He had never expected this to happen. He had run every imaginable route through or across or around or within the mansion's entire property.

Within the last three days.

Plus training with Cafas, which involved a lot of running around.

This was almost getting frustrating. If he didn't run, then he twitched at everything and couldn't stay put. Prowling didn't help. It just made him run into more people. People who either tried to get him to do stupid stuff with them or were loud or smelly or tried to grab him or ran away. People he'd sort of met in a glancing way, but didn't know. He didn't want to hang around people he didn't know.

So he was out running, now in full night, and far enough away from the mansion-school for the streetlights to be faded and scarce, the debris to collect in the corners of building foundations, the alleys to go from street-wide paved pathways for almost-parked vehicles to the off-black recesses of violence and waste.

It felt less like home than the last time he'd been in this area.  He watched the shadows without his breath or heart quickening, a levelness keeping his eyes steady from behind, and he didn't feel out of place but -

when had it stopped being the place he belonged?

The wolf slowed to a trot, and then to a walk to pick his way through a puddle that stretched clear across the street. Well, street was a bit generous. It wasn't an alley, it had a name post... but it definitely wasn't well used or maintained. And the puddle was deep, rising well above his paws and even up to his rear dewclaws at its deepest point.

He hadn't liked rain in a very long time, but this last shower he'd barely even noticed. Tucked inside, with secure walls and a roof that seemed completely immune to leaks, the rain only affected him when he went out to run. The mansion property didn't flood like this. Most of the really rich places didn't.

He shook his feet to get the worst of the water, leaving muddy splatters across the grimy pavement, stretched his forelegs in a shallow bow, and rolled into a lope again. His breath came easily and the route, unplanned and impulsive but as yet completely familiar still, flowed through his paws without thought.

The back road petered out for a while, less pavement and more chunky blackish gravel that still bled oil in the rain, and Adder skipped around the potholes large enough for him to lie down in, had he been so inclined. The smaller ones he just stretched his stride into an almost-jump and soared past. The ground joined together again, and for a while his oily footprints padded behind him.

Street lamps ahead. Adder passed through them unconcerned, eyes closing against the bright light but pace unaffected. He smelled people more recently now. The general stragglers of unsavoury places.

Would they still recognize him as one of those stragglers, or would they mistake him for a rich person now? Well, if he were to shift. Right now he was wolf and the most mistaking they would do would be to think he was an escaped pet or stray dog. And neither was true in any sense! He wasn't escaped, he wasn't a pet, he wasn't a stray (or astray), and he wasn't a dog!

He was wolf, and if the people in that car rolling past didn't see the smirk he gave them then they were completely clueless. He kept going, and they disappeared behind him with the stink of their exhaust.

And then he was alone on the street again, stretching his range and still just pad-pad-padding along, one paw in front of the other and the next behind it. On and on and on.

Noise ahead. People-scent. Not especially familiar people, familiar stenches. Dirt and oil and sweat and blood. Not all human blood. Dog fighters? That noise made sense. People out trying to collect strays to do whatever and then dump their bloody carcasses back in the street? He'd found more than a few meals that way, but he had learned very quickly to only scavenge in those areas on two feet.

They left him alone that -

so that was which alley they were in. One of the ones with a bunch of dumpsters crammed together, overflowing with bags and boxes and stench. Adder skirted around it before the local scent could reach him. Two people, crouched at different corners of the dumpsters. Two swearing people, who smelled of fresh not-animal blood. Tough cat.

Best for him to get gone, though; he had no intention of fighting off a couple of idiots even if he had nothing against cats. They got less worked up at him than dogs.

He could hear them behind him, kicking at the dumpster and swearing at the cat who apparently outright taunted them. Probably one of the wilier adults. They did find enjoyment in some crueler things, like stealing your food and then perching just out of reach.

Or sneaking up on you while you slept, just to swipe with their skinny hooked claws and bolt. He knew they were laughing at him.

An engine revved. Motorcycle? Ahead of him.

Two. Time to not go that way. Adder looped around an unlit streetpost and headed back up the street.

Movement caught his eye as he passed the cat-dumpster-idiots alley. His weight was on the other side, and he was still shifting it to dodge away when something too narrow to see closed around his neck.

He wanted to dig his feet in and pull. Of course he did. That was wolf reaction to being trapped. Pull away.

He got fingers under the thing, the plasticy wire, before it tightened through his absent ruff. It still wrenched him into the air, but he could breathe.

And see, see the cat-scratched man running at him even as he shouted something ringingly useless. Adder brought both heels up and into the dogfighter's hesitant mug, hauling on the choking wire for leverage and shoving his back into the chest of the one he'd almost managed to miss. They both went down, but it gave Adder enough slack to get the wire off his head.

And then he kicked stick-and-loop-idiot in the throat. He stayed down, but the other one was moving away, hands over his very bloody nose and making little noises. Adder stalked towards him, rubbing his reddened throat gently as he glared down.

"D-didn't know you w-were a shifter," he stammered. "P-please, w-we're sorry!"

"Unless you want a job?"

Adder turned back so he could kick stick-idiot in the face again, but he just got hands. And a yelp. He liked the yelp. "Get out of here," he growled.

The two dogfighters made their way out of the alley. The motorcycles were long gone, and he could hear the two insulting each other for a few blocks. If they got beat up for coming back bloodied and empty-handed so be-

Something was pricking his leg through his pants. His good new pants.

His angry hand got pricked even more, and earned a hiss.

...

There was a cat the size of his hand on his knee and climbing higher. At least, it smelled like cat. And assorted garbage, mostly not-food garbage. Lots of papery smells. Some different flavours of slime. Banana peels. It was patchy with half dried, half wet mud - the patches being different levels of dry more than different amounts of mud - that he suspected wasn't all the same shade of brown.

And it was climbing up his leg, and getting mud all over his new pants.

He tried to grab it again, but whenever his hand came in range the little thing seemed to twist itself inside out to sink those very tiny but very, very, very sharp needle claws into his skin. He even tried pushing through the claws to grab it, but somehow it got its teeth in as well.

Although...

Adder looked at the kitten hanging from the ball of his thumb. It wasn't on his pants now, he supposed. Stubborn little thing.

Rude little thing too. And now it was meowing at him, or kind of hiss-growl-mew-ing, around his hand.

Whenever the kitten let go with one paw or its teeth, something else was locked into his skin or the wrist of his shirt long before he could actually make any progress on getting it off.

"I can see why they were so beat up," Adder growled. The muddy kitten mewed at him. "What, are you proud of that?" Apparently very proud, and of taunting him like this too. Know what, fine. Adder made his way out of the alley and far enough down the street for most of the smell to fade away, and then shifted.

...

Kitten didn't miss a beat and climbed right up his foreleg to the back of his neck. OH COME ON.