I promise you won't be alone

[Wade Calhoun]

Sitting behind the wheel of his old '95 Chevy with the peeling pale blue paint, Wade fidgeted with the keys. More like he tossed them and caught them. Tossed. Caught. Looked out the rolled down window. He didn't like any of this. But he already crossed the line, he already said he would share it with Declan.

Was it the right thing to do? There was nothing either of them could do about what was in the vision but... It wasn't as if the vision itself meant... meant... what it looked like it meant. Wade sighed and tossed the keys one more time, this time not catching them, let them slide down his leg. They crashed onto the floorboards at his feet but he didn't immediately retrieve them.

The vision didn't make much sense at first. But then other visions followed. Snippets of a story that he was trying to piece together.

When he first met Declan--back then, he was just a dog and a pup out in the rain, on the highway. They were looking for shelter, that much he could see. But it looked like they were being pushed out of the forests by an aggressive pack of wolves. Knowing what he knew about Declan now, Wade was surprised that he even got into the truck. But that evening, it just made sense. Wade liked dogs. Used to travel with one in his twenties. Waving a sandwich at it and whistling, the big dog didn't budge but the little one came for him. The big dog didn't have much choice after that.

Wade thought it was a mom dog at first. But he learned pretty quickly, no. Strange, he thought, for a male dog to travel with a puppy. But it didn't really mean anything until he woke up after a vivid dream featuring shifters. Didn't happen until maybe a month or so into traveling with them. At first, Wade didn't say anything about knowing the truth. Kinda embarrassing; he kept thinking back to the things he had done or said during that time. Why would they stay with him? All that time? Must be going the same way, he said to the dog once. And the dog looked at him like he understood his words. Uncanny. Kinda weird.

By now, he was used to it, though. Declan didn't have much to say either way. Lily was the talker but she had no reason not to be.

Movement up ahead caught his eye and Wade peered out the window, then let out an exasperated sigh. What was with this guy and always showing himself in dog form? Wade knew. There was no point to the charade anymore! Shaking his head, he leaned over and opened the passenger's side with a familiar old creak. Lily was with him. Wade knew that she would be but he didn't want her to see it.

"You know there's nobody out this way, right?" he said to the dog unabashedly.

Declan Finnigan

[Declan Finnigan]

Luckily they weren't too far out when Wade called—though unluckily, Lily had the phone with her, playing some games while they waited to be seen at the local clinic. They'd stopped in at a diner after the errands were done, where he wolfed (haha) down a sandwich and Lily pecked her way through a kid's meal of chicken tenders and apple slices. Her appetite hadn't been too good lately—hence the clinic. Doctor didn't know what was wrong with her, but Dec thought he knew. The check-up was mostly to rule out disease or illness.

It was like this after her ma died, too. Her words dried up and she wouldn't eat, refused to go out and play. But back then he was a foreign presence in her life, having left shortly after she was born. It wasn't until maybe a year in that her chatterbox ways resumed, probably when she realized that he was here to stay and wouldn't leave her. Now, they had to uproot themselves again and Lily wasn't taking that well.

He'd just finished shifting when Wade called, and Lily outed him before he could tell her to quiet down. Well, Wade already knew, but Dec was plain stubborn and unless he was caught in the act, he wouldn't back down. That wasn't even the dog in him—just the ornery human. But as it turned out, talking to Wade maybe wasn't such a waste of time after all. Wade had useful—if alarming—information for him and after finding out about the vision, Dec was quick to make his return with his girl in tow.

The old familiar blue car loomed up ahead and Dec bounded towards it, while Lily trotted behind. He barked unnecessarily because Wade already said he'd be waiting for him and leapt onto the passenger's side. Lily climbed into the back and immediately began to rummage through the little plastic bag she'd brought in from town with some snack and treats inside.

"Hi Mister Wade!" She waved a lollipop at him and then stuck it in her mouth.

Dec barked in what he hoped was an unmistakably unamused way, staring at Wade expectantly. He refused to break cover out here in public.

[Wade Calhoun]

"Hey, little Lily!" Immediately, he lit up as he reached out and gently gave Lily's head a little ruffle. Girl or dog, it was the way he always greeted her. He looked over her bag with interest. "And what do you have there, honey? More candy?"

It looked to be just a bagful of various snacks. It hadn't escaped Wade's notice that her appetite wasn't all that great lately, either, but he didn't have any suspicions as to why. Probably just coming down with something. Kids were liable to pick up every little thing. Wade didn't have to be a parent to know that much; he'd been around the block a number of times and kids were an unavoidable part of life. Kinda strange he never had any himself by this point but the truth was, Wade didn't think he would make much of a father. He couldn't even make himself much of a boyfriend and the one time he married, it didn't last long. There was something squirrely in his brain that couldn't set itself in one place long. And so far, nobody seemed to have that same squirrely part in their brain.

Hazleton was a weird little town. Dusty and old but there were parts of it that were clearly trying to appeal to the hipsters from Oregon, to the tourists that came and went. Having come from a small hick town himself, Wade expected to feel like he was coming "home" when he arrived but he didn't. There was something strange in the air around Hazleton that made him hesitant to call it home or anything like it. But he was also reluctant to leave it... for some reason.

Yet... he knew it was here that his vision took place because he saw it. He saw it plenty of times now, especially after coming in contact with Declan and Lily. And the closer they got to Hazleton, the more he dreamed it. The same spluttering scenes, the same dropping feeling in his stomach.

After a moment, he leaned down to grab the keys off the floorboards. Although he slid the key into the ignition, he didn't go anywhere. Declan didn't necessarily have to be human in order to share the vision. At least... he didn't think so. The only person he ever shared visions with in the past was his ex-wife and she wasn't a shifter. So he didn't really know. He just didn't think it much mattered one way or the other. He could drive away from this area on the outskirts of town, get into the forest proper, maybe. But something stopped him. He didn't want to go further into town and the forest and hills, those were also part of Hazleton.

"Okay... well."

Wade glanced at Lily. Maybe this wasn't the best place for it. But honestly, there was no better place that he could think of. It wasn't like he could tell Lily to go play outside. Even telling her to get into the truck bed seemed like a bad idea; he wasn't blind, he saw those missing posters around town with kids' faces plastered on them.

"Just a warning here," he said as he turned toward Declan. "Not sure how good it's gonna come across. Only done this with one other person and we had a strong connection, so might be what made it possible."

But there was also something about Hazleton, too. Something that made them stronger. The visions. Without any more excuses, he put a hand on top of Declan's head. Nothing at first. Then he closed his eyes and lowered his head, pulling at the visions that occupied his mind as if they were bits of yarn. There. That one. And he pulled at it, unraveling it.

The sky was ashen grey, icy cold rain falling in fat drops. The figure of a man stood about a hundred feet away. Jacket. Boots. Hood. Wade couldn't see his face, didn't know who he was, but he held a gun in his hand and at his feet was the bleeding form of a man with tangled dark hair. Declan, Wade knew. Lying in a pool of diluted blood as the rain fell harder.

He could hear Lily crying. His arms were around her. He pressed her face to his chest so she didn't look.

Beyond the hood, Wade could make out a flickering open sign in a small cafe window. It was some place in downtown Hazleton. Couldn't make out the actual name of the place, everything was so grey and blurry. Somebody came upon them, down the street. The man in the coat started to turn toward them--and Wade, no matter how hard he tried to get a look at him, at his face, to identify the danger, always ended up back in the present.

Taking in a deep breath as if he had been drowning, Wade let go of Declan's head. And he was back in the present, with no more information than he'd been able to gather over the past month. His heart still clamored in his chest as if the scene was happening in the moment, but Lily was safely singing to herself and they were inside his old beat up truck, the sound of the wind rustling through the trees. Daylight. No rain. And Declan, as a dog in front of him. Wade turned away, setting his hands on the steering wheel in front of him to steady himself.

[Declan Finnigan]

"I got some lollipops! And gummies!" Lily flapped the colorful packets around as she showed off her haul enthusiastically, seemingly unaware of the implications of them being outed. While Dec was careful when shifting in and out, he knew that once or twice Lily had been caught outright but to Wade's credit, he didn't go after her to get to Dec, to oust him as a shifter. It was kind of a pointless game anyway, because they both knew what Dec was but only Dec knew why he couldn't reveal his secret, even to someone who had taken them in and made them part of his little traveling family.

Lily really took to Wade, though, and it was easy to see that Wade took naturally to her. Funny, because Dec was wary of him even long after they'd been picked up just in the nick of time after escaping from some wolves. Dec really had Wade to thank; he would have fought to the death to protect his girl and he might have taken out one or two of them, but it was a dire situation that Wade pulled them out of. Still. That didn't make him Jesus.

It was quite a long time before Dec let down his guard but he imagined that Wade understood. Dec had a daughter to protect.

While Lily hummed to herself, kicking her short legs idly, Dec looked to Wade. He didn't know how visions worked; his kind didn't deal in that sort of magic. Shifting was about the only thing he knew how to do and he was no expert in any other kind of supernatural out there. Hell, he couldn't name half of them either. Nobody ever accused Declan Finnigan of being an intellectual.

Bark!

He impatiently tried to urge Wade to hurry it along, as he was given a disclaimer. Dec didn't need any warning, he wanted to get to the vision, get to the point of this whole exercise. Why Wade couldn't tell him over the phone, he didn't know. The dark brown eyes of his collie form glinted dangerously—if Wade didn't hustle, Dec had no problems biting him. Or at least giving him an encouraging 'nip' to let him know that this wasn't the time to be dallying around, not if he or Lily were in danger.

So Wade got on with it, putting a warm hand on top of his head. Dec's tail betrayed him with a wag. Just one singular wag. He put an end to that nonsense real quick, though, stilling himself as he watched Wade keenly. If ever a dog could put on a stern face...

The scene changed so suddenly that he jolted, only to find he wasn't... anywhere. He was looking at a scene as though he was sitting in a theater, watching a giant screen. But he could smell the rain, hear it pattering down around him, feel the chill breeze as it wafted through, stirring the hood of the man with the gun. Dec took in his own body laying by the man's feet, and then he turned to see Lily clinging to Wade, crying, with the rain beating down on them both.

The diner? It looked like the one they ate at earlier while they were in town. Dec tried to glean more clues but a noise distracted him and then the man turned towards it, just as the movie ended and he came back to his own dog body sitting in Wade's battered pickup truck. For a long moment, Dec did nothing. His brain was trying to land back in his body; his thoughts were racing, remembering the vision, seeing everything in his mind's eye.

What happened after, he wanted to ask. What happened to Wade and most importantly, to Lily? Did the man turn the gun on them next? Or did they get away?

Wade turned away, knuckles white on the steering wheel. Lily was humming a different song and making up silly little words, the way kids did. Then, slowly, Dec slipped out of the truck and went to sit outside, with his back turned. He closed his eyes; the wind blew through, ruffling his silky dark ears and bring in dark, dense storm clouds from the North.

Looked like a storm was setting in.

[Wade Calhoun]

The closer he got to Hazleton, the stronger the images had become. At first, they were vague. There was the sound of a little girl crying. A gunshot. There was rain, always the rain. A telltale sign that they were close to the vision now. They were in the right place and the time was drawing closer. It sat in the pit of Wade's stomach like a stone.

He didn't know what happened or why, but this place was dangerous for Declan. If he just told him, over the phone, or even in person... he wasn't sure the weight of it would be expressed. Showing it to him... that was the only way to share with him why it was something to worry about. Telling him he had a dream or a vision where he'd been likely shot, maybe killed... that was... it could be brushed off as a nightmare. Seeing it for himself...

Wade wished he hadn't shown it to him, though. Afterward. When Declan left the truck. When he sat outside, back turned to them. It was impossible not to read the emotion from him, even as a dog. Seeing oneself dead... dying? Wade set his jaw for a moment, lowered his head to the steering wheel.

"I'm sorry," he said. "For... whatever it's worth."

He didn't even know if Declan could hear him. Probably as a dog, yeah. Didn't much matter, though. It was a lot to take in. Wade never saw a vision of himself in such a state. Was it possible that Declan had died? Or was he just wounded? When Wade first saw that vision, he assumed he was dead and he thought the worst. But now... He couldn't help hoping...

The wind around them picked up outside and to Wade's horror, the sky slowly began to darken. He swallowed hard. A storm rolling in. And here they were, in Hazleton.

"How 'bout this," Wade said. "We stay away from cafes. Stay away from downtown. We'll head out. Away. Yeah?"

He had never been able to thwart a vision before but... he didn't want this one to happen with such fervor... maybe sharing it would make it more possible to avoid.

[Declan Finnigan]

All his life, Dec had been selfish. All his life the only person he thought about first and foremost was himself—not his mom or his pop, not the people who called themselves his friends, not his wife or his kid, not nobody. Declan Finnigan was the only person that Declan Finnigan looked out for. That led him to do a lot of things that he wasn't proud of; it made people wince when they heard his name, in his little home town. Declan Finnigan was synonymous with trouble.

When Morgan died, she didn't even call for him—that was how little faith she had that he would be able to take care of their daughter. Or maybe she didn't think he wanted to, after he walked out. Lily was two, maybe two and a half when that happened; Dec didn't know what sort of father figures she had in her life, if any. Morgan wasn't exactly the marrying kind herself but when she got knocked up, it seemed like the only thing to do. She always said that she had no need for a useless man in her life but Dec wondered if that was true, or if she only said it because Dec, he...

He wasn't the settling down type. He wasn't the kind of man to put down roots—even now, he only wanted it for his little girl, but not for himself. Dec was much happier roaming. He liked going places and seeing different things, meeting new people, laying his head down onto a different pillow each night. It wasn't the kind of life most people wanted to live, and it was no sort of life for a little girl, but it did him just fine.

But he couldn't be selfish anymore. He had Lily to think about—he had to consider what was best for her, not what was better for him. And he didn't even know when that switch flipped, whether it was the first time she looked at him with those big brown eyes of hers, in that little pale face, and asked him—"Who are you?" Morgan had thrown away every picture of him in the house, erased him completely from her life—from their lives. If his pop hadn't told him what happened to her, Dec might still be out there, still be selfish.

Wade's voice behind him finally drew him out of his thoughts. He didn't turn or acknowledge the words but he heard them, heard the strangeness in Wade's tone. Regret? Pity? Sorrow? Wade was fond of them, after all—probably more so Lily than Dec, who was obstinate and stubborn. He should've been born a bull shifter, really, rather than a dog. Dec wasn't even a 'good boy.'

Slowly, after a moment, he turned. He turned and he shifted out of his collie form, hardly caring that he would end up naked. Dec had decided. Gently he shook his head, like a dog might try to shake out water, as the world around him blurred briefly. Sounds, sights, lights, colors. Everything adjusted to his human body, to his human eyes and ears and brain. He reached up and pushed back the long black hair that fell into his eyes and then turned those eyes onto Wade.

There was nothing more humbling than the notion of mortality to a man. When he was a wild young buck, Dec didn't know the word—he had no concept of his own fragility as a human. Death was a foreign concept to someone so absorbed in himself but now... Now he couldn't afford to be selfish any longer. So he turned to Wade, put a hand against the side of the door to keep it open as Lily kept humming to herself, low and soft, one of those country songs that Wade loved to put on the radio as they drove through the hills.

Dec teased him about it but he liked it. He liked it when Wade sang to them, liked the sound of his voice above the wind whipping past his face as they drove down endless country roads.

"Take her to the Carter ranch," he said, voice soft and rough, unused to making the kinds of noises a human made after staying as a dog for so long. "Tell him Sean Finnigan sent you. That's my dad. Carter will take you in. Keep you two safe."

[Wade Calhoun]

The Carter ranch. The one they were heading out to. Wade was going there for work; he thought Declan was doing the same but it sounded like there was some family back story there. The Carters and the... Finnigans, was it? They hadn't gone to the ranch yet but Wade was still under the impression they were going together. The vision he saw wasn't on a farm, after all. Not on a ranch but somewhere in downtown Hazleton.

"Now hold a minute," Wade said, putting up a hand. "No way I'm just leavin' you out here. You're comin' with us, you hear?"

Just because it was starting to rain right now didn't mean that the vision was going to happen right now. Besides--the vision clearly showed that Wade and Lily would be present for whatever happened to Declan. Maybe that was Declan's reason for separating them. Maybe he thought if they weren't all together, it wouldn't happen. Or if it did, it wouldn't happen in front of his daughter.

Wade reached out and grabbed onto Declan's arm.

"Hey," he said. "Just because things looked grim doesn't mean..." He wished he could say they could change it somehow but thus far, he never had been able to change it. In fact, there seemed to be a loophole that when he showed somebody, it still happened. And not showing him meant he was less prepared. It seemed fair to show Declan, whether he could change it or not.

"You're comin' with us," he said, not finishing that pointless comment. "You'll probably be safer at the ranch with us."

[Declan Finnigan]

The vision showed them together, the three of them and the hooded man with the gun. If they weren't together... Maybe that could stave off the inevitable until Dec could find some way of learning more about this. He saw the rain clouds and smelled the storm on the wind; he couldn't risk being with Lily and Wade until it passed.

The Carter ranch was the only place he could think of at the moment that was a ways from the diner in town. It was the place he intended to head out to, to find work; his pops said something about ranch hands being needed there and Lily could go to the school in town and have a stable home. Dec told his pops to put in a good word for him before he left for Hazleton, and his dad pulled through.

But now, everything had changed. The vision changed everything. Dec knew enough about the supernatural world to know that true visions were rare, but almost always needed to be taken seriously. If Wade had simply told him about it, he wouldn't have brushed it off but he might not have the same sense of urgency that he did now, as he looked into the back of the truck at Lily. She seemed to sense that something was wrong now; the humming stopped and her eyes were wide as they met Dec's.

"No." He tried to pull his arm away, out of Wade's grasp. It took a lot for Dec to trust anybody, especially with Lily, but he thought that Wade was okay--one of the good ones, as his ma might have said. Heart was in the right place, too. "You two go on ahead. I'll join you later."

[Wade Calhoun]

"What if you don't?"

What if... What if Declan didn't join them later and Wade went looking for him? What if Lily insisted on following him? What if the recipe for disaster was already forming in front of them without their knowledge? Wade wasn't ignorant to the value of his visions; they did give him some warning. But he'd never been able to sideswipe one before. He didn't really know if he could do it now. Maybe by sharing it... things could be different. If there were two of them looking out for all the signs.

But Wade didn't really believe that. If he did, he wouldn't have felt nearly as apprehensive as he did. The idea of leaving the man while it was raining out, in similar conditions as the vision--well, that just didn't set well with him.

"You're coming with us," Wade repeated. "We won't drive through downtown. You're not in any danger right now, at least."

[Declan Finnigan]

"Then there's no reason for you to worry, if I'm not in danger," Dec said dryly, with another brief shake of the head. That stubborn streak? Yeah--miles wide. From the back seat, Lily let out a confused sound. Dec saw her anxious little hands crinkling the bag of snacks around as she tried to process what was being said. He eased away from the front of the truck and stepped towards the back, reaching out to pat the top of her dark head.

"Daddy?" Lily looked up at him with a frown. There was a tremulous shake in her voice. "What's going on?"

"Nothing Lily." Dec's voice might've been a touch rougher than usual as his hand slid over and down the back of her head, gently stroking her soft hair. "Dad's gotta do something in town, so you gotta go with Wade for a while. I don't want you to give him no trouble, you hear? You listen to what he says, and you do what he tells you. Understood?"

"But daddy--" Lily clung to his forearm. "I don't--"

"Be a good girl. I'll be back soon. Promise."

[Wade Calhoun]

"That's not what I meant and you know it."

Wade could be stubborn too but he had never met the likes of Declan. Why was he so bent on leaving them behind? Especially his daughter? Lily obviously didn't like what was going on and she could sense her father's agitation. The man might be one of few words but that didn't mean he didn't exude certain emotions.

"What?" Wade shot Declan a look. What was he going to go do in town? Why the hell was he walking back into the bowels of it, anyway? Wasn't it safer to just stay in the goddamn truck and go with them to the Carter ranch? Honestly, Wade didn't know what the hell the man was thinking.

It was the damned vision. Whatever Wade thought it was going to do, it seemed to do the opposite. Wade had it in his head that he could use it as a foreshadowing, a warning, a caution sign as he moved forward around the cafe in the vision. In the rain, in the evening. It wasn't evening; at least Wade was confident enough about that. But he still didn't like it. He felt like what he had done was push Declan closer to that gruesome destiny and it was the last thing he wanted for him. Ever since seeing it, the vision disturbed Wade, even if he wasn't like to say as much.

"Declan, c'mon. Just come along with us to the ranch. We'll go straight there, through that path up there." Wade pointed it out--the opposite direction of the damned little town and the downtown area. "Just get back in the truck."

[Declan Finnigan]

Thing about fate was that there was no getting around it.

So Dec, he was going to meet it head on. Whatever plans Wade had to keep him safe by taking him away from the scene of the vision might have been well and good in his mind, but Dec wasn't going to take chances. The vision had them all together—that seemed like the important thing. The location, maybe not so much. Did it much matter where it happened? Or was the real warning the fact that Dec would get shot in front of his daughter and Wade?

He was never much of a big picture guy but sometimes when faced with death, a man's mind had a funny way of putting all the pieces together. If he was all the way on the other side of town, maybe it wouldn't happen. Or if it did, that it only happened to him and not to Lily. He didn't want her to see it. She was safer with Wade than she was with him, at least in this very moment.

"Daddy?" Lily was scared now, picking up on the tense tones of their voices and in the way Wade was talking to Dec. He leaned down and gently kissed her forehead, his long dark hair tickling the sides of his neck.

"It's gonna be okay baby. I'll come back."

Then he eased back and away, ignoring the way Lily was looking at him, ignoring the desperate way Wade was trying to get him to go with them. That bullet was meant for Dec. Didn't have nothing to do with Lily and Wade. Having that warning was already more than he deserved. But he knew Wade meant well, that he was trying to protect everybody. His little traveling family—that was how Dec started seeing them, funny enough. Never been much of a sentimental guy but...

"Take care of her." He leaned in to curl a hand around Wade's forearm. A strange calm had come over him, as though having seen his own fate settled him somehow. His biggest fear was always leaving Lily with nobody to look after her but now there was Wade, and there was his pops. As long as she was taken care of, didn't much matter what happened to Dec. He wasn't looking to die but he wasn't afraid of it, either.

It was never something that he tried hard to avoid; if it was his time, it was his time.

The world shrank again and soon there was only Dec the collie, nose to the wind to sniff out the scent of the storm rapidly rolling in. Thunder boomed overhead as a forked gleam of lightning flashed in the distance and the wind picked up, howling all around them. Dec let out a sharp bark that trailed off into a frightened whimper. He sank down onto his belly as the wind roared suddenly, with unnatural ferocity.

Somebody was coming up the way, walking against the wind with hardly any effort.

[Jem Wilson]

Strange.

The weather went from fairly sunny to grey skies. Was there a weather witch within the vicinity? Jem checked his theurgimeter; it was off the charts. Somebody was interfering with the weather using magic. That much was painfully obvious. Frowning, Jem stepped outside, eyes on the sky. He might not have been magic or a magic user himself but even he could feel it in the air, almost palpable, like a thunderstorm on the horizon.

His attention skirted over to what looked to be a lone dog, slinking down the street. Not the dog. A dog couldn't command this kind of magic, not even a shifted dog. Shifters didn't have the capacity to touch the weather. That was up to the worst of the worst when it came to the supernaturals: the magic users. Those "gifted" with the touch of magic. Jem had been hot on the tail of a witch specializing in curses. This wouldn't be in that witch's wheelhouse. This was somebody else.

Probably somebody even worse. More powerful. Jem's crooked smile was grim. Well, he was in the right damn place to set the world straight, wasn't he?

The storm was really going at it now. The dog was on its belly and no matter what it was, dog or shifter, it looked pitiful. Jem's theurgimeter was still buzzing off the charts, useless. He stuffed it into his coat pocket and that was when he noticed the other form down the street. So unexpected was the presence that Jem actually felt his heart leap and jolt--and he wasn't one easily startled. Jem came out into the street.

"Showing off, are we?"

[Declan Finnigan]

All dogs knew their masters.

Especially as a shifter, with his senses heightened, Dec knew that the man coming up the way was nobody he could even raise an eyelid to. He laid on his belly, completely cowed as the animal part of him briefly took over. It was like meeting God. Dec had never been superstitious much but... when one met their maker, it was hard not to be overwhelmed. No wonder his human mind shut down, letting the dog take over.

Another man came out, though--not the one approaching the truck. Someone new, stomping out into the rain and talking to the stranger as though he wasn't afraid of him. But he should have been. Ohh, that was a bad idea; even Dec knew that. Slowly he slunk back into the truck, into the back with Lily, whimpering softly as thunder and lightning and rain lashed down on the beat up old truck.

The powerful stranger had come up to the truck; despite the rain, he wasn't even wet. Not a hair on his head was drenched. He smiled, in a slightly disarming manner, and handed Wade what looked like a keychain with a charm on it. Dec chanced a peek; he thought he saw the picture of a fox on it. "Take care of that for me, will you? I'll need it later. You should get out of the rain. There's a ranch up that way." He pointed towards the Carter ranch, then turned from them.

At first it looked like he was just leaving, headed towards the second stranger who had come up to speak to him. But Dec's keen ears heard only two words, spoken by the powerful being.

'Kneel, hunter."

[Wade Calhoun]

"What the hell's that?"

Not who. Whom? Whatever. It wasn't a person, it didn't feel like a person. Felt more like a part of the storm itself and that worried Wade. Before he even had a chance to whistle and call him to him, Declan made for the truck and leapt inside, safe and sound. As safe as one could be from something like that.

Wade squinted out of his window but it was hard to see past the washed out blur that the torrential rain made on the slick glass. He looked out the passenger door, then reached over and pulled the door shut with a loud creak. It made the man who came out look over but he barely spared them more than a glance. He seemed more interested in the... thing walking through the wind and the rain like it wasn't there. It didn't even seem to wet his clothing. Meanwhile, the other man's hair was soaked to his head, his coat quickly clinging to his body.

After a moment, Wade rolled down the window of the passenger's side.

"Hey--!" Wade called out to the man, to tell him to get into the car and come with them. But... instead, the powerful man approached and smiled. Why... was he smiling? Wade blinked, then looked down at the keychain that was handed over to him. Turning it over in his hand, he looked back up at the man. How... did he know they were heading out that way? Somehow, the knowledge of it made something in the pit of his stomach grow cold.

"Right..." Wade turned the key in the ignition. They were getting the hell out of here. As they drove off, he saw through the rearview mirror that the other man, the soaked one, was on his knees. Strange. Everything about this was weird as hell.