A Chance to Breathe

"Well it's official," you say to Allegra, looking at your phone. "Keith is gonna be tied up in bullshit for awhile."

The two of you had gotten a bit of a reprieve on the ride home as Jenny was pretty beat. Why wouldn't she be? She just killed a whole mess of vampires and... might have saved the world? You dropped her off at her apartment building, and you figured she was going to get a shower and immediately crash.

"Poor guy," Allegra chuckles from the other side of your couch. "He thought he had all this in the bag. Oh well, not really his fault."

"Yeah, he's just lucky Jenny was there, I guess."

"Speaking of Keith," Allegra says, gesturing to her own phone, "guess what I found?"

"Do I even wanna know?"

"Sure you do. I found the site he put up for his last D&D campaign!"

"You're still going on about that?" You groan.

"Well we're still definitely not human, yeah?"

Since getting back to your apartment, the two of you had showered and taken stock of things. None of the changes you'd accumulated while in the haunted house seemed to be going away. Stranger still, both your drivers' licenses already reflected your new, wilder appearances. A look in your closet revealed not only clothes that fit your new frame but a... decidedly different fashion sense. It was like the world thought you were always like this.

"I'm not gonna risk wolfing out right now but sure, let's say you're right," you sigh.

"He's dedicated like a whole page to werewolves in his campaign. Serious world-building shit."

"Anything particularly interesting?" You raise a brow.

"Says the first werewolf was the frost giantess Angrboða, and the first pack were her children."

"A giant that's also a werewolf sounds pretty terrifying," you snort.

"Well in Norse myth she's also knocking boots with Loki, and gave birth to Fenrir."

"So okay," you nod, "some real-world mythological basis that the machine might've... welded us onto."

"Here he says that there's human bloodlines that are related to Angrboða, and that if they get infected they usually go on to lead packs. The big thing about these bloodlines is they've all got red hair like her."

"Of course he wrote it that way. God, what a dork."

"Yeah well, get this. Angrboða's favored children each had a collar that they wore, and these got passed down in the packs over time. Collectively they're known as the Collars of Fimbulwinter, and only a pack leader can wear one."

You look down at the spiked collar dangling about your neck. You'd taken it off to shower, but you quickly put it back on when you were done. Truth told, you've really started to like wearing it. It looks badass, with its black leather, wicked spikes, and fur lining.

"Fimbulwinter. Isn't that... like, the big storm that's supposed to come before Ragnarok?"

"That's the one. Angrboða's descendants are supposed to usher it in, according to Keith's stuff here."

"More end of the world stuff, great."

"I don't know if it's gonna do anything now that the machine's off, so maybe you're not gonna be the wolf-woman of the apocalypse," Allegra snickers.

"If I start acting weird you've gotta tell me, okay?"

"I dunno," she smirks. "I kinda like some of your weird."

"Yeah, I... noticed."

"About time," she says, fixing you with a look.