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Miranda's Pov

I made it home and packed the small amount of things that I actually owned. I also decided to steal as much from that shitty pack as I could. Because it was only nine, a lot of people were still in the house, which meant I had to be very cautious of what I stole. I waited until the very last possible minute to steal from them, and when I did, I made sure that it was only the most useful things I could find. I wanted to take several weapons, but this pack never did much if any training with me or the others which meant that grabbing a gun and some ammunition was going to be my best bet. If I grabbed a knife, I was sure I was going to hurt myself more than anyone else.

My bag was light, and I was ready to disappear without anyone knowing where I was and hopefully being too far gone for them to track me and take me back. I went into the woods in the back of the packhouse and hid behind a tree to ensure I was alone. I set the pack down and shifted. Even after a year, it still took so long to get used to it. The sounds could make anyone sick as the bones snapped and popped, shifting into that powerful wolf body. To me, it felt like an hour to shift as I could feel each individual bone break and each stretch of skin as if it was nothing more than a sheet wrapping around a mattress.

Shifting took anywhere between a few seconds to almost a minute, depending on the wolf and the abilities of it's human. For me, shifting took around five or ten seconds, but I watched some wolves take 50 seconds to shift. I stretched my wolf body as it wasn't used to being in motion this often, if it all. I tried to shift once a week at night in my bedroom or in the bathroom. Shifting in those nights by myself was more of a reminder of who I was and what was in my veins than anything else. While Stormy was being quiet at the moment, I could feel the strength of our bond increase tenfold due to being in her body.

I knew that if she wanted to run, she would just ask or start to take control, but something told me that she wasn't entirely ready just yet to run free. Taking in that house one more time, ingraining it into my memory, I picked up my bag and started running and didn't stop until I was out of the pack territory.

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I couldn't tell how long I had been running. It could have been three hours. It could have been twelve. What I did know was that I left my pack territory and was finally free of them and on my way out of this state. The sob of relief racked through my animal body as I could no longer scent them. The constant fear of being found and forced back into that hell hole now eased a bit and led into an alert, almost paranoid mindest. Me and Stormy were switching control back and forth. Considering it was her body and I had little experience running as a wolf or even being a wolf in general, it was mostly Stormy in control.

The pack was near the middle of North Carolina, and I knew I was getting close to Tennessee. Once out of the state, I would stop at a motel for the night and let my body rest. I did steal as much money as I could find from every single member of the pack. The 300 dollars I had wasn't much, but it could get me a night at a motel near the middle of nowhere and keep me from being exposed to the harshness of the night.

It was starting to get dark, and I still hadn't made it to Tennessee yet. I had to skirt several pack territories and sometimes had to turn into a human and walk or run through the city just to avoid those packs. I was tempted to catch a ride out, but the fewer people that saw me, the better. I didn't want them to know what state I ran to as there were several bordering North Carolina.

I made it to the Tennessee border much later than I had wanted to. It was almost ten at night, and I was worried I wouldn't be able to find a room in the small town on the border. The motel looked like something I would be murdered in, but I had nowhere else to sleep, and it was only 50 dollars a night. I shifted into my human body that I tried not to look at too much with that malnourishment wrecking my body. I knew Stormy would never admit it, but she was just as tired as I was. The run ran through all of our reserves, and we drastically needed food before we could get anywhere.