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During the Extermination, all was chaos. Damian was roughly woken up by Remy, his older brother, who picked him up as quickly as he could on seeing that Damian was still groggy. Screams were filtering in through Damian’s sleep-fogged mind, and he immediately became scared. What was happening? Where was their dad?
Remy put him down just outside their house, before grabbing his hand and beginning to run. Damian could smell smoke as he struggled to keep up with his brother, figures of all shapes blurring past him. In the distance, for a split second, Damian thought he saw Virgil from school, sprinting off in wolf form, but when he tried to go after him Remy told him to stay by his side or he would get worse than grounded.
It wasn’t until they were far away from the city that Damian saw their dad, pacing and looking more scared than Damian had ever seen him.
“Boys!” Their dad almost shouted upon seeing them, Damian still in his pyjamas and half-wrapped in a blanket. Damian got swept up in a hug, allowing him enough of a respite to begin to fall back asleep, unable to make out what his dad and Remy were talking about.
When Damian next woke up, he was curled up in what felt like a large bowl, and he opened his eyes to see the side of a basket, barely big enough to hold him. The world beyond was dusty and yellow, completely unlike the forests back home, and he wondered why they had travelled so far. Turning over, he noticed that his dad was in wolf form, carrying the basket he was in, and several other wolves were around them, all carrying various belongings. Everyone seemed so tired, and the sun was hanging low in the sky. Had he slept through the whole day?
Once the group had settled down for the night, the grown-ups remaining in wolf form to provide warmth for the younger people, Damian broke the silence, staring out into the vast expanse of the world while sat next to Remy.
“What happened? Why aren’t we at home?” Remy sighed, rubbing his eyes before turning to Damian, clearly trying to hold back tears, because he was a cool teenager, at least that was Damian’s guess.
“Our home’s gone, bud, but we’re searching for a new one that won’t be taken away from us.”
“Oh…” A few minutes ticked by, as Damian tried to think of what else to say. He decided to ask “Do you… know what happened to Virgil?”
“Nobody’s seen him, the adults would’ve easily picked him out from a group of animals.” Remy paused, before adding “I’m sure we’ll see him soon though. We’ll meet up with him and his parents when we build our new home.”
That was Damian’s hope, that he kept close to his chest for the rest of the journey to a secluded woodland, and the many years building new houses and market stalls and all manner of attractions to keep the younger Lupi entertained. Even when he was an adult, Damian still held onto that hope, as more of their old clan found them, including one of Virgil’s mothers and his siblings. That day was particularly hard, as none of them had heard anything from Virgil since the Extermination.
The land had shifted since the chaos of that day. Lupi were extremely ancient beings, having been around long before the first pure humans, and had witnessed the rise and fall of multiple empires and the growth of human civilisations. One such small group was the village of Ferncombe, England. It had sprung up not too far from the new Lupi Clan and had stayed a constant through the hundred of years, to the point that now, several of the adult Lupi had taken up jobs around the village, mingling and gaining friendship with the humans. It was strange, how similar they seemed to be, and how easily the Lupi integrated into human society.
It had been a mistake, really. Damian had been observing the village late one night, pitch-black fur bristling against the slight breeze. The Clan had sworn to never be in Ferncombe once the sun had set unless held up at work, but Damian was curious to what the humans got up to in the dark. It was fascinating, watching lights flash on from everywhere, and humans walking to and from buildings Damian had never seen open during the day. He wanted so badly to join in, revel in the artificial light, that he didn’t even realise he had begun to walk closer to the village until he heard a surprised shout, which snapped him out of his daze.
Standing a few feet in front of him was a group of humans, all looking to be in their early teens, staring at Damian dumbfounded. Immediately, he recognised Toby and Elliott, two people who regularly came into the shop Damian helped out at, and he froze. Oh no, he had just broken the most sacred code among his Clan: to never be seen in wolf form by humans. However, it wasn’t until Toby reached a hand out to touch him that Damian’s reflexes kicked in, causing him to growl before turning and sprinting off into the woods, hoping against hope that he wasn’t being followed.
Damian slowed down once he reached the clearing where most of their buildings had been built, trying to seem calm and not at all freaked out, at least until he heard footsteps behind him and a voice, confident and loud.
“Found you! Now- whoa…” Damian whirled round, instincts now on high alert as Toby stood at the edge of the clearing, and Damian could only imagine what was going through the human’s mind at seeing a woodland settlement filled with huge wolves and people living together. “Holy… Dr Picani!?” Oh great, of course, he had to go and know Damian’s dad, leader of the Clan and the worst possible person to know of Damian’s mistake.
“T-Toby?” Emile asked, walking over and giving Damian a confused yet enraged glance. “Why, whatever are you doing here?”
“I was following this big dog! It is yours?”
“Oh, uh… you could say so, yes.”
“Damn, I was hoping if my dads saw it then they’d let me ke- what the fuck!?” As Damian turned to see what had caused Toby’s outburst and was horrified to see Remy run into the clearing and change into his human form, yellow smoke forming around him as he did, the signature for their bloodline.
“Oh boy…” Emile sighed, “Guess the wolf’s out of the bag? And Toby you should really watch your language, there are kids here and you’re still young yourself.”
It had taken a lot of explaining, but Toby eventually understood who they were, and was in fact extremely on board with the idea, persistently asking if he could get bitten to transform into a werewolf himself, to which Damian, now in human form, would constantly remind him that it was Lupus, not werewolf, *that* word was offensive to their kind. Toby had seemed so alright with their existence that it sparked the beginnings of a co-habitation between Lupi and humans. The Clan slowly revealed themselves, and some even moved into Ferncombe as permanent residents, including Damian. Oh, the internet was a wonderful thing, Damian learned. So much information at your fingertips!
Another added bonus of living in Ferncombe was, undoubtedly, Toby. Now he was 24 and had only recently touched Damian for the first time, which was evident by the soulmark that had formed on Damian’s wrist. Luckily, they both already liked each other, so weekly dates with Toby were always enjoyable, even more than the internet.
Oh, the internet. It was a Tuesday when the internet solved Damian’s deepest, longest problem from thousands of years ago.
On this Tuesday, it was warm, and Damian was finishing up his shift at one of the local cafes, he enjoyed being surrounded by coffee and pastries and the good community. He ran a hand through his hair, momentarily revealing the scar over the left half of his face from when they were building the Lupus settlement, before deciding to take a walk through the woods. However, that plan would never take hold, as he heard somebody call his name.
“Dee!” It was Toby, hurriedly walking down the road to meet him. “Babe I have to show you this video right now,” he was speaking extremely fast, and Damian couldn’t even read the expression on his face.
“What is it? Are you okay?”
“Won’t be until you watch this,” Toby thrust his phone into Damian’s hands, so Damian sighed.
“Okay okay, I’ll watch it.”
The video showed a grey-furred wolf, that appeared to be the height of a larger-than-average person, barreling through the streets of a city before colliding with an inhumanly disfigured creature. The pair brawled, deep growls filling the audio to the point that nobody recording could be heard, and then a purple smoke surrounded the area. A head, a human head, reared out of the smoke, and it looked to be a guy in his 20s, with dark hair and eyes that were glowing red, as well as teeth too long to be human. The guy collapsed, next to another, bleeding person, and the video shut off, showing Damian his own stunned expression.
“Where… where is this?” were the first words that came to Damian’s mind once he recovered from the initial shock.
“A town in America, don’t know exactly where but I’m sure it’ll be in the news, why? Do you know him?”
“Maybe…”
If Damian’s hunch was right, then Virgil was alive, in America, and severely injured. And now that he knew, he needed to know if there were any other Lupi with him.