The day was abnormally cold even though it was the middle of December. Citizens bundled themselves in multiple layers and large coats, then made their way to school or work or wherever else they needed to be for the day. Children hoped for a snow day out of school, with no positive results. It was dry cold, and the sun shone as if it were there to provide any warmth at all (which it wasn't.)


Alexa awoke to the sound of her phone's alarm. The thought of having to crawl out of her warm and snug bed on such a dreadfully cold morning depressed her, to say the least. It crossed her mind that she could just stay home today, feign sickness. That way she wouldn't have to go. Still, school was inevitable, no matter how unappealing. So she dragged herself out from underneath the comfort of her thick blanket and sat on the floor in front of her bed for several moments before picking herself up. She stretched. She yawned. She dressed. Then, she headed downstairs.

Of course, her brother wasn't out of bed yet. It took him two minutes to throw himself together, and he didn't much care if he looked disheveled or not. However, her mother was sitting on the living couch watching the morning news.

"Good morning, mom," Alexa greeted her.

"Good morning," her mother grunted back, never a morning person.

Breakfast consisted of a piece of peanut butter toast and coffee loaded with cream and sugar. That was the way Alexa liked it.



Alex's eyes opened only when he heard constant banging on his bedroom door, which he always kept locked for a reason. Unknowingly, he groaned loudly and turned over, pulling the covers over his head.

"Alex," came his father's voice. "You need to get up or Alexa's going to leave you."

"I'm up," Alex lied, voice groggy and weak.

It took him at least five more minutes to bring himself to get out of bed. Monday mornings were the worst. Except it was Thursday. Same difference to him. He'd stayed up until two in the morning playing a hot new first person shooter game online. Now, he was kind of regretting it. Kind of.

As always, he threw on the first shirt in his closet and a pair of jeans. No matter what he wore, he always found himself to be very attractive. Whether other people did or not wasn't much of a problem, unless it was a female he was trying to impress.

Downstairs, Alexa was waiting by the door with her school bag thrown over her shoulder. His mother had already left for work - she was a nurse - and his father was sitting at the kitchen table eating from a plate of scrambled eggs. Alex nodded sleepily at him, muttered a good morning, and grabbed his school bag from beside the couch.

"See you later," Alex called to his father.

"Bye, dad," Alexa chirped.

The two teenagers headed out the front door to their shared car.

The blaring sound of his mothers alarm drifted down the hall of the families two bedroom house and alerted Copper of the time, 4:30. Mothers were busy people. He stayed on the couch under the two spare blankets left in the house and stained from coffee that nobody from his family had drank. He wished to hide beneath the mounds of fur that were sometimes his, to keep the cold at bay but his mom was never happy to see him like that and so for her sake at 4:30 in the 50 degrees Fahrenheit house he stayed in his skin.

His mother scuffled down the hallway and the shower began, a small hiss filling the silent house for a short few minuets,telling Copper it must be cold. Then she came down the hall and into the kitchen, riffling through the pantry for something quick. A wrapper sound meant that she found something and now she would leave to clean everyone else's home and watch other parents' children. She was like a breeze, coming and going in a short blast of 10 minuets, every morning, at 4:30.

His brothers followed shortly after, though much louder and less structured than their mother. Both Thompson and Willbert had jobs as they were 21 and 19 respectively. Neither of them had gone to college, it was doubtful hat Copper would either. Every day they left in a rush. Their jobs paid for the house and utilities and so off to work they went before 5 in the morning.

After they left Copper got to his mourning routine of staring at the ceiling until boredom could lure him out of bed. Today the cold sunk between the covers and kicked him out and up, quickly dressing in several sweaters. Then he sat on his mothers bed starring at the clock until it got to 5:30 when he'd need to get ready for school. By 6 he'd be out the door, walking the near mile towards his junior year at high school.

"Now, dear, is this really necessary? You'll be late for work if you keep this up."

"Rrrmmph," came the low growl of the Iberian wolf, who had responded to his mother's entrance by curling up tighter on the bedsheets. They were always messed up and nobody knew how it happened, not even Clay, whose fluffy body was partially covered by blanket right now. It was fairly clear that he was not a morning person.

She scratched him behind the ear, which he hated because he loved it. His tail thumped involuntarily in approval. His parents had adapted well to raising what had suddenly become a werewolf without any explanation. He was grateful, but not willing to show it, at least not right now. "Hhhrrrgh," he sighed, and put his head on his paws.

"I have to go. I made you a pot of coffee. And young man, if you're late for work because you were a lazy bones you'll be in big trouble!" The warning didn't carry much weight. No matter how strict his mother tried to come off as, she was simply too gentle a person to follow through on things like punishments. It even showed in her voice, which she kept lowered for some unknown reason. Clay flicked an ear in acknowledgement as the plump woman left the room and closed the door.

With one more sigh, Clay gave a mighty stretch and changed to his human form. It was clearly inferior in terms of temperature control, but unfortunately it was necessary for things like putting clothes on, which was legally required if he wanted to earn some money. He pulled on his clothes in a sort of groggy stupor and went blearily out to the kitchen with a pout on his face. He'd asked multiple times for different hours. Everyone had assumed he was exaggerating about how much he disliked mornings. He poured a mug of black coffee and downed it rapidly, checked his watch and nearly choked. "Shit!"

He started his work day by rushing out the door, tripping over his own feet, and starting the car in a wild hurry. His mom wasn't kidding. He had three minutes to get to work.

Luckily, Clay had a habit of speeding without getting caught. He revved his engine and muttered, "Bring it on, Father Time."

"Really mother?! Seven years and you still act like I'm freaking the devil himself or something. SEVEN mom!" What a perfect way to start out the morning, a nice lovely argument with her parents. She had been watching the morning news, waking up before everyone else in the house. Then again, as she was a only child, that was not a hard thing to do for Raven. It still aggravated her that her mother and father treated her the way that they did, seeing as she could not help what happened to her body and the shift had most likely been something wrong with the genes on their end, but, whatever. Grabbing her book bag on the way out of the house and slamming the door behind her, the girl would be dressed in one of her favorite outfits. Her destination was the café where she worked as a waitress right down street.

Taking a deep breath, the girl would start her journey down the sidewalk.

A typically shady-looking man carrying a plain black backpack approached a girl that he'd been secretly tracking for quite a while now. She was called Aibhlinn, an unusual but oddly captivating name. Though the man was certain that she had siblings, he was not sure if they could transform. He knew of her own abilities, which was one of the reasons why he had been stalking - er, tracking her. In no form did he consider it stalking, exactly, because that would mean she'd have to be a normal human. She wasn't. This was his reasoning. She wasn't human. She was a creature. Therefore, she could be captured and manipulated with no damage to his moral conscience.

As he approached the girl, he noticed her fiddling with a sketchpad with earphones plugged into her ears. He plopped down on the bench beside her and leaned eerily close to her, looking at the paper she was drawing on.

"What'cha drawing there?" he asked. His voice was like smooth velvet with a deep, rumbling tone. Nothing like the usual "creep" voice.



"One more year," Alexa chirped as they pulled into the high school parking lot. "One more year and we'll be graduated. It's amazing to think about how we've lived such a normal life, you know, considering."

She looked over at her brother with a small smile, and he nodded his head sleepily.

"Yeah," he said. "I was almost certain we'd be bullied because of a spontaneous change we had. Or that, at least, mom and dad would find out by now."

"We'll have to tell them eventually," Alexa mused. "It's just, I've never heard them talk about it or anything, so I don't know their whole standing on the topic." She put a finger to her chin and rolled her eyes upward, looking at the ceiling of the vehicle. "I mean, I guess they wouldn't mind too much. It's not like we're monsters, or ravenous murderers or something, you know?"

"Yeah, well," was all Alex said as he grabbed his bag and hopped out of the car. Alexa sat in a bit of a stunned silence, watching him walk to the entrance of the school. He normally wasn't so crabby, even in the mornings. And that one little remark had been like a slap in the face.

She blew out an agitated breath, blowing her hair out of her face, then exited the car as well. She'd made sure to lock it before she walked away. As she headed up the front steps, she looked over and saw a very creepy looking man leaning over a girl that she wasn't familiar with, but had at least one class with before. Every part of her being screamed, "Stranger danger!"

Then, she had an inner fight with herself. Go over there and show the man that the girl wasn't alone, but risk being dragged into whatever he might be planning? Or simply go inside and be safe, and risk something bad happening to a classmate and potential friend?

Sighing, Alexa descended the steps again. The more caring and courageous side of her had gotten the best of her actions once again. She put on her "fearless" face and walked up to the girl. She tried to recall her name, but couldn't, and instead made one up and hoped the girl went along with it.

"Hey Abby," she said, knowing that the girl's name was something to that effect.



Alex left his sister sitting in the car by herself. He hadn't really meant to be so harsh, but he was in an awful mood this morning with no explanation.

It must be hormones, he thought. After all, he was a growing teenage boy with plenty of reason to have angst, angst, angst.

At this thought, his face sunk and his expression turned grim and irritated. It drew some odd looks from classmates in the hallways, because they were used to him being such a happy-go-lucky person. He shrugged it off and went to his locker, pulling the metal door open after utilizing the combination lock. It frustrated him further to think about the time he just wasted, because he realized he didn't need anything out of his locker. Slamming the door shut, he stormed off to his first class and sat himself in his assigned desk.

"What's gotten into you?" his friend, Aven, asked.

"I don't know," he answered truthfully through clenched teeth.

Aven's eyebrows rose in concern, but he didn't press the subject. For that, Alex was thankful. He put his head down in his arms and closed his eyes, letting himself drift off into just one more minute of sleep before the school day officially started.

Copper soon found his way to school though the cold wind deterred him and called him away to his other body and the woods. Skipping school would not be the worst thing to do and today would not be the first time he'd done it. On the other hand it would still be cold, even with a fur pelt and he had several tests in different classes that missing just wouldn't be smart. So on he trudged, at least it would be heated inside of the school.

The front steps held their usual amount of people; creeps, jocks, goths, cute people who he'd love to be friends with but isn't that brave so he just steals glances of. The usual. he tripped going up the first step, it was icy and he wasn't paying the most attention to where he was going. Now his hands were scuffed and bleeding and a few papers were flying off and maybe he should have skipped any way, it wouldn't have been that bad. Instead he picked himself up, and then the few papers that got away, and more carefully made his was into the yellow-brick building that was apparently red. and to his class where he could read before school began.

Today he took a detour to wash his bloodied hands in the bathroom and by the library to get a new book but other than that it was the same routine. The same homeroom, and the same loneliness that had followed him since the first grade.

"God damn everything," muttered Clay just after cutting someone off to get into his turn lane. It was just starting to look like he'd be on time for work with about thirty seconds to spare, when some idiot came out of the parking lot without paying attention and crashed right into the front of his car. He had no time to think or say anything but a surprised yelp before his vision went dark.

When he woke up, everything was a jumbled mess. There were police lights approaching the scene. There was broken glass all around him, and a few small droplets of blood scattered on his lap. There was a voice outside his window.

"Dude, are you awake? Holy shit! I'm so sorry! I was–– I mean–– I didn't mean to––"

No shit he didn't mean to. Clay had never seen the guy before in his life. His response was a sullen glare and a soft growl, which didn't do much to shut him up. It at least provided the comfort that he hadn't been sitting in the driver's seat with a shard of glass in his larynx. He tried to open the door, but it wouldn't budge. He muttered an obscenity that would make a sailor's skin crawl, and hauled himself out of the "open" window.