The Huntress

by TheLiteraryEscapist

The first installment in the Argent Chronicles. Follow Adrianna Argent, the demigod daughter of Kate Argent, as her mother's murder forces her to choose a side between the hunters she's always known and the wolves of Beacon Hills. Is she a friend, or a foe? Or, perhaps, neither? (Takes place during MTV's 'Teen Wolf' Season 2 and between the Lightning Thief and the Sea of Monsters.)

11. Chapter 11

11-Battlefield

H e had his head in his hands, his short fingernails curling into his scalp to try to alleviate the constant, pounding of a migraine. Ringing tickled the insides of his ears, making it impossible to focus. He closed his eyes and prayed for peace.

The knot in his chest would not unwind.

And then, over the constant beating of Derek's pacing feet against the ground, and the pulsing of his pack's hearts, he heard it. One breath, one beat, one set of footsteps among the chaos.

He looked up on impulse, although somewhere in the back of his mind, he knew she wasn't inside the building yet. She wasn't his anchor. No, that place belonged to someone else; someone he'd never forget—their memory seared into the back's of his eyelids—the person that made him most afraid of losing control and becoming the very thing he'd feared for so long; a monster. But she was someone special. Someone he cared about.

It was more than that, Isaac could tell, but he wasn't ready to admit it just yet.

Slowly, the rasping inhales and shuddering exhales, the fluttering heartbeat and fumbling footsteps became clearer. They were louder, closer, until she was just outside the door. Isaac held his breath, sitting as still as he could manage, waiting for the large door to pull open. For her to stand in the entrance, strong and healthy—alive.

As the door swung open, clanging loudly once it completed it's ark, colliding with the inside wall, Isaac was both disappointed and frightened to see a very different reality than what he'd been expecting.

There was blood everywhere.

It was the first thing Isaac noticed.

Not the long, shredded fragments of her clothes or the hollow void filling her green irises. Not even the fast, fluttering pumping of her heart and the sudden stop in his as he saw her for the first time.

It was the blood.

Black and gooey, clinging to every inch of her frame. It was inescapable. Like a poison hanging in the air, choking his lungs and scattering his thoughts. She wasn't alone and if it hadn't been for the arm Scott had slung around her back, Isaac had a suspicion that she wouldn't be standing there at all.

He rose up to his feet, his eyes never wavering from their place, and it was as though that one action was enough to shatter the delicate quiet that had encompassed them all before then. Isaac didn't need to turn to know that Derek, Boyd and Erica were all staring where he was. He could feel it on his back, burning his shoulders in the short distance between him and them.

As she and Scott hobbled into the large warehouse, their fumbling footsteps and uneven breathing the only sounds in the space, it felt like Isaac's primary organ had plummeted all the way to his feet. He hadn't experienced the feeling in a while—at least since his father had been killed—and yet the presence of such a reaction didn't startle him. He'd come to expect it, if he was honest, whenever the Argent huntress was in danger.

As she most certainly was in now.

"God, Scott." Adrianna complained, her jaw clenched tightly as Isaac narrowed his eyes, her nearly blood-less skin beginning to reveal the pearly bones hidden beneath, or perhaps it was just his imagination. She was paler than he'd ever seen her. "Could you be a bit more gentle?"

Flickering his glance between the assembled werewolves, Scott hesitantly adjusted his grip over the huntress, seemingly weighing the other's reactions to her presence alongside him. "Sorry." He mumbled non-committedly as his eyes remained trained on Derek, the one with the final decision.

As the seconds ticked by, more and more blood accumulating at Adrianna's feet and weighing down what remained of her clothes, something in Isaac snapped. He moved forward to help her, to set her down on the ground or somehow stop the massive loss of blood, but was stopped before he could get more than one step away.

"No." Derek's firm, angry growl rung in his ears, as heavy and sharp as the clawed hand resting over Isaac's chest. "Don't help her. She's not one of us." He explained, his posture as rigid as a steel pole and just as welcoming.

Furrowing his brows, Isaac reeled back at the exclamation, too shocked to immediately come up with a response. Scott did so for him, frowning as he advanced, Adrianna limping by his side. "What the hell are you talking about, Derek?" He incredulously demanded, his eyes narrowed as his stance widened to steady them both. "She risked her life for us back there. Just because she's a hunter and not a werewolf, doesn't mean she's not one of us. We have to help her. " He argued. "We owe her that much."

"I don't owe her anything." Derek spat back, his expression turning into a grimace as his own light green eyes stared daggers into Adrianna's weakened form. She lifted her head to meet his gaze, her stare never wavering despite the heat in his.

Looking away from her for the first time since she'd entered the warehouse, Isaac watched his alpha refuse to even consider helping their ally. It ignited an angry, protective fire in his heart that could not be quenched.

"That's not entirely true." Isaac pointed out, trying his best not to allow the heat scorching his veins to show in his voice. "She's betraying her family just by being here. That's got to be worth something." He reminded Derek.

Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Adrianna's lips tilt in a slight smile, her sight flickering over to him before moving back onto Derek just as quickly. "I don't care." The alpha roughly replied, his words echoing throughout the building. "She's not our ally. She never has been."

"How can you say that?" Scott shook his head in disbelief as the fingers of his right hand, clenched in what remained of Adrianna's clothes, became slick with her blood. "Isaac's right. She's just as much a target to the Argents as we are now."

"Yeah?" Derek barked, sarcasm clinging to his voice. "That's what she wants you to think. She's been playing us from the start. All of us." He waved his finger towards her threateningly in the way Isaac knew he did when he was barely restraining himself from lashing out violently.

Clenching his hands into fists, Isaac felt his nails elongate and pierce through the flesh of his palms. It was barely enough to keep him human as silence echoed among them, no one brave enough to say anything to either agree or dispute Derek's claims.

"You think I'm still on their side." Adrianna's strained words held the distinctive tone of a statement and not a question. She righted herself with great difficulty, pushing away from Scott, who's hands lingered around her as though he worried she'd fall without his help.

"I know you are." Derek retorted hotly, his lips rising in a snarl. "You know, if I hadn't recognized that smell after the rave, when your psycho aunt was trying to kill Scott, I would have no idea what a traitorous bitch you really are." He yelled, moving forward to close the space between them at the same pace Adrianna barely managed to maintain.

"Oh, so that's what this is about." She smiled cynically, an ominous chill raising the hair on Isaac's neck as she wobbled before the alpha, not an ounce of fear in her despite her clear disadvantage. "I wondered when you'd figure it out."

"Adrianna," Isaac wondered, his thoughts racing the longer he pondered her answer. "What's this about? Is Derek right?" He couldn't help but ask, instantly realizing his mistake as pain flashed in the huntress' eyes for a second before being concealed by forced arrogance and false hatred.

"Why don't you ask him yourself?" She replied, her teeth bared as her breathing quickened. "Derek seems to have all the answers. He's figured it all out." She mocked, glaring at him almost as though he'd insulted her. "Go ahead. Ask."

"She's been lying to us from the start." Derek voluntarily offered, his tone less sharp but still just as condemning, as he regarded the injured girl. "This whole time, we thought she was being noble—sacrificing her safety and her well-being—when all she's really been doing is her job."

Isaac watched as Adrianna's head tilted to the side in confusion. She didn't seem to know what Derek was talking about, although, if the alpha was right, Isaac supposed he wouldn't have been able to tell either way.

"You're exactly like Kate." Derek breached the space between them, leaning his body over hers in a move that was clearly meant to be demeaning as his eyes narrowed in accusation. "You never switched sides. You've been lying to us since the very start. That smell you always have around you, I know what it is. I know what you've been doing." He shoved her away as his cheeks colored with rage.

"Tell them!" He shouted as Adrianna stumbled straight into Scott, who had stayed behind her. "Tell them the truth!" Looking around herself, Adrianna met eyes with Scott. "She's been poisoning us all with wolf'sbane—the same breed Victoria used on Scott." He admitted, stealing away McCall's attention for just long enough. "You can smell it, can't you?" He asked the boy.

"Planted behind our defenses like a freaking Trojan horse and waiting for the opportune moment to strike us all down in our beds. It's the kind of thing only Gerard could come up with." He shared openly, each word like a bullet through Adrianna's crumbling composure, her lips beginning to wobble ever so slightly and her eyes moistening as she refused to cry. "She never left her grandfather. She's been doing his bidding since the moment she was born. Coming to Beacon Hills hasn't changed that. We were fools to have believed differently."

Although he'd prevented her from falling, Scott's hands didn't linger to support her as Derek's words sunk in. His gaze eventually averted away from hers in guilty uncertainty as, like the rest of them, Scott realized that Derek had a point. They'd all smelt it at one point or other. Even Isaac recalled the floral scent she'd carried around since the moment he'd met her, which had slowly intoxicated him.

This time, the wound was not visible on her face as she pushed away from Scott, her hands trembling where they hung by her sides, black blood dripping from her chipped fingernails. "You believe him." She spoke evenly, composed. There was a cold detachment in her tone as Scott refused to look back at her. His avoidance was an answer in it's own.

Turning, she beckoned an answer from each and every one of them. "Erica, Boyd?" She asked, only to be faced by down-turned chins and wavering stares, Erica's blonde hair hanging so that it concealed her expression as she clutched Boyd's hand tightly.

Isaac stood frozen as Adrianna turned to him next. He didn't know what to say, what to think. She was important to him. Yes, she'd hurt him—multiple times—but she'd also saved his life long before ever getting to know him. She hadn't even needed to hear his voice or know his name that night at the sheriff's station, to come to the conclusion that he was worth saving. It had been the same for Derek, the one throwing her in hot water when she most needed their support.

"I suppose I don't need to ask you, to know your answer." Adrianna hesitantly begun, a throbbing, rawness making itself known in the redness of her eyelids and the tightness of her voice. "I don't blame you. How can I?" She rhetorically questioned, biting her bottom lip as her shoulders stiffened. "I've given you no reason to trust me."

"That's right." Derek trampled over Isaac's unspoken words. "We don't know anything about you. You do things no human can do, and yet, you can't heal like us. You're not a werewolf." He surmised gruffly. "To be honest, I don't even know what you are, but one thing's for sure, you're not—"

"Human?" She interrupted, the word sounding odd on her tongue, as though she was pronouncing it wrong.

"Yes." Derek succinctly replied, his brows furrowed and his eyes narrowed. "Quite frankly, I'm beginning to doubt if any of you Argents are what you say you are."

"You would know all about that, wouldn't you?"

The fire returned to her eyes, if only for a moment as she stared off against Derek Hale, a man who, at the best of times, was at least double her strength. It didn't seem to bother her. Nothing did, when it came to battle, Isaac recalled.

Lips pulled back in a sneer, Derek roared out loud in frustration, the wound Kate Argent had left behind clearly still raw despite it's apparent age, and not appreciating the constant poking Adrianna had been dishing out.

"They trained you well, didn't they?" His voice was demeaning but his eyes betrayed his rage. "When exactly where you gonna turn on us? Was it before or after you seduced my beta?"

Isaac knew, somewhere beneath the surface of his shock, that Derek was talking about him. If he hadn't been frozen solid, partly out of surprise and partly because he wanted to hear Adrianna's answer, he would have complained.

As it was, he remained eerily silent, as did the others. Apparently, he wasn't the only one curious about Adrianna's motives. She'd been lying to all of them but the only thing that really mattered was what she'd lied about. Deep down, he found himself hoping she wasn't what Derek said she was; a double agent.

Breathing in deeply, so much so that her entire chest inflated and the charcoal coloured blood pouring from wounds on the side of her face, neck, and shoulder trickled faster still, Adrianna seemed to steel herself against Derek's assault.

"Is that it?" She wondered, her expression clearing of all traces of discomfort as her fists clenched tightly by her sides, at the ready. "Is that your argument? Was that how you planned on pulling the truth out of me? Guilt and public humiliation? You can't be serious."

"Oh, I'm dead serious." Derek replied, not missing a beat. "Tell us the truth now—the whole truth—and maybe I'll let them help you." He gestured to Scott and Isaac with his chin before moving to circle her wobbly form.

Her voice dropped an octave and the air seemed to chill a few degrees, "You won't like what you hear." Adrianna warned. Derek's eyes narrowed but he didn't rise to the bait. "The truth about me isn't pretty; it's violent and bloody. "

"I'm sure Kate planned it that way." Derek suddenly interrupted, his temper stretched to the max as his claws extended and his eyes tinted red. "She always was one for blood and violence."

And just like that, the short fuse holding back Adrianna's anger lit in a shower of bitter, raw sparks, and set off like a powder keg of explosives.

Screaming deep in her throat, the sound scratchy and painful, Adrianna—weaponless and still bleeding heavily—charged the alpha werewolf.

Isaac feared what would happen when the two collided. Whose side would he choose? Already, he could feel his heart racing and his body responding to a silent demand to protect the girl he'd become so fond of, despite the constant dangers posed to him.

But, they never did.

Halfway to Derek Hale, Adrianna's strength ran out and her eyes rolled into her skull as she lost consciousness. The momentum of her sprint carried her the remaining distance between them so that she fell, rather than threw herself, into Derek's arms.

For a split second, Isaac felt relief. Adrianna was safe, although her passing out meant that she'd lost a whole lot more blood than he'd realized. And then, his mind caught up to what his eyes were seeing and the needles prickling his skin and numbing his organs returned once more.

Because Adrianna was not safe with Derek Hale. Not even close.

The older man—instead of understanding the huntress' debilitated state and catching her before she could fall, damaging herself further—continued in his attack as his hands wound around her throat, suspending her limp body high in the air, choking what little life was left within her.

A cruel, feral smile twisted Derek's lips until he was unrecognizable to Isaac. It helped somewhat in allowing the beta to react as his heart demanded, leaping across the distance to snarl at his alpha and, using Derek's momentary surprise to his advantage, push away the much stronger werewolf from the unconscious huntress.

This time, as Adrianna fell, dark bruises mottling the skin at the base of her neck, Isaac caught her, using as little force as he dared. She seemed so brittle, so fragile, he was certain she would break if he held her even a little too tightly.

Kneeling down so that Adrianna's head was cradled against his chest, Isaac didn't have to worry about Derek's next move as Scott launched himself in between them, followed shortly by Boyd and Erica.

"So this is how it's going to be?" Derek gruffly questioned, betrayal shining in his now green eyes. "You're going to protect her even if she doesn't deserve it. Even if she's been planning to kill us all in our beds?"

Although their faces were turned from him, Isaac knew from the squaring of their shoulders and the silence ringing in the large warehouse, that the other betas were with him in helping Adrianna.

"Human or not," Scott began as Isaac remembered to check Adrianna's pulse, using his fingers instead of his ringing, useless ears. "Hunter or not. She's helped us keep Jackson alive. And right now, she needs our help."

Isaac breathed a sigh of relief as Adrianna's faint but steady heartbeat came to life beneath his bloodied fingers. He allowed himself a glance at Derek. The expression on the man's face was pinched and disbelieving, but it was also pained—betrayal prominent in the disgusted curl of his lips.

"She's not her mother," Isaac quietly reminded his alpha, if he was even still that. "Kate wouldn't have waited to kill us. She would have done it already."

And he knew his words held truth in them, despite how little he knew of Adrianna's mother, because Derek didn't refute them. He simply grunted heavily, narrowed his eyes on each of the rebelling betas, and turned around to leave.

"Don't come crying to me when she proves all of you wrong." Derek called over his shoulder before disappearing in the darkness outside the warehouse. The sound of his car's engine roaring to life and the squeal of his tires, was the only indication to any of them that he'd truly left.

Kneeling down beside him, Scott brushed away some of the dampened hair mingling with the pool of blood collected in the crook of Adrianna's prominent clavicle bone.

"What now?" He asked Isaac, voice uncertain. Neither of them had ever dealt with someone this injured. Once more, Isaac took note that there was too much blood. Adrianna barely had minutes to live, if even that.

"Uh," Isaac struggled to think, his mind going back to the thousands of times he'd had to patch himself up after a particularly bad beating but coming up blank. Nothing had ever compared to this. Even the health course he'd failed at in school, didn't make a slight difference.

"We should stop the bleeding." Boyd piped up from the side where he and Erica where standing by, watching the scene unfold. "I doubt we can take her to a hospital so we'll have to stitch the wounds closed ourselves and hope for the best." Distantly, Isaac remembered Boyd mentioning that he'd applied for ROTC courses.

"That won't work," Scott shook his head sadly, lips pulled taut as his brow furrowed in consternation. "She's lost too much blood already. She might not have enough left by the time we manage to close the wounds."

"What about a transfusion?" Erica proposed uncertainly. "One of us could give her blood, if we're compatible."

Glancing between each other, Scott, Boyd and Isaac all knew that it wouldn't work. Not only was there not enough time and materials, but none of them even knew how to use an intravenous line.

With Adrianna's last, shuddering breath, it became clear to Isaac what had to be done. Already her skin felt colder to the touch than it had a mere second ago. Already, he could hear her heart beginning to slow.

It was now or never.

He didn't have time to explain what he was doing to the others, nor would he have wanted to, because explaining meant thinking and thinking meant understanding. And Isaac wasn't sure he wanted to understand the risks of what he was about to undertake.

But it was Adrianna's life on the line. The girl who'd saved his life without even asking for a reward. Who'd turned her back on everything she'd ever been taught, because she'd seen what was right and wrong. Whose laugh was even rarer than her smile, and who wasn't afraid to stare down impossible odds if it meant she was fighting for something she believed in.

He couldn't afford to be selfish now; to be scared.

So, as Adrianna's heart lay still in her chest and her lips rasped out one last ragged exhale, gurgling due to the blood she was drowning in, her eyelids fluttering with one final ounce of life—perhaps a dying wish—Isaac took hold of her frigid hand, squeezing tightly as he welcomed the icy tendrils of death to steal away his strength.

With his body tense and his eyes tightly sealed, prepared for the agony to come, it was as much a surprise to Isaac as it was to Scott, Erica, and Boyd, when nothing happened.

The fear, then, was much worse than what he'd ever felt living with his father. It was all-consuming and inescapable as he opened his eyes back up and shook Adrianna's lifeless corpse.

"No," He whispered beneath his breath. "No, this isn't supposed to happen this way. Come on, wake up." Isaac urged her, shaking her shoulders lightly before realizing that the efforts were fruitless.

His spare hand thread it's way through the messy tendrils of her hair as he sat back, defeated. He'd been too slow, hesitated for too long, and now Adrianna Argent was dead.

Harsh fire ignited behind his eyes as Isaac fought the urge to cry. His chest burned cold the tighter he squeezed her stiff digits in his. Scott's distorted voice rung in his ears, but the words were indistinguishable to him, a garbled mass of confusion.

His head was light and his veins felt as though the blood within them had been replaced by battery acid. As the minutes ticked by, his thoughts became foggy until the mild headache pounding in his temples turned into a full blown migraine.

A groan slipped past his tightly sealed lips as a strange sort of heavy agony churned throughout his entire body. It wasn't until later that he'd realize the groan was not his.

He didn't remember much when he awoke next, but the image of Adrianna's bright green eyes staring back at him, wonder and gratitude hidden within the depths of her gaze, seared itself into his mind as something he would never forget.

Adrianna's words rung in his ears before the blackness took over,

"Thank you."

#-#-#-#-#

Steam rose in billowing clouds out of the shower, moistening everything it touched and thoroughly fogging the bathroom mirror as Scott pushed aside the dripping curtain and stepped onto the cold, tile floors.

A shiver rushed up his spine at the contact but, wrapping a towel around his waist and shaking out some of the water from his hair, he did his best to ignore the sensation.

His hands clenched the side of his sink as he leaned in close to the mirror, wiping away the condensation with his palm as an afterthought. "What the hell am I doing?" Scott wondered aloud, his ears tuning into the muted sound of Adrianna's breathing coming from his room.

Shaking his head, Scott's surprise had yet to wear off when the young Argent had literally returned from the dead. Yes, she hadn't been dead long. But still, her heart had stopped. By all accounts, she should have died permanently. Except she didn't.

Which, in a very clear way, meant that Derek had been right.

Adrianna Argent wasn't human.

Just as Scott began to consider what it was that she could be, if not a normal girl and not a werewolf, his ears pricked at the elevation in Adrianna's heartrate. Not only was it faster, but it was louder, too—it's tone modulating, almost as though she had more than one heart, only that was impossible.

Concentrating, the young beta focused his hearing outwards only for a cold sense of dread to settle into his gut as he heard, not one, not two, but three steady heartbeats followed by the loud, disruptive shattering of glass and slamming of furniture next door.

In an instant, Scott was scrambling for the door. Somehow, despite his inexperience using his enhanced senses, Scott could tell that one of the heartbeats belonged to his mother.

Swinging open the door rather roughly, not caring when it banged into the wall, likely to have dented the plaster, Scott was greeted by a scene he'd feared for as long as he could remember; for as long as the hunters were a threat to him and the people he loved.

His room was trashed. Broken splinters of wood littering the ground along with glass shards he knew he'd have to be careful to avoid walking over with his bare feet. But that wasn't what stole the air from his lungs and settled a thickness at the back of his throat that made it nearly impossible to talk or think.

Like a sledgehammer to the chest, the sight of his mother suspended above the ground, the Kanima's long, deadly tail wound tightly around her throat, caused a spike of protective fear to invigorate Scott's resolve.

Clenching his fists, he prepared to take on the Kanima alone.

Except, with an abrupt start, Scott recalled that he wasn't alone.

"As you can see, Scott," Gerard spoke languidly, a taunting bite in his voice. "There have been some interesting developments as of late. I think we should catch up." He suggested as Scott's gaze drifted over to his bed where Adrianna's furious green eyes glared back at him.

Her hands were tied together with metal cuffs, the skin on her wrists already blistered and red from her efforts to escape, along with dark black veins which stood out in comparison to the pale skin on her arms. As Scott looked between her and Gerard, he realized that the only thing keeping her from doing exactly as Scott had previously planned to do himself, was the shiny pistol aimed at her head.

"Come on, Scott," Gerard mockingly urged, one hand unclasping from where it had been holding onto Adrianna's wrists, a mad glint shining in his eyes as Scott grudgingly relaxed his fists. "Let's be realistic about who's got the upper hand here."

As Gerard let go and took a few steps back, the dark veins faded from Adrianna's arms along with the rosy colour in her cheeks. She looked gaunt and tired, her shoulders sagging slightly, and Scott was struck by the sudden realization that she looked worse for wear than she had when she'd died.

"Let them go." He bravely demanded, a bitter edge to his voice he was unfamiliar with, rising to the surface. "Both of them."

Scott felt Adrianna's heated glare on his face—although it was not nearly as menacing as it usually was with a bruise already darkening around her left eye and still scarred temple. Even so, Scott refused the slight urge to succumb to the temptation of holding his gaze in her direction for too long. His eyes quickly flickered back to Gerard, silently challenging him.

"I can't do that." The older man tutted his lips together, almost in disappointment. "But let them live? That's up to you."

Sighing through his nose, Scott felt the anger in his gut subsiding, being replaced by dread and a slow, sickly hatred for the lead hunter that threatened to turn his insides putrid.

"What do you want?" He all but growled.

The smile on Gerard's lips was more of an insult than it was out of amusement. "I want to talk." He said with false innocence. "You haven't been answering your phone."

"Let them go, and we can talk about whatever you want." Scott shot back, not yet ready to play into the old man's trap. Overhead, the Kanima hissed impatiently, it's grip tightening over Melissa's throat.

Narrowing his wrinkled eyelids, Gerard rose his brows in distaste. "I want the same thing that I have always wanted." He admitted, skipping over Scott's attempts to negotiate. "I want Derek and his pack."

Lifting his hands up by his sides incredulously, Scott took a careful step forward. "You have them all in hiding." He pointed out, his voice rising despite his resolve to refrain from violence. "How am I supposed to know where they are?"

"I think with the proper motivation, you could draw them out." Gerard countered. Out of the corner of his eye, Scott saw Adrianna picking at her cuffs with a small hair pin. "And if you hadn't noticed, I now have a fairly impressive means by which I can motivate people."

Scott thought about distracting Gerard, but it seemed that the job was already done for him. The puzzled, slightly anxious expression on Scott's face must have increased the older man's urge to gloat.

"Why do you think I'm able to control him?" He questioned, gaze training up to meet the Kanima's as it hissed, it's reptilian eyes blinking the vertical slits of it's lids. "Oh, you know the myth, Scott. The Kanima is a weapon of vengeance."

Grappling for something to say, Scott latched onto the first thing his mind could properly understand. "This is about Kate?" He asked dumbly, but the question did it's job.

Fire burned in Gerard's greyish orbs as his spare fist clenched mid-air and shook angrily. "I didn't just come here to bury my daughter." He purposefully stated, each word holding a sense of finality. "I came to avenge her."

If it hadn't been for the echoing click that Scott's ears easily detected, he wouldn't have known that Adrianna had finally managed to disentangle herself from her bonds, she was that stealthy.

But apparently, he was the only one that didn't notice.

Loud and heart-stuttering, the ear-splitting bang of the gun nearly shattered Scott's eardrums as Gerard lazily pulled on the trigger, shooting his own granddaughter as casually as one would change the channel on a TV remote.

For a second, Scott thought that the bullet had misfired. His gaze automatically traveled to Adrianna's forehead, where the gun had been aimed, only to find clean, unbroken skin dappled with sweat and dried blood.

A slight smile broke across his face. No matter how mean and nasty Adrianna had been to him, he didn't want to see her brain matter splattered across his bedspread. The nightmares alone would haunt him for weeks.

In his moment of distraction, Gerard retreated out of the room, slinking into the shadows of the hallway beyond as though he'd materialized from them in the first place. The Kanima followed soon after, carelessly dropping Scott's mother to the floor as it hissed at them all before scuttling across the ceiling, after it's new master.

Taking one last hurried look at Adrianna, Scott rushed to Melissa's side, pressing a hand to her back as she remained kneeling on the floor, catching her breath. "Are you okay?" He couldn't help asking, cringing even as the words left his lips.

No, she most certainly wasn't okay. He could see that for himself.

Shaking her head, his mother took a moment to sit back and regard Scott. None of the usual warmth was present in her gaze as she answered him. "Oh, I don't know what's happening. I don't know what that thing was, or even what you are, but whatever he wants," She told him, drilling a hole through his heart as her voice cracked with emotion. "Just give it to him."

"Mom," He reluctantly disputed, hesitantly removing his hand from her back as his mother shakily rose to her feet. "It's not that easy."

"Do what he wants." Melissa brokenly repeated, her hands reaching out to squeeze Scott's shoulders, only to think better of it, retracting moments before coming into contact with his skin. "Just give him what he wants." His mother pleaded, tears shining in her eyes.

Adrianna spoke up for the first time that night, her voice raspy from disuse, or perhaps a residual side effect from Derek's choke-hold over her. "I don't know if he can."

The words rung throughout the room as Scott contemplated them. He narrowed his eyes on the distinct hand prints bruised around her throat. It wasn't just the injuries pitching her voice strangely and quickening her heart, Scott realized as the small amount of colour she'd regained after the strange connection Isaac had initiated to bring her back to life, drained from her visage.

She wasn't just injured, or scared, or recovering from the wounds still splitting across her skin. She was bleeding, again, this time from her leg. And abruptly, Scott realized that Gerard's bullet hadn't misfired at all. It had hit it's mark.

He'd never intended to kill her, why would he? All along, Gerard had wanted to wound her. For what reason, Scott didn't know. In his opinion, she was already hurt enough as it was.

As Adrianna's forehead pinched in sudden comprehension, her stare sliding down to the ripped hole in her jeans, blood already dripping onto Scott's cream carpet, she reacted in a way that Scott had realized only she could pull off without sounding totally ridiculous.

"Well," Adrianna commented snidely, the slight tremble in her voice the only indication of her pain and fear. "This day just keeps getting better and better."

#-#-#-#-#

Melissa's fingers hurt from hours of scrubbing them beneath the piping hot water of her kitchen sink. Even still, the blood remained lodged beneath her fingernails.

Now, Melissa had never been one to be squeamish of blood. It was just blood, anyways. There was nothing special about it aside from the fact that every person needed it to survive.

But this blood, Adrianna's blood, was different.

Pitch black and gooey, almost like tar, the viscous substance clinging with determination to the underside of her nails reminded her of the hours of work she'd just finished completing to save the young girl's life.

Shutting off the tap, Melissa hastily dried her tingling hands on a tea towel. They trembled within the fabric and she angrily threw it aside when it became clear that her hands couldn't get any drier.

Migrating to the kitchen table—which was still strewn with medical supplies ranging from sutures and gauze, to forceps and a bloodied pair of gloves—Melissa took a moment to sit down and breathe, trying to assimilate the strange world she'd been thrown into so suddenly.

Digging into the pocket of her nurse scrubs, which she still hadn't found the time to change out of, Melissa retrieved her cell phone, scrolling through her contacts until she came upon a familiar number.

Her fingers paused on the keys. Plenty of things had happened since the last time she'd spoken with her ex-husband. But somehow, Melissa found that the longer the blank text blinked before her, the fewer words she could string together.

She had nothing to say to the man that had walked out of her and Scott's life nearly ten years ago. Besides, what could she say? That their son had turned into some kind of wolf-man and a lizard creature was killing people in Beacon Hills... Please come and help?

No, she had to do this without him. Just like she'd been doing everything else in her life. One step at a time.

But then, her eyes darted over to her fingernails and the black rims still present beneath, and she remembered the shaky surgery she'd undertaken to save Adrianna's life. There had been so much blood and Melissa couldn't help noticing the scars that dotted her body from older wounds that hadn't had the luxury of proper, professional treatment.

She couldn't imagine what the sixteen-year-old had been through. And even if she could, Melissa didn't think she wanted to.

Without her permission, the shaking in her digits had amplified, so much so that the small, electronic device resting comfortably in her palms clattered to the floor. It seemed to signal the end of Melissa's short-lived bravery.

Tears once more collected in her eyes as she stared down at the phone, not caring that her floors had probably been dented, and relished in the curtain of privacy her frizzy curls allowed her as they fell in front of her anguished expression.

She sniffled pathetically, reaching up to wipe at her nose and resolving to pick the cell phone up and stash it somewhere she wouldn't be tempted to use it, when she noticed that she wasn't alone any more.

Directly in front of her, standing on two feet with one hand outstretched, the phone dangling precariously from two fingers—almost as though the device was radioactive to her—Adrianna offered the cell phone to her with a grim smile carved onto her chapped lips.

"Here," The young woman gestured for Melissa to accept the phone from her pincer-like grip. "You dropped this."

Hastily wiping under her eyes, no doubt further smearing her mascara and making herself look even more frightening, Melissa gratefully took the phone from the other girl's hand.

"Thank you." She muttered quietly, taking a moment to straighten out her emotions before continuing. "Shouldn't you be resting? I don't want those stitches pulling out." Melissa lightly reprimanded her, having to tilt her head upwards to meet Adrianna's gaze.

She smiled, this time without any of the bitter realness, and let out a tiny puff of air that might have been meant as a laugh. "I appreciate the concern," Adrianna told her, carefully pulling out a chair and using the table to help herself sit down. "But I'm fine. It's you I'm worried about." She shared, resting her elbows on the edge of the table so that she leaned forward, her entire attention devoted to Melissa.

Clearing her throat from the uncomfortable tightness that had developed there, Melissa plastered on her best impression of confusion. "Me?" She wondered, her voice shrill. "Why would you be worried about me? I'm fine." But even to her own ears, the words sounded false.

Tilting her head to the side, almost like the way Melissa had seen curious predators doing, Adrianna's eyes shone with understanding as she easily saw through the badly constructed wall Melissa had put in place to block her emotions.

"No, you're not." Adrianna finally replied after a long moment of thoughtful silence, holding up her index finger as Melissa parted her lips to disagree. "I can tell you're freaking out. Believe me, I've been there before." She raised her brows, permitting Melissa to speak.

If she hadn't been so focused on the fact that she actually was freaking out, Melissa might have felt degraded to be treated in such a way by someone a fraction of her age. But then, there was a maturity in Adrianna that had always surprised Melissa.

"How do you kids manage?" She found herself truthfully wondering, instead of lying, like she'd been tempted to do for the briefest moment. "How do you get up every morning, and pretend like everything's okay? Like there aren't real monsters out there, ready to kill you."

Adrianna's chest seemed to constrict as she exhaled. There was sadness in her eyes as she shook her head. "Do I really look like I'm managing?" She tightly replied, a twinge of sarcasm in her tone. "Because I'm not. A moment ago, I was dying. An hour ago, I was dead. I'm not managing. I'm not even surviving."

The words bounced inside Melissa's skull. Even though she understood what Adrianna had told her, it was as though a part of her refused to accept it. Like there was a buffer between the truth of the world around her, and the fantasy life she'd been living in for over forty years.

"What?" She clenched her eyes shut and then opened them again, wide and disbelieving. "You were dead—you died?"

This time, the laugh that slipped past Adrianna's lips was equal parts amused and resigned. She avoided Melissa's eyes as one of her hands dug into the back pocket of her jeans, searching for something.

"I've been a lot of things over the years." Adrianna revealed as her fingers slowly uncurled from around the item she'd taken out of her pocket. "A murderer. A weapon. A daughter, granddaughter, niece, cousin. But I never had the chance to be a child."

In the light breaking through the blinds covering the large bay window in front of the kitchen table, Melissa caught a clear glimpse of what it was that Adrianna was holding.

It was made of silver metal, molded into an elongated cylinder with a pointed tip at the end. Melissa recalled the seal etched into the base of the bullet with clarity that astounded her. She'd been the one to pull the projectile out of Adrianna's flesh.

Melissa didn't think she'd ever forget what it looked like.

"You know, despite everything you think you might understand. Despite what seems obvious to you." Adrianna continued, pressing the bullet into her palm as though the chill of the metal somehow soothed her nerves. "Scott isn't a monster. He's a good kid. He's just trying to fight for what's right. You can't blame him for that."

But, deep down in her heart, Melissa knew that she already had. "You don't understand," She said unevenly, the sheer weight of the conversation crackling in her vocal chords. "It's not the claws or the teeth—the eyes and the hair. I don't care what he looks like." Melissa spread her fingers wide, trying to find the words to express herself.

"He's just, not the boy I raised. He's not my baby—not the kid I couldn't stand to ground and who had to tote around an inhaler just to breathe properly." She was nearly bawling now, tears tracing paths across her cheeks. "He's not Scott anymore, when he's that...thing." It sounded stupid, flimsy, even from her perspective.

Thankfully, Adrianna seemed to understand. She glanced between the bullet in her palm and Melissa's teary gaze before hesitantly placing the crafted silver ammunition on the table top.

"You're afraid of him." She easily discovered and Melissa seriously considered if the girl's earlier words held some truth. Maybe she had been in Melissa's position before. "Afraid of what you don't understand. The wolf—it's not human—but that doesn't mean that Scott's not still in there."

"Think of it like two different parts of him." Adrianna demonstrated, drawing one hand under the table before delicately placing a pistol she'd retrieved from a holster Melissa hadn't noticed strapped to her uninjured leg, beside the bullet. "The wolf is savage, it's an animal—raw power—and it's only goal is to ensure it's own survival."

"Then there's Scott." In a series of quick, concise movements, Adrianna pulled an empty clip from within the pistol and held it in her right hand, picking up the stray bullet in her left. "He's everything you know him to be. He's still your son; still the boy you raised. The selfless, caring, compassionate boy who makes a lot of dumb mistakes but always ends up picking the right side."

Melissa couldn't help but let out a watery smile. It certainly sounded like Adrianna had gotten to know Scott. Her description matched him perfectly. Memories of Scott's childhood, his clumsy first steps, to the day he'd gone to school and met his best friend, Stiles Stilinski, flashed across Melissa's mind. Was it true? Could Scott still be in there, despite the monster she'd seen him become?

"And both of these things—the animal and the man—exist in the same space, together." Adrianna effortlessly slotted the bullet inside the empty cartridge, as though demonstrating her words to Melissa. "Right now, Scott's fighting the wolf with everything he has in him. He's afraid of what will happen if he lets up for even a moment. Scott doesn't trust that side of him—at all."

Something warm and reassuring fluttered to life in Melissa's heart at the knowledge that her son was doing everything he could to stay normal; to remain human. But at the back of her mind, she knew that her son being at war with himself wasn't something to be happy about.

"But eventually, he's going to have to face reality." Adrianna tightened and then loosened her hold over the clip in her palm, reaching out to grab the heavy, ominous pistol with her spare hand. "The wolf is a part of him. It's there and it's never going away. You can't fight something that's literally grafted to your being, forever."

"What happens then?" Melissa hesitantly asked, less afraid of the answer and more frightened by the prospect of losing her son, than she'd thought she would be. "What happens when he can't fight it anymore? What then?"

A smile that was far too cruel for the moment twisted across Adrianna's lips as she loudly slid the cartridge inside the pistol, cocking the gun and holding it steadily in her hands, aimed directly at Melissa.

"That's when he'll realize his full potential." Adrianna made it sound as though the very thing had happened to her once before, bitterness spiked in her voice, defensive and impossible to approach as she set down the gun heavily. "That's when he'll find out who he really is, deep down. Good or bad. Murderer or savior... Wolf or man."

Melissa wondered who Adrianna had found herself to be and whether she'd been happy with the answer. She wanted to ask her which side she'd chosen, or if she'd even made up her mind, but by that time the girl had already smiled sweetly—fake and closed off—brushing her fingers over the cold metal of the gun, and walked away.

Adrianna's retreating footsteps echoed in Melissa's mind, as did her words. She knew she'd treated Scott badly after finding out about his transformation, but she couldn't shake the feeling that he'd betrayed her somehow, by not telling her sooner.

I'm still his mother, after all. Melissa reasoned.

Which meant, Melissa realized with a start, that he was still her son. No matter who or what he became.

#-#-#-#-#

His stare was focused on Adrianna despite the obvious pain his patient was in. A cream colored mini-poodle at the end of it's battle with a deadly disease, whining and shivering each time he or Scott tried to touch it. The longer he stared, Deaton supposed, the more frustrated the young huntress would become.

But try as he might, he couldn't pull his gaze away.

It wasn't that she looked different, appearance wise. She still wore the same scuffed leather jacket that had once belonged to her mother. The same laced combat boots, tight, darkly washed jeans, along with the customary holsters attached to her belt hanging loosely near her back. Deaton suspected she was armed with more than the two daggers, but he didn't feel the need to question her about it.

Because he couldn't get over what was different about her.

Dark bruises, nearly black in colour, stained the skin at the base of her neck in two wide hand-prints. They showed no sign of healing so it was Deaton's guess that they had either been created recently—too recently to have begun healing—or Adrianna's body was no longer capable of healing itself.

Unfortunately, Deaton realized as he pressed his lips together, scanning over the shallow cut to the side of her neck and the pained winces Adrianna couldn't stop from releasing each time she inhaled, hinting towards broken or fractured ribs, the latter was most likely to be true.

He had wanted to ask her, since the moment she had walked into his clinic, trailing behind Scott looking very uncertain and lost, what had happened. But doing so now, Deaton knew, would mean revealing at least part of Adrianna's condition to the otherwise oblivious werewolf which was her ally.

And he knew that doing that, would be simply unforgivable in Adrianna's eyes.

"Would you mind seeing who that is?" He questioned Scott as the distant ringing of a bell told him that someone had entered the clinic. Deaton hoped it wasn't Derek or Gerard. Neither would help him in his efforts to learn the truth of what had happened at the station, particularly in reference to the quiet huntress appearing much younger than she'd ever allowed herself to seem, before that.

Nodding his head in affirmation, Scott set down a culture Deaton had had him studying, calmly making his way towards the door which lead out of the back room, toward the front entrance.

As soon as Scott was out of earshot, Adrianna's gaze snapped upwards, taut and wide-eyed. She knew he wanted to talk, that much was certain. "I'm fine." She stubbornly insisted as Deaton permitted his eyes to peruse her slumped form. "Really, nothing's wrong. I'm fine."

"Fine?" Deaton tested the word on his tongue. He's used it before, many times, so he could easily distinguish how misplaced it was in reference to Adrianna's physical and mental state. "So is that including the contusions and lacerations, the broken bones and the fact that the temperature in this room has just dropped a good ten degrees, or in spite of all that?"

If it was possible, Adrianna's shoulders slumped even further. Her verdant colored eyes, although downcast toward the floor, seemed to wildly search for an excuse he would fall for. Her lips parted but then shut. It seemed even she, a practiced liar, could not find one.

He heard two sets of footsteps, both heavy and consistent, and Deaton knew his time alone with Adrianna was drawing to a close. "All you have to do is ask for it." He supplied, staring at her meaningfully so that when she looked up, surprise bringing unprecedented youth and innocence to her features, she would know exactly what he meant.

Still, she asked him for clarification, her expression cautiously neutral as the words tumbled past her lips. "Ask for what?"

"Help."

Adrianna sat back, stunned. Her hands, which had been hanging idly by her sides, moved to grip onto her knees. Her breathing picked up, despite the damaged ribs Deaton hoped to fix but knew Adrianna would never allow the opportunity to arise, and for a moment, there was nothing shielding her thoughts from him.

And then Scott walked back into the room followed closely by a rather sheepish Isaac Lahey, and the conversation ended quite suddenly, the walls slamming back into place as she sat with her spine rigidly straight.

Turning toward the others, Deaton felt a soft smile pull across his lips, replacing the concerned frown he'd allowed to reside there only a moment before. Observing Isaac's awkward, jittery movements as the werewolf surveyed the back room, Deaton took it upon himself to calm the boy's nerves.

"It's okay, Isaac." He cautiously reassured. "We're open." Deaton gestured for the young man to come forward and watch as Scott injected a mild sedative into the dog's neck.

It yelped rather loudly, startling Adrianna in her chair and drawing the room's attention over to her. Deaton didn't think he'd ever seen her that tense. Normally, Isaac's presence brought out a flirtatious, very Kate-like side in her. Apparently, she was in far worse condition than she'd let on, merely turning her head aside and waiting until the other's stares drifted away, instead of growling out an insult.

"Why does it smell like that?" Isaac's hesitant voice filled the room, louder than a shout. Out of the corner of his eye, Deaton could see Adrianna's hands shaking in her lap, water pooling in her eyes, making the orbs appear shiny and dark.

Despite his best intentions Deaton allowed a small, amused smile, followed by a short laugh to slide across his features and shatter the tense air between himself and the two werewolves.

Isaac's brow furrowed as he glanced around himself, almost as though wondering if it were truly him that Deaton was laughing at. "What?" The young teen asked uncertainly. Much like Adrianna, the battle and each of the events afterwards, had drained away Isaac's cocky bravado.

Deaton couldn't say he missed it.

"Scott said almost the same thing to me a few months ago." He shared, careful to steer the conversation well clear of his silent observations. "One day he could somehow tell the difference between which animals were getting better and which were not."

The words seemed to lie heavily on Isaac's shoulder as the truth settled in. "He's not getting better, is he?" The boy spoke out loud, his question nearly rhetorical. "Like cancer."

"Osteosarcoma." Adrianna's light voice filtered through his ears as she sat forward to watch. "He's got three weeks left."

"How?" Isaac began to question, disbelief and something like admiration clinging to his voice.

"It has a very distinct scent, doesn't it?" Deaton hastily interrupted, wary of what excessive questions focused on her true heritage might do to Adrianna's fragile state of mind. "Come here." He beckoned Isaac once he'd regained the boy's attention. "I know you're well aware of what your new abilities can do for you. Improved strength, speed, and healing. But have you ever wondered what it could do for others?" He asked the beta.

And for some reason, Isaac's stare instantly drifted back to Adrianna. Unlike the other times, Adrianna did not look away. There seemed to be a connection between the two, Deaton could not deny it. He feared what would happen if war broke out. Love was not something that often flourished in the harshest of times.

It would only serve to weaken them both, should they find themselves on opposite sides.

But even so, Deaton couldn't find it in himself to discourage them. Both had lost much in their short lives thus far. How much, Deaton could only guess, but he knew it was more than they should have been able to bare.

"Give me your hand." Deaton requested. His words only garnering a succession of short glances in his direction, followed by Isaac's warm, sticky palm in his own. "Go on." Deaton encouraged as he carefully placed the boy's hand over top of the trembling dog.

There was trepidation in the young man's eyes as he stared between Deaton and Scott, then over to Adrianna. Deaton hadn't realized, but the dark circles encompassing the bottom half of Isaac's eyelids was darker than usual, almost as though he hadn't slept well in weeks. He briefly considered whether Adrianna's injuries and Isaac's fatigued state were entwined, but quickly set the notion aside.

Adrianna and Isaac, though they were not on hostile terms, were not—to his knowledge—what one could label as friends. There would be no reason for either to help the other.

Yet, Adrianna's next encouraging words seemed to shake that knowledge. "He's trying to teach you." She stood on wobbly feet but Deaton didn't move to help her, neither did Scott or Isaac. Clearly they knew her well enough to have become accustomed with her stubborn resolve to remain independent.

"Just, let go." Her breathing was shallow and controlled. Pain edged her voice. Even so, she managed to walk up to Isaac's side, her pale white hand enveloping his and directing it into the dog's soft fur. "Don't think, do." She urged him, an intensity blazing in her stare that Deaton had not seen in her before then.

Isaac inhaled shakily, then exhaled. His fingers curled in the dog's long, curly coat as he absorbed Adrianna's words of advice. Isaac stared at Adrianna just as unabashedly as she did to him. His lips formed over her last words and he closed his eyes, the fingers on his spare hand clenching into a fist and then relaxing.

Deaton watched as black veins lifted to the surface on Isaac's left hand, the agony that the mini-poodle was feeling slowly trickling away. Eyes flashing open with lightning speed, it took the boy barely a second to pull away from the pain infiltrating his body from all angles.

"What did I do?" Isaac croaked, the experience rattling him as much as it amazed him. His right hand reached up to wipe under his moistened eyes. Adrianna had yet to let go of Isaac's wrist. Her fingertips whitened, almost as though he was a life-line to her, before loosening their hold.

Smiling, unaware of the spark that had been lit between Adrianna and Isaac, Scott readily shared his knowledge. "You took some of his pain away."

"Only a little bit." Deaton hastily corrected, his mind greedily absorbing the small clues he was able to garner from the long, drawn out silence that stretched on as Adrianna's grip slackened, only for Isaac's to strengthen. "But sometimes, it's the small thing that make the biggest difference."

And he wasn't just talking about the dog anymore.

"It's okay." Scott spoke up as Isaac smiled with his teeth, wide and overwhelmed, but happy. Perhaps happier than he'd been in a long time. "First time he showed me, I cried too."

He remembered that day quite clearly. Isaac's reaction, though similar, was not the same. There had been something else causing the tears, the emotion within him. Deaton cautiously watched as the huntress and the werewolf thread their fingers together, not daring to meet each other's gazes as they did so.

Deaton was about to give up watching, resuming his fruitless tests on the dog which had already been diagnosed by individuals who could do so better than any human, when he saw it.

It started on the top of Adrianna's hand, spreading slowly up her arm. Blackish purple veins, engorged and pulsing in much the same way Isaac's had only a moment before, leeching away the strength in shiny, nearly iridescent waves from the werewolf by her side, forcing his eyes to glow yellow for a split second.

But just as Deaton had convinced himself to speak up, the effect stopped abruptly. He felt his brow furrowing as Isaac's hand squeezed Adrianna's before letting go. They shared a meaningful look which reset whatever assumption Deaton had thought would be safe to make about them.

Because, Deaton understood with shocked clarity, Adrianna had not stolen away Isaac's energy and strength. He'd given it to her, willingly. Which meant that there was more going on beneath the surface than Deaton had ever realized.

#-#-#-#-#

They'd walked out on him. Just like that. All it had taken was a bit of desperation and a couple of howls, which probably didn't even belong to real werewolves at all, and his young and stupid betas had taken off.

Erica and Boyd were gone.

Derek had tried to warn them. He'd told them the techniques the Argents had used against him and his family for decades. How other packs could modulate their howls to sound larger, when they were really just the stragglers; perhaps even two lone omegas banded together to find a pack.

But they hadn't listened.

Hope had blinded them. Turned them dumb, deaf, and reckless.

And there wasn't a single thing he could do about it.

Behind him, the floorboards in his old, burned out home, squeaked. The hairs on the back of Derek's neck stood on end. A scent so familiar to him, he'd wished never to come into contact with it again, invaded his nostrils.

Without another thought, Derek firmly grasped the first weapon he could find—which happened to be a shard of one of the mirrors Lydia had placed around the home in order to bring back his psychotic uncle from the dead—and used the momentum of his body as he turned around, to throw the projectile in the direction from which the noise had come from.

"I expected a slightly warmer welcome." Peter Hale calmly began, the shard of glass held centimeters away from his face, firmly held between his index finger and thumb. "But point taken." The older man admitted.

Anger seemed to froth in Derek's stomach, burning away whatever thin semblance of composure he'd managed to maintain in front of his betas and leaving behind only his bare instincts.

Right then, his instincts were telling him to tear Peter apart, limb from limb.

"It's quite a situation you've got yourself in here, Derek." His uncle pointed out, allowing the shard to clatter to the floor as he paced the room, thoughtful. "I mean, I'm out of commission for a few weeks and suddenly there's lizard people, geriatric psychopaths, Kate has a daughter, and you're cooking up werewolves out of every self-esteem-deprived adolescent in town."

As always, Peter's rambling only served to increase the rage scorching Derek's veins. "What do you want?" He rasped through tightly clenched teeth.

"Well, I want to help." Peter continued suavely, like he was closing a business deal, and not chatting up his killer. "You're my nephew. The only relative that I have left."

A chord struck in Derek's mind. There was a reason he and Peter were the only Hales left, besides Kate and the fire that had killed the majority of their family. He'd killed Laura. All for the selfish, ultimately temporary power of being the alpha.

"You know, there's still a lot that I can teach you." Peter's honey-silk voice reminded him. Grating over each of the damaged nerves Derek had tried so hard to hide. "Can we just talk?" His uncle wondered, smiling tentatively as Derek's expression remained stormy.

Derek thought about all the mistakes he'd made; the futures he'd cost his betas, the lives he'd failed to save as the Kanima went about it's murdering spree, unchallenged, and the dangerous decisions he'd made impulsively which had quite possibly ruined everything.

His hands flexed by his sides, remembering how it had felt to wrap them around Adrianna's neck. Now, nothing but guilt and diffidence rose to the surface.

Derek was not the man his mother would have wanted him to be. He was not the Alpha his pack needed him to be. And most importantly, he was not the leader that Beacon Hills deserved.

He couldn't stop Gerard and capture the Kanima all at once. He couldn't even keep his pack from falling apart.

"Sure," Derek found himself saying, all the various feelings of incompetence stewing within him until the only things he could feel were hatred and rage directed at the first thing he could latch onto... "Let's talk."

Which happened to be Peter Hale.

His fists curled, the knuckles popping from the effort, and his heart beat steadily as he allowed his eyes to glow ruby red. When Derek was angry, he was in control. And right now, control was all that he lacked.

Peter realized a moment too late, what it was that he was doing.

As his blood, his family, his tormentor, and his sister's murderer flew through the air, colliding heavily with the wall across from the stairs leading up, crumbling plaster and spraying chips and splinters of wood throughout the house, Derek realized that what he was doing was morally wrong; that attacking Peter made him no better than the man himself.

He just didn't care.

#-#-#-#-#

She curled and uncurled the fingers of her left hand into a fist, again and again. Still, the strange tingling in the digits would not diminish. Adrianna figured that it had something to do with the strength Isaac had lent her only a few minutes before.

But it had nothing to do with the fluttering in her stomach, the clenching of her heart, and the disquiet in her mind. That had happened all on it's own. Or so she'd unavailing tried to convince herself.

"Erica and Boyd are leaving tonight," Isaac informed Scott. "During the game." He added afterwards, and the rich timbers of his voice forced a shiver up her spine.

Scratching at his hairline, Scott's confusion was loud and obvious in the way he pressed his lips together and then licked them uncertainly. "So, why are you telling me?" He replied slowly, each word loud and disruptive in the fragile atmosphere that had descended over the three teenagers.

"I'm not telling you. I'm asking you." Isaac sighed, running a hand through his messy curls. "I'm asking for your advice."

Adrianna barely resisted the urge to swat away Isaac's hand and comb his hair herself. The thought scared her, so she tucked her palms beneath her thighs, just in case the appendages decided to betray her.

"From me?" Scott incredulously rephrased, his brows nearly disappearing from his forehead, he raised them so high. "Why?"

"Because I trust you." The boy lifted his head to meet eyes with Scott and then Adrianna. "Both of you." He amended, the topaz tint of his irises reflecting all of the fear and hesitation she felt, back into Adrianna like a shattered mirror.

Scott asked the question posed on the tip of her tongue, for her. "Why?"

Isaac's gaze tore away from her. The moment it did, Adrianna felt as though a black hole had opened up inside her. She felt nothing but hollow emptiness. It was more terrifying than anything she'd ever felt before.

"Because you always seem to want to do the right thing." Isaac explained, rubbing the back of his neck in what might have been embarrassment. Adrianna couldn't tell because, suddenly, it was as if the walls were closing in on her, choking what little life remained in her fragile body.

"I usually have no idea what I'm doing." Scott revealed humorously, but the self-deprecating curl of his lips spoke volumes of how honest he was being. Of how much the truth bothered him. "Actually, I always have no idea what I'm doing."

Isaac hummed thoughtfully, sitting back in the chair. The distance between them, though marginal, might as well have been an entire ocean. Adrianna wondered what was wrong with her, because there had to be something. She'd never experienced the sensation before.

"Do you want to let me know what you're doing right now?" Isaac continued the conversation, his tone casual, although there was an underlying note of severity. The answer was important to him, Adrianna realized.

She felt the sudden urge to spill her guts to him. To tell him everything.

Adrianna had to bite her lip until she tasted blood to prevent herself from doing so.

"I'm not going anywhere, if that's what you mean." Scott replied, being much more ambiguous than Adrianna thought she could have managed. "I have too many people here who need me."

Isaac's chin dropped down. "Well, I guess that makes me lucky 'cause, uh—" He struggled to say, becoming anxious the closer he got to finishing his sentence. "'Cause I don't have anyone, so." He looked away, his voice lowering at least an octave.

Pity flooded Adrianna's system. She wanted to tell him he was wrong. The words, 'You have me', flashed across her mind. Adrianna shuddered at the thought of using them. Since when had she become so desperate, so pathetic?

Instead, she cleared her throat, keeping a firm grasp over her riotous feelings, and placed a hesitant hand over Isaac's hunched shoulder. "You're not alone in this, Isaac." She told him, even as her face grew hot with a blush and a static jolt seemed to course through her veins. "You still have your pack. They're your family now."

And the desire to touch Isaac's hair was so overwhelming, that she couldn't contain herself any longer. Slowly, so slowly that each second felt like an eternity, Adrianna reached up to Isaac's collar, her wrist lying across the nape of his neck, and allowed her fingers to barely—just barely—brush across the tips of his curled hair.

For a moment, Isaac held his breath, his shoulders going stiff from the effort. But then, his body uncoiled and he leaned into her touch. That in itself was far more disturbing than any of the other unrealized emotions she hardly managed to keep in check, beneath the surface.

Because Adrianna knew that if she were to let go, to really abandon all of her rules and to forget about the ideals her family had ingrained in her since childhood of standing on her own against the entire world, Isaac would probably accept her with open arms.

"Are you gonna go with them?" Scott cautiously broached. His eyes darted between her and Isaac. Even he could see that something was different.

Pulling her arm back, Adrianna avoided both of their gazes dutifully as Isaac stood up and shook his head, ostensibly trying to find a way to intelligently answer Scott's question.

It seemed she wasn't the only one who'd lost control of her senses as Isaac mumbled his first word. "Yah," He hurriedly supplied, licking his lips before continuing more evenly. "Yeah, I think I will. Good luck with the game though."

"Well, thanks," Scott muttered, dejected. "But I'm not—I'm not going either." He stuttered, obviously upset. "I can't even think about playing some meaningless game right now."

Adrianna couldn't say she blamed him. The distance between her and Isaac had seemed to clear her head, at least marginally. Her thoughts drifted over to her school work. She was tremendously behind. For the first time in her life, Adrianna dreaded the inevitable failing grade she'd receive in each of her subjects.

Isaac tilted his head to the side, his feet firmly planted in the ground, all thoughts of leaving vanquished from his expression. "You weren't at practice last week, were you?" He asked, confused by something that had escaped both her and Scott entirely.

"No, I skipped it." Scott answered. "Why?"

A flicker of what might have been fear fizzled in Isaac's eyes. "Then you didn't hear?" He rapidly uttered, urgency in his voice.

"Hear what?" Adrianna couldn't stop herself from asking.

In the handful of heartbeats before his response, Adrianna's imagination took flight with the different kinds of fantastical horrors that might transpire. She expected to be disappointed when Isaac's statement hit her, but it appeared that she would never be that lucky.

"Jackson was there." He told them, and Adrianna's heart instantly plummeted to her feet. Emotions she'd bottled up since childhood threatened to expand within her and consume all that was left.

She didn't know what she felt for Isaac, but whatever it was, what she felt for Jackson was nearly as strong—if not stronger.

"What do you mean, 'there'?" Scott demanded, his pitch rising with concern. "Like, he was—"

"As if nothing had happened." Isaac agreed, finishing off Scott's sentence for him.

A shadow of doubt crossed over Scott's face. "Really?" He wondered once more before conviction set his jaw in stone. "That means—the game tonight?"

"Yeah," Isaac affirmed, a grim tilt to his words. "He's playing."

Adrianna released a string of Latin curses so foul, even Kate—the woman who'd taught most of them to her in the first place—would have washed her mouth out in soap before agreeing with her.

"This is bad," She surmised, the doom she'd felt slowly beginning to abate the longer she focused on a plan to save Jackson's life. "This is really bad."

#-#-#-#-#

Despite the leather, high heel boots she'd worn in anticipation of the early spring chill forecasted for that night, Lydia found that the cement walkway beneath her leeched the warmth straight out of her toes, leaving her feeling as though she were floating on pins and needles.

She knew all she would have to do to resuscitate the digits would be to move them, restoring blood flow and allowing the nerves to calm in their rather painful complaints. But the boots were too tight and the heels were too tall.

Lydia feared she'd toppled over if she even tried to twitch her big toe.

Of course, the trembling in her knees wasn't helping any. But she chose to keep that small detail to herself as the approaching footsteps of the lacrosse team began to echo through the tunnel she was in.

They were on their way to the field. Soon, the game would begin and she'd have to make sure to cheer her loudest and smile her widest, or else people might start to catch onto the fear that was knocking the wind out of her lungs and making her head feel fuzzy and clear at the same time.

Just as promised, the rhythmic stomping became louder, picking up speed as the team came closer. Lydia backed into the wall, not wanting to be trampled as the first line of players ran past, whooping excitedly and lifting their lacrosse sticks in the air.

She waited until most of them had left, draining out onto the field and taking up their positions. All the while, her calculating stare perused the crowd of teenage boys, looking for one name and one number on the back of a Beacon Hills jersey.

Eventually, Lydia found what she was looking for.

"Jackson!" She called out to the boy wearing the number 37 on his back, Whittemore scrawled in bold at the top of his jersey. "Jackson, wait!"

Her voice sounded shrill, even to her own ears, but Lydia didn't have time to think about her public image. Scrambling to catch up with the jogging boys, she nearly tripped over the masses of cleated feet and loosely swinging sticks before she reached Jackson.

Using her sharp elbows, Lydia sighed out in relief as she stood beside her ex-boyfriend. "Jackson." Lydia repeated, only slightly quieter as she dutifully followed after him. She couldn't hear herself think over the pulsing sound of footsteps and hollers. "Jackson, wait up."

But he didn't stop. There was a determined glint in his eyes, almost akin to madness. Tugging on his sleeve impatiently, sweaty bodies jostling her every which way, Lydia's patience began to fray.

"Jackson, what's wrong with you?" She tripped over her own feet, having to lean heavily onto Jackson's arm in order to avoid falling over. "It's me. It's Lydia." She insisted, roughly pulling his sleeve and digging her heels into the floor as she tried her hardest to halt Jackson's catatonic marching.

Lydia had never been strong. She'd always been pretty. And she'd always mysteriously passed her courses with flying colors.

Those were things that were never supposed to change.

But as she took a deep breath, her temper finally snapping after everything she'd been through, Lydia found that nothing was as simple as she'd thought it was.

"Jackson!" She yelled, finding strength from a place she'd never been able to reach and nearly knocking the boy off his feet as she pushed him into the wall. Only, Lydia could have sworn she never felt her hands come into contact with Jackson's body.

For a moment, he didn't seem to notice. Simply standing still against the wall, staring off into space. But then, one of his hands reached out to wrap around her wrist. The grip was tight, painfully so, and Lydia couldn't help wincing as Jackson's fingers tightened even further.

"Ow," She complained, trying to pull away. "Jackson, you're hurting me."

Lydia could feel the other boy's stares burning the back of her head, but she stubbornly refused to turn or ask for their help. They could say all they wanted about her. Everyone already thought she was crazy. What was there left to add? Freak?

She'd convinced herself a long time ago that she could overcome anything thrown her way. But the one thing she couldn't handle, was Jackson ignoring her. No matter what had happened between them, no matter what was real, she simply couldn't live with his apathy towards her forever.

"Stop it," Lydia cried out, her voice turning desperate the longer her wrist remained tightly shackled in Jackson's meaty palm. "Let go, it hurts!"

And, as he slowly blinked his eyes, the fog clearing ever so slightly, it seemed he couldn't, either.

"Lydia?" He asked, brows pinched in confusion, as though he hadn't had an inkling of the trouble she'd gone through to gain his attention. "Lydia, what are you doing here?"

She didn't answer. Although the words had been running over and over again in her head, they didn't seem to matter anymore. Her wrist burned as Jackson's grip refused to slacken. Lydia glanced down at it, drawing Jackson's gaze with her.

"Oh my god," He started, his fingers immediately releasing her. "I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to—I never wanted to hurt you." Jackson apologized, his tone darkening ever so slightly.

Lydia shook her wrist out by her side, attempting to rid herself of the ghost-like sensation of his fingers squeezing harder and harder. "I'm here to watch the game." She brushed over his regret, lightly tracing her other hand under her eyes, clearing them of unshed tears. "To watch you play." She clarified, her chin raised defiantly.

"No," Jackson replied, his expression pinching. "You can't be here. You don't understand. It's not safe."

His hands extended to take hold of her shoulders as he began to steer her away. They were the only two left in the tunnel. "Not safe?" Lydia repeated, a sliver of cold fear stabbing her heart. "What do you mean? It's the championship game. Everyone's here."

But Jackson wasn't listening to her anymore. As he continued to push her towards the entrance to the boy's locker rooms, away from the field, he muttered concernedly under his breath, "You're not safe. You have to stay in the school."

She only had a moment to be confused before her anger took over. "No, Jackson." Lydia refuted, swatting away his hands as she stood with her shoulders squared. "I'm not going anywhere."

Rage sparked in his blue eyes. He snarled, lips curling upwards, and for a split second, Lydia worried that he was going to hit her. A small part of her, the part she'd tried to lock away for good, reminded her that he wasn't human—not anymore.

"You just—you don't get it. You never understand!" Jackson roared, the words strained and painful. He pulled at his hair like he could somehow convince her of his sincerity by damaging his scalp. "You can come and see me play any other night. Just not tonight. Please." He begged her.

A cold, heavy pit of concern sank in Lydia's stomach. Jackson had never begged her; not for anything. She considered his words and whether they held some truth to them.

What she found, she didn't like.

"What's so special about this game, Jackson?" Lydia asked him, her tone losing almost all of it's defensive grit. "Why are you so scared that something will happen to me? What do you know?"

He seemed to struggle with himself, waging a silent war that Lydia desperately wanted to fight for him. But she also knew that he had to fight his own battles. Both of them did.

"I don't know anything, okay?" He finally settled on saying, his tone as mocking as ever. "It's just a feeling."

"A feeling?" Lydia considered, her tone disbelieving. "Do you expect me to follow your every command when you lie to my face on a regular basis? How am I supposed to trust you?"

Jackson shut his eyes, staring up at the overhead ceiling to collect himself before he replied. Lydia tapped her foot on the floor, impatiently waiting for his response.

"I—I can't tell you the truth, Lydia." He mournfully said, and it was probably the first honest thing that had come out of his mouth in a very long time. "You have to trust me. I just want what's best for you and if you go out there tonight, I can't guarantee your safety." He pointed behind him, toward the lacrosse field bustling with noise and activity. There were only a few minutes before the game began.

Lydia swallowed thickly, heat searing the backs of her eyelids as she held back her tears. "You couldn't guarantee my safety the night of the winter formal." She pointed out shakily. Her hip began to ache as her mind went back to the night Peter Hale had bitten her.

After that, nothing had been the same.

Jackson stepped back, as though the mere mentioning of that night—of his failure to keep her safe—physically pained him. Lydia regretted bringing it up for only a moment. Then she steadied her resolve and pressed her lips together firmly.

"That was different." Jackson quietly disagreed, his eyes refusing to lift up and meet Lydia's level gaze.

"How was it different?" Lydia pressed, the months of betrayal and lies building up until all of it threatened to come pouring out of her. "Last I checked, werewolves and hunters still exist, both sides are still fighting a losing battle against each other, and you're still stuck in the middle."

She breathed deeply, her tirade leaving her short on oxygen. "Yeah, I know about all of it." Lydia smiled sweetly, her tolerance for lies finally having reached it's end. "Everything that everyone has tried to hide from me. I know."

Jackson's shoulders sagged, almost as though his strength had left him, before he rubbed at his forehead. In the distance, Lydia could hear someone calling his name. "Who told you?" He questioned, a sense of finality weighing his words.

Lydia couldn't help feeling satisfied as the name slipped past her glossy lips, loaded and ready to inflict maximum damage. "Peter Hale."

Other than his rapid inhale and the widening of his pupils, Jackson's surprise was hardly note worthy. Lydia had the sudden craving to hurt him, as he'd hurt her—as everyone had hurt her, by lying for so long.

"While you were busy keeping secrets from me, I was fighting him off." Lydia circled Jackson, her cruelty getting the better of her. "I was caught in my worst nightmare, helplessly enslaved to the whims of a madman, while you were enjoying your new-found power and abilities."

"You blamed me for your problems, so you'll forgive me if I blame you for mine." She goaded, hoping he'd rise to the bait. Memories of the day he'd accused her of passing her immunity onto him—immunity to a werewolf bite—flooded her thoughts and sharpened her tongue. "And you'll forgive me, if I don't take you're warnings seriously."

She turned to leave him where he stood, but his hand on her arm stopped her. Lydia turned her body to the side so she could glare at him heatedly. "I'm sorry." Jackson told her, and the words left her speechless. "I'm sorry about lying to you, about not being there when you needed me. It's my fault. I should have taken better care of you."

His grip wasn't painful, it was loose. Jackson's thumb slid across her bicep. The gesture raised goosebumps on Lydia's arms. "I'm here now, though. And I'm going to make sure nothing bad ever happens to you again." He promised, the words ringing like music in Lydia's ears. "You mean the world to me. I—I care about you. Please, listen to me. Don't go out there. Go home, where you'll be safe."

And Lydia wanted to do just that, she wanted to listen to him. She wanted to please him, to make him happy because he was her world, too. In her heart, she knew she loved him. Admitting he cared was as close as Jackson could get to saying the very same thing.

But, as the coach charged down the tunnel, screaming and complaining that Jackson was holding up the game and that Beacon Hills would lose without him, Lydia's heart hardened into iron.

"You know, I'm glad you said that I mean the world to you," Lydia began soothingly, her resolve cracking for a moment as a rare smile stole Jackson's lips away. "Because for a moment, I thought I was just—how did you put it?" She asked, her tone turning acrid.

"Oh yes, now I remember." Lydia laughed savagely as she effortlessly pulled away from Jackson. "Dead weight."

As Lydia turned her back on him, her strides long and purposeful, she missed the devastation that painted Jackson's visage and pooled in his eyes. She also missed the way his emotions shut down as the Kanima took control, his free will helplessly enslaved to the whims of a madman.

To the whims of Gerard Argent.

#-#-#-#-#

The forest was dark and the night air was bitter, far colder than it should have been in mid-march, but even so, Allison managed to relish each moment. She sat straddling the ATV, one leather combat boot hanging freely on each side of the metal monster which growled and screamed each time she pressed down on the accelerator.

Strapped to the front of the vehicle, a large megaphone resonated with each pre-recorded howl that shattered the silent evening. Her bow was slung across her shoulder, resting comfortably against her back, and the knives in her boots reminded her of her mission.

Derek Hale would be sorry tonight.

He'd beg for mercy. Mercy that Allison wouldn't grant him.

Suddenly, the recording shut off, allowing Allison a moment of silent thought. She didn't know what Gerard was going to do to Derek's betas once she and her father caught them, but Allison found that it didn't matter much, so long as it meant they found Derek.

As she rolled the ATV over the top of a hill, her father holding out a closed fist in front of her, signaling for her to stop by his side, Allison surveyed the dark forest beneath them with barely withheld disdain.

"Play it again." Her father commanded her, his scrutinizing gaze unreadable to her, even from such a close distance. She did as he asked, choosing not to test him any further. They hadn't spoken since he'd saved her from the Kanima. Allison didn't think she'd know what to say, even if she'd had the opportunity to talk.

Loud and disruptive, clearly meant to draw attention towards it, the recorded howls rung in Allison's ears even after the track had finished playing. They stayed for a moment in the same place before her father revved his engine and continued on.

"Is there even a pattern to any of this," Allison complained, her newfound blood-lust reaching it's peak. "Or are you just guessing?"

Chris' gaze was narrowed as he looked back at her over his shoulder. Allison nearly shivered. There was none of the usual loving fondness in his eyes. Just dark reproach. He hated her. Hated what she'd become.

"Yes, there's a pattern." He tiredly informed her, the aged lines of his face seemingly etched deeper than Allison remembered them being. "And if you'd just keep quiet and watch me, instead of complaining, you might actually learn what that pattern is."

He had a point. Allison hated that he had a point. She crossed her arms in front of herself for a moment, acting more petulantly than she'd ever allowed herself to, before nodding her head.

"Alright," She agreed stiffly. "Just as long as we catch the runaways and find a way back to Derek."

Her father seemed to want to argue with her, but chose not to at the last minute, turning his head away and taking his ATV into a particularly steep stretch of woods.

Allison knew she wasn't experienced enough using the equipment to successfully scale down the same hill. And yet, her stubbornness reared it's ugly head within her, and she followed after him anyway. Slipping and sliding, nearly toppling back wheels over front before reaching the bottom, Allison bit back a smile as the ATV screeched at the base of the hill, intact, for the most part.

She glanced over at her father, a cocky grin stretching her lips, but found that his expression held nothing but distaste and disappointment. It made her sick to her stomach so she turned her gaze elsewhere.

To the far left, moonlight slipped through the overhead canopy. Allison thought that there must have been some kind of clearing in that direction. The sound of leaves rustling in the wind reminded her of the many times she and Scott had spent daydreaming at Lookout Point.

Allison forcefully stopped her train of thought before it could get too far. It was then that she realized there was no wind swaying the overhead boughs of the tall redwood trees which made up much of the Beacon Hills preserve.

Forgetting her resolve, Allison's head whipped towards her father, surprise and excitement shining in her eyes. She didn't have to use words as her father nodded his head, lifting a finger to his lips for silence.

His eyes no longer held that strange emotion, reminding her of the way he'd always looked at her. The way he apparently still could.

Quietly, not daring to press the accelerator any further than she needed to, Allison followed her father's lead in turning themselves around so that they faced the direction where she'd thought there might be a clearing.

Tense and jittery, Allison's arms shuddered where they strained to hold onto the ATV's handlebars. She wanted to run, to pull her bow off her back and shoot at the creatures that had stolen her mother away from her, but she didn't dare move as her father remained where he was, as immobile as one of the trees.

And then, her father flicked on the flood lamp of his ATV—Allison's clumsy, frozen fingers haltingly rushing to do the same—and the shadows were swept in light. At first, Allison couldn't see much, but a moment later, as she blinked rapidly to adjust her vision, she could make out the distinctive shape of two large objects crouched behind a fallen log.

Two pairs of glowing, amber eyes stared back at her through the thick foliage.

They belonged to two people she knew. Kids her age who'd, at one point or other, been her study partners in school. But now, as one of them bared their teeth to reveal a mouth filled with sharp, pointed fangs, they were nothing more than rabid beasts to be hunted down.

Allison's instincts allowed her to gun the engine a microsecond before her father did. It gave her an advantage, straight off, against both her prey and her mentor.

Chunks of dirt and moss sprayed behind her, kicked up by the thick tire treads of the outdoor terrain vehicle. Allison narrowed her eyes and paid the strong gust of wind blowing directly into her face little mind.

She had one purpose, in that moment, and it was to complete the mission Gerard had set out for her. To capture the two rogue werewolves. Names and ages didn't matter to her anymore. Species was the only deciding factor. Human, or not.

Chris struggled to match the pace Allison had set, cornering the werewolves on the opposite side, forcing them into the clearing. Unfortunately, the trees were less dense in that area, allowing for thick underbrush and fallen debris to tangle in the ATV's wheels.

Allison didn't hesitate as she brought the vehicle to a stop, roughly pulling off her dark black helmet. She dismounted with ease, pulling her bow off of her shoulder and nocking an arrow from her brand new quiver across the string.

"Come on! Run!" She heard them yelling to each other, fear propelling them straight into a trap, towards the clearing. "Run! Run!"

She followed them at a brisk trot, holding her bow level with her body, ready to shoot at a moment's notice. "Allison, wait!" Her father called out behind her, but it was already too late.

Plowing through the underbrush, Allison felt her blood pressure spike as she caught her first clear glimpse of the night's prey. They were dressed darkly, perhaps in anticipation of their attempted escape, and the fear so prominently displayed on their features, though it should have disturbed Allison, only brought to life the hunter that had been awakened upon her mother's death.

Lifting the bow up to her shoulder, pulling back on the string so that the edge of the nock pin just touched her lips, Allison released her first arrow straight into Erica's thigh.

The beta struggled to keep running, to follow behind the larger male, but another solid hit to the same leg was enough to prevent any further movement. "No!" Erica yelled as she fell to the ground clutching at the bloody arrow shaft, glancing behind her at Boyd. "No, no, run. Go!" She shook her head, repeating the warning.. "Go!"

Allison grinned at the display of affection and concern between the two werewolves. She nearly laughed as Boyd stalked past Erica. They cared for each other, maybe they were even in love. It would make them weak.

Reaching back into her fully-stocked quiver, Allison produced another arrow, holding it at the ready as Boyd steadily approached, his stare thunderous as he snarled.

Her eyes narrowed in a challenge, head tilting to the side as she wondered whether Boyd would attack her to defend Erica, or save his own skin and run away.

Claws extending by his sides, eyes shining bright yellow, filled with anger, Boyd continued to move forward, picking up speed until he was practically charging her.

Allison made her decision a moment later.

The arrow flew through the air and hit it's mark with a dull thud on impact.

Boyd stood very still, staring at the metal rod embedded in his chest, before returning his focus to Allison with renewed rage.

Before he could attack again, Allison reloaded her bow and shot him again and again until the giant was forced to his knees.

"Stop!" Erica's scream was blood-curdling. "Please, Allison, stop." The young wolf begged, tears streaming down her cheeks as she watched Boyd grunt with each new volley of arrows sent his way.

Like a well-oiled machine, Allison continued to pull arrows from out of her quiver, nocking them and then releasing them into the massive beta who'd dared to challenge her. Who had thought that he could defeat her.

Allison was too far lost inside her mind to notice or care about the atrocity of her actions. Each new arrow felt like retribution, justice. It felt like she was avenging her mother's death.

The screams didn't stop her, nor did the sobbing wails or the loss of blood.

She didn't stop when her arm grew tired, or when the sorrow in her heart seemed to drown her. Her father's voice was garbled and unclear. His words didn't matter any more than the beta's lives.

Allison only stopped shooting when she'd run out of arrows.

She supposed it made her a monster, but anything was better than a victim.

#-#-#-#-#

The air was heavy with distrust and fear, lights not quite illuminating into the deepest, darkest shadows, and even the cheering voices of the pathetic lacrosse fans weren't as loud as they should have been.

All in all, it was the perfect time for Gerard to enact his flawless plan.

He felt a twinge in his chest, as though the muscle hidden behind his rib-cage had begun to revive, and Gerard couldn't help a deep sigh as he recognized that the distress flooding his system was not his own. It belonged to the Kanima.

Clenching his fists tightly, Gerard rolled his shoulders back, testing out the strength he'd taken away from his granddaughter. Snippets of her emotions, her violent, rebellious tendencies, threatened to break free of the metaphorical box he'd quickly shoved them in.

If he hadn't had as much practice with it as he had, by now, Gerard was certain he'd be overwhelmed.

But he did havepractice; lots of it.

He'd been stealing away strength from Adrianna for a very long time now, nearly as long as she'd been in Beacon Hills, and so he easily controlled the flare of uncertainty that bubbled in his gut.

He'd needed her strength to capture the Kanima in the first place, and he'd need her again to keep that control. Which meant the subtlest aspect of his plan would be the most pivotal. He could trust no one with it but himself.

As the whistle blew, sharp and clear across the field, Gerard focused all his mental strength on quelling the Kanima's remorse. Soon enough, it's presence felt like nothing more than blind obedience and loyalty.

"Scott, can you hear me?" He tested, speaking just loud enough that his words could not be eavesdropped upon by the people standing next to him on the sidelines, but that a werewolf across the field could pick up on them easily, if they were listening. "Ah, you can. Good." Gerard exclaimed as he saw Scott's chin turn to the right until the boy stared directly at him.

"Listen closely because the game is about to get interesting." He informed the young man, turning his attention over to the bright, neon scoreboard hanging from a tall metal trellis. "Let's put a real clock on this game, Scott. I'll give you until the last thirty seconds."

"When that scoreboard clock begins counting down from thirty," Gerard explained patiently, his stare fixed on the angered set of Scott's jaw and the tightness of his posture. "If you haven't given me Derek, then Jackson is going to kill someone."

Out on the field, among the mass of fumbling players running or coordinating among themselves, Jackson stood out, absolutely still as his head rolled to the side, slitted eyes blinking as he screeched inhumanely.

"So, tell me, Scott, who's going die tonight?" He conversationally went on, beginning to pace as adrenaline fused with his blood. "Should it be your mother, who so bravely came out to support you? Or the sheriff, your best friend's father? Or the pretty little redhead who managed to survive the bite of an Alpha?"

Scanning the crowd for more victims, Gerard's eyes caught on someone he hadn't expected to see at the game. Pushing through the sea of bodies, making her way towards Scott only to sit down on the bench next to him, was his own granddaughter, Adrianna.

For a moment, he was at a loss for words as Adrianna leaned in close to Scott, her gaze set directly on Gerard as she whispered something into the werewolf's ear. "Or maybe one of these innocent teenagers with their whole life ahead of them?" He found the will to continue, even as shock tingled in his veins. "Or should I do everyone a favor and kill that ridiculous coach?"

She was far worse for wear than he'd thought she'd be. Gerard supposed he should have expected it, he had been draining her life force and poisoning her with wolf'sbane for nearly three whole months. And yet, nothing could have prepared him for the similarities his gaunt, nearly lifeless granddaughter would share with her mother.

With Kate.

His daughter.

The only one that had ever mattered to him for the precise reason that he couldn't control her.

Scott's socially awkward friend, Stiles, leaned into the conversation gesticulating wildly as he turned his head, fast enough to cause whiplash, in Gerard's direction. Although the boy did have intelligence, he was sorely lacking in the art of subtlety.

"It's up to you, Scott." He let his previous threats sink in for a moment before turning up the heat. Adrianna had made her choice. Now, he'd have to force her hand. She had brought it down on herself.

"But you are going to help me take Derek down," Gerard carefully pronounced. "Because if you don't, I'll have Jackson rip someone's head off right in the middle of the field and drench everyone you love and care about in blood."

The ultimatum hung in the air, which only grew heavier as the clock ticked closer and closer to the deadline he'd set. Now this was a game he'd like to watch; a game to be remembered for years to come.

Beacon Hill's championship tournament: Derek Hale and Scott McCall facing off against the Argents, the werewolves against the hunters, humans fighting beasts.

And it was sure to be bloody.

Cracking his knuckles, Gerard grinned menacingly.

He couldn't wait.

#-#-#-#-#

His best friend was playing. Stiles Stilinski, who'd been a member of the Beacon Hills lacrosse team for over five years without once having been given the opportunity to step onto the field, was actually playing—in a championship game nonetheless.

And he sucked.

Badly.

"Sit down, McCall." The coach ordered gruffly. Scott hadn't even noticed when he'd stood up from the bench. It must have been some time after Stiles blew one of the easiest catches ever.

"But, coach," Scott complained, his adrenaline levels still dangerously high after Gerard's deadline had been set. "We're dying out there."

His mind went back to what Gerard had said in the locker room. 'Get out there and murder them.' He'd doubted that anyone other than Jackson would take that seriously, but now he wasn't so sure.

"Oh, I'm aware of that." Finstock sarcastically retorted, his hair looking even worse than it usually did. "Now sit."

Despite the nervous quivering of his muscles demanding to be used, to do something, Scott did as the coach asked. He didn't think it would be wise to cross the man now, especially not when he'd seen the coach break into his secret stash of spiked Gatorade in the last half hour.

Bobby Finstock was a dangerous man when his sugar levels soared as high as they were now.

Pressing a hand to his sticky forehead, Scott sighed heavily. Defeat was already weighing down his bones, making him feel like the whole world was resting on his shoulders.

"It's alright." Adrianna consoled, her lips drawn into a thin line, making her appear older than she really was. Or perhaps it was just the strange sheen coating her skin. "The game doesn't matter. All we have to do is bench Jackson. From there, I can keep an eye on him."

And by 'keep an eye on him', Scott knew she meant inflict bodily harm so as to incapacitate Jackson and prevent him from literally ripping someone's head off. What kind of bodily harm, she hadn't specified in great detail. In fact, she hadn't cleared up anything in her plan since the moment she'd whispered it into his ear and he'd had to try and share his attention between her and Gerard to catch every detail.

He wasn't even sure he could remember what the plan actually was or what he was supposed to do.

"Are you sure you're up for it?" Scott couldn't help wondering, although he immediately regretted saying so when Adrianna's calm stare began to burn the side of his face.

But then, instead of lashing out at him, like he'd expected her to, Adrianna simply shrugged, loosening her posture so that she hunched on the bench next to him. "I don't know." She muttered, her voice as sincere and honest as he'd ever heard it.

Someone slid onto the bench between them and it took Scott a moment to realize who it was. "You came to help." He hopefully stated as Isaac smiled back at him, baggy lacrosse jersey slung over his tall frame.

"I came to win." Isaac corrected, some of the confidence he'd gained from Derek's bite having returned to his voice. There was no trace of the lonely, despair ridden teen they'd seen at the animal clinic.

He felt a burst of energy fill him up and solidify his resolve. Leaning forward, Scott beamed over at Adrianna and she managed to return the favor, though her eyes were set on Isaac.

"You know," She started, a new lightness present in her tone. "I could just kiss you right now."

Scott could easily bet that Isaac's reaction was just as surprised as his. For a moment, no one said a word as the distance between Isaac and Adrianna seemed to be much closer than it had a second before. Then Adrianna nervously patted Isaac's shoulder, straining a small laugh.

"Not that I'm going to." She stuttered to say, her cheeks flushing light pink. It was the most colour he'd seen on her since before the attack with the Kanima.

Clearing his throat, there was a prideful twinkle in Isaac's gaze as he brushed over the topic. "So, uh," He began inelegantly. "You got a plan yet?"

"No," Scott rapidly shot back at the same time as Adrianna answered with a 'yes'.

Confused, the two glanced at each other over Isaac. "Yes." Adrianna repeated again, more forcefully, just as Scott replied with a hesitant 'no'.

"Um, okay?" Isaac thoughtfully considered, trading his gaze between Adrianna and Scott. "Which one is it?"

Narrowing her eyes on him with deadly intent, Scott decided he'd allow Adrianna to explain. He didn't want to take his chances interrupting or contradicting her again.

Adrianna sighed before scratching at her hairline nervously. "Yes, we have a plan." She shared, avoiding both of their focused stares. "I suggested that if we can somehow get Jackson out of the game and onto the bench, I could make sure he doesn't hurt anyone."

"But that's not gonna work." Scott spoke up, choosing to share his opinion now that there was room for input. "Jackson's one of our best players. There's no way coach will bench him in the championship game." He pointed out.

The huntress mulled over his words, clamping her hands tightly around the edge of the bench as she nodded her head, seemingly in agreement. "Okay, so maybe you're right." She struggled to admit, a harshness present in the way her jaw stuck out, as though she wasn't used to being wrong and then facing up to it. "What's your idea?" Adrianna deflected, her verdant orbs landing expectantly on him.

Scott staggered back on the seat before he sheepishly realized that he had no idea. "Well," He racked his brain for anything that could be considered a plan, even a course of action, but found that only one thing stuck out in his mind. "Right now the most important thing is keeping Jackson from killing anyone."

And even though it was obvious and just a little bit dumb, Scott felt better than he had in ages for contributing to the plan. Maybe he could make it, all on his own. Maybe Derek had been right. Maybe he had what it took to be his own alpha.

"That might be easier if you're actually in the game." Isaac reminded him, clearly buying into whatever vague notion Scott had lain down. "We have to make it so coach has no choice but to play you."

"How do we do that?" Scott forced down the anguished moan he felt rising in his chest. He had to be strong. People's lives were at stake. "He's got a bench full of guys he can use before he ever puts me on the field."

"I can do it." Adrianna's voice startled him. He forgot how she could disappear without even leaving his side. "I'll sneak up behind them. All it'll take is one touch and they won't be able to play for weeks."

Isaac shook his head adamantly. "No," The word was clipped, final. There was an undercurrent of emotion Scott recalled feeling himself, whenever Allison was in trouble. "You nearly died today and just because you're out here, barely standing on two feet, doesn't mean that you've recovered enough to take down the ten goons coach has lined up."

"So what?" Adrianna growled back defensively. "There's no other option. It's either this or we let Gerard murder everyone in this town, starting with Derek and his pack."

Isaac's fists clenched in his lap but he remained silent as Adrianna turned towards Scott. "I can do it." She said again, almost to herself. "If I was stronger, I could put them in comas or knock them unconscious. In my condition, I can still manage to daze them. When I'm done with them, they won't know up from down."

And though the words alone were convincing, all it took was one thorough look at the Argent huntress for Scott to know that she was wrong. Perhaps she hadn't meant to lie, but her pride couldn't allow for her to acknowledge her defeat.

"Okay, good." Adrianna interpreted his silence as agreement, beginning to push herself off the bench in order to somehow eliminate the remaining players aside from Scott.

"Wait," Isaac called, his hand snapping forward to enclose around Adrianna's wrist. He held her there, his grip preventing her from leaving. "You don't have to prove that you're strong. Everyone already knows that."

"I'm not trying to prove anything." Adrianna argued, pulling on her arm, although Isaac's grip didn't slacken. "I'm just doing what needs to be done."

"Then stay on the sidelines," Isaac insisted. "Save your strength for when we will need it. Don't waste it on something anyone else can do."

"This isn't something anyone else can do." Her lower lip trembled as she refuted Isaac's statement. Scott wondered why she was even bothering to explain herself to them. Normally she didn't bother with words. "I can do this—I have to do this. It's the only way."

Both huntress and werewolf stared off, neither willing to submit. Eventually, Isaac licked his lips and loosened his hold over her. "Alright," He assented, something challenging in his voice. "Prove it."

Scott had never known Adrianna to back away from a challenge, big or small, and she didn't disappoint, pulling Isaac's arm towards her chest, twisting it so that her arm was wrapped over top.

Blackish veins lifted over the back of her hand, spreading down Isaac's arm. For a moment, Scott thought that Adrianna might have been a werewolf. He'd only ever seen anything remotely similar when he used his powers to siphon pain. But then Adrianna's eyes glowed a purplish colour and black goo started to leak from her nose and tear ducts, and Scott knew Derek had been right all along.

She wasn't human.

She wasn't a werewolf.

Quite frankly, she wasn't natural.

But that didn't mean she wasn't still their ally.

Adrianna stumbled and probably would have fallen if Isaac's other arm hadn't shot out to hold her steady. The corners of her lips rose in embarrassment but her cheeks didn't tint red. Scott wondered if she had enough blood left in her to blush at all.

"Okay, I get it." She agreed once she was seated, one palm to her forehead. "My powers haven't quite come back yet." Raising her chin to look at Scott and then Isaac, he saw that there was still a determined spark in her eyes, despite her failure to do to Isaac whatever it was that she normally did. "But if you're gonna go out there, you have to be careful not to play straight into Gerard's hands. He's ten steps ahead of us already. You can't let him catch onto what you're doing until it's already done." She advised seriously.

Scott followed Adrianna's hand as it migrated from her lap over to Isaac's. She clenched his palm in her own and then released. Scott wondered when they'd become a thing, or if they even knew what that thing was.

"Do you think you can do it without putting anyone in the hospital?" He questioned Isaac, setting aside the strange, twisted relationship he'd been spying on and choosing to direct his focus onto the rapidly forming plan which might actually have a chance at working.

Isaac kept his eyes on Adrianna for one more long moment before tearing away his stare. "I can try." He told Scott, grabbing hold of his helmet and pulling it over his curly head.

"Lahey! Ramirez!" The coach shouted over, waving for the players in question to march onto the field. "You're in."

"Isaac!" Adrianna abruptly yelled, her shoulders unfurling as though she wanted to stand up, but couldn't. The number 14 jersey turned as Isaac walked backwards, raising his arms for her to continue despite the coach's chattering protests.

Scott followed her line of sight as she looked between Gerard and Isaac. There was a hardness in their principal's features that betrayed his discomfort knowing that his granddaughter was fighting on the opposite side. Scott didn't think it would be wise to push the eldest Argent's patience any further than it needed to be.

But then, Adrianna hadn't ever adhered to caution.

"Win this thing," She told Isaac, a flirtatious smile brightening her otherwise pallid features as she dared to defy her grandfather. "And we'll see about that kiss."

Scott didn't have to see Isaac's expression to know that he was smiling back. The bounce in his step and the beta's elevated heart-rate told Scott everything he needed to know.

Gerard had been playing a game with them all since the start.

Now, it seemed that Adrianna was playing it right back.

He only had a brief moment to consider whether her supposed feeling were genuine, before Isaac rammed into a lacrosse player on his own team.

One down, nine more to go, Scott counted.

It was going to be a very long night.

#-#-#-#-#

Their cries rung in his ears. No matter what he did, he couldn't shake their expressions from his mind. They were just kids and his daughter, his own flesh and blood, had hunted them down like animals.

Chris remembered a time when he would have done the same thing.

He felt disgusting; unclean. Like the blood of a thousand dead werewolves—many of them already having spilled innocent blood, but others still naive to the savage world they lived in—stained his hands, marking him for what he was.

A killer.

"You owe me a new bow." Allison offhandedly told him, but there was an undercurrent of real anger in her voice. The type of anger that could not be quenched in anything but blood.

Chris restrained himself from screaming until his throat was hoarse. For a moment while they'd been hunting the beta's, he'd thought that Allison—the real Allison—had surfaced. But now, she was gone again. "You owe me an explanation." He said instead.

"For what?" Allison's eyes narrowed on him. "I caught them." She reminded him stiffly, arrogance sounding like acid on her tongue. "Me."

If he wasn't careful, he'd become her enemy and Gerard would have finished destroying what remained of Chris' life. Already they were drifting further apart than he'd ever thought they could.

But he couldn't just stand by and remain silent forever, like he had when Gerard had first twisted his daughter's heartbreak into hatred. "'Caught' came very close to kill." He pointed out, the words catching in his throat as they itched for more power, more conviction. "And that's not the way we do this."

"Maybe it's not the way you do it." Allison adjusted the bow hanging over her shoulder, sliding off her empty quiver and stashing it in a compartment on the ATV Gerard had given her. "I think my way worked out pretty well."

She sounded more and more like Kate with every minute that passed where Chris failed to shine light—the truth—over her warped perceptions. Lifting one leg to mount the off-road vehicle, Chris hastily searched for something to add.

Something that would prove how utterly insane his father was to her.

"Allison," He began, saliva clinging to his throat and forcing him to swallow roughly. He would have to tell her everything. All the terrible things he'd done in the name of protecting his kind from the wolves. All the terrible things that their entire family had done, throughout the ages.

But before he could even think of the right way to tell her that her grandfather was a psychopathic mass-murderer, Allison had her cell phone out and pressed to her ear.

She held out her hand, palm facing him, as she waited for Gerard to answer. "Hey grandpa, it's me." Allison chirped into the receiver. "We got our two runaways. Call us back."

Pushing the phone back into the pocket of her jeans, Allison reached behind her to pull on her black motorcycle helmet before turning towards him, a puzzled wrinkle forming between her brows. "What?" She demanded sourly.

Chris shook his head, trying to clear the shock from his features. Allison didn't respect him anymore. She didn't respect anything. Not the value of life—human or not—or the sacrifice her mother had made. Not even, he suspected, the dying wish Victoria had entrusted him with and written to Allison about in her death note.

"Nothing," He pathetically excused, bitterness biting at his tongue. "It's just the first time I've heard you call him that."

If he hadn't known it before, he certainly did now.

Allison was gone. Buried beneath the rubble of a life that had been destroyed after her mother's death.

The only way to get her back, Chris hoped, was to dig her out. And he'd do it. He'd use his bare hands if he had to because Allison was all he had left.

Damn the code.

It was time to follow his heart.

#-#-#-#-#

Isaac had never been confident before the bite. He'd been shy and quiet, afraid of sharing his opinion or revealing the secrets his bruises held. Without Derek or any of his pack, Isaac had begun to feel like that helpless kid again, trapped in a steel box and unable to get out.

He'd set it aside to help Scott, but never in a million years had he ever thought that anyone or anything could make it disappear forever.

Adrianna had proved him wrong.

He felt stronger, moved faster, and thought clearer than he ever had. The huntresses' words rung in his ears and for some reason, Isaac felt his pulse rising. There was a bounce in his step as he ran towards another one of Beacon Hill's players—another one of his teammates—and knocked the poor boy to the ground.

"Lahey!" Coach criticized, waving his hands above his head in frustration. "Seriously, what the hell is your problem?" He demanded to know after the eighth player in a row was collected off the field, limping heavily.

Turning in the direction of the coach, Isaac shrugged innocently. Without his permission, his gaze traveled over to the bench where Scott and Adrianna were sitting. His enhanced vision allowed him to see that Adrianna was already looking his way.

Isaac's cheeks hurt from smiling. He didn't think he'd ever been happier in his life. The freedom he'd gained with Derek couldn't compare to this. It hadn't been absolute. There were still rules, expectations; shackles.

But what he felt when he looked at Adrianna, when her skin touched his and he could hear her heart beating in his hears. That was true freedom. He didn't care what it was, whether she felt it or not, or even if it would last.

The moment was his and he wasn't going to waste it.

As the whistle blew once more to announce another play, prickling the insides of his ears, Isaac positioned himself near the back. The coach had allocated him to defensive line. Isaac had other plans.

Digging his cleats into the solid turf beneath his feet, Isaac rushed forward as soon as the ball was off the ground, plowing through someone called Greenberg and barreling over the fallen kid straight into another player.

He'd never taken two out in one try before. Isaac felt pride blossom within him. It made him cocky and reckless as he turned around to find Adrianna's gaze. But unlike all the other times he'd done so, her green eyes weren't crinkled near the edges in joy.

No, this time, they were wide and frightened, conveying a silent warning. He didn't have time to decipher what she was trying to tell him because in the next moment, a force stronger than any other he'd encountered on the field smacked into him from behind.

Distantly, through the ringing in his ears and the pain flaring at the base of his neck, he heard his name being called, followed by a sudden whistle blow. Possibly a penalty, but Isaac couldn't be sure.

He winced on the ground, his hands gripping fistfuls of grass as he attempted to gain control over the agony coursing through his body. Something was definitely fractured, maybe broken. He hoped it wasn't his neck. Isaac didn't know if that would heal, but he didn't want to find out.

Isaac tried to focus on anything that would keep his mind off the pain. Releasing the grass in his fists, Isaac clenched his fingers tightly against the palm of his hands. He felt his nails beginning to grow as he lost control over the wolf inside him. His eyes blurred from the effort of stabbing his nails into the meaty flesh of his hand, but he knew it had to be done.

He couldn't allow their secret to be revealed. Not when so much else was going wrong.

As he shut his eyes, his spine suddenly relaxing as the pain inexplicably began fading away, Isaac felt a presence kneeling down next to him. Hands darted over his chest gently, nearly feather-light in their touch, searching for injuries.

"It's alright, Isaac." He heard Adrianna's voice soothing him and he couldn't resist opening his eyes. "Aside from your leg, you don't seem to be hurt."

Although her tone was calm and even, her expression was anything but. The wide, terrified look in her eyes had yet to leave along with the thinning of her lips and the furrow of her brow.

"You know, I didn't win but maybe you could give me that kiss now?" Isaac wondered, grimacing as a new wave of discomfort hit him. It seemed like a legitimate question, but Adrianna laughed disbelievingly.

"Did you hit your head?" She questioned, mirth in her voice as her hands moved up to his forehead. Adrianna used the back of her palm to take his temperature. Her hand was as cold as ice. It was nice against Isaac's feverish skin.

"No," He began, glancing upwards to see that the EMT's were finally on their way. "I don't think I did." He reached out his hand to stroke her face, but the appendage wouldn't move.

It was then that he identified the concrete-like thickness weighing down his bones. "Oh no." He muttered, dread filling his voice.

Scott reached his side, kneeling next to Adrianna as he took his own quick catalog of Isaac's condition. "It's not broken but I can't move it." He shared, struggling against the panic that wanted to overcome him. "I think Jackson nicked me 'cause I can feel it spreading."

"You're okay," Adrianna reminded him, standing back as the medical technicians, stocky middle-aged men who were probably on leave from Eichen House, slid a stretcher beneath Isaac's lead limbs and lifted him off the ground on the count of three. "You did well."

For a few paces, Adrianna followed him, her hand slipping into his. Isaac noticed the concentrated twist of her brows and took it upon himself to pull away before she could attempt to lend him strength he wouldn't need.

"Don't," He whispered, catching her hand before it could slip away and holding it delicately. "Save it for later. You'll need it more than I will." Isaac told her before her fingers slipped through his and he was carried out of sight, inside the school building.

Even through the concrete walls, he could hear her response.

"You're right. I will need it more."

The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end. It wasn't the words, so much as her voice that chilled him to the bone.

He'd only ever heard her speak in such a way, once before.

And every word had come true.

#-#-#-#-#

The tall, lanky boy with the number 14 on his jersey and the last name of Lahey, collapsed in a heap as number 37 slammed into his turned back. Melissa tensed as their helmets crashed and what sounded like bone splintering echoed throughout the field.

It was safe to say she hated lacrosse. It was far too violent for her tastes.

Why couldn't her son have taken an interest in a safer sport, something like tennis or golf?

But then, Scott had taken an interest in many unsafe activities as of late. Activities she was just coming to learn about, now. Her mind drifted back to the talk she'd had with Adrianna, who was kneeling beside the fallen boy on the field along with her son, motioning with concerned gestures. Suddenly, she didn't feel so justified in being angry with Scott.

Standing up off the metal bleachers, Melissa carefully made her way down the steps onto the field as the boy was carried away on a stretcher, Adrianna trailing behind.

"Hey," Melissa placed one hesitant hand over her son's shoulder to gain his attention. "Something's happening, isn't it? Something more than a lacrosse game?" She asked, her voice wavering more than she'd have liked.

Dazed, or perhaps lost in his thoughts, Scott looked directly at her but didn't seem to see her until a few moments had gone by. "You should go." He told her. He sounded older than he was. He sounded like he knew what he was doing, like he was in charge; a leader.

It shook away whatever doubt Melissa still held about her son's true nature. "Oh, I'm not going anywhere." Her rebuttal seemed to surprise Scott nearly as much as the determination in her gaze. "And everything that I said before, forget it. All of it. Okay?" She pressed, wanting to get her point across.

Scott's expression pinched but he nodded his head in understanding. "If you can do something to help, then you do it." She instructed him. "You have to."

It was probably redundant and not very inspiring, maybe even a little hypocritical, but Melissa didn't care. She'd seen a monster in Scott, at first, but the longer she looked, the clearer the truth became to her.

Monsters weren't always the most obvious of people and just because you looked like one, didn't mean that you were one. It certainly wasn't the case with Gerard Argent, the man she could see glaring at Scott over his shoulder.

"I will." Her son replied, his stare never wavering from hers.

And she believed him.

#-#-#-#-#

His nose hurt.

And it wasn't just his nose. His entire body throbbed painfully.

But it was his nose that bothered him the most.

Now, it was crooked.

"You tried to build your pack. You tried to prepare for the worst." He lectured his fuming nephew, holding a cracked segment of mirror in his hand as he tried to push his nose back into place. "You weren't ready. Because of it, Gerard is winning."

Beneath the facade of superiority and nonchalance, Peter was worried for Derek. His nephew had always been unstable and abnormally angry, but this was different.

Derek had beaten him into the ground and even though Peter had let him—not daring to fight back after the debt he had yet to repay to his nephew and the trust he had yet to regain—he had a feeling that it wouldn't have made a difference if he hadn't allowed the cathartic violence to play out.

The outcome would have been the same.

His unfortunate condition was unavoidable.

He just wished Derek hadn't hit his nose so many times.

With a resounding crack, the cartilaginous mass righted itself in the center of his face. "He's taking his time." Peter informed Derek, carefully wrinkling his nose as he tested how securely it was attached. "He's toying with Scott. He's going after your wolves, one by one. He's relishing in his victory."

From the corner of his eye, he noticed the way Derek's shoulders rose, almost like hackles in a wolf, and he readied himself for the onslaught of anger and possible broken bones. "How about you tell me something I don't know?" His nephew rumbled dangerously.

"Oh, I'm going to." Peter promised, backing up until he sat down on the charred steps of his old home. It had nothing to do with keeping his back to a wall. He was just tired. His feet hurt and coming back from the dead was harder than he'd thought. "And it's going to prove why you should trust me. Why you need to trust me."

Derek crossed his arms in front of his chest, clearly not liking the way Peter was testing his limits. "Okay, okay." He conceded, waving one hand in front of himself in dismissal. "I'm going to tell you how to stop Jackson."

"What do you mean?" His nephew questioned, his interest peaking as he made his way forward peacefully, or as peaceful as Derek Hale could get. "You know how to kill him?" He wondered.

"Actually," Peter grinned, hardly able to hold back his glee. "How to save him."

He didn't feel the need to add in the fact that he wasn't entirely sure it would work. Supernatural remedies were messy. Derek knew the risks. At least, Peter hoped he did, for Jackson's sake.

#-#-#-#-#

The crowd was cheering, despite the fact that they were several points behind the opposition's score. Stiles could hardly hear them over the sound of his blood rushing in his ears.

His ears still burned from his constant embarrassment on the field. First it had been his dad, who'd stood up on the bleachers and loudly encouraged Stiles, much to his chagrin. Then, it had been Stiles' absolute inability to catch the ball in his lacrosse stick, or even his struggles to avoid being trampled as Isaac had single-handedly diminished their team to the bare minimum of players.

Stiles didn't even want to ask about that.

He was probably better off not knowing.

And the final nail in the coffin had been when he'd narrowly avoided tripping over his own shoelaces, only to assist a rival player in his confusion, and contribute to the opposition's five point lead.

By that time, Stiles had begun to permit himself to accept defeat. Lacrosse just wasn't the game for him. No matter how much he practiced, how long he'd been on the team, or even the pristine condition of his equipment, Stiles simply wasn't coordinated enough to play and win.

His shoulders hunched forward as he dragged his stick behind him, merely remaining on the field because the coach had yet to tell him to leave. Stiles figured it was out of necessity, there weren't enough players left and even Stiles knew he was better than Greenberg.

And then, the crowd seemed to hold it's breath.

Frowning in confusion, Stiles turned around, searching for the cause of distress, but everything seemed normal. That was until he realized that both lacrosse teams were gathered together in a tackle-like huddle, each trying to gain hold of the ball.

Only, the ball wasn't in the huddle with them.

Somehow, it rolled across the grass, stopping mere inches from Stiles feet.

Now, he understood. His blood seemed to coagulate in his veins and his hands shook as he unthinkingly scooped up the ball in his lacrosse net. A part of him knew he should have been running, possibly towards the other team's goal, but he couldn't move his feet, they were as heavy as lead weights.

As his heartbeats counted the seconds for him, his body shuffled awkwardly, not certain what course of action would be wisest. The decision was made for him when one of the other team's players finally realized there was no ball among the group of players.

"Hey!" The burly, towering giant shouted at him. It was enough to garner many of the other's attention. Stiles only had time to think quite distinctly, I'm screwed, before he turned around and ran for his life, a dozen larger, stronger, faster kids racing behind him.

Stiles heard a high-pitched whining sound as his feet thundered over the grass. He considered that it might have been coming from him as he approached the goal, facing off against the surprised goalie.

He twitched side to side, countering each of the goalie's movements. The lacrosse stick was raised over his head, but he couldn't bring himself to catapult the ball over his head. The statistics of his survival were thinning the longer he stood, doing nothing.

"Stilinski!" The coach screamed at him, desperation making his eyes appear wide and manic. "Shoot it. Shoot the ball! Shoot it, you idiot!" And Stiles briefly wondered how that was supposed to be encouraging.

Stiles could hear the incoming wave of players behind him. They were barely three meters away, and closing. Each of their steps sounded like lightning in his ears and shook like an earthquake up his knees.

But then, he looked out into the crowd, searching for his best friend—for anyone that would lend him the strength and confidence he'd need to make a nearly impossible shot. Well, impossible for him.

"Shoot it!" Lydia Martin's voice pinched in her panic, echoing across the bleachers and into his ears.

She was standing up, bouncing slightly. Stiles shook his head, about to ask himself if he was hallucinating, as he realized that Lydia was cheering...for him.

Without a moment's notice, Stiles vaulted the stick over his shoulder. He watched as the ball soared through the air, hardly daring to hope that it would miraculously evade the goalie and sink into the net.

He didn't hear the swoosh, or the thud as the goalie landed on the ground—unable to stop the projectile—but he did hear the deafening roar as the fans screamed out in joy. Someone started cheering his name, and soon enough, the entire crowd was chanting it.

"I scored a goal?" He asked no one in particular, the adrenaline slowly fading from his racing heart. "I scored a goal!" He understood, pride filling him up and replacing the defeat he'd felt earlier.

"I scored a goal!" Stiles shouted, elated.

He could almost forget about the brutal, bloody, deadly violence that Gerard had promised to unleash, because the impossible had become possible.

Not only had Stiles finally played on the team, instead of sitting on the sidelines, but he'd scored his first goal to tie the championship game.

Maybe he wasn't just some useless human anymore. Maybe he was more capable than he'd thought he was.

And even though he was still one hundred and forty-seven pounds of pale skin and fragile bone, he somehow felt like so much more.

#-#-#-#-#

Derek's knuckles stung and as he flexed them, some of the joints popping or cracking, he realized that he had no choice but to listen to his uncle's words. It would take at least ten minutes for his hands to heal. After that, he could continue beating Peter to a pulp.

That wasn't the only reason he was bothering to listen. But Derek wasn't sure he was ready to admit how much he still needed his uncle. Without him, he was sure there would never be a way to stop the madness from spreading in Beacon Hills.

At least with Peter close, Derek could make sure he didn't do anything stupid.

"There's a myth that you can cure a werewolf simply by calling out its Christian name." Peter told him, his voice as patronizing as ever, if not a little thicker thanks to the broken nose Derek had been only too pleased to give him.

Shaking his head, Derek continued to pace the floor, each scorched board creaking beneath his weight, but not giving way. "It's just a myth." He resolutely stated. As soon as the words left his lips, he knew he'd made a mistake.

"Sometimes," Peter began, a self-satisfied smirk twisting his lips. "Myths and legends bear a hint of truth. Our name is a symbol of who we are but the Kanima has no identity. That's why it doesn't seek a pack. "

Holding back the annoyed roll of his eyes, Derek nodded as he agreed with his uncle. "It seeks a master." He supplied even as something niggled at him from the back of his mind. Peter was up to something, that much was always certain.

"Yes," His uncle's voice turned sinister, as though Derek had fallen for a trap he hadn't known was waiting for him. "And sometimes they bear a lot more than just a hint. Sometimes, the ghost stories we're told around campfires and before bed, meant to scare away our wits and snuff out rebellion, are one hundred percent real."

This time Derek couldn't help himself as his green eyes rolled in their sockets. Releasing a heavy sigh, Derek unwound his arms from in front of his chest and set them firmly on his hips. "What's this really about, Peter?" He roughly demanded, tired of the ultimately flippant evasion his uncle was famous for. "What do you want?"

"Seriously?" Peter placed a dramatic hand over his chest, his expression one of surprised offense. "Derek, we've already been over this. I just want to help; to perform my familial duty in guiding you down the right path. If you haven't noticed, you seem to be in dire need of some guidance."

Narrowing his eyes, a searing hot sensation bubbling up behind his vision as he was sure the orbs began to glow red with his frustration, Derek forced himself to pull back the wolf, shutting his eyes for a moment before opening them once more to find that the heat had diminished.

"Bullshit." He informed his uncle gruffly. "You came back for a reason. The same reason you're still here, pretending to help me. Face it Peter, you never do anything unless it benefits you."

"So I'll ask you one more time," Derek finished as his uncle's gaze conveniently rested on his hands, which were clutched in his lap. "What do you want?"

Peter looked up at him, then, his stare thoughtful—almost as though he was debating telling the truth, for once—before he stood up and positioned himself across from Derek.

"What do I want?" Peter asked himself, stroking the stubble on his chin. "Well, I wanted to live." He confessed, raising his brows as he considered his words. "But I didn't come back from the dead just for the fun of it, no. It was much more work that I thought it would be."

Derek waited, as patiently as he was able, for his uncle to spit out the real reason why he wanted to help him, because it certainly hadn't been out of the charity of his heart, as he would have had Derek believe. It took a few more minutes of glowering on his part, to convince Peter that he was on the brink of beating the information out of him, before the older man spoke again.

"I wanted to know if it was real." Peter lowly admitted, one hand tightening into an emotional fist, rising into the air as his gaze flickered between a rotted floorboard at his feet to Derek's confused eyes. "I had to find out for myself, whether or not the nightmares were true, to gather concrete evidence that Kate's daughter wasn't what I thought she was."

Derek's forehead creased in a frown. He shook his head slightly, trying to understand what his uncle was saying. He couldn't stop himself from rising to the bait. "What did you think she was?"

The flash of annoyance, followed by disbelief colouring his uncle's expression made Derek feel stupid. He instantly hated it, but quelled the urge to re-break Peter's nose long enough to hear his uncle's next sentence.

"Well, I thought," He cleared his throat, awkwardly scratching the back of his neck before resuming more fluently. "I thought she was your daughter."

This time, Derek didn't bother holding himself back as he growled, eyes shining red, and charged Peter. Even though his uncle dug his heels into the floor, reaching up to push back, Derek was stronger now that he was the alpha.

"I'm gonna take that as a no." Peter groaned as he collided with the far wall.

Derek took one hand away from where he'd secured Peter's shoulders, pulling the arm back to land a punch to his nose. "Wait!" His uncle cried, tensing his features as he expected the blow. "Hold on just a minute, Derek. Let's not do anything rash."

Derek didn't know why, but his arm stopped mid-way to Peter's face. He let him squirm for a minute before releasing his hold. His dropped a few inches as his feet hit the floor. Peter dusted off his shirt, seemingly not believing his luck, before he cleared his throat and finished explaining himself.

"You don't think I didn't notice what you had going on with Kate, before the fire?" He seemed to try and pose delicately, obviously wary of the prospect of having his nose flattened again. "You can't blame me for jumping to conclusions. Especially not when the alternative is worse than I thought."

Peter's one weakness, had always been his pride. Derek hadn't been much better, as of late, but he liked to think that it wasn't his Achilles heel. Which was why it hardly came as a surprise to him when Peter delved deeper than he should have, mid-rant.

"What alternative?" Derek snarled, his chest rumbling as he yearned to growl and snap his teeth at the older man. "You know something about her, something important." He realized as Peter grimaced, his mistake out in the open.

"Alright, yes, I know something." He raised his hands, trying to assuage the situation. "But so far, it's just an educated guess. Besides, the Argent girl isn't our priority right now—Jackson is."

Derek could have forced his uncle to tell him, right then, but there would be no guarantee that Peter wouldn't just lie. Maybe he was lying right then. Maybe he'd been lying the whole time. And although he hated to admit it, Peter was right. Jackson was the priority.

"The Kanima seeks a master?" Derek reluctantly dropped the subject, his voice carrying every ounce of his exasperation across the room.

Peter grinned. It was almost enough to make Derek reconsider. "And who else grows up with no pack?" His uncle quickly hurtled onward, leaving their unfinished argument miles behind him. "With no identity? No name?"

The answer popped into his mind in an instant. "An orphan."

Peter nodded his head. "Like Jackson." He pointed out. "And right now, his identity is disappearing beneath a reptilian skin and you need to bring him back."

Derek didn't like the implications of his uncle's insight. He didn't like the responsibility which was already starting to curve his bones. "How?" He questioned Peter, no longer caring whether he kept the upper-hand.

Peter had won the moment he'd steered the conversation clear of the information he hadn't wanted to share. Perhaps he'd always had the upper-hand, thanks to the knowledge he'd somehow learned before or after his return from the dead.

"Through his heart." Peter factually informed him, not being able to resist twisting a final insult as he added, a hint of satisfied snark in his tone, "How else?"

Derek huffed air through his nostrils, amused more than he was angered. "You know, in case you hadn't noticed," He began, not quite ready to submit totally. "Jackson doesn't really have too much of a heart to begin with."

He remembered the night that Jackson had come to his home, stood in the very hallway Derek was occupying now, and demanded the bite as compensation for helping them defeat Peter.

Jackson was selfish, arrogant, and immature.

Derek didn't want to think about what that made him, for acquiescing the boy's ridiculous demands, in the hope that it would kill him instead of turning him.

"Not true." Peter's voice broke through his reverie, snapping him back to the present. "He'd never admit it, but there is one person. One young lady with whom Jackson shared a real bond. One person who can reach him; who can save him."

The first person matching Peter's description that came to mind locked his spine in place and forced his lungs to work harder, just so he could breathe. He remembered what it felt like to be dragged across the floor he now stood on, his arm cut open as he was used like a tool in Peter's resurrection.

Derek breathed out the name like he was exhaling fire. "Lydia."

Circling Derek like a hungry wolf, Peter leaned against one of the walls that had remained relatively intact, crossing one ankle over the other casually. "Your best ally has always been anger, Derek, but what you lack most is a heart." His uncle easily observed. "That's why you've always known that you need Scott more than anyone."

Impatiently, almost as though he knew how much his words affected Derek, Peter pushed away from the wall, trailing his fingers over the sooty plaster. "And even somebody as burned and dead on the inside as me knows better than to underestimate the simple, yet undeniable power of human love."

The pessimistic part of Derek refused to be silenced as his nose crinkled distastefully. "What if it doesn't work?" He flatly queried. "What if Lydia can't bring him back?"

"Then you'll have to hope that the myriad collection of teenagers Scott's managed to assemble is enough to stop him." Peter easily replied, but his tone had lost it's cheerful banter. There was a solemn truth in his eyes.

"Because if they're not, we're in for one hell of a thrashing."

#-#-#-#-#

The game was tied, thanks to Stiles Stilinski, of all people, but that hardly mattered to Adrianna. She wasn't there to watch a stupid lacrosse match, even if it was the championship game. She was there to stop Jackson and her grandfather from killing people. She was there to protect the innocent.

But the job was easier said than done.

Her shoulders ached, both of them, from where she'd been shot by Gerard and Matt—Matt who she knew for certain was dead, even without seeing his body. Each time she breathed, the agony in her rib-cage became a little harder to deal with, a little more difficult to conceal.

Adrianna wondered why she even bothered.

She knew she looked bad, really bad. She'd been avoiding mirrors like the plague, but that hadn't stopped her from catching glimpses of herself every now and then. Quite honestly, corpses had more life in them than she did, at the moment.

The concerned glances Scott kept sending her direction hadn't helped any. In fact, they were beginning to make her feel lightheaded. Or maybe that was because of the bright spotlights stationed over the field, blazing with an intensity that forced Adrianna to squint at least twice a minute.

And to top it all off, there was a roiling uncertainty in her stomach that told her someone was going to die. She had a suspicion it would be her.

"Where is he?" Scott abruptly voiced as he panted, not having yet recovered from his time on the lacrosse field. He'd been benched again, for what reason, Adrianna didn't remember. She couldn't remember a lot of things, actually.

There was a dimness in her mind that was starting to frighten her. Like a black hole, slowly expanding within her, eating away her consciousness.

Adrianna blinked forcefully, willing her mind to cooperate as she licked her dry, chapped lips. "Huh?" She asked Scott, as she realized that his question had completely flown over her head. "What did you say?"

Scott stared at her strangely, more sickly sweet concern clinging to his visage as he frowned. "Gerard," He carefully repeated, as though talking to a child. "He's gone."

A wave of fear plowed into Adrianna, nearly knocking her off her feet. If Gerard had left, he'd done so for a reason. She fumbled to recall her training, to understand why her heart suddenly felt heavier than normal and her throat seemed to constrict on itself, but try as she might, the answer eluded her.

"Okay, um." Adrianna stalled, trying her hardest to string together a coherent thought. "Did you see where he went? Was there anyone with him?" A migraine split the base of her skull and she couldn't hold back a pained gasp.

"Are you alright?" Scott asked her, reaching out to steady her balance as she tipped forward, nearly falling over. She felt about as strong as a leaf in a gust of wind, ready to blow away at a moment's notice.

Even so, she pushed Scott away and straightened her shoulders. "I'm fine." Adrianna nearly spat the word. "Now answer the question."

Scott appeared taken-aback by her reaction, but complied to her request. "There were two guys with him. Big, tall; they were wearing black." Turning, Scott pointed over his shoulder. "I'm not sure, but it looked like they were going toward the school."

"Toward the school," Adrianna repeated for her own benefit. There was inexplicable rust coating her thoughts. "How many guys did you say there were?"

This time, Scott didn't react to her obvious confusion. He had his head tilted in the direction he'd told her Gerard had gone. It reminded Adrianna of how she'd seen hunting dogs listen for their prey.

"Isaac." He suddenly exclaimed, worry coating his voice. "They're going after Isaac."

Despite her weakness, the name managed to drill some sense back into Adrianna as she tore off her jacket, her skin becoming clammy from sweat. "You stay here," She instructed Scott, the urgency of the situation demanding that she set aside her pain. "I'll help Isaac."

But instead of agreeing, like she thought he would, Scott shook his head. "Are you sure about that?" He asked her. "Maybe I should go."

She was nearly certain that he hadn't meant to insult her, but the sting of betrayal and doubt that followed his words was inevitable. Adrianna took a step back, as though she could somehow avoid the assault by moving away from Scott.

"We don't have time to debate this." She grunted, tightening her belt and pulling the leather scabbards holding her knives away from her back so that they rested comfortably on her hips.

"You were right before. I'm not strong enough." Adrianna conceded, interrupting Scott before he could think to get a word in. "Which is why you have to stay here in case the Kanima decides to attack. Gerard's human and at least fifty years older than me. Against the Kanima, I don't stand a chance, but against my own kind—"

Her eyes sparkled with determination as her words hung in the air. "I can kick their asses, Scott." She finished off. "I know I can."

"Okay," Scott eventually surrendered, trepidation shining in his eyes. "Go save Isaac."

Adrianna smiled, her chin dipping in a rare show of respect before she sprinted away from the sidelines, pushing past lacrosse fans with painted faces until she reached the entrance into the school.

She took the stairs two at a time, nearly tripping over her own feet more than once. The metal railing kept her upright. When she flew past the stairs, into the main lobby, Adrianna found that she sorely missed the iron bar assisting her nearly non-existent balance.

The hallways seemed to bend in front of her, or perhaps that was simply a trick of the darkness. She ran with nothing but the moon's fractured reflection to guide her. When there were no windows to see by, the shadows seemed to claw at her, wanting to rip her to shreds with sharp fangs and long, curved nails.

Screams echoed all around her. Not mine, she reminded herself, darting her tongue out to moisten her stinging lips. Someone else's. Maybe Isaac's.

Something hot dripped from her nose, falling into her mouth and tasting like acidic bile. Adrianna wiped it away. Her lips were firmly closed, not wanting to taste her own blood ever again, so much so that she could hardly manage to breathe as she stopped by the boy's locker room to rest her heaving chest.

Again, the scream echoed. Except this time, it was more of a pained grunt. Masculine, Adrianna realized. It was definitely masculine, but it didn't belong to Isaac. She'd heard him scream before—knew what he sounded like when he was in pain—and that wasn't it.

The sound of crackling electricity came from behind the door leading into the boy's locker room, followed by a choked wail that was definitely Isaac's. Through the opaque glass, Adrianna could see four shapes. Scott had been right. Gerard wasn't alone.

"It was a good effort, Isaac. It was." She could hear her grandfather taunting, moving forward out of the formation made by the three shadows. He was carrying something, but the distorted panel of glass didn't allow Adrianna to clearly see what. It could have been a cane or an umbrella, but it could have also been a super-powered taser or a crossbow.

Carefully, holding her breath as she did so, Adrianna turned the doorknob, pushing the door open a crack through which she was able to see. Just as she'd assumed, both hunters had stayed behind as Gerard advanced on Isaac, who was dragging himself across the floor, the Kanima's venom working against him as it paralyzed most of his lower body.

Gerard hefted what he was carrying into the air and Adrianna caught the gleam of metal sparkling dangerously. Engraved diagrams and ancient Latin and Greek words decorated the blade of the broadsword clutched tightly in Gerard's steady hands. It was her broadsword. The very same one she'd used to make her first kill in Beacon Hills.

"This would be so much more poetic if it were halftime." Gerard mourned, a savage strength overtaking him. The sword weighed at least thirty pounds. It was made of solid silver. By all means, Gerard should not have been able to use it.

But—as Isaac turned around, pulling himself off the tile floors by clutching onto two porcelain sinks on either side of him—Gerard defied his age by holding the broadsword high over his head, ready to release it in a deadly ark that promised to sever the young beta in two.

For a moment, it was too much for Adrianna. She trembled violently, struggling to remain on her feet. The shock, the pain. Even worse, the fear she so rarely felt for another person's life, thrumming painfully in her fingertips. She couldn't think of a plan, couldn't even breathe.

Swallowing roughly, the panic ebbed away as soon as Adrianna took hold of her foot-long hunting knives. She twirled them, becoming re-accustomed to their grip, before inhaling deeply and kicking the door open all the way.

Adrianna had gone into a fight without a plan plenty of times before. If she was smart about it, she could beat them. But only if she preserved her limited stamina.

Instantly, the two hunters closest to her spun on their heels to face her. She recognized their faces not only from her past, but from a dream she'd had what felt like decades ago. She'd learned enough now, to realize that it hadn't been a dream at all, but a memory, exchanged for the strength her grandfather had stolen from her.

The man to her right was bald-headed and appeared to be in his late forties, although Adrianna knew from experience that he possessed the strength of a man half his age. Many years ago, he'd taught her how to disassemble a sniper rifle.

The man to her left, a Frenchman whose only distinctive features were his thin, graying mustache and greasy, wiry hair, had been responsible for her limited archery training. His name was Antoine, she distantly recalled.

As they advanced, Adrianna had to remind herself that they would not allow the history they shared with her to affect their performance. She couldn't let it, either. Not when Isaac's life was on the line.

She felt Gerard's stare land on her, heavy and demanding. "Be careful with this one," He instructed the hunters. Her stomach squeezed as she dared to meet his gaze. "I need her alive."

Heart beating uncontrollably fast, Adrianna looked away from her grandfather, the madness in his gaze overpowering her, and as she struggled to regain her composure, her eyes made contact with Isaac's.

She only had a moment before the two hunters would be upon her.

Isaac was still weak, the Kanima's venom having sapped away much of his strength and mobility, but his firm stare assured her that he could survive against Gerard long enough for her to battle with the two tightly coiled wads of muscles coming her way.

That knowledge alone, made it easier to focus on the fight ahead.

Adrianna leveled her breathing, concentrating on the men before her. She anticipated their moves and thought up her own counter-attacks. Her hands clenched tightly around her knives, sweat dripping from her wrists but not interfering with her grip, thanks to the leather cord wrapped securely around each weapon's hilt.

"You messed with the wrong werewolf today, boys." She smirked, her body's natural adrenaline already infusing with her poisonous blood. It would have to be enough. She'd forgotten the remaining doses Deaton had given her in her leather jacket.

The Frenchman attacked first, his reflexes slowed by the weight of his favored weapon, a spiked mace which he gripped with both hands. It swung in a wide arc which promised to intercept Adrianna's burning shoulder. She stepped back, just out of reach, and avoided re-opening her stitched bullet wound by a hair's breadth.

Glowering at the man, Adrianna proceeded to pull down one of the metal lockers standing like tall sentries over them. One locker fell to the ground with a loud crash, followed by another, and then another.

Adrianna didn't waste any time.

Conserving as much strength as she could, Adrianna slid over top of the first locker, using her momentum to carry her straight into the bald-headed man, her heeled boots knocking the man's knees out from under him.

Bones splintered and twisted at odd angles. Adrianna landed in a crouch over top the man. She attempted to rise up, but wasn't quick enough. The man's hands were already snaked around her biceps, holding her firmly in place.

Adrianna hastily dug her knee into the man's stomach, smirking when the action elicited a pained gasp. Unfortunately, pain alone was not something that could easily stop a hunter. Gritting his teeth, the man slammed his forehead into Adrianna's before rolling them over so that he was over top of her.

She screeched as his elbow tucked into her ribs. His meaty fists tightened around her wrists, pulling her hands apart and pointing the blades of her knives towards her own chest.

Adrianna measured her breaths the closer the knives got to puncturing her skin. Her arms quivered from her fruitless efforts to overpower the man's hold on her. In the background, she could hear the spark of a taser as Gerard narrowly missed his mark, which happened to be Isaac, who was clumsily fighting to evade her grandfather's surprisingly agile attacks.

Delving deep within herself, Adrianna scrambled for tactical ideas, but her mind was frustratingly blank. She jerked left and right, but the man was steadily seated over her, and nothing shook him.

In desperation, Adrianna lifted her knee up and was satisfied when the hunter's expression contorted in agony. The Frenchman, who had been fighting with a rogue locker intent on squashing him flat until then, turned on her the moment it was clear she was in danger of overthrowing his hunting partner.

"Stay down." He warned her, stalking towards her as the bald-headed man moaned and hunched over in distress, not having yet recovered from the injury Adrianna had inflicted between his legs.

Adrianna rolled onto her stomach, using her tired arms to stand up and deliver a swift kick to the injured man's temple, knocking him unconscious. A dribble of bloody saliva leaked past his lip, down his cheek, captivating Adrianna.

She nearly forgot where she was. Rumbling footsteps shook her aching head. They should have meant something, Adrianna knew, but she couldn't remember what. Death called to her, his voice alluring and familiar. Adrianna felt tears prick her eyes as she realized that she was powerless to stop her father.

He was near, ready to check one more name off his list.

The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end, tearing her away from the shivers cascading up her spine, and she barely managed to twist her upper body backwards—nearly having to place her palms flat against the floor, her feet still steady beneath her—before the Frenchman's mace flew over her head.

Snapping up to her normal height, Adrianna took advantage of the heaviness of the mace and the amount of time it took the Frenchman to pull the weapon back to his side in preparation for another swing, to step closer to the man, using her knives to slash at his exposed chest.

Within moments, her blades were slick with blood. The weight of her heart seemed to triple the longer she fought, her breathing becoming laboured and raspy. Adrianna knew it was only a matter of time before she could no longer fight.

For the first time in her life, Adrianna wished not to meet Thanatos face to face. She wasn't ready to die. Not yet.

A pounding noise began in her left temple, spreading across her skull. It sounded like her heartbeat, but was far too sporadic to have been considered healthy. Adrianna bit down on her lower lip, reminding herself to focus.

Her physical condition wouldn't matter if she didn't continue to defend herself against the Frenchman's concussive attacks.

But, just as she'd feared, in her distraction, the Frenchman managed to swing his clumsy mace. Adrianna saw the large weapon barreling towards her, but didn't have the time to react before it crashed into her skull.

Adrianna didn't remember falling, but the next thing she knew, the Frenchman's boot was planted over her chest and her back was pressed to the frigid floors. She bucked, trying to push herself up, but found that her strength had abandoned her, possibly for good.

Frustration boiled within her, replacing the fear she felt as the Frenchman pressed harder, splintering and then fully cracking her damaged ribs. Despite her best efforts, a scream tore it's way past her lips. She couldn't see anything, her world was painted in reds and blacks, consumed by pain.

Her fingers reached out, digging beneath the muddy boot, attempting to lift it off of her chest, to no avail. Adrianna's body began to tremble as her temperature dropped, her back becoming soaked with sweat.

Through the haze, she stared up at the Frenchman, who grinned down at her. His teeth were crooked and yellow. Adrianna imagined breaking them with her fist. Gaining a handle over her agony, she was able to turn her head to the side only a moment before Isaac's body was thrown down next to hers.

He convulsed for a moment, tendrils of electricity rolling off of him in waves, before he managed to stare at her. There was a bruise colouring his jaw and a blister on his neck where the prongs of a taser specifically designed for werewolves had struck.

Isaac's stiff fingers reached out to take hold of her own as a tear slipped out of Adrianna's eye, rolling down the side of her face, disappearing into her hair. "I'm sorry." She muttered brokenly. Emotion caught in her throat and her fractured voice wouldn't allow her to say any more. She hoped Isaac would understand.

Somehow, she didn't feel like herself anymore. In fact, she couldn't feel anything at all aside from the strange stirrings swirling in her gut, pushing to the surface, demanding to be expressed. Numbness began to spread, outwards from her heart, all the way to her fingertips.

"Don't be." Isaac whispered comfortingly, his words catching over the split in his lip. "You'll need it more than I will." His grip over her hand tightened, the prompt coming out in an exhale filled with pain.

Adrianna immediately understood. Her heart constricted guiltily, but as Isaac squeezed her hand, she squeezed right back, preparing to steal away his strength for the third time that day, only for the Frenchman's boot to move from her chest, onto her hand.

Their bones crunched and she feared that Isaac's hand would become melded to hers by the time the Frenchman was finished. Thankfully, Gerard stepped forth and leveled a hand over the hunter's shoulder.

"That's quite enough." He informed the brute, then directed his attention over to Adrianna and tutted his tongue against the roof of his mouth disapprovingly. "Things didn't have to happen this way, Adrianna. No one would have gotten hurt if you'd only listened to reason."

The faces of the men she'd killed came to the forefront of her mind. Despite the tenderness in her fingers, she refused to separate herself from Isaac. She would not die a coward. Her defiance singed in her eyes as she stared evenly with the man that had tried to corrupt her beyond salvation.

"I will not repeat my mother's mistakes." She stubbornly exclaimed. "I will not become a pawn in your games."

Incensed beyond reason, Gerard's features contorted as he reached down, threading his bony finger through her hair, and pulled her up off the ground. "Insolent child, do you never learn?" He cried, twisting each follicle deliberately as he tried to rip a scream from her. "Love killed your mother. It weakened her to the exploits of evil creatures and warped her mind beyond recognition."

Adrianna stared back at him, her shoulder twisted at an odd, painful angle as Isaac's hand remained firmly grasped in hers. There were a million things she wanted to say to him.

To say it had been his fault Kate had run herself ragged, all the while trying to prove herself to him. How he was the reason for her madness and her inability to trust or express emotion. That werewolves as a breed, were not inherently monsters, forged from misery and hardened into killers. How love was not a poison at all, but the antidote.

But Adrianna knew him. She knew how his mind worked.

And none of it would have made a difference.

So, instead, her eyes hardened into steel and her head bobbed side to side in the smallest shake Gerard's hold over her would allow. Tears blurred her vision as she came to terms with where she'd ended up on the battlefield.

If she was to die tonight, Adrianna knew that she would not regret her choices.

She meant to snarl defiantly, but ended up with the words bubbling in her throat, cracked and imperfect, charged with all of the hatred and guilt she'd never let herself feel. "Go to hell."

And it was quite possibly even more bone-chilling than if she'd have screamed it off the rooftop or written it in blood. Because Adrianna's rage had always been loud and articulated through violent explosions.

Her restraint seemed to shake Gerard to his core.

Greyish orbs narrowed on her, staring into her soul, and it was as if they were the only two in the entire room, perhaps in the world. He understood at the same moment she did, that her side had been irrevocably chosen. And she had not chosen him.

"Kill the beta and take her alive." Gerard commanded to the bruised and cut, but otherwise unharmed hunters, which limped over to Adrianna and Isaac's sides. "The game is nearly finished. It's time for the final act to commence."

Confusion and icy fear swept over her as Gerard roughly released her. Adrianna's tail bone collided with the floor, but she felt no pain. She followed each of Gerard's steps as he exited the locker rooms, hesitating for a moment at the door, his hand over the knob, before continuing on his way.

He never looked back.

It was then that Adrianna allowed herself to take note of her situation.

The Frenchman slipped one hand under each of her armpits, lifting her off the floor and sliding metal cuffs around her wrists. The other hunter, his bald head gleaming with blood and sweat, came at Isaac—who could no longer move at all, the Kanima's venom having consumed every inch of his body—a wicked sharp blade gleaming in his hands.

"No," Adrianna realized, her feet kicking out desperately as the man took hold of Isaac's shoulders, forcing their entwined fingers to slip apart as he did so, poising the blade beneath his chin. "No, no, no, no!"

Nothing but the frightened set of his jaw, teeth clenched as his lips pulled back, and the oceans of his wide, blue eyes informed her of his terror. A droplet of blood collected on the knife's edge, sliding all the way back to the hilt, pooling at the hunter's hand.

"Don't hurt him; let him go! Please." She begged her captors, pulling with all her might against the hunter's grip over her arms. "He wants me, not Isaac. He wants me!" Adrianna sobbed, her limbs no longer holding any strength in them.

Isaac's gaze didn't slide away from hers, even as the hunter holding the knife inches away from his aortic vein snapped his forehead back rather harshly. Her eyes burned, blurring as tears pooled and then slid across her cheeks.

"No," Adrianna rasped, a sudden fire igniting in her belly as her brows furrowed and her lips pulled into a thin, determined line. "No." She repeated. The word scorched her throat, searing her bones and traveling along her muscles as the Frenchman's grip over her became delightfully cold. "Not today."

A gasp sounded from behind her and Adrianna stretched out her fingers, taking hold of the Frenchman's wrists as his hands tried to pull away. She didn't need to turn to know that black veins were crawling out of her digits, consuming the Frenchman.

Loud and jarring, her handcuffs snapped off her wrists as her depleted stamina was greedily replenished. When they made contact with the tile floor beneath, they shattered into several bent, useless metal chunks, steaming in the hot air, ice still clinging to what remained.

Adrianna kicked back, stepping on the Frenchman's toes. He screeched behind her, but the sound did not satisfy her. She wanted more. She wanted all of it. Every last moment of his life, every memory, every skill, and most importantly—all of his strength.

Her hands, free to move as they wished, clenched around the Frenchman's elbow and wrist. As easily as breathing, Adrianna pulled the large man over her shoulder. He crashed to the ground soon after, tiles cracked in a crater around his body.

Groaning, the Frenchman stared at her, unable to move, perhaps out of fear, or—more likely—because Adrianna had taken all he had to give and then some.

Her prey was weak, now. Adrianna made her move, pressing her boot over the man's neck and kneeling down to his level. She looked up at the bald-headed man, who still held onto Isaac, the knife and his orders nearly entirely forgotten as he watched, horrified of what had become of his hunting partner.

"No, don't." The Frenchman pleaded beneath her, the vestiges of engorged, pitch colored veins still clinging to the sides of his neck and temples, pulsing along with his shallow breaths and weakened heartbeat. "Please, have mercy."

But whatever mercy she'd had, whatever strange spell had once possessed her and allowed her to show the tender, pathetic side of herself—her bleeding heart which oozed poison—had gone.

And all that was left was the huntress.

Without looking away from the Frenchman's startled eyes, Adrianna put all of her weight into jamming her heel through the man's throat, twisting to the side in a fast jerk.

His neck snapped as easily as breaking a toothpick.

The hunter which remained took several hurried steps back, abandoning Isaac as he fled from the girl that had easily killed his partner. "Run." She spoke, eerily detached. And the bald-headed man did just that.

She didn't pay much heed to Isaac's worried questions as she stepped over his paralyzed form, following her prey. Adrianna was in a trance as she stalked her quarry down the long, winding corridors of her school.

It wasn't until the hunter stumbled through the double-doors which served as a back exit for the building, tripping over his feet and glancing behind him in fright, that her trance was broken.

Because waiting behind the door, was her grandfather, holding what could have qualified as a lightning rod in his hand.

Adrianna had just enough time for her pulse to falter, fear grasping her heart like an iron hand, before the pincer-tip stabbed her in the chest, sparks flying as agony like no other surged through her bones.

Her eyes rolled back into her skull and she fell to the dirt beneath, her body convulsing.

For the first time in her life, Adrianna welcomed oblivion and the cold, numbing embrace of death.

#-#-#-#-#

When it happened, it wasn't anything like Jackson had expected it to be...

He saw the clock, watched as it counted down the seconds, ticking all the way to the half minute mark, but at the same time, he didn't. It felt like it wasn't him that was looking at the clock, not his eyes that stared intensely at the blinking numbers.

It was almost like a dream. Like he was watching himself do things without any power over his decisions. He cared, but he didn't. It was real, and yet he knew it couldn't be any more than a hallucination.

He remembered every detail in vivid clarity, the way the crowd jumped up as one, counting down the seconds in anticipation of their team's victory. And yet, a moment later, as he tried to filter out the screams—one voice in particular standing out to his ears—he couldn't recall what had just happened.

Time was continuous, moving in a straight line which occasionally seemed to drag on a little longer or speed past a little faster, but which never dwelled too long on one thing. Jackson felt the same.

He'd never been claustrophobic, but the sheer tightness of his enclosure within himself, trapped inside, unable to do or say anything, reminded him of what it felt like to be cornered in on all sides stuffed within a box too small for him to fit.

And then, he heard it. The voice—no, not a voice—it seemed to resemble a thought or an impulse, but Jackson couldn't tell if it had come from his own mind, or from a different place entirely.

It told him what to do. The desire to lift his arms was suddenly overpowering. His fingernails sharpened into claws, translucent and dripping some kind of liquid, but Jackson couldn't remember if he'd wanted his body to react in such a way or if the sudden shout in his mind had been responsible.

Jackson felt fear spike his pulse, sticking in his throat, but at the same time, he was calmer than he'd ever been, a sense of peace quickly washing over his trepidation and hesitance.

He hardly noticed when the clock hit zero, the buzzer wailing loudly along with the riotous fans. The lights shut off, casting everything in darkness. Strangely, Jackson could still see clearly. It didn't alarm his as much as it should have.

There was a presence near him, almost as though someone had taken his arm and helped to steady him, but there was no one standing still next to him. People were running , screaming. He wanted to follow them, but his feet were firmly planted in the ground.

The same force spoke again, demanding his obedience, his sacrifice.

It felt like a parent was directing him down the right path, but it was also similar to a friend's advice, or his own inner revelation. A big part of Jackson didn't want to think about it, but he couldn't stop asking himself what it was.

He was just as scared of it as he was fond of it. He trusted it more than he doubted it.

And when it happened—when his claws dug through his jersey and pierced the flesh of his stomach—it wasn't anything like Jackson had expected it to be.

Because he was in agony, so much so that he wanted to scream to the heavens until his throat bled and his vocal chords no longer worked, but there was also a foggy haze that had fallen over him, anesthetizing his body and allowing him to feel nothing at all.

He was a contradiction of himself.

"Jackson!" He heard a different voice yelling. Unlike the others, it was clear and understandable, breaking through part of the cotton filling his head and slowing his thoughts.

Was that even his name? He couldn't remember.

It must have been, at one time. He felt a strange connection to it, to the high-pitched voice crying, sorrow and guilt in her tone. He couldn't remember who she was, only that she mattered to him.

The colour red came to mind the longer he thought about her, but he didn't know why.

Words he'd never had the chance to say, words that didn't make sense, kept repeating themselves over and over again in his head. Almost like a broken record.

'I love you, Lydia Martin.'

His tongue wanted to twist and his throat ached to release the message, but he didn't know how. Had he ever been able to speak? Perhaps that had been a dream, too.

Darkness fringed his consciousness, clinging to him like spider webs. At first, they were easily removed, but soon, there were too many and their hold over him strengthened beyond his control.

He didn't know what was real anymore. He didn't know if the hands he felt clutching his head were there, or the constant pressure on his chest and lips, or if he had a body at all.

Something coiled in his gut, wanting to break free.

But not yet, it wasn't ready yet.

It slithered and hissed, hesitant to leave the space that it had been locked away in for so long. It's eyes blinked sideways. He thought it should have been wrong, but didn't know why.

The voice was gone now, it had abandoned him to the void. He wished for death to find him, not entirely aware of what it meant, but knowing that it would somehow be able to break him free from inside the beast he had become.

No, he hadn't become it yet. At least, not entirely.

He was in the process of transformation—metamorphosis—into the very thing that lurked inside him and threatened to suppress what remained of his being. To consume him from within and disseminate it's horrifying reign on anything or anyone that dared to cross it.

The shattered fragments of Jackson Whittemore were being torn away to make space for the Alpha Kanima.

And there wasn't a single thing he could do to stop it.