JUDE'S HOT SOUP TURNS TO STEW (the plot thickens)

STILL FRIDAY, LATE MORNING

"YOUR SOUL MATE IS RUBY?!!!" Dum, dum, dum. If this was a werewolf romance, the camera would make a full circle and pan in to show Jude's conflicted expression. But this wasn't a movie. I think we had established this earlier. Nothing about it was playing out like a werewolf romance either. I looked at Jude, the male lead who thought he was starring in a romance but found out suddenly that he was actually in a low budget B grade horror flick. I mean, we were so low budget here, we only had one zombie.

{Targets are attempting to enter building via second floor balcony.} One of my warriors reported over Mission Flush channel.

Was that Owen?

{Owen! You're here!} I felt quite pleased to recognize him.

{Ah, yes Alpha.} Owen sounded more concerned than pleased though, {Please be careful.}

{Owen, continue report.} Stephan prompted.

Opps. I guess even though I was just here on my own whim, these guys were on duty.

{Yes, Captain.} Owen was quick to switch back into warrior mode, {5 male rogues. 1 female...}

Owen paused at this point, it's as if he were searching for the words to describe it, {The female is Ruby. But she...ah...}

{She's a zombie now?} I supplied helpfully.

{Y..yeah.} Owen admitted. Another long pause.

{What does that mean?} Gamma Harry asked.

{Owen. Please elaborate.} Stephan said.

{Ah, yes Captain.} Owen did his best, {I'm sorry...I... She is walking and moving but she looks like a corpse...}

{Is that the new fashion now?} Gamma Harry asked.

{Ah... No, more like... but ah... Her flesh appears to be decomposing... She seems to have difficulty maneuvering one of her legs.} Owen tried to describe, {There is also a smell.}

{What smell?} Gamma Harry asked.

{Like that of a...} Owen sounded like he was trying to make sense of it as he described it, {...a dead body left out for too long, I imagine.}

Which, if you were in the Warlock's tropical jungle, was also the scent of a particular flower.

{She's kinda undead.} I tried to help Owen explain, {She was executed in the Gold Packlands. But she had this resurrection charm... Although it seemed to have been been defective.}

Even as I said it, I was quite sure no one would understand what I was going on about.

{Oh.} Gamma Harry said, {Maybe her talisman was expired.}

Say what?

{It's dangerous to use old talismans.} Gamma Harry said, {If the leaf is not green, maybe that can happen.}

Suddenly, I remembered the dried up folded triangle made of leaf that Roy had shown me. But wasn't that supposed to be a resurrection charm from Beta Lorent's ex-lover from long ago or something?

{How did you know, Gamma?} I asked.

{Back in Night Forest...} Gamma Harry started, and then suddenly changed his mind, {It's very important to check the expiry date. Yesterday I ate a box of chocolates without checking the expiry. It wasn't nice. It tasted terrible.}

Yet, he ate the whole box...

{Civi sighted.} Owen reported then.

{Report, Owen.} Stephan ordered.

{Pack wolf, teenage female, blond. In white t-shirt and jeans. She just opened the balcony door to let the rogues in.} Owen said.

Eh, who? Did Jude have a traitor in his midst?

"Neil, you need to get your alpha princess out of here." Ron stepped forward towards us, "She's here."

"Who the hell let her in?" Jude grumbled looking up the stairs.

Neil and Jax looked at them and then back at me.

"I wonder how they got past so many warriors." Ron mumbled to himself, "This is bad. Mimi, better go with Neil and Jax too. You're probably gonna be safer with the Night Leaf Gamma outside."

Jude nodded, "Don't worry, Mama. Do as Ron says."

To me he tilted his head and smiled - oh! I finally placed that slappable smile - it was the kind Tim and Shannon used whenever they wanted a girl to help them with something, "You'd help me buy some time with ol Gamma Harry, won't you my Princess? I've gotta take care of something here first before I go."

{Awaiting your orders, alpha.} Stephan prompted.

Huh? What? I only took the slightest moment to realized that I was the alpha and Stephan was prompting for my instructions. But why was he asking me? How was I supposed to know? I took another split second and then decided to go with the first idea that popped into my head.

{Stay put.} I answered, {Let's play along and see what they're up to.}

{Please be careful, Alpha.} Owen said.

{Yes. Who is there with you?} Gamma Harry asked, {Neil, was it?}

{Yes, Gamma. It's Neil. Jax is here too.} Neil answered sounding rather like the reliable warrior suddenly.

{The lorrie healer too.} Jax added.

{Good, good.} Gamma Harry decided, {If anything goes wrong, remember to evacuate Sam first.}

{Yes, Gamma.} Neil and Jax responded immediately.

Since when did Gamma Harry get to call the shots?

{Captain, ready your men. On my signal, we go in and capture them live.} Gamma Harry continued, {Delta Oran, don't mind if I trouble you to keep the key rogues alive. Dead dogs can't talk.}

{Understood, Gamma.} Delta Oran agreed, but he sounded drained.

And yes, now that I've heard Gamma Harry's plan, just capturing the rogues for interrogation did sound like the more sensible way to tackle the situation.

{Gamma Harry, do you wanna just, you know... get in here and be over and done with now?} I offered. I might be the Alpha, but I was also suddenly acutely aware of my inexperience.

{No, no. I'm just the back up.} Gamma Harry refused modestly, {But if you don't mind, Sam. Please let us finish before lunch.}

Ah... right. This was Gamma Harry after all. {Yeah, okay.}

{Including clean up, if possible.} Gamma Harry added, {The packhouse is making bangers and mash.}

{OH YUM!} Jax got excited immediately.

Actually, I wanted to eat the bangers and mash too. Its something our packhouse made because Beta Lucas ate it somewhere once upon a time and had a craving. When he told our cook, Mama Rosa, she asked what a banger was. Beta Lucas said it was some kind of sausage, whatever she had was fine. So Mama Rosa put in every type of sausage she had on hand. Till today, I had no idea what real bangers and mash would really taste like. In our pack, it referred to Mama Rosa's assorted sausage stew over mashed potatoes. (Its good.)

Okay, let's wrap this up before all the good sausages were gone.

{Captain, you should bring your warriors over to the packhouse for lunch after this.} Gamma Harry invited generously, {You can't go wrong with bangers and mash.}

{I...} For the first time, I felt Stephan falter, {I have no standing orders for code "bangers and mash". Please instruct.}

We all paused, and then I remembered how unique our Night Leaf leaders were, "It's not a code for anything Stephan. Gamma Harry was literally talking about lunch plans."

{Oh.} I had to say Stephan took it in his stride, {In that case, I thank you for kind invitation, Gamma. My men and I would be honored.}

{Good, good.} Gamma Harry sounded satisfied, {I've already sent the order to the kitchen. Bangers and mash is good. Very good. Okay Sam. Please finish your business there and we can go back for lunch.}

So now that the important matter of lunch was settled, I turned back to the issue at hand inside Jude's packhouse, "Mimi can leave. Delta Oran too."

"What about you Princess?" Delta Oran worried.

I shook my head, I seemed to be the kind of girl who attracted worrywarts or something. Why did every wolf I become friends with like to worry so much?

"Neil, you gotta get your princess out to safety." Ron said, "Ruby's out to get her."

Yeah, she wants to switch wolves with me. I know.

"She wants to switch bodies." Ron said. Wait what? Oh, well, I guess she would need a new body, but was that even possible?

"She's mad." Ron continued, "She claims she's got a machine that can transfer herself into the blue wolf. You need to get your princess away. If anything happens to her on Asphalt turf, I doubt Alpha King's gonna look at us kindly."

"Stop meddling, Ron." Jude shoved him roughly aside, "I told you, I can handle it. Just take my Mama outside."

"I'm staying too." Mimi spoke then, "I don't know what's going on, but..."

A blood curdling scream interrupted her mid sentence. Too late to leave now.

"Just get out, Mama!" Jude insisted as he braced himself to face whatever was coming down the stairs. It tumbled down in a sickening way... a body.

Mimi screamed.

Unfortunately, I recognized the body crumpled on the side of the stairs. It was... what was her name? Dean's girlfriend... Sandy!

"Cindy!" More than one male wolf on the first floor exclaimed.

Right. Cindy. I meant, Cindy. She remained balled on the steps crying quietly.

Delta Oran stepped back and found a safe place to stand roughly behind Jax. Neil stepped forward, his hulking frame shielding me from what followed down the stairs... which was mostly a woman's laughter.

"Why did you do that, darling?" Jude asked up from the foot of the stairs.

{Rogues are here.}

No kidding.

I couldn't see Jude's darling descending the stairs where I stood, neither could I smell her since I was dream traveling, but I could see everyone else on the first floor smelling her. It looked bad. Thank goddess I was dream travelling.

"Is no one going to announce me?" Ruby's voice demanded.

Ron pressed his mouth together and adverted his gaze. No? Not him?

"Luna is here." A rogue behind announced and chuffed boorishly, but I couldn't see him either.

What I could see was Jude's priceless expression, "Wh...what are you doing here, darling?"

Ruby made the last few steps down the stairs. I could see her legs make a slow and awkward gait down the last few steps. It wasn't just because she was wearing red heels. Owen was right, there was something wrong with one of her hips. She stopped on the bottom step, so that she was facing Jude, but half a head taller, "I missed you, babe."

And then her tone got almost maniacal, like even worse than Maria when she was excited. I never thought anyone could sound more unnerving than a vampire, but Ruby had exceeded herself, "I missed you SO MUCH. Especially when the rogue army that I had usurped from my ex-lovers FOR YOUR SAKE were being slain like lambs in a slaughter house and YOU WERE NO WHERE AROUND TO LEAD THEM."

Ruby placed both arms on Jude's broad shoulders. Jude tilted his head up to face her, his lips pursed and eyes hooded, like he was desperately trying to look seductive and hold his breath at the same time.

"Babe, you know how much I suffered to get this opportunity for you." Ruby whined, "But you..."

"Something popped up." Jude quickly cut in. (I think he must have needed to breath again.) He removed Ruby's arms from his shoulders and stepped away as if taking a moment to consider the view outside the window nearest to him. (I think he was trying to inhale as little stench of decay as he could.)

Jax was pinching his nose from next to me - and we were tucked farthest from the scene.

"Tell me." Ruby took the last step down. The rogues behind her chuckled and stepped down too. One of the kicked Cindy's unmoving body down the last of the stairs to widen the path for them.

I noticed Trent hold Coby back by the arm from the corner of my eye. Mimi's hand was over her mouth - from the stench or shock, I couldn't tell.

"Tell me." Ruby repeated again, sidling up against Jude, her hands reaching around his shoulders and neck. Now that they were both standing on leveled ground, Jude was taller again - even with Ruby's heels, "Tell me, what was more important that clearing out Morning Light for your army? Tell me... what was more important than securing our first victory?"

At this moment, Jude made the mistake of glancing at my direction.

Right, he met me. I was what popped up. That's why he wasn't out there leading the rogue army. I knew my lucky sense of direction never led me wrong. I had run straight to the "Alpha" behind the rogue war. I knew I was lucky, but in this case, there really was an Alpha behind it. I totally didn't expect that.