Disclaimer: Twilight and its inclusive material is copyright to Stephenie Meyer. No copyright infringement is intended, yaddah yaddah yah.

A/N: Um. Whoops?

Now or Never

But free will is what it means to be human, and no one can determine the path you take through this universe. Choice is our greatest right, our greatest gift ― and our greatest responsibility.

― Amie Kaufman, "Their Fractured Light"

But there was a difference between being stuck and choosing to stay. Between being found and finding yourself.

― Martina Boone, "Compulsion"

Preface

If this was the end, she didn't mind.

Well, she did. Things were finally worth living for again. But to go out in a blaze of glory with her Alpha and her best friend, defending his choice until she breathed her last — that was something which agreed with both parts of her: the woman and the wolf. Parts of her which, until now, she'd always counted as separate entities and had, at times, struggled to keep apart to stop them from obliterating the other. Now they were finally, finally at peace with one another and stood together, side-by-side, all the more stronger for it.

If this was the end, they would go together — all of them. They would fight for life, for the Pack, their family and their lands. And they would not go down so easily. Not like they expected them to.

She could see it in their eyes: the moves they'd already planned to make, the victory they had already claimed here. But it would be a hard-fought win.

If this was the end, she would be the one to make sure of that. She had already made her vows.

Her Alpha pressed his side against hers. Across their bond, he whispered his love to her and their brothers, giving the last pieces of himself to each and every one of them. And it was to her he handed his heart, for it had been hers to guard for all these months anyway, and he told her not to forget.

She would not forget. She would never forget, even when the darkness took them as it was bound to.

She would not forget any of it.

She was ready.

When Jacob gave the order, his Pack leapt as one.