Joel and Grian are curled up on either side of Jimmy, and Jimmy is lying wide awake.
He shouldn’t be worried, of course. In a lot of ways, he’s not, really. Sure, Joel sort of smells like blood and Grian sort of smells like gunpowder, but that’s to be expected of the two of them, especially considering the amount of bloody gunpowder from the day before. Joel is happily and contently asleep, having mellowed out almost instantly after his kill for the day, and Grian had taken longer to sleep but fell into it easily enough, oddly sated, and Jimmy—
He’s still awake. He’s staring at the stars.
He sort of feels like he’s a human who got adopted by a wolf pack?
Which, like, okay. Joel occasionally hums in his sleep, which is weirdly cute. If someone tried to attack them in the night, Jimmy’s pretty sure Grian would actually bite them. Like, Jimmy’s pretty sure he’s seen Grian bite before. The rules of the game say no killing on green but Joel loves killing and Grian will tie himself in knots to avoid the rules so it doesn’t matter.
There’s nowhere in the world Jimmy could be safer, really. Like, outside of the fact Joel and Grian are both morons who convince him to do dumb things too, but from the moment Joel came across him and asked if he’s a bad boy too, Jimmy knew that would happen. It’s fine. It’s fun, even.
It’s… heady, even.
Jimmy lies on his back and looks at the stars. He feels like a human who got adopted by a wolf pack. Sure, he doesn’t know how to be a wolf, but that’s okay. They do. They’ll show him. They’ll make up for the places he can’t fight.
They’ll make up for the things he fails to hunt.
They’ll…
Grian turns over. Jimmy lies stock still.
They’ll do it until they realize he’s not a wolf. Then what? Joel brought him into the pack. Grian joined on willingly. They knew what they were getting into, really, they did. The two most bloodthirsty men on the server, they’d known what they were doing, taking on one of the only men here who hadn’t managed to kill almost at all. They had to have known, right?
They had to have known. They’ve made fun of him for it before. They still make fun of him for it now.
But.
But.
Jimmy lies awake on his back and looks at the stars. A human adopted by wolves—it has things the wolves wouldn’t. There are reasons wolves decided to let humans run in their packs long enough to make them dogs. There are reasons to take a human in, if you’re a wolf.
Jimmy wonders if there are reasons to take him in, or if he’s just… dead weight.
Joel hums in his sleep. Grian turns over again. Jimmy doesn’t move.
For now, though—for now it’s good. Feels good, lying between two wolves. Feels good. Feels better than lying in the cold, at least. Feels like he can almost be one of them. Feels like he could understand.
Gods, he’s never telling Joel or Grian he thinks of them as wolves. He’d never hear the end of it. He wonders if Joel knows how to bark.
Slowly, he stretches an arm around both of them. They get closer.
He may as well enjoy it, he decides warily. If they never realize he’s a lamb in wolf’s clothing, that’s on them.
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