The alarm buzzed at 6:30 AM, same as always. Fenris reached across the nightstand with a massive clawed hand, silencing it with practiced care. The routine was automatic now - shower, shave, dress. Dark jeans, flannel shirt, leather jacket. The same motions that had anchored him for months.
But as he stepped onto the sidewalk, something felt different. The morning air carried an edge he couldn't name. Mrs. Toki wasn't walking her corgi. The street felt too quiet, like the city was holding its breath.
He pushed the feeling aside. Paranoia was a luxury he couldn't afford in his new life.
The first sign something was wrong came three blocks from the shop. Broken glass glittered on the sidewalk, catching the early sunlight like scattered diamonds. Fenris quickened his pace, his footsteps still silent despite his growing urgency.
When he rounded the corner, his blood turned to ice.
Rosetti's Butcher Shop looked like a war zone. The front window was shattered, spider-webbing outward from a central impact point. The door hung askew on its hinges. And there, pinned to the doorframe with a kitchen knife, was a piece of paper that fluttered in the morning breeze.
Fenris approached slowly, every predatory instinct screaming. The message was written in bold, angry letters.
WRONG MOVE, WOLF.
The scent hit him before he stepped through the ruined doorway. Fear. Desperation. And underneath it all, the metallic tang of blood - not fresh, but recent enough to make his hackles rise.
Inside was devastation. Display cases were overturned, their glass fronts smashed. Meat scattered across the floor, ruined and spoiling. The cash register lay on its side, coins scattered like confetti. And in the center of it all, Marco Rosetti sat hunched on the floor, his weathered hands pressed against his face.
FNR: Marco?
The older man looked up, and Fenris saw tears streaming down his cheeks. Marco's kind eyes - the ones that had always crinkled with laughter - were hollow with grief.
RST: They... they destroyed everything. Thirty years I built this place. Thirty years.
Fenris knelt beside him, careful to keep his movements slow and unthreatening despite the rage building in his chest. The shop that had been immaculate yesterday was now a graveyard of broken dreams.
FNR: Are you hurt?
RST: No, no. They came after closing. Broke in through the back. Left this mess and... and that.
He gestured weakly toward the front door, toward the knife and its message.
RST: What does it mean, Fenris? Wrong move, wolf? What did you do?
The question hit like a physical blow. Fenris looked around at the destruction - at Marco's life's work scattered and ruined - and felt something cold settle in his stomach. The alley. The girl. The two men who had run when they saw him. This was his fault.
FNR: I... I tried to help someone yesterday. Two men were bothering a girl in an alley. I made them leave.
RST: And they did this because you helped someone?
Marco's voice broke on the last word. He gestured around the ruined shop with shaking hands.
RST: This was my father's business. And his father's before him. Three generations, Fenris. Gone because you... because you what? Did the right thing?
Fenris stood slowly, his joints creaking with barely contained tension. He walked to the front door and tore the letter from the knife with deliberate care. The paper crumpled in his massive fist, the sound unnaturally loud in the devastated shop.
RST: Where are you going?
Fenris paused at the threshold, his crimson eyes reflecting the morning light streaming through the broken window. When he spoke, his voice carried a weight that seemed to settle into the very bones of the building.
FNR: Work.
The door's broken hinges groaned as it swung shut behind him, leaving Marco alone with the ruins of everything he had built, and the terrible understanding that the gentle giant he had come to trust was something far more dangerous than he had ever imagined.