here is the next chapter, regular disclaimer applies, except with my characters

also, this is a celebration chapter for me, i was accepted to college and have recieved what is basically a FULL RIDE YES!! So here is the chapter and please review

The announcement of a missing hiker had an immediate effect on the house. Everyone was in the lobby of the inn not 20 minutes later, ready to go into town. Jacob found himself mashed between Carl and Tristan in the cab of one of the trucks. No one said much, but you could all but feel the tension that had settled in the air. Jacob was forcing himself to stay awake, he could feel his body reacting like it had the times when he went days without sleep. Auto pilot.

Carl's fingers had tightened on the wheel to the point where it was making odd groaning noises, Jacob wondered blearily how strong he was before Carl relaxed his grip. Jacob had only seen one person break the steering wheel of a car and that had been Paul when the bloodsuckers had gotten away that time that they were tracking Victoria. He had never thought that actual humans could do that as well. Jacob's musings on Carl's strength carried them into the city where there was a large group if people gathered in the town square.

He climbed out along with the others and noticed that while some were relived to see the Baptistes and their family they also looked rather wary of them. He cast a glance around the circle and figured he knew the answer to that. He hadn't really noticed the sheer size of them before, being around the same height and weight as the boys, but they towered over the townsfolk. And add the forbidding aura that some of the older boys had in spades you get nervous people.

He listened as the chief of police gave the standard details on the missing woman. She was in her early 20's, blond, about 5'5" and athletically built. Her name was Rebecca and she had been missing for 12 hours from the hiking trail that her and her friends had taken. Jacob could tell the chief was annoyed that they had branched off the marked trail and her friends had continued on when she decided to take a break. Jacob himself was annoyed, that was probably how she got lost, she had no idea where she went, and now she could be anywhere in the park, and all they had was an approximate location.

He watched as the chief and Gabriel began to divide up the groups, all the inn workers were put in their own groups. Carl and Gregory would be driving up and down the trail looking for her, while the other ranged out on foot. The chief placed him with the local high school kinda in shape group and assigned them a piece of land right off where the hikers had branched off the trail. Jacob eyed his group with a wary eye, they reminded him greatly of Mike Newton and company, one even styled his hair in the same little spikes.

They were dropped off by a parent on the trail and pointed in the general direction of their search area, but when Jacob started to walk over the other boys didn't follow. In fact they started to talk about a recent party. Jacob listened with shock as they started to lie inventively about the girls that they had laid.

"So, Megan was all over me, 'cause I'm the quarterback, you know. And I was like 'Hey, baby, let's slow down,' and she was like 'no.' So, we did it, right there in her... I mean my car. And let me tell you, she's real good at driving stick shift." The blond boy that seemed to lead the little group was saying as his friends listened on in awe.

"Aw hell man, that's nothing. I'm trying for Serena, I ain't afraid of her brothers, just adds to the excitement." This young man was rather unfortunate looking, small and weedy, he wouldn't have stood a chance in a fight with Rosa.

As his friends expressed disbelief in his statement, Jacob opened his mouth to yell and then gave it up as a bad job. He slipped into the woods without them.

He started to search the normal way, when he remembered how Sam had found Bella in the woods, he shrugged off the pain of the memory and backed further off to go wolf. He didn't need the sex freaks to actually start looking and see him, that might not go over well.

Jacob slunk around the trees looking for a quiet spot where he could strip and transform. He had finally found a spot where he couldn't hear the calls of the search party when he saw the wolves. He quickly ducked behind a tree and thanked whatever god there was that he was downwind of the predators. There had to at least be 20 of them and even in his wolf form he knew that he couldn't take them on and win if it came to that. He peered around the tree to see if they had passed on yet and was greeted by the perplexing sight of the wolves spaced out in a circle and scenting the ground. It was obvious that they were looking for something, but there were rabbits around and the wolves were ignoring them.

Jacob frowned and looked closer at the animals, it was them that he realized that one of them had a shirt in it's mouth. They were searching for a person? But they weren't the trained dogs that the park rescue had brought, they weren't trained at all as far as he could tell, there wasn't a human with them. Jacob held very still and tried not to make any noise, he wanted to figure out what the hell they were doing.

They had gotten maybe twenty yards away from his hiding place when one of them stopped and threw back his head and howled. The large black one followed him over and also howled when he saw whatever the other wolf had been looking at. Jacob only had a short moment to ponder the reaction when a large Jeep came crashing through the woods. He saw Carl and Gregory hop out and scoop up the missing hiker. She was obviously what the wolves had been searching for. Carl held the door open for Gregory and turned and made a short bow to the large black wolf before hopping in himself and revving the engine. They were in and out in less than 10 minutes.

As soon as Carl and Gregory where gone the wolves turned as well and started to head deeper into the woods, Jacob watched them until the trees had swallowed them up. He then turned back to the path, the search was over and there was no need for him to still be out in the woods when he could be sleeping.

He thought about maybe telling someone what he had seen, but decided against it. No one would believe him and in truth he had no idea what he had witnessed himself. Maybe he needed to do more research into this area. There were other tribes around that could maybe had similar gifts to his tribes...maybe. Or maybe this was all perfectly normal and he was looking for something odd, but then ... the whole Carl bowing to the wolf thing was really weird, in fact it was what the tribal elders did to Sam. Hum, maybe he should call his dad...

Oh, forget it. He was too tired to think anymore. He would ponder it more when he had a solid 8.

Serena sat tensed next to her mother in the Jeep, the lost hiker was the 3rd this winter. Maybe they really needed to make better maps and forbid going off the trail. There was going to come a time when they weren't going t be able to find them, and it was still winter, and she hoped to God that the girl was dressed right.

"Serena, sweetie, calm down. Everything is going to be okay." Her mother soothed, lifting one hand off the steering wheel and smoothing down her hair. Serena cast a glance at her mother, she never seemed to worry about anything.

"It's not that Mom, if we find her how are we going to explain it, again."

"Like we always do, we know these woods like the backs of our hands. The townsfolk are never going to be able to accept that, but it sets us a little higher than they can deal with. The heroes of Calais. They can't run us out this time."

Serena sighed and thought about the stories that the older ones told, about the fire that burned down the first inn, and the subsequent year in the suburbs. Funnily enough they never mentioned details from that year other than that they didn't like it there. Serena felt that there was a deeper meaning under the silence than others wanted her to know.

"Well, at least this one is at night. We can be in out wolf skins without having to worry overmuch about being seen. Right?"

"Right sweetie, and your father is very confidant that we will find her. She wasn't very far off the trail this time."

They rode in silence the rest of the way until they reached the middle of town. She noticed that Jacob was there. She had thought that he would have tried to get some sleep, he looked terrible. She watched him instead of listening to Chief Robbins, the man could talk and talk, Jacob actually looked like he was listening. Serena noticed somewhat distantly that Zach had stolen a piece of the girl's clothing and that they had the exact spot they had gone off the trail. She noticed however with great detail that Jacob didn't seem pleased with the group that he been assigned, and honestly she couldn't blame him. That group was complete dunderheads. She looked up when her father tapped her on the shoulder and with a sigh followed him to the car, they drove way into the park and got out at a spot where there weren't any other people.

"Alright everyone," her father boomed over the clearing. "This is a simple search and find. Spread out in circular formations and howl when you think that you've found her. Carl and Greg are driving around waiting for the signal so we don't need to worry about the cars or anything. Let's find her."

Serena stretched and started the change. She could feel her back pop and the bones begin to stretch as the change overtook her, a few minutes later she was the light gray wolf of her wolf skin.

She trotted over to where Zach was waiting and got a whiff off the shirt that he had swiped. After all the pack members had sniffed the shirt he picked it up and they set off into the forest. The searching was rather boring, sniff until you think that you have a trail. The ground was slightly damp and thus held the scent better, but also magnified all the other scents that were also present. She had been looking for over an hour when they got to the section that Jacob and the football players their water boy had been assigned. She wasn't surprised to see the boys weren't doing anything, but she couldn't see Jacob, and that did surprise her.

Serena got back in the circular pattern that the rest of her family was in and fanned out. She thought that at one point she caught a glimpse of denim around a tree, but it was gone when she looked again. Suddenly Tristan set up a howl that had her father hurrying over as well. They had found the hiker, Carl and Gregory did their part and everyone headed back to the cars and their clothes. As they were walking away Serena looked back over her shoulder and could have sworn that she saw someone standing there watching them, but they were gone when she looked next. She convinced herself that it was a trick of the light.

Jacob collapsed into the bed that was now his, thank God that it was comfortable. He shut his eyes and considered crashing for several hours and waking up only when he at least had gotten a solid 8 winks. He was right on the median of sleep and the land of the waking when the howls and barks shot him straight up. He was off the bed and half way to wolf form when he remembered that it was not his pack. Instead he rushed to the window and peered out into the false dawn gloom. The same wolves from the night before where in the yard, and they were... playing? Almost like it was their territory and they felt completely safe there, but it was civilization. Wolves should never want to come this close.

"What the hell is going on here?" Jacob asked himself. As he watched the large black wolf that reminded him of Sam, gave a short commanding bark and trotted around the side of the house, out of his sight. The rest of them followed suit.

Jacob shook his head and laid back down, "And to think that I came here to get away from the wolves."

He muttered to himself before falling deeply asleep.

It was nearly 11 o'clock when he surfaced again. Rubbing the sleep from his eyes and pulling on his shirt he stumbled into the kitchen.

Theo gave him a mild glance before placing a large cup of coffee and even larger plate of waffles in front of him.

"Thanks," Jacob mumbled before starting to shove food in his face.

"Tired after the search last night?"

"Yeah, and add to that, that I haven't had a decent nights sleep in months. I just crashed and went completely dead to the world." He looked up from his waffles with a slightly distressed look on his face. "Gabriel isn't mad that I'm not working is he?"

"Nah, Tristan said that he tried to wake you up, but you said a dirty word and rolled back over. Called him dad too. Not a morning person huh?"

"Only when I don't get enough sleep," Jacob drained his coffee mug and rose to dump his dishes in the sink. "So, off to work I go. Hey, real fast. Did the wolves last night wake you up as well?"

Theo nearly dropped the plate that he was washing, but managed to save it.

"Wolves?" he asked sharply. "No, I didn't hear any wolves, you might have been mistaken."

"No, I looked out my window and saw them. Oh, well, just thought that I should mention it. Don't want anyone to get hurt, right."

Jacob grabbed his jacket off the peg and proceeded to head over the the carpentry shed, not knowing that he was leaving a dumbstruck man behind him.

"SHIT!!" Theo threw a towel across the room. If Jacob was that alert they would have to watch what they did around him now. He strode over to the phone and dialed his dad's office.

"Dad? We need a pack meeting. It's about Jacob."

Dun, dun, dun, dun, DAH

what will happen next? review and tell me what you think it should be