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Tweak says, "in a Tweak's eye!"

Isaac Lahey (louptragique) wrote in dunwichgame,
@ 2024-02-12 12:06:00

Entry tags:

!log/thread/narrative, green creek series: robbie fontaine, ∙ plot: 013 rock lobster, ◌ inactive: isaac lahey

ISAAC & ROBBIE

meeting wolves
the woods • sunday night
⚠ discussions of backstory (kidnap, memory wipes, etc)

STILL NOT STILES

code

It was easier to deal with life as a wolf. Robbie was not really acclimating all that well. No, in fact, he was sure he was sliding backwards. Mark, Gordo, Carter, they were all so… Nice wasn’t the right word. Helpful. Expecting. They wanted Robbie to be okay and they were maybe a little too understanding sometimes and it was a lot. Robbie still warred with wanting to rip their heads off some days.

So, he became a wolf. A gray wolf, black stripes down his face and it was good because as a wolf he didn’t think so much, as a wolf it was baser instincts he could work through. The emotions were there, but they weren’t so complex. He slid his clothes into the hollow of a tree, and shifted.

He was far from the pack territory. He could smell whenever he got near it and went the opposite direction. It smelled like coming home and Robbie didn’t know what to do with that. He had no home. He ran instead, the other way, deep into the woods. He was quiet as a mouse, even as he ran, until he caught the scent of someone else.

Unfamiliar, wolfish but not entirely - werewolf, probably, and Robbie slowed, following the smell.

One minute he was in France. It was just after dawn and he was finishing a dig, and then there was fog rolling in. And it just felt weird. Isaac didn't know what made this any different from any other fog, any other morning, but his hackles rose, hair stood on end.

Then something wrapped around his ankle and grabbed him, and pulled. He fell into the open grave and kept falling.

And then he was … somewhere. In the woods.

He hadn't experienced anything like it in years, not since he'd left Beacon Hills. He yelped quietly as he hit the ground, eyes flashing yellow as he looked around him.

The scent he was starting to pick up told him he wasn't alone.

Robbie saw the yellow eyes before anything else - the unfamiliar scent, mixed human and wolf and yellow eyes. He’d never seen yellow eyes before. Red, orange, purple sure but not yellow. What kind of wolf was this? He hesitated - because not everyone was super comfortable with nudity and Robbie had left his clothes in the trees.

Darting off, he grabbed them in his mouth quickly before making his way back, dropping them before he stepped through the trees, approaching the other slowly. He bent his head a little to show he wasn’t planning on attacking, cocking his head to the side soon after curiously, circling the other as he sniffed.

He didn’t seem like he was going to attack - there wasn’t aggression there. Confusion he could sense, and Robbie was starting to think he’d encountered his first new Dunwich arrival since his own. Taking a few steps back, he shifted back human, throwing his pants on quickly. “Hey, man, you alright?”

You could've knocked Isaac over with a feather. He knew there was a wolf, but this wasn't a werewolf like he'd seen. He'd heard that Derek’s mom was a full wolf but he'd never met her, obviously.

It wasn't her, though.

“Stiles?” he asked as he transformed back. “Stiles, what the fuck.”

He wasn't a werewolf, that was kind of Stiles’ whole thing. He got to his feet, brushing off his work pants and glaring over at him.

“Did Derek bite you?”

“The fuck are you talking about?” Robbie, who had forgotten enough things was not exactly fond of people coming up to him and acting like they knew him, when he didn’t know who they were. Still, this one wasn’t calling him Robbie. He was calling him Stiles, whoever that was.

Fishing the glasses out of his pockets, he set them on his face. It was a comfort thing, really. He didn’t need them. The lenses weren’t even prescription. “Who’s Derek? Look, are you - do you know where you are?”

Robbie wondered if this is what he looked like to Mark, when he arrived. Confused. Asking Mark why the hell he was here, what was going on, when Mark didn’t even know who Robbie was.

Glasses. It threw Isaac for a loop. He squinted as he watched him, utter confusion dawning over his features.

“I have no idea where I am,” Isaac said. And then, “je ne suis pas en France,” he added, rubbed the back of his head. “And Stiles is here. And a full wolf. And in glasses. J'ai perdu la tête.”

He'd lost his mind.

Maybe he’d fallen into an open grave and hit his head, and this was the weird hallucination he was having before he died.

“What the hell is going on, Stiles?”

“Still not Stiles.” He repeated, watching the confusion wash over his face and he took a careful step forward, putting his hands up. “It’s okay man, you uh, you’re in a place called Dunwich. In Massachusetts. Are you French, bro?” He had no accent but damn did it sound like he spoke it fluently.

“I’m Robbie, I was brought here like two weeks ago. Did you see a mist? Find yourself suddenly somewhere else entirely after stepping into or falling into a foggy misty thing?” He hadn’t noticed it himself, but then it had been foggy in Oregon like every day he’d been there. Not exactly distinguishable from the normal haze.

He knew what werewolves were, though, and he had to be one himself. “You’re a werewolf?” But not one that changed in full, because that seemed to surprise this guy.

“Stiles,” Isaac said with so much disdain in his voice, “you know I'm not French.” Stiles wasn't Robbie and Isaac wasn't French and this wasn't anywhere. “Would you stop messing around, this isn't funny. Where's Scott? Did something happen to Scott?”

It seemed a straight progression. Something had happened to Scott so Stiles had gotten bit by Derek - because Scott would've killed Derek if he'd done it otherwise - and now he was here, as ever, on a mission from the universe to screw with Isaac's head. At least that felt familiar.

It only gave him pause when Stiles asked him about the mist. “There was a fog, and then something grabbed me. Pulled me into the grave,” he looked back over his shoulder as though he was expecting to see an open grave in the dirt.

No hole, of course.

“You know I'm a werewolf,” he added.

“Still not Stiles.” He repeated, because this guy was definitely not getting it. Robbie was a little stressed by it all honestly. He’d had enough fucking with his head and how confusing everything had been for him the last few weeks. He didn’t need more of it, honestly. Yet, here they were.

“I don’t know any of the people you’re talking about. I’m Robbie, you’re a werewolf, I’m a werewolf, different kinds I think and you’re in Dunwich. It’s a super fun place where you get kidnapped by some weird mist and brought to fuckin… Massachusetts of all places. There’s a line around the town we can’t cross. People from all different universes and timelines.” It was a lot to take in and Robbie was probably not the best person to be explaining it.

He rubbed his hand along the back of his own neck, trying to think of what else he could possibly say. “Do I look… like this Stiles guy?” He must, at least enough. Unless this guy was straight up losing it. “Same… age, style, everything?”

This was a lot. But luckily, Isaac had been through a lot of this is a lot before. All you could really do was just roll with it.

“You look exactly like him,” Isaac told him after a second. Was this really that much weirder than finding out werewolves were real and getting offered to become one? Or anything else that had happened after that?

“Robbie,” he said finally. Took in a breath.

“I was just in France,” he said. And now it was Massachusetts. And Isaac had never been to Massachusetts before but it sounded right.

Smelled right.

He took another deep breath and shook his head. “So you transform into a full wolf.”

“Must have been a real handsome dude.” He couldn’t help himself, okay? Robbie watched as the reality of the situation started to register on his face and he could empathize with that feeling, and he let out a sigh, looking down at the ground for a moment. “Robbie, yeah.”

He kicked a little stick out of the way, folding his arms awkwardly over his bare chest as this guy explained where he had just been, and how’d he got here. “So is there a specific reason you were in a grave like… were you dead or…” He didn’t know how that worked, here. This place was weird.

“Yeah man, we - I mean, the wolves from where I’m from, anyway, all do. I can half-shift if I need to, too.” His teeth grew longer and his eyes flashed orange, claws growing from his fingernails. It was brief, before he let the shift subside. “Wolf thing. I was in Oregon, and then I was here. Took like one turn and bam, fog brought me to this shithole.”

Well, the town wasn’t that bad when it came to amenities and whatnot, but the rest he’d heard about it was pure garbage. “I can take you back to town, and get you all… set up and shit, here. You know. I just got here barely over a week ago, it’s kind of a lot but they have free rooms for all of us who’ve shown up like this.”

And after a beat. “What’s your name?”

“That's exactly what he would've said,” Isaac told him with a roll of his eyes. And if he had to be totally honest with everyone involved, he wasn't totally crazy for saying so.

He nodded slowly. Okay, so, maybe he was out of practice for weird. The past few years had been quiet. Provincial. But it was like riding a bike, right?

“I'm a gravedigger. I dig graves? As a job. My dad used to run a cemetery so I had the practice.”

He watched Robbie do the half-shift. Isaac nodded and he looked down to his hand, concentrated for a second to make his claws extend. His teeth lengthened, his eyes flashed yellow.

“I'm from California originally, place called Beacon Hills,” he said as he let go of the shift, went back human-shaped. “I'm Isaac.”

Damn right, but don’t let Robbie hear anyone say that or it’d go to his head. He was, at times, a little pompous. Mostly as a cover.

“Can’t you like, smell… with being a wolf and all… That must be kinda gross, dude. I mean props, someone’s gotta do it.” Robbie didn’t have the fortitude for that. He was more into computers, than anything else.

His shift was similar, but it looked like maybe he couldn’t shift more than that. Again with the yellow eyes, and he wondered if that was just the color of beta’s eyes, where he came from. He didn’t feel like an alpha.

“I was born in New York.” Which, he did happen to have a jersey accent at times, though it wasn’t always so pronounced. “Ended up in Maine, moved around a lot. I was only in Oregon for…” Well. Apparently years, but he’d forgotten them all. “A week, this time around.”

Not that he was going to explain that. “It’s nice to meet you, Isaac. I’m sorry I look like your friend. That shit must be confusing. And yeah, this place is going to be more confusing. But there’s, like, good people here and a lot of support and stuff.”

He blushed a little, feeling awkward at his own words - repeating what had been repeated to him but doing a much worse job at it.

Isaac had to laugh a little at that. “It isn't the plague times, there's no cart of bodies. They're inside, embalmed, in coffins. I mean yeah, there's some smells, but mostly it's digging holes at night.”

Which was kind of a canine thing to do, actually.

He nodded a little, and it all slowly started to set in. Weird place, new people, fog, confusing. Lots of confusing. He'd said it multiple times.

“Is there a pack?” he asked. It had been a while since he'd been part of a pack. He told himself he didn't want to be. The pull in him told him he was lying.

“Sounds about right, then.” Digging holes at night, yeah, definitely a wolf thing to do. Robbie wouldn’t admit it out loud, but he definitely dug holes when he was a wolf. Chased squirrels. Tried to take down deer, and he was never fast enough.

There it was. The wave of confusion, the look on his face settling into something more what the fuck because, yeah, what the fuck. He gave him a moment, before he stepped up to him and placed a hand on his shoulder for a gentle squeeze.

He let go and turned towards the trees, walking over to grab the shirt and shoes he’d dropped off before shifting human again. “There’s a pack, yeah.” And he felt blue because that should be his pack, that’s what they all said, it was his pack and he belonged to them and Robbie wanted nothing more than to belong and be with a pack, like he’d never been before… that he could remember. “There’s a handful of wolves in Dunwich, all different kinds. Alpha’s name is Mark. Kitty is his second, I think.”

For a second, Isaac thought Robbie was trying to help with his pain and confusion, trying to ease a little bit of it out of him when he touched his shoulder. But it wasn't like that; it was just comforting. It was nice of him.

He watched him, a little puzzlement on his face as he seemed so down. Isaac could feel it, a little prickle of sadness. He could relate to it, kind of. Lonely sadness, not belonging.

He moved to follow him, reached out to set his hand on his shoulder. He'd return the favor, and the veins in his arm went black for a second as he siphoned away just a little bit of that pain.

“I've been in a few packs but none for a while now.”

That was a surprise - the hand on his own shoulder, the way he could see Isaac’s veins turn black and feel the relief in him, that green green relief. His breath shook a little, and Robbie relished in a moment of feeling actually okay.

“I’ve been in a few, too, but none that fit. Loosely in a pack I guess, you know, not really belonging.” He shrugged, because it was what it was. That was good enough for him, or it had been, he thought.

It really sucked that he’d apparently found one that did fit, and he didn’t remember it. “Since you went to France?”

It always reminded him of that first time, at the vet, when he'd helped the dog. It had made him so happy, joyful, that he'd helped something like that. They couldn't do it too much but it was nice every now and then, it reminded him that he could do something right.

“Yeah,” he agreed. He got that, not really belonging. “I tried to fit into a few different packs but it never really clicked. It's supposed to be easy, right? You're not supposed to feel like you're bending to fit.”

With Derek he'd been vicious. With Scott he'd tried to be like him. With Chris he'd tried to be a hunter, even if it wasn't a pack he still thought of Chris as his third alpha in a way.

“Yeah, since France.”

“What did you do, just then?” He asked, feeling lighter than he had in a while. Robbie turned back to look at Isaac, briefly, searching his face. How’d he do that? He was just a werewolf. Not a witch, not like - he didn’t even think the witches he knew could do that.

After lingering probably a little longer than necessary, Robbie turned and started for the town again, although it was clear with the slow pace he was not all that eager to get back to town. Just a destination for some point in the future, because eventually they’d probably want to eat and Isaac might want to quietly freak out about this place in the sanctuary of his own space.

“No, it’s supposed to feel right. Not like you’re bending or like it’s just… out of convenience, or something. It should feel like family.” Like love, but Robbie didn’t say that. He kept that to himself, though it was implied in his words. “I was sort of in a pack, I thought, but…”

It had all been a lie, if the stories were to be believed. If the things he sometimes dreamt were real. “Not ever a real one. C’mon, town’s not far.”

“Your wolves don't do that, where you're from?” Isaac asked. It must've been pretty weird, if Robbie had never seen it before. “It's this thing we do, we can take pain from someone. It helps them heal faster if it's spread around. It's not like you're healing them, it's just taking the pain and fear.”

It was hard to explain but what else was new, today?

He followed along, not minding the walk. They didn't seem in a hurry.

“Yeah,” he agreed. It should feel like family, but Isaac’s family hadn't even felt like family for a long while. Who could blame him for not being able to find a pack that felt right?

“You just got here too?”

“Not like that, no. We - we have these bonds, you know. I don’t know, I’ve never felt them as intensely as they should be since I’ve never really been in a pack, but you can sort of push that on each other - feelings of pack, family, love, all that. So you can help each other deal.” Which, again, he didn’t have and still did not and never remembered having. So Isaac’s touch, that little warmth that took some of that pain away? He imagined that’s maybe what it felt like.

This guy was a mystery, but Robbie already felt comfortable. “Just got here, yeah. Left one messed up situation for another I guess. It’s not… I mean there’s nothing wrong with this place that I’ve seen, but I’ve heard some weird things. I did see some fucked up lobster monster which apparently this town like worships I don’t even know man, it’s strange.”

He kept on with the slow pace, next to Isaac. Every so often, his shoulder would bump into Isaac’s. Robbie didn’t even notice. It was very, very natural for wolves in his world to be close. Usually not with strangers, but, well. Everyone was a stranger to Robbie. “Why’d you do that, though? Take my… pain or whatever. How’d you know?”

“Huh.” Isaac made a little sound like he was absorbing that information. “I guess it's more of a pull with us. Taking the bad. We can't really push the good.” He hesitated before he added, “and we can't do it too much. I've heard of alphas losing their status from doing it too much. Or it can wear you out.”

He nodded, right on board until Robbie mentioned that the town worshipped a lobster. “Is that just an east coast thing or just Dunwich or…?” he joked weakly. It was the craziest thing he'd heard yet, but he was trying so damn hard not to let it crack him.

He noticed, being close to someone, but that was just because he hadn't had a lot of friends in France. It reminded him of Beacon Hills.

“I could feel it. You were kind of, I don't know, heavy? I figured it wouldn't hurt. I didn't really think about what if your wolves didn't do that.”

It sort of seemed like the opposite of what they did with their pack ties, but to the same end. Trying to help, using that closeness to ease each other’s pain and sadness. Robbie appreciated it, it was the lightest he’d felt in a very long time.

“I think it’s just a Dunwich thing? But like, Maine really likes lobsters too. It’s also kind of an east coast thing. Who knows, man. The lobsters here are apparently giant like monsters. Everyone keeps calling them lobstrocities.” Or at least, that’s what the network said. He still wasn’t all that convinced.

It was like breathing, to Robbie, being close like this. The Bennett pack seemed more into physical touch than most wolves, but it was a wolf thing overall in his world. For scent, touch, closeness, bonding. For pack.

“Definitely didn’t hurt. It - its pretty nice, actually. I uh, I didn’t realize how heavy I’d been feeling. Things were weird before I came here, don’t know if its weirder or not but, it is what it is. What about you? How’s France? What were you doing all the way over there?”

“Lobstrosities,” Isaac repeated, his voice deadpan. That was the most ridiculous thing he'd ever heard but honestly, maybe it was a little comforting to have something totally insane and external to focus on. “Giant lobster monsters.”

He figured, hey, at least he'd hit the peak weirdness early. Nowhere to go now but up.

“Good,” he said simply, even if sometimes helping someone feel better felt a little foreign to him. It hadn't been a strong suit for a while. But he was glad he'd helped Robbie.

“It's a long story. I went with my,” he figured he should explain how he knew Chris. “I just started to date this girl, and she was killed by this thing we were fighting, so I went with her dad to finish up taking care of the thing,” he explained as succinctly as he could.

“So, France. And I stayed with him a while but I realized I'm always following someone. Alphas, Chris. So I figured I'd better figure myself out, so I just started working and being on my own for a couple years. I thought, why not France? I was already there, I was learning how to speak the language pretty well.”

He shrugged and looked over to Robbie. “Why were things weird before?” he asked him.

He knew he was saying a lot of weird shit and, just like he had been, Isaac was probably more than a little overwhelmed. Robbie leaned against him again as they walked, trying to push calmpeaceitsokayitsokayitsokay. It wasn’t a physical thing, it was an emotional thing, but it helped. At least it did in Robbie’s head.

Trying not to be too weird, he backed off again, space separating them at least a little bit as they went through the woods. He could see the edge of it not far off now. “Okay, killed by a thing. That’s descriptive.” Not that it was his business, or even if he’d said what it was that Robbie would even know what the thing was.

“I mean, I heard France is really nice so that’s kind of a fair deal. I would have done the same.” He had, but just all over America. Roaming. Forming loose and sad bonds that worked well enough to keep him from going Omega but not enough to stay anywhere for too long. “Things were weird uh, well, I guess I’ve had like five years or something of my memory erased. I don’t remember my pack, where I’d been, nothing, and the person I thought was my friend was… actually the person who stole my memories.”

Which sounded insane. He still didn’t believe it himself. He was sure he was going crazy, really, but he had given up trying to think too hard about any of it. At least for now. “That was kind of a lot, sorry man. I’m not doing a great job at this.”

Isaac didn't necessarily realize Robbie had done anything. He knew he felt a little better, calmer, a soft exhaled breath leaving him as he leaned back against him for a second. Everything was fine.

“Yeah, it was called a Nogitsune, it was this ancient dark spirit that possessed, well,” he gestured to Robbie a little. “Stiles. But we got it out of him. And then we had to put the thing we trapped it in, somewhere no one was going to find it.”

He frowned a little as Robbie spoke. That was awful, trusting someone and having them do that, steal all of that from you.

“Five years is such a long time. I've been a werewolf for five years and that feels like a whole lifetime. That's,” he trailed off, shaking his head. “That sucks, man. Do you think you'll get them back? The memories? They can't be gone forever, they've got to just be locked away or something,” he suggested.

The past had a way of sticking with you like that. “I think you're doing all right,” he assured him.

Okay yeah, he definitely did not know what Nogitsune was but fortunately, Isaac explained a little more and Robbie could follow that. “That’s a lot. I mean good on you though, getting it out and everything. Damn.” Dark spirit, possession. Will you hear me, dear? Robbie tensed, because he was thinking of himself as that possessed person, since he looked so much like this Stiles guy, and the he realized.

Yeah. Yeah he wasn’t possessed, but he was still dangerous. The trigger was still there. The magic that blocked his memories, the magic that had taken the best parts of his life from him was strong and lingering and moved like poison, rotting all the good things inside him.

He kept going, though, because that’s all he could do. Keep going. “I’m underselling that… a bit.” Five years wasn’t enough, if what they were saying was true. “Must be more like…” He did the math. He arrived in Caswell in 2019. He was told he had been in Green Creek since 2013. Not to mention, he didn’t remember being in Caswell the first time. “I guess it was.. Probably more like eight, maybe ten. I don’t know.”

There was a lot he didn’t know, and he bumped shoulders with Isaac again as they stepped out of the trees, a little residential part of the town sprawling out before them. “I don’t know if they’re gone forever. We tried to get them back already but it didn’t work. They said maybe it’d be different here, because the witch who did this to me isn’t in this world.” He shrugged and sighed. “We’ll see. Anyway, Pickman is close and I can help you find all the you know all the initial stuff to get settled, if you want me to.”

“So unless your kind of wolves age a lot differently than mine, that's a huge chunk of your life,” Isaac blurted out before he could really think about being tactful. He was blunt, sometimes it wasn't the best quality. “Like half, almost.”

That really sucked. He had foggy memories of some parts of childhood, which he'd heard happened when things weren't the best, but just missing a huge chunk of your life like that… Isaac thought he didn't know who he was, he couldn't imagine Robbie.

“Yeah,” he said, in agreement. “Uh, that'd be good, yeah.” He didn't know what to say to Robbie. It wasn't like he could fix his memory or give him back anything.

“Do you guys do anchors?” he asked him.

“I mean, it’s not - I’m like, almost thirty dude. So its a big chunk but not like half.” He wasn’t sure why he was offended by that, when he should be flattered. Maybe he didn’t look twenty-nine. That was good, right? Especially since he only remembered his life from when he was around twenty and earlier.

That still gave him pause though, a lot to think about. It was a huge portion of his life. It was why he felt so out of place all the time. “A third is still a lot.” He finally said, before shaking his head and heading out onto the sidewalk. “Pickman’s about five minutes from here.”

Isaac’s question about anchors had Robbie raising a brow, looking at the other wolf curiously. “Anchors? We call them tethers, but I’m going to go ahead and guess it means the same thing. It’s the thing that keeps you human, keeps you from just giving into the wolf fully, right?”

Isaac scoffed, looking at Robbie a little closer for a second. He looked a little younger, but werewolves did age well. “I would've guessed you were my age, I'm 21,” he reasoned. “Maybe it's the Stiles thing.” Made sense. He was probably going to have to be careful of not expecting Robbie to be and do certain things just because of Stiles.

“Yeah,” he agreed. It was a lot. He nodded. “Yeah, that's an anchor. Kind of cool we all have the same kind of thing. You still have yours, right? You didn't lose it with your memory or anything?”

It was pretty important to have, not just for everybody else's safety. To be safe in yourself, kind of. Keep from losing yourself like Malia had, stuck in the coyote for so long.

“I shaved, I look like a baby when I shave.” He should have left the facial hair, honestly. Probably shouldn’t have cut his hair, either, the rougher look did make him look more his age. Without it, and the glasses, well. He looked a little silly but it was what it was.

He still thought he was hot, anyway. “I wonder if that’s universal. There’s other types of werewolves here, different from me and you I think. I wonder if they have tethers. Anchors. I didn’t lose mine, no. My tether has always been the same thing, since my first shift.” Even eight years of memory loss would never change that.

“So are your anchors - are they things, people, what makes something an anchor?”

“Man, I suck at growing facial hair,” Isaac admitted with a laugh. “I don't look older, I look like I'm getting my mug shot taken for getting drunk and fighting a clown at the circus.”

Sad but true.

He nodded a little bit. “Yeah, they're people or things or memories. Whatever it is, something that reminds you of who you are. It can change, evolve, whatever.”

His own was kind of a weird topic, but Isaac didn't mention it. “So other wolves, huh? There are others like you. I wonder if there's anyone I know.” But if no one else had called Robbie ‘Stiles’ before, maybe not.

Robbie snorted, patting Isaac’s shoulder in a pity kind of way. “Yikes, that really paints a picture. Specific. Have you had your mug shot taken for getting drunk and fighting a clown at the circus, Isaac?” The smirk widened into a smile as Robbie watched Isaac, brow raised in amusement.

As for anchors vs tethers, Robbie nodded. “It’s the same for us. It can be a feeling, a memory, you know all that kind of stuff. That’s so weird, that it’s similar like that. Cool.” His own tether was a weird topic, too. It was hard to explain how it could still be his mother, given she’d died when he was so young.

“Yeah, other wolves. I - I haven’t met them yet, just one really. I don’t know if anyone else you know is here, or if they are and just from… different times, like the ones I know are. At least this is the first time I’ve been called Stiles.”

“Yeah, not since I shaved,” Isaac joked back with a little chuckle, nudging his shoulder against Robbie’s a little. It had really been a long time since he'd joked around with someone like this. It was nice.

“Yeah, it is cool. Maybe all wolves are kind of like that, needing an attachment. I knew a girl, she was a coyote, changed when she was really young and she got stuck for so long. She ran totally wild in the coyote for I think ten years,” he said. “Maybe we all need something so we don't do that.”

Isaac nodded. “Anybody I know would've called you Stiles,” he agreed. So just him, he thought, and he was kind of sad about that. “Oh well,” he said.”

“That’s good, man. Probably should stay that way if the beard thing makes you fight clowns.” Which ultimately made Robbie shudder, a little, because of all things he wasn’t afraid of - well, he didn’t really like clowns. He noted, a little, that Isaac had nudged his shoulder against Robbie’s. Maybe it was common where he was from, too, to rely so much on touch.

It was about scent, where he was from. Touch mixed scents, and mixing scents made bonds stronger. It was a lot of things, it meant a lot of things and it meant different things to different wolves. For Robbie, it felt like calm. It felt like peace.

“Wow, that’s a long time. In mine if you lose your tether, if you don’t have an alpha and a pack and a tether you can end up an Omega, and Omegas, well.” He knew he was wrong about them, now. Some of them at least. Or maybe all of them, he wasn’t sure. “You end up being more wolf than not. Feral, basically. Sometimes. Most of the time, I think.”

It was all complicated now, he wasn’t sure what he knew. “They could show up, you never know. Mark told me - he’s from my world, he’s the Alpha here now, for their pack. He told me he was alone for a long time, before anyone else showed up. You never know.”

“Yeah, you say that until you see a clown that needs fighting. Then you'll be looking for my help.” Isaac found it easier to joke and tease than it was to think that he was here in a weird place with a pack he didn't know, and even if he wanted to go home he didn't think he could.

It'd always been an option, back in France. He could take his savings, buy a plane ticket, go back and find somebody he knew.

“Yeah,” he agreed, reaching up to rub the back of his neck. “So what's the pack like, here? What's Mark like?”

Robbie nodded his head solemnly, looking seriously at Isaac with the straightest face he could possibly muster. “You’re absolutely right. If I encounter any scary clowns, will you please save me?” He teased back, because yeah. It was a lot easier to joke around than it was to really deal with what was going on here.

He felt the blue coming from Isaac, and tried to push again - they didn’t have bonds, not really, but he thought maybe it didn’t matter here, in this world. That maybe there was enough magic here, enough mystical moon bullshit that maybe he’d feel it anyway and he pushed itsokaywe’reokayyou’reokay.

They were coming up on Pickman pretty quick, and Robbie naturally found himself, selfishly maybe, slowing his pace just a little more. “I don’t know about the pack. Guess I’ve been kind of hiding out since I got here. Mark is quiet, he’s reassuring. Nice. Always seems to know the right thing to say. Kitty is kind of… motherly, I guess? She’s got this air about her. Carter is funny, easy to feel comfortable around. Gordo’s a dick, but it’s mostly for show. I’m pretty sure he’s soft underneath all that.”

As for the others, he didn’t know. He barely knew any of them, even the ones he supposedly should have known. “Guess we’ll have to learn about them together.”

Isaac smirked a little, nodding in agreement. “Sure, you just let me know, I'll come to the rescue.” There wouldn't be any creepy attack clowns in this town though, obviously.

He let out a breath and felt his shoulders relax just slightly. Yeah, maybe it would be okay, here. New people, new place. It'd been good for him in France.

“Doesn't sound too bad,” Isaac noticed they were slowing a little but it didn't bother him. Things were probably going to start moving around him when they got to where they were going. There was going to be stuff to figure out. Stretching this moment out a little didn't sound so bad an idea.

“Yeah, that sounds good,” Isaac told him, offering a little smile.

“Thanks man, I’m pretty awesome but I can play damsel in distress when it comes to clowns.” Which was kind of true, because Robbie thought clowns were creepy as all hell, so it was mostly a joke with a hint of truth underneath there.

Of course, Dunwich might have monsters but they didn’t have killer clowns. Right?

“I think they’re alright. Just complicated with me and them, that’s all. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try and figure out whether they’re right for you on your own, too, even if I decide not to.” He didn’t want to influence anyone based on his own convoluted issues.

Robbie smiled back, wondering what kind of world this is that he’d find another werewolf in the woods randomly, who knew someone who looked exactly like him. Weird, weird world. He wasn’t all that mad about it, either. “Yeah? I think it does too. Pickman is right there.” He pointed towards the building which looked small and unassuming, from the outside.

“It’s bigger on the inside, which is weird. There’s a like, community fund of money that you can use to get basics like food and clothing. The rooms are free. There’s a - get this, and I know man, I know its a lot - there’s a fucking portal that will take you to another building owned by other people like us. They have a free pantry, free clothes and stuff there, too.”

There was a lot to take in. Isaac stopped for a second to look up at Pickman, and reached up to scratch the back of his head. Bigger on the inside, portal, free stuff. His hesitation was palpable. He looked over to Robbie again and then sighed.

“Okay,” he said simply. What else could he say? The place was going to be weird whether he was cool with it or not.

“I guess I'm going to figure out where my room is. But you want to meet back up later?” he suggested.

Robbie could feel that he’d overwhelmed him and he grimaced, giving him an awkward, straight line smile of oops, sorry. He reached is hand out, patting Isaac on the shoulder again and nodding. “It’s going to be okay, I swear.”

He just wanted to reassure him, because he knew what this was like. Hell he’d just had the same feelings barely over a week ago. “Yeah, there’s a like, reception lobby area right inside and there’s always someone working, so they can give you your room and if you had a cell phone in your pocket it’s probably already connected to the network and to all of us stuck here. So you can message me or something, if you need to. Or want to.”

A reassuring smile, and then they were at Pickman and Robbie motioned towards the front door. He wouldn’t follow him in, even though Robbie lived there too. He still wanted to run.