Three Werewolves: Tour Blog

The morning after was always rough.

But this morning? This one was biblically cursed.

The tour van—beloved, battered, and one shaky tire away from becoming modern art—was packed with four barely-functioning humans and three sleep-deprived werewolves, all equally grumpy, and at least two of them actively contemplating violence. The sun wasn’t even fully up yet. Everyone looked like they’d fought a tornado and lost.

Gabriel was at the wheel, wide-eyed and buzzed from his second gas station cold brew—he insisted on driving this leg. Thane, in the passenger seat, looked like a man on his sixth war tour, arms crossed, expression unreadable except for the faint twitch at his temple every time the van hit a pothole.

In the back row, Jonah was passed out against the window with drumstick imprints on his forehead. Rico was slumped next to him, earbuds in, mouthing lyrics to a song only he could hear.

Cassie sat with her knees pulled up, hood over her head, holding a half-eaten granola bar like it had personally wronged her. “If this van hits one more bump, I’m gonna puke out my soul.”

Maya was trying to tune a guitar in her lap while simultaneously elbowing Gabriel in the ribs from behind his seat. “I told you we should’ve stopped at the nice coffee shop.”

“There wasn’t time!” Gabriel barked back, slurping his cold brew like it was a life elixir. “We’re twenty minutes behind schedule already because someone left their entire amp rig back at the hotel.”

Rico raised his hand weakly. “That was me. I have no regrets.”

From the back, Jonah moaned, “Tell my mom I died doing what I loved. Except I didn’t. I died in a tin can with no AC and Gabriel playing ska on the Bluetooth.”

Gabriel grinned into the rearview mirror. “It’s called character development, Jonah.”

Maya launched a balled-up sock at his head. “You’re lucky you’re cute.”

Mark, seated sideways at the side equipment rack (the only one tall enough to do so without folding like origami), checked the rig straps with an expression of deadpan despair. “If this amp stack slides forward one more inch, it’s going to flatten Jonah like a pancake.”

Thane growled without opening his eyes. “Maybe then we’ll have room for the fanmail crate.”

Gabriel yawned, then jolted suddenly as the van hit a speed bump at mach five.

THUMP—CRASH—SPLASH.

The third coffee of the morning shot skyward like a geyser and splattered across the roof liner, raining back down in glorious brown droplets.

Everyone screamed.

“I just bought that!” Maya wailed.

Cassie covered her head like it was acid. “Coffee rain! COFFEE RAIN!”

Jonah sat bolt upright, blinked at the mess, and murmured, “Is this… my resurrection?”

Gabriel swerved slightly from laughter. “Okay, okay, my bad! But look on the bright side—we’re all awake now!”

Thane stared at the mess, clawed hand slowly rubbing his muzzle.

“I swear,” he muttered darkly, “if the promoter doesn’t have our load-in ready by the time we get there, I will burn their stage to the f***ing ground.*”

Gabriel glanced sideways at him, still grinning. “Love you too, my wolf.”

Thane exhaled sharply and leaned his head against the window, eyes closed. “Only reason you’re still alive.”

Mark, from the back: “This is fine. This is normal. This is the exact energy I signed up for.”

The van creaked, coffee continued to drip from the ceiling like an espresso-based rainstorm, and the open road stretched out before them like a dare.

Feral Eclipse rolled on.

Backstage smelled like ozone, fog fluid, and sweat-soaked denim.

The band stumbled into the green room like survivors of an apocalypse—sweaty, buzzing, wide-eyed, and trying to remember how to human again. Gabriel kicked the door open with his heel and flopped onto the faux-leather couch like it was the throne of Valhalla.

“Holy shit, that crowd,” he breathed, wiping his soaked face with a towel. “Did you see the kid in the front row with the LED werewolf mask?”

Thane followed behind, one clawed hand clutching his pack of coiled cables like a python he hadn’t finished choking yet. “I saw him. I also saw the idiot trying to film on stage right while standing on the damn fog cannon. Nearly launched him into the f***ing truss.”

Mark walked in last, still adjusting sliders on a wireless console in his hands like the show wasn’t over until the lightboard said so. “Three beams overheated. One fogger’s clogged. Two strobe units blew their fuses. Great show.”

Cassie collapsed onto the arm of the couch, makeup smeared, shirt plastered to her back. “I think my spine fused to the mic stand mid-second song. Might need a crowbar.”

Rico wandered in with a bag of gummy worms and just sort of… fell sideways into a beanbag chair. “No thoughts. Only sugar.”

Jonah followed him in, looking half-possessed. “I transcended. I saw sound. It was red.”

Maya, who had already found the mini-fridge and was halfway through a bottle of water, raised an eyebrow. “You broke two sticks and your backup pedal, dude.”

“I used the kick drum like a cannon. I regret nothing.”

Gabriel raised a celebratory fist. “That’s the energy I live for!”

He then tried to high-five Jonah, missed, and knocked over a stack of plastic water bottles.

Thane growled and started rewrapping cables with the same energy someone might use to interrogate a spy. “I swear, if I ever meet the promoter who installed those janky power tie-ins—”

“I already put a beer in their office toilet,” Mark muttered.

Cassie snorted. “That’s why you were gone for ten minutes.”

From the hallway, a runner poked her head in timidly. “Uh… just wanted to say, you guys have mail. Someone dropped off a package. It’s, uh… vibrating?”

Everyone stopped.

Gabriel sat up straight. “Is it addressed to me?”

“…It just says ‘To the black-furred one with claws.’”

Gabriel lit up. “That’s me! I’m gonna open it.”

Thane barked, “Do not open anything that vibrates and doesn’t have a return label—”

But Gabriel was already slicing into the package with a claw.

Inside?

A single, blinking LED collar.

And a note that read:

“You looked so dominant tonight. Call me. 🐾”

There was a moment of stunned silence.

Then Jonah muttered, “So hey, do we need to, like, screen our fanbase for collars now?”

Cassie choked on her water. Maya cackled and fell over. Rico was too tired to process and just popped another gummy worm.

Gabriel blinked at the gift, then looked up slowly. “Okay. One: flattered. Two: deeply confused. Three… Thane?”

“Burn it.” Thane grunted, not even looking up from his cables.

Gabriel sighed, tossed it in the trash, and flopped back on the couch.

Mark clicked a button on his tablet. “Cameras off. Lights stable. Fog fans cooling.”

Cassie raised her water bottle like a toast. “To another night of madness.”

They all clinked—plastic bottles, metal cans, and one rogue drumstick from Jonah.

And for a moment… just for a breath… it was quiet.

Then Gabriel, grinning sideways, whispered, “Hey, anyone else wanna prank Maya again tonight?”

“NO!” came five simultaneous voices, and a pillow flew across the room.

The stage lights were dimmed, flickering faint red like an animal’s breath in the dark.

The crowd hadn’t stopped murmuring since the doors opened—part anticipation, part confusion. Nobody had seen a soundcheck, there were no openers, and a few fans were whispering that the band had stormed into the venue like a tornado of gear, fury, and caffeine.

Backstage, Thane clicked the last cable into place and gave Mark a quick nod. “Whatever doesn’t explode, make it flash.”

Mark’s fingers danced over his patch panel. “My specialty.”

Cassie, doing last-second stretches, cracked her neck. “Can we just not break anything vital tonight?”

Jonah slapped his snare like it owed him money. “No promises.”

Rico was behind his kit, head bowed, muttering something to the gods of rhythm and fire.

Maya stood center-left, testing her strings. “Let’s see if the roof holds.”

Then Gabriel stepped forward.

He didn’t speak.

Didn’t smirk.

Didn’t even twitch.

He just howled.

Not into the mic—just raw from his chest, filling the backstage hallway, vibrating the metal door hinges.

The crowd outside erupted like gasoline to a match.

Mark hit the lights.

Six VL2Bs exploded into deep red, blasting down through a thick layer of creeping fog. The backdrop shimmered as the Feral Eclipse logo cracked across it like lightning splitting the sky.

And then—BOOM.

Maya’s guitar screamed to life with a war cry of distortion.

Rico slammed into the opening riff like he’d declared war on time itself.

Gabriel leapt onto the stage, claws flashing, bass in hand, carving the first riff into the air like a blade. His icy blue eyes locked with the crowd’s and dared them to blink.

Cassie hit the mic like she’d been born with one in her hand.

“WE—ARE—FERAL ECLIPSE!”

The audience surged forward.

Thane moved through the shadows at stage left like a predator, hands flying over the controls strapped to his rigging vest, eyes flicking between meters and surge levels as if managing a nuclear reactor.

Mark’s lights hit full sync: pulsing, breathing, attacking the fog and giving the stage a heartbeat of its own.

Gabriel dropped into the breakdown—low, growling notes that made ribcages thrum and eyeballs twitch. He threw his head back and roared.

And the crowd roared back.

Fists in the air. Horns. Claws. Cell phones forgotten. Tears on some faces. One fan threw an entire wolf tail plushie onto the stage and Gabriel kicked it back into the pit with a savage grin.

Maya hit her solo, bending the strings like reality itself had to obey.

Jonah exploded behind the kit, snapping sticks, flipping them mid-beat and catching the replacements with the swagger of a man possessed.

Cassie dove into the final chorus with a scream that cracked like thunder over the fray.

And Thane?

He stood at the monitor rack, drenched in sweat, clawed feet planted wide as he juggled feedback loops, dying power amps, and the wrath of the gods, running the sonic war machine with blood and fire.

By the end of the set, the crowd was rubble.

Literal crowd-surfers lay in sweaty heaps, breathless.

Someone fainted.

Someone else proposed.

A kid near the front had clearly peed himself from excitement.

And in the center of it all, Gabriel stood over the mic, chest heaving, fur soaked, claws out, smiling with the fury of a beast set free.

He leaned in, voice gravel and glory.

“Next time… bring more friends.”

The van screeched into the venue’s back lot with all the subtlety of a garbage truck crashing into a dumpster full of bad decisions. A stack of mismatched road cases toppled sideways in the rear as Thane killed the engine with a growl low enough to match his mood.

“Six hours of driving,” he muttered, stepping out barepaw and already bristling, “and we’re ten minutes late because somebody needed Red Vines and a spirit quest.”

Gabriel, still chomping on said Red Vines, flashed a cheeky grin. “I regret nothing.”

The venue? A concrete shoebox with the acoustic warmth of a metal coffin. There were water stains on the ceiling, two visible rats near the loading door (Mark nodded at them respectfully), and someone had duct-taped a “DO NOT FLUSH ANYTHING EVER” sign on the green room toilet.

Inside, the stage was half-lit and still littered with bits of confetti from whatever ska band had played last night. The sound tech was a kid who looked like he’d dropped out of college to follow jam bands and had the wiring skills to match.

Thane’s icy blue eyes locked on the kid. “Power drop?”

The tech blinked. “Huh?”

“POWER. DROP.” Thane’s claws flexed.

“Oh! Uh… yeah. There’s one. But like, we lost the three-phase a while ago. Got this one quad outlet, but two ports kinda smell like smoke.”

Mark stepped up beside Thane, crossed arms, and loomed. “We’re going to need more than that unless you want your monitors to burst into flames.”

The kid stared. “Cool…”

Maya groaned, throwing her guitar case down and opening it like she was preparing for battle. “If my strap snaps again, I swear to every human god, I will beat someone with the amp head.”

Cassie stepped over a tangle of cables, her mic in one hand, and looked around. “Who the hell books a band like us and gives us one working power strip and a fog machine that smells like burnt soup?”

Rico, always the optimist, chimed in. “Hey, at least there’s a stage this time.”

Jonah looked up from reassembling part of his kit that had exploded during the bumpy ride. “And at least I still have my beer bottle from the last set. You know. In case of emergencies.”

Gabriel slung his bass on, still chewing Red Vines. “We’ve played worse.”

Thane looked at him sideways. “Name one.”

Gabriel grinned. “That wedding gig where we accidentally caused the divorce mid-set.”

Cassie smirked. “Oh yeah. That was beautifully traumatic.”

Thane rubbed his temples and began plugging in the gear himself, grumbling like a thundercloud. “Alright, wolves and humans—let’s see if we can make this sonic trashcan shake.”

Mark, perched in his lighting command zone (which was really just two milk crates and a borrowed laptop), flicked on the VariLites. They blinked once. Then again. Then flickered out entirely.

“Cool,” he said flatly, “they fear commitment.”

Gabriel’s voice rang out from center stage. “Y’all ready to blow the doors off this sad shoebox?!”

The monitors squealed with feedback that could peel paint.

Jonah dropped his beer bottle.

Cassie covered her ears.

Thane looked like he was about to shift, chew through the PA rack, and eat the contract.

And from somewhere near the back, the jam-band tech kid yelled, “Duuuuuude, that’s, like, real primal.”

The band responded in unison:

“SHUT UP, KYLE.”

The sun was starting to set over the McMansion hellscape as the last of the balloons bobbed lifelessly against the overpriced wrought-iron fence. The businessman’s check had cleared—mercifully—and the van was loaded.

Mostly.

Cassie climbed in last, her arms covered in smeared cake frosting and possibly face paint. “That kid spit on me. Twice.”

“I saw,” Maya muttered, arms crossed, rage-smoldering. “You flinched the first time. That was your mistake.”

Thane slammed the side door shut with enough force to rattle the window seals. “Drive. If we don’t make this next gig, I swear I will bite someone.”

Mark, already in the passenger seat, glanced back with the expression of a man who had accepted the universe’s cruelty. “What was that, like, thirty-five miles of emotional damage?”

Jonah grunted as he shoved his drums back into place in the rear. “This is how I die. Not on stage. Not in glory. Just slowly melting into a puddle of rage in a van that smells like fruit punch and broken dreams.”

Gabriel slid into the driver’s seat with a grin that could only be described as bravely optimistic bordering on oblivious. “Hey, c’mon! The little guy hugged me at the end. Said we were his favorite band!”

Cassie deadpanned, “He also asked if we were part of Paw Patrol.”

That got a low growl out of Thane.

“I swear,” he muttered, digging claws into his seatbelt, “if one of you so much as mentions ‘Baby Shark,’ I will end this tour.”

The van lurched into gear and pulled out of the neighborhood. The silence inside was thick enough to chew.

Then…

POP.
From the back.

A glitter balloon.

The last one.

It exploded with a faint twinkling sound and showered the interior in a final, fatal sparkle storm.

“NOOOOOOOOO!” Jonah screamed, smacking at his sleeves. “IT’S IN MY DRUM PADS!”

“IT’S IN MY FUR!” Mark shouted, sounding like someone discovering a cursed tattoo mid-concert.

Cassie coughed. “I swear this stuff multiplies. I had glitter in my nose.”

Thane was vibrating. Actively vibrating. He turned slowly toward Gabriel.

“You.”

Gabriel flinched. “Look, I didn’t know! He said ‘private party,’ not ‘cake-fueled hell rave for six-year-olds!’”

Maya grabbed a bag of gummy worms off the floor and hurled it at him. “You said we only play as a pack.”

“Yeah, well…” Gabriel shrugged, catching the bag with one hand. “You’re still alive. That’s something!”

Thane pinched the bridge of his muzzle. “No talking. Nobody talks. Until we’re at the next venue. And if there’s a bouncy castle there, I will burn it down myself.”

“Can we at least get food?” Jonah grumbled.

“There’s still cake,” Gabriel offered.

The growl that rose in the van could’ve registered on seismic equipment.

Mark, ever the voice of reason—albeit exhausted reason—sighed. “I’ll call ahead. Tell them we’re twenty minutes late. And maybe also warn them that we’re all one sugar crash away from homicide.”

It started innocently enough—like all good catastrophes do.

Feral Eclipse had just wrapped a scorcher of a show the night before, still buzzing as they piled into the tour van that morning. Gabriel, ever the caffeinated optimist, convinced everyone they needed a pit stop for coffee and road snacks. Again. They pulled into a sleepy corner mini-mart in some suburb that probably had more HOA meetings than music venues.

Gabriel bounded inside, hoodie half-zipped, tail twitching lazily behind him, already headed for the cold brew cooler when a sharply dressed man intercepted him near the energy drinks.

“Excuse me,” the man said with that million-dollar-smile-and-zero-personality vibe. “You’re the guitarist from that band last night, correct? Gabriel?”

Gabriel blinked. “Uh… yeah?”

“I’m throwing a private party today. I was impressed by your… stage presence.” The man handed over a sleek black business card. “Would you be interested in doing a short set for a private audience? I’m happy to pay well for a few live songs. Just a little fun for the family, you know?”

Gabriel, never one to say no to playing—and high on caffeine—lit up. “Sure! But we don’t do solo gigs. We play as a pack. You get the whole band or nothing.”

The man smiled wider. “Perfect.”

---

🏡Arrival at the Lair of Disappointment

An hour later, the van rolled through a gated community lined with perfect lawns and suspiciously identical mansions.

“This doesn’t feel like a venue,” Thane muttered, narrowing his eyes at the giant inflatable bounce house on the front lawn.

Gabriel squinted. “Huh. Maybe it’s a backyard BBQ thing?”

Maya groaned. “If there’s a piñata, I’m leaving.”

Mark stared at the life-size cardboard cutout of Bluey on the driveway. “I’m not emotionally equipped for this.”

The van creaked to a halt. The band climbed out and were immediately greeted by a swarm of sugar-drunk 6-year-olds wearing party hats and face paint. A bubble machine hissed somewhere in the distance. A clown juggled silently on the porch, his expression dead inside.

“Welcome to hell,” Cassie whispered.

The businessman came striding out, clapping his hands. “Wonderful! You made it! We’ve got power outlets on the patio, and I moved the balloon animal station so you can set up near the bounce house. You don’t mind playing a few covers, do you? Something the kids can dance to?”

Thane slowly turned toward Gabriel.

Gabriel gave him the most sheepish, wide-eyed, tail-curled-between-the-legs look he’d ever mustered.

“I may have misinterpreted what he meant by ‘private party.’”

Thane inhaled like he was about to commit a felony.

Mark, already pulling a light case from the van, muttered, “I hope this kid’s ready for some trauma.”

---

🎶Setlist of Doom

The band tried—tried—to adapt.

Cassie sang a painfully toned-down version of “Veins of Thunder” with all the growls removed. Rico tried to find a beat that didn’t inspire headbanging. Jonah wore his sunglasses the entire time and muttered under his breath, “This is how legends die.”

Maya played with her volume knob dialed so far back it was practically a lullaby.

Meanwhile, Gabriel was thriving. He handed out picks like candy, let kids touch his strings (against every bassist instinct in his body), and even led a mini mosh with inflatable guitars someone handed out.

At one point, Thane was asked if the “doggie man” could tie balloon animals.

“I will eat that clown,” he growled.

“I’m begging you not to,” Mark said flatly.

---

🎁A Very Special Encore

As the set mercifully wrapped, the birthday boy was handed a custom-made “Feral Eclipse” cake—complete with poorly drawn werewolf figurines on top.

“You guys were AMAZING!” the businessman beamed.

“Sir,” Jonah said, “you invited a metal band to a child’s birthday party.”

“Yes,” the man nodded. “Great exposure! All the neighborhood parents are on Instagram!”

Gabriel laughed. “Well, at least someone had fun.”

Cassie, clearly seconds from cracking, whispered, “If I hear the word ‘kidcore’ one more time, I’m setting the merch van on fire.”

---

As they loaded the van, Thane looked over at Gabriel, who was somehow still grinning.

“You are never allowed to talk to strangers in mini-marts again.”

Gabriel shrugged. “You gotta admit… it was kind of legendary.”

Mark slammed the back door shut and muttered, “I have seen war zones with less chaos.”

The next morning, the band arrived bleary-eyed and still buzzed from Cassie’s accidental takeover at the venue. They’d been booked for a live on-air interview at a local alt-rock radio station—Z95.1 The Foxhole—known less for thoughtful music coverage and more for fart soundboards, obnoxious jingles, and DJs with names like “Dingo” and “The Badger.”

Feral Eclipse stepped into the cramped glass-walled studio at 7:45 a.m., greeted by the overpowering smell of coffee, artificial maple syrup, and whatever unholy body spray Dingo wore like war paint.

“YOOOOO!” Dingo howled, punching the “AIR HORN” button twice. “It’s your boys—and girls—and wolves—from the band that made last night explode harder than a diet soda in a dryer! Say it loud—it’s FERAL ECLIIIIIPSE!”

He mashed the soundboard again. Fart noise. Explosion. Goat scream.

Maya blinked slowly. “I already hate this.”

Cassie flopped into the interview couch, oversized sunglasses hiding the regret in her soul. “I could still be sleeping.”

Jonah groaned, nursing an energy drink. “I should still be sleeping.”

Gabriel was the only one beaming, tail swishing lazily as he leaned into the mic. “Morning, Foxhole!”

Dingo grinned. “So, uh… let’s get into it. For those of you who don’t know, Feral Eclipse is like… part human, part werewolf, part musical hurricane, am I right?”

Badger chimed in: “And last night y’all howled. Literal howling! That’s your gimmick, right?”

Thane leaned forward, eyebrows raised. “It’s not a gimmick. It’s just how we are.”

Dingo gave a wheezy laugh. “Sure, sure. But c’mon — what’s it really like sharing a stage with a bunch of howling, barefoot, clawed-up werewolves?”

There was a pause. A long one.

Maya took off her sunglasses, locked eyes with Dingo, and said in her calmest, most terrifying voice:
“Like standing in front of a speeding train made of teeth and distortion pedals.”

Cassie snorted. Jonah choked on his drink.

Thane grinned just enough to show fang. Gabriel wagged a finger playfully. “You poked the wrong female, Dingo.”

The interview spiraled from there.

They were asked if the band hunted groupies under the full moon.

Maya responded by asking if Dingo hunted brain cells in the dark.

Badger wanted to know if Gabriel’s claws helped him play bass better.

Gabriel shrugged. “Helps me open beer cans.”

Thane was asked if his job as a tech manager was “just plugging stuff in.”

His audio cable was in his hand faster than a viper strike. “Wanna find out what this does if I wrap it around your mic?”

Jonah was asked nothing, because he fell asleep mid-interview with his head on Cassie’s shoulder.

And by the time they wrapped, the station had exactly one usable clip: Gabriel laughing, saying, “We’re a weird band, yeah. But we’re real. We don’t need fake howls or pre-recorded tracks. What you hear? That’s us. Raw, sweaty, and sometimes covered in confetti, but it’s us.”

---

Outside the studio, walking to the van

Maya muttered, “I should’ve punched that guy.”

Cassie shrugged. “I would’ve held him down.”

Thane just rubbed his temples. “No more radio. Ever.”

Gabriel leaned over to him with a wicked grin.
“But what if the next one has a buffet?”

Cassie never meant to be the frontwoman of Feral Eclipse.
Originally? She was just the backup vocalist.
Mostly tambourine. Sometimes keys. Definitely not lead anything.

Jonah was the original singer—front and center, gritty vocals, lots of swagger. He could wail through a distortion pedal and command a crowd like he was born in a stadium.
But after one particularly chaotic gig at a dive bar with a sketchy fog machine and a stage no bigger than a shower mat, everything changed.

---

Six months earlier – Flashback

The band was mid-set. Jonah stepped forward to belt the chorus of “Midnight Riptide”—their big closer.
He hit the wrong reverb pedal, tripped over a half-coiled cable, and faceplanted into a monitor with a sound so loud, the crowd thought it was part of the act.

Cassie, frozen at the side of the stage with a mic in hand and wide, terrified eyes, heard Thane yell in her earpiece:
“CASSIE! COVER HIM—NOW!”

With zero conscious thought, she stepped up, snatched Jonah’s fallen mic, and absolutely tore into the chorus like a banshee possessed.
The crowd lost their minds.

Mark, from the lighting booth, later described it as “the musical equivalent of watching someone discover they could breathe fire by accident.”

---

Backstage, post-set

Jonah sat with an ice pack on his face and a smirk that said he wasn’t mad about it. “Well… turns out I’m a better drummer than a lead vocalist anyway.”

Cassie was still shaking. “I thought I was gonna puke.”

Gabriel clapped her on the back. “Then why’d you sound like a war goddess?”

“I blacked out. I don’t even remember it.”

Thane just grinned. “Good. Keep blacking out then.”

Jonah raised his hand. “Call it now—Cass is the front. I’m movin’ to drums.”

Maya squinted. “Wait… can you actually play drums?”

Jonah: “Better than I can walk on stage without breaking a limb.”

---

Now

Cassie owns the mic like she was born with it.
Jonah absolutely rips on drums, complete with flying sticks, acrobatic fills, and that feral grin he never used as a singer.
And every time “Midnight Riptide” comes around, Cassie makes damn sure to stomp that chorus like it owes her rent.

The morning after Fred’s surprise onstage cameo, the tour van was unusually quiet—mainly because Gabriel had lost his voice from screaming “HOWL WITH ME, FRED” no less than nine times during the encore.

Thane sipped his diet Mountain Dew with his claws wrapped tightly around the can like it had personally wronged him. Mark, of course, was already deep into his daily crossword, mumbling threats at a particularly devious five-letter word for “stage fog.”

Then Thane’s phone buzzed.

Unknown Number:

*Hi! Mayor Patterson here. We’d like to present Feral Eclipse with a Key to the City this afternoon. We also have several angry complaints about ‘the wolf with the glowing eyes’ howling at our senior citizens, but let’s focus on the first thing. 🙂 *

Thane stared.

Gabriel, now wrapped in a hoodie and nursing a hot tea like a recovering banshee, looked up with a hoarse: “Did we win something?”

“You, specifically, terrified local retirees and are now being honored for it.”

Mark didn’t even look up. “Sounds about right.”

---

City Hall – 3:00 PM

The entire band filed into the council chambers, clearly out of place among floral upholstery and oil paintings of mayors past.

Gabriel’s hoodie was replaced with a leather jacket. His voice was back to a raspy whisper—just enough to mutter, “I feel like a rock ‘n roll Grim Reaper.”

Rico had managed to tape a “Feral Eclipse” sticker over his bass drum that he brought for the photo op. Jonah brought… himself. And Maya, bless her, had a guitar case, a toothpick, and zero patience.

Cassie was livestreaming the whole thing. “This is going to be either legendary or a misdemeanor.”

The mayor approached in a pressed suit and trembling hands, holding a plaque and a large ceremonial key. “It is with great honor— and mild concern—that we recognize Feral Eclipse for their… unique cultural contribution to our city.”

A polite cough. “Please, someone… uh… step forward.”

Fred, standing beside the group in his now slightly upgraded “FERAL GRANDPA – ROAD CREW” hoodie, shoved Gabriel aside and stepped up.

“I accept this key on behalf of the wolves, the humans, and the sheer madness we unleash nightly.”

The mayor blinked. “Sir, are you in the band?”

Fred grinned. “Not yet.”

Mark coughed to cover a laugh. Maya full-on snorted.

Gabriel leaned into Thane. “Should we correct him?”

Thane sipped his drink, deadpan. “Nope. Let him have it. Honestly, I’m afraid of what’ll happen if we say no.”

The press cameras flashed. Fred raised the key in triumph. Somewhere in the back, an old lady from the retirement home fainted with joy.

---

Later That Night

A new sticker now graced the van’s sliding door:
“KEY TO THE DAMN CITY.”
With a crude drawing of Fred howling under it.

Fred, now fully outfitted in a custom “Feral Grandpa” tee and a trucker hat that said “HOWL, DAMMIT”, had somehow become the official senior emissary between Feral Eclipse and the retirement home next door.

“Listen,” he said, sitting backstage on an amp case like a mob boss, “Eunice in 2B says she’ll call the cops if your soundcheck rattles her teeth again. But… Doris in 4A wants to know if the tall black-furred one is single.”

Gabriel blinked. “What?”

“She saw you on the venue’s Facebook page. She thinks you’re ‘mysterious.’”

Mark nearly choked on his water bottle.

Meanwhile, the soundcheck was proving… difficult. The moment Jonah tested the kick drum, every loose ceiling tile in the green room trembled. Rico’s quick snare roll caused a piece of decorative molding to fall off the balcony. And Maya’s amp—set to her usual “scorch the demons” level—triggered some sort of city-wide seismograph alert, apparently.

Thane, hunched over the audio rack, groaned. “I can feel this venue judging me.”

Outside, two elderly women were peeking through the venue’s side door, one clutching a purse like it might ward off evil, the other clearly hoping for a glimpse of a shirtless Gabriel.

Fred leaned toward Gabriel again. “Now, about Doris…”

Thane stomped over. “Can we not sell our bassist to the geriatric community?”

Gabriel shrugged. “He’s got charisma. I respect that.”

Back inside, Mark activated a gentle red wash across the stage for a lighting test. Unfortunately, the retirement home mistook it for a fire alarm and evacuated the east wing.

Fred returned from making amends with a tray of cookies. “Diplomacy,” he said, passing out chocolate chip apologies.

Rico grabbed one. “Fred, you’re the best thing that’s happened to this tour.”

Gabriel took two. “You’re gonna come on stage with us, right?”

Fred puffed up. “Damn right. I want in on the howl song.”

---

That night, just before the encore…

Thane leaned into Gabriel. “You really sure about this?”

“He earned it,” Gabriel said.

And so, on the final chorus of “Lunar Burn,” the lights went wild, fog blasted high, and out onto the stage hobbled Feral Grandpa Fred—raising his cane high to the roar of the crowd.

The audience lost their minds.

Thane stood off-stage, stunned, cable draped over one shoulder.

Mark muttered over comms, “…I think I actually like this guy.”

Gabriel grinned, howled at the ceiling, and pointed at Fred like he was the goddamn finale.