We walked into the cave, I went back to human form, dug around in my trashed pants and grabbed my phone. It was still working, thankfully and the missed call was from Cas. That was a good start anyway.
"Cas called, I'll call Dig," I said to the assorted wolves that were standing around me, "Have him bring some clothes. He may have to break into Sam's and my room, we didn't put extras in Baby like we usually do. The one time, I swear. Tom, Carlos, I'll call Rick too, see if he's keen on having you guys join him. If not we'll try to figure something else out."
Sam shook his head, "No, I'll do it after we get clothes. Tell Dig to bring some bottled water so we can clean up some before we get dressed. I know Rick better than you do."
"All right." I pulled up the voice mail and listened to it first.
"Dean, it's me. I'm back," He sounded like he was in pain, "I'm fine. I'm about three hours away. I'll acquire a car and return as soon as I can. Please let me know how things are. Coyote seemed upset when I connected with her briefly in her sleep. We shall speak soon." Then he hung up.
Sam and Coyote's ears were straight up and facing me, "Cas is about three hours out, he's going to get a car and head back this way," Sam gave me this funky look, like I was repeating myself. "You guys heard that voicemail huh?"
"Yes," Coyote answered.
"Right, well that makes things easier. Guess I'll call Dig now." I pushed Dig's name on my phone, he picked it up the second it started ringing.
"Dean?"
"Yeah, we're all alive."
"Good." He didn't even try to hide how relieved he was.
"Well kind of. Look, we need clothes. All of us, including Coyote. We'll explain when you get here. No, no orgies or anything fun like that was involved. Mairyn and her pack are dead. I'll call the hotel and see if they can give you a spare key for our rooms. Did Oliver give you a spare one for his?"
"Yes. Why am I getting the feeling that alive came at a price?"
"Because it usually does. Just grab some clothes, I'll text you where we are. Call me when you get here, we can't meet you in the parking lot. We'll guide you in. Oh and bring lighter fluid, matches and bottles of water. We need to clean up a few messes."
He hesitated for a second, "All right. See you soon."
I knew he wouldn't let us down. "Got it." We hung up, I texted him where we were, called the hotel and told them to give him a copy of our keys because he was getting something from the rooms for us, got off that call and looked at Sam. "Sure you want to call Rick. The more we shift the hungrier we get."
He didn't answer as his bones cracked and moved while he panted and whimpered in pain. I got the feeling that no matter how many times we did this it would still hurt like hell. Sam stayed on his hands on knees for a minute, catching his breath. "Yeah. Give me your phone. Don't feel like digging for mine." He sat down, I handed him my phone. While he scrolled through my contacts I started gathering up all our phones and everything else from our pockets.
"Oliver, Roy. See if you can backtrack and find our weapons. That way when Dig shows up we won't have to spend time tracking them down. Either stick them in a pile somewhere or shift and bring them here, up to you."
"Do you think we can talk long distance like this?" Oliver asked.
"We'll find out I guess. If you guys aren't back when Dig gets here, I'll yell your name a few times once we get clothes on and are headed back here to clean up. Just in case the whole speaking with our mind thing fails. I'm sure you'll hear it."
"Sounds good. Roy?"
Roy didn't reply, just spun around and started loping out towards the opening. I knew at some point he was going to lose it. I had a feeling it still didn't seem real to him yet. As long as he kept busy, as we kept busy, we could push the other crap away. Oliver followed him without another word.
I could hear both sides of Sam's conversation with Rick. It was creepy yet kind of cool. It took some convincing but Sam got Rick to agree to take Tom and the rest in, for now anyway. As soon as Sam got off that call my phone rang again.
"It's Dig," Sam stated, "Hey Dig."
"Sam. I'm parked next to Baby. Now what."
"Right, start walking south. You'll come to a dry creek bed about a mile in. We'll meet you there. Oliver and Roy are out rounding up our weapons. Bring everything with you. Look for a large white wolf. Don't panic."
"Wolf?" Dig doesn't panic easily, but I could hear it in his voice, "What the...oh no. All of you?"
Sam's guilt-ridden eyes met mine, "Yes, I'm sorry. It's.."
"No.." Dig interrupted, "You're alive, all of you are. She's dead. The threat's been eliminated. The rest doesn't matter right now." There was no doubt or condemnation in his words or tone.
Sam's eyes widened as he struggled with what Dig was saying. That was two of us now telling him not to blame himself and I knew Coyote and Oliver would say the same thing. Kind of weird that the shoe was on the other foot, usually I'm the one people are telling not to feel guilty.
"I'll meet you guys at the creek bed," Dig continued, "See you soon."
Once Dig hung up Coyote started talking, "Tom, do you guys have clothes back at the cabin?"
"Yup."
She got right in their faces, they looked away from her as she stood in front of them. "Rick agreed to house you four. Do I have your word that you will go to the cabin, get dressed, call him, meet him somewhere and not hunt?"
All four of them nodded.
"Good. What's your phone number so Dean can send you Rick's number?"
"602-232-1556," Tom answered.
"All right, we will be checking in with Rick. You don't meet up with him, we will come looking for you. He'll keep us updated on how you guys are doing. Stick with hunting wildlife and you won't see us again. Understood?"
"Yes, thank you Alpha," Carlos replied.
"Good. Dean, send Rick that number, then let's meet Dig. I really want to get this blood off me. You four go get dressed, call Rick and start making your way to his place."
I did as she asked, Sam and I pulled fur back on and about ten minutes later we tracked Dig down. I saw him before he saw us so we stepped out of the treeline and I barked. His head whipped around and he stood stock still. I wasn't sure where the thought came from, but I threw my head back and howled. Oliver and Roy replied instantly. There was a lot of white showing in Dig's eyes, I'm sure if he had a lighter skin tone he'd be getting a lot more pale.
"Was that really necessary?" Coyote asked, "You just scared the crap out of him."
"Um, easier than yelling Oliver?"
"Seriously? Get him over here so we can get cleaned up and clothed."
"Yes ma'am." I waved my paw at him, then pointed at the treeline. He nodded and slowly started walking towards us. We waited until he was next to us then we all headed into the denser woods. We found a stand of trees that blocked views from most directions and switched back to two legs. Dig's jaw dropped wide open before we were even halfway through. He recovered fast though and started digging through the bag he had. The first thing he pulled out was some of Coyote's clothes and a bottle of water.
He made sure to turn away from her as she finished shifting, "Here, I'll just, um look over here. Tell me when you're decent. Guys, all your stuff's in the bag too."
She took her clothes and the water, "Thanks. Babe, can you help me? I think there's blood on my back." Something about having clothes in her hands made her start shaking.
It was real now and it was hitting her hard. She looked and felt like she was about to throw up and her teeth started chattering. "Sure honey, sure. Let's get some space. Come on." I spotted one of my shirts rolled up around a pair of jeans so I grabbed it and wrapped my arms around her shoulders, she just about fell into me. I guided her behind some larger trees so we'd have some privacy.
"Oh god, oh god...we're monsters, we ate them...we..." Her breaths started coming in gasps. "I, you..."
"I know, I know, shhh...let it out, you've been so damn strong." I pulled her close and held on tight.
"So much blood, it made me...I couldn't stop.." I felt tears hit my chest.
"We had to, or we'd be a lot worse off. Not anyone's fault here..."
"Worse? Worse than what?" She asked, "I can feel it, the wolf, it's so strong. It wants to hunt. How do I deal with this? How do we?"
I was already hungry again and I knew Sam was too. All the shifting had burned through what we'd eaten earlier.
"I don't know, but we will. We'll work it out, I promise."
"How do we go home? Go back? Live? How Dean? How?"
I felt her spiraling emotions in full high def. Roy was starting to pick up on them too, which was making him lose it. I closed my eyes and focused on the pack, I could almost see in my mind the strands that connected us together so I started throwing up blocks. I sectioned off Coyote and I, without really knowing how. The only reason I knew it was working was because I could feel Roy start settling back down.
"One step at a time sweetheart, one step. We can control this, we search for something, anything that can help. If we don't find anything, that's when we make permanent life changes. Right now, just focus on getting dressed, getting cleaned up. Cas is on his way, maybe he can do something. If all else fails, we move in with Sam for the time being."
She pulled her face off my chest and met my gaze, "We can do that, but what about Oliver and Roy? They have lives elsewhere. What are they supposed to do?"
"They may need to take some time off. It's too risky for them to be doing the vigilante thing right now. Besides, can you imagine how pissed Oliver will be if h shifts and rips through that suit he wears? That's leather and custom made. It's not like he can pick one up at Superheroes Costuming down the street."
It was small and kind of forced, but she managed to smile. "Good point. We can't have that happen can we? He does have an image to maintain."
I kissed her forehead, I didn't think she'd be all that keen on anything else at the moment. "Exactly. Here, let me wash you off."
Dig had wrapped up some washcloths inside the stacks of clothes. She took a small step back from me which let me soak a washcloth and start rubbing blood off her. As I worked my way from one of her hands to the next, then did her face, torso and feet she became less and less shaky. By the time she pulled her pants on she felt more like her usual self.
"Let me get you," she said after she finished getting her shirt on.
"Sure." I held my hands out for her and forced myself to relax into the feel of the cloth as she rubbed it along my skin. I'd been through too many things like this to really panic, at least yet. In a few weeks if we hadn't found a way back to being human, then I'd panic. I was more concerned about Roy and Oliver and how they'd deal with this. Oliver would not like being away from Starling for any length of time, same with Roy, not to mention how the hell they were going to explain this to Felicity, Thea and the rest of their team.
Once she'd finished cleaning as much blood off as she could she handed me my clothes, I got dressed and we got ready to join everyone else. We'd both heard Roy and Oliver walk by, shift and clean up. They were being quiet though, too quiet, even through the pack bond.
"Everyone decent?" I asked before we walked out around the trees.
"Yeah," Sam answered.
"Good." As soon as I saw them it was plain as day why they weren't talking. Neither Oliver or Roy really had any idea how to start this conversation and it looked like Sam had been waiting for us to get back. Great. Dig looked at us and didn't say a word, his face was doing the talking for him. "Right, so we're all werewolves now." I may as well be blunt, "Not the usual kind either. They ambushed us, hamstrung us, dragged us to a cave, killed us, we woke up in some sort of in between place, met Fenris, as in the wolf son of Loki, he told us that he was the one who had gifted Mairyn with the whole wolf thing. Since we were killed by werewolves, we came back as werewolves, with Fenris' help. Mairyn went evil centuries ago, Fenris killed her, leaving the rest of her pack to pretty much fend for themselves. Eventually they all got killed and went to Purgatory. Fast forward to about two years ago. According to some of Mairyn's pack that got dragged back with her, a rogue Reaper, as in the things that take your soul when you die and deliver it to where ever it's supposed to go, hooked up with Gordon somehow and they started working on bringing monsters out.
That happened because of when I was down there, then got out, the monsters realized they could escape. So for the last two years monsters have been coming back, learning how to hunt hunters and planning. Fast forward to now. Mairyn and her pack are dead, there's about thirty five regular monsters that were working with her. We know where they are and are going to send Gerald and the rest after them. We're basically unkillable now, except for things like being drowned. We also have a pretty hardcore predatory side now too, that would be the downside.
Sam and I came up with a way to deal with the portal and the Reaper without any of us having to go to Purgatory, we hope. We'll explain that later once we clean up all the corpses in the cave. Any questions?"
As I'd rattled everything off the amount of disbelief mixed with horror and confusion grew on Dig's face. When I finally stopped he looked at all of us in turn, shook his head, took a deep breath and picked up his bag. "Yes, but this isn't the place for them. Destroy the evidence, get back to civilization and then we can talk. Where's this cave?"
Talk about rock fucking solid. If I didn't have Sam, Dig would be the man I'd hunt with, hands down.