KTNY’s old brick studio had never looked better. The neon sign out front buzzed with warm red light. The big tower out back blinked its slow, steady rhythm against the early evening sky. And inside, the station was alive in that distinctly Friday way — full of footsteps, laughter, muffled doors closing, someone rustling chip bags in the kitchen, and the shuffle of wolves getting comfortable in a building clearly not designed for seven of them.
It was 6 p.m. The House Party didn’t go live until seven, but the pack always showed up early, partly out of habit and partly because they liked being here. The place smelled like old carpet, warm electronics, and a thousand memories from the before-times.
Mark was at the engineering desk, hunched over a console with clawed precision as he adjusted the final settings on the station’s AudioVault automation system. “Okay,” he muttered, tapping a monitor. “Top of the hour ID, two bumpers, and the promos are slotted. The music log is loaded. We’re perfect.”
Gabriel was in Studio A, adjusting mic height and fine-tuning the EQ on his channel. He leaned in, testing. “Check one, check one… This is Gabriel, your friendly neighborhood wolf with a face made for radio.”
Rime, entering the studio behind him, blinked and asked, “Why you say that? Your face fine.”
Gabriel turned around dramatically. “Never explain the joke, Rime.”
Rime frowned. “Why?”
Holt laughed so loudly from the hallway that the audio meters bounced.
Thane stepped into the control room, brushing a paw over the soundproofing foam like he was greeting an old friend. “Feels good in here,” he said.
“It should,” Mark replied. “We spent all week getting the last of the dead bulbs replaced. Studio B hums again.”
“Studio B hums?” Thane asked.
“Like an angelic fridge,” Mark said proudly.
Varro stood near the record library, studying the wall of CDs with a strange reverence. “So many… discs,” he murmured.
Gabriel poked his head out of the booth. “Music storage medium. Antiquated. But spicy.”
Kade walked in carrying a box of donuts from the newly reopened bakery. “Thought we might need these.”
Holt immediately took three, stacked them, and ate them like a sandwich.
“Is that even legal?” Gabriel asked.
Holt shrugged. “I am bank security.”
“That’s not related.”
“Still counts.”
The whole room buzzed with easy banter and the comfort of routine. The kind of energy only a valley restored to life could produce.
Thane leaned against the doorway, watching them with a quiet smile. “Feels like a real Friday again,” he said.
Gabriel nodded. “Yeah. There are people across this valley right now waiting for the House Party. Not because they need information or warnings… but because they want to hear music and voices and laughter.”
“And because,” Kade added, “they like listening to wolves talk about donut sandwiches.”
Holt gave a proud thumbs-up.
Thane chuckled. “It’s been a hell of a month. Currency restored. Glacier Bank running like an actual institution. Savings accounts. Paychecks. Taxes, for crying out loud.”
Rime perked. “Taxes are good?”
“No,” Gabriel answered. “But they’re normal.”
Varro nodded. “People are happy. Easier to trade. Easier to plan. No bartering chickens for tires.”
Mark looked over from the engineering desk. “I do not miss the chicken economy.”
“And the school,” Thane added. “Students laughing again. Teachers teaching. Kids drawing pictures of big wolves with tiny legs.”
Kade looked confused. “Why tiny legs?”
Gabriel shrugged. “Kids are weird.”
Thane stepped into Studio A, the central mic glowing softly. He ran his claws over the desk like the ritual it had always been. “Tonight’s show needs to celebrate that. The wins. The progress. The fact that we’ve gone from patching leaks to building a future.”
Mark entered behind him with a set of headphones. “Already prepared a talking points file: power, water, bank, school, dam crew, restored shops, Eureka trade routes, Thompson Falls patrol network.”
Gabriel gave him a look. “Talking points? That’s adorable. I don’t use points. I freewheel.”
“You rant,” Mark corrected.
“I riff.”
“You ramble.”
“I soar artistically.”
Mark tapped his notebook. “You read this or I unplug your mic.”
Gabriel snatched the notebook. “Fine.”
Thane sat at the main mic — Mic 1. The gravel in his voice seemed to settle into place automatically.
Mark gave him the two-minute warning. “Station ID at the top of the hour. Then your open.”
In the hallway, Holt practiced looking fierce in front of the glass, his reflection doing exactly what he wanted: intimidation with a hint of “please take your money to the bank.”
Rime and Kade settled onto the big old couch near the newsroom window. Varro lowered himself into a chair beside them, watching everything with a quiet contentment that would’ve been impossible months ago.
Thane took a breath. “Alright. Let’s give the valley a Friday night.”
The top-of-the-hour jingle played: KTNY 101.7 — The Voice of the Valley.
Mark pointed at Thane.
The ON AIR sign lit up red.
Thane began.
“Good evening, Libby, Eureka, Thompson Falls… and every cabin, farm, and ridge line in between. This is Thane, and you’re listening to The House Party on KTNY 101.7. It’s Friday night, and for the first time in a long, long while… it feels like an ordinary one.”
Gabriel slid into his chair and leaned into his mic. “The good kind of ordinary.”
“Exactly,” Thane said. “Our towns have power. Running water. Working kitchens. A school full of kids who laugh loud enough to shake the walls. And as of this week… an honest-to-God bank. Wages. Savings. Commerce. A money system that actually works again.”
Mark spoke into Mic 3 with his calm, measured tone. “And a staff that learned very quickly not to hand Holt the stapler.”
Holt shouted from the hall, “I WAS TESTING IT.”
“On a chair,” Mark replied.
“It lost!”
Thane chuckled softly. “We’ve had a month of rebuilding, and all of it has been made possible by the people listening right now. Marta, who has been the beating heart of organization. Hank, who keeps our borders safe. The dam crew, who show up every day like the world never stopped. The mayors of our sister towns — Tom in Eureka and Nora in Thompson Falls — who stepped up without hesitation. And every single one of you who work, rebuild, teach, craft, grow, and just… live.”
Gabriel rested his chin on his fist. “It’s been kinda beautiful to watch.”
“It has,” Thane agreed.
Varro, from the hallway couch, murmured, “Valley strong.”
Thane glanced at him through the glass and nodded.
“And to my pack,” Thane added into the mic, “you’ve done everything that’s been asked of you. More than I could ever expect. You’ve built bridges. Run power. Restored communications. Protected families. And yesterday… you worked real jobs. Honest-to-God nine-to-five jobs. You have no idea how proud that makes me.”
Holt yelled from the hall, “I AM HEAD OF SECURITY.”
“We know,” Gabriel said. “We’ve all heard.”
Thane leaned in a little closer to the mic, voice soft but sure. “Tonight’s show is about celebrating that progress. The normal. The mundane. The beautiful little pieces of life that mean we’ve climbed out of the dark and stepped back into the world.”
Mark queued up the first track and gestured that he was ready.
“Let’s kick things off with something warm,” Thane said, leaning back as the music faded in. “A song for a valley that chose to grow again.”
The first guitar chords of “Beautiful Day” by U2 rolled through the monitors, soft and bright. The wolves settled into their seats around the station, some on couches, some leaning in doorways, some simply listening with closed eyes.
It was a Friday night.
It was peaceful.
It was normal.
And the valley was alive.