The Los Sangrientos Way

Bodycount frowns too, the uncharacteristic crack in Snow's facade making him feel both concerned and strangely privileged at the same time. He squats down next to her and places his arm around her back, giving her shoulder a reassuring squeeze.

"We didn't win this place," he muses. "We've taken it as our home, but we didn't pay for it. Two packs of heroes did, with their blood and their lives. I don't know much about them yet, but I do know that they were the kind of Uratha who die for a reason. This place must be important. They wouldn't have died here, otherwise.

"I don't feel at ease here yet, not any more than any of us do. It's an...alien place. And the dream was...scary. Especially the fact that we were buried in a heap together with strangers without so much as a spray-painted sentence on the wall to mark our passing. I really don't like the idea of being forgotten. But what would be even worse is to be remembered as 'the pack who ran'.

"That's not the Los Sangrientos way. It wasn't our way when the Boss was around, and it's not our way now that you're in charge. These last weeks, the whole world has been trying to intimidate us. The Boss dying, the state of our new home, this dream - it all seems almost engineered to frighten us, to make us stand down, bare our throats, even run. But that's not who we are.

"We're gonna stare the world in the eye and intimidate it right back, until it rolls over and submits. We're going to tame and master this new home, remember and honor those who died to make it ours, and do our damndest to make sure that those who come after us remember us with the same reverence. We'll face the future together as a pack, and when the day comes, we'll fall together, as a pack. That's one thing even that dream couldn't dispute. That, all of it, is the Los Sangrientos way."

Bodycount falls silent for a moment before giving Snow's shoulder another squeeze.

"I think you did the right thing leading us here. Two packs of heroes died here - now it's up to us to give their deaths meaning. Even if the dream does come true in the most literal sense, and we are murdered and forgotten, that doesn't change the fact that we died doing the right thing. That's what matters most, in the end. I'd be proud to share even an unmarked grave with you."