Brinton, population 2450, Irene read to herself as they passed the tiny, bright green sign marking the beginning of the city limits. Had that always been there? Irene was always a little surprised at how she could notice something new every time she came into town, considering how small and stagnant it was, but that was probably because she hadn’t grown up here like most of the other Garou in the sept. They passed the one-story buildings slowly, the speed limit severely reduced in what was essentially a glorified residential neighborhood, just behind the businesses lined on either side of the main street. Half of those shop fronts were boarded up or left glaringly empty, however, waiting for some disaster to strike so the building owner could collect insurance. A payout from an accident was far more likely than waiting for an aspiring entrepreneur to come to town looking to lease.

Wendy herself was also something of a transplant, having grown up in the next town over, a half hour’s drive through winding trees and steep hills. Her hometown was just as small as this one, so this kind of dreary, dilapidated scene was very familiar to her. They drove in relative silence, Irene listening with half an ear as the younger girl sang along to the radio, having long since given over humming. It saved them both from having to make conversation during the trip, but now that they were finally coming into town, Irene reached over and slowly turned the volume down.

Wendy trailed off, glancing down at Irene’s outstretched hand adjusting the radio. “We’re just going to the station, right?” Wendy asked in anticipation.

“That’s all that Yeeun told us to do, but we’ll see what the officers have to say; they might need to be lead to the… location,” Irene postulated, hoping that saying the bodies were ‘near the old hunter's shed’ would be enough for the first responders to know where to go. They stopped at the red light - one of only two major intersections in the entire town - and waited, letting silence fall between them again.

Wendy knew Irene was thinking about what she was going to say to the sheriff. She was always thinking. It was part of her philodox nature; those born under the half-moon tended to weigh all of their options carefully before making decisions. Wendy had tried to understand when to coax Irene out of her thoughts and into a conversation, and when to just let her be, but it was a difficult learning process.

Luckily she was saved from her internal debate when Irene spoke up again. “The reporter may be there,” the alpha stated in a cautious tone. Usually Brinton’s 8-page weekly newspaper wasn’t worth the subscription fee - it was barely worth the paper it was printed on - until an incident like this occurred. It would add an extra layer of complexity to their attempt to keep the situation under wraps, but considering Brinton was predominantly a town of Kinfolk, it shouldn’t be too difficult to make sure the paper stuck to the appropriate bylines, even if they had to use a bit of intimidation.

“I guess I can see why Yeeun wanted some follow-up.” Wendy wondered how events in the past had been handled, and why Yeeun hadn’t given them a bit more insight about how to take care of the situation. “How long has Yeeun been the sept alpha?” she asked as she slowed down to pull into the police station.

“It’s packed,” Irene remarked instead, noting all the cars in the lot. Many of them were family-sized SUVs, with the odd pickup truck squished in between the patrol cars, and some vehicles double-parked behind others. Wendy hoped they weren’t too late in trying to get a handle on the situation, and that the Kinfolk girl Irene had sent back to town had done her job.

She elected to park on the street, seeing that they weren’t likely to get a spot in the lot and sat back in her seat as she shut off the engine. Neither of the girls moved for a long moment, until Irene finally uttered an “Oh,” startling Wendy out of her reverie.

“Oh?” Wendy prompted as she unbuckled her seatbelt.

Irene was still staring out the window at the parking lot with all of its cars. “Yeeun sent us because no one knows who we are.”

“Oh.” They were both newcomers not only to the Sept, but to Brinton as well.

“We shouldn’t have any unnecessary trouble doing what we came to do and then leaving again.”

“... Oh. Like a riot?”

“Like a riot.”

Wendy scooted out of the truck, hopping down to the asphalt, and she heard Irene doing the same. With the small bit of reassurance about their anonymity helping to calm their nerves, they walked confidently through the lot and up to the small station, with its blue-grey wood panelled facade and tinted windows. She saw the wisdom in the sept alpha’s decision, but still wondered why Yeeun had essentially sent them in blind. She shook herself out of her foreboding thoughts and stepped ahead to hold the door open for Irene and saw that the lobby was standing room only.

Irene wove her way through to the front desk while Wendy glanced around, following behind. Everywhere she looked were red puffy eyes, forlorn faces, and exhausted postures.

“We need to speak to the sheriff for a moment,” Wendy heard Irene say in her soft, commanding way, and she turned her attention to the officer at the desk.

The young man rubbed his buzz-cut hair and sighed, looking around at the crowded lobby. “You can add your name to the list, and I’ll call you when he’s available,” he said with a gesture at a clipboard with a list of about twenty names on it, only the first three crossed out. Wendy could sense his stress all the way from behind Irene. She peeked around her alpha’s shoulder and read the name stitched onto his uniform, ‘DO’, but didn’t recognize it. Was he not Kinfolk?

Irene locked eyes with him and leaned in to quietly insist. “We're from the Lake. I think the sheriff can squeeze us in.”

Officer Do stared back at her for a moment with an unreadable expression, though Wendy could see the muscles in his jaw flex. He seemed like he was about to try to hold his ground, but broke eye contact and pushed up out of his seat. “Alright,” he ground out, gesturing for them to walk ahead of him down a narrow hallway. “He’s down at the end.” The doors they passed on either side of the hall all had large windows criss-crossed with wiring, and Wendy took note of the clerical nature of the offices behind. She had never been in a police station before, but shouldn’t there be holding cells and people being escorted to and fro in handcuffs?

Irene strode down the hall purposefully and stopped at the final door, the window of which was opaque white glass with the name ‘Sheriff Jung Yunho’ stenciled on in small black lettering. Officer Do awkwardly scooted between them to reach for the door.

“Sir? These two girls are from the Lake and- oh, I’m sorry.”

The sheriff was already in a meeting with another woman seated in front of his desk, and when she turned to look at Irene and Wendy, they noticed she was wearing a dark blue EMT uniform with patches of medical insignia sewn onto the sleeves. And darker still were the stains covering most of her torso.

“I can take them back out into the lobby to wait,” Officer Do mumbled apologetically, already beginning to close the door, but Sheriff Jung stood from his desk and waved his hand.

“No need, I think we’re just about done here, right?” he asked the woman still seated in front of him.

The girl turned her glare from Irene and Wendy slowly back to the sheriff, showing him an equal amount of contempt. “I guess we are,” was all she said as she rose brusquely and marched for the door.

“When you’ve finished with the recovery, can your team come back and help us file an official report…?” the sheriff called after her as she roughly shouldered her way past the two Garou.

“Yeah, yeah,” she grumbled darkly.

“Eunji…!” the sheriff called after her, raising his voice slightly. She finally stopped and glared at him from the hallway. He sighed. “I’m counting on you, alright? We’ve got to work together on this.”

His sympathetic gaze almost softened her own, but with The Ones from the Lake watching her, she grit her teeth with renewed anger. “Hard to cooperate when I’m covered in the blood of a dead teenager,” she paused, gesturing to her button-down uniform. “But I’ll do what I can.”

“That’s all I ask,” the sheriff finished tiredly, gesturing for Irene and Wendy to come into the office and be seated. “Thanks, Kyungsoo. I’ll take it from here.”

+++

After Sumni had chastised Hyoyeon for her poor manners, and the latter had finished off Yeri’s breakfast, the two Garou thought it’d be best to walk the new pup to the training grounds in hopes of finding Yubin already there waiting for them.

They led Yeri through the cluster of cabins and into the forest, away from the Lake that kept Yeri’s senses on edge. The morning fog had burnt off in the heat of the midday sun and with the air lighter and clearer, Yeri was assaulted by the confusion of smells that permeated the camp. As they followed the well-worn paths, she was beginning to realize that this really wasn’t just some old converted ranger’s station. This place had been inhabited for decades… perhaps even longer. It was their home, and it seemed like they wanted it to be Yeri’s as well.

But how was she supposed to leave everything behind, just like that? Wasn’t this kidnapping? Yeri could feel her blood beginning to boil. And how could Hyoyeon just laugh at what had happened? How was any of this fair? She should be waking up from a hangover on Joy’s couch, not giving herself a headache desperately trying to remember if she hurt anyone last night.

Sunmi fell into step with Yeri and took her hand, lacing their fingers together. Yeri tried not to let her anger show through her expression as she looked up at the much taller woman. She didn’t want to be welcomed so warmly by another monster. She didn’t want Sunmi to take her underwing and show her around her supposed future home. And she certainly didn’t want to Sunmi to pull her arm out of its socket with the way she was swinging their clasped hands back and forth like that.

“She is out here,” Hyoyeon called back to them as they came into another clearing and spied a figure lazily perched on top of a section of fencing.

Sunmi practically yanked Yeri off her feet as she raised their hands high to wave. “Yubin~” she called gaily, but then she fell into an oddly pensive pout and murmured to Yeri, “I wanted you to meet her during breakfast, but everyone disappeared on me.”

Yeri couldn’t imagine why.

As they approached, Yeri could see that the ‘training grounds’ looked oddly like a large roundpen for working horses. It was a wide oval section of packed sand hemmed in by pipe corral fencing, and Yeri could only begin to wonder what kind of ‘training’ was supposed to take place here.

Sunmi launched straight into the introductions: “Yeri, this is Yubin Proudjaw.” Yubin rolled her eyes with a faint smirk but still stuck her hand out. Yeri knew she shouldn’t be surprised at how strikingly pretty Yubin was; it was common knowledge that Kinfolk had a tendency to be more attractive than most, so it stood to reason that Garou would take that bit of genetic luck even further - something about breeding fitness, she remembered her dad saying once. But even so, Yeri found herself in mild shock as she hesitantly took Yubin’s hand.

“And Yubin, this is Yeri,” Sunmi said in an oddly proud voice. “You know, Taeyeon’s sister.”

Yubin’s handshake slowed. “Taeyeon’s? Yeah, I guess I can see that. Listen, Taeyeon’s kind of held up at the moment, but I guess since I’m the Master of Challenges or whatever, I can teach you the basics.”

“The Master of Challenges?” Yeri asked warily. Was she going to have to pass tests?

Yubin shrugged. “I don’t know, honestly, something about me being the best fighter in the Sept or something.” Hyoyeon scoffed out of view, and Yubin smirked. “All you need to worry about is that I’m like Yenny’s right hand- Has she met Yenny?” Yubin suddenly asked, interrupting herself.

Sunmi shook her head. “I couldn’t find her.”

“Probably still with Taeyeon. Anyway, our sept has this like, hierarchy, right?” Yubin began, turning her attention back to Yeri. “Yenny- uh, Yeeun is the alpha of the whole Sept. She's my boss, your boss, Hyo’s boss,” she indicated, hooking her thumb at Hyoyeon. “She's everyone’s alpha. But! Then there are the packs. Sunmi and I belong to Yeeun’s pack, while Hyoyeon belongs to Taeyeon’s pack. Maybe you’ll end up in her pack, we don’t know, but Taeyeon is Hyoyeon’s alpha.”

It was clear Yeri wasn’t quite following, the way her eyebrows drew closer together the more Yubin tried to explain.

“Taeyeon is the alpha of her pack, but all of the packs answer to Yeeun, the sept alpha,” Sunmi clarified, and was relieved to see Yeri’s expression clear up a bit, forming a small ‘o’ as she slowly nodded.

“But that’s just politics,” Yubin dismissed with a wave. “Hyo, wanna be my guinea pig while I show her some things?”

“What things?” Hyoyeon asked with a skeptical expression.

Yubin climbed over the pipe corral and hopped down onto the hard-packed sand. “You know, rage, different forms, regeneration…”

Hyoyeon smirked and joined her in the pen. “Alright, Proudjaw, but we’ll see who the guinea pig is.”

+++

“What about the hospital? Are they going to give us any trouble?” Irene asked after Sheriff Jung finished reciting the story the police had already drafted in order to help cover up the modest massacre.

Yunho tapped his pen against his legal pad and glanced at the mess of sticky notes with various phone numbers scribbled on them that surrounded his desk phone. As long as most of those numbers were still valid, he knew it shouldn’t be much trouble to get the hospital staff to cooperate. Most of them, anyway, he thought, recalling the way Eunji had stormed out of his office. He sighed and shook his head.

“You’re new at this,” he stated, leaning back in his leather desk chair.

Irene’s mouth became a hard, thin line as she watched him carefully.

Yunho laughed. “Hey, that’s a good thing! It means that hopefully you haven’t seen much of... this before,” he explained with a vague wave of his hand.

Irene was absolutely not in the mood to be lectured by a Kinfolk about her job as an alpha, but she tried to neutralize her features. “But this isn’t your first time dealing with this kind of situation, it seems,” Irene reasoned. It was no wonder to her now why Yeeun had sent them. The sheriff looked like he already had everything under control - the recovery operation with the EMT crews had already begun before the girls had even stepped foot in town.

“Not my first rodeo, no,” he agreed, though his darkening expression didn’t match his light tone. After a moment he suddenly sat up and through his sticky notes, remembering one possible hole in his usual plan. “It’ll be a little bit trickier this time, though, now that the funeral home closed. We’ll have to cart all the bodies to the next town…” he grumbled half to himself. He found the particular note he was looking for, Park & Sons, and flicked it into the trash, useless now that there was yet another vacant business in his dying town.

“Will that be a problem?” Irene asked, raising her eyebrow. The insinuation that it’d be up to Yunho to ensure that it wouldn’t be a problem was clear.

“No,” the sheriff assured her, though he squinted at her tone. “I’ve been dealing with these kinds of messes for a long time,” he added wearily. “I’ll take care of it. Tell Taeyeon that I’ll handle it.”

"Taeyeon?" Irene asked, blinking in mild confusion.

"Your... alpha or whatever?" Yunho asked back, matching her expression.

"Yeeun is our sept alpha," Wendy offered for clarification.

Yunho's eyebrow quirked in surprise and he frowned lightly, but then nodded. "Oh. Okay, I guess that makes sense... Anyway, tell Yeeun, then, that everything's going to be fine." He pulled his legal pad closer to himself and jotted down some notes, and Irene took that as their cue to leave. The import of Yeeun’s direct order to take care of the situation hung over her, though, and she couldn’t help clarifying that the sheriff was going to actually do his job.

“It’s a necessary evil, Sheriff,” she stated coldly as she stood from her seat. Wendy knew Irene was difficult in an argument and she could feel the tension in the office wind tighter and tighter.

Yunho’s pen paused, and his eyes widened a little as he smiled faintly. A necessary evil… He blinked and carefully relaxed his expression before looking up at her. “Call me Yunho. I have a feeling we’re going to be seeing more of each other in the future, and I don’t think it’ll be under better circumstances, unfortunately.”

“Unfortunately,” Irene repeated curtly, but Wendy reached out and held her wrist. “... I’m Irene, and this is Wendy,” she continued after an unspoken exchange with her omega.

Yunho smiled wryly and gave the girls a wink. “I’ll let the Sept know if anything comes up.”

Irene rolled her eyes and shoulders after Wendy shut the door behind them as they left Yunho’s office. While she supposed it was nice to find that Sheriff Jung actually seemed receptive to her input on making sure the situation was being taken care of, she wasn’t sure she appreciated his easy-going approach.

Wendy, however, had seen through his personable exterior and noticed the clear signs of stress and overwork on his features and his cluttered desk. She felt sorry for him, but he seemed to understand the task he had undertaken. Maybe he had known about the Sept of the Sacred Shore ever since he took the position of sheriff. Maybe even longer than that - was he Kinfolk? Wendy was about to ask Irene, when the alpha paused right in the middle of the still-packed lobby.

“Ire-?”

“It’s her again,” Irene muttered quietly. “That Kang girl.”

Wendy followed her gaze to the door of the station that the girl from the forest was holding open for someone. “We got here before her?” The girl looked like she had showered and changed, but she still seemed exhausted. "I suppose she did have to walk back to town," Wendy answered herself.

There was nothing Irene could do except continue walking, so she strode on towards the door, knowing the girl was inevitably going to notice them.

And Seulgi did indeed notice as Irene brushed past her to leave the crowded station, and she paused only for one tired moment before she got over her shock and rushed back out into the parking lot after her.

“Hey, wait! I… Irene!” she called, bringing the two Garou to a halt.

Irene sighed and turned. “Kang…”

“Seulgi,” Seulgi finished, feeling Krystal come up behind her and put a hand on her shoulder.

Irene watched them mutely, waiting as Seulgi visibly struggled for words.

“Is… she okay?” Seulgi finally asked. She was having trouble reconciling how small Irene and Wendy looked, standing there in the parking lot of the police station; the dominated and defeated feeling from when she had met them in the forest was gone. Both of the girls from the Lake seemed out of their element on pavement, though it was hard to tell from their fixed expressions.

“She’s safe,” Irene relayed confidently, having seen Yeri at breakfast with Sunmi. The pup was far safer at the cairn than she would be anywhere else at this point, but she couldn’t help feeling a small pang of guilt remembering the rash promise she had made Seulgi in the forest. She should make a point of having a conversation with Yeri when they returned to the Lake.

“Yeri is?” Krystal spoke up, drawing Irene and Wendy’s attention.

The alpha watched Krystal carefully, ever so slightly cocking her head to the side in suspicion.

Wendy looked between all three of them and elected to speak up, knowing how Irene tended to come off to strangers. “Yeah, she’s being taken care of, don’t worry,” the omega supplied.

“By Taeyeon?” Krystal pressed. It was so obvious that these girls were Garou, something inhuman, and the mere thought of speaking to someone from the Sept of the Sacred Shore again was making her heart race. The questions were pouring out of her before she could stop herself.

“How do you know Taeyeon?” Irene asked carefully.

Krystal held her breath in a pregnant pause. “I’m Kinfolk, too.”

“Jung,” Seulgi piped up helpfully, reaching up to place her hand on Krystal’s supportively.

“Wait,” Wendy sputtered, suddenly seeing the resemblance. “You’re-”

“Jessica’s sister,” Krystal confirmed with bated breath.

Seulgi felt like they were both desperately scratching at the door to another world in which neither of them belonged.

+++

Yeri winced as the one Sunmi had introduced as Hyoyeon ‘Ironpaws’ took a rather nasty kick to the stomach and doubled over in pain.

“Really? It wasn’t that bad,” Yubin complained with her hands on her hips, watching Hyoyeon painfully straighten up.

“Okay, okay,” Hyoyeon laughed. “I just had a big breakfast is all. Let’s go again.” Ironpaws was already raising her fists again, approaching Yubin in a stance that made her look like something between a boxer, and an experienced bar fighter.

Sunmi had tangled her long limbs through the bars of the corral as she watched, though Yeri only tentatively rested her hands upon them, allowed to slip back into her own thoughts to the sounds of blocked punches and grunts of exertion. She was still in shock at the abruptness of all these changes. Not 24 hours ago she had woken up excited to be going to the graduation party with Joy and the seniors, and all of their friends. She had been more worried about her finals the following week than she had been about going into a frenzy and killing her classmates.

With every dull blow the women in the enclosure exchanged, Yeri felt her stomach lurch. This wasn’t just some horror story she was witnessing from the sidelines anymore. This was her story. She was the villain this time. Yeri heard a wet crack from the arena, and a hiss from Sunmi, and looked back up to the fight to see Yubin with her face in her hands, blood leaking between her fingers and staining the knee of Hyoyeon’s jeans.

“Okay,” Yubin’s muffled voice announced from between her fingers. “Playtime’s over. You know how I feel about my face…!” And Yeri was rooted in place as she watched Yubin double over and change.

Nothing could have prepared Yeri for how quickly the older woman’s figure quite literally doubled in size, both in height and breadth. She clapped her hands over as Yubin’s form become a mass of muscle and sinew, covered in a layer of caramel-colored fur. With a primal snarl, Yubin straightened up and revealed her great lupine head - she looked like something straight out of a pulp fiction movie, but her eyes, that was where the true horror lay. Yeri felt a fear that reached back into the forgotten depths of her very DNA as she looked into Yubin’s piercing golden-yellow gaze.

A fear, and a familiarity.

“Oh, come on. Aren’t you overreacting just a little?” Hyoyeon asked as she caught her breath, shrugging with her arms out wide.

“For the pup,” Yubin answered in an aggressive snarl.

Hyoyeon glanced over at Yeri’s stricken expression and blinked. “Oh, right. Okay, I guess it’s my turn, then.” Hyoyeon lowered herself to one knee and winked at Yeri who was holding onto the pipe corral for dear life. “Watch closely, young one.”

Watching the transformation for a second time, Yeri didn’t see it so much as she felt it. She remembered it. As she watched the dun-colored hair cover Hyoyeon’s kneeling figure, she felt goosebumps rise on her own skin. She felt her own gums tingle as glistening fangs sprouted from Hyoyeon’s lengthening maw.

As the two transformed Garou crashed into each other, grappling and snapping, Yeri’s fingers flexed. She knew the feeling of digging claws into another’s flesh. She remembered being full of another’s blood.

“This is their crinos form.” Sunmi’s voice shot through Yeri’s thoughts like lightning across a dark cloudy sky.

“Is that what I did to my friends?” she asked, her voice sounding so hollow, barely heard over the grunting and scuffling of the two women in the corral.

Sunmi glanced over at Yeri sympathetically. The more Yeri saw, the better it would be for her in the long run, but Sunmi couldn’t help feeling like she wanted to hold Yeri and protect her from the look of dread spreading across her features.

“We’ve all been there,” Sunmi tried to placate. “What you did, we’ve all done.”

“I know,” Yeri admitted.

Ah, yes she would know, Sunmi realized.

Yeri was a Kim, after all.

+++

“Jessica’s sister, huh?” Wendy mused as she heard Irene shut the door to the pickup and buckle her seatbelt.

“Maybe.”

Wendy paused with her hand on the key in the ignition. “Maybe?” She certainly looked like she was Jessica’s little sister, she had said so, she knew who Taeyeon was-

“She didn’t have a scent,” Irene clarified curtly.

“Would she smell like Jessica, though?” Wendy asked. She knew Irene’s ability to discern different scents was peerless, even amongst the other Garou in the Sept, but Wendy wasn’t sure what Irene was getting at.

Irene shook her head and looked at Wendy levelly. “No, I mean she didn’t have a scent at all. Not human, not Kinfolk, not Garou… nothing.”

“But... that doesn’t really make any sense, does it? I mean she has to have some kind of scent…?” Wendy led, finally starting the truck. All living creatures had their own unique smell, right?

But Irene wasn’t so sure. She watched the two supposed Kinfolk girls disappear back inside the police station, and continued to stare even as Wendy began to drive away. Whoever that girl was, though, she seemed to know Yeri, so that was as good a place as any to start asking questions.