Leung, they moved on, searching.
Finally a flashlight lit up Will's face; he was a little bloody but looked
fine, thankfully.

I thought that once the lights had found Will, they would turn off.  But
instead, as soon as the first light shined upon Will, all the other lights
moved to shine upon him as well.  His naked figure was so bright he looked
like he had some supernatural glow to his skin.

He squinted and put his hand in front of his face to try and block the
light--obviously it was blinding him.  And then I really started to get
pissed off, because the flashlights weren't focusing on anything besides
Will.  And what was worse for Will than being blinded, while Leung probably
wasn't able to see Will before, now Will was painfully visible.  I heard a
deep growl, and knew that Leung had taken the opportunity to morph into a
werewolf.

I looked around at the holders of these flashlights.  Every one of them
that I could see was from Hadrian's pack; in fact I could see Hadrian
clearly, holding a flashlight aimed at Will with a look of malice upon his
face.  He was trying to control the outcome of this fight, and Will was not
in his favor.

I was furious.  I flicked my own flashlight back on.  To Case, who was on
my right, and Cougar, who was on my left, I said, "turn your flashlights on
and shine them on Leung.  Tell the others to as well."

As my message spread through my pack, I searched with my flashlight into
the darkness, looking for Leung, but he had completely disappeared.

Then his presence became quite apparent as he attacked Will from behind,
sinking his teeth into the back of Will's neck, and his claws into the
muscles of Will's back.  I winced.

Will somehow was able to fight him off and run away from Leung's attack,
but as soon as he did, the lights shining upon him were blinding him once
more, and all he could do was look around frantically.

I shined my light upon Leung and the others followed my lead, until six
lights brightened up Leung's features.  He had walked around to Will's
side, trying to flank him and catch him in another surprise attack.

But this time, with our flashlights locked onto the werewolf, Will saw
Leung before he could attack and ran off again.

Then Will did the smartest thing he could have done; he turned into a wolf
and ran off through the trees, his small, fast, dark figure leaving the
London pack's flashlights behind.

Their lights searched everywhere again, trying to find Will, while my pack
kept our locked onto Leung as he searched as well.

After a long while of nothing, Leung was suddenly under attack from behind
by another werewolf.  Will must have morphed in the darkness.

Leung spun around and the two of them fought fiercely, but Will had scored
several serious wounds upon Leung with his first attack, and afterwards
Will was able to outfight Leung.

Leung fell to the ground, still under the glow of our flashlights.
Everybody was able to see Will's victory, and many started to cheer.

"Philadelphia moves on," said Hadrian sourly after throwing down his
flashlight.

I ran out into the woods towards Will, exuberant.  He was a bloody,
nine-foot tall werewolf in front of me, but I didn't care, I tackled him
when I reached him, hugging him excitedly.  My clothes soaked through with
blood but it was worth it.

Will morphed back then, and I hugged him still.

"You just beat the wolf they claimed was the best wolf fighter, ever," I
said, after I had let him go.  "That speaks pretty damn highly of you."

"I got lucky," he said.  "I would have lost if it wasn't for all of you
shining your lights on the bastard.  Whose idea was that?  Yours?"

I smiled, feeling very proud of myself.

He laughed.  "Do I even have to ask?  Of course it was you."

"Hadrian was trying to make you lose," I said.  "I couldn't just watch and
let him do it."

"Hadrian will stop at nothing to win this tournament," he said.

Right at that moment, Hadrian's voice shouted over the crowd.  "Next fight
will be tomorrow night, at midnight.  The location will be inside the
ground level of my den."

"Again?" I said.  "Hadrian must be out of creative locations."

"The fighters for tomorrow, obviously, will be myself and Taipei.  Now, my
wolves will lead you back to the cars."

Will grabbed his clothes and got dressed while I found Case with the
others.

"Case, your flashlights really saved our ass tonight," I said, patting his
back.  "Thanks a lot."

He shrugged.  "No problem."  He looked inordinately pleased that I had
acknowledged him.  He smiled warmly, then when I turned to rejoin Will, I
noticed his face turn cold.

"This was the second toughest fight I've ever fought," said Will as we
started to walk back through the trees, a little behind the others.  "The
toughest fight I ever had was of course when I fought you."

"Don't worry," I said.  "I'll be as nervous as ever, but I'll fight the
next fight for us."  Then I turned to face him.  "Unless the next fight is
against Hadrian.  Otherwise, I'll do the fighting."

He grabbed my hand, pulled me to a stop, and kissed me.  We were far enough
behind that nobody would have been able to see us, and this spontaneous
gesture I found extremely touching.

"What was that for?" I asked when he had pulled away.

"I don't know," he said.  "I guess just a celebration that we're a little
closer to our goal.  I couldn't do this without you.  I wouldn't want to
without you."

I squeezed his hand in mine.  "I couldn't do this without you, either," I
said.  "We're partners.  We're practically symbiotic.  We're strong because
we think and act together."  I pulled him towards the crowd.  "Come on, I
don't want us to get lost out here," I said.  "We've had enough adventures
in the woods recently to last me a lifetime."

We hurried back towards the others before we lost sight of them completely.

*****

The next night when our pack walked into Hadrian's warehouse, it was much
like the night of the first fight, with all of the other wolves crowding
around the center of the huge room.

There was one very noticeable difference, though.  In the middle of the
warehouse, surrounded by the crowd of wolves, was a large black van like
the one that had picked us up from the airport.

"What's that van doing there?" asked Cougar.

"Maybe this isn't the location of the fight after all," said Matt.  "We
could be driving some place."

"No, look," said Malcolm, pointing to the van.  "All the seats.  In the
back.  See?  They're missing."

A wolf jumped upon Hadrian's crate who was definitely not Hadrian.

"Alright, alright, quiet down," he said in an English accent, much more
timidly than Hadrian would have.  "I'm Hadrian's beta, Mark," he said.
"I'll be referee for tonight."  Then he lifted his hand into the air.
"London and Taipei, come to the van.  If the others of you could step back,
please."

We all backed away from the van as Hadrian came forward, wearing just a
robe, a knowing smile upon his greasy face.  The Taiwanese wolf came
forward too, trying with all his might to be brave, but looking seriously
anxious nonetheless.

"Remove your clothing, please."

They both stripped.  Hadrian's lean, muscular frame was covered with thick
salt and pepper hair.

"This fight will take place inside the van," said Mark from the crate.

There came a series of murmurs from the crowd.

I looked at Will.  "Inside the van?" I asked.  "There's no room in there
for a fight."

He shrugged, but he didn't show any sign of surprise.  "This is Hadrian's
fight," he said.  "You can't really expect fairness here."

Hadrian opened the van door, and looked at the Taiwanese guy as if he was
about to devour him.  "After you," he growled.

The nervous wolf, who was obviously completely out of his depth here,
stepped into the van.  Hadrian followed him in.

"Neither wolf is permitted to leave the van until the fight has concluded,"
said Mark as Hadrian shut the door.  "Go!"

As soon as he heard the word, Hadrian began to morph into a werewolf.  The
Taiwanese guy did what seemed to be the right move--he stayed in the form
he was in and attacked Hadrian while he morphed.

Hadrian just took it, not ever budging.  It was as if he was made of steel.

Then, when his transformation finished, all hell broke lose inside that
van.

It was like watching monster movie.  Hadrian took up most of the space in
the van with his huge, terrifying form.  He reached down, thrust his claws
into the Taiwanese wolf's ribs, pulled him to his mouth, and began to rip
him to shreds.

The wolves watching were all glancing at each other nervously.  Then the
windows in the van were splashed with blood, blocking our view at all.

"He's not going to kill him, is he?" I asked Will, concerned.

Will once again shrugged.

The door to the van opened, and Hadrian stepped out, once again a man.
"It's over," he said.

Inside the van the other wolf was certainly unconscious or perhaps worse.

"London wins!" exclaimed Mark.  All of the other wolves in Hadrian's den
were cheering wildly.

The alphas closest to the van went forward to inspect the wolf from Taipai.
While Hadrian's pack swarmed around him like groupies, the eyes of all of
my pack were locked onto this poor wolf's lifeless body, fearing the worst.

Quite to my relief, the wolf emitted a bloody cough and sat up.  He was
alive.

I looked at Will and sighed.  He rubbed the back of my head reassuringly.

Hadrian had climbed on top of the crate again, still naked.  "Alright,
enough celebration for now," he said.  "We'll move along into the next tier
of this tournament starting tomorrow night at 3 am.  We'll be going back to
the Hastings Office Tower, only this time the fight will take place on the
roof."

I shivered.  Fighting on the roof sounded dangerous.

"The contestants will be..."

I had a suspicion that one of them would be me.

"Myself," Hadrian continued.  "And Mumbai.  See you then."

I took a deep sigh of relief.

"What are you so happy about?" asked Will.

"I really didn't want to fight on the roof," I said.  "And especially not
against Hadrian."

"Well don't celebrate yet," he said.  "Hadrian's left the wolf who might be
the strongest in this tournament to fight you."

"Watt's," I said.

"I'm telling you," interrupted Matt.  "Watts is the best there is here."

"Are you sure you don't want me to fight that one too?" asked Will.

"No," I said, a bit insulted.  "I'm just as good a fighter as you."

"That's true," he said.  "But you can't afford to be scared here.  You go
into one of these fights nervous or scared, you lose."

"That's why, when the time comes, you'll fight Hadrian.  Watts I can
handle.  I need to make my contribution."

"Okay," said Will, but I didn't detect much faith from him.

It would have been hypocritical to be angry with his doubt in me--I doubted
myself so much more than he realized.

*****

When we woke up the next morning, it was raining.  There weren't any
windows in our den that would have allowed us to see the bad weather first
hand, but we could hear the rain, and more water than ever dripped down
from the ceiling.  Cougar, the only one in the barracks unfortunate enough
to choose a top bunk to sleep on, woke up before dawn to water dripping
upon his face.

It was raining harder than ever by the time the fight began.  Once again,
late at night, we were heading up in the service elevator in groups of ten.
The roof of the tower had nothing upon it beside the rainwater, and even
that swiftly poured into the gutters that lined the building.

"It's a long way down," said Will, who was peering over the four-foot
railing.

I looked down, the empty street below looking unnaturally small.

When everyone had made it up, Hadrian's beta, not having a crate to stand
upon this time, just waved his arm in the air to get our attention.

"All spectators, please move towards the railing."

My pack and I were already waiting against one of the railings.  Everyone
else moved outwards, leaving just Hadrian and the Indian wolf in the
center.

"Fighters, please remove your clothing."

Both of them took off their wet clothes.  Hadrian's gray, curly locks were
sticking to his face as he stared down his opponent.

Unlike last night's opposition to Hadrian, the Indian wolf seemed composed
and calm--carrying the attitude of someone who knows he has a good chance
of winning.

"It's fitting," he said to Hadrian, squinting his eyes, "that you and I
should face each other in battle.  Our home countries have had a long and
bloody history.  It's time once again that you English relent and offer us
change."

Hadrian raised an eyebrow.  "Oh yes, Mumbai?  Do you fight in the name of
India like some werewolf version of Gandhi?"

The Indian wolf didn't smile.  "Gandhi wouldn't approve of the techniques
I'm about to show you."

"Go!" yelled Mark without warning.

They tore into each other, splashing around in the water.  It was a
completely straight-forward fight, as the playing ground didn't hold any
surprises or secrets here, it was just an empty, open space.  It was
surprising to me that Hadrian hadn't chosen an arena that would have given
him more of an unfair advantage.

Perhaps he figured he didn't need it, and watching him fight, I could see
for the first time why he had ruled the wolves for so many years.  He was
incredibly skilled, moving with an ease and grace that I could not compare
to.

But the wolf from Mumbai was no laughing matter either.  It seemed to be
that he had the strength advantage here.

Both of them were extremely aggressive, neither one ever striking a
defensive posture.  They hadn't transformed yet either, as they both
refused to back off of each other long enough to do so.

Finally, Hadrian landed a hard blow on the Indian wolf that he wasn't
expecting.  I gasped as he flew backwards, landing on his back in the
water.  Was that it?

No, he got to his feet again, now a good fifteen feet from Hadrian.
Remarkably, even though they were separated for the first time, neither one
of them took the opportunity to morph.  Instead, the Indian wolf glared at
Hadrian, and Hadrian sneered back at him, beckoning him forward with his
hand.

With a grunt the Indian wolf ran at Hadrian at his fastest pace, splashing
through the water.

Hadrian didn't move away from his opponents charge.  Instead, with his
limbs moving too quickly for me to follow, he grabbed the Indian wolf and
sent him flying up into the air.

My jaw dropped.  Everyone's jaws dropped.  There was nothing anyone could
have done.

The wolf from Mumbai, arms flailing wildly, searching for something to grab
onto, but not finding anything, went flying over the heads of the wolves
lined up by the railing.

Silently, the direction of the wolf's movement shifted downwards, and he
disappeared from my view.

The rain drowned out any sound his body made when it hit the street many
stories below.

Everyone was running over to the railing to look, and I was no exception.
Will grabbed my arm and tried to stop me, but I had to see for myself.

There, so many stories down, was what was left of the wolf, his limbs bent
and twisted and torn.  Around him the rain water was turning red with
blood.

I turned away from that sight and faced Will, who had followed me to the
railing.  "Can a wolf survive that?" I asked.

He shook his head sadly.

I felt sick.  Even though I had seen much more disturbing violence, this
act was so empty of any meaning and so cruel that I couldn't even fathom
it.

"London wins, by default," said Hadrian's beta.

"That's totally fucked up," Cougar said beside me.

"Somebody should push Hadrian over the ledge and call it even," Russ said
back.

The other wolves, even some of Hadrian's group, were all just as frustrated
and upset as my pack was.  But we all knew that no rules had been broken
here.  There was to be no punishment for Hadrian's cruel tactics.

Hadrian himself started to talk.  "I'm very sorry," he said.  "It was an
unfortunate accident, and nothing more.  I've already sent my boys down
there to clean up the mess.  All of us wolves know that death is a
possibility when we enter these fights."

I looked around.  The angry faces on all the wolves seemed to suggest that
nobody was buying this.

Hadrian's forced solemnity shifted quickly into excitement.  "Now for the
information concerning the next fight, Brisbane against Philadelphia."

I perked up my ears.

"We will be meeting once again at 3am tomorrow night at my den, where
transportation will be provided to everyone.  The contestants will be
fighting in an emptied out swimming pool."

I looked questionably at Will, and he shrugged back.  What was the point in
fighting in such a place?

"I don't even want to know what he has planned for me tomorrow night," I
said as Will and the rest of the pack headed towards the elevators.

"Better not morph into Were form if you'll be in water," said Malcolm,
widening his eyes.  "You'll sink straight down."

"Thanks for the tip," I said.  "But Hadrian said the pool would be empty,
luckily."

During the trip back to the den, the rest of the pack was quite vocal at
their outrage over the death of the Indian wolf, but I was the only one who
was truly shaken.  Part of it was due to the fact that I had never
witnessed a death of a wolf until then, and oddly enough the death of a
wolf seemed to hold so much more weight to me than the deaths of the
vampires I had seen or caused, and even the lost lives of the victims I had
taken.

Also, I couldn't help but feel a little responsible.  It was because of me
that this tournament had ever been conceived.  If it wasn't for my
meddling, there would be one more wolf alive this night.

I was still lost in my head when we had gotten back to the den and Will
lead me into our bedroom.  I stared at Will coldly as he stripped off his
wet jeans and shirt, taking off his boxers, me not really looking at his
naked beauty, but instead right through his body.

"You'd better get undressed," he said to me as he sat on the bed.  I stood
there, completely dazed.  "What, you're limbs not working tonight?" he
asked.

Will stood up and yanked my shirt over my head.  Then he quickly pulled my
pants and boxers off as well, leaving me naked and standing there, still
staring silently ahead.

"What's wrong?" he asked.  "You cold or something?"

He wrapped my into his warm arms, rubbing my back with his hands.  I shut
my eyes at this simple but profound touch.

"I think we should drop out of the tournament," I said.

"What?" he asked, pushing me forward by my shoulders so he could read the
expression on my face.  "Why?  Don't you still want to take Hadrian's
place?"

"I do," I said.  "But Hadrian killed someone tonight," I said.  "I can't
help but think that Hadrian is planning to do the same to the rest of us.
You, me, Watts... any one of us could die before this tournament is over."

Will rubbed my shoulder.  "Look, after tonight more than ever, I know that
we can't stop until Hadrian's power is gone.  He's a killer, plain and
simple, and he killed that man tonight to try and shake us up.  If we quit
now he'll have won."

I let these words sink in, knowing them to be the truth.  "Alright," I
said, nodding.  "You're right.  We can't stop now."  I rubbed my eyes.
"I'll do my best tomorrow night."

Will walked away from me and got into bed.  "No way.  You're not fighting
tomorrow, I am."

"What?  No!  It's my fight."

"I don't give a damn," he said.  "I'm doing the rest of the fighting in
this tournament.  I'm better trained for it than you."

"You don't think I can win tomorrow?" I asked, my ego bruised.

"No, you can win," he said.  "But you can also die.  After I saw what I did
tonight, I knew I would have to be idiotic to let you fight one of these
fights."

"That's ridiculous," I said.  "You are taking just as much of a danger to
yourself as you would have me avoid."

"That's right," he said, putting his hands behind his head.  "I've lived a
long life already, and you're just a teenager still.  If one of us has to
risk his life, it should be me."

I shook my head obstinately.  "No.  I'm fighting tomorrow.  I don't care
what the risks are."

He flipped over angrily and punched the wall.  "Damn it, why can't you just
do what I say?"  He turned on his side, looking towards me.  "I have a bad
feeling about tomorrow," he said.  "I couldn't stand to lose you."

"You've had bad feelings before, Will, and I'm still here, still alive," I
said.  "Besides, if you died tomorrow, you think I could stand to lose you?
I'm fighting tomorrow, as planned.  If I win, then you'll be the one to
fight Hadrian."

He groaned.  "Fine," he relented.  "You'll fight tomorrow's fight.  Now,
get the fuck in bed with me."

I got under the covers and wrapped my arms around him.

"I'll make you proud tomorrow.  I promise, no dying," I joked.

He kissed me.  "I'm holding you to that."

*****

The next day, at ten o' clock, I sat in one of the plastic lawn chairs in
the main room of our den, feeling overwhelmingly nervous about the fight
that was to commence five hours from then.  There was so much pressure on
my shoulders to win, most of it self-imposed.  The stakes of this fight
were bigger than any other I had faced.  Combined with that was the
realization that this would probably be my last fight in quite some time.
Failure was not an option, but I wasn't at all confident in a victory.

Will and I had stayed in while the others went out, sparring some in our
bedroom since it was the only way to really get any practice in this den.
A half hour ago, I had stopped the practice, knowing that I was as prepared
as I would get.  What was needed was not more fighting practice; what was
needed was for me to conquer my nerves, a battle I feared I was already
losing.

"You're scared," said Will from behind me, standing in the kitchen.

"You can tell?"

"It's not that hard, pup.  I can hear your heart pounding from here."  He
looked at the clock on the stove.  "We still got a lot of time," he said.
"Wanna fool around some?"

"Now?" I asked him.  "I have the biggest fight of my life tonight and you
want to have sex?"

He didn't listen to my complaints.  He lifted me up out of that chair,
turned me towards the bedroom, and pushed me towards the door.  "Move it,"
he said.  "It'll help calm you down."

"I'm really not in a sex mood," I said, wiping my sweaty palms on my jeans
as we went into the room.

Will shut the door, and pushed me onto my back on the bed.  "You stay
there," he ordered.

I watched him as he undressed, loving the sight of his nude body as much as
ever, but still feeling too preoccupied to want to act on my attraction.

"Here I come," he said, smiling.  He jumped up into the air and over me,
until all I could see for a moment was a large naked man spread-eagled
above me, and then landed with a thud on top of me.

He laughed, wrapping his arms around me, rubbing his naked legs against my
denim-covered ones, and kissed me deeply, flicking his tongue against mine.
He pulled my T-shirt up and off, kissing my throat tenderly, then sucking
on my nipple.  He bit at it a little as he sucked, and it was at that
moment that I got aroused enough to erection, although I was still highly
distracted.

He rubbed my dick through my pants, smiling at me.  Then he unzipped my
fly, reached his hand inside, and retrieved my hard cock.  Suddenly his
lips were around it as I gasped, startled.  He went down on me eagerly and
forcefully, using his tongue as expertly on my dick as I could have done
myself.  He had come a long way at sucking cock recently.  Now, like
everything else it seemed, he was an expert at it.

I tried to relax and enjoy myself.  Certainly Will was making every effort
to distract me.  But even when his wet tongue was flicking in and out of my
piss slit, I was thinking about the night's fight.

Finally he pulled off of me.  "This isn't doing you any good," he said
disappointed.

"I'm sorry," I said.  "But I warned you I wasn't in the mood.  We can do
this anytime."

He looked at my dick.  "Yeah, that's it," he said.  "I suck you off all the
time, so what's the big deal right?"

I didn't know how to respond to this.  "No, it's special to me, Will, it's
just that--"

"Shut up with the excuses," he said.  "I'm not pissed off, I'm just sayin'
the truth here."

He slapped my dick with his hand playfully and jumped off the bed.  "I'll
be right back," he said.  "When I get back, you'd better have your pants
off."

He strolled into the bathroom, his hard-on leading the way, and I took my
pants off, wondering what the hell he was planning next.

He came back with a bottle of lotion in his hand.

I was disappointed.  "You want to fuck me?" I asked.  "How's that going to
help?"

He shook his head.  "I want you to fuck me," he said.

I perked up.  "What?  Are you serious?  I thought you said you'd never do
that?"

He squeezed some lotion into his hand and wrapped it around my dick, lubing
it up.  "I'm making an exception for tonight," he said.  He looked at me
and raised an eyebrow.  "This offer expires tonight.  You interested?"

"Hell yeah I'm interested," I said.  "But what about you?  You've never
been fucked, right?"

"Never been fucked," he admitted.  "Did plenty of fucking in prison, but
never took it.  Not that none of the other inmates never tried.  But I'm a
tough motherfucker, am now and was back then.  Nobody's gonna force their
cock up my ass if I don't allow it."  He got onto the bed beside me.

"You sure you want to do this?" I asked him.

"Sure," he said.  "After all, I fucked the hell out of you back in the day.
It's only fair that you get your chance at payback, right?"  he scooted
back so his head was on the pillow.  "How do you want me, face up or face
down?"

"Face up," I said, smiling, remembering what he had told me during my first
time with him.  "So you can see my face."

He rolled onto his back, bent his legs, and spread his knees apart.  I
positioned myself between them, tickling the hairs of his inner thighs with
my hands.  I looked down at his pink, puckered hole, something I had seen
and loved and admired along with the rest of his body countless times, but
know I knew for this first time it was mine to do as I pleased with.  I
squeezed some lotion onto my fingers, and then reached for his hole,
feeling its small form with my greasy hand.  After rubbing around the
tender flesh with my finger, I pushed it inside a bit, gently, feeling the
moist warmth of his insides before taking it out again.

After he was sufficiently lubed, I leaned forward and kissed him again,
thanking him before I began.

Then I returned to his hole.  "Want me to try and loosen you up some?
It'll make things less painful."

He shook his head.  "Bring on the pain," he said.  "I can take it."

I was unsure if he really realized what he was getting into, but I agreed
anyway--by this time my erection was painful, my dick was throbbing with
every slight touch and dripping precum like mad.

I leaned back on my knees and pressed my dickhead against his hole.  Then,
pausing momentarily and looking into his eyes, I only saw encouragement.  I
pushed into him as he squinted and let out a slight grunt.

There was quite a lot of resistance at first, and I slid slowly in, feeling
the warmth envelop my dickhead until it was all the way in.  After that,
noticing the look of slight pain on his face, I pushed the rest of the way
in very slowly until my pubes hit his ass.  I stayed there for a moment,
appreciating the feeling of being totally inside his hot, moist ass, and
then I pulled, ever so slowly, back out.

"Don't pussy out on me here," he said as I was out down to my dickhead.  "I
said I wanted you to fuck me tonight, so fuck me."

With these words he grabbed me under my arms and yanked me up towards him,
my dick thrusting inside of him and my pubes slamming against his ass.  He
let out a painful grunt, and his deflated erection told me that he wasn't
exactly having fun.  But, with his insistence, I did as he asked.

I put my hand down on either side of his body, holding myself over him, and
I started to fuck him, in and out, fast and firm.  The pleasure was insane,
more than it had been with Matt, Russ, or Case.  Maybe it was an emotional
response on my part--I knew this man I was fucking meant the world to me
and this was the last threshold we had yet to cross together.  Whatever it
was, as my dick plunged inside of him, I had to groan with every slap of my
balls against his ass.

As the fuck went on, the pain slowly left his face.  He looked into my
eyes, and he started to get hard again.  I figured I must have been doing
something right.

Finally, the cum that had been building up in my balls and my dick wasn't
going to be held back any longer.  I stopped fucking as the orgasm came.  I
groaned louder than every, stiffening up and holding my breath.  My cum
spurted out of my body and into his.

Panting and sweaty and still inside of him, I fell onto his hairy chest,
exhausted.

I pulled out of him slowly, and he pulled my body up towards him, kissing
me deeply again.

"You okay?" I asked him.  "Was it too painful?"

He laughed.  "I'll live," he said.

"Sorry I couldn't get you off," I said.  "You want me to give you a BJ or
something?"

He rubbed his hand through my hair.  "I'm fine," he said.  "How `bout you?
Did that take the edge off your nervousness as much as I was hoping for?"

I let out a deep, relaxed sigh to demonstrate the soothing effect fucking
him had had on me.  "It was perfect," I said.  "The ultimate relaxation
technique.  Thanks for doing that for me.  I'd never ask that of you again,
you know."

"You didn't ask me to do it in the first place.  I asked you."

"I know," I said, playing with his chesthair between my fingertips.  "But
still, I never expect that again.  It was fun, but I prefer doing the
things that give us both pleasure instead of just one of us at a time."

"So do I," he said.  "So do I."

*****

Fucking Will had calmed my nerves entirely in the moment, but by the time I
was riding in one of Hadrian's black vans to the location of my fight, much
of my nervousness returned.

"You okay?" asked Will, who was seated in the van beside me.

"I'm great," I told him, not wanting him to know how nervous I really was.

Our van and all of the others drove to an abandoned old health club that
looked like it had not seen a costumer in decades.  We went in through a
broken window in the back, and were led into the pool room.

I was in awe.  The room was huge, and the empty pool was the biggest I
could ever remember laying eyes upon.  The whole room was dilapidated and
filthy.  Many of the tiles on the floor and walls were cracked or missing,
and the whole place seemed to be covered with rust and mold.  The
electricity must not have been working, because there were lanterns set up
everywhere, giving the place an almost haunted feeling.  As if I wasn't
terrified enough.

I quickly looked into the pool, where I'd be fighting.  The bottom surface
of the pool had two flat planes, one on the side that was closest to me and
the other on the side that was across the room.  The flat plane on my edge
was about five feet deep.  The flat plane on the other side of the pool was
about twenty feet deep, set up for high-diving.  Connecting these two flat
planes was a rather steep slope that went from the shallow end to the deep
end.  This slope took up the majority of the pool.

There was something very odd contained in the pool in the absence of water,
something that didn't belong at all in a public pool.  Littered all over
the bottom surface were what I guessed to be about a hundred sharp
pitchforks.  Most of them were settled on the flat planes.  Some of them
were sticking up out of the slope, nailed down to prevent them from
sliding.  All of them had quite obviously been planted by Hadrian.  It
looked absolutely horrific.

"What kind of insane wolf puts pitchforks in the pool?" asked Cougar.

"Hadrian wants this to be one deadly fight," said Russ.

"That's not fair," said Case, shaking his head angrily.

Will grabbed me and pulled me away from the others.  "You're not fighting
this fight," he said.  "Somebody's going to die here tonight, and I'll be
damned if I let that somebody be you."

But Hadrian had already climbed upon the rickety old bleachers and was
calling everyone to silence.  "Welcome to the pool," he said.  "I've taken
the liberty of adding some props of my own, to spice the fight up a bit.
Contestants step forward."

Watts came out of the crowd, his normal arrogance seeming shaken by these
strange circumstances.

At the same time, I stepped forward.

"Ah, the boy wonder from Philadelphia finally fights a fight," said
Hadrian, looking upon me.  "Let's see what he's learned."

Will grabbed me, was pulling me back.  "He's not fighting tonight," he
said.  "I am."

I pulled off of him, shaking my head angrily.  "I'm fighting, it's my
turn."

"That it is," said Hadrian.  "The boy fights or Philadelphia drops out of
the tournament."

"Then we drop out," said Will.  He yanked my arm back towards the crowd.

"No, we won't," I said, holding my ground and shaking him off.

"Don't do it, Rick!" yelled Case.  "It's not worth it!"

"Call it off!" yelled Matt.

"I'm going ahead with the fight," I told Hadrian.

"Good," said Hadrian.  "Clothes off!"

Watts, across the pool from me, started to remove his clothing, and I did
the same.

Will grabbed me and pulled me back again forcefully.  "This isn't gonna
happen," he said.

"Get off of me, Will."

"Hold him back!" yelled Hadrian, and a group of ten or so English wolves
pulled Will back into the crowd.

"Fighters, enter the pool," said Hadrian.  "You will remain there until one
of you has defeated the other."

I climbed down a ladder into the shallow end of the pool.  Across from me
Watts was doing the same thing.

I looked around me.  There were a good deal of pitchforks up here on this
flat ground, but all of them could managed to be avoided, if careful.

But what if, in our upcoming struggle, I fell off the edge of this plane
and went sliding down towards the deep end of the pool?  I looked down the
slope.  The pitchforks nailed in seemed to be positioned with the intention
of impaling anyone who lost control on this hellish slide.

I decided it would be best to stay on the deep end.  There were more
pitchforks down there, but at least there wasn't the possibility of
falling.

Very carefully, I navigated down the slope, trying not to slip, and
avoiding all the pitchforks.

"Careful, Rick!" yelled Case somewhere above me.

"Spectators are not to interact with the fighters!" yelled Hadrian.

"You haven't even started the fight yet!" barked back Case.

When I got to the deep plane safely, I looked back.  Watts was making his
way down the slope as well.  When he reached the bottom, he gave me a
worried look.

"Get the ready for the fight!" Hadrian yelled to some of his wolves.

"These pitchforks don't give me much comfort," Watts said to me quietly.

I looked solemnly at Watts.  "He means for us to kill each other with
them," I said.

Watts nodded.  "I tell you what.  I won't use them if you don't."

"Agreed," I said.

This fight wouldn't be so bad after all.

I heard the metallic howl of old pipes, and then the hiss of water being
released.  On the other side of the pool, at the top of the shallow side,
water was pouring out of a large pipe.

The other alphas were angry at this new development.

"You can't turn on the water," protested Will.

"I think that qualifies as an interaction," yelled Case.  Others from my
pack and some with Australian accents were vocalizing their agreement.

"Like you said," Hadrian said to Case.  "The fight hasn't started yet."

The water was rushing down the slope, turning it into a waterslide, and I
was thankful that I still wasn't up there above it.  When the rushing water
reached the deep end, it picked up a bunch of the pitchforks with its
force, pushing them around dangerously.

"Go!" yelled Hadrian to us.

I wasn't sure how to proceed.  The ice cold water was covering my bare
feet, and I had my eyes on the pitchforks instead of my opponent.

Watts didn't have the same hesitation.  He ran towards me, separating the
distance between us, and knocked me over.  He jumped upon me, straddled my
chest with his naked thighs, and started hitting me in the face.

As his incredibly strong blows knocked my head, I knew this was not a good
position for me to be in.  Worst of all, the water was filling up so
rapidly that I was soon underwater.

Suddenly a pitchfork came flying towards us, picked up by the strong
current, and stabbed deep into Watt's thick thigh.  He screamed painfully,
and I pushed him off of me, once again getting to my feet.

I could have taken the opportunity to attack him while he was down, but I
didn't have the heart to do it when he had four metal rods embedded into
his flesh.  He grabbed the tool and pulled it out of his leg, the blood
gushing into the water before his wound healed.  He tossed the pitchfork
down again angrily.

Now I went for him, my limbs flying at his body with all the speed I could
muster.  He fought back, he dodged when he could, but I knew I was stronger
than him.  Perhaps just barely, but I was.

This gave me hope and curbed my anxiety as I continued to attack him.

But beating him man to man would take time, as I had no stronger weapon
than my closed fist.  And time I did not have, as the water was filling up
more and more.  It went above my crotch, sending chills through my whole
body, and kept rising.  Meanwhile, the pitchforks were still flying around,
and I always had to keep an eye out for them, dodging when they came my
way.

This I managed until the water reached such a depth so that we were more
swimming than walking.  And, as the water got deeper, a whirlpool seemed to
be forming around us.  Soon I had been swept off my feet and was being
pushed around, along with countless pitchforks.

Watts was in the same position I was.  "We can't fight down here any more,"
he said, just barely avoiding a pitchfork.

He climbed onto the slope, water pouring down on top of him, and somehow he
managed to start to climb up towards the top.

It was obvious to me that the longer I remained in this whirlpool, the more
likely I was to get impaled.  I swam towards the slope, gripped my fingers
onto the surface, and very carefully started to climb.  It was incredibly
difficult, as the water was rushing down upon me, hitting me in the face.
But somehow I managed, very slowly, to follow Watts up.

Then, for no obvious reason, I lost my grip.  I tried to recover it, but
could not, and within a split second I was sliding down the slope.

I never reached the bottom, though.  Instead, a pitchfork stopped my fall,
ripping right into my right shoulder and chest, poking out through the
other side.

I screamed bloody murder, drowning out the gasps of all the spectators and
the protests of Will and the others watching with horror at my injury.

It hurt like hell, and for a while I could do nothing put scream from the
pain.  Finally, with my left arm and my feet gripping the slope again, I
was able to ease my body off the fork.  I just stayed there for a moment
until my wounds had healed.

When they had, I started my climb once again.

Watts was waiting for me at the top when I got there.  As soon was I got to
my feet, we were fighting once more, carefully avoiding the edge.

The problem that we were facing at the top was the fast water rushing
through, grabbing at our feet and calves with its current.  At one point in
our fight, Watts lost his balance and slipped, almost falling off down the
slope again, but stopping himself at the edge and pulling himself to his
feet.  I didn't blame him; I had almost lost my balance several times
myself.

Then Watts morphed for the first time that fight, becoming a werewolf.
When he had finished, he walked towards me with confident footing.  With
his heavy weight and with the pads on his feet, he was stable for once.  It
seemed to be a smart move.

But I refused to morph along with him.  I remembered what Malcolm had told
me about werewolves not being able to swim.  This pool would fill up sooner
or later, and when it did, I didn't want to be stuck at the bottom.

Watts attacked me, and the fight resumed.  He was much stronger than me in
his form, and although I was quick, having the pitchforks all over the
place was making it difficult to dodge his attacks with any real
efficiency.

Finally, he had me cornered against the wall.  I struck out at him, but he
pushed my arm aside and bit into my throat with his huge, jagged teeth.

I started to cough painfully, feeling the familiar sensation of having my
throat ripped open.  I was bleeding all over my wet body.

I was going to lose.

As I started to black out, I gave once last shot at breaking away from his
bite.  Instead of pulling away from him, I rammed his large frame with all
the strength I had left.

Amazingly, it worked.  His teeth ripped loose from my flesh as he went
flaying backwards.

Unfortunately it worked a little too well.  He flew onto the slope, sliding
down quickly.  As my throat wound healed, I watched with horror at his
descent.

A pitchfork nailed on the slope went through his leg, but instead of it
breaking his fall, the fork tore right through his leg and he kept on
falling.  Another impaled his chest, but again he was too massive to come
to a stop.  He kept on falling.

By the time he had hit the water on the deep end, he was unconscious.  Just
as Malcolm had said, his werewolf form sunk to the bottom like a boulder.

"Philadelphia wins!" yelled Hadrian above me.  Nobody cheered; there was
absolute silence in the room.  "Unfortunately, there's been another death
in the tournament," Hadrian went on.  "Brisbane should have been more
careful for his own sake."

I was in pieces.  Had I just killed this man?

I ran to the edge of the slope and looked down.  Watts was at the bottom of
the pool, unmoving, his blood tinting the water red.

I sat down on my butt and pushed onto the slope, sliding down carefully,
pushing myself out of the way of the pitchforks.

"What is he doing?" asked Hadrian angrily.

"Get back up here, Rick," yelled Will angrily.  "You can't save him."

I didn't listen; I knew Will was just concerned for my safety.

When I reached the bottom, I dove down into the water.  I grabbed a hold of
Watt's furry body, and pulled him up, somehow managing to lift his weight.
I brought his head to the surface.

We were still being threatened by all of the pitchforks flying around in
the water.

"Turn the fucking water off!" shouted Will urgently.

They water turned off with another hiss, and the current stopped.

The werewolf in my arms made a weak hack.  Once again, all the spectators
gasped.

The wolves from Australia were starting to climb into the pool.  They took
his form me as he started to regain consciousness.

"Will he live?" I asked them, troubled.

"He'll live," they said as they started to pull him up the slope towards
the ladders at the other end.

My mind at ease, my conscience left clean, at least for tonight, I swam to
the edge of the pool where Will was reaching down to help me.  I jumped up
and grabbed onto his hand, and he pulled me out of the pool.

Now they all began to cheer, not just for my victory, but for my valiance
as well.  I smiled and thanked the alphas as I went by, completely
overtaken by pride and accomplishment.

"You did it, boss," said Malcolm.

"Awesome fight," said Cougar, patting my back.

"You're the man, kid," said Matt.

Case somehow had found a towel for me, and he wrapped it around me.
"Listen to that sound," he said to me as he started to dry my shoulder.
"Hear them cheering?  They love you.  They all want you to lead."

I nodded appreciatively to him, moved beyond words.  I took the towel,
wrapped it around my waist, and went back to Will.

He put his arm around me and rubbed my wet hair, smiling.  "You got real
courage," he said.  "I knew you could do it."

I shook my head, smiling.  "No you didn't," I said.  "You thought I would
lose, admit it."

He shrugged.  "The thought may have passed through my head once or twice.
But you proved me wrong.  You did as good as I ever would have done."

I nodded, wanting desperately to show him more affection, but not being
able to with the crowd still watching me.

"Alright!" yelled Hadrian.  "Enough with the celebration.  The next fight,
the final fight, will be between myself and Philadelphia.  The arena for
this fight is still being... arranged.  I will notify all of you of the
location and time of this fight as soon as my pack has these matters
finalized.  That's all for tonight."

I looked at Will.  "I fought my fight," I said.  "The last one is yours to
worry about.  Hadrian I'm sure will procure an arena that will give him a
major advantage.  Think you can win in spite of it?"

Will shook his head, his usual unwavering confidence seeming a bit
challenged for once.  "I don't know," he said.  "I hope so, or else all of
this will have been one big waste.  We'll just have to see what mysteries
Hadrian has left to reveal."


TO BE CONTINUED