Doug had already packed his things, but was too impatient to wait for the others.

He had already discussed his plans with his parents, and they had agreed to let him do whatever he felt was right.  And to him, this felt right.

He didn't know how long he'd been walking already.  It felt like weeks, but night hadn't even fallen yet.  He silently prayed to himself that no full moons, blood moons, or moonless and starless nights would occur while he was traveling.  Those were the last things he needed.  They were the most dangerous nights of all — even the sirens didn't sing on those nights.

Everyone knows that on blood moons, vampires thirst for blood more than ever, and on full moons, werewolves have an uncontrollable urge to kill everything and everyone in sight.  Those were the nights that monsters prowled around outside and everyone had to stay awake and alert to protect themselves and their families.

However, moonless and starless nights were the worst.  Those are the nights the stokliers come out.

Thankfully, those nights only happen once a month, so there hopefully won't be any problems with that.

He did, however, have problems with the lightning storm.  Bolts of lightning struck often.  It never failed to make him jump.  Lightning was one of his worst fears...one of them.  It was quite aways down on the list of his fears, though.  His top fear is losing his family and/or friends.

He paused when he heard whining nearby. Nervous, he ran off to hide.

Breeze ran past in husky form, not noticing Doug, who hesitated and peeked out at the husky neko.

"..who's that? What's he running from? And...why's he so skinny?" he whispered to himself. Despite not wanting to share, he gave a quick bark to tell the husky neko to stop and tossed out a small piece of meat.

Breeze froze and glanced over nervously, but perked up when he saw the meat. He went back over and sniffed it to see if it was safe to heat, then hesitantly took a bite of it before wolfing it down. He looked around for the one that had tossed the meat.

Doug tossed out another piece of meat without revealing himself, and Breeze went over and ate it too.

"Okay, who's doing this?"

Doug remained still and silent. Breeze sniffed the air to try to find any scents.

"...a werewolf? I thought werewolves don't share."

"Racist!" Doug suddenly barked, then covered his mouth with his hand.

Breeze jumped and looked over before creeping over. Doug flinched away.

"...hello?" Breeze whined, his ears back nervously. Doug seemed equally afraid. "...d-don't worry, I w-won't hurt you...just please don't hurt me...!"

"...I wont hurt anyone." Doug muttered under his breath.

Breeze tilted his head. "...well, what's a lone werewolf doing all the way out here...?"

"... searching."

"For what?"

"It's more of a who..."

"Well, for who then?"

"My sister."

"What do you mean?"

"She was kidnapped."

Breeze's ears immediately went straight back. "K-k-k-kidnapped!?"

"...what's gotten you so worked up?"

"T-th-there's a g-g-g-gang...o-o-of s-s-s-s-smugglers...t-t-they m-might be the o-o-ones w-who k-kidnapped h-h-h-her..."

"Gang of smugglers?" Doug repeated.

"Y-y-yeah...I-I'm a r-r-runaway fr-fr-from them. T-they w-w-w-wanna k-k-kill m-m-me..."

"...why?"

"I-i-it's a long story that I'd r-rather not talk about..." Breeze whined.

Doug rolled his eyes. "Fine. Could you at least show me where the smugglers are?"

Breeze hesitated for a moment before nodding. "I-I can show you...b-but I can't go in with you."

"I can handle going in on my own."

Breeze nodded again before running towards the direction of the gang's camp. Doug followed close behind.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ • ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The group met up together again.

"...where's Doug?" Sasha asked.

"I don't know..." Cory muttered nervously.

Kasai paced back and forth. "If he doesn't get here soon, we'll have to leave without him! We don't have time to wait aro- AHH!" She screamed and jumped back as a lightning bolt struck in front of her.

Flash casually grabbed Zakk's hand as hard as she could. Zakk flinched. "Ow...Flash, careful much?"

"...sorry." She let go.

Katie whined as she stayed close to Streak. "This is baaaaaad..."

"Calm, Katie, calm." Streak muttered comfortingly.

"... looks like we'll have to just go without him." Sasha muttered with a sigh.

"Guess so. We can't keep waiting around here." Kasai agreed, crossing her arms. "Maybe he already left. C'mon, let's go."

She led the way out of the forest with the rest of the group behind her.