While used to being high energy, Kami was feeling particularly riled up the last few days, and so she was practically bouncing as she flitted around, helping to tidy up (not that Amy Reed let there be much that needed doing!) as the pack started filtering in. She'd arrived early with a large foil tray filled with fried kotlet to share.

That social feeling only seemed to grow as people arrived, though when a familiar face walked in that she hadn't seen in years, she practically squealed. "Caspian! What are you doing here? When did you get in town?" Kami asked, crossing quickly to him and squeezing her arms around him in a friendly hug. She hadn't seen him in five years, but she would remember his face anywhere! Eleven years her senior, she'd always looked up to him and Eric.

---

Cap smiled a big, bashful grin at Kami's reaction to seeing him and her excited welcome. "Just a couple days ago, pretty bad timing with the Moon, but when Craig reached out about my move, he invited me along for the run," he said, hugging her back softly. Kami was a high schooler when he'd last seen her, but the feeling of 'family' and 'comfort' rushed back to him at their reunion.

"How've you been? How do you like it here?" God, there was so much to catch up on. He had only really been in touch with Eric over the years since the Pack had migrated fully to the east coast. He stepped back and couldn't help but to look her over like an old auntie might at the only holiday you see each other every year.

---

Her eyes bugged out a little bit, and she laughed, shaking her head. Traveling that close to the moon when you weren't traveling away from civilization did seem a bit crazy. "Move? You've moved here? It's not just a visit?" she asked, firing off the questions in quick succession, excited at the thought. It had been a strange sort of disconnect when she'd chosen to move here with the Reeds, when the pack had split with so many of them staying behind in Washington.

"Good, really good! I love it here," she answered. Of course, being only eighteen when they'd moved, she didn't really have experience being independent anywhere else, and she'd truly built a life here. When he stepped back and seemed to be looking her over, she held her arms out at the sides with a chuckle. "I know, right? I'm all grown up!" She didn't get the impression he was checking her out, though Kami wasn't sure if she was disappointed or relieved. But the Reeds and the Puceys had always felt like family to her, so maybe she should be relieved.

---

"You did! Hard to believe," he replied, shaking his head and then chuckling at her arms out and her showing off. "I thought you were supposed to always be that gangly kid I knew, did you know that?" he joked.

"I'm glad you've liked it here," he said sincerely, looking around the little gathering. It hit him for the first time, really hit him, that the Pack had been irrevocably split in two when some had chosen to stay behind. He had been one of them. And he'd thought at the time that he'd done the right thing. But now... Now he wasn't so sure. Suddenly his heart hurt. Not because of Fiona - though lately that had been the only thing he'd been able to feel - but because of how he hadn't realized how much he'd missed these people over the years. They were family to him, his Pack, as much family as his parents and Eli.

---

Giggling, Kami scrunched up her nose and stuck her tongue out at him. "Just cause you were already a giant when I joined the family," she accused teasingly. It was true, though, that she'd blossomed in the ten years since she was turned, from a scrawny, sickly thirteen-year-old to the strong, trim twenty-three-year-old standing before him now. Even the last five years had seen changes, Kami filling out into adulthood.

There was something in his tone and eyes that had her furrowing her brow at him. "Hey," she said gently, stepping closer and resting a hand on his upper arm. "Are you okay?" she asked, not sure what was going on in his head but certain that he was feeling something hard in that moment.

---

He shook his head, "Yeah, I am, I just..." He breathed out in a woosh, "I missed you. Everyone." He corrected himself - he had missed Kami, of course, but... everyone.

"I think it didn't really hit me until now, isn't that weird?" Why would it just hit him as he's seeing everyone again? Maybe the loss of Fi had left a chasm inside of him that he didn't notice until he saw for himself all the people he'd given up for her...

---

Even though she understood what he'd meant, Kami gave him a rather sympathetic smile when he elaborated. She could imagine why he was feeling that way; it was a large part of why she'd decided to move with the Reeds out this way five years ago. She hadn't been able to imagine being separated from such a core part of her Pack. They were her family just as much as her mother was.

"I don't think it's weird at all, Cap," she reassured him. She looped an arm around his back and squeezed him in a side-hug. "I feel confident in speaking for everyone that we missed you too, and we're all excited you're here." She still couldn't quite believe that after five years, he'd finally decided to move out here. She wondered absently why Fiona wasn't with him, but she wasn't going to be a busybody about it. She would just hope that someone brought it up eventually while she was in earshot.

---

Caspian hugged her back, grateful for the support - both emotional and physical. When his nickname came out of her so easily, that feeling of home settled into his heart, warm and heavy, again.

"So, what's the dish? Help a guy out, Eric has been - notoriously - tightlipped over the years. I hear he has a girl, but that's all I know. Won't even give me her name! And he hasn't been all that open about how things with the Pack are going..." He gave her a silly, pleading look. Cappie loved gossip, and deep down really did want to know how everyone was doing.

---

Still settled against his side, Kami tipped her head to look at him with raised brows at the request. Eric really hadn't told Cappie?! "Dude," she whispered urgently. "You have no idea." There was so much gossip about Eric, half of which she was sure Eric wasn't even aware that she was aware of, but she did so love knowing things.

She stared at him for a long moment, her lips pressed together in a tight line though her dimples showed she was hiding a smile. "Maria," she finally said. Her own feelings on Eric and Maria were incredibly mixed. On the one hand, Maria was a badass and she loved her. On the other hand, Eric was a bit of a dope and Maria could do so much better. An adorable dope, to be sure, but still a dope.

---

Blinking a few times as the information sort of settled into his brain... Maria... As in... Maria?! No wonder Eric hadn't given his girl a name. "Wait, Maria? Like... Maria." He stuttered. "Maria Maria." He cocked his head. "Like, Maria? Our Maria." It was like the word sounded weird suddenly, or foreign. Caspian could speak four languages with pretty high proficiency, and this one word had him confounded.

"No way," he finally got out, looking scandalized and delighted. Maria was of age these days - Eric had whined non-stop about her turning eighteen and being moved in with him - so that part didn't bother him, but she was also like a little sister to him back in the day so... That part was weird! Less so for Eric to be interested in her... Eric had always kept his distance from the younger wolf. He'd been charged with her protection and hated every part of it, so he'd been aloof, absent, even.

Cap was downright giddy over this information. Oh, he was going to make Eric's life hell teasing him for this.

---

Cappie's reaction was everything, and Kami tried hard to contain her giggles, though she wasn't doing a very good job of it. "Mmhmm," she confirmed on a hum. There was a little about it that was weird, but mostly Kami just thought Maria was way too amazing for Eric, and a part of her wished she was into ladies so she could have tried to steal her away from Eric. Alas, it just wasn't to be!

"Way," she confirmed again. "They're disgustingly sweet, too. Ugh! You should see the way they look at each other when they don't think anyone can see, not even the other." She sighed wistfully at that. Maybe someday she would have something like that, but she wasn't in a rush. She'd find her wolf in shining fur when she was meant to.

---

Caspian was giggling as she continued, but they were soon in the path of Craig and Amy and both tried to school their faces. "Packmaster," Caspian greeted Mr. Reed with a hand out to shake. "Amy," he said, warmth in his voice obvious and effusive, as he leaned in to hug her. Amy was like everyone's Mom. She was the perfect partner for a Packmaster, which made him think of Maria... He... Well, that made him pause in his giddy, silly thoughts about making fun of his best friend.

Eric would probably eventually be taking over leadership of Reed Pack, right? It just made sense to Caspian... but Maria... as the next generations Amy?

Oh dear... he thought, as he gave Kami a quick hug and then followed Craig's command (without compulsion, but a command nonetheless) to walk with him.

The two men caught up - mostly, Craig wanted to know if this was a traveling visit, or if he had plans to 'rejoin' the Pack. Officially. Cap was honest in his answers, that he did plan on staying in the area, at least for a good bit, but that he wasn't sure about his Pack plans. If there would be any at all. Craig took it all well, well, Cap thought he did. He was a hard man to read. And before long, Amy was calling everyone to the picnic tables for dinner before the moon had risen, and then the evening was upon them.