Almost an hour had passed since Reed had left Callas alone in the spare bedroom, to think to herself for a little while as the additional information was revealed to her. They were something else. After letting out a small puff of air—a small way of trying to psych herself up—she nodded her head, believing that now was a good a time as any to finally go downstairs and face the others. She got up from the bed and walked over to the bedroom door. Her laptop was left untouched from when Emily had walked in, with the plate of food—that was now more or less finished as Callas mindlessly ate away while stuck in concentration—and Callas didn't plan on going back over to it anytime soon, it would have been too much. Slowly, she stepped out of the room, shoving her hands into her hoodie pocket, that was still covered in muddy paw prints from Zeus's greeting outside. As she edged towards the stairs, her racing heart picked up even more and fear began to crawl its way up her body. They weren't completely human. Will had mentioned a few times about them being 'mutts', but Callas thought that was impossible—the key word being thought. Past tense. Now, Callas wasn't sure what to think. Was anything real? Was she simply dreaming? Maybe she was dead. Whatever it was, Callas was done not knowing, but she also felt like she wasn't ready to know either. She took her left hand out of her pocket and held onto the railing as she began to descend the stairs, one by one, slowly but surely.
When she reached the bottom, her gaze shifted around the room, meeting the eyes of everyone else—who seemed just as nervous and scared as she did in that moment. Emily had moved to sit back on the arm of the chair by Sam, her right hand was resting on his left shoulder while her left was resting on her knee. Seth was holding onto Zeus as they continued to sit in the same place on the sofa from before. Seth turned his head to look at her and Zeus shuffled around on the sofa quite happily, oblivious to everything. Quil had moved from the other sofa to sit next to Seth and Zeus, considering it had more space now that Reed and herself weren't sitting there, leaving Jared, Paul, and Embry to sit on the other one. Jacob was sitting on the wooden chair that Embry had been on when Callas first arrived at the house, and Reed was sitting next to him, picking at one of the muffins, leaving the crumbs to drop onto the small, white, circular plate on the table. She could feel them all staring at her, aside from Reed—and she knew that if they continued to do so, they would probably burn a whole through her head, Scott Summers style. A shudder rippled through her body at the slight consideration of Cyclops's concussion beams disintegrating her. No one said a word, and she wasn't going to be the first to start talking. Callas glanced over to Embry, he didn't smile, he looked more ashamed of himself than anything else.
Sam, after clearing his throat, stood up from the single sofa. "Callas?" He caught her attention away from Embry, who looked like he wanted to say something but didn't, and Sam motioned his head outside.
Callas nodded her head, wrapping both of her arms around her body as she slowly followed Sam outside, with Reed trailing behind her, closing the sliding doors behind them so Zeus couldn't get out as well. "Why are we out here? Are you going to murder me?" Callas stepped back, away from Sam as he stopped walking.
It was still dark out. The trees overlapped one another and covered the majority of the ground where they stood, with only a few open patches that allowed the water to fall down from above. The wind was cold and uncomfortable to stand in as it picked up. Callas wrapped her arms around her body tighter, wishing that she had Reed's body heat or at least a better-insulated hoodie than the one she had on in that moment. Heavy rain had started to hit the metal roof of the shelter loudly, which stopped Callas from hearing her own heart race. The faint, almost completely dull, porch light was turned on. One of the lights underneath the shelter buzzed lowly, a few flies and bugs flew around it, even as it flickered a few times before settling back into a constant glow. From a small area in front of the house, where the trees separated and a dirt road lead in, she could make out a few cliffs and part of the water down at the beach. The black sand and the darkening colour of the water made it look like the ground was being swallowed up by the void, disappearing just at the drop of the cliff. Sam turned around and looked at Callas with the shake of his head, he looked drained, but she probably didn't look any better with tear stained cheeks, a red nose from the cold and from rubbing it so much, and puffy, swollen, red eyes.
Sam sounded tired as his eyes looked over her face, "I'm not going to kill you, Callas. Please stop thinking that."
With a nod of her head, she looked around them before looking back at him. "Okay... So, why are we out here then?" She turned to look back at Reed, who started to move towards his Jeep, standing near Sam on his right, he avoided looking at her directly. "Is it like a cult sacrifice? I'm not really down for that, even ask Embry,"—she pointed her left thumb back at the house—"he knows I'm not a fan of cults."
"Callas." Sam sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose, clearly tired of Callas's excessive rambling. "No." He shook his head, letting out a sigh before he looked back over to her. Callas assumed that Reed must have warned him about her bad habit with how much time they had been spending together, but she might not have even come up in a conversation. "Listen, what you're about to see is... hard to take in. It will be difficult to fully understand and believe that what you see is real, but, I will let you know now that it is, in fact, real. Remember, it's still Reed. Don't be afraid. He is still himself. He won't hurt you. He is still your brother."
Callas, understandably confused and nervous, nodded her head. "O-Okay..."
Sam pointed towards the area under the shelter for her to stand. Slowly, her feet dragged across the wet ground until she turned back to look at them. In her mind, all she could think about was the possibility of her being sacrificed for Sam's anomalous cult. That Reed was the one who had to do it. It would explain his own nervous behaviour. Sam was still standing in between Reed and herself, his hands out in front of both of them before he stepped back towards the porch, lowering his hands. He nodded his head at Reed one last time. "It's okay." Reed nodded back, gulping as his eyes locked with Callas's.
"Now, remember, it's just me." Reed placed his hand on his chest.
"I know that." She nodded.
"It's always going to be just me."
She opened her mouth. "I-I know." Reed noticed her hesitation and the small nod she offered him.
"Are you ready?" His voice was gentle, hoping to calm her down.
"Sure?" Her eyes flickered to Sam quickly before looking back at Reed. "For what, though?"
"The truth."
"About?"
"Me. Us... Everything."
Reed sighed, taking his jacket off, throwing it off to the side. "Uh?" Callas pointed to his jacket, uncertain of what it was that he was doing.
"It's going to be okay," Reed told her again before taking his shirt off.
"I... really... don't need to see that, Reed." Her eyebrows drew together in confusion. "This... doesn't make sense. Just put that back on."
"Remember the legend that Billy spoke about at the bonfire?" Reed asked as he undid his belt buckle.
Callas held her hand out in front of herself, blocking her view of Reed aside from his face. "Okay, Reed. I don't know what this is, but I'd appreciate it if you put your clothes back on, and then some. Please... stop." Callas turned her head away from Reed as he continued to undress. "I'm not about the incest life, I didn't think you were either, but clearly you do have some unresolved issues. You need help, Reed, and you need to put your clothes back on."
"Well," he started, "the legends are true." He ignored her rambling. "We are descendants of wolves, from the ancient spirit warriors of the Quileute tribe, we're protectors. C-Can you please look at me?"
"Can you pay for the therapy I'm going to need after this?" She asked as she hesitantly turned to look at Reed again, lowering her arm. Callas noticed a dark circle on his right shoulder. "When did you get a tattoo?"
Reed cleared his throat. "When I joined the pack."
Callas mouthed the sentence back to herself as she distinctly remembered that the boys almost said that word before, but quickly changed it to 'group'. "'Joined the pack'? Reed, what does that mean?"
"It's still me," he repeated before strange, white wisps of—what looked like—smoke expelled from around his body, a low rumble—similar to a growl—echoed from his body. Soon, his body stepped back, only to be replaced by a large chestnut-brown wolf with darker brown ears in his place. Instead of Reed, there was a wolf that stood almost six feet tall on all four legs, no doubt a lot taller when simply standing on its hind legs. Its head shook and Callas could see its snout move. Sharp white teeth and incisors, almost as sharp as blades, were revealed underneath the upturned lips. Its eyes were almost a golden-brown colour. Callas couldn't move. She only watched as its face seemed to relax and it lowered itself onto its paws, resting its head on the ground, the rest of its body lowered as well, still a distance from her own body.
There wasn't a single bone in her body that knew what to do. Her body felt like it was on lock down, doing the only thing it could as shock set in—she felt like a million tiny Callas's in her head were panicking, running around screaming, just like an episode of SpongeBob she remembered watching a week or so ago. A nervous laugh erupted from the back of her throat as she stared at it. The wolf, with its head now raised up and tilted, turned to look at Sam. Sam was looking at Callas closely as she stepped back an inch, wanting nothing more than to get away from what she was looking at. It couldn't have been real. Will must have hit her head harder than she first thought. There was no way that what she was seeing was actually happening. From the corner of her eye, although she wasn't paying much attention, the sliding glass doors opened and Seth stepped out of the house, with an unreadable expression. Fear crept up on her, like maggots digging their way into her skin and she rung her hands together, shaking her head as she still continued to laugh weakly. Her heart hammered wildly and her hands started to shake. Her eyes stung as more tears began to collect.
"Sam," Seth said clearly as he watched Callas.
Upon hearing his name, Sam quickly made his way over to Callas before her eyes rolled backward and her body completely collapsed to the ground. He caught her effortlessly, picking her body up from the ground, turning his head back to look at Reed. Callas's mind flooded with images of Reed disappearing and the wolf taking his place on repeat. She could feel her body being lifted and a warmth hitting her cold skin instead of the cold bite of the wind outside. Murmured, washed out voices echoed around her as her body was lightly jostled about until her body was laid onto something soft and slightly cold. She wanted her eyes to open, but it was almost as if her body wanted to protect her from what it thought she was about to see. Her mind raced back to the bonfire and the images she saw that night as well. The murmuring continued, and something touched her skin softly. There was no doubt in her mind that she had completely lost all sense of her sanity. It was the only reasonable explanation that she could come up with.
But, when she finally managed to open her eyes again, the first thing she saw was the ceiling of the spare bedroom at Emily's. The soft touch reconnected with her face and her eyes darted towards the body next to her, terrified. Emily was brushing her hair from Callas's face, wiping away the small tears that had fallen down her cheeks as she hummed a soft tune to herself. Callas breathed out deeply, looking down towards the end of the bed where Sam stood with his arms crossed, his usual hard glare was replaced with anticipation and possibly worry. Reed stood next to him in different clothes than before, his hair was wet and his eyes were trained on the small knitted blanket at the end of the bed, rather than on her. Which, in some way, Callas was grateful for. She felt as though she had no idea who her brother was anymore. There was an obstruction by the doorway, the light was interrupted by both Seth and Jacob looking in the room. Callas guessed that the others were downstairs.
She swallowed hard, sitting up slowly, bringing her legs to her chest. Her voice sounded small and quiet, like a scared child as she wrapped her arms around her legs, staring at the same blanket Reed was looking at. "What the hell was that?"