My name is Sunggyu. Kim Sunggyu. I’m ten years old. Even though I’m only ten, I’m hundreds of thousands of miles away from my home. Right now, I’m in Venice, Italy. My home is a place called Springfield where I lived with my grandfather for a few weeks before he sent me away.

I had been given the task of finding certain people and bringing them back to Springfield. That’s how I ended up in Italy. The list given to me sent me from one corner of the world to the other, all the while looking for Jang Dongwoo, Nam Woohyun, Kim Myungsoo, Lee Sungyeol, and Lee Sungjae.

Five people. Yet instead I had found six. Lee Sungjae not being one of them. The boys of similar age to mine that now sat in the same room as me are Jang Dongwoo, Nam Woohyun, Lee Howon, Kim Myungsoo, and Lee Sungjong.

Due to complications I reported to my grandfather, I ended up instead bringing along the six-year old Sungjong instead of the thirteen year old Sungjae.  For the sake of Sungjong’s future, I vowed not to tell anyone about what happened to his brother. For all intensive purposes, the other boys think it was him I was supposed to find in the first place.

Lee Howon was a different story. It was pure coincidence I found him that snowy night. Without consent, I took him in. My punishment for going against the list my grandfather granted to me was to be decided upon returning home.

Now however, I had no idea when that would be. To clarify, the room we are all currently in is a hospital room. A hospital room funded by my grandfather after much persuasion in order to keep the boy named Lee Sungyeol alive.

Lee Sungyeol is currently in a coma. The doctor had previously told me there were no signs of him ever waking up. Still, the movement he showed while I was in Thailand retrieving Myungsoo, witnessed by Dongwoo, Woohyun, Hoya, and Sungjong, showed he was in no way brain dead. As long as there was a chance he would survive, I would stay here by his side.

Soft chatter coming from behind me where I sat at Sungyeol’s bedside made me turn. The meek Sungjong was again attempting to strike up conversation with the stoic Myungsoo. Myungsoo was older than him by a year, a reason for Sungjong’s soft whispers of the word “hyung” as he spoke to Myungsoo. Myungsoo on the other hand seemed to have no interest in talking. I understood why, considering the situation I had just been his escape from. He had a right to remain quiet. He was however truly listening to Sungjong despite not talking. The look on his face now told me as much.

Seated next to them on the couch in the room was Dongwoo. He had long since opened up to me but he was still holding back with everyone else. Seeing as how we spent three months with just the two of us before he finally agreed to follow me to Springfield, I don’t expect him to open up so soon.

Hoya on the far end of the couch was silent. He noticed I was looking and looked towards me, away from who he was previously staring at, Sungyeol. Hoya is what he likes to be called despite his legal name being Howon. I decided to respect his wishes as he came with me so willingly. I was not supposed to stumble upon and end up bringing him with me.  Well, six is too much of an even number anyway. An odd seven sounds better.

“Look at this.” Woohyun showed them a magic trick in which he pulled his thumb off of one of his hands, a trick seemingly well known by Dongwoo. Hoya however was mystified and stared on. There was no laughter at his action but that didn’t keep the joke teller, Woohyun himself, from laughing.

His defense had been laughter. A smiling face. His defense against what? Questions which would bring up issues he had finally put behind him. The main and only one being the death of everyone he knew and loved.

“Do it again.” Sungjong, the youngest, asked from down the couch. Woohyun grew even more excited as he once more performed the simple trick, awing the young man. Myungsoo watched as well as Dongwoo, all five of them now thoroughly engaged.

What is the reason I was sent to gather all of them together? My grandfather told me it was to restore Springfield’s werewolf population. I was to go back as soon as I was done. Though as stated before, I cannot due to Sungyeol.

Lee Sungyeol who is in a coma. Lee Sungyeol who will be the last person I am to convince to join my grandfather’s pack before heading back to Springfield. Due to his current predicament, Sungyeol’s own pack no longer lives here in Italy, where he was supposedly born and raised. Though this is a story left for him to tell, not me.

The only person who had a pack upon my retrieval of him was Myungsoo. That was the shortest amount of time I had spent traveling in any one country for all of them. In a mere matter of seconds, he agreed to join me. As Sungjong had requested of me as well, I was asked to keep his past secret. His act of coming with me was in order to escape his life. To start anew. So while my grandfather and I know of his origins, the others assume he was picked up in similar ways as they had been.

Dongwoo, Hoya, Woohyun, and Sungjong all were without packs upon me reaching them. They were attached to no one. This may have been the reason they looked at me in such adoration and respect as they did now. I’m only ten. I’ve always been told I’m too mature for my age. My grandfather has often told me to stop nagging and try to have fun every now and again.

I stood up from my chair, walking towards the window of the hospital room. I whipped the curtains open, letting the early morning light enter the room.

“Something wrong Hyung?” Woohyun voiced and all their eyes went to me. That’s when a once steady beat picked up. A small hitch that caused me to quickly return to Lee Sungyeol’s side. The room was silent as we all awaited the fluttering of his eyes open.

After a moment, the beat went steady again. Woohyun let out a heavy sigh and sank back into his seat. I once more had my hopes dashed by Sungyeol’s relapse back into his coma. Woohyun didn’t tell a joke, though no one would have listened to it anyway.

A smack coming from beside him caused Myungsoo to flinch back. Sungjong had hit the table with his palm once and hard at that. A moment of silence went by before he smacked it again, and again, and again, “Hyung!” He called in urgency, “He moved! I saw it!”

I let my eyes fall to where Sungjong had focused, Sungyeol’s right hand. We all watched, the build up causing us to become more suspicious of his claim with each passing second. Then, we saw it.

A twitch of the finger. That wasn’t all. It was followed up by the slight clenching of his hand into a fist. Sungyeol was moving. Now, everyone was moving, standing immediately from their seats as they rushed over to take a look at the boy whose voice they had not yet heard and whose eyes they had not yet seen.

His eyes slowly opened, his breathing getting rougher as he came back from his vegetable like state. His head turned towards the left, inching slowly, towards me. His eyes locked with mine and for a moment, it seemed as though he knew what this all meant.

“Woohyun, go get the doctor.”

Woohyun almost tripped over himself as he ran out the door and down the hall of the hospital. After this moment, the seven of us became one pack. Sharing a bond as tightly knitted as brothers. Our lifestyle was seemingly simple until one rainy day during the fall season of Springfield.

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A/N:

This was a special chapter that took a peek into the werewolves' past to commerate 100 chapters of Springfield. It's been a long ride full of mysteries and secrets. Plot twists around every corner. Answers supplying only more questions at every fork in the road. I want to thank each and every single one of you for going along with me on this journey, enjoying it just as much as I have. Springfield is far from over so let's all continue to enjoy the ride together!

I wouldn't trade my readers for anything. So there's only one last thing to say now. Even though I say it so often, I just have to say it to all of you again.

I love you!