Chapter 3 - Wolf Hunters

As Joss and Lionel were driving back to their precinct, John called her.

"Where are you?" he demanded forcefully in full Alpha mode.

Despite the fact she was in human form and not Wolf, Joss felt her hackles raise at John's tone of voice. "Don't worry I'm not alone, Alpha. Where have you been?"

In the seat next to her, Fusco seriously considered bailing out of the car even though it was in motion. He knew that tone of voice Joss was using meant he was about to witness yet another Alpha Argument.

"I've been calling the other Alphas," came the curt response. "We need to talk, meet me at the library, now."

"We're on our way," Joss snapped and slammed her phone shut.

Oh goody, thought Fusco, I get to witness the argument in person now. At least Finch will be there too.

Joss and Lionel reached the library. Joss stormed in while Lionel followed at what he hoped was a safe distance.

They found John in the computer room with Finch looking the pictures that Fuso had sent earlier.

Joss stood in front of John with her arms crossed and her eyes hard and angry. "What do we have here, John?" Joss demanded of her mate.

"Wolf Hunters," John said shortly. "Probably from Hungary by the looks of the writing on the wall." Joss and Lionel both gaped at him, temporarily unable to say anything.

Finch turned in his chair and looked up questioningly at Reese, "Wolf Hunters? I have never heard of such a thing."

Reese sat down wearily in another chair, "They're just what they sound like, non-Wolf humans who hunt and kill Wolves."

Finch was wide-eyed. "I was aware that there was a considerable amount of prejudice and discrimination against Wolves, but I was not aware there were those that actively hunted you like animals."

John nodded grimly, "They think we are animals, Finch. Remember how I once told you that there were whole portions of Europe where there were no Wolves because they had been wiped out?"

Finch nodded, "Yes, but I thought you meant they had been killed by neighbors who were tired of being bullied by the Wolves, not by organized genocide."

John nodded, "Mostly yes; it wasn't organized, but there were areas where killing Wolves became a sort of the national sport. Romania was particularly bad."

John got up from his chair and began pacing the room, clearly agitated. But his voice remained quiet and even. "I suppose you know that according to some old legends Wolves are considered to be servants of the Devil?"

Finch blinked rapidly, "Yes, folklorists think it's because of your upright ears, they vaguely resemble the horns of the devil." Finch looked down at Bear, dozing at his feet, "Sorry, Bear." The dog just looked confused.

John continued pacing. "There was a Hungarian orthodox bishop about a century ago who preached that Christ couldn't return to Earth until all Wolves had been destroyed since we were the servants of the devil. Some of the zealots decided to take matters into their own hands and began an organized effort to destroy any Wolves they could find, even peaceful ones. There are regions in Eastern Europe where the Wolf population was systematically wiped out."

Finch looked sick, "So lacking Wolves to kill in their home country, they have moved to New York to continue their work."

"It looks that way. And this time, my mate and my child are on the front lines," John's face was as intense as Finch had ever seen it. John turned to his mate who had been listening quietly throughout the exchange with Finch, "You need to start your maternity leave NOW. We need to get you out of town and far from these killers."

Harold chimed in helpfully, "I have properties in several other cities and you could go just about anywhere you wanted."

As Joss had listened to John describe Wolf Hunters and their mission, she had suddenly understood why John had been so abrupt earlier. This danger was very real to them and their pack, their friends. And John wanted her to run away.

Oh HELL no!

Joss lifted her chin in defiance and spoke firmly. "I have another month before my maternity leave starts and I wouldn't show my backside to these bastards anyway. I have to catch them before the baby's born. She's Wolf and I don't want to bring her into the world with these people running around in it."

At this point Harold and Lionel decided to vacate the premises. Bear looked at John, then at Joss, then hastily followed them.

John stared at her with his most intense expression, "Joss, these people are dangerous and you are an extra inviting target, you're pregnant and you are the detective on this case, we have to assume that you're on their radar now."

Joss met her mate's intense stare with one of her own. "I've been a soldier in a war zone. I'm a cop and a damn good one. I have you and Lionel and the whole pack. I'm not easy pickings."

"There's more than just you at stake here," John laid a hand on her swollen belly. "Think of the baby."

"Don't you think I am! These bastards will kill her if we don't catch them!" Joss laid a hand over John's and looked up into his eyes. "You can't expect me to run and hide from that."

"Do you know what they will do to you if they get a hold of you?" John voice was low and rough, tears pooling in his eyes.

Joss closed her eyes and nodded as the image of a bloodied Bert Gore crossed her mind. "Our lives are never safe, John, you know that. We chose this life because we wanted to make a difference, and I've never wavered. I won't start now. I can't."

Joss had expected John to continue to fight her, but instead he pulled her into a tight embrace. "I've already lost so many people I care about; I can't lose you too," then his voice broke.

Joss held her mate for a few minutes and buried her face in his chest. Finally she looked up at him, "I'll be careful, I promise, but I can't just walk away from this. There is someone out there killing Wolves; I can't sit on the sidelines while there is a threat to my family and my friends."

John buried his face in her hair, and sighed. He knew her; he knew she couldn't walk away from this case any more than he could. Her courage and determination to do the right thing was why he chose her and why she held his heart in her hands.

He held her tightly while he brought his raging emotions under control. Then he kissed her on top of her head, "Stay close to Fusco, don't go anywhere, and I mean anywhere, by yourself. Can you at least do that for me?"

She looked up and nodded.

"That's my girl," he said softly.

She kissed him and patted her swollen belly, "I won't let anything happen to our little girl."

John dropped to his knees and kissed Joss's round stomach. "Take good care of your momma for me," he whispered softly. Joss gently stroked his hair while he rested his cheek against her tummy.

After a few minutes, John stood up and Joss called out, "You guys can come out now!"

Lionel and Harold peered around a bookcase and walked carefully into the computer room. They looked relieved to see the Alpha Argument was over.

"Come on, Fusco, we need to get back to work." Joss started walking to the stairs. When she reached the steps, just before she started descending, she looked up at John and shot him a reassuring smile, then she vanished down the stairs.

John stared at her until she was out of sight, his face an unreadable mask. Finch watched him carefully, fully aware that this case was different from all the others. As the lead detective on the case, Jocelyn and her unborn child could very well be squarely in the crosshairs of a group of zealous killers. His stomach clenched with fear at the thought.

Finch tried to be reassuring for his friend. "John, she is fully capable of taking care of herself, and Fusco will have her back the entire time. You know he will take a bullet for her and the baby if came to that."

John glared at his employer, "You sound like her now," the growl was from deep in his throat, the most menacing Finch had ever heard from his operative.

But Finch met Reese's hard stare calmly; he was used to his dangerous employee. "I am merely trying to reassure you that Joss is not a very vulnerable target for these Wolf Hunters."

"She's carrying a Wolf cub, a Born Alpha. Wolf Hunters have special things they do to pregnant she Wolves. They like to cut the baby out and kill it while the mother is still alive," John whispered.

Finch blanched at that. "Oh my god," he gasped in horror.

"My first tour of duty with Kara in the CIA was in Hungary. I saw some things there that make what happened to Gore look like child's play."

"John, if you could convince her to go, I do have properties in other cities…"

John shook his head unhappily. "No, she won't go. She can't walk away while there is a Wolf Hunter out there, Finch. She can't walk away any more than I could."

Finch nodded. He was quite familiar with Detective Carter's stubbornness and protective instinct that were matched only by John's. But he couldn't help but wish she would let it go just this one time, for the baby's, and for John's, sake. Losing her would destroy John.

John had been through so much in his life, first losing his parents in a violent murder, followed by a campaign of lies and rumors that caused the pack that should have welcomed him as their Alpha to reject him, then having to let go of the woman he had loved to return to army after 9/11, getting recruited into the CIA and partnered with a psychopath, having his own country try to kill him and then discovering that that his love had murdered by her own husband. It was no wonder that John had been well on his way to killing himself by alcohol poisoning when Finch had offered him a chance at redemption.

When Finch had first recruited Reese, he had thought of him as nothing more than a useful employee; a tool for saving innocent lives. But over time Finch had come to know the good man that was still within Reese and had come to consider that man a dear and close friend. Finch had watched in wonder while John had slowly recovered and mended his broken soul. He found his true purpose in life, preventing bad things from happening to good people. He had even accepted a chance to become an Alpha again.

But love had remained elusive. For the first couple of years, John simply was not capable of loving anyone, his own self-loathing got in the way. He had made tentative steps to have a relationship with Zoe Morgan, but ultimately the relationship floundered. Due to the nature of their respective jobs, they had to keep too many secrets from each other in order to have a meaningful partnership.

Then a small miracle had happened, Joss Carter, the woman that John had idolized and placed on a pedestal, had jumped off her lofty perch straight into John's arms and made it clear to him that she was not taking No for an answer. Joss shared John's need to protect people and she was fully on board with the mission to save the numbers; there were no secrets between them. Finch, not being Wolf, really didn't fully understand the bond they shared, but he knew it was deeply embedded in both of them.

Now, with Joss's pregnancy, everything John had ever dreamed of having was within his grasp, and New York was being stalked a group of violent killers who rip that hard won happiness away. John would never survive losing Joss and the baby, that would just be too much for him. Losing Joss meant losing John as well, Finch was well aware of that...

John's voice brought Finch out of his reverie, "Finch, why didn't the Machine didn't give us Gore's number?"

Finch turned back to his screens. "It must not have been planned, it must have been spur of the moment," he said thoughtfully.

"So the killers just saw Bert walking down the street, followed him home and killed him?" John sounded incredulous, like he didn't think that was a very likely scenario.

"Yes, something like that..." Finch's voice trailed off while he was lost in thought. It was the only reason he could think of for the machine's silence, but the idea that the Machine could not predict the Wolf Hunters's moves scared him badly.

Finch was not the only one who was unhappy that the Machine had not been able to predict Gore's death. The Machine itself had been listening into the entire conversation and it was quite concerned about the new threat to its assets. It had found the Wolf assets highly effective and efficient and the Machine was very invested in keeping them functioning at their usual high rate of performance.

The Machine began an in-depth analysis of the threat posed by Wolf Hunters. Once the analysis was completed it would make the necessary changes to the predictive algorithms and alert the Admin to additional threats. But this could take time….