The secret collective

MANAIA POV Matt, Devon, Stacey, Te Aroha, Rawiri, Taika & I sat in a circle on the ground around the campfire, Alpha Henry of the Silent Shadows pack hidden in the bushes of America glared down at us in anger, some of his powerful alpha aura leaking out. He took a deep breath let it out and said begin again, this time focus on your Wolf try bring them into your space neither of you take control and get to know each other. We all rolled our eyes & Rawiri stupidly opened his mouth, “but alpha we have been at this for 8 weeks, everyone else has pretty much completed this but all my wolf & I do is bicker with each other, I’m never gonna get this, also it feels weird having no one in control.” Alpha Henry sighed again and looked over at his son who was 3 years younger at 15 than our 17, 18 & 19 year old group, Bear automatically opened his mouth “ even though we have already told you why this is important we will waste everyone’s time and go over it again. This is important and the last part of your time here before you go home, if you don’t do this your wolf could turn feral. Creating this stronger bond from hanging with them in your mind knowing likes, dislikes & anger triggers helps you to know your wolfs mood. I know it feels weird having neither of you in control but it’s important you do this otherwise the collective will request your wolf be neutralised, it’s not pretty and most don’t survive, your a good kid with a lot of potential so” Bear claps his hands looks at his dad & the alpha says “Begin” We all look into the flames and I recede into the blank space of my mind where my wolf Tymora is waiting for me. She rolls her eyes and says “so the doofus twins still haven’t gotten it yet”. We roll on the floor of my mind laughing passing the time talking & sparring with each other until Tymora hears the call of the alpha to take control, she slips into the front, makes our head drop (when no one is in control the body looks straight ahead the first time I saw it happen I freaked out screaming ) to show submission & says “ good evening again Alpha” he chuckles and says “nice to speak with you again Tymora ,you can bring Manaia back now” She gives me back control & I stare at the ground waiting. The alpha Henry looks around the group and says “first light tomorrow I want you 3”looking at the boys “back here at 3am we will try again, the rest of you have free time until these guys get it. Bear you can be there escort while they are here until the others have completed the training. I do however expect you all to be at daily mandatory training at 0700 with the rest of the pack, is that clear! “Yes alpha” we said in unison. “Dismissed” we all standup stretch our legs and start the long trek back to the pack house, we are about 1 hour and a half walk away. After the alpha dismissed us Stacey, Te Aroha, Bear & myself walk back to the pack house, I check the time on my watch it’s now 0530 & the sun is just about to rise & we have been up every day for the last 3 weeks at 0300, this is by far the most intense training we have had so far and it’s not even physical. Stacey & Te Aroha took longer than me to get this last part of the training but this is due to my gamma blood line, Us 3 along with Devon are members of the Hidden North Tangata Whenua (in Maori this means “ people of the land”) pack of Aotearoa New Zealand the other boys with us are members of the Hidden South Maui pack, they like to joke that they have a panther colony living within their collective that they train with, I think they are kidding cause everyone knows that there are no Panthers in New Zealand. Actually no one in New Zealand thinks that there are no packs or supernatural beings, this is because the bush land is so dense and large that we can hide easily if we do come across humans. So your probably wondering why or how I ended up sitting on the ground gazing into a fire in the US. Well we are all part of a secret global supernatural collective that has been around since the days of Columbus. As soon as collective members turn 5 you start the mandatory collective training; From 5-7 years old you are required to live in Japan to learn etiquette & manners. At 8 you get to spend 6 months living with your pack then 18 months living in Europe learning history & medieval weapons training, At the age of 11 you either get sent to to train with the aboriginals in Australia, or the nomads of the desert ,some go to Africa,others to South America or Europe, Ireland, Scotland or Wales for a year, a few go to India or Japan. I don’t really remember much as this training is only for your wolf so I wasn’t really present for it maybe I can get Tymora to tell me. Anyone that is a collective member gets their wolf at 13, As soon as we turn 13 we get enrolled into “homeschooling” for the human government records. From 12-14 we go home and recreate the bond with family and pack, for me this also meant expedited gamma training on top of normal school. When we turn 15 we go to the US and travel to different packs for trainings in 6 month blocks for 4 years which brings us back to the pack house in front of me. I head to the space I’ve called my room for the last 6 months and 3 weeks get changed into something suitable for training, now that I’m alone I release the frustration by letting out a scream, I’m so pissed off with the stupid boys we were supposed to be finished this training 5 weeks ago but the boys have been mucking around and not being serious about the training, we think it’s just cause the next stop is their pack lands in New Zealand & they know that we know there are no panthers in NZ, or maybe it’s cause they don’t want to leave. Who knows what goes on in the brains of boys. I look at my watch and see I have 10 minutes to get to the field for mandatory combat training. I lace up my shoes walk out my door and start jogging to the spot. I see the boys and some other members of the pack heading the same way as well and call out a hello, they look at me wave and grumble a small “lo” clearly they have stumbled out of bed & are still waking up hope they get their head in the game otherwise they might get hurt. When we arrive the head warrior Marcus is already organising everyone into sparring groups according to age and skill the littlest of them are 2-4 years old (they used to have their training way later in the day but kept running away from the nannies to come here so alpha approved the time change, actually I think it’s genius cause when we are training and they are there it reminds us if there was ever an attack from non collective members or rogues they are who we would be fighting for which pushes us to work harder) they look so cute doing their repetitive motion training. Marcus finishes organising us I see that I have been put into a group with Rawiri, he always looks down at me because he thinks Im only gamma cause of my bloodline not my skills, I’ll teach him the obnoxious pup. He has been like this ever since we met at the age of 5 but he got worse after I completed my expedited training, you know how sometimes you meet someone and they instantly grind your gears that is me and Rawiri through and through. I look around and see that Jemma a girl from the pack who is the same age as & is mates with Jacob has also been put into our group as well as alpha Henry’s nephew Jacob he rolls his eyes at Rawiri and says you ready? Rawiri gets into a defensive position and the 3 of us start attacking him at once cause in a real fight you never know how many opponents you’ll be fighting. He ducks, weaves, uses his foot work to block and defend I wait for an opening look over to see Jemma throwing a roundhouse kick he starts spinning towards me when I throw my fist into his face and feel the impact of his nose break, Jacob then sweeps Rawiri’s leg and he hits the ground Marcus looks over at us and says good job guys, Ra sit a spell and wait for your nose to heal then go again this time, Jemma on defence. While we wait for Ra Jacob takes a seat next to him and starts explaining how to use your wolfs senses to anticipate the attack. Jacob looks up at me and Jemma and says you girls wanna show him. I’m taking a breather ( he’s always like this he won’t hit Jemma) We stand up facing each other we both crack a grin then take defensive positions, I take a deep breath Tymora comes to join me as we have joint control my senses overload I can feel, see and taste everything 100 times better than before, I glance at Jemma and see her & her wolf Kaia staring back at me eyes a mixture of pitch black with green flecks, my eyes probably look the same pitch black with brown flecks. They both contort their face into a smile their voice a mixture of both they say “let’s do this” we launch at each other but neither of us can get a hit in both with our superior senses heightened we feint, block and keep trying to get a hit in on each other, time passes quickly when suddenly a whistle blows and we both stop trying to get a hit in. Marcus is looking at us in disbelief. Girls he says that was phenomenal, Ra , Jacob go again. You two come here and can you help lead repetitive motion training with the pups. We walk over to the pups and break them up into smaller groups and start doing drills. Combat Training is finally over we all head to the locker rooms in the gym to shower and change, then it’s to the kitchen to help with breakfast.