That bad type

[Kang Taebin]

Music pounded and the lights strobed across the room, casting everything into garish shades of red and green and yellow and blue. Josh pounded back a shot from an overfilled glass, hardly caring if the liquor splashed over his hand as he did so. Lazily, he licked away the spilled remnants from his fingers and savored the burn in the back of his throat with a low, throaty hum of satisfaction.

Leaned casually against the bar with one elbow resting on the countertop, he scanned the rest of the room. On the main stage, a well-proportioned man was working the pole; others, dressed so scantily that they might as well have worn nothing at all, meandered through crowds of cheering and hooting women to serve drinks. Josh saw tips being stuffed into underwear, winks and nods, flushed cheeks. The strip club was mostly full of women but there was a decent smattering of men here too, taking in a show.

Josh's predatory gaze flickered from one to the next. "Hey bartender." Josh gestured with the casual arrogance of someone accustomed to having his way immediately. "That one."

A man at the end of the bar finally caught Josh's interest. As the bartender walked over with a purple drink and handed it over to the man, then gestured towards Josh, he smiled. There was just enough self-assuredness in it to not be completely cocky, but confidence and Josh never strayed far from each other in a sentence.

[Reagan Ryang]

...why?

Why... was he even here? Part of him--most of him--was incensed that Josh thought he could snap his stupid fingers and just make things happen. What made it even worse was the fact that Rae was actually here, like some fucked up, lovelorn puppet with no will or backbone of his own. But he had a backbone, and he knew he did.

So. Then. Why was he here again?

Rae hated these places, unlike Josh, who seemed to practically live in them. Seedy dark places were his favorite places. Rae was more of an outdoorsy type; he would rather go on a hike, he'd rather hole up in a log cabin, he'd rather fuck in a bush. That was the wild part of him, the part that grounded him to his wolf heritage. His human side, though... still hated these places. They were loud and offensive to every sense and just trying to walk was akin to wading through a slough of undulating bodies, all hoping to get closer to another body. A couple of them grazed or ground up against him and Rae growled under his breath, pushing past the bodies so he could find Josh.

He should have figured he'd be at the bar. He did say he was drinking and that meant being close to the bar.

And the strippers. They were strippers. Candy to the eyes of the rest of the population. Rae admittedly hardly gave them much of a look. There were old habits, like the fact that he used to belong to one person exclusively for a long time. Five years of his life was a long time and all that time was spent genuinely giving a shit about the person he was with, even if it was also frustrating in more ways than one.

Now that he was "free," he sure as hell didn't feel that way. If anything, he felt more strangled by Josh's invisible leash than he'd ever felt with Alva.

With his phone broken, there was no way to even get back to Josh and he'd thrown the damn thing straight out the window on the way because all it did was send broken transmissions. And he wasn't even sure they were going through so what the fuck was the point? What did he need with that damn thing anyway? It was just filled with pain; Rae was achingly aware of the photos of Alva and himself in it. Maybe breaking it was the best thing that happened to him. Somehow, it didn't feel that way.

And now he was standing across the room from the bar, watching Josh drink, watching him buy a drink for some other fucker that probably smiled or winked at him. Why am I here? If Josh wanted to fuck so bad and he wanted a fucking stripper, why didn't he just let him do it? Rae stepped back, and right on top of the shoe of some haughty man who shoved him off with a sneer.

"Watch where you're going!"

Anger sparked, familiar and charged with the situation. Rae turned swiftly toward the man who'd pushed him, didn't care who he was or what he looked like. He went straight for the nose and glared down at the haughty man as he leaned down, grabbed his nose, and cried out in rage. Blood poured through his fingers, which gave Rae a grim sort of satisfaction. He would have fought the entire bar just to let out that tightly bound up tension in his muscles.

[Kang Taebin]

Whatever Rae was on, Josh didn't want in on it—for once. He looked at the nonsense that Rae was sending and his lip curled in disgust. If that was meant to be a joke, well, it had just missed its target audience. And Rae was a shitty comedian anyway. Unimpressed and annoyed, Josh tucked his phone away into his back pocket and turned to the man at the end of the bar who was drinking the drink he ordered.

It wasn't as if Josh was going to bend him over the bar then and there. He went over to chat the guy up while he waited for Rae to eventually come storming in. Good little predictable puppy—he'd come if only to snarl and snap and to let Josh know in no uncertain terms that he was pissed off. And then... what? Rae's plans never seemed to extend beyond unleashing his own explosive emotions.

Good thing Josh knew how to lead.

He briefly looked around once in a while for Rae but Rae took his sweet ass time getting to the strip club. Meanwhile, strippers danced onto and off of the stage and it was loud and the lights were gaudy and garish. This was Josh's scene. He seemed to have an instinct to buck against the expectations of the straight-laced upper-class society that he was born into. Everything he was expected to do, he did the opposite.

Maybe that was why, when the commotion across the room turned nearly every head, Josh continued sipping his drink. He heard the cursing and saw fists being thrown out of the corner of his eye. Security guards mobbed the area and dragged a few people out of the door. Josh elected to finish his drink before sliding off of the bar stool and leaving his bemused new friend.

Outside, he let out a soft breath and glanced around. Having just rained, it was wet and humid; he smelled the damp earth and felt moisture settling against his skin. The commotion had spilled out into the parking lot so Josh walked himself on over. That was Rae's fight, not his; he hadn't entered a strip club with any intentions of biting someone's throat out. With a kind of calloused amusement, Josh hung back to watch and to let Rae's temper run its course. He had to admit that Rae's assailants weren't doing a bad job against him. Probably supers. Well, Rae wouldn't die.

[Reagan Ryang]

Inevitably, the fight was taken outside. Rae wasn't the only one dragged out by security. There were others. Friends of the guy he'd walked into. Friends of his friends. Nobody was there for Rae but it was hard to care when all he saw was Red. All he wanted to do was fight at this point. He wanted nothing to do with any of the trappings of a relationship. Even friendship was pissing him off. There were a thousand reasons to be angry and pissed off; nothing seemed to be going in any way that Rae could predict and he fucking hated it. What it did was make him feel like a caged dog with no concept of where he was going or how to escape. Maybe he was just blindly ripping out his own guts in the process but it wasn't like he knew any better way to feel anything.

At least the fight was something physical. Rae could handle physical pain. Punches, kicks, bites, broken arms. Yeah, he was pretty damn sure that guy broke his fucking arm. One of the friends turned out to be a big'n and all he had to do was pull him forward and twist. Pretty sure it was out of its socket too but Rae had no reason to back down. Backing down meant he had something to lose. Some reason to preserve his life. That Red in his vision, though, that Red was all he saw. All he tasted. Dark and metallic on his tongue, down his nose, down his arm. down the knuckles where he'd punched great dents into whatever came his way.

Preservation? That was for people who had reasons. Reasons for living. Reasons for going forward. Reasons to plan. Rae wasn't much of a planner from the start but at least, once he had some kind of plan, some kind of predictability to offset everything that wasn't so predictable about his temper or the life he led. Now that was all out the window. There was Josh, whose smile mostly just set him off and whose laugh burned through him. Always mocking. He didn't know how it was possible to hate somebody as much as he did and still....

Still...

What?

He took a hit to the gut and stumbled back a few steps, even ended up grounded, one knee on the ground, one good arm reflexively protecting his stomach from further attacks as he fought to catch his breath. Fuck. He could hardly breathe at all. Every time he did, his body convulsed and he could taste more blood filling up his mouth. Spitting, he forced himself back onto his feet, a heat filling his veins, a familiar heat. One that he should have been fighting but he half closed his eyes, waiting for it. Waiting for the change.

But it didn't come. Something held it back and the guys surrounding him looked him over. One laughed. Another put an arm around his buddy. They were all friends. Content with how they'd beat this piece of shit down. Was that all he had? Refusing to let them just leave him like that, Rae pounced forward, this time claws growing, slashing the closest friend of the original guy in the back. Rae's howl as he changed was not filled with triumph or glee or even violent revenge.

It was the howl of a lone wolf that has finally realized it.

[Kang Taebin]

The fight seemed to be an euphemism for the way that Rae's life was going. It wasn't going well. He watched them mobbing Rae and saw Rae falling, rising, falling, rising in an endless loop. There was no quit in him; Rae was the kind of stupid that would fight until he died. Something in him couldn't just give up and lay down and Josh wasn't sure it was all pride anymore.

Josh could have stepped in at any time but he didn't. He wasn't afraid of getting hurt and he was no stranger to a bloody, vicious fight but tonight something stood in the way. Maybe if he stepped in and got his hands dirty, it would reveal too much. Maybe if he helped, it would show that he gave a damn about someone other than himself. The conversation from earlier wouldn't get out of his mind. Love. Love. Love. It made everyone weak and stupid.

For long moments Josh watched, unflinching even as Rae fell and got up only to stop, waiting for something that didn't happen. The group walked away laughing, nursing their own wounds but seven or eight against one wasn't much of a fair fight even against a full-grown feral. Josh put a foot forward at last only to stop again as Rae shifted and attacked the group again. But they weren't humans. There were shifters, what looked like a witch, maybe a vampire.

If he didn't intervene, they probably would have killed Rae. Josh stepped forward again but the sound of a mournful howl stopped him cold. He looked down for a moment, let out a breath, closed his eyes. The sounds of animals snarling and roaring and the impact of bodies on bodies became louder in the absence of sight. Josh wanted to leap into the fray but again, something stopped him. Something was different in Rae tonight; he was changed even before he got to the bar. Something was different in Josh, too.

"...shit." He opened his eyes when he heard sirens approaching and saw the blue and red lights growing brighter. Police cruisers glided into view and there were guns drawn, the sound of shouting, scuffling and tasers being fired. Josh saw the bodies falling and convulsing, saw the cops crowding and wrestling with just about everyone. Even then he could have probably helped Rae but he turned away. He couldn't help Rae from the inside of a jail cell, which was where he would end up if he got himself involved now.

[Reagan Ryang]

Blood.

Everywhere.

His blood. Somebody else's blood. He tasted it on his muzzle, breathed it in with every lungful of air. Metal and warm but there was always something cold about the way blood smelled. Snorting, he sprayed blood, snarled, fought again. There were different bodies around him now; shifters. Magic.

It was the magic that ultimately got to him. Humming through his body, it stopped him in his tracks, felt like a great big plastic covering over his body keeping it from moving but he stubbornly pushed through the shield. And then a second later, electricity coursed through him. He almost wanted to laugh. He sort of wanted to cry. Sadly, he just let out a characteristic wolf whimper because that was all that would escape as his body twitched against its will.

Others, too. They were all being controlled. Crowd control. Cops. Cops that knew about the supernatural community. Cops that had probably been called by the supernatural club owner.

There wasn't much left of a fight in any of them as they were packed away into special trucks usually driven around by rangers or animal control. Lovely. They were being taken to the pound? Rae closed his eyes where he lay on his side. A couple of shifters were in the back with him, but they were all locked away in their own cages so they couldn't continue the fight in the back of the truck. Rae, being a large wolf, was in a cage large enough to accommodate his human form. Exhausted as he was, he didn't have the energy to switch back so he left it as it was. One of the other larger shifters did shift, though, and the whole way the truck rumbled down the street, he had to listen to him bitch at him and the others about how his good night was ruined by some mangy wolf.

There was no sign of Josh.

Figured.

Rae was so disheartened by the time they arrived that he just let himself be handled by the animal control officer, pushed into a cage, surrounded by yappy, barking dogs. He never showed up. Rae was pretty sure he just left with some stripper, just the way he wanted to. Threatened to? Were they ever even friends? If they couldn't even be honest with each other, he supposed... not. They were just... two people fucking. And always pissing each other off. Or Rae was always pissed off and Josh didn't give any fucks. It was fun to rile somebody up for him. Maybe that was all Rae was to him; and if he wasn't pissed off or at the edge of his temper in some way, he was... pointless. Not fun anymore.

Without meaning to, he let out a little whimper-sigh. Fuck it all, he was so pathetic that he couldn't even get himself good and killed. He tried to set his chin down on his paw but it was his bad paw and he ended up growling at himself before letting his face rest against the cold concrete.

How the hell was he getting out of this one? His gaze shifted over to the dog locked up in the cage next to his. Just a regular dog, from the looks of it. But some of the other shifters were here too. One shifted back to a human. And he heard the guys talking; they did know what they were dealing with. Shifters.

"Got somebody to call?" said one of the animal control officers as they came up to his cage. Rae just stared at him. NO. There was nobody to call. Fuck him. After a long stare, he turned his head away and closed his eyes. Fuck the whole goddamn world.

[Kang Taebin]

The cops didn't see him slipping away. It wasn't hard to melt into the crowd emerging from the club to see what was going on, and then making his way to his car to join the fleet of other cars vacating the premises. Josh briefly saw animal control pulling up and thought it almost fitting that Rae was going to be tossed into the pound. He lived more like an animal than a human these days.

Maybe Josh had something to do with that, though. Didn't he always deride Rae for being too civilized? Didn't he purposely go out of his way to entice the animal out of him? He liked Rae when he was spirited and fiery but this was neither spirited nor fiery. This was desperation. This was... an epiphany of some kind, no doubt. Josh wasn't stupid, he had eyes and ears and a working brain big enough to put together the pieces of the puzzle.

He drove around town for a long while afterwards with the windows down, letting in the damp, earthy air. There was something organic about the smell of rain, of the light scent of dirt and pine that always hovered around town since they were surrounded mostly by woodlands. Josh didn't have a destination; he drove and drove and drove and let the winding roads take him where they willed.

Was it worth it? This fight? Did Rae even have it in him to keep tearing himself up that way? Josh didn't want a broken toy. He wasn't in the business of wiping away tears and stitching up hearts. He was a career heart-breaker. Somehow he never imagined that his own heart could be affected in some way. Before Rae, it was all about the sex and the domination. The power. The superiority. Josh was insufferable and he knew it, and they all knew it too but nobody cared because it was a game.

What was this now? Not a game. Not a fun game. Why was he even here, cradling someone else's broken remains in the hands that were made to destroy rather than heal?

At a stop light, he rested his elbow against the open window and wiped a hand over his face, feeling tired and... heavy. Restless. His legs didn't know how to arrange themselves and his hands slid up and down on the steering wheel, guiding the car mindlessly. Damnit. And damn him. Why couldn't Rae just get over it? Just... get over him and be grateful that Josh bothered with his sorry ass at all?

They could've been so good together. There was obvious chemistry between them from the first meeting and the sexual tension that simmered just underneath the surface made everything so exciting and amusing at first. Josh was even willing to admit that he could see himself with Rae in some capacity--although not monogamously--but it was obvious that the fox wasn't ever going to be completely out of the picture. Rae was broken. Being with Josh somehow made the cracks bigger, made him needier, more restless. He saw it coming, though. Maybe he didn't want to acknowledge it but deep down, Josh knew that things weren't the same anymore.

Even Aldon didn't act like--okay, Aldon was worse. If there was ONE single sliver of a silver lining it was that Rae, at least, wasn't Aldon.

HONK HOOONK!

The angry driver behind him slammed on the horn and Josh glared into his rearview mirror venomously. He sped away from the intersection and swerved abruptly off-road to let the asshole pass him by. Josh leaned back in his seat and stupidly pulled out his phone. Who would he even call? What friends did he have that he wanted to talk to aside from Aldon and Rae? Aldon was useless and Rae was probably tased out of his fucking mind by now. No message from Rae either, which was a given; wolves didn't have pockets to hide phones in when they shifted.

Still. His hand tightened on the phone until he heard an ominous crack and then he let it drop listlessly onto the passenger's seat beside him. Josh reclined the seat and laid back, closed his eyes and let the sound of cars and rain sweep over him.

[Reagan Ryang]

Pitter. Patter. Rain dripped down on top of the tin roof of the dog kennel. Rae woke up shivering. The room was grey. Everything was so grey. The concrete of the floor, the grey bricks of the walls, the grey of the chain-link fencing that made up the gate of his cage. Throat so tight he could have choked, Rae sat up, realizing as he did so that he was no longer in wolf form. Somehow, he had changed in the night without knowing. Or... He reached up, rubbing at a sore spot on his shoulder. Somebody injected him with something.

This time, the person who came walking down the row of cages--inciting the dogs to start yammering and yapping again--was a woman with a no-nonsense sort of expression. When she spotted Rae, she looked over her shoulder and then beckoned somebody forward. Another one of the animal control officers came stumbling over.

"Yes ma'am!" she said eagerly to her superior.

"Get this one something to wear so he can make his phone call."

The girl immediately took off to do as she was told. Rae watched with impassive eyes as the woman stayed where she was, watching him. She was a wolf, too. He could just tell by the look in her eyes. Or if she wasn't a wolf, she was something close to it. She looked down at a clipboard she held, consulting whatever had been written on it.

"So you started a brawl? Did you know that nine in total were arrested and most of them were injured? And none of them claim to have been fighting with you... but rather against you." She looked up. "What were you trying to accomplish?"

Rae didn't answer her. What did anybody have to gain by his answer? The woman was a patient one, though, and she waited... And still nothing. The girl came back with clothing and after the older woman opened the gate, the younger one gingerly stepped inside and held out some generic looking clothes, probably from a donation box. Rae didn't take it. Eventually, the girl set the clothes down and slipped back out, looking more like she had escaped the snapping jaws of an alligator rather than the cold stare of a man who was a wolf on the inside. Or used to be, anyway.

"We'll give you some time to get dressed," the older woman said, before steering her protege off, presumably to speak to one of the other shifters.

Rae didn't know how much time passed before he eventually gave in to his baser instincts. He was cold and the clothes taunted him; eventually he pulled them on. Jeans that were a little too big around the waist. A t-shirt that was fine and a sweater that was a bit too snug. He wasn't winning any fashion awards any time soon, that was for fucking certain. More time passed, until eventually somebody came in with a cellphone in hand.

"Reagan?"

A familiar voice. Not the kind that made his heart twist or burn or flip. But it was familiar enough to make Rae look up. At the obnoxiously familiar face of Ryland Ren. Of course it was Ryland Ren. Because of course it had to be somebody linked to Alva. Of course it did. He didn't need this, in the middle of all the other things crowding his head.

"Go away."

"Don't you want to--"

"GET THE FUCK OUT."

Ryland, if he had anything more to say, didn't say it. If he reacted with a flinch or a glare or if he looked as if he wanted to speak, Rae didn't see it because he refused to even look at him. He waited, he waited until he heard the cage door close again, with a secure little creak and a click of the lock. And then he looked. Ryland was still standing there and he looked like he was fighting with himself to say something or not to say something.

"Go," Rae said slowly. "Away."

[Alva Ren]

"Are you SERIOUS?" Hands on hips, Yoojin's disapproval couldn't have been more obvious. She shook her head slowly at Alva, who was shoving his coat on inside-out while frantically searching for his keys. "You can't go down there, Alva! The guy is out of his mind! And did you already forget that he cheated on you? Where's lover-boy now that he's all locked up?"

Alva stopped and squeezed the keys that he'd just grabbed off the coffee table. He sat in silence for a moment while Yoojin seemed to regret her words, and came over to place a hand on his shoulder. When he spoke, his voice was low and shaky. "I know... I know what he did better than any of you. But. I can't just—somebody has to help him. He won't listen to anyone else and he's hurt. He needs help."

"But why does it always have to be you, Alva? Why can't someone else deal with him? He's not your responsibility anymore."

"Rae needs help," Alva repeated gently. He gazed pleadingly up into Yoojin's still-disapproving face but her expression was softening and she rubbed his shoulder with her thumb lightly. "Please. I need a ride down to the shelter before he does something even crazier and makes everything worse."

A few minutes later he was in the car, left to his own thoughts while Yoojin drove them to the shelter where Rae was being held. Alva said very little and his responses were absent-minded. He didn't know if this was the right thing to do but at the same time, he couldn't leave Rae there, all alone and injured with no one by his side. Rae was very much already a caged animal from the beginning, straining against the bars to get out. He was wild and untamed before Alva came along to temper some of that ferocity and now being cooped up in an actual cage, Alva didn't want to think of what could happen.

Part of him didn't want to go, though. Part of him wanted to be safe, to safeguard the heart that was already broken and shield it from more harm. It wasn't mending right but at least all the pieces were there again, together, waiting to be reassembled by a caring, loving hand. Alva dropped his head and swallowed the lump in his throat. Everyone already knew this was a bad idea. He didn't even know what he would say to Rae once he saw him.

Nothing had been resolved. Rae cheated, blamed it crazily on Susumu's presence in Alva's life, blamed it on Alva, and then... was gone. Back to Josh. As if that wasn't damning enough. All that did was drive Alva right into the arms of another man. Alva had his own problems to worry about and really, a broken arm wasn't life-threatening, was it? Why was he rushing down to the shelter for someone who couldn't even say sorry?

Was he making a mistake? Maybe it was a mistake. Maybe he was the stupid one, hanging on to sentimentality when he really needed to excise Rae out of his life and keep him out. There was nothing left between them except some bitterness, blame and regret. He couldn't even remember the last time he thought of the name Reagan Ryang without feeling nauseous and ill, without his eyes stinging and his heart twisting in his chest.

And yet... it wasn't in Alva to ignore those in need. He was the first one Ryland called because even Ryland had to admit that only Alva could help Rae in a situation like this. Alva couldn't forget—even if he wanted—that he loved Rae and cared for him. Feelings like those didn't magically go away; they simply became buried underneath the hurt and disappointment. Once, Alva's was the hand that soothed and mended. He didn't hate Rae, despite everything that happened between them.

"We're here honey." Yoojin reached over to touch his hand and he held on to it tightly. "Are you SURE you want to do this? It's not too late to go home..."

Alva stared at her for a long moment and then nodded. "I'm sure." But as he maneuvered his chair inside, into the lobby to ask for his cousin Ryland, his mouth was dry and his throat was tight and still, in the back of his mind, he wondered if he was doing the right thing.

[Ryland Ren]

It was kinda weird, seeing Rae... that way. Not naked--Ryland didn't even see him like that. He came in a bit after that debacle. Honestly, he was still reeling from the fact that they were aware of shifters and worked with them accordingly. Ryland thought he was doing something good for shifters on the down low. Turned out there were people already in place for that. Curious. He wondered just how much Hazleton knew that he never knew that they knew.

Hah...

Not a good time for humor. Ryland looked down at his phone with a sigh, at his own reflection in the black rectangle. Wasn't it fitting that the sky was grey and drizzly? That the air was cool and dewy? He shivered slightly, even under his jacket. Then he forced himself to send a series of texts to Aldon. Why did he even still have his number, anyway? It was like it imprinted itself in his memory even after upgrading his phone and trying to purge everything that he shouldn't hold onto. But moving on in a small town like this... It was a nearly impossible feat.

And wasn't Aldon supposed to leave? Ryland thought he'd heard it down the line but he still caught glimpses of him around town. Hard not to. Again, Hazleton was small. People were all about being in one another's business, even when it couldn't possibly involve them.

Still... Ryland did sort of make this whole thing his problem. Maybe he should have tried to deal with it on his own but Rae sure wasn't making it easy. Uneasily, he looked toward the old door that led down the hall of one of the dog kennels, where they stowed Rae away for the night. Now that the dogs had been fed, they were mostly quiet but the minute they set foot back in there to retrieve Rae, it would be all barks and dog feet mashing against chain-link gates. Ryland sighed again, until Kathy called him and told him that somebody was there for him.

"Be right there!" Ryland called. He looked down at his phone one last time, then shoved it in his back pocket. Time to take care of Rae. He didn't know the full story about how he ended up here. The assumption that Josh was there was merely an assumption. Normally, whenever Rae got into trouble, he was with somebody, be it a brother or Josh or even Aldon. But now he was just out there on his own, which was just kinda... weird. Ryland wasn't going to pretend to be an expert on the guy any more than Alva was on Aldon but... something was definitely off. Maybe it was spells again.

Ryland met with Alva in the front office, where Kathy had gone to speak with somebody on the phone and her assistant, Lizzie was awkwardly standing with Alva. It seemed like she was filling him in on the night before.

"--so then they brought them out to us and the, the lynx guy showed us the um, the marks on his... his back." Lizzie touched her back, making a slight swiping movement. "He said the wolf got him from behind when they tried to leave. His friend used a freeze spell on him to stop him but then the police were there and they all got... got um tased."

"I'll take it from here, Lizzie," Ryland said, gently patting her on the shoulder. She nodded quickly, adjusting her glasses nervously.

"Okay! I'll just... if you need anything, I'll be feeding the birds."

"Sure."

Lizzie waved at them and then awkwardly moved off toward the door that led out to the bird enclosure. Now that Ryland was alone with Alva, he watched him for a moment, worried that he did the worst possible thing. Maybe he should have contacted Aldon first. They were still best friends or something, right? Aldon could talk Rae into leaving, right? Although, flashing back to the way Rae told him to leave, maaaaybe not. Then again, Ryland wasn't close to Rae in any capacity so.

"He's this way," Ryland said as he led the way to the kennels, holding doors open along the way. "We tried to at least get him to come out of the cage but he's pretty much made himself at home in there."

Once they were at the door to the kennel, he made a face. "They're all going to start barking their heads off when we go in so..." He opened the door and just like clockwork, the dogs were barking and throwing themselves up against the gates so they could be noticed. Rae was toward the back, too, which made it even more unnerving.

"Hey," Ryland said, getting his keys out as he approached Rae's cage. "If you won't listen to me, maybe you'll listen to him."

Rae didn't even look up. He looked like a bad dog, even in human form.

[Alva Ren]

The more he heard, the more anxious and worried Alva became. It sounded like a terrible fight and at a strip club no less. What was Rae doing at a strip club? Alva didn't want to know. Even though he felt some type of way about it, he didn't want to focus on those negative emotions. They weren't together. Rae could go to strip clubs if he wanted.

"Thanks Lizzie," he smiled wanly at her as she tripped away—literally, nearly banging into the wall on the way out. Alva leaned forward like he could catch her but she got to her feet, smiled uncertainly back at them and disappeared around the corner. Then it was just them, and the awkward silence that hung like ripe fruit. Alva sighed; he looked at Ryland as Ryland looked at him and all he could say was: "Thanks."

How they got to the kennels, Alva didn't know. All of a sudden they were there and the dogs were barking and straining for attention, and as much as Alva wanted to stop and pet each one of them, he had a job to do. The chaos outside had nothing on the chaos inside but he... was just here to coax some sense into Rae, nothing more and nothing less. Whatever history they had wasn't as important as getting Rae to a hospital and if he focused solely on the task, he might be able to get through this.

"Thanks, Ry." He squeezed Ryland's hand in passing, easing his chair around his cousin and up to the man-sized cage. Alva's heart did a summersault at the sight of Rae laying so dejectedly and so forlornly, like a... a sick dog. Wolf. A wolf with all the fight taken out of him, laying there waiting to expire. Lightly he touched his hand to the cage door, seeing his own fingers trembling almost without quite realizing that those were his fingers.

"...Rae? It's me."

[Reagan Ryang]

There they went off again. Usually, Rae would have told them all to shut the fuck up but he was too tired to give a shit. Besides, they did it every goddamn time somebody came close to the kennels, like barking and flinging themselves at the gates were going to convince the humans to let them out. He was too tired to even roll his eyes at them.

And there he was, back again. Stupid Ryland Ren couldn't mind his own goddamn business. Kept coming in and checking in like he thought Rae was going to die on him. Did it really matter if he did? Rae thought it did; he wanted that lynx to tear out his throat. If he ended it that way, it would have been a lot cooler than bleeding out on the concrete floor of a goddamn animal shelter. Could there be a more pathetic way to die?

Ryland made some kind of statement that sounded vaguely like a threat--oh, he couldn't get him out of the cage? Now he had the big guns. Rae didn't believe it; what, did he find Josh somehow and drag him in? What a laugh. Or was he talking to Aldon now? Somehow, Alva didn't come to mind. It was like he'd been swept into the darkest corners, trapped beneath the cobwebs. Didn't matter; Rae still knew that voice when he heard it. How could he not? Five years... Five years was a long time to be with somebody and hear their voice in every pitch and tone it could possibly go.

Things couldn't get any worse, honestly. Josh seeing him this pathetic would have been bad, he admitted. But this was even worse. Fuck, he hated Ryland Ren. More than anybody else he ever knew. Who the fuck did he even think he was, going around calling up people like Alva and bringing them--dragging them back into his life? Maybe if he ignored him, he would just go away. Rae waited in silence but the dogs were still excited and when he finally did look up, Alva was still fucking there like a specter from the past.

Immediately, he had to puff out his chest and lift his chin like nothing was wrong. It was just instinct, an automatic response, especially since Alva was looking at him like that. Like he was something to be pitied. Rae hated pity. There was nothing about him that needed pitying. He was fine. Alive and scarred up but that was wolves. Never mind that was more a sign of a weak wolf because a good, strong wolf wasn't going to carry scars; they won fights, they didn't lose them.

What did he even say to him? Rae didn't have words left. Even his usual scathing (immature) taunts were dried up and shriveled away. Honestly, even as his body blustered itself into a show of strength, he felt bone tired. Seeing Alva just made every vein shiver like a whelp crawling into the curve of mama's warmth. Uncharacteristically, he looked away, gaze directing itself at the place where the cage wall met the gating. Like somehow he could squeeze his whole soul right through it and escape Alva's scrutiny.

"...guess you're the big guns." It should have pissed him off that somebody still had knowledge of his weaknesses and used them against him. Normally it would have but that readily heated core of anger that perpetually set off over even the smallest slights had been doused. Even Rae didn't know how to react without it. It was like an angry little nerve. One little brush set it off without permission from the rest of Rae. Now it was numb. Even when he tried to set it off himself, it didn't react.

[Alva Ren]

How was it humanly possible to feel so many conflicting ways about one person? Alva was angry and still hurt and disappointed, but also saddened, anxious, concerned. He wanted to go and grab Rae by the shoulders and shake him and shake him until he shook some sense into him and at the same time, seeing Rae with those horrible wounds, with his arm broken, with his dejected body splayed carelessly on the cold concrete, made Alva want to gather him up and hold him and bring him back up from those low lows.

Alva wasn't the type to hold a grudge (for long) but he also couldn't let go of the injuries that those wolf claws had inflicted. Five years of faithfulness felt like a pointless, painful, fruitless labor. And it wouldn't even have been so bad if... if it wasn't Josh. If it was anyone but Josh, Alva might have had it in him to accept defeat and concede that maybe there was someone out there better for Rae.

Because loving someone the way that Alva loved Rae meant that he wanted the best for him. He wanted Rae to be happy, to be healthy, to aspire to more than everyone told him he could be. Rae wasn't a dumb wolf, not a mindless animal, wasn't a killer. That wasn't how Alva saw him but that was what Josh wanted him to be. Josh treated everyone that way, like toys that he could bat around when he was bored. Alva didn't want that for Rae and maybe deep down Rae didn't want that for himself. Alva wanted to believe that Rae was just blinded by Josh's facade, by the charisma of a dangerous beast. There was nothing beyond that gaping maw, though. There was only hurt and disappointment and pain.

He didn't know what to say afterwards so he stayed silent as Rae immediately tried to bluster and prop himself up, pretending as if he meant to be caught laying there. All part of the plan. Rae could never let himself be vulnerable. Weakness was unacceptable. He'd rather die fighting than be caught dead whimpering. Alva heard it all before. He was never fooled by that swagger, though. Somehow, he got past the barriers—Rae let him through—and he thought... that connection they forged might last.

"I'm not." Big guns? Alva? He was hardly that, with his crippled legs and his clumsy wheelchair that could barely fit between the cages stacked on either side. Alva watched Rae staring off at the corner of the cage like he was desperately seeking an avenue of escape. Was Alva in that camp now? The camp of people Rae didn't want to see at his lowest moments? When Alva was the one who used to prop up his wings so that he could soar?

Was he the enemy now?

Rae needs help. Alva wasn't called here to air out his grievances or to judge him or to do anything except get him to a hospital.

"Rae, I'm here to help. Please come out."

[Reagan Ryang]

I just want to die. The world wouldn't let it happen, though. Death by battle, that was the best way to go. Fighting until the end. Rae didn't really think about what it meant if he didn't die fighting, if he was caught unawares, half dead with all the lights blown out. That was probably his worst trait: he just didn't think beforehand. Everything was always in hindsight. Why the fuck didn't he ever think before he leapt? What was he trying to accomplish?

Death. Last night. But what about before that? And before that? What was he trying to accomplish by throwing out his phone or going to the strip club? He could have turned his phone on silent. He could have never gone to the club. He could have ignored all the taunts and just... got on with his life. Other people could do it. Why couldn't he? Why was his fuse so goddamn short? And why was he so transparent that anybody could light it with a flick of a finger?

By now, his bad arm had gone as numb as that little spark. He couldn't move it at all. Maybe he should have been alarmed but he wasn't. He continued to stare at that little gap that he couldn't escape through while Alva denied being the big guns. Alva didn't think so but he was. Wasn't he? Rae slid his gaze back over to him, slowly, reluctantly.

Come out and then what? Get all healed up? They could fix the outside but they couldn't reach into the inside and make things better. They couldn't erase all the stupid mistakes or put the broken pieces of his heart all back together. Where did they even go? All those pieces, where did they belong anymore?

Alva looked good. He looked better than he had when it looked like he was on the verge of death and everybody was scrambling to help him. Something was going right for him, somewhere in his life. It almost didn't seem fair but then it did because Alva wasn't the one who did all the wrong things, despite what Rae's inferiority complex had him believe. There was a time when Rae trusted Alva. There was a time when he made Rae the best Rae he could ever be. And as much as he wanted so badly to push it all back on somebody else, anybody else, Rae sort of knew it. Hidden there in the cobwebs, knowledge of his own part in ruining his life and not wanting to admit to it.

Because that was weakness. Rae knew it for a long time but never wanted to admit to it: that he was weak. A strong wolf didn't need to bluster or put on a show. Real strength wasn't an act. It just was. Rae was not strong. He was never strong. That was his problem; and deep down, he knew it was true so he had to play it up, he had to let the anger spark up to take the place of actual strength. And for so long, he believed that it was. He played himself, lied to himself, believed in himself.

Everybody said that Alva was weak. But he survived something terrible and came out the other end still strong. It had nothing to do with having legs to walk with or whether he could punch a guy out with one hard fist or not.

Rae got to his feet, ignoring the unpleasant sensation of his head swimming and the floor wobbling beneath him. He walked to the gate that separated them.

"It's too late," Rae said. "You can't save me this time."

[Alva Ren]

"I'm not here to save you Rae."

Alva shook his head slowly. He had to look all the way up at Rae, who was standing on his own two feet now and at the gate, gaunt and pale from loss of blood no doubt, beaten, bruised, abused. But still standing. Still trying to be strong when it was okay to be weak. It was always okay to ask for help and Alva fell over himself to offer all that he could.

He wanted to believe that they were stronger together. That when they were Rae-and-Alva, spoken in the same sentence as one, they were the best versions of themselves. He softened Rae's edges and Rae made him braver. The weaknesses that they each had canceled out. They were a team, fighting against all odds to stay together.

What was it all for, if not for each other? Why did they fight so hard against everyone? No one approved of their relationship in the beginning. Nobody gave them half a chance to make it past a week. Rae was too wild, they said; Alva was going to get hurt, if not purposely then inadvertently. Wolves weren't meant to be with foxes, they didn't mix.

For five years, Rae and Alva proved them wrong. They made it... only to crumble from within. It wasn't outside pressure that forced them apart but their own insecurities and fear. Dishonesty. Little white lies. Lying to each other, to themselves, to avoid the uncomfortable truths that they'd paved over in their haste to show that they were right and everyone else was wrong.

That wasn't a factor any more, though. They were already separated, it was all over and all Alva felt was emptiness. When he looked at Rae, he saw a reflection of himself, except Alva was fine on the outside, but that was all that was fine. Inside, he wasn't fine. His life was spinning out of control in such a way that he didn't know if he was even living his own life. Maybe he was living someone else's. Maybe he was a part of someone's nightmare and when they woke up, his torture would be all over.

Alva wheeled up to the cage, as close as he could get. He reached out to touch the cold metal of the cage, curling his fingers over the horizontal bars. "Come out, Rae."