His hands found fabric. He yanked on his boxer briefs, hopping on one foot as he tried to get them up his legs. This was not the time to be naked. Whatever was happening outside, whatever had made Grayson’s voice go all wrong and dangerous, Ryan needed to be dressed for it.
The snarling got louder. Closer. Ryan could hear it through the closed window, through the walls. It didn’t sound like dogs. It sounded bigger. Meaner. He found his jeans and nearly fell over trying to get them on. His hands wouldn’t stop shaking. The button took three tries to fasten.
More shouting. Colton's voice this time, yelling something that might have been a warning. Then a sound Ryan had never heard before in his life. A roar. Deep and rumbling and so loud it seemed to vibrate through the floorboards.
Ryan’s shirt was inside out. He didn’t care. He yanked it over his head while stumbling toward the door. His feet were still bare, but there wasn't time to find his shoes. Wasn't time to do anything except move, get downstairs, figure out what was happening.
The hallway was dark. Empty. Ryan could hear sounds coming from the first floor. Movement. Something heavy hitting something else. His feet carried him toward the stairs even as his brain screamed at him to go back, lock the door, do what Grayson had told him.
But what if Grayson needed help? What if the people who'd sent the text had shown up with guns or weapons or something worse? Ryan couldn’t just hide in a bedroom while people got hurt trying to protect him.
He reached the top of the stairs and looked down into chaos.
The front door stood open. The cool night air rushed in, carrying scents that made Ryan’s stomach turn. Something wild and musky and wrong. Through the doorway he could see shapes moving in the yard. Large shapes. Too large to be human.
Ryan’s feet moved down the stairs without his permission. One step. Two. His hand gripped the railing so hard his knuckles went white. The sounds from outside were clearer now. Snarling and snapping and those roars that seemed to shake the house.
He reached the bottom of the stairs just as Grayson crossed his line of vision. Moving toward the open front door. Still shirtless, still barefoot. His shoulders were broader than they'd been upstairs. Something was wrong with his proportions. With the way he moved.
Then Grayson’s body did something impossible.
It didn’t break or crack or shift slowly. One moment he was human, tall and muscled and recognizable, and the next moment, he wasn't.
The change happened so fast Ryan’s brain couldn’t process it. Couldn’t make sense of what his eyes were seeing. Where Grayson had been there was now a lion. Massive and golden, with a dark mane that seemed to absorb the light from the hallway. The lion's muscles bunched and released as it moved, each step silent despite its size.
Ryan’s legs gave out. He sat down hard on the bottom step, his mouth open, no sound coming out. This wasn't real. This couldn’t be real. People didn’t turn into lions. That wasn't a thing that happened in the actual world where Ryan lived and worked and worried about normal things like bills and whether he’d remembered to water his plants.
But the lion was there. Right in front of him. Moving toward the open door with purpose, its tail lashing behind it.
Another shape moved in Ryan’s peripheral vision. Reese. Except Reese wasn't Reese anymore either. He morphed into a polar bear right in front of Ryan’s eyes. White and enormous, easily twice the size of the lion that had been Grayson. The bear’s head swung toward Ryan for a fraction of a second, small eyes finding him, and then it was gone, following the lion out into the yard.
Ryan’s brain was trying to shut down. Trying to reject what he was seeing, filing it under hallucination or dream or mental breakdown. But he could smell that wild animal scent flooding the house. Could hear their breathing, heavy and animal. Could see the way their muscles moved under fur and skin.
His hands pressed against his mouth. He might have been screaming. He couldn’t tell. Everything had gone muffled and strange, like someone had wrapped his head in cotton.
Get up, something in his brain whispered. Move. You need to move.
Ryan’s legs obeyed before his conscious mind caught up. He stumbled toward the kitchen, drawn by some instinct he didn’t understand. The window. He needed to see. Needed to understand what was happening, even though understanding seemed impossible.
The kitchen was dark except for the light spilling in from outside. Ryan pressed himself against the counter and looked through the window above the sink.
The backyard was full of animals.
The lion prowled near the tree line, its movements fluid and predatory. The polar bear stood near the house, massive head lowered, teeth bared. And there were others. Smaller shapes, moving in and out of the shadows. Their forms were wrong somehow. Too hunched. Too angular.
Hyenas, Ryan’s brain supplied. Those were hyenas.
Except hyenas didn’t live in this part of the world. Didn’t exist anywhere near here. But there they were, circling the larger predators with cautious aggression. Their laughter echoed across the yard, high-pitched and manic.
Malik and Colton were there too. Still human. Still recognizable. They moved between the larger animals with weapons Ryan couldn’t identify. Something that looked like metal rods. They were yelling, coordinating, but Ryan couldn’t make out the words through the glass.
One of the hyenas lunged at the lion. The lion that had been Grayson. Ryan’s hands pressed harder against his mouth, trying to hold in the sound that wanted to escape. The lion moved faster than anything that size should be able to move. It caught the hyena mid-leap, massive jaws closing around its throat.
The hyena made a sound Ryan would hear in his nightmares. Then it was gone. Dissolving into shadow or running or something Ryan’s eyes couldn’t track. The other hyenas scattered, their laughter turning to yelps. They moved as a pack toward the fence, scrambling over it with unnatural speed.
The lion roared again. The sound went through Ryan’s body like electricity. He wanted to run. Wanted to hide. Wanted to wake up in his own bed and discover this had all been some elaborate stress dream brought on by death threats and fear.
But he couldn’t move. Could only watch as the hyenas disappeared into the darkness beyond the fence. As the polar bear lumbered back toward the house, its white fur stained with something dark. As the lion's head turned, scanning the yard for remaining threats.
