Morning didn’t so much dawn on the house as crash through it.
It began with the smell of something burning in the kitchen—followed by Rico yelling, “That was intentional!” and Jonah’s immediate, “That was a Pop-Tart, you psycho!” Maya opened the front door to grab her hoodie from the porch railing and nearly got tackled by two fans pretending to “jog” by with their phones aimed directly at her face. Mark sat at the breakfast table in complete silence, stirring his coffee with a claw and watching it all unfold like a man on the brink.
Emily filmed everything.
By 10 a.m., the crowd outside had doubled. Then tripled.
Some fans had brought folding chairs. Others brought poster boards. A few had just laid down picnic blankets on the lawn like it was a goddamn music festival. The entire front yard was a slow-moving flash mob of Feral Eclipse superfans, gawking neighbors, curious passersby, and the same HOA president who now stood at the edge of the driveway holding what looked like legal documents.
Diesel stepped outside, popped a lawn chair, and began offering to sign autographs on the back of the HOA fliers.
Then came the drones.
Three at first — buzzing just above the roofline like little mechanical vultures.
Mark spotted them from the garage and growled, “We’re being watched.”
Gabriel came out behind him with a bowl of apples. “Yeah, no kidding.”
“What are you doing?”
“Defending the homestead,” Gabriel said, launching one of the apples skyward like a fastball.
It missed. Barely.
The drone dipped, adjusted, and kept filming.
“Oh we’re doing this?” Maya asked, appearing with an armful of oranges. “Let’s do this.”
Before long, half the crew was on the lawn throwing apples, oranges, even leftover sweet potatoes at the drones. Jonah retrieved a nerf gun and duct-taped a spoon to the barrel. Cassie hurled an entire loaf of garlic bread. Mark stood off to the side muttering about inflation and how they were literally weaponizing their grocery bill.
“You owe me five bucks for every apple,” he growled. “Five.”
One drone caught a banana to the rotor and crashed into the garden wolf statue by the mailbox.
The crowd cheered.
The second was knocked out by a potato lobbed by Rico with uncanny precision.
The third escaped — but not before Emily caught the whole thing on video. She uploaded the clip with the caption:
“The wolves defend the den. #DroneWars #FruitFight”
It had two million views in less than an hour.
By mid-afternoon, it was clear the chaos wasn’t dying down.
In fact… it had just hit the news.
A local KFOR-TV van rolled up and parked across the street. A bright-eyed field reporter and a cam op popped out and made a beeline for the lawn. The reporter cheerfully asked for an interview — while trying not to trip over someone in a Team Gabriel hoodie crawling through the rose bushes.
Gabriel leaned over to Thane. “She’s cute.”
“She’s live,” Thane muttered. “And this is all being recorded.”
Mark appeared behind them, holding a bag of hot dog buns and looking like he wanted to throw it at someone. “We’re out of food.”
Thane blinked. “Out?”
Mark nodded slowly. “Out. No bacon. No coffee. No cereal. Someone used the last of the milk to chase Fireball. We need to fix this.”
Thane pulled out his phone. “Instacart?”
“Instacart,” Mark agreed solemnly.
They built the order together: 200 burger patties. 200 buns. Every bottle of mustard and ketchup available in a five-mile radius. Relish, pickles, onions, chips, 12 family-size bags of frozen fries, two party packs of veggie burgers “in case the HOA complains,” and twelve giant jugs of lemonade.
Thane hit order.
Gabriel popped his head in. “What are you guys doing?”
“Food run.”
Gabriel grinned like the chaos goblin he was. “PERFECT.”
Ten minutes later, he stood on the back deck — shirtless, arms raised to the sky, and shouted:
“HEY EDMOND!! WHO WANTS A COOKOUT?!”
Thane dropped his phone. Mark just howled in disbelief.
It was too late.
The backyard was swarmed within minutes.
Fans leapt the fence. Neighbors pushed through the side yard. Someone actually opened the gate like they lived there. A dad in a Minions T-shirt offered to DJ. Two guys started assembling folding tables like they’d been waiting for this invitation their whole lives. The HOA president fainted.
The Instacart driver pulled up, looked at the scene, and just texted “good luck” before dropping the entire order on the curb.
They grilled everything. Jonah flipped patties like a short-order diner demon. Rico played guitar on the patio. Maya coordinated condiment distribution. Cassie poured lemonade like a rockstar bartender. Emily livestreamed from Thane’s shoulders as he tried desperately to keep the crowd from knocking over the smoker.
Mark stood on the roof with a bullhorn. “NO DRINKS ON THE AIR CONDITIONING UNIT.”
Gabriel, still flipping burgers shirtless, grinned and said, “Best staycation ever.”
Thane finally leaned against the railing, jaw slack, as the moon rose over his absolutely ruined backyard.
“This is a nightmare.”
“It’s a party,” Gabriel corrected, passing him a burger. “With buns.”
Thane took a bite. “We’re gonna be sued.”
“Only if the internet doesn’t protect us first.”
And as another drone zipped overhead — this time from a local news station — they all looked up, raised their hands…
…and gave a perfect synchronized wolf snarl for the camera.
The internet did not survive.