I walk through the crowd of people on the boardwalk followed by my three best friends. We head to the carousel and stand in line. As we get closer to the entrance gate, I hear laughter from behind. I look and freeze. Blonde rock star long hair, piercing blue eyes. The boy with these features looks at me and I look at him. Our eyes lock and there is an instant connection. I continue to stare as the boy and his companions walk into the line. My friend Sarah shakes me back to reality and I follow her onto the carousel. We find two free horses and get on right as the carousel starts to move. I start to put the mysterious boy in the back of my mind as I listen to the music. But then, I see him again. He and his friends walk between the horses that me and Sarah are on. As he walks past, he looks back at me and smiles. I freeze again and stare. The smile was both inviting and threatening. It was the smile of a predator. I continue to stare after the boy until he and his friends jump off the carousel. As he hits the ground, my vision spins out of control and I black out.
When my vision comes back, I see that the carousel is gone and a bonfire has taken its place. I am no longer sitting on a carousel horse, but am lying on sand. I look around and see that I am on a beach. Suddenly, my ears are filled with screams. Terrible, terrifying screams. I look at the bonfire and gasp. Four grotesque beings are tearing guys apart and throwing body parts into the fire. As I look, I become even more horrified. The monsters are the boys from the carousel. I get up from the sand and try to back away, but my feet won't move. I keep trying to move my feet while at the same time, not looking away from the bonfire. As I look, the boy who smiled at me looks in my direction. My breath leaves my body as he smiles at me again. It's the same smile. Inviting but threatening. As he smiles, he walks over from the bonfire. He walks behind me and wraps his arm around my waist. The second his arm touches me, my entire body freezes. I can't move a single muscle. The boy moves my hair and kisses my neck but soon the feeling of lips on my skin turns to fire as the boy sinks his fangs into my flesh. I gasp for breath as the pain intensifies. The fire doesn't go away but my vision does. I fall into blackness and am soon surrounded by icy coldness.
I shoot out of bed, covered in sweat and gasping for breath. I look around my room, in a slight daze, but then exhale the breath that I had held in. It was only a dream. I throw the covers off my legs and to the side of my bed. I yawn and stretch before getting up. I walk into my bathroom and take a warm shower to wash off the sweat from my dream. As the warm water runs over my body, the smell of lilacs mixed with pond lilies fill my nose as the shampoo I used rinsed from my hair.
As I leave the bathroom after drying off and putting on my black undergarments, I hear my father holler to me from downstairs. From the tone in his voice, I can tell something serious is going on downstairs. I quickly put on a black tank top,a pair of faded blue jeans, and a pair of black converse over white socks. I leave my room and go downstairs. I find my father in the family room talking to another male. I lose my breath and quickly look down at the floor as I approach them. The man my father is talking to is none other than the alpha of alphas. Being in the same room as the alpha alpha made my feel like an omega again.
I continue to stare at the floor until I am given permission to look up. I look at the alpha alpha and smile slightly. He smiles back and extends his hand, an obvious sign that he wants a handshake. I shake hands with him, but am then unsure what to do next. I just looked at my father.
"So.. what did you call me downstairs for?" I asked.
I expected my father to answer but Carlisle answered for him.
"The alpha of Santa Carla is concerned for his pack. Over the past few weeks he has lost some of his wolves to a mysterious predator. The lost wolves were very important to the pack and without them, the pack is weakened. The alpha is moving his pack out of Santa Carla to a safer town. Even though his wolves won't be in any more danger, he doesn't want anyone else to get hurt." Carlisle sighed deeply at that point. "What I'm asking is if you, along with your friends Blair, Blaze, and Sarah, are willing to go on a mission to stop the predator from claiming more victims in Santa Carla?" My eyes widen at the news and I go speechless.
A mission! To be chosen to go on a mission is a huge honor. It means that Carlisle has seen that me and my friends have true potential. He has seen that we have completed enough training to be able to defend ourselves enough to get out of dangerous situations. I try to speak but the words are caught in my throat because of my excitement. Carlisle sees and chuckles to himself. He tells me that he understands and then he gets serious again. At that point my father says that we should sit down so we will be more comfortable while we talk. Carlisle agrees and sits down in an armchair by the fire-place. I sit in the armchair next to him as he begins talking about the mission. My father left the family room as we talked and went to the kitchen to fix up some snacks.
The mission was a search and destroy. The way Carlisle explained it, even though it was repeated information, was that werewolves were disappearing in a resort town called Santa Carla. The alpha of Santa Carla was moving his pack because of the disappearances, but he wanted to make sure that whatever was taking the wolves was killed in case another pack wanted to move into the Santa Carla territory. I thought the job seemed easy and agreed to do it. Carlisle was pleased and told me that I should leave for Santa Carla the following day. It seemed a little early to leave for the mission but I didn't argue. I just shook hands with Carlisle and then left him so he could talk with my father.
I ran up to my room and called my friends. Blaze and Blair were up to the job, but Sarah wasn't so sure. It took a lot of coaxing and pleading, but after a while, Sarah finally agreed to go. After telling her and the other two all about the mission, I started to get my things together. I packed several shirts, a few pairs of pants, a couple of pairs of shorts, some extra undergarments and socks, some essential hygiene products, and a couple of pairs of converse. I also packed a couple switchblades as well my Colt 1911 and my S&W Model 4006 pistol with plenty of ammo for both. Carlisle said to bring plenty of weapons if we had to protect ourselves in an ambush. I thought it was stupid. If me and my friends were attacked, we could just transform and fight like wolves. But, then again, Carlisle probably thought that we wouldn't last if we were attacked from above because he said that the killers could fly. Fortunately for us, me and my friends have other abilities that Carlisle doesn't know about.
After packing my bags, I went down to lunch and talked to my father about the mission.
"Carlisle is very hopeful that you and the girls will get the job done."
"I agree. We will get the job done quickly. No more people will go missing."
My father smiled and then hugged me as he got up to put his dishes in the sink. I hugged him back because I knew what he was saying even though there weren't any words being passed between us. He was worried. He knew that I was trained enough to be able to protect myself, but a father is always worried when their only child goes off and does something dangerous with the results being that their child might not come home.
"Everything will be alright. We will come home safe and sound." My father knew I was right, but he still couldn't help but worry.
As I layed in bed that night, I thought about many things. I thought about my father and his worry for me. I thought about the mission and how my friends and I might fail. I couldn't sleep at all because of all the things running through my head. I looked at the alarm clock beside my bed. I groaned with disappointment as I saw that it was only 3:00 AM. I got up and paced around the room a couple of times before deciding to go through my bags. I exchanged some shirts and shorts for others and packed some more undergarments and shoes. This time I packed my make-up kit along with a pair of steel toed leather boots. They were great for hand-to-hand combat. As I went to sleep after putting my bags away, I thought about the mission and wondered what I would meet.