RESPECT THE TERRITORY

23 FEBRUARY, TUESDAY, CONTINUED

It wasn't a revolt.

I had rushed towards the window to take a look at the noisy parade that had spilled out of the packhouse.

Then I opened the window for a better look.

"What are you doing, Alpha Princess?" Delta Oran nearly hissed.

Well, he was the one holding a gun. What did he intend to do, shoot through a shut window? So I ignored him.

It wasn't even a fight dog thing - half the small mob were pack wolves, although I supposed to Delta Oran, they looked the same. Which either goes to show how well the ex fightdogs had integrated with my pack... Or how my pack wolves were very much fight dog material.

If this were a movie, this would be a scene where a group of warriors were having a drunken stumble out of the packhouse - which was as likely as a revolt with like less than 20 people. Maybe we were in a really low budget movie.

"Are they intoxicated? How much did they have to drink?" Delta Oran sounded incredulous, but he didn't lower his gun. Oh great, wait till the Lorents hear about this!

But I was quite sure there was no way that could be right.

Wolves didn't get drunk easily - especially strong warrior wolves, and because our packhouse kitchen only served alcohol under gamma or beta directives - and this was usually limited because the kitchen held very limited stock.

Mama Rosa always said, "You're here for the food. If it's drink you want, drive out to the pub."

And nobody wanted to mess with Mama Rosa, not even full grown warriors.

Also, no matter how many times Beta Lucas requested it, Mama Rosa would forget to order more.

Dad was all, "Let's not make things hard for the ladies in the kitchen. Grown wolves who want drinks are perfectly capable of running out to town on their own."

So in the end, Beta Lucas or Gamma Harry would drive out to buy a few crates, and Mama Rosa would reluctantly allow them to put some of it into her fridge. The rest had to go into the corner behind the freezer because Mama Rosa needed the chiller space to cure ham.

Dad wasn't a beer type of guy. He said he'd seen too many good wolves make fools of themselves. I mean, just because a wolf was resistant to alcohol didn't make him immune.

"What's the fun of drinking? I don't understand it." Dad had declared. Well, I wouldn't know, I'm underage, but even I was aware that my Dad sometimes sounded like a stick in the mud. Except that no one would say it straight to Dad's face. The other wolves just say our Alpha's strict and they respect him for it.

Come to think of it, I don't think my dad minded other wolves drinking. Beta Lucas' stories had a lot of party and club settings - which now that I was older, I could infer had a lot of alcohol flowing in the background.

Beta Lucas himself met Mrs Beta because he climbed into the back seat of her car when he was drunk while at a party with Dad.

Unlike Dad, Beta Lucas wasn't adversed to enjoying a drink or two, or ten. Hahaha. Maybe Dad never had fun because he was the one dragging Beta Lucas' drunken butt home when they were young. Hahahaha.

So anyway, drinking wasn't a big thing in our pack for this single reason, our alpha wasn't a fan.

And I'm not sure how this info got out to the rest of our wolves, but most wolves wouldn't ever get drunk in front of my dad... Or in the vicinity of our pack house or Goddess forbid, the Alpha house. Night Leaf wolves might be on the wild side, but they were very respectful of their Alpha.

Dean had told me that his Mum had boxed his ears for singing too loudly while walking past the Alpha House. I think the fact that he was singing "who's afriad of the big bad wolf" was at least partially to do with it.

But it wasn't just Florence, pack wolves in general, out of respect of the Alpha did not sing at the top of their lungs while passing the Alpha House.

Beta Lucas was boasting about his cleverness at choosing the plot of land directly opposite the Alpha House to build his home, "One does not litter or make yellow snow outside the Alpha House, so I knew our frontage would always be clean."

Personally, I didn't think one should do those things in front of anybody's house, but Beta Lucas might be right, since I've not seen the above-mentioned outside my home before.

Even with the regular pack BBQs at the packhouse next door, nothing ever spilled over to our lawn - except for pups because they would follow me, and I had no concept about respecting the alpha house.

Should there ever be a need to "let loose" or "go crazy" I heard Delta Felicity's house was a good place to head over for after parties. Actually, Delta Felicity was the only wolf I've ever seen on a high - but that could just be her party mode and nothing to do with the drink in her hand. With Delta Felicity, it was hard to tell.

They've got yellow snow in their street too. Tim had brought a bag of it to school and emptied it in someone's locker. And I don't mean like a sandwich bag. More like a medium sized garbage bag. He had collected it across the weekend.

That ended badly... Tim had to stay back in school and write a letter of apology, but I think the guy who lived with the smell of pee in his locker for the rest of the semester had it worse.

Meanwhile the wolves outside were right now brawling-rolling-stumbling right across the Alpha House lawn towards our newly opened window.

"Hoi! Hoi! Alpha!" EJ shouted as he detached himself from the rest of the group.

I leaned over the ledge, and suddenly thought of Romeo and Juliet - although there were 17 Romeos looking up at me.

"Rapunzel, Rapunzel! Let down your hair!" EJ cried out. Hahaha. I guess EJ had his own idea of what scene this was.

And then a snowball hit him. Bullseye.

This was when I realized that none of them were drunk in the slightest. They were stumbling over mostly in laughter actually.

EJ scrambled up the wooden trellis. I had to hand it to him. He was really agile. The other guys pelted him with snow balls, "Alpha! Fluffy says when new wolves come to Night Leaf, it's tradition to snow fight."

Eh? We did have a snow fight. Once.

"Come down and play Sam!" Ben yelled, "The dogs are getting trashed."

"We are not!" EJ shouted back down.

He was immediately pelted with snowballs.

"You've been shot so many times, dog. I've lost count." Ben yelled up.

"63 times, beta." Ink announced.

"Mou.... It's not fair if my own team is shooting at me!" EJ argued. The guys laughed.

Hahaha. It looked like they were having fun.

By now EJ had gotten up to my window, "Hoi, Alpha. I thought your room was on the third floor... Eh? Eh? Eh? Eh?"

Because this was the point that EJ realized that Delta Oran was standing next to me with a gun.

"What, EJ?" Someone shouted.

"EJ be careful!" I think this was Flynn.

And then EJ struck with a sudden force and speed that surprised me. I was so shocked that I froze - hair and all.

EJ kicked into the room, landing a high kick on Delta Oran's wrist to disarm him and then he dragged Delta Oran by the collar of his well pressed suit and tackled him out of the second floor window.

The guys below yelled the first expletives that came to their mind.

"Are you mad dog?" Ben yelled, "Let go of the Delta."

"He had a gun in his hand!" EJ protested.

"Are you okay Sam?" That was Flynn.

I sighed and popped back out of the window. Then I yelled back down at my wolves, "That's our last working healer. You guys better not have broken him!"

But the guys had dragged Delta Oran up to his feet. Neil grabbed him such that I worried that Delta Oran would be burst like a bag of chips.

"Why are you alone with our alpha?"

"Which room is that?"

"How dare you hold a gun to our alpha!"

"F***ing Lorent."

WTH.

Seriously! They were going to break him.

"Don't be so rough!" I climbed out the window.

"Sam, be careful! You're on the second floor!" Flynn yelled up.

Yeah, like I wouldn't have noticed.

I flared and jumped - which was stupid. Maybe stupidity was infections.

"Dammit, Sam!" Ben yelled.

"I got her!" Jax shouted.

"No, I got her!" Torque yelled.

"You guys are c***eyed!" Ben scolded.

"Ssss...." Cobra said, appearing just next to me in mid fall.

Oh right. I shifted my shoulders and curled up my legs to mimic him. I think he meant to dive down first and catch me before I hit the ground, but I landed mirror image to him.

Yup, I had forgotten that little trick. Nice. This second time, I think my body moved more easily into the right position at the right time.

"Sssss..." Cobra hissed, looking down at his empty arms in surprise.

"Gotcha!" Barry said before ramming straight into Cobra. I quickly sidestepped, and then I sidestepped again to avoid Torque's trajectory.

Just for a moment, I thought Torque was going to splinter the porch beam, but luckily Barry and Cobra fell in his way and absorbed the damage.

Whew. We just got this house, and I wasn't going to have it destroyed on the first night Dad left me in charge.

Not that he said anything about me being in charge, but I was really the only alpha still standing here.

"Sam! That was dangerous!" Flynn looked like he was about to lose his mind or get a heart attack.

I blinked at my trainer. I really didn't feel like Flynn was in the position to freak out for my sake. I mean, they were the ones who stomped up to my house and dragged out Delta Oran.

Poor Delta Oran who was right now being terrorised by Jax while Neil held him down.

At any rate, I was the alpha! I'd be asking the questions around here!

I looked squarely at all my wolves and then I released Boo, "You guys... What do you think you were doing?"