Everything had happened so fast. Douglas reacted purely on instinct; his fight-or-fight kicked on whenever Alphonse was present, but this time, instead of reacting with flight, because he had back-up for once, the young werewolf was prepared to fight. The desire in him to backup Dominic against the alpha wolf override his fears and insecurities; if Dominic was willing to fight for him, he would throw down with him. It felt good. It felt right.
Douglas had experience with sparring and fighting. It was a mandatory regime for Charles’ wolves, even for the little one in the pack. But, being the youngest and the best tracker, the famous hunter was never willing to risk putting him in serious danger to need to use the skills practically. His fights remained mostly with the other pack members - but those were tough on their own. Alphonse was explicit about no hold backs on the kid when he pitted them against him until one of them broke Doug’s rib right before a big mission and Charles put an end to that unless he was present The favoritism protected him, but it also pissed off Alphonse and the rest of the pack, which only made his life harder when Charles wasn’t looking.
Doug had never fought Alphonse, though. Alphonse knew he could annihilate the kid - and quite frankly, he wanted to - and Doug was brutally aware of that. The only thing that had protected him for so long was Charles, but now with the young man vocally denouncing the hunter as his master, Alphonse saw his opportunity. Doug was a traitor now. He could kill a traitor.
Doug very quickly felt the no holdbacks from Alphonse. There were parts of the fight in the pub that felt like Dominic was just in his way of snapping Doug’s back in half. Alphonse was built like a brick house, his unrestrained punches hit like a wrecking ball, and most worrisome, he wasn’t afraid of playing dirty. When Dominic had taken a blow to the ribs getting in the way of Alphonse’s focus on Doug, Doug was able to pull himself up to his feet fast enough to throw his arm in the way of the werewolf’s teeth from ripping into Dominic’s shoulder. Adrenaline kept him going, he barely noticed the pain even went his arm stopped responding and was hard to throw a punch after.
Then things got a little tougher. Dominic had taken a lot of heavy blows. Doug got thrown around. He kept bouncing back, trying to use his speed and small size to his advantage, but one solid punch to the head discombobulated him. He fell backwards onto the ground, the bar spinning around him in a blur. He braced himself, anticipating the end for a half second when another body got in the way of Alphonse yet again.
They were running out of energy, out of steam - when police sirens could be heard screeching outside of the pub. Another few minutes, and the fight might have been done without a happy ending - but the police were not something that Alphonse wanted to deal with. Despite his raging desire to end both of their lives, he fled. The people in the pub saw it as a victory, that they’d won - but Doug wasn’t so sure.
Doug’s vision was blurry for awhile before he finally recovered enough to get his equilibrium back. He couldn’t be bothered to care about his injuries - he was alive, that was enough - but his concern immediately ran to Dominic. He’d taken a lot of Alphonse’s power hits, and being human, Doug knew that that couldn’t have been a good thing.
Doug followed Dominic and Belle to his home; both out of concern, and a little out of fear. Alphonse was still out there, and given his keen ability to find him, he was afraid of being alone. Even with Dominic downed, he still felt safer near him than he did alone. Even if he had no strength left, he at least had guns.
The moment Dominic was in better condition to talk, Doug glued himself to his side. He smiled immediately at him, still carrying concern in his eyes, but also an admiration of the man that had not only stood up for him, but fought for his freedom that he never thought he could have.
“Hey,” Doug said quietly, the cut on his lip cracking underneath the weight of his half smile, “You didn’t – you didn’t have to do that for me. But – thank you. Thank you. You saved me. In more ways than just one, I think.” He was still processing everything - he had a lot of anxiety about what could happen because of his rebellion, but right now, he tried not to think about it. All he knew is that he owed Dominic his life.
Dominic never backed down from an opponent, even if this one was physically stronger than him. He had never lost a fight before, but that was mostly due to him picking lesser fit men to brawl with. This time he knew what the costs were going to be as he stood between Doug and Alphonse. At least he was doing something that felt right. That was enough indicative for him to keep going.
As the fight stretched on it was clear that Dominic was only getting in the way. Alphonse seemed to want to kill two birds with one stone but it was clear to everyone in the pub that night that he wanted Doug above all else. With that knowledge Dominic tried to wedge himself between the two taking some shots that were initially aimed at Doug and took them straight to the jawbone. Alphonse’s fists felt like a ton of bricks but Dominic couldn’t back down now, he just needed to give Doug some time to re-cooperate from Al’s swings.
It seemed to work for awhile. Every time Dominic came back with a bloodier face than before. That was until Alphonse struck a blow to his ribs. That was enough to knock Dominic out of the game, he was only human after all. It didn’t matter how strong he was, these were two supernatural beings. Dominic stumbled back towards the bar, knocking over some stools and glassware with him. Falling to the floor Dominic watched as Doug gave him a worrisome expression. Dominic barely had any strength left but he used what was left of it to encourage the other. “Give em’ hell kid.”
The rest was a blur to Dominic after that, there were countless of punches that covered every inch of his battered body. His ears were ringing and he felt like he was sitting in a warm pool, which was just both their blood combined into one massacred mess. Dominic wanted to continue to fight back but his strength was gone, and Alphonse was much too strong. The blows hurt way more than he was willing to admit, it was nothing like the beatings he had gotten from his father when he was younger, this was excruciating pain. Now it was nothing but complete numbness. Only noticing the scenery had changed when bright red and blue lights infiltrated the room.
Belle’s voice. He could barely remember walking home with Belle and Doug that night but at some point he was lying somewhere comfortable. With the sound of Belle’s voice and Doug’s in the background. They were safe. So he finally allowed himself to black out to recover.
When Dominic finally came too he noticed Doug at his side. If Doug still looked beaten and bruised he could only imagine what he looked liked right now. “Hey kid.” Dominic replied in a swallow, his throat feeling extremely dry. Groaning slightly as he tried to adjust himself comfortably again. “No problem.” He replied, with that same charming gaston smile. “By the way, that Alphonse guy? Total douchebag. How’d you put up with that back home?” He joked, trying to lighten the situation some. “Tell me I don’t look as bad as I feel.”
