The video of Thane taking a bullet for Gabriel hit the internet before the last echoes of the concert had even faded.

It spread like wildfire.

News stations ran the footage on a loop. Social media turned it into a thousand memes, reaction videos, hashtags. Commentators everywhere lost their minds over the sheer brutality and grace of what they’d witnessed — a bare-pawed werewolf throwing himself between a gunman and his bandmate, absorbing the shot, and not even going down.

Backstage, chaos had barely settled. Thane sat shirtless, blood still dark on his side, though already scabbing over. His black polo had been shredded by the impact and removed by a medic who seemed more starstruck than concerned. Gabriel hadn’t left his side since the second the attacker was hauled away, sitting cross-legged beside him, tail brushing against Thane’s thigh like it needed constant contact to prove he was still alive.

“You sure you’re okay?” Gabriel asked for the fifth time, voice low and cracked at the edges.

Thane huffed softly, not quite a laugh, and flexed his fingers. “Little sore. Healing fast.”

Gabriel reached down, his clawed hand lightly brushing over the matted fur at Thane’s side. “You took a bullet, my wolf.”

Thane shrugged. “Didn’t really think about it.”

“Exactly,” Gabriel whispered. “That’s what scares me.”

Thane looked at him then — really looked — and saw the storm of fear and love swimming behind those icy blue eyes. He reached up, brushed the back of his fingers along Gabriel’s jaw, and leaned in close until their snouts touched. A quiet, steady nuzzle.

“I’d do it again. Every time.”

The next morning, the media exploded.

Every major network played the angle. “Werewolf Saves Bandmate,” “Bullet-Proof Love,” “Modern-Day Guardian.” It was everywhere. The clip was slowed down, looped, analyzed frame-by-frame. There were debates on werewolf physiology, ethics panels discussing pack loyalty, political commentators trying to twist it into something it wasn’t — and through it all, Feral Eclipse stayed quiet.

For twenty-four hours.

Then the band broke the silence on The Tonight Show.

Mark didn’t speak at all. He just stared at the host with a dry, withering glare that shut down the usual “edgy werewolf jokes” before they started. Maya, however, picked up the slack with a passionate blow-by-blow of what happened, complete with vivid hand gestures and the line, “That man got dropped like a sack of racist laundry.”

Jonah reenacted Thane’s leap from the stage using a stool and a marker as the gunman.

But it was Gabriel who silenced the room.

He spoke softly, claws curled in his lap, and said, “He didn’t think. He just moved. That’s what it means to be pack. That’s what love looks like when it’s not afraid.”

Thane added only, “I’ve had worse. Just cracked a rib. Or ten.”

By the weekend, Feral Eclipse was everywhere.

Rolling Stone put Thane on the cover — claws crossed over his chest, the bent bullet resting in his palm like a war trophy. TIME Magazine called it “a defining moment in modern music and cultural identity.”

A limited-edition shirt dropped that same night:
“Protect the Pack”
Black-on-black embroidery. One small, red-stitched bullet near the hem.

It sold out in three hours.

Fan videos turned the moment into art. Animation, tribute songs, poetry. One viral TikTok dubbed it over with orchestral swells, the tagline fading in over slow-motion:

“Not all heroes wear shoes.”

Thane healed in a day.

Gabriel did not.

Not physically — his bandmate was untouched. But inside? Gabriel was shaken. He stayed close, quieter than usual, fingers always brushing against Thane’s fur, as if afraid the memory might take him if he looked away too long. Every meet-and-greet, every camera flash, every chant of “Protect the Pack!” brought a complicated blend of pride and pain to his face.

They ended up on the hotel roof the night before the tour resumed. The L.A. skyline burned like a molten sea of lights behind them, but neither wolf was watching it.

Gabriel leaned against Thane’s side, head tucked under his jaw.

“I thought I lost you,” he whispered.

Thane didn’t answer right away. Just tightened his arm around Gabriel’s back, holding him firm and safe.

“You didn’t,” he finally said. “And you never will.”

Gabriel licked his cheek once, a gentle sweep of tongue across fur, and exhaled.

The silence stretched comfortably between them.

Down in the city, cameras flashed. News anchors talked. Fans screamed.

But up here, under the quiet pull of the moon, Thane and Gabriel didn’t need any of that.

They had the only thing that mattered.

Each other.