Adela not knowing what the wretched creature was did not ease Renard’s tension. Instead it just made the muscles in the dog’s legs tense more, making him look stiff-legged and like someone could just push him over on his side and his legs would still be stock still. He watched with wide eyes as his alpha leaped up to peer inside the building, but let out a breath when she planted her feet back on the ground, unharmed by the monstrous being inside the asylum. Whatever it was, he wasn’t a big fan of seeing it again.

When he and Finn were commanded to go back to town and inform the mayor, he simply nodded. There would be no rebellion from him this time. He had seen where that had gotten him, and even though his discovery was one that could have potentially saved or destroyed the pack, he wasn’t quite ready for another one yet. Renard went up to Finnegan and nudged him gently, saying, “Let’s go get our clothes and head back.” With that, he took his clothes in his mouth from Alice and then headed back to where he had seen Finnegan change. They’d stay in their dog forms to get through the forest quickly, but the mayor wouldn’t be able to understand them unless they were human.

Alice turned to Adela, her face pale from the news of what had been seen. “I hope this won’t cause too much harm to the pack,” she murmured softly, not really sure if she wanted her alpha to hear her or not. Such things should never have to be endured by a pack, at least not the presence of a horrifying being that might mean to eat them or all the children in town. She seemed to recall most monsters eating kids, as they tasted better or some nonsense like that.

Finnegan had to admit he was expecting Renard to speak out against being sent home, but it would seem whatever he had seen inside had shaken him enough to leave him beyond arguing. As he was nudged back towards the woods he merely nodded his head, retracing his scent back to the bush where he'd left his clothes and shoes, pawing them back out before scooping them up in his mouth. It was a twenty minute trek back to town. He could only pray the creature didn't try to attack Adela and Alice while they were gone.

•••

"We have faced worse," Adela reminded Alice in a soothing tone, recalling especially a tangle with a small band of werewolves a few years back. "Whatever this is we can and will defeat it." Her voice held a conviction she didn't truly feel, but at the least Adela was always good at reassuring her packmates on most occasions. "From what Renard described this beast is quite large. While we wait for the rest of the pack we should search for other clues out here and try to determine how it got inside. " The front doors weren't very wide after all and the windows might be big enough for a weredog to climb through, but not so much for that thing.

Had the giant slug thing not startled him quite so badly, Renard would have argued about being sent back. But, had he not seen it, it wouldn’t be going back he’d be arguing about. It would have been disobeying. Nevertheless, once the asylum was out of sight, he relaxed his muscles significantly. They ached from how tense he had kept them up until this point, but he figured they’d be fine in a few days. It wouldn’t keep him from complaining to Alice later, though. The soreness was already fairly irritating, so it was only a matter of time before it got worse.

“Well, we’ve got kind of a long walk ahead of us,” he said as he put down his bundle of clothes. “I don’t know how the mayor is gonna react to this though. He seemed kinda… nervous to me. Ya know? Like he wasn’t a hundred percent comfortable with our presence. So telling him about the slug thing might just push him a little too far. What say you about us just telling him there’s something less… disgusting out there, like maybe just say we found a vampire and we want the rest of the pack to be there in case it’s a strong one?”

•••

Alice nodded, her eyes softening at her leader’s words. “You’re a good alpha, Adela,” she said. It renewed her belief that whatever it was, it was no match for the pack. They had been protecting this town for a long time now, longer than Alice had even lived here in Silverwood. Nothing quite so grotesque had ever shown up on their borders in the year she had stayed there, and she hoped that it would be easy to get rid of, or if not, that it wouldn’t be a danger to anyone.

“Alright,” she agreed. “I’ll take the other side of the place, okay? I’ll call you if I find anything.” With that, she bounded away to the front of the asylum, where the road that lead up to it was cracked and decayed almost as much as the building itself. First she tried the front doors, which where shut, but when she pushed the hinges groaned and she quickly pulled back. The last thing she wanted was to give the beast a way to escape, and the two large doors on this side of the asylum might just be big enough for it.

Stepping back, she looked at the windows. None were something a giant slug could climb into. Not without cutting itself open. Then a thought came to her. Renard had asked if it ate weredogs, and mentioned that it was fat. Perhaps it hadn’t been that big when it first arrived. Maybe when it ate, it got bigger. Thinking this was a good enough explanation as any, she returned to Adela and dipped her head politely before explaining what she thought might be the case with their mystery slug. “It might have eaten things out in the forest first, then kept eating anything that came into the asylum. We’ve seen mice and rats go in there before, so… maybe?”

Finnegan had to agree that the mayor seemed like the type to panic upon being told there was some massive, unknown creature shaking up in the old asylum. "We should tell him it's a werewolf. I think the pack has dealt with them before. He'll feel more at ease if he thinks it's something Adela has encountered before and knows how to handle," he suggested, letting his own clothes drop down to his paws to free his mouth. He glanced over his shoulder, the clearing blocked off by trees by now. "We better get a move on. Like you said we have awhile to go," he muttered before snatching his clothes back up and sprinting off toward town.

•••

The returned reassurance from Alice renewed some of Adela's own confidence, her heart warmed by the other woman's kind words. Sometimes she doubted she would ever be as good an Alpha as her father was, but she would damn well try. The pack deserved a good leader. "Agreed," Adela replied with a nod of her head before prowling to the back of the building. There was a single door at the very end, but it appeared far too narrow for the slug to have squeezed it's way through. The only other openings were a few windows made up of dirty or broken glass.

Upon hearing no signs of distress from Alice she began to pace, mind racing to come up with an answer. 'Perhaps it was born inside the asylum and grew from there?' Thinking it over, she eventually came to the same conclusion as Alice just as she came to meet her in the backyard. "Yes, I think you are right," Adela agreed. "So that is possibly one mystery solved. We know the creature is carnivorous and presumably grows larger through consuming other living things. What remains to be said is if it is venomous or if touching it will be harmful, avoiding any teeth of course." If worst came to worst they would have to exterminate the beast themselves somehow.

Renard grinned, glad that Finnegan agreed with him on something. He had been pretty sure the other weredog didn’t like him very much when he jumped in the window of the asylum, and that he could say something that would sound intelligent to the other canine was reassuring. When the other were suggested they tell the mayor it was a werewolf, he nodded, accepting this as the way to go about it. Then he took off, just slightly behind Finn since his legs were a bit shorter still.

As they reached the edge of the forest, right before the town, he slowed down and stopped so that he could shift and pull his clothes back on. He turned his back on Finnegan, sure that the other weredog would once again dive into the bushes away from him to put his clothes on. When they finished, as they walked toward the gates of town, he asked, “Do you know any of the other weres and where they live? Mayor Barron is probably asleep now, and I’m not sure his wife, if he has one, will like us banging on the door this late.”

•••

“I don’t think anyone is going to want to get their teeth near that thing anyway,” she said, “whether it’s poisonous* or not. And our claws are only good for digging. We might have to try to use something else, but I’m not sure how good any of us would do with a blade, and we’d still have to get close. Our best bet might be a hunting rifle. What do you think?”

(( *Poisonous means biting/eating it will poison you, venomous means if it bites you you get poisoned. But you probably knew that. :P ))

Finnegan's legs felt as if they might fall off as they neared the town, stopping just out of sight of the main gates to change forms and replace their clothes. He didn't bother disappearing into the underbrush this time, the urgency of their situation demanding he put aside his shyness for the time-being. Adela and Alice were counting on them to reach the pack as quickly as possible. Once they were both ready to set out again he sprinted toward the gates, using his identification card to grant them access to the community beyond.

"I met a few of them last night, but I'm not sure where they live," he admitted. "We could try going to the park and doing the pack howl. The humans probably won't find it out of the ordinary other than being a bit noisy and it'll summon our own kind." He felt a bit apprehensive about this option, but it seemed the next best option. He could just imagine the looks on the other weredogs faces, being called in by the new guys. Hopefully they would understand once they were informed what was going on. The dark brindle Shepherd who attacked him when he first arrived would probably be snide as always he imagined. He wasn't looking forward to see him again. "One of them is...a bit aggressive. Try not to get on his bad side. He's got a rotten attitude, but we have bigger things to worry about right now."

•••

"Yes, we may need to use our human forms for this one," Adela agreed grimly. though another idea popped into her mind as she eyed the old asylum. "If that doesn't work, we'll try fire." Setting the place ablaze could have dire consequences for the surrounding wildlife so she hoped they could avoid that option. If not they'd have to keep plenty of water and hydrants on hand to keep the burning controlled.

((No I'm just dumb. Our in character excuse can be that English isn't Adela's first language and she confuses the two sometimes.))

Renard felt a bit frustrated when he had to slow down a bit for Finnegan. This was urgent, why couldn’t the adrenaline kick in for this dog and help him keep up? Renard himself was used to doing a lot of running around, especially during apple-picking season where he would have to gather apples and then quickly run them back. They had to make sure each and every one was picked before they had a chance to rot over the rest of the season. It didn’t occur to the teenager that Finn might not have had to do such things where he came from.

“The pack howl sounds like our best bet right now,” he said, thinking about it a moment. It would take too long to sniff every house for the scent of a weredog inside. “It may wake up a few people but they aren’t likely to look for what we’re doing. Humans don’t usually think about what could be causing dogs to howl.” Renard nodded, mostly to himself, deciding once and for all that was what they would do.

“Don’t worry about the aggressive guy,” he told Finn. “You’re gonna be part of the pack, and then no matter what he does, he’ll get in trouble for anything that could hurt you. Now, since I don’t know anyone but you, Adela, and my sister, I think you should do the pack howl. Put some confidence in it. You got this.”

•••

“You mean… burn the whole asylum to the ground?” she asked, a bit surprised. A moment of thought had her nodding solemnly, though. “Yes, that may be the best option. It would also mean there would be nowhere for vampires or werewolves to hide in the area. We’ll just have to be careful that the surrounding forest doesn’t catch too.” The last thing they needed was for that to be set ablaze, especially since it could easily spread to Silverwood.