"You good now?" Midge asked, knees cold against the wet stones of Sweetwater River, where Val had found a spot in the ice to slip under.

"So much better," Val groaned, "Girl, you gotta get back out there! The town is going mad!"

"I know it." Midge sighed, picking herself up from the ground, and rubbing her hands to create warmth. Her phone buzzed again; her parents, summoning her home.

If she didn't look, she wouldn't have to go.

"Stay safe," Midge said, "And just stay beneath the water. I'll find you when it's over."

Val nodded, and Midge watched as she flashed away under the ice, like a brilliant multi-colored fish, swimming far away from this curse.

It came at Midge in waves; like water lapping the shore. She would feel the effects of the spell try to wash over her, like someone dousing her shoulders with a bucket of water, but her powers would burn back through it. It was like a fever that would ebb and flow.

She had no idea where Josie or Archie was, but the town center was a pretty good guess. She had only gotten her learner's permit two weeks ago, but she doubted she'd be pulled over right now for not driving with an adult. It seemed that there were other bigger issues. Besides, as Kevin had put it, it seemed most of the police officers were under the spell too.

She put the car in gear and started sputtering back towards the town center. She was halfway there, through the woods, when she came upon a man frantically trying to fend off three werewolves.

"Oh, no," Midge groaned. She parked the car, and got out.

"Ma'am! Stay back! It's not safe!" The man sputtered, shaking, using what looked like a tire iron as a weapon.

"I'm fine," Midge assured. She stomped her foot, "Shoo! Shoo!" She said, waving her arms like they were flies.

She wondered which wolves these were.

One wolf seemed to roll their eyes, as though realizing Midge was going to make this difficult for them. One whined like a child and swung his muzzle toward the man. He shrieked.

"Uhm, he wants the beef jerky in your hands, sir," Midge groaned, spying the bag.

"You can't be serious."

"I entirely am." She said. The man was frozen in place, so Midge took the bag and threw it toward the second wolf, who hummed contentedly, dragging it back into the woods.

"You should go," Midge said, staring at the third wolf.

"I can't leave a lady alone," He huffed.

Midge didn't hear him. She took a step toward the third wolf. As soon as the wolf moved, the man bolted.

"I know these eyes…" Midge said with a quiet smile, a warmth spreading throughout her body. The wolf blinked at her, confused.

Midge tried something; she didn't think she could do it twenty million times over, but her powers were similar to Betty's, but the vehicle of magic was often different. She wondered…

She placed her hands on the wolf's head, focusing on clearing the cursed fog away. It was like scraping dirt off a window pane, and soon, the thoughts of the wolf were shining back through.

The fur shimmered and soon, a teenage boy was standing in front of her. She spied the totem that Betty had made Sweet Pea's friends; for the better. She would have been bright red if he would have turned without his clothes.

"Hi, Franklin," Midge said, offering a smile.

"Do we…have we met before?" Franklin asked, tilting his head and examining her, "Why when I look at you do I think of flower crowns?" He asked quietly.

"It's a mystery," Midge said, forcing a smile. Her heart thudded fast. She knew her forgetting spell had been good, but part of her heart hoped…still, he remembered something.

Feelings couldn't be erased.

"It's that spell Sweet Pea warned about, huh?" Franklin asked, looking around, "What was I doing?"

"Bothering a hiker for beef jerky," Midge said with a quiet laugh. Franklin chuckled.

"Good. I hoped it wasn't dismembering someone, you know?"

"You're too good for that," Midge shook her head, "Even under a curse."

Franklin examined her, "You can call me Fangs. Most everyone does."

Midge rolled the nickname around her tongue, "Fangs. Alright. I'm-,"

"Midge." Fangs said, blinking rapidly, "I don't…why do I know that?" He asked, confused.

"Perhaps…after this…we could sit down? And have a coffee?" She offered meekly, shy.

"Are you going back into town?" Fangs asked, his smile sliding off his face, "It's not safe."

"I'm protected. I'm not just going to let the town tear itself apart," Midge said seriously.

"Okay," Fangs said after a moment, "Then I'm going with you."

XXX

Jughead was incredibly lost.

He'd been walking from the jail to Betty's house, with some information that would make her head explode (that Sweet Pea should probably be privy to too) when things took a weird turn.

He knew it was after the Jubilee, and he knew that lots of people celebrated especially this year. But he'd walked this walk so many times it felt like second nature. He knew how to get from the center of town to Betty's like it was seared into his brain.

No problem, right?

Well, usually…until, that is, until first off, he got caught up in that weird rainstorm. It soaked him to the bone, so he darted under the tree line to try to stay a bit dry, though he knew by the time he made that choice it was a moot point since his entire body was drenched.

Then, as he was walking in the bushes, after the rain had teetered to a light mist, he heard a group of boys coming up the street; Castle, Chuck, and a bunch of his other very least favorite Bulldogs.

They had a freshman with them, and they were encouraging him to eat literal worms on the side of the road, laughing cruelly as he threw up and searched for more.

Jughead didn't know why the boy just didn't stop, and he never imagined that Chuck could be like that; sure, he was sort of a piece of shit, but this was almost downright evil.

But this made him decide to go deeper into the woods, knowing that if they saw him, he'd be their next victim. He was scrawny, he knew this, and didn't have the power to fight back. Even thinking of a worm crawling down his throat made him veer deeper into the trees.

If he stayed going in the same direction, he'd come out where he wanted eventually, right?

Except his damn phone had lost power, and was basically a brick of metal in his pocket right now, and utterly useless for anything…compass app, phone, internet, or texting.

He usually didn't find the woods freaky, but tonight, something was setting him on edge. It made him feel like he should be expecting something at any second.

He wasn't sure when he came to the conclusion, as he had no idea how long he'd been in here, but it was becoming increasingly obvious…Jughead was really fucking lost.

Panic began to rise; he could wander these trees forever, and no one would find him. These woods were dense and thick and only had a few well-documented trails throughout. Anyone looking for him would have no idea where to find him.

He could very well die in here.

A flash of color sped past him out of the corner of his eye.

Jughead spun, breathing heavily, scared shitless.

He found an old boundary marker pole and picked it up. As he was doing so, he had the thought that this was absurd. Was he going to fence someone with this rusty piece of metal? And that was even if he could land a hit on someone…most likely, he'd be knocked on his ass long before the fight began.

And yet, despite all these good reasons, Jughead found himself clenching that for life, chalking it up to his own survival instincts kicking in. No, not quite survival...something deeper, something darker driving him. It was like bitter candy in the back of his throat, and Jughead was scared. Not just because of the woods, but because his mind was being flooded with dark ideas.

Another brush in the shadows let him catch a better glimpse and he relaxed, momentarily.

Wolves.

Changed, running around like children being chased in some large game, that hardly saw him. They were smallish wolves, so he assumed the younger generation that Sweet Pea had been so upset had been turned.

For a moment, Jughead was sure they wouldn't see him, too caught up in what looked like a wolfish game of hide and seek, and he wasn't sure if he was fine with that.

Because if he could just get one to change back, he could ask where he was and ask them to guide him out. No more Lost Adventure Jughead.

But he didn't know if they understood him when they were wolves, and they didn't seem in a helpful mood.

He tried to back away and melt into the shadows quietly, but he cracked a stick. He stood frozen, holding his breath, hoping that they were too into their own selves to even notice him.

He thought he was in the clear, until a wolf lunged at him, jaws snapping and foaming.

He rolled out of the way, crying out, and grabbing the pole off the ground as he ran, shoving aside branches and trees and tugging as his shirt caught on briars in the underbush.

There was a space of cleared brush, somewhere with fewer trees, and this is where another wolf knocked him over, hitting him like he was being T-boned by a car and knocking the wind out of him.

Next thing he knew, he was shoving the metal pole against the throat of the wolf for dear life, begging and crying and scared shitless.

For some reason, these wolves wanted him dead.

And he would have assumed he had the very bad luck to run into regular wolves (they were the right size, not the towering huge bulk that the rest of the wolves had) had it not been for the very human eyes that stared back at him. But they were blank, and vacant, like someone had forgotten to turn on an attic light.

He pushed harder, apologizing under his breath, until the wolf rolled away, whimpering pitifully and doing what he assumed was a cough.

"It's me! Jughead! FP's son!" Jughead yelled, hoping that they'd realize and move on. But it didn't seem like they were in a position to retain any information right now.

He hardly had time to try a different tactic when another wolf skidded into the circle, this one a soft and tiny sandy-colored wolf that helped the gray one to its feet by nudging her nose underneath the stomach and pushing up.

With two, they seemed much more confident, sinking into a snarling circle, with more wolves behind them.

Jughead was backed up into a line of trees, nowhere to run. And even if he did, they'd still surely catch him immediately.

As the gray wolf leaped, he used his shoulder and body weight to almost hit it to the side, changing its course of impact.

The sandy-colored wolf flung herself at Jughead and he turned, still holding the pole- pointy side up and seeing everything in slow motion; how her jaws were going to come down inches away at his throat with an ironclad grip, how the claws would still gash him up pretty badly, but the worst of all, how his pole would go right through her with a sickening squelching sound.

The wolf collapsed, all four legs falling out from underneath them like they were a beanie baby doll, the metal pole sticking through their skin and chest.

The gray wolf whimpered and began to howl, and another wolf came and started frantically licking the fur around the wound, as though desperately hoping to fix it. He knew that their saliva had amazing healing properties, If he had the words, he'd say that he didn't think that this was a time it would work.

Even as he thought it, and stared uncomprehendingly at the wolf unmoving in front of him, snout pushed up to his shoes, it began to dawn on him what happened.

The sorrow in the howls of the wolves, eerie and agonized, joined into his string of thoughts frantically trying to push themselves together and he wondered why the hell he thought he could take on wolves, or why he was even holding onto the damn thing in the first place?

The wolf shimmered in front of him, and just as he blinked, a very, very young girl now lay in front of him. She had her clothes on, which meant that she must be important to Sweet Pea in some way, enough that Betty made her a token to wear.

But she wasn't moving.

She was very dead.

The realization washed over Jughead like someone pouring ice water down his back.

"No, no, no…" Jughead whimpered to himself, unable to look at the eyes of the girl. She was so fucking young. And she was just laying there, with a pole through her heart, blood pooling on the forest floor beneath them.

He barely had a moment to say or think anything else, because the next thing he felt was utter and uneding agony as all the bones in his body broke at once and his whole figure changed into something lupine.

XXX

Reggie was on his computer, trying to write an English paper that he knew he'd probably only get a D on anyway when he heard yelling from outside. Before he could even traverse his bedroom, his father burst into his room.

"It's happening!" He said, almost vibrating with excitement, "Here, son, take this!"

He shoved a Mentos tin into his palm.

"What?" Reggie asked, still confused. He opened the tin to see…Mentos.

"Now, now!" His dad urged, "Before the spell takes hold. Take one now."

Reggie took one, right as a weird tingling started up his body. He chewed on the item, finding it minty, but certainly not a mentos. The tingling went away.

"What? Dad, what's going on?" He asked, and he took everything in a second too late. The gun strapped to his father's side. The silver bullets. And the pistol in his father's hands, which he was pressing out to Reggie, offering it. Reggie took it before he realized truly what it was, or what it meant.

"The wolves are out. We must protect our town!"

Reggie stumbled after his father, shoving the gun into his waistband, to see his grandfather at the door, adjusting an old hunting cap.

"The night is upon us! Hurry, we must go now!" He said, croaking and wheezing.

"I don't see any wolves..." Reggie said, pulling his father's shirt back, "Dad, seriously?"

"Oh, just you wait."

"Okay, fine, then, what the heck was in that tin?" Reggie asked, "Mentos from the 90s?" He asked. Perhaps they were just expired.

"Magical pills. I was glad I still had some; got them from a witch in Vermont in the 80s. I know a chaos spell when I feel one," His father sniffed, "We need our wits."

"For the wolves," Reggie snorted, about to make a sarcastic comment, until one broke through the treeline.

"Holy fuck! They're huge!" Reggie sputtered, "They're real?" He echoed, shaking his head.

"We're on the hunt!" His dad said with the gun raised, "Follow me!"

Reggie expected someone, anyone, to stop them from walking through the town with a gun raised…but everyone was going crazy too it seemed.

"Dad, maybe we should help-," He started uneasily.

"We are helping," His father said gravely, "By ridding the world of these monsters. Now, c'mon."

They followed the wolf through the forest. His father raised his gun and Reggie prayed it missed.

The silver bullet exploded the bark of a tree.

"Curses. My eyesight isn't what it used to be." He shoved the gun into Reggie's hands, "Aim, boy, aim!"

"Dad, I don't-,"

He felt his dad grasp his shirt collar, tugging hard, "Listen to me. You shoot, or I'll shoot you."

Reggie nodded meekly, lifting the barrel. He caught the wolf in his sight, praying that the wind would take the bullet or the beast would flee.

The wolf howled as the bullet struck.

"Another, good!" His father encouraged with a maniacal look in his eye.

Reggie fired again.

This time, the wolf went down. Hard.

His father was almost giddy skidding over to the body.

In front of them was a human man, eyes wide and staring at the sky, naked. Blood was pooling around him.

Reggie turned and his dinner came back up his throat.

"Now's not the time for pussies," His father said, yanking him up, "The night is young, Reggie. And we have work to do."

XXX

Cheryl saw the fires in the town and knew what she had to do. The thought had been ruminating around for a moment, but now that she really saw the start of whatever her mother had cooked up, it became obvious.

When her mother found her, she had a candelabra in her hands and an eerie smile on her face.

"We need to start over. Be purified. Fire mages rise from ashes," She said, kicking over the can of gasoline, "And the gods will pull those worthy through this."

Before her mother could stop her, Cheryl gave one last pleased smile and dropped the candles at her feet.

The heat and burn of an open flame had never felt so much like a warm hug.

At her mother's aghast face, Cheryl laughed.

"What's the matter, Mother? Isn't this what you told me to do? I'm just following your instructions; burning the world that harmed me. You should be proud."

XXX

It was hazy.

Jughead was all fur and feral thoughts.

He was confused, and anguished, and he could feel the pain of others, as distinct as though it was the pain that he himself was feeling.

He could hear thoughts too, everything swirling. It was like a radio glitching, and he was hearing eighteen different channels all at once.

Everything… hurts.

He wanted to curl up in a ball and die. Or sit and cry. He wanted to sob, openly, humanly. He wanted to wake up tomorrow like none of this ever happened like it was the worst bad dream he'd ever had.

His senses were too sharp, and part of that was smelling the blood from the girl's body as it continued to seep into that spot, forever marring that place in these woods, marking her final moments.

He backed up, but his feet were paws and he was gangly and didn't know how to move yet, so he sort of fell over. Twigs and other forest debris stuck in his fur, which was long and a muted gray color. Not the ash gray of the wolf that just saw and howled over the body of her friend, but the gray of a stormcloud. Of a roaring, angry sea. Of his hat.

Two wolves broke into the clearing and immediately turned back into humans. They stared, wide-eyed at the scene in front of them.

He recognized them as two people his father had greatly respected; Hog Eye and Byride.

"Whole pack's gone mad and now this?" Hog Eye groaned, "Get 'em away from her. They don't need to see that."

While Byride coaxed the other young wolves away, and Jughead could pick up that she was encouraging them to go home (through that weird mind connection thing), Hog Eye approached.

"Hey there, hey…" He whispered, speaking to Jughead like a mustang, hands open, concerned.

He looked down, expression filled with indescribable pain.

"Kid didn't deserve this," He whispered, and took his jacket off, laying it over her body with respect.

"I don't recognize this one. But he's new." Byride said, examining Jugehad, "I didn't…" She seemed rattled, like this out of everything changed everything she knew about life, "I didn't think that if you killed us, you changed. That's now how it works." She insisted.

"Maybe something in that she-witche's potion fucked with the laws of the magic world, I don't know!" Hog Eye snapped furiously, "But it happened!"

"He killed one of our own! What are we going to do with him?" Byride asked savagely, shaking with fury, "He killed a fucking kid at that."

"Well, it's gotta be one of ours. Otherwise, we wouldn't feel the connection." Hog Eye said, and then stared at Jughead, who still was only half-able to follow any of this, wondering if this was how dogs felt when their humans talked, "Oh, oh man." He said.

"What?"

"We gotta accept him in. And get to the bottom of what happened."

"Why?" Byride demanded, "I don't think we need to accept any kid killers."

"It's Jughead…" Hog Eye said, sounding weary and so old beyond his age, "It's FP's kid. Serpents take care of their own," He reminded, but it also seemed like perhaps he was now talking to Jughead, a soft reassurance.

Byride stared at Jughead's wolf for a long moment, realization dawning upon her face as well, "Fuck." She said, a short clip, almost a resignation, and spoke words that at the moment sounded like jello, but later he would come to appreciate, "You're right; we have your back, Jughead. We'll figure out this whole fuckery when the world isn't trying to tear itself apart; I don't think you'd mean to, and I can tell you feel guilty."

Hog Eye sighed, and when he spoke, it almost sounded like a consolation or a disappointment, "Welcome to the Pack. You're family. You're a werewolf now."

XXX

A man with a bat, trying to break into the bank, slugged Fred in the stomach and shoved him off the curb.

"Need a hand?"

Fred groaned, spitting up his pain, and blinked, expecting his son. Instead, he saw a man and a wife with a full array of medical kids strapped around their waist.

"Are you…" Fred frowned, "Aware?" He asked.

Bite the hand.

Fight them.

Kick their noses in.

Fred ground his teeth, trying to fight against this curse that had a little voice in the back of his mind, encouraging him to do bad things.

He had never thought much of his willpower until now.

"Fully." The man helped him up. He seemed about Fred's age.

"How?" Fred asked, "Is there something I'm missing?"

"Let's get this man to safety first," The woman said, grasping the bat from his hands with practiced ease, "We're hand-cuffing people to poles until we figure out something better."

"Weird weather we're having, huh?" The man asked, casual as ever.

"It was Penelope Blossom, so I heard," Fred said dryly. The man whistled in through his teeth.

"Well…color me more surprised than I should be!" He shook his head, "Where are my manners? Donovan Deleers. And my wife, Una."

"Fred. Fred Andrews." Fred said, shaking his hand.

"To answer your question, we're just…unaffected," Una said, hauling the man to a place to hand-cuff him to a pole safely, setting a water bottle and a few granola bars in his reach, "We used to be part of the Serpent pack, but we gave up phasing long ago. But, since we're still wolves, we're not exactly…human. We realized we're in between."

"And therefore the spell doesn't hurt you. A loophole…" Fred laughed, "Just like Betty figured out."

"Jordan's witch?" Donovon said with a hum of surprise, "Wow, smart girl."

"You seem…fairly in control," Una said.

"Oh, trust me, it's not easy. But I'm not the type of fall to their baser needs anyway," Fred assured, "And I want to help."

"You're a good man."

"That's my son; Archie. He's a…" Fred was still unused to talking so casually about these things. When he and Mary were young, it wasn't even whispered, "A Grimm."

"Ah, yes. He's Jughead's friend, isn't he?" Una snapped her fingers, "We're the family taking Jughead in while FP is away."

"Oh!" Fred blinked, "Well, very nice to meet you. I'm glad Jughead seems to be picked up by upstanding folks like yourself."

"We do what we can for The Southside…and the North side today," Donovon said, grimacing as he looked at the destroyed town center.

"How many more handcuffs do you have?" Fred asked, seeing people causing trouble as far as the eye could see.

Donovon shook his head, "Not nearly enough."

XXX

Sweet Pea skidded down the carpeted stairs, watching Betty disappear upstairs with a shell-shocked Polly in toe.

Arriving in the basement, he swung around to see Alice tearing through a wooden door like a savage, one of her wrists shackled in chains and tied to a place on the wall where a metal loop had been drilled into the wall.

As though constraining someone with shackles was a normal occurrence.

"Mrs. Cooper?" He asked, confused and mildly terrified.

"Sweet Pea…" She panted, "Thank god it's you and not Betty or Polly." She said.

"Uhm, yeah, if you don't know-,"

"Something's going on. My willpower…it's waning," She said, and he could see sweat and perspiration on her forehead, "Been too long since I…it wants out…it wants to burst open…" She sounded feverish, almost delirious.

"What?" He echoed, confused.

She blinked and he could see some awareness return to her eyes. She stared down at the door and the chains.

"These won't hold me long. Sweet Pea, I need you to do something for me. You need to go up into my closet. In the back, there's a box that has stronger chains and a gag. You need to get it. Now."

"Why…why?" He stuttered, wincing as she tore through another piece of the wood on the door.

"Because this beast wants out. And if it gets out, it will kill everyone in this house, and possibly the whole town. I won't even be in the backseat, I'll just be gone until it's satiated. We cannot let that happen." She lunged, or the beast forced her to, and she almost came up to Sweet Pea. He stumbled back, gasping.

In the light, he could have sworn her eyes were golden.

"Now!" She snarled, clenching her teeth so tightly he almost thought she'd shatter them.

Sweet Pea nodded numbly, throwing himself back up the stairs and into Mrs. Cooper's bedroom.

He threw open the closet door. He heard Betty kicking around in her bedroom, her feet thudding down the stairs. He tuned it out as he threw items behind him, searching for the box in question.

He found it; there was only one box.

He threw open the lid, and immediately, his breath caught.

He stood, absolutely frozen, as he gingerly touched the first item in the box.

A neatly folded Serpent's Jacket.

His hands shook with uncontrollable confusion as he lifted it, noticing how small it was, for clearly someone of a smaller stature than the average Serpent.

Begging to be wrong, he turned the jacket around, fingers fishing for the tag at the top.

And it was there in crisp, perfect, and so totally unlike any normal Southside handwriting: PROPERTY OF ALICE SMITH.

Underneath the jacket were the chains, along with a few other pack-related vintage items.

Understanding flooded him at once, a sense of almost anger he hadn't sussed out before, and a sudden jolt as he started to consider what this meant for the two Cooper daughters in the household.

"Alice's an ex-Southsiide Werewolf," He mumbled out loud, begging the universe to prove him wrong, correct him, but the words felt true as they left his mouth.

You could give up the pack, but you could never give up the wolf.

And Sweet Pea had a very bad feeling she'd been repressing her wolf for over twenty years.

He shuddered to think what would happen if it came out, especially during this spell.

The severity of the situation crashed down on him and he grabbed the heavyweight shackles and chains, almost flying down the stairs.

As he got to the top of the basement stairs, his brain exploded with pain, like a signal finally making its way through.

He faintly heard Betty yelling for him, but that might have just been his imagination.

It was like all the wolf thoughts were flooding in all at once; anguish, horror, anger, confusion, wariness, chaos.

And what's worse; it was glaringly obvious to Sweet Pea that there were voices added, new thoughts running in circuits that hadn't been there before.

And yet, an even more sobering thought. There were thoughts and people that were just gone from the pack consensious. Not just unphased, and human (though, most had been compelled by the spell to turn into wolves) but wiped from existence, like someone deleting a browser history.

Gone forever.

"Sanders," He gasped out, tears running down his cheeks as he realized a voice missing, and the source of that anguish, of the howls that echoed in the back of his mind and could be heard outside. It felt like someone was clutching his heart, digging nails deeply into it, and crushing it in front of him. He didn't realize the brotherly love he felt until her presence was gone, and he was left reeling with the realization that he should have been doing something, or could have maybe prevented this, even if he didn't know how. All he knew was that he felt guilt. Or perhaps it was a transferred feeling from some other wolf, but it felt like that times a thousand for Sweet Pea.

He forced himself down the stairs, numb and unable to talk as he helped Alice get chained up, before stumbling outside into the chilly air from the basement door, digging deep into his brain for answers, searching and scooping through his wolves' minds, like he was speed-interrogating everyone at once.

He needed to get back to the Pack.

Then, an even worse thought passed into his mind, this one from Hog Eye's unorganized brain vomit. Most wolves wouldn't be able to decipher it, as it sounded like he was speaking a different language, but as an Alpha, the once unintelligible thoughts of his pack mate were now translated easily in his mind.

Jughead Jones had killed Sanders, and he had - somehow, despite everything they thought they knew about how someone changed - turned into a werewolf.

Sweet Pea felt woozy.

FP was absolutely going to murder Sweet Pea.

XXX

Morning broke over Riverdale far too late.

This would be known as the night that the town truly went from the idyllic small-town charmer to a place of weirdness, insidious plots, and a cautionary tale told to other 'perfect' places.

The death toll was hard to really accurately count. Some said that there were over 50 casualties between Riverdale and even Greendale, and some estimated it to be closer to 100. There was so much hush-hush after things wore off that the town would never know and theorists, bloggers, and reporters would always question exactly what happened and how many people fell prey to the strangest event to hit Riverdale (yet, of course.)

The official FBI sheet said it was 'folie de deux' or a shared madness. Basically, one person started it, and everyone had something close to a hallucination/acid trip all at the same time, feeding off the delusions of the person next to them and so on and so forth. If the FBI truly knew it was magic or not, no one could really guess. But this was at least an answer that kept non-supernaturals happy.

That morning, Archie and Fred staggered into Pop's, wearing similar faces of sheer exhaustion and matching distressed clothing, marred with cuts, blood, and dirt. It looked like they were walking from the ruins of an apocalypse, and to many, that's exactly how it felt like.

Archie wiped the sweat from his brow, feeling his Grimm powers return, a tingle in his finger. The mania had ended as dawn swept over the trees of the forest, and with it, he'd felt his urges to kill any supernatural that he came across to subside.

His phone was still dead, having died early into the panic of last night. But he'd been so busy trying to keep townsperson from killing townsperson or holding his hands on wounds or stitching up wounds that he really didn't have time to worry about his friends until now.

Well, he knew that Dilton was safe after they'd found him streaking and taken him home. They'd given him a Valium to calm him down, which had sent him into a snooze right on the rug, his running shoes still on.

Midge and Josie had left right before dawn when things started to calm down. Fangs had been with Midge, seemingly 'awake', but didn't know the status of any other wolves.

There had been Jughead's new foster parents, for now, The Deleers, helping to tie people up who needed a time-out. They'd left at around 4 am, citing that they wanted to see if the Pack needed anything. Archie's father had waved them away, saying that they should come over for a cookout soon.

Archie, Fred, and Kevin had worked until Sheriff Keller had wandered back over, blinking and groggy, as he'd just woken from the strangest dream.

When Fred asked Kevin if he'd like to join them at Pop's for breakfast, Kevin laughed.

"I'm assuming school will be closed for a while and I'm going to go home, wash off this gunk, and then sleep until I'm summoned to Riverdale High again." He saluted them, "C'mon, Dad."

"What…happened…?" Sheriff Keller asked, squinting into the ruins of the main town square, utterly confused.

"I'll explain it on the way home. See you on the flip side, Andrews." Kevin said, waving them goodbye.

But the people that Archie really cared about- Betty, Jughead, Veronica, and heck, even Sweet Pea and Cheryl- he hadn't heard anything about or seen at all. Hopefully no news as good news, right?

The windows of Pop's were smashed where it could be, the rest boarded up hastily. It looked like an abandoned holdout of a last stand in some end-of-the-world movie. They entered cautiously, the little bell ringing as they padded inside.

"You open?" Fred asked Pop, who was just sitting behind the counter, slowly wiping the area behind him up.

"Might as well be, I guess." Pop sighed, "Weird times."

"The strangest," Fred agreed, "How did you fare here?"

"Well, we had kids trying to loot the place. It was the strangest thing; one moment, everyone was eating burgers and enjoying themselves, and the next, everyone was going mad. We shoved most out with a broom, but some came back. So we put up our tornado window protections, and that helped some. Nothing violent. Mostly just stole mayonnaise. Can't explain it at all," He said, a tad mystified.

"And you? The staff? You're okay?" Fred pressed.

"Right as rain, Fred. I can't say I was in control of my actions. For some reason unknown to me, I decided to fry all my fries in my decaf coffee. Suffice it to say, it did not go well. We're also out of decaf and french fries. Molly over there decided she wanted to become a Youtube Blogger, and spent most the night showing the world how to make makeup with everyday food items." He chuckled, "Those went down not long ago. It's like we just…lost all our good senses. I can't explain it at all!"

"Yeah, well, glad to hear you made it out okay."

"Can't say the same for everyone else?" Pop asked with a haggard sigh. Fred pressed his lips together.

"I wish I could."

"Well…" Pop said after a long moment, unsure how to really respond to that, or to the strangeness that had turned his night upside down, "What can I do you for?"

"Coffee. Both of us. Strongest you got." Fred said, rubbing his face.

"Really?" Archie perked up. He usually wasn't allowed to have coffee, his father always saying he was far too rambunctious and impulsive without it.

"You deserve it. I'm proud of you, son. You really stepped up tonight." Fred said, clapping his back, "And whatever the boy wants."

"The usual. Erm…without fries." Archie winced, "Hey, you got a charger back there?" He asked Molly, who had been on this shift for a long, long time, as he held up his black-screened phone.

"Yeah, uhm… somewhere. I dumped my purse out near the coolers." Molly said, motioning him to follow her back.

The kitchen was in absolute disarray, though it didn't seem due to people doing it out of malice. It seemed like someone had thought it was a great idea to throw all the flour on the floor and make snow angels during the night. If Archie hadn't seen the carnage and violence, the true darkness that everyone had, he would have almost found it absurdly funny.

They searched and shifted through the items on the floor together, sort of organizing as they went. Finally, half-submerged (only the cord) in a pot of chili, they found her charger. She wiped it on her apron.

"Might still work," She offered with a shrug.

Archie plugged it into the wall, and then his phone.

And then he prayed and waited for the apple sign to show up.

Now he was hoping for messages. Check-ins. At this point in the aftermath, hearing nothing would confirm the worst.

Just as the white half-eaten apple sign surfaced on his phone, and Archie let out a sigh of relief, he heard a commotion from the front.

He had heard the guy come in quickly, but until he started talking, he wasn't focusing.

"Show me the safe! Show me the money! C'mon, old man, I'll use this!"

Archie shot up, shoving Molly behind him.

"Stay here!" He hissed.

He heard his father get up, the chair from the booth squeaking as he shoved it back. Archie threw himself out to the main diner part a second too late; just in time to see a bullet fly past him and into his father's chest.

In the back, his phone turned on, and as he held his hands against his father's chest, tears clouding his vision, his messages pinged over, and over, and over.

Absolutely one thing was true; everyone lost something on this night, but most of all, these young friends - at the center of a war that they inherited - lost everything they had

Sequel is called 'Someone is Watching'.

At this point, as I do with most stories, I reach out to lurkers and ask you to review. What's a lurker? Someone who has maybe been here for a long time- perhaps since the start of the book, that eagerly awaits each update but hasn't ever reviewed. And I get it! Life gets super, super tough and super busy. But I'm asking you to review now, just as a little 'thank you'.

If you don't know what to write, hey, that's fine! Here's some things you can tell me, if you want some inspiration:
* Favorite scene
* Favorite OC
* Favorite couple
* Something you saw coming
* Something you didn't
* Predictions/what you'd be interested in the next installment
* Songs (Halloween-themed; I'm running through them for titles quickly!)