The wolves had always been there; this was just the first time I saw them for what they were. It all started when Canada absorbed the U.S after world war 3, I was only 5 when that happened but I could see that things were changing. My family packed up and moved to a small town right on the edge of the Border where I attended the town's middle school with the same 50 kids I had met when we first moved. When I was 9 two twin boys moved to town and shortly after they began going to the school. The first day I met them I thought something was off. They were twins but they looked completely different and they had completely different personalities but that wasn't all that stood out to me. They had a weird aura that surrounded them; it was like that of a dog or a wild animal. At the time I thought it was just my imagination and they weren't exactly the talkative type so no one really knew where they came from. everybody else treated them like normal so I thought I would do the same but like I said they weren't really chatty. Fast forward to when we were 14 we went on a field trip to the National Lab. The bus ride took forever since we live so far away but when we got there we were excited to see all the scientists and what they've been working on, our teacher told us that it was going to be amazing so we were at least going to get what we came for. The field trip was going well and we were moving on to the third floor of the lab when a red light started to flash and alarms echoed through the building. My teacher grabbed all of us and started running towards the exit as she was instructed by the scientists to make sure we didn't run off or get lost. as we were running down the stairs I noticed that the twins were gone. I turned around and went back upstairs and started looking for them around the third floor. I found them in the lab huddled around something they looked upset at and I was confused when they saw me. They panicked and threw a vial at me. hit the wall shattering, releasing gas into the air. Before I could tell what was going on my mind started to go blank and inadvertently breathed in a decent amount of smoke even though I had tried not to. I felt like I was going to faint and I collapsed right then and there. The last thing I remember is hearing Marcus yell at Blake for throwing that vile at me. When I woke up I was in the hospital back in our little town asking one of the nurses what happened and she said that I had fainted and the two of my classmates brought me back. she didn't know she told me to wait for my parents to get back so I did. I was in the hospital for a few days after that but when I was discharged I was swarmed outside the hospital by my classmates, well all except two. When I got home it was around 3 so my mom asked me if I was hungry and to my surprise I was actually very hungry so she made me some food and when I was done eating I had the strangest feeling. I had eaten a lot but I was still hungry and it was as if I had not eaten at all and I was really tired. It was confusing but I didn't want to worry so I just went up to my room and lay down for a bit. The night fell and I wasn't tired anymore but I hadn't slept.I had assumed that it was just from being in the hospital and laying around all the time so I thought nothing of it. I got up to take a shower and when I looked in the mirror my face was different. It took me a while to realize that my two teeth were bigger and slightly pointed at the ends. just freaked me out a bit but I didn't want my mom to worry so I left it alone. I have been about a week and I had figured some things out, one that no matter how much food I eat I was always hungry, tubing that I never was asleep at night I was only sleepy during the day but I could sleep at right if I forced myself to, and three that something had happened at the lab that Marcus and Blake knew. I had spent the night at a friend's and she picked up on my lack of sleep during the night.She turned to me and said "You must be nocturnal if you're not tired by now." II laughed it off not thinking much of it but it wasn't into that following Monday at school but I realized that I was just like a nocturnal animal. I was so confused but I knew I had to talk to Marcus and Blake now at least try to fill in some of the blanks of what happened on that day. I caught them after school on their walk home and they wouldn't talk to me. It was not too surprising though they were always very closed off. Marcus was nicer than Blake when they were together it was like only they mattered and they were on their own Planet but when they were apart you could clearly see that Marcus was way more than that, and when Blake was by himself he was just more rude. I went home that night and thought about all the possibilities of what can be going on with me and I came to the conclusion that I need to get Marcus alone so that I could ask him about what happened because there was no way that Blake was going to say anything or let Marcus tell me I think he was around so I had to figure out how I could separate them. Two weeks later I noticed that Blake was staying late at school because he didn't fail the majority of his classes and Marcus walked home alone. I followed him without even thinking about what I was doing. when I was following him I noticed that he wandered off into the woods and I was confused so like any smart person I followed him. in hindsight that wasn't a good decision but I did it anyway, what I saw when I found him was shocking. he went to some old abandoned Cemetery that was pretty beaten up and almost unrecognizable I hid behind a couple of trees and watched as he stood there and looked like he was in pain. he's grabbing his head and bending down as if you're trying to contain something. when he stood back up the scariest thing happened. behind ears that more pointed up out of his head and he had his tail and his hands look like paws. it was almost as if he was "A dog!" I whispered to myself as I moved from behind the tree slightly to get a better look. Of course what happened next was even scarier. I stepped on some leaves and inevitably crunched. He turned around frantically and looked at me. We made eye contact and I panicked. His teeth were sharp and sticking out of his face and his eyes were bright golden brown. "Maddie!" I turned around and ran as fast as I could. I thought I was hallucinating. I had no idea what I just witnessed when I got back to the road. I noticed that Blake was walking home. It was just my luck that he noticed me Breathing heavily. Running Out of the Woods he looked at me and his confusion turned to Pure rage as he realized exactly what I had just seen. He started walking toward me aggressively and I freaked out and ran again. "Ugh Marcus you idiot!" Blake yelled as he ran down into the woods. When I got home I was in pure shock and had no idea what I was supposed to think or say and I had no idea what I even knew. I pretended like I was sick for 2 weeks but my mother eventually forced me to go back to school. When I went back I was worried but Marcus and Blake were gone. I asked around a bit and everyone said that they hadn't been School for the past couple of days. I tried to think nothing of it but my mind couldn't help but Wonder do the most unrealistic of scenarios. I was so confused as to what was real and what wasn't anymore and if my entire life has been a lie and if this had something to do with the changes that occurred with me after we visited the lab. It has been about 3 days and it was Friday. I was walking home from school. When I got there my parents informed me that Marcus and Blake wouldn't be returning to school for a while because they've been sent to a boarding school across the state. There's no doubt in my mind that this had something to do with me and what I saw. After a few months I had assumed that I would never see them again, and I didn't until my second year of high school. We were 17 and they came back. gave me a very smooth transition back into school and pretended like they were just visiting old friends. It was odd how normal it felt. I had avoided them the first two days of school, I wonder if they've forgotten about that day a few years back when I saw Marcus in the woods. I know it has been quite a while but it was still fresh in my mind like it happened yesterday. When I finally saw them it was odd. I approached me and I was getting two very different signals. "Maddie, how have you been? It's been a while nice to see you doing well." Marcus said, I was so confused as to what he was. He was more Charming than ever and let's just say that the years have been kind to him. Blake on the other hand skopt looked at me and rolled his eyes. change one bit but his bone structure was more to find in his face and I couldn't help but notice he was handsome. "Yeah long time no see." I said looking away trying to maintain my composure, Blake looked at Marcus who was looking at "Youve got to be kidding me." he scoffed as he pushed past me and walked on the whole. Marcus and I just stood there awkwardly staring at each other smiling like idiots. I had remembered at that moment that I had wanted to talk to Marcus alone that day that I found him in the woods and I figured now's my chance because I was still curious and I had changed over the years too. an incident last year with a little bit of blood and feeling like I was going to kill somebody I had also managed to come up with a cohesive way of sleeping during both the day and the night to compromise with my body. I figured if I was ever going to get a chance this would be it so I might as well take it and that's exactly what I did. " I have to get to class but can we talk later? There's some things I wanted to ask you, that is if you have time." " I am pretty busy, but I don't mind wasting my time with you, catching up with an old friend I mean." he said, staring at his feet trying to hide his face as if I didn't notice he was blushing. "Perfect uh, diner at 5?" "I'll see you there." My plan was in motion. I would get to see him tonight and hopefully answer what I needed both about what happened to me and what happened to him. I went to class and had a certain sense of security and knowing that I would finally get some kind of closure. That night I went to the diner and waited for Marcus. When he got there he sat down across from me and we started talking. "Anyways, what did you want to talk about?" "I was wondering, what are you?" "I'm not sure I understand what you're asking-" "You know what I mean Marcus." I said as he looked at me with a sense of remorse. " You really want to know?" He asked as he extended his hand towards me. "Yes I wasn't the whole story." I said as I put my hand in his. "Fine then I would spare you the details.When Blake and I were born the doctors pressured our mother into putting us in a clinical trial. They had a drug that was supposed to enhance the animal genes in a human's genetic makeup. They essentially wanted to give us the strength and agility of animals. There were about a dozen other kids in the trial, all given a different animal. Since Blake and I were twins they infuzed both of our DNA with that of a wolf. We were picked at and poked for 5 years. Our mother eventually said that we were unhappy and demanded that they stop the testing. Slowly all the other children involved in the trial died after they started to show signs of the animals that their DNA had been infused with. My mom panicked and wanted them to cure us before we started to show traits of wolves.They eventually gave us some injection that they said would kill the genetic modification before it became life threatening. However we shortly realized that they had just pumped us full of stabilizers that delayed the manifestation of our animal parts. for the three years that we thought we were cured our bodies were producing both animal and human hybrid genes when we turned eight they finally manifested and both Blake and I started to adjust into wolves little by little. Her parents were absolutely terrified so they moved us here, where they thought we could go undetected. And for the most part it worked until that day you saw me in the woods. it was always harder for me than it was Blake because he had been able to control his transitions, I however was not so lucky. I told my mom I wanted to go to boarding school so that I didn't ever have to scare anybody because I was different and Blake decided to come with me because he didn't want me to be alone. While we were at boarding school I got better at containing it so I said I wanted to come back and here we are.Is there anything else you want to know?" I just sat there in shock holding his hand, I eventually faded back into reality taking in everything he had said and there was just one thing I was still unsure of. "I do have one question actually. When we went on that trip to the lab in grade school, why were the two of you snooping in that room?" "We had a few of the lab staff talking and they mentioned one of the doctors that was involved with the trial. We heard that he was experimenting with new gene mutations and we wanted to see if we could find a cure by any chance. We were digging around and that's when you found us." "Oh." "I forgot, I never apologized for Blake throwing that vile at you. I have to admit I was worried you'd be poisoned but I'm glad you were ok." He said as he gave my hand a little squeeze and I couldn't help but laugh. I looked at him and he was genuinely confused as to what was so amusing. "I'm sorry did I miss something?" He asked, looking at me as if I was crazy. "Yes, I just found it funny that you brought that up." "Why?" "Well I wasn't poisoned per say but I was affected by whatever was in that vile. Now that I know the contents of that room belonged to the same scientist that worked on the same thing that turned you and your brother, I have a feeling that the same thing had happened to me." He looked shocked, his eyes were full of pity and remorse. "I-I'm so sorry, what happened, I had no idea." "Well when I first started to change it was weird because I was unable to sleep at night and no matter how much I ate there was always this undeniable hunger that never went away." "Do you know what anime you have been infused with, it sounds like something nocturnal." "That's what I thought and I was sure it was bad DNA until-" "Until what, what happened?" "Well I have fangs, and there was an incident with some blood and well." "What? It Couldn't have been that bad- ``''I almost killed Marcus." "What!" "That undeniable hunger that I had always felt. That was blood lust, I came to the conclusion that I am some sort of vampire human bat thing." I was on the verge of tears, I had never told anyone that story. It was a bit of a touchy subject and quite frankly I was scared that he was going to think of me as some kind of monster. I hadn't noticed that he had grabbed my hand a bit tighter and put his other hand on top of my holding it as if it was a lifeline. "I am truly sorry that we did this to you,no one deserved to suffer the way we did. Will you ever be able to forgive me?" I was shocked, he was being apologetic, I looked into his eyes and I saw pain he was hurting inside. "There's nothing to forgive. It was just an unfortunate sequence of events, I'm not mad." He didn't let go and neither did I. We just sat there for what felt like eternity. We eventually said our goodbyes and He walked me home. I felt like a weight had been lifted off of my chest, but I couldn't imagine how Marcus was feeling. I couldn't help but remember how he felt guilty for my situation. "Hey, I'm home." Marcus said as he walked through the front door dropping his bag,and hanging up his jacket. "Where have you been?" Blake said from the kitchen as Macus walked in. "I was with Maddie." "You left at 5, it's 9. You were talking to Maddie for four hours?" Blake talked to everyone like they were beneath him and his tone had always been malice but he rarely acted that way with Marcus.They shared a bond that was so strong that for the longest time they didn't have or feel the need to invite others into their world. "Yes we were at the diner." "Well you two seemed cozy this morning." He said rudely. "Don't do that." "Do what?" Blake asked, being more obnoxious than ever. "Don't talk about her like that, you have no idea what she's going through." "Ha yes Marcus I'm sure she got it so rough, she's a little princess what could she possibly have going on that's worse than anything we've been through. Please enlighten me." He almost yelled the last word. "She's a hybrid." Marcus said quietly. "Hillaros." "I mean it, she really is just like you and me." "That's impossible, there's no one left. No one could have tuned her." "Blake, you did." Marcus said as hesteped closer to his brother. "How would I have-" It hit him like a bus, he had suddenly realized. "What is she?" He asked as he buried his head in his hands in disbelief. "She's a vampire." "How is it that even possible vampires don't exist? There's no way that could have happened." His head started spinning and he was overwhelmed with guilt. Truth be told Blake had always had a thing for Maddie but he never knew how to go about telling her. So he ignored her for the most part, their interactions short and hostile. "She thinks she was infused with a bat, and if that's true there was something in the new formula that her body modified or rejected causing her DNA to alter into a new type of animal, and her traits manifested way faster than ours. She hasn't been able to turn yet but she might not have the ability to do so and she might end up like the others." When Marcus said that out loud he got uneasy, what if she did inevitably die like all the others. She was the girl Marcus had always been rather fond of and he wanted to tell her. "Don't say that, she won't, she can't be like the rest." "She won't, I'll make sure she's safe, it's not your fault." "But it is, well it's not like it matters." He regained his composure and tried to shake it off, Blake was upset but he didn't need to show it. "It's not my problem to bother yourself with the burden if you want to, I'm going to bed." Just as transparent as always Marcus thought. It was no secret that Blake was the more deviant of the two and he was arrogant and overconfident. Marcus however could see right through that, you could say it was from never being around anyone else, or from shared traumatic experience, or it could just be plain only brothers intuition either way he knew Blake was upset. Marcus eventually went to bed as well and they had both hoped that when they woke up things would be back to normal, if only things were that simple. "Hey Marcus wanna group up with me, Candice is already in a group so I'm all alone." "Yeah sure you can join Blake and I." "No!" Blake said paying me absolutely no attention, not that it was anything new. "Why can't she work with us?" Marcus asked confused as to why Blake was being colder than usual. "I don't want the freak in our group." Marcus's jaw practically dropped when Blake said that neither of us knew how to react. Figured I should be mad but I didn't want to cause problems. "Freak wow, I can clearly see I'm not wanted here. I can find another group." As I turned around to walk away I stopped and had the frivolous through to give Blake a taste of his own medicine. Let's see how you like it when someone pokes at you I thought as I said. "Actually on second thought I think I'll stay, even though somones in a bad mood. Did mommy forget to play fetch with you this morning?" I said as snarky as possible "Maddie!" Marcus said looking at me in shock "Was that a dog joke?" Blake was aggressive that time and I got a little worried but I maintain my composure and continued to nitpick "I don't know, was it funny?" I said trying to reflect his own obnoxious behavior back onto him "No it wasn't funny!" he said, stepping closer to me as Marcus moved between us to insure my safety. "Then no it wasn't a dog joke." Blake was clearly very annoyed and Marcus pushed him back a little as he gave me a look of disapproval. "Are you two done?" He asked as he glared at the both of us. "Yeah sorry, should we get started this project isn't going to finish itself." I said as Marcus and I looked at each other laughing at what had just happened "Yes let's start." Marcus said enthusiastically, trying to shift the mood to something more calm. We broke up the work into three parts after we started Marcus and I looked over each other's work, Blake not wanting to participate in the actual group part. Blake sat at the end of the table plowing through his part of the project wall marcus and i sat in the other end working peacefully with some occasional small talk. we were just about finished when Blake notes a rather inconvenient error. " Who did the chart?" He asked looking across the table at us laughing at the smiley face I drew on Marcus's hand when he wasn't paying attention. "I did why?" I asked confused as to what the issue was. "It's completely backwards, you have depth and perception where irregularities should be, and chemical compounds under the wrong section." "Oh my god I must have looked at the outline wrong." I said flipping back though the instructor packet. "It's fine we can fix it." Marcus said as he grabbed the outline out of my hand stopping my frantic page flipping. "You two can but I'm not wasting my free period fixing what the dud screwed up." Blake said as he grabbed his bag about to get up and leave. "Blake!" "What, this is not my problem. Maybe if she hadn't been batting her eyelashes at you for 45 minutes she wouldn't have screwed up." "She said she was sorry let it go, and who are you to assume it wasn't just an honest mistake?" "Marcus dont play dumb she likes you and you know it. You two were sitting there giggling at each other like a couple of idiots." " You have no idea what you're talking about, what's your problem!" They were both angry at this point and truth be told I was also getting a little uncomfortable after that last comment, I tried to diffuse the situation as best as I ould. "It's fine you twocan both go, I can fix it 'll only take a moment." "Im leaving either way." Blake said as he got up and walked out probably going to hang out under the bleacher in the back of the library looking aggressively depressed like he always did. Even after three years he hasn't changed one bit andI could still read bhim like a book. " I'm sorry about him." Marcus said as he sighed and looked back at the shard. "It's fine really, I'd be mad too. I can fix it if you have somewhere to be." "Well I had planned on just roaming the halls aimlessly for an hour but I can keep you company if you'd like." He said as I felt heat rising tomy sheeks. "I don't know, if you stay here who's gonna wander the halls." I said as we both laughed and I got to work on redoing the chart. Our free period came and went and after lunch we had AP history, not my best class I might add. That was one of the two other classes I had with marcus. We had calculus,Ap history, and biology together. O had a few classes with Blake too, we had geometry, chemistry, and physics together along with a theater class. History was boring so I opted to sit in the back. I never really focused in this class to be honest. I would usually just zone out or get so deep in thought that I didn't know what was going on until the bell rang. However today Marcus decided to move from the front row and cum slum it in the back with me. I was surprised when I saw him come in and sit by me but I didn't want to look too shocked. We were about half way through class when the announcements came on and a monotone voice came over the speakers "Good afternoon student, I hope you're having a wonderful day. I hope you're staying focused and taking your academics seriously, and don't forget about the pep rally tomorrow night to ready our varsity football team for the start of their season. There are still 5 open spots on the team so try out fast before they're gone." There was minimal feedback and the speakers went off. "Hey, are you still good at sports?" I whispered over to Marcus who I had caught looking at me about four times now. "Yeah why?" He washed looking intrigued by my sudden question. "You should join the team, we kinda suck." "ha, well I would but I can't." "Why not?" I asked genuinely curious as to what his reasoning would be. "Well if you hadn't noticed I'm kind of a loner." "Oh and here I thought it was because I kicked your butt in double dutch in the 5th grade." Truthfully he was a bit of a loner, even though Marcus was nice and easy to get along with he was almost always around Blake who wasn't exactly a ray of sunshine. When they were not together Marcus would be social the only problem with that was because Blake was so harsh everyone was scared that he would lash out at them for stealing his brother.