A/N: Quent'll kill me if I try to claim anything. Thanks to Words Without for the beta. This is one of those insanely long chapters that just got divided, by the way.
Paradise Blues: Part II - The Broken Pack
The wolf - the man - the thief - the one who had saved us - the target - the one who might have killed us, but he didn't but he still might... Kiba sat right in front of me, staring straight ahead after Tsume's motorcycle, completely silent and apparently oblivious to my internal struggle to define him.
"If you get blood on my interior, you're paying for the cleanup," Hige said before starting the engine. It wasn't as though the fabric was in any better condition than the rest of the car, but I sat the pistol in my lap for the moment, and after offering both Kiba and Hige a warning glare, Pops followed suit and put away his rifle. Kiba made no move, barely even glancing at us as Pops at last removed the extra wheel of bullets from his pocket and replaced it in the gun, letting the spent brass clatter into his gloved palm. My father spent the rest of the ride refilling the wheel. I sat watching him until we pulled into town, listening to the familiar clicks to drive away the roar of the wind outside and the heavy silence of the being in front of me. He looked harmless, but I did not trust nine millimeter bullets or the switchblade up my sleeve to save me from this creature if he decided to turn on us.
I did not envy my brother the windburn he was bound to get, clinging to Tsume's back on that little red bike, but a part of me was glad that Toboe was not here, not with the wolf. Even if the worst should happen, Tsume could get my baby brother away from this, away from any scene of slaughter. They would not even have to look back.
"So, Kiba, isn't it? Where're you headed?" Love him for it or not, Hige never was one to hold to silence.
"What's it matter? We should take him back to Freeze City if we don't kill the beast where he stands," Pops growled. "Nothing but an agent of desecration…" He rammed the next shell home so hard that I was half-afraid that it would go off in his fist.
Those blue-green eyes continued to stare after Tsume's motorcycle. "Paradise," he answered Hige, ignoring my father.
"Huh," my fiancé glanced from the narrow, snow-covered bridge. "That doesn't sound like a drive to destroy the world to me."
"You've never read the Book of the Moon." Pops glared at Hige as if he were wondering if my intended had lost his mind. "The road to paradise is a path to apocalypse."
"If that's the only way to find her, so be it," Kiba spoke in a voice barely above a whisper. How could he dismiss the entire world so mildly? "But my intentions are to save the world, not destroy it."
"Tell that to my wife. Tell that to Bruce. Tell it to all your kind killed in Kyrios." Pops replaced the filled wheel in his pocket, his hand twitching for his rifle.
"And how many of my kind were killed in Kyrios?" The wolf glanced only into the rearview mirror, but his eyes were frightening enough when merely reflected in glass. "I'm heading for paradise, and Cheza. Blue, Hige, you're welcome to join us. I won't hurt you if I don't have to, Quent, but I'm not heading back to the city with you." How had he known? What had Tsume told him?
"Paradise sounds worth checking out," Hige said, either not noticing that the wolf knew more than he should or opting to ignore it for the moment.
"Toboe's going?" I asked, although I suspected I already knew the answer before that dark head of hair nodded in front of me. "Then Pops and I are going too." This presumption earned me glares from both my father and the white wolf, but I was damned if I was leaving Toboe alone with one proven wolf and another who might be. I was equally damned if I could scrounge up the bravery to do this without Pops, though. Thank god he didn't contradict my bold statement.
Before us, the biker wound his way into a deserted-looking back street of the run-down island city, pulling into a rather tawdry-looking strip mall. At least there were a few other cars in the lot, none of them in any better condition than Hige's. There was a moment when I swore my heart stopped with the engine's complaining rattle, but then Kiba pushed open his door and Hige hurried around to help him hobble over to the rest of our group. Pops and I moved to follow, but when Pops lifted the rifle, I came to a decision. "You still have your revolver?" I asked, delicately setting the automatic pistol down and trying to squelch the part of me that screamed at my hand for its stupidity. Pops nodded, touching the front of his jacket. "Then let's see what he does when he thinks we're unarmed."
My father looked as reluctant to leave his rifle as I felt about leaving the pistol. "You sure that's a good idea?"
I thought about the promise I'd made to Toboe concerning his boyfriend, and the one I'd made to Tsume concerning my brother. "If we have to take him down, Toboe would understand it better if he saw what wolves are like."
Pops glanced towards the other four, milling together and headed towards the building. "He'd better damn well understand if that monster tries anything." Even so, he lowered the rifle into place next to the pistol and pushed the lock down before shutting the door. We strode quickly to catch up with the boys.