Sloth: well, I usually wait a week or so before posting another chapter but after getting the latest chapter done, I couldn't help it. Things are going great. I would also like to thank the many people who favorited the story and put it on alert.

I would also like to throw out thanks yous to CommentsGalore7777, mFabulous15, and TeamEthanMorgan for their wonderful reviews!

AU Information: Ethan didn't get bitten by Jesse, having been saved by Benny. Benny distrusts Sarah because of the incident. Also, Blue Moon never happened.

Chapter Summery: After being mauled by a dog, Ethan begins to act strange. Now that he's woken up, he's acting weirder than Rory. when he catches the eye of a strange guy, what's going to happen next?

Smells Like Trouble

Benny woke with a start when he felt something poke him. Blinking his eyes, he scanned the room. Sarah was using the coffee table as a pillow, sleeping in an uncomfortable position. He turned to the couch, only to find his best friend missing. He sat up alert, his "protect Ethan" alarm going crazy.

"Boo!"

"Gah!" Benny jumped out of his seat, twirling around to find the source of the noise. At first, he thought Rory had somehow gotten into his house. Rory would be the only one to find pleasure in scaring the living daylight out of him. Or anyone for that matter. However, much to his surprise, Benny didn't find Rory laughing like a maniac. Instead, he found Ethan, holding his sides and leaning on Benny's chair as if he'd fall to the floor from laughing.

"Ethan?"

"Oh man Benny, you should have seen the look on your face," Ethan laughed, laughing harder at the confused look on Benny's face. It was kind of ironic really. Benny had always remembered waking up Ethan with crude methods, like a bucket of water or shaving cream on his face, and then laughing about it. However, in all the years he'd known Ethan, the other boy had been too shy to cause his own little problems.

"You're looking a lot better," Benny noted. And Ethan did. His skin had returned to its usual healthy tone, his hair looked neat and combed instead of messy and matted with sweat, he was standing taller with his back straight, and he just seemed more…perky. Benny was starting to wonder if Ethan had woken up earlier and found his sugar stash.

"Oh yeah, way better. Whatever you guys were feeding me really did the trick," Ethan said, absentmindedly scratching at his bandaged arm. Benny looked down at the bandages and noticed the lack of blood. He was sure the last time he saw Ethan, the bandages were still bleeding. Perhaps his grandmother changed them in the middle of the night.

"How's your arm?"

"Hmm? Oh, yeah it's fine. Hey, check this out."

Ethan walked around Benny and tip-toed toward Sarah. She hadn't woken up during the duo's exchange, which was a surprise considering she had supersonic hearing. Ethan leaned down, resting his elbows on the table and placed his chin on the palms of his hand. At first, Benny thought Ethan was just staring at Sarah and couldn't help the smirk on his face. As much as he disliked Sarah, Benny found Ethan's little admiration of his babysitter quite amusing. Ethan was like a little love sick puppy who-

"SARAH, WAKE UP!"

Benny jumped at the same time Sarah bolted awake, covering her ears from the obviously echoing sounds of Ethan's "wake-up call". He actually kind of felt bad for the vampire. Even with his normal hearing, Benny was pretty rattled by the abnormally loud scream. He did not want to know what it was like to be a vampire on the receiving end of that one. Ethan on the other hand, from what Benny could tell, was actually enjoying himself. The boy was actually on the floor laughing as if he'd just pulled off the ultimate prank. It was kind of obnoxious really. And Benny would know obnoxious.

"Oh man that was awesome," Ethan laughed.

"Ethan? Are you insane? Why did you just do that?" Sarah demanded. It then occurred to her that he charge was awake. "Oh, you're okay. That still didn't give you the right to shout in my ear."

"I couldn't help it," Ethan shrugged, "you looked just so vulnerable."

Benny raised an eyebrow at Ethan's choice of words. The younger boy got up off the floor, wiping his pants.

"I'm hungry. You got anything to eat, Benny?" Ethan asked, walking towards the kitchen without even waiting for an answer. Sarah walked over to Benny's side, crossing her arms in her usual "this is a problem" pose.

"There aren't any side effects to that potion your grandmother made, are there?" she asked Benny, who secretly wondered the same thing.

"You trying to say my grandmother made a bad potion?"

Sarah glared at him and Benny returned the glare. He knew now wasn't the time to pick a fight, but he couldn't help it. Deciding fighting wouldn't do either of them any good, they heading towards the kitchen. By the time they got there, Ethan had already raided most of the pantries. Breads, jams, cookies, hams, cheeses, donuts holes, and more were all spread out across the table. Ethan was stuffing down anything and everything in sight. His cheeks puffed out and made him look like a skinny little squirrel. After washing down a peanut butter and jelly donut-hole sandwich with a can of Peppy Cola, Ethan let out a loud, echoing burp.

"Want some?" Ethan offered his two friends before stuffing a piece of sour dough bread into his mouth.

"Dude, I think you should slow down," Benny warned, "you might choke."

Ethan slowed his rabid eating and looked in the corner, pondering and deciding if he really should. He then stuffed three more donut holes into his mouth and smiled, his cheeks big and round like a squirrel's. What amazed Benny and Sarah was the fact that Ethan immediately swallowed everything whole without choking.

"Kind of reminds me of Rory when he's watching Scare Finder," Benny muttered. Sarah nodded her head in agreement. Rory was known to be an anxious eater and could stuff anything into his mouth. Although right now it looked like Ethan just beat the blonde's record.

"Ethan, are you sure you're okay?" Sarah asked. The smallest of the trio just gave her a confused look.

"Yeah I'm fine," he answered, "Actually, I feel amazing. Hey, who's up for laser tag?"

"Oh, me!"

"Benny!"

"What? He seems alright to me now," Benny justified. He might have been worried at first, but thanks to his ADHD, the prospect of laser tag with his best friend, who was obviously feeling better, was much more appealing than staying at home all weekend.

"Come on Sarah, you want to come to? We could get Rory and make teams."

"Uh, I don't know."

"Oh come on Sarah, for me?" Ethan pleaded, giving her a puppy dog look. Seeing that Ethan wanted Sarah to come with them, Benny mentally sighed and pulled out the good ol' Benny charmed.

"Yeah, please Sarah? For Ethan?"

"Fine, I'll go," she relented.

With a cheer, Ethan raced out of the kitchen, heading for the front door and leaving the giant mess he made behind. Benny called after Ethan and followed after the "scamp". It was then that Benny's grandma, dressed in a pink bathrobe, strolled into the kitchen waning. The minute she saw the mess, she gave Sarah a look.

"Uh…Bye!"

And Benny's grandma was left alone to clean up the mess.

….

…

..

The rest of Saturday went surprisingly better than Benny had expected. Which was pretty low considering the fact that Ethan was recovering from a rapid dog bite, Sarah was being her usual depressive self, and Rory was…well being Rory. As per Ethan's request, they went to pick up Rory, who was more than happy to spend the day doing something other whatever it was Rory did. They seriously didn't want to know what the "Vampire Ninja" did in his spare time.

They spent the good of the morning at Q-Z Laser Tag. At first, Benny had been focused on keeping an eye on Ethan, making sure the boy was indeed fine. However, after Rory vampire ninja'd him, Benny had a new goal in mind. And that involving blasting Rory with lasers until the blond couldn't move anymore. Well, figuratively speaking of course.

After their four hour laser tag game, they ate at the food court in the mall. Somehow, an eating competition started between Rory and Ethan and if Sarah hadn't stopped them after their fifth basket of chili cheese fries, one of them would have exploded. Granted Benny had to admit that he was surprised about how much Ethan and Rory could put away. They were a pair of skinny little kids and they each had five baskets each. Where did they put it all?

After lunch, Ethan practically dragged them to the bowling alley. It seemed like he wouldn't be satisfied until he had completely and utterly exhausted himself by doing everything there was to do in town. So there they were, Benny and Sarah sitting in the springy, creaky chairs while Ethan and Rory duked it out for "King of the Alley".

"Score!" Ethan cheered after he got another strike. Benny raised an eyebrow as his best friend did a little victory dance. It wasn't because of how inappropriate Ethan's victory dance was, but of how…obnoxious Ethan was starting to act. The smaller boy was starting to remind Benny of…well himself.

Sarah shuttered as he picked up on Benny's whispered musing. "Great, just what the world needed. Two Benny's."

"Must you eavesdrop on everything?" Benny growled as he turned in his seat, giving Sarah a glare.

"I can't help it. You don't whisper as quietly as you think."

Benny turned away from Sarah, but he kept his eyes on her. Now, it wasn't really like him to hold a grudge against someone, but Benny really cared about Ethan. Ethan didn't know it, but there had been times where he beat up a bully for Ethan. Of course he didn't tell Ethan. He knew how much his friend didn't like violence. Well, violence against other living human beings of course. Give him a water gun filled with holy water and a vampire and Ethan will paint the town red. So yeah, call him unfair for blaming Sarah for Ethan almost getting turned into a vampire, Benny was just watching out for his best friend.

At that moment, Rory walked over to them, taking his seat next to Sarah.

"Man, Ethan is a beast today," the blond commented. "How can anyone get five strikes in a row?"

"I don't know, but don't you find it kind of weird how Ethan's acting lately?" Sarah asked.

"Uh…not really. He's actually kind of better."

"Better?" Benny questioned.

"Yeah. I mean, don't get me wrong, Ethan's great, but I've never seen him have this much fun before. It's like, he's a totally different person."

"You guys talking about me?" Ethan asked as he plopped right next to Rory, a pretzel in his hands.

"Dude, where'd you get that pretzel?" Benny asked. Ethan just pointed to the group next to them, where a teenage girl was looking around for the missing pretzel. The threesome turned to Ethan, who was scarffing down the oven roasted bread.

"Ethan, you can't just go around taking people's food," Sarah scolded. The boy just gave her a look.

"Why not? It was right there. Besides, I wasted most of my money on those chili fries," he said in between bites. He finished off the pretzel and wiped his hands. "I'm going to go pee, be right back."

With a little jump to his steps, Ethan strolled to the restrooms, leaving his friends bewildered. There were a lot of things going through their separate minds. Rory was enjoying Ethan's new behavior. It was like someone turned on the fun switch in Ethan's head. Sarah on the other hand wasn't enjoying it as much as the blond. She found it disturbing and rude. As for Benny, he figured he needed to keep a better eye on the smaller boy. He had known Ethan long enough to know that this wasn't right.

He was about to get up and follow Ethan when Rory asked the strangest question.

"Does anyone else smell weird?"

Benny and Sarah both gave the blond matching looks. What on earth could have made him ask that?

….

…

..

As Ethan entered the restroom, he hummed a little tune. He didn't know why, but he just felt giddy. It was almost the same feeling he got when Benny put magic mushroom in his sandwich. The only difference of course was the fact that he was aware of everything and wasn't in the corner praying for the walls to stop melting. He wondered if maybe someone did put magic mushrooms in that stuff they were feeding him last night. It would explain his uncontrollable appetite.

Scratching at his bandage, Ethan finished his business and turned to wash his hands. As he turned, he felt himself colliding into a solid object. Backing up, he looked to see a taller male in his way. The male had shaggy brown hair and mischievous blue eyes. Ethan eyed the leather jacket the taller boy was wearing with some envy. He wondered what he'd look like with a jacket like that. He could see himself walking the halls of school, flashing his jacket and swooning all the girls.

"Sorry about that," the taller boy apologize, snapping Ethan out of his little fantasy. "Hey, you're that kid who took my girlfriend's pretzel."

Ethan felt his smile turned into a worried frown.

"Don't look so worried. I thought it was pretty cool how ya managed to sneak her pretzel without being caught. Ya got some skills man."

Ethan felt his cheeks burning. He didn't get comments from strangers that often. Hell, strangers normally just ignored him and went about their day, leaving the "geek" to his own accord.

"Uh thanks…uh…."

"Derek. Derek Tevinur," the taller, leather glad boy greeted. He extended a hand and Ethan shook it.

"Ethan Morgan."

"Nice to meet you, Ethan," Derek smiled. As they shook hands, Ethan took notice of the firm grip the taller boy hand. It was really tight. Like there was a vice on his hand. But as quick as the tightness was, it ended just as fast and the taller boy let go of Ethan's hand.

"Ya know, I see a lot of potential in ya."

"Potential? For what?" Ethan wondered. This was probably the first time anyone outside the "Geek Squad" had taken interest in him. And he felt an odd curiosity to find out what this guy wanted to give him. It was weird. He had come in here to drain the bank and now he was talking to someone who was interested in him. He felt so giddy. Like a puppy with a new toy.

"Ya got the potential to do a lot," Derek patted Ethan on the head and the minute they made contact, Ethan's eyes started to glow white.

Everything was in black and white, just like the first time Ethan's visions started. On the top of a hill stood a large, muscular wolf. It growled as a young man landed next to it. The two stared down at one another before they launched at each other, fangs bared. The scene then shifted to a full moon glowing with an ominous blue hue. The glowing moon changed into an intricate circular design, which appeared on a small glass bottle. The bottle shattered, sending shards of glass everywhere and ending Ethan's vision.

"Whoa man, are you ok?"

"Uh? Oh, uh yeah I'm fine," Ethan answered.

"Well, if you ever want to have some fun, I usually hang out here on weekends. Just come and find me." Derek said as he turned to leave. Ethan nodded slightly. And then it occurred to him; didn't the guy come in to use the bathroom? Deciding to leave it be, Ethan walked out of the bathroom to return to his friends, the vision all but forgotten.

Sloth: thanks for reading. Hope to hear from you guys!