An Hour Later — Feral Eclipse Tour Van, Hotel Driveway

Jonah was the first to say it out loud.

“Okay, we’ve officially gone viral. Again.”

He was hunched in the back of the van, phone in hand, eyes wide as he read the comments scrolling past at lightning speed. “There’s already three TikToks with Riley’s blurry selfie, and one of them is set to our live version of ‘Blood Moon Promises.’ It’s got 40k views in the last half hour.”

Gabriel, lounging in the passenger seat with his feet on the dash and his coffee cup (now his third) in clawed hand, grinned. “She had a good angle. I looked damn heroic helping her up.”

“You looked like a caffeinated cryptid,” Mark muttered.

“I am a caffeinated cryptid.”

Thane was in the back with his laptop open, trying to settle the next venue’s load-in logistics, but he paused when Rico spoke up from the other bench.

“Uh, guys… the hotel just reposted it.”

Everyone froze.

Rico kept reading: “’We’re howlin’ with excitement! Feral Eclipse spotted at our breakfast buffet this morning! Thanks to fan @RileyEatsStars for the sweet clip. #FeralEclipse #WerewolfWakeup #HazelnutHospitality’”

Thane looked up, deadpan. “They hashtagged Hazelnut Hospitality?”

Gabriel leaned over to peek. “Wait, is that fan art?!”

Sure enough, someone on Instagram had already sketched a pastel-styled drawing of Gabriel handing Riley the tiny Nutella jar like it was a holy relic. Thane was in the background, looking confused and vaguely annoyed, and Mark was photobombing with a raised eyebrow and a fork full of bacon.

Gabriel snorted. “I look like a breakfast saint. That’s going on my next T-shirt.”

Mark groaned. “We’re never gonna have a quiet hotel breakfast again, are we?”

“Nope,” Jonah said. “Also… uh… the hotel’s other guests are now tagging us too. Apparently, a dad with a hangover got mad about the ‘wolf boys’ scaring his kid, and now he’s in the comments arguing with fans.”

Thane shut the laptop slowly and sighed. “This is why we can’t have nice things.”

Maya chimed in from the back bench, tapping her phone. “We’ve been on Instagram for two hours and you’re already trending on three platforms. I can’t decide if I’m proud or worried.”

Rico held up his phone. “Oh, and look—someone just uploaded AI fan art of all of us eating breakfast shirtless. Mark, you’re oddly shredded.”

Mark blinked. “…That’s unsettling.”

“Flattering, though,” Gabriel added, sipping his coffee. “I say we lean into it.”

Thane chuckled under his breath, the beginnings of a smirk tugging at the corner of his muzzle. “You lean into it. I’m going to get us to the next gig without being mobbed by children holding Nutella jars.”

As the van pulled away from the curb, Mark pulled his hood up and muttered, “Calling it now—next time, someone’s gonna ask me to autograph a bagel.”