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kariachi · 1 year

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Oh look, a commissionpiece for @thenixkat! 10.7k words for what is now the Werewolf!Richie trilogy!

Times don’t really get any easier for our poor boy.

~~~~

The life of a hunter was not glamorous, nor was it easy. Their work was hard, dangerous, and messy. Civilian attitudes veered wildly- a hunt where you were all but paraded down the street as a hero could be followed immediately after by one where naïve locals condemned you as worse than the monsters you killed. Their clients were often peculiar and unpredictable. Gear suppliers few and far between. Informants wary, mysterious.

A hunter lived and died by those informants. Most beasts were well experienced in hiding themselves, slipping carefully under the radar of the humans that lived around them. Tracking them required diligent monitoring of human and animal deaths, and even an experienced hunter may not find enough of them to support their living without concerned residents offering them places to focus their investigations.

And then, some days, all they had to do was turn on the news…

*** ***

The Foley household did not get an hour after getting Richie comfortably settled in the basement, curled whining on a bed that had housed three generations of Foley wolves, before there was knocking at their door. Luckily it wasn’t an oddly polite hunter. Nor a witch, the government, or the police. Who it was was Batman, come all the way from Gotham of all places. Maggie couldn’t have honestly told you if this was any better. Maybe if it had been Wonder Woman- they’d worked together on wolf things before, she would probably understand- but the Bat was an unknown.

Normally she would have been self-conscious having a guest, especially such an important one, in her home when she was so tired and harried, but that night, with blood awash on the streets and her son’s hands? Self-consciousness took more energy than she had to spare. It was pure luck she even managed to put out a package of cookies like a good host, even though this was Batman and he probably subsisted off justice filtered from the air like some sort of sea sponge.

“Mr. and Mrs. Foley,” the Caped Crusader said once he was settled at the dining table and had politely polished off a singular oreo. Maggie was sat across from him, but Sean refused to take a seat, instead standing by her chair. “I have some hard news about your son.” Because that didn’t raise hackles like nothing else.

“Do you now,” Sean said in a tone that was as much warning as anything else. Batman looked at him, but otherwise appeared unfazed.

“Your son is a werewolf,” he continued, only for Sean to snort harshly.

“He better be.” That fazed the man, facial expressions hard to read with the cowl but the way a second cookie smushed in his fingers and the muscles around his mouth tightened said it just as well. “He was when he went to Gotham.”

“So he was,” Batman said, slowly. “Are you aware, then, of what’s happened tonight?”

“Yes,” Maggie answered this time, pulling together so her voice was firm and back straight. “We know what happened, and that Richie is safely secure now.” And hero or no he couldn’t have pulled the ‘where’ out of her with torture. Batman sighed, just barely, and set his cookie down.

“I understand you want to protect him,” he said, “but I need you to understand that Richie is very dangerous-” She hadn’t realized her hackles could go any higher.

“Richie,” Sean growled- and though he didn’t have enough wolf to him to see through magic like she and Richie did, between his parents and his sister he could growl and howl near as well as anyone- “wasn’t a danger to anything but a rack of ribs and the occasional stray cat until we let him run off to your turf, and the cat was more likely to get the scare of its life than anything.” The Bat tensed further.

“He’s killed thirteen people and injured more.”

“And it’s not going to happen again.” Batman met her eyes, unblinking.

“You can’t assure that. I just want to suggest sending him somewhere he can be kept an eye on, where he won’t be a threat to himself or anyone else.” Channeling her cousin, Maggie maintained eye contact.

“Our families have been handling young wolves for generations,” she said, “and have had one rampage to worry about-”

“That only happened because you didn’t do your damn job,” Sean interjected.

“-I think we can manage.” More tension.

“Mrs. Foley-”

“If you want to make a fuss about it,” Sean said, and she knew his hackles were raised at least as high as hers. He was far from the best husband and father, but he was at least good enough for this. “-then you can feel free to try.” And God as her witness she was on his side. Yes, Batman was a superhero, yes, he was only looking toward the greater good, but she was a mother. One who had more information than she would ever feel comfortable giving him, after Richie had confided in her about his obvious discomfort when he’d learned her boy was a werewolf. He wanted to lock her only child up- and that was what it was, he could talk until he went blue in the face but everyone in the community could read between the lines. Given the opportunity Richie would be locked up until they found a way to ‘fix’ him or a hunter or witch stole him away.

That wasn’t about to happen. Slowly, Maggie rose to her feet, eyes still on her ‘guest’.

“I think you’ll find,” she said, “that the door is right where you left it.”

*~*

The moon is up again and he’s in the basement with the door firmly latched. His pup is with him, his dam is with him, but neither is a substitute for the open air to which he’s accustomed. To running under the moon.

He can’t run in the basement. From one wall to the other is little more than two strides, with no way to build the sort of speed that makes him feel alive. At most he can pace, back and forth and back and forth in what feels more like loops than lengths. Stop on occasion to press his nose against the cracked window, breathe in the cool night air, and whine.

“I know,” his dam says, “I’m sorry. You can’t go out tonight. Too many people are hunting.”

He knows this. People are hunting him because he was a Bad Boy. He ate too much, he hurt his pack (his tail hasn’t wagged since he became himself again and at the memory of his brother and sister on the ground it presses between his legs) he was Bad and now he’s in trouble. Now he’s hunted like prey and locked in the basement and his siblings are nowhere to be found.

He’s tempted to howl, to call them, but that would be Bad.

He’s tempted to slip deeper into the layers of his city, find a place to run and leap, but that would be Bad too.

Whining again, he plods back to his bed, worn to comfort and smelling heavily of kin, and collapses on it, laying his head in his dam’s lap. She scratches behind his ears as his pup comes and settles in beside him- stroking his fur in his best attempts at grooming- and hums an old lullaby about wolves and bears. As she does, she moves a platter of ground meat to where he can easily tuck in.

Stomach still fuller than he’s ever known, his sister’s blood behind his eye, he turns away.

*~*

“Richie?” There were many benefits to being an adult, the greatest one being that while her father’s reaction to everything that had happened the night before had shaken Sharon as badly as it had Virgil, she didn’t actually have to obey his ‘you’re grounded’ if she didn’t want to. At least not if she had a good enough reason. Leaving her free to, after a few respectful days, personally go around and check in on the kids. Though Daisy and Frieda had at least come to the door for her.

“Come on in.” Steeling herself more than she’d like to admit, Sharon nodded and slipped into the bedroom. Richie was sat at his desk, a videogame of some sort going on his computer, wearing what she had to guess was his father’s shirt. Understandably so, as the muscle he’d built up over the last month had clearly not gone anywhere and instead been joined with a nice layer of fat.

She supposed eating a street’s worth of people would do that to anybody.

Beyond that and the mildly haunted look in his eye, though, there was little sign of the things he’d done just a few nights before.

“I brought over that necklace we mentioned,” she said, pulling it out of her pocket. A perfect match to the bracelet around his wrist. “How are you holding up?”

“Fine,” Richie said, taking the necklace from her with forced casualness and putting it on as tightly and firmly as was possible. “Mom wants me to stay where she can keep an eye on me for a few days more, but other than that...” Sharon raised a brow. It wasn’t abnormal for him to not sleep well over the full moon, but the dark circles under his eyes still didn’t speak to ‘fine’.

“I’m a counselor, Richie, no lying to me.”

The two stared each other down for a long moment, Sharon blindly stepping over to pat BackPack when the machine whirred at them. Richie, tired as he was, broke first, slumping with a sigh and faint smile.

“I put my two best friends in the hospital, killed a load of people, and haven’t really slept since before we fought those worms.” A quiet, forced laugh. “Been a bit of a week.” Yeah, it had, for all of them. She’d preferred to think of it as little as possible. With a sigh of her own, she pulled him into a hug that was as much for herself as him.

She could’ve very easily lost both her brothers that night, and much like her father she wasn’t sure what she’d have done had it happened.

“It’s all over now,” she said as he held her back. “Just keep the necklace or the bracelet on-”

“Oh, I’m wearing them both forever now.”

“-while we figure out a way to actually fix this. Until then-” She pulled back with a supportive smile. “-I’m going to get your mom to make you some cocoa and a good meal-” Something twinged across his face, but she let it pass. It had been a bit of a week, after all. “-and then you’re going to get some sleep. Okay?” Richie nodded.

“Okay. Thanks, Sharon.” They both knew it was for a million things, from still looking out for him to bringing the necklace and everything he’d apologized for over shock vox. She just nodded.

“It’s nothing.” Flashing a smile, she reached into her pockets again. “But, whenever you feel up to it, there’s a favor we’d like to ask you…”

*~*

There was nothing that distracted from nasty memories like work, any work, so Richie was more than happy to take an hour or so to sit down, BackPack in his lap and a bowl of pasta by his side, and modify the communicators they’d all gotten from the League.

Batman hadn’t shown up at anybody else’s house yet, presumably because even in this sort’ve situation you didn’t just risk outing somebody’s secret identity, but that didn’t mean he hadn’t made attempts to contact the rest of the team.

They’d all feel better not picking up calls if he had his own ringtone to avoid.

*** ***

Dakota was a mess. The young man at his motel who had, with a smile, handed him maps and guides and a list of nearby restaurants had given only praise for the city, but he was a local and Armel was a professional. He knew a monster when he stepped into it and the city of Dakota, with its hour drive of abandoned warehouse district and advice to pull over and wait three minutes if he ran into a sudden dead end, was a monster filled with monsters. Especially in the last few years. He’d had an inkling as he’d done his research, but now that he was here, he was certain a more generalized hunter could make the place their life’s work. A whole team maybe.

But he was a specialist and would be gone as soon as he’d cleared up and processed their little werewolf problem.

There were at least four. He had evidence of three, from various news reports, but his parents had taught him that there were always more wolves than your first count gave you. Informants, the news, often only caught wind of the least cautious, and you could rest assured that there would be more who were better at hiding behind them.

Finally bringing his van to a stop outside his motel room, after seven dead ends and at least three turns that shouldn’t have been wrong, Armel set to work unloading the newspapers and security footage he’d managed to get his hands on while he took in the lay of the land. Step one of a hunt, after all, was always to figure out precisely where you could find your prey.

*** ***

For the first time in his life, Richie was eating a green bean. He wasn’t normally the sort for green food- green was the color of mold and clearly that was a sign- especially not fucking green beans, but desperate times called for desperate measures and these times were nothing if not desperate.

The hunger that had been a background noise to his entire life, not so strong as to do him ill but as much a steady thrum as his own heartbeat, had come back full force after only a few days. Unfortunately, so had his instinctual craving for meat, no matter that even the sight of a steak made a pained whine rise unbidden in his throat. Chicken tasted like hot red blood in his mouth. If he shut his eyes, he could swear he was back on the street with his teeth in a woman’s throat.

He'd spent an hour on the phone with his grandmother that morning, trying to figure out why. This hadn’t happened after his first transformation, and he’d eaten an innocent man then. Yeah, he’d yearned for some produce afterwards, but it’d only taken at most an hour to turn right back around to his beloved meat. Their best guess, in the end, was a sheer matter of scale. Before he had never done more than toy with crowds, nip and play. To suddenly go to full scale slaughter? Even if it had been normal behavior, rather than brought on by presumed illness, the change would have had an impact on him.

Whatever the case, his body seemed not to have gotten the memo that meat was no longer a good option, and the crunch of frozen vegetables was- not a good substitute for the urge to chew a bone, but about what he was getting.

*~*

“Well,” Richie said with forced levity as he sat down in his normal spot at the lunch table, “if I had a social life before we can safely say it’s gone now.” All the tables around theirs were barren of any sign of life or use, with all the rest of the cafeteria crammed tight with students who clearly did not want to be anywhere near him.

“Don’t worry, Rich,” Virgil tried and failed to sooth him, “things’ll calm down. It’ll be fine.” Richie very, very much doubted that. From the moment he’d walked back into the school people had kept their distance, even ‘subtly’ trying to move their desks aside during class. Eyeing him with suspicion and fear when they thought he wouldn’t notice. Worse, eyeing Frieda and Virgil with pity as it became clear that they were still hanging out with him. Her less than him- you could mostly hide a concussion, but a broken arm was pretty obvious.

“I think there’s maybe three people who believe he was kidnapped,” Frieda said. “Everyone else is certain he’s a werewolf.” Fighting to keep his shoulders from tensing, Richie shoved a handful of fries into his mouth and worried the amulet around his neck with his other hand.

“Everyone,” he asked as incredulously as he could. Just because people thought he was a werewolf was no reason to admit it in public. Daisy shrugged.

“You were showing all the stereotypical signs,” she said. “There’s not a lot of people who don’t at least know somebody who likes werewolf media, they recognize the tropes.”

“Maybe if you’d come back to school sooner-”

“Or thinner.”

“-leave him be, Virgil. Maybe if you’d come back sooner the rumors wouldn’t have gotten the time to stew, but right now this is what we’re dealing with.” The frown on Frieda’s face said she probably didn’t believe it herself, and neither did Richie. The rumors weren’t baseless, after all. Knowing about them now, he couldn’t even blame people for wanting to avoid him. If this had been happening to someone else last year, he probably would’ve been wary too. And he had eaten like a dozen people.

It was really fucking messed up.

“Like I said, my social life is officially dead.”

*~*

The less said about his attempt to apologize to Russ for his behavior- about his tight smile, about his forced laugh- the better.

It stuck like a knife in the gut.

*** ***

The first wolf was a breeze to figure out. Armel had just had to find the first news article to mention them, and then comb through the rest for any mention of their name. Each time he found one, he noted down the area they were seen. Then it had been a simple matter of grabbing a map of Dakota and marking off all the sightings to figure out a general territory. He’d also looked into the family, but all reports seemed to agree that the wolf was one of those ‘Bang Babies’ that infested the place, and a weekend stakeout had provided no evidence otherwise, so he set any concerns about them aside. He had their names and their address; he could always check again when he was done.

The others were more trouble. One of them had gone on a little killing spree the year before, tearing through pets, zoo animals, and one unfortunate civilian, but since had only been seen occasionally loping about side streets and alleyways. The other had only appeared the once, not seen any of the other nights of the moon and with no more victims found. There was, as suspected, no video that he could find that showed any transformations, and neither had had any scars or accessories he could pick out on the footage that could be used to track a human shape. Worse, the patterns of sightings and attacks were all over the place, with no obvious paths or territory to focus his attention on. But Armel was a professional, and he was certain that with more digging he would find a lead on at least one of them. There was the risk that, like the first one, these were also both Bang Babies and so there would be no connection to pull on and find the greater community in the area- there was one, he always found one- but even so.

Until then, however, there was still plenty he could do. With a huff and a heave, he swung a crate of hook traps into the back of his van, all freshly cleaned and sharpened, shoving it back between a box of hardware and the brightly-colored pup traps. A big cooler of chicken quarters followed, carefully secured before he slammed the door shut, sealing it with a padlock.

If nothing else, it seemed like you didn’t have to wait on the moon to go a-trapping around here.

*** ***

“Daisy! Freida!” The pair stopped on their way to the doors at the end of the day, turning to watch Carmen Fonseca run up the hall their way. A nice enough girl, if a little self-important. She all but skidded to a stop in front of them, shoving out her hands with a smile. “I made these for you!”

A quick look and Frieda felt her mouth twist in a frown. A pair of butter knives, painstakingly bent into loops that matched the spoon around Carmen’s wrist.

“Thanks, Carmen,” Daisy said far more politely than Freida felt, “but we’re good.”

“Better safe than sorry,” Carmen countered, eyes flicking to Freida’s head. Her ire kicked into a higher gear.

“Just because the rest of you have gone paranoid doesn’t mean we have,” she said. Already she’d been annoyed, right from when Richie came back to school and most everyone had avoided him like the plague. Then, not even a few days later, people had started showing up kitted out in all the silver they could get their hands on. She knew for a fact a few of their classmates had mugged people for jewelry.

The good news was that eventually it had given people the confidence to stop maintaining a six-foot gap between them and her friend whenever possible. The bad news was that Richie was having one hell of a time getting around without hurting himself or letting on he actually couldn’t touch the silver.

Nobody wanted to know what would happen if the rumors got that sort of fuel.

Scowling, Carmen dropped her hands, going to put the ‘bracelets’ back into her bag.

“When Richie eats you,” she said admonishingly, “I won’t feel bad. I’ve done what I can.” They watched silently as she, with a small huff, shoved passed them and walked out the big front doors. Freida shook her head.

“Remind me to never do her a favor again in my life.” Heaving a sigh, Daisy readjusted her hold on her backpack and headed out.

“No problem.”

*~*

Richie may as well have not been eating at all, for how his stomach was acting. It didn’t matter how many carbs, eggs, cheese, vegetables he threw at it, that gnawing hunger refused to soothe back to it’s normal undercurrent. He could all but hear a refrain of ‘meat’ in his head, the smell of it at dinner and in the lunchroom as alluring as it was off-putting.

A yearning as deep as the pit in his stomach and the guilt in his heart.

*~*

A week and a half after The Event and nobody had seen Richie eat a meat product. If this had been one of the girls, or even Virgil, that wouldn’t have been a big deal, but this was Richard Foley, who they’d all assumed was required to eat at least three hamburger patties a day lest God strike him down.

None of them could bring themselves to mention it though. Daisy and Sharon had watched him eat a man, and while they would never say it, they were kind of happy not to see him tear into anything more visceral than an onion ring. Virgil still keenly remembered teeth bared in his face while he struggled to breathe. Frieda had the least trauma there, and still it had only taken seeing the look on Richie’s face when offered half a burger- yearning, disgust, hunger, pain- once to break her heart and do

Nothing.

*~*

Static lays on the ground beneath him, pinned with long clawed hands. His breathing is shallow, bones cracking one by one under his weight. Blood bubbles from his mouth, just as it did from his sisters’, and Richie knows it’s not enough. Not enough blood, not enough meat, and he’s so so hungry that it’s easy to lean down for a bite

Richie woke to a mouth full of sharp teeth, an endless whine in his throat, and BackPack’s worried prodding. A jolt of fear and disgust shot up his spine as the remnants of his nightmare, blood and meat and pack, swirled into the dark depths of his mind. His jaw clamped shut, he yanked BackPack close to him, curling as tight as he could against the comfort of whirring gears and clicks as he tried to force back his teeth and a whimper.

His stomach growled.

*~*

The more time passed, the more he started itching again.

Richie’s first instinct when he’d noticed had been to panic. After all, the whole last month preceding his rampage had been marked with constant itching of the scar still sat over his shoulder. This wasn’t so centralized, however, which was a relief for about as long as it took to remember that it was also the main symptom of his transformations. Lo and behold, a few checks showed patches of fur, long teeth, claws, all trying to work their way out when the itching started.

He panicked all over again.

*~*

“Okay,” Daisy said, slumped on the couch and silently wondering if they were ever going to stop having Richie issues, “so you’re transforming just, whenever?”

“Only a little bit,” Richie said like that made it better, then dropped the act. “I’m not sure why, this hasn’t happened before.”

“Maybe it’s another witch thing,” Virgil suggested. “Have you smelled anything weird lately?”

“No.” Richie shook his head. “Everything’s been as normal as it ever is in Dakota.”

“That’s not exactly a high bar.” She had to agree with Freida. Neither of them had ever been out of the state, but they engaged with media from elsewhere and…

Two weeks and the werewolf rampage wasn’t even a footnote in the news anymore.

“We should probably keep an eye out anyway,” Sharon said. “Better safe than sorry.” Everyone nodded their agreement. After all, if this was more witch stuff then it was entirely possible this one was using different spells than the last.

“Either way,” Virgil said, “we may wanna see if we can safely solder those amulets on.” Snorting humorlessly, Richie flashed a grin and waggled the wrist with the bracelet.

“I’m way ahead of you, Virg.”

*** ***

He blamed Dakota itself for the issues he was having. Not a single one of his traps had caught this damn wolf yet. In fact, so far all they had caught was dogs. Big, identical dogs that he kept having to shoot so he could just get on with clean up. Not like he had to worry about maintaining a salable skin, the damn things’ ragged hides weren’t worth the time they’d take to remove. Meant a nearly free source of bait meat though, so at least it wasn’t all a wash.

‘Still’, he thought as he stuffed trap and dog both into a waterproof sack, tying it shut, ‘it’d be nice to hear an alarm and have an actual fucking catch.’ It didn’t help that he felt like he might finally have found a lead on those other two wolves. A kid had disappeared around the time they each popped up, same one both times. Might have been an adolescent they’d been teaching, and if so that meant those two were probably of the same pack, found in the same area. It was worth looking into, but first he’d hoped to have this one’s skin and fat stored away for processing. Hunting unrelated wolves at the same time could be an absolute bear.

Heaving a sigh as he tossed the sack into the back of his van, shutting and locking the doors, Armel shook his head and started for the driver’s side.

If he wanted to get this done before the wolves caught on, he was going to have use the hands-on approach here.

*** ***

They changed where they normally sat in the lunchroom. Ostensibly they picked a new corner spot so that Richie didn’t have to deal with people side-eyeing him through lunch, his friends now a full barrier between him and the rest of the rest of the school. Functionally, he was able to actually eat when there was a lower risk of somebody noticing that he had claws half the time.

*~*

“Had lunch with some of the guys from the west end. Apparently they’ve been finding pools of blood out in the Dockside District,” his dad said during dinner one night, to he and his mom’s surprise both.

“Pools,” she asked.

“Pools. Lab came back this morning saying they’re dog but, has to have been some big fucking dogs. Hewitt says it looked like somebody’d bled the damn things out.” Richie kept his eyes on his salad, already tasting like ashes in his mouth before the topic had changed. Dog sounded far too good in that moment.

“Do they have any idea who did it?”

“Not a clue. All they’ve know is whoever it was loaded them into some sort’ve vehicle and they wear a size ten boot.” His mom shook her head with a tight frown.

“That’s horrible.”

“Yep,” his dad said, “some sick people out there. What the fuck would you even need all those dogs for, they found at least ten pools.” Stomach rumbling loudly, Richie shook his head and changed the subject.

*~*

Unsurprisingly Richie got into five different confrontations once the ‘dead dogs’ news trickled fully into the school. Physical violence was thankfully avoided, but only because three times he’d been with Virgil and the girls and had numbers advantage, and the other two the ever-popular Joey Bombura had helpfully reminded everyone involved they needed to get to class and escorted people himself. After all, who in their school was going to fight him about it?

The way his blood started pumping whenever he was challenged, Richie was more than grateful for the help.

*~*

“Gear?” Only halfway through the fight did the others notice that their friend had just, stopped in midair. Out of the way, thankfully, but still odd behavior to put it lightly. Enough so for Hurricane to abandon the conflict- not like the other girls couldn’t handle it for a minute or two- to fly over and check on him. “Gear? Are you okay?” She put a hand on his shoulder, reeling back when he started like a spooked deer.

“Hurricane?” Eyes torn from their opponent- yet another newly public Bang Baby who’d figured out how to weaponize walking on anything- he faced her, breathing heavily, muscles tense.

“Are you okay,” Hurricane repeated, a twisting worry in her gut. Slowly, Gear nodded.

“Yeah,” he said haltingly, “yeah. Just… I think I should probably bow out today.” Well, that did nothing to help her concern. Still, Hurricane nodded.

“Okay. Don’t worry, we’ve got this.”

*~*

“Did you read in the paper,” Frieda asked at lunch one day, “Jaron Coombs got shot last night.”

“Who,” Virgil asked, echoing the first word in Daisy’s head.

“Wolfboy,” Richie said.

“Oohhh, him, okay. What happened?”

“More importantly,” Daisy cut in, “who’s ‘wolfboy’? I thought we only had Richie?”

“He’s a Bang Baby,” Virgil explained, “tried to go on a rampage pretty much immediately. Then Hotstreak lit him on fire, and he’s mostly kept a low profile ever since.”

“You’ve got to give him that at least,” Richie said. “There aren’t too many people around here who figure out they’re outclassed and decide to just keep themselves to themselves.”

“Nobody’s really sure what happened,” Frieda said. “Some old lady found him curled up under her porch, took him to the hospital. He’s still there.”

“Well,” Daisy said, “I hope he recovers alright.”

She didn’t mention the niggling in her gut that some paranoid local may have mistaken him for Richie. They probably all were thinking it anyway.

*~*

“You’d think ‘The World’s Greatest Detective’ could take a fucking hint. Why is he still calling us?”

“Do you think the Justice League has a complaints department we can get in touch with?”

“I’m beginning to hope. Wonder Woman would take us seriously about it, I’m sure.”

*~*

Richie was so fucking hungry…

*~*

He’d begged off lunch, even though it visibly sent up about every red flag in the world for his friends. Still, they’d let him go, begrudgingly accepting his list of excuses as to why he needed to hit the library up that day and why he couldn’t go after school and why they totally should just go and have lunch themselves he’d be fine don’t worry about it. They were going to worry about it, and he felt guilty, but that was no change from his new norm and

And he couldn’t do the lunchroom right now.

Not when he could smell all that meat, right there. Not when it made him itch- and it was definitely that making him itch. He hadn’t been able to admit it when the theory first came to mind- not while he still couldn’t handle eating the stuff and god had he tried- but the longer this went on the more he knew it in his rumbling gut. Especially now the scent left him about ready to vault a table and sink his teeth into whatever fleshy bits he found. Better to go the empty library and keep himself busy until they could all sit down and talk about it. Keep himself distracted from his stoma-

“Richie, man, I was wondering where you were. You never skip lunch.”

Alarm bells started going in his chest as Richie looked up from the book he was hardly managing to pay attention to to see one Joey Bombura crossing the room with a smile. They weren’t necessarily friends, but they’d always been friendly, willing to lend each other a hand if needed, and even as the school descended into werewolf paranoia the other boy had never been one of the ones eyeing him like he’d bite. Never worn silver (not even a little charm-)

“Hey Joey,” Richie said with a pasted on smile, resisting the urge to scratch the itch creeping up his spine. “Yeah, got a full day so, only time I’ve got for the library.” Joey nodded as he reached him, a wall of teen that would’ve felt like it was looming had he been anyone but himself (so much meat-), holding out his fist companionably.

“Do you need some company,” he asked as Richie mirrored the action, stomach roaring (meat-), hands itching (meat!)

His lunge stops short, jaw snapping shut over open air. Joey’s sudden grip on his shoulders is tight, sleeves catching under his claws as he tries to dig in, rip it away.

“Richie, Richie relax!” He strains harder against the hold, teeth yearning for a throat they can almost reach-

Joey walks backward, dragging him with him. His arms are locked, holding Richie at a constant distance as he checks the hall and pulls him into it. This doesn’t stop Richie’s struggles, snapping, snarling, clawing and kicking at him in an attempt to get close enough to bite, kill, eat, he’s so hungry- The third door down the hall is nudged open, and Richie unceremoniously tossed inside. He goes to spin around, lunge again as the door slams shut

Something squeals.

Like a switch Richie turns towards the back of the room, sniffing for the source of the sound. A big glass tank, a fuzzy little thing running in circles, terrified by the sudden appearance of a new predator in its vicinity. His chase instinct kicks in.

In a flash his head is in the tank, snapping once as the critter bolts away. There’s not enough space to avoid him though, not when he has two hands to snatch and teeth to snap. Quickly it’s crunching in his jaw. Hot blood, soft flesh, crunchy bone. He doesn’t normally eat all of his prey but he’s been so hungry for so long and soon his hands are empty, his stomach beginning to settle as he licks them clean-

“Richie? That better?” He froze, every muscle going tense as Joey’s hand fell onto his shoulder and his human mind clicked back into place.

He just ate Mr. Thornton’s guinea pig. In front of Joey.

He just tried to eat Joey.

“Oh god,” Richie groaned, pulling away and sinking against the back cabinets, guts twisting as he hit the floor. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean- I wouldn’t- I’m so sorry!”

“Hey, hey, it’s okay,” Joey said, still smiling as he knelt beside to him. “No harm, no foul.”

“I tried to eat you!”

“But you didn’t.”

“Because you shoved me at a guinea pig!”

“And I’d do it again.” Looking at him, Richie could only stare. Clearly being cute, strong, and personable was all that was keeping this boy alive, because he apparently had no survival instinct. “Are you still hungry? They’ve got those riblet sandwiches in the lunchroom today.”

“No, thanks,” he forced out, thumping his head against the cabinet behind him, willing away claws and teeth with effort. His heart and gut couldn’t take it. Not after everything, and now a guinea pig. Nearly a classmate! Joey nodded calmly.

“Okay.”

*~*

There were only so many things you could hide from your team. Or, more to say, only so many things you could keep quiet about. So long you could keep you’re here-to-fore unproven theories to yourself. Especially when they already had gotten up your butt more than once about not talking to them about shit you were dealing with. He’d been pushing that line for days.

So, that afternoon, when the team met up pre-patrol, Richie flopped down on the couch with a tight smile and confessed.

“I almost ate Joey Bombura today.”

The rest of the team froze, turning towards him slowly.

“Say that again, Rich? I seem to have gone deaf.”

“I almost ate Joey, at lunch today. He came looking for me when I didn’t show up to eat and…”

“Does he know you almost ate him,” Sharon asked, with the sensibility and foresight that came with being the only adult in the building. He nodded slowly.

“It… it was really, really obvious.” Surely straight up admitting to trying to rip a guy’s throat out with his teeth wasn’t necessary, they wouldn’t make him do that. “He’s not hurt.” They also surely wouldn’t make him admit to eating Mindy. Mr. Thornton’s afternoon classes had all been cancelled after he found his beloved class pet nothing but a small puddle of blood-soaked bedding, and even thinking of his reaction was like a spike through the heart.

“Ah.” Daisy collapsed beside him, staring straight ahead. “So, he knows the werewolf thing for sure now.”

“Yeah,” Richie said. “I think he’s cool though. Literally said ‘no harm no foul’ once I came back to my senses.”

“I knew there was a reason I voted for him,” Frieda said, plopping down on his other side. “Is there a particular reason you tried to eat him? Normally you’re very… Puppy.” Chewing his lip, he glanced around at everyone, watching him with concern and curiosity.

“I was hungry,” he settled on. “I was so hungry and he was just, so much meat in one spot and unprotected.” Besides his own strength which, thank god for that. The others glanced between themselves guiltily, which did nothing for his own regret.

“So, avoiding meat has been a bad thing for you then,” Frieda said more than asked, and Richie cringed. Logically he’d known they had to have noticed his change in diet, but nobody had said anything and he’d let himself hope- Hope that he wouldn’t cause them any more worry than he normally did. (Bad boy-)

“We should’ve known,” Virgil muttered. “He’s a fucking werewolf, of course he needs to be eating meat!” He collapsed into one of the other chairs with a huff and a guilty frown, Daisy leaning over to pat his good arm.

“Okay, yeah, we probably should’ve accepted it was a problem, but nobody is hurt and we can handle it now.” She turned her attention back Richie’s way. “Why haven’t you been eating meat, if you need it?”

The room went quiet. There were a million things Richie could’ve said. He could’ve lied. He could’ve told them everything. He could’ve downplayed things. He could’ve dropped a flashbang, jumped over Frieda, and booked it home never to bring this up again. It took what felt like forever for him to make a decision that didn’t pull at the dark spots in his brain too much.

“You,” he finally said, “try eating fourteen people and see how looking at a hamburger makes you feel for the next few weeks.”

“That,” Sharon said, kneeling down and putting a hand on his knee as the others looked anywhere but at him, “is perfectly understandable. It was a bad experience for all of us and you were the one right in the middle. But, if going without is going to mess with your control like this, we’re going to have to figure out a way to get you passed it.”

Richie nodded slowly. He knew that, he really did. But that didn’t make it better. Didn’t make the smell of meat excite and disgust him any less, or the taste bring back any better memories. Maybe, he could just let the change take over for a bit? He’d eaten the guinea pig fine (meat-) But then could he trust, in that state, that he wouldn’t try to eat a person again? That wasn’t a chance he wanted to take.

“I think, first of all, we should probably take him off patrol,” Frieda said, looking his way. “No offense, but, I think all five of us would feel better if you weren’t getting riled up right now.”

“No, no, I get it.” He nodded, a little relieved somebody else had brought up the option. “I totally understand.”

“So, we try to get him eating meat again,” Virgil said, “and you girls handle things on your own in the meanwhile. That’s totally doable.”

“And, we make sure he’s not going around alone anymore,” Daisy added. “I’m glad Joey’s okay, but someone else might not be so lucky.”

“I’ll have a talk with your mom,” Sharon said, “maybe she can figure out some ways to sneak meat into your diet without setting off your trauma.” Fuck, she was right but hearing it called that burned. “Meanwhile, you and I can see if we can talk you through this. Set up some meetings when we’ve got time. Okay?” Still, Richie nodded again, making himself smile wider. Anything to not hurt anybody again.

“Okay. Thanks, guys.”

“It’s what friends are for.”

*** ***

The fucking wind had changed. At the last minute, just as Armel’d lined up his shot, the goddamn wind had shifted right around and left him upwind. He’d still tried to take the shot, of course, but the wolf had known he was there and bolted as soon as they glimpsed the flash of metal. The bullet hadn’t even lodged, going through the back of a leg and winding up embedded in the wall of the building behind them, and there’d been no chance he was going to catch up with them, even with the injury.

He'd hoped for another chance, but some moron had found and moved them to a hospital, and the reward wasn’t worth the risk of having to fight through a bunch of innocent, idiot civilians.

So, he’d been forced to move on to the other lot. Taken a few days to scope out the home of that potential adolescent, look at the neighborhood. He was pretty sure he had a pack going there. There was some wolf scent, and a look around the property when it was empty had found claw marks at the back of the foundation that lined up well with a digging wolf. It was a relief after the shitshow on the west end, to have this part come together so easily.

Now he just needed to find a good spot to lay some traps, where no kids or anything would run into them, and hopefully things would be golden.

*** ***

“Seriously, man, who designs these fitness tests? I’m a werewolf and those sprints left me out of breath.”

“You sure it’s not just that you still haven’t dropped that weight,” Virgil laughed, poking him in the little remaining pudge around his middle. Richie bit back the urge to playfully swat him with his own backpack.

“I’m still at over ten more pounds of muscle than you, Virg, I’m allowed some fat!”

Idly, he wondered if he’d have kept more of the fat on if he’d kept up eating meat or if the amount of cheese and eggs he’d tried to replace the protein with should’ve managed that on its own. He’d have asked in their health class but, it was only two days after the great guinea pig ‘vanishing’ (meat, meat-) and he wasn’t ready to look Mr. Thornton in the eye like that.

He was still avoiding the lunchroom, the brief taste of meat having seemingly put a sharp edge on his cravings. Instead, he was continuing to spend lunch in the library, and the rest of his team had begun skipping as well in solidarity and to make sure nobody got eaten. Joey had been joining them, had even brought an extra hamburger (meat-) the day before in an attempt to keep Richie fed, though he’d come empty handed that day, after being told having meat there might do more harm than good. He’d even offered to fill the role of walking him home once they, giving in to the fact that he was already in on the werewolf thing, gave him a brief- heroless- run down on the situation, but been politely informed the position was filled.

The fact it was filled by Virgil was a point of contention. Not with Joey, he was cool, but Sharon’s big sister instincts were screaming at her. After all, while Virgil was pack, and just as powerful as the rest of them, he was also the most grievously injured. Concussions could take a while to heal, yes, but broken bones took longer. Sharon had insisted that this meant he was in greater danger if Richie got desperate enough to forget he was pack, Virgil had been indignant about the idea that he couldn’t protect himself from his bestfriend, there’d been furious debate over whether Richie even could get that desperate without outside influence- In the end everyone had been forced to agree that, since they were the two currently not doing the hero thing, it was the most convenient option, and the risk to Virgil himself was low, so Sharon was outvoted.

“If you’re not careful, Rich, you’re gonna start looking like your dad, and how are you gonna find a man then?” Oh, were it not for those busted ribs (meat-)

“I’ll have you know there are plenty of guys out there-” He paused for a moment on the sidewalk as a sharp, metallic scent hit his nose (meat, meat, meat-) then shook his head clear. “There are plenty of guys who are into fat dudes.” Virgil stopped short when he did, worry creasing his face and lips twisting down.

“You okay?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Richie said, waving the matter off as best he could with his hands full. “Somebody got back from the butcher or something” (meat, meat, meat, meat-) “I’m, I’m fine.” For obvious reasons, Virgil didn’t look convinced.

“Come on, let’s get your butt home.”

Richie didn’t know that he was convinced either, especially as they started back off, at double the pace, and the scent only got stronger (meat, meat, meat-). Enough to set him itching, shifting their backpacks in an attempt to scratch. No dice. The closer they got to home the stronger the scent was- red meat, bloody, dog, it shouldn’t have smelled so appetizing it was dog (meat, meat, meat, meat, meat-) and the fiercer the itching. He picked up speed again, Virgil jumping to keep pace, as he tried and failed to force the transformation back, clothes shortening, teeth shifting, pants too tight

“Richie? Come on, just a one more block, we can play videogames or fetch or something, you just have to-” Their backpacks hit the ground and he’s running.

It feels so good to run in the open air after those days locked up. To stretch his legs and howl to the bright, blue sky. Bone-aching hunger is all that keeps him from running laps around the neighborhood, the bright metal scent of blood and flesh calling like a siren’s song, over fences and through yards. Even the wind’s shifting back and forth can’t deter him, too late and slow to hide his heading. The call brings him to an empty house, one of the hundreds of abandoned buildings that litter every inch of his city, the doors and windows open wide.

He beelines for the meat, a pile of furry pieces sitting in the kitchen, up against the oven, and skids to a halt in front of it, horking down great mouthfuls before he’s even stopped moving. Not the most marvelous thing he’s eaten, that’s the little squeaker that’d come after weeks of all-but nothing, but certainly the next best thing. Warm meat, soft and bloody, the itch of fur a pleasant addition, sliding down his gullet in big chunks. This, this is what he’s been needing all this time, why had he ever stopped

A chunk of silver lodges in his throat.

*~*

It always took a little while to group up for patrol. The entire team had different things they had to deal with after school or work, and so generally never ended up going directly to the Abandoned Gas Station of Solitude (and now that they had it to themselves for the next while the girls were considering changing the name while they couldn’t be outvoted under ‘we were here first’ law). But they did generally end up getting there at about the same time, more often than not walking in as a single unit.

Meaning every active member was there at once to find their current least favorite hero standing ominously in a corner.

They all tensed.

“Batman,” Sharon led, as the eldest, “what brings you here?”

“I’ve been trying to get in contact with you,” he said.

“Really? Nothing’s come through on our end,” Frieda lied through her teeth.

“Maybe the communicators aren’t working,” Daisy offered. “I mean Static’s all electricity all the time, he might have shorted them.”

“Maybe.”

“This is important,” he cut in firmly, eyes narrowed at them.

“Important enough to catch us out of costume,” Sharon countered. She was fairly certain there was some sort of code about respecting secret identities. But then, this was Batman, he’d probably known who they all were before even meeting them.

“I’ve been maintaining surveillance around the Foley home,” he said like all three of them weren’t going to immediately have their hackles raised to the ceiling.

“Hold on,” Daisy said, “you’ve been spying on one of our team?!”

“Only outdoor cameras, nothing in the home,” he said. It didn’t make it better, but he continued before any of them could say anything. “I noticed this.” He pulled out a picture and held it out for them. Frieda caught it in a gust of wind to bring closer- it showed an old brown van, nondescript, uninteresting.

“Okay, and...” she asked.

“That van was stopped on their block four days in a row. Always on a different street. During this time, a man inspected the property while Mrs. Foley was out. Prior to this the van came up on multiple cameras in the Dockside District.” Where those puddles of dog blood had been found. And, fuck, hadn’t that one wolfy Bang Baby gotten shot out there…? “I’ve checked across the city and there’s no sign of it in Dakota prior to the last full moon.”

Sharon could all but hear pieces clicking into place for the girls, same as they did for her, and for a moment she couldn’t breathe.

“Someone’s hunting werewolves,” she said faintly. Batman nodded.

“I think so.” He didn’t even finish the words before Sharon had her shock vox out, putting out a call. She couldn’t let the boys run around not knowing this. Fuck, they’d had enough going on- picking up Virgil’s slack, poking at leads for fixing Richie, figuring out what was wrong with Richie now- they’d never given the mess out there a second thought, considered that it might be a werewolf thing, or that whoever was behind it might gun for Richie…

“Virgil,” she started as soon as he picked up, but got no further.

“Richie got a scent! He bolted!”

Fuck.

“Find him, now! We’ll be right there!”

*~*

Shoving his shock vox back his pocket, Virgil flew as fast as he could in the direction Richie had run, cursing his broken arm. Getting the Static Saucer out of his bag with one hand was more difficult than he’d like at the best of times, and Richie was fast enough like this that he was left to scan from the air for signs of his passage. Torn up yards, scratched up fences, a swing set still going. Thankfully Richie had never been a wolf to hide his tracks, and it wasn’t difficult to trail him to an old house, the door wide open.

Virgil nearly fell off the saucer in his haste when he flew low to investigate only to hear banging and gurgling whines.

“Richie!” He didn’t even think to be wary as he charged inside, nearly tripping over his own feet. Something was clearly wrong, and once again they were not losing him!

Though it may have been a near thing.

Following the noise led him directly to the home’s kitchen and far more blood than he ever would have liked. There was a pile of raw meat on the floor, but more pressing was Richie, thrashing about, whining and hacking. Blood poured from his mouth as he strained, fighting, against a chain running from the oven into his throat. For a good three seconds Virgil’s heart didn’t beat.

“Richie,” he cried, running to his side and trying to get a hand on him as he rolled and clawed. “It’s gonna be okay, man, it’s gonna be fine! Just gotta be a good boy and calm down for me-” The whine that came out of him, bloody and agonized, tore right through Virgil’s heart. “-come on, just a bit so I can help, please.”

No dice. Richie was very clearly in pain and panicking, neither of which Virgil could blame him for. Instead he turned his attention to the chain, wrapping his good hand around it and trying to yank it free. If he got lucky, then working together they could do it and then Richie would calm down. But this clearly wasn’t his day. The whole thing was slick with blood, both Richie’s and whatever poor animal had been dismembered for the trap, and he couldn’t get a grip.

Virgil threw out every curse he could think of as he gave up. He might have to wait for the girls, if Richie lasted that long.

“Fucking finally!” Spinning in place, Virgil saw a large man stood outside the open window.

“Who are you,” he demanded as the pit of his stomach fell out. Wasn’t hard to guess that this was the work of some sort of hunter, but the seeming confirmation, and that they were right there, certainly did nothing to help anything.

“Was beginning to think this city would fuck me over completely,” the man muttered, ignoring him completely in favor of eying Richie. “Rangy thing, but the pelt’s pretty enough.” Lips pulling back in a deep scowl, Virgil surged to his feet, sparking heavily as he sidestepped a thrash from poor Richie.

“The pelt’s off limits,” he said, forcing himself not to growl it even as the image of Richie’s skinned hide hanging on somebody’s wall sank itself into his brain. Finally, the man looked at him, eyeing him up with an unimpressed frown.

“Of course you’re a fucking Bang Baby,” he said, shaking his head, “because a ‘good samaritan’ civilian wouldn’t be annoying enough to deal with… Whole city’s fucking infested, swear to god…” As he grumbled, he took a few steps back, raising a rifle Virgil hadn’t seen.

Practice as a hero had Virgil acting before his brain fully processed the weapon, letting off a blast of electricity that shattered the window and sent the hunter diving to the side and out of sight. A string of annoyed curses came through on the breeze, fading quickly as the man seemingly ran off, though who knew for how long. Virgil’s first instinct was to go out after him, but another, weaker whine pulled him back to the whole of the situation. The idea of leaving Richie bleeding out alone wasn’t one he could entertain, not for a minute, especially not now.

But there was a man with a gun outside looking to kill them, and he had to do something. Glancing frantically about for something, anything he could use, Virgil found himself putting his powers to use moving the fridge in front of the broken window, and a busted old dish cabinet in front of one of the two passages into the room. That left only one weak point in his patchwork defense, and he made sure to face it as he dropped to his knees beside Richie again.

“Come on, Rich, work with me, I know it hurts but you need to let me help.” His thrashing was weaker as he wore himself out and lost more blood, and with every heartbeat Virgil’s worry heightened, that it may be too late before he could get Richie still enough to find and fix the problem.

A crash rang outside that certainly didn’t help matters, not when he didn’t know who or what he was dealing with, or if the man had back-up, what he was doing out there-

“Virgil?! Richie?!” At no point in his life had he ever been so happy to hear his sister yelling, or the thump of shoes on carpet.

“In here!” Sharon rounded the turn to the kitchen fast enough to overshoot the entrance and have to readjust. “I can’t get him still!” Immediately she nodded and took the cue, using her powers to hold Richie firmly to the floor. It didn’t do anything about the heart wrenching whines, but with the thrashing stopped wholesale they had a proper chance to work.

“We’ve got a hunter gearing up out there, Batman and the girls are handling him,” she said as she dropped down at Richie’s other side and, seeing the chain, wrenched his mouth open. The name ‘Batman’ raised Virgil’s hackles, but he had bigger things to worry about right now than what the man would say or do. Without an ounce of hesitation he shoved his hand into Richie’s mouth, feeling down the chain into his throat, muttering ‘good boy’s all the while. Something was down there, angular and sharp inside a tattered piece of meat, and he set immediately to carefully easing it free and out.

He didn’t even look at it, tossing it aside carelessly in favor of pulling Richie’s head into his lap.

“There we go, you’re gonna be okay now, the nasty thing’s gone,” he said, breaths coming heavy and heart going a mile a minute at the close call. Richie continued to whine, but his tail faintly wagged as Sharon stuck her hand into a hole in what had once been his clothes and gave him a good belly rub.

“You were a very good boy there,” she said, “very good. But you can’t keep running off like this, or I’ll be grey by thirty.”

“We both will,” Virgil managed.

“Oh, thank god.” With a brush of fresh air Frieda and Daisy slid into the kitchen, quickly joining them on the floor, burying their hands in Richie’s fur as his tail managed to wag harder. There was no way Virgil could’ve felt more safe and secure in the circumstance. But even that couldn’t stop him tensing when Batman followed only a few minutes behind them.

The older hero gave them as wide a berth as he could as he passed, heading for the trap. Finally, Virgil looked at it, ire rising in his chest at the jagged, z-shaped hunk of metal Batman hefted in his hand. That had been stuck in Richie’s throat, purposefully baited to be swallowed. Clearly Batman found it as inhumane as he did, scowling harder than any of them had ever seen as he turned it over and, inspection done, dropped it to clatter unceremoniously back onto the floor. Only then did he turn his attention to the team, standing, wiping his hand clean on his pants, and taking the few steps to join them. Virgil resisted the urge to spark as he knelt down beside him, eyes on Richie.

His brother whined.

Batman put a hand between his ears. Gave a little scritch.

“Don’t worry, with what was in his van, that man will be in prison for a very long time, I promise you.”

*~*

“Okay,” Sharon said as she finally joined the rest of the team in Richie’s room, taking charge of his desk chair after a quick visual confirmation that between the teens and BackPack there wasn’t space to collapse on the bed anymore, “I think your parents and I have managed to talk Batman around. Or at least convince him you’re not normally dangerous.”

“So, silver lining, seeing somebody try to hunt him and another mostly-innocent wolf for profit got him off our backs,” Virgil asked, good arm still right where it’d been around Richie’s shoulder when they’d first gotten to the house.

“Oh no, he’s still annoyed at the rest of us for ‘being reckless with civilian safety’,” Sharon explained with a sigh, “and intends to have a talk with us at some point, but he seems to have accepted that Richie being dangerous is abnormal. I had to give him a full rundown on how we were managing your presumed allergy and the current situation but, I think we’ve managed.”

“Hold on,” Frieda said, “‘the current situation’, tell me you didn’t tell him Richie nearly ate somebody. He’s already spying on him!”

“Wait, what?!” Richie sat up straighter, voice still slightly raspy and eyes going wide as his grip on BackPack tightened.

“Relax, man,” Virgil said, pulling him back down, “now we know we can find and fry his cameras, we’ll make a day of it.” Frowning heavily, Richie made himself relax.

“I’m scavenging at least two for parts.”

“We expect no less.”

“I kind of had to,” Sharon admitted. “It’s not like a lack of transparency’s done us any good in the past. I think he’s probably going to go talk to you guys’ friend before he makes a final decision though.”

“Joey?” Richie’s expression shifted to something more curious, then he nodded. “I’m good with that, actually.”

“Yeah, it’s not like he’s going to throw Richie under the bus,” Daisy said. “He’s too nice for that.”

“That’s good to hear.” As she said it a visible weight shifted off Sharon’s shoulders. “When I came up here Batman was talking about helping your parents get some recipes together so they could sneak meat back into your diet, so, fingers crossed. I think your mom might lock you in the basement again at this rate, though. Says these past two months have taken a decade off her life.” The others sighed, shaking their heads. Richie patted BackPack as the machine whirred at him.

“You know, after today,” he said, “I’m almost willing to go along with it.” Huffing a little laugh, Daisy clapped a hand on his shoulder.

“You say that- I’m pretty sure by the time this next moon’s done you’d be howling a different tune.” He huffed one of his own, giving the rest of the team a small smile.

“That depends, how do you guys feel about taking a few nights off?”

#fanfic #commissions #commissionwork #static shock #i think the formatting issues are fixed if not i did what i could

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