Brody threw open his suitcase and grabbed a white shirt and some pants out, throwing them down on the dark duvet. He turned as he picked up the shirt again and he caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror which hung on the wall near the small closet of the room he would be residing in for the next five weeks.
His tattoo's seemed to stand out against the paleness of his skin, the dark ink forming intricate patterns all over his arm and torso, extending up to the base of his neck. Each patch of ink meant something, each section having its own special link to his heart.
His biceps were still small, too small for his liking.
He threw the shirt over his dark hair and pulled it down his torso. The pants were next, and he was done.He put a water bottle and his phone into his gym bag and swung it over his shoulder, making his way out of his room. As soon as the door opened he felt eyes on him. He cursed the fact that most of the students liked to keep their doors open, and that groups of people were just lurking in the hallway having conversations with friends.
He noticed the looks, the glances and the curious expressions as he passed each person. Some of them he read as just confusion, people not knowing if they had seen him before, trying to place him. Others expressions were downright judgmental and Brody felt like screaming, 'Yeah I know, I'm not my brother!' into their faces.
Yet, he kept walking, his head down and his fingers fidgeting against the strap of his bag.
He tried to stop it, but he imagined his brother walking down this hall, his large stature walking confidently as he hi-fived people he passed and smiled at his friends. Everyone loved Hunter, everyone wanted to be friends with Hunter.
Brody had the sudden feeling that he was an imposter, that he was taking his brothers position, that it should be his brother standing here, his brother should be walking these hallways, but his brother wasn't here, and he was, and that was all that mattered.
Brody took a deep breath as he reached the elevator, pressing the little arrow which pointed down. He stood there for a few moments before the doors opened up and a guy stepped out. Brody stepped to the side to allow him to pass, but the guy didn't wait for him to finish his step and just walked straight into him, his shoulder making contact with Brody's.
Brody was knocked back, but he steadied himself, then looked at the guy who obviously had no manners and muttered, 'sorry,' even though he knew that he had nothing to be sorry for.
The guy looked down at him. 'You're the new Lewis kid, right? From the pack in Helena?'
'Uh, yeah,' Brody confirmed, somewhat nervously. He felt intimidated, surrounded by so many first born Alphas and suddenly this huge guy was right in his face.
The taller guy just gave Brody the most disapproving look that he had received in a long time, and he slightly shook his head, as if he couldn't even believe that Brody was who he was. The guy didn't even say anything, but his look said a thousand words.
The guy when kept walking down the hall, but Brody was stunned and just stood, staring at the open elevator doors.
He snapped out of it and stepped through the doors just as they were about to shut. He looked down at the hand he had wrapped around the strap of his bag, his knuckles pressed into his white shirt as he rubbed his thumb over the fabric of the strap.
You're here for your pack, you are here to learn to protect them, Brody thought to himself, trying to convince himself that he could last this whole five weeks.
He heard the doors open and looked up. His eyes widened as he saw that Nate King was standing just outside of the doors, looking at him with curious eyes. A rush of embarrassment flowed through Brody's body as he remembered what he had said to him only a short time before. Nate King was the future council member, Nate King was going to lead one of the biggest packs in the country and Brody knew that his father would have been extremely upset if he had heard Brody criticizing him.
In the moment, all that he could think was that he was taking his responsibilities as one big joke, and Brody didn't think that was okay. Brody thought that was the opposite of okay, actually. Nate King was going to have the protection of the entire country in his hands one day, and that was important. If he made mistakes then people got hurt, fathers got hurt, daughters got hurt......brothers got killed.
Nate didn't look angry with him now, he just had this curious expression in his face. Brody didn't like it, so he pushed past them both and made his way towards the large double doors, not looking back once.
The camp grounds were huge and extravagant. Every building looked like a masterpiece and the gardens looked like they had been plucked straight out of someone's dream. Beautiful flowers in the brightest reds and blues were blooming right next to the cement pathway that Brody was walking along and he couldn't help but admire them as he passed.
He found the building easily, following the signs which lead him to one of the main gyms. This one was open to students at any time of the day, and Brody was pleasantly surprised to see the extensive amounts of equipment in the large room. Each corner seemed to be dedicated to something different and in the centre was a large mat, which Brody assumed was to be used for hand to hand combat training.
He groaned just thinking about hand to hand combat. His brother had trained at it for years and yet Brody had never felt the need to. Now it was up to him to learn it and train alongside people who had known their Alpha fates their entire lives.
Brody had assumed that his Alpha status would be pointless, useless, that he would just grow up and settle down when he found his mate and then that would be that. His brother would become the leader and he would just be plain, old Brody.
Now he was here, the place that every child wished that they could go. Alpha Camp, the place where the leaders of the werewolf world prepare for their futures.
He looked around the gym, the building was well lit with a couple of large windows on two of the walls which faced the outside. He could see the gardens and paths from the windows. The walls were painted a light blue which stood out against all of the black and silver gym equipment.
There was nobody else using the gym, and Brody was relieved to have a little bit of a break from the constant staring and the comments. He knew that most people would have figured out who he was by now, he had heard enough of the passing comments and gossip about him to know what people thought of him.
Most of the people had just felt sorry for him, the inexperienced rebellious looking guy who had lost such an awesome brother. Then there were the people who didn't care for him at all, just because they thought that his pack was too small to even matter. Those people didn't want him here.
Brody didn't care what they thought, he was going to complete the camp and he was going to go home and find his mate and lead his pack like he was supposed to.
Brody shoved his gym bag against the wall and got to work.
He jumped on the treadmill and ran as fast as he could. It took him a while before he started getting tired, but by then he was quite bored of running. He went over to the weights section and started working on his arms, knowing that it would help him when he had to do a mock fight with some of these giants.
He had been working with the weights for a couple of minutes when he heard the loud voices of people.
'I bet a hundred dollars that I can lift more than you!' someone was saying.
'You are full of bull, I have way bigger muscles than you,' someone else said.
'Guys, let's stop comparing dick sizes and actually work out please,' a third person said as they rounded the corner. The other two both laughed, looking somewhat embarrassed.
Brody could see now that the person who was talking last was the same person that he had seen outside of the elevator with Nate. He was tall and intimidating looking, definitely bigger than the other two guys that he was with.
The red head saw him first, rolling his eyes.
'Look who's here,' he said sarcastically, 'future leader of the smallest pack in the world.'
'Tye,' the elevator guy warned half-heartedly, getting on the treadmill.
'Do you even have pack houses? Or does everyone just stay in one room?' the other guy asked in a malicious tone.
Brody kept his eyes down, trying to focus on what he was doing. These guys were Alpha's and running away or fighting back wouldn't work in his favour. He knew that they were bigger than him, stronger too, and if he spoke back they would probably end up in a physical fight on the gym floor. Running away would just be giving into them, and the wolf side of Brody wasn't about to let some punk ass kids make him feel small.
'It's no wonder that you get attacked so often, I doubt you have any fighters at all,' the guy called Tye taunted.
'Are you a fighter?' the other guy asked, speaking the question like it was the most ridiculous thing in the world.
Brody just ignored them, not responding to their cruel words. He just wanted to work out, he just wanted to get by. He didn't care if he had no friends, he just wanted a calm five weeks. He was here to learn how to lead, not deal with hormonal and callous teenaged Alpha's.
'I think that my five year old sister could do heavier weights than you,' Tye commented, walking even closer to Brody and leaning against one of the machines.
'Tye, Jace, shut up,' the elevator guy warned again, but he didn't seem to care that much as he just kept running on the treadmill. He then plugged his headphones into his phone, completely zoning out as he ran.
'Why didn't you just pass on your role to someone who could actually do it?' Jace asked, and the wolf side of Brody was growling on the inside, itching to defend his name and hurt the person who was being so cruel. Brody pushed it down, but the anger was there, the reaction to the two guy's hurtful words and it was just simmering below the surface, just waiting for its opportunity to escape.
'Yeah, no offence but all those tattoo's make you look like some small time drug dealer, not a leader,' Tye added.
Brody took deep breaths. He could feel anger rising up in his chest, and the wolf side of him was screaming at him to fight, to grab these guys by their necks.
He calmed himself down, they aren't worth it, he told himself.
Jace took another step closer. 'I wonder what Hunter would think if he knew this scrawny ass brother was taking over his beloved pack?'
That was it.
The mention of his brother was what made him snap, the wolf part of him rising to the surface without him actually turning. He could feel his teeth as they extended into points and he knew that his eyes would be glowing golden if he could see them.
Brody threw the weight across the room, his Alpha strength combined with his anger sent it flying straight through one of the glass windows. The smash of the glass was audible and the high pitched sound echoed around them. Brody didn't care about the glass at all.
He stood up, looking Jace in the eye. 'Don't you dare talk about my brother, you don't know anything about my family!'
'It speaks,' Tye laughed out, compleyley unfazed by Brody's actions. He then moved to come to stand next to Jace, right in Brody's face.
Both of the boys bared their teeth which they had forcefully extended into sharp points. They stood shoulder to shoulder in an attempt at intimidation, and Brody knew that they were strong, taller, better, but the wolf side of him was trying to claw its way from inside of him.
'Do you want to fight us? What are you going to do? Bitch slap us to death?' Jace asked, sarcasm dripping from his words.
Brody was fuming, and it was taking all that he had for him to not pounce at the two guys, ripping at their throats.
'Stop it,' Brody demanded, trying to put strength into his words, but only the anger was showing.
'Or what?' Tye growled out, leaning right into Brody's face. Tye's hands then came and pushed against Brody's shoulders, taking him off guard. Brody fell down with a thud, and embarrassment flooded him. How could he protect his pack when he couldn't even protect himself against two teenaged guys?
'What's going on in here!' suddenly a voice rang out through the gym. The three of them turned to see that Nate was standing at the entrance, a confused expression on his face. He was dressed much differently than he had been before, this time he was in casual gym gear, a water bottle held tightly in his hand.
Brody picked himself up, looking over at the window where the entire glass had shattered.
Nate's gaze stayed on the two guys as he walked past his friend who was completely oblivious, still engrossed in his music as he ran on the treadmill.
'Go do something,' Nate told Tye and Jace, who shared a look between them.
Tye and Jace then backed down, both of them taking a few steps back. Brody could have laughed if he wasn't so angry. The two guys had been vicious creatures towards him but as soon as there was a future council member in the room they had turned to their best behaviour.
'Are you alright?' Nate asked, and there was, what sounded like, genuine concern in his words, but Brody knew better. People didn't want to help him, people like Nate didn't care about him, he was the future leader of the smallest pack, as they had said.
Brody didn't say anything, he just stormed off, grabbing his bag from the side of the wall as he went. He slung it over his shoulder and practically ran outside of the gym.
He left through the wide double doors and entered another garden. This time he ran around the side of the building, coming to stop just as he rounded the corner. He was standing on some random patch of grass, those some beautiful flowers blooming only a few feet away from him and yet he couldn't even spare a thought for their beauty.
He had been here, what? An hour? And already he had created enemies, already he had destroyed a window. His father had warned him. Those people may not take so kind to you, but you have to ignore them, focus on what you have to learn, he had said. Brody groaned, how did his brother handle this? How did Hunter deal with all of this?
A tiny though in the back of his mind sounded, echoing around his mind like a ricocheting bullet, Hunter was better than you.
He pushed it back, locking it away in the box at the back of his mind where it wouldn't be able to escape.
'Hey,' a voice came from near him and Brody's head whipped to the side, seeing who had found him. He hoped that it wasn't one of the douche bags from before.
Brody was somewhat pleased to see that it was actually Nate who stood there, looking at him through concerned eyes.
Nate was better than the other two, but in the remainder of Brody's anger, he scowled at the guy. 'What do you want?'
'I'm sorry about what my friends did, they had no right to bully you like that,' Nate explained.
Brody huffed. 'Well, I'm fine, so just go back to your friends.'
Nate shuffled around on his feet for a moment, like he was unsure of what to say.
'I'm not some charity case, I don't need you to apologise for them,' Brody told him.
Nate shook his head. 'I don't think you're a charity case. I, I just knew your brother and I just want to make sure that you are alright. It can't be easy for you, and I can help you catch up if you want?' Nate offered and the offer seemed innocent enough but Brody still didn't trust him.
'I can catch up on my own,' Brody shrugged off the offer, adamant that he didn't need this guy's help.
Brody couldn't even think of accepting help from him. Nate was the future council member, Nate was the one that everyone wanted to be, Nate wasn't the sort of guy who would genuinely want to help the future leader of the smallest pack.
Nate sighed. 'Fine, at least just tell me if the guys are stupid again and I'll have a word with them.'
Brody huffed, this guy just wouldn't give up. 'I don't need protecting, thanks. I can fight my own battles.'
'I didn't say you couldn't I just-'
'I don't care. Stay away from me,' Brody told him, turning on his heels and walking off in the other direction.
He didn't need any help, not from anyone.