Five Months Later.

The Alphas took their time in planning their attack, and when they made their move, they went hard.

Deucalion was dead.

Four Alphas left.

Four revenge driven Alphas, to be exact.

Claire, Derek, Scott, Isaac, Cora, Peter, Boyd, Allison and even Lydia and Stiles were up against the four Alphas.

Two Alphas.

Four Betas.

One crazy Uncle that no one could figure out if he was an Alpha or Beta anymore.

One Werewolf Hunter.

And two humans.

Strength in numbers.

You would think the odds were in their favor, wouldn't you?

"There is only one way to fight, and that's dirty. Clean, gentlemanly fighting will get you nowhere but dead, and fast." Claire told Isaac and Scott as they took cover to pull a wounded Cora to safety, "Take every cheap shot, every low blow, absolutely kick them when they're down, and maybe everyone will walk away from this fight."

She left to join Derek in battle - against the bald-headed Alpha; it was a nice name for him considering she never stopped her flurry of punches to ask him his name - knocking the idiot in the head. He stumbled, and then the she wolf jumped in and growled at Claire. Being a martial arts expert, Claire dodged every punch, every kick and every head-butt that she wolf threw at her.

They were not helpless...Many times in their lives they'd been powerless, but not this night. Right now they had the power to choose the manner in which they would die. If they have been a master of nothing else in all your days, they were now a master of this moment.

"You're going to die, bitch!"

She wolf charged at her again, knocking her to the floor and tearing her face open because she caught Claire by surprise, the claw marks went all the way down her to her cheek bone. Blood spilled down her face. Claire recovered quickly, though, replying, "This isn't the first time I've faced death, and I don't intend for it to be the last."

Claire twisted her legs around the werewolf's throat, catching her in a choke hold as she squeezed her throat. She wolf got one last good swipe, slicing her side like a hot knife through butter. Claire resisted the urge to scream in pain as she grabbed the werewolf's hands and held them in place.

"NOW!"

Stiles was in her face not a moment later, throwing mountain ash on the bitch, burning her. Claire grabbed a handful of the ash and shoved it down the bitch's throat - keeping her mouth shut as the life literally left her eyes.

Payback is a bitch.

Have you ever had one of those moments when time just freezes? You know, when the world suddenly goes deathly still, and you could hear a pin drop, and the squishing sound your heart makes is so loud in your ears you feel like you're drowning in blood, and you stand there in that suspended moment and die a thousand deaths, but not really, and the moment passes and dumps you out on the other side of it, with your mouth hanging open, and an erased blackboard where your mind used to be?

That's what it was like.

Isaac and Scott had the Alpha twins.

Derek and Boyd had the bald-headed Alpha.

Two down.

Three to go.

Her energy was waning as she threw the body aside, holding her side. Stiles helped her up, bringing her over to the safe spot behind a pillar where Cora was.

"You're not healing."

"I'm fine." She leaned against the pillar, breathing heavy.

Allison lifted the tank top she'd been wearing and Stiles cringed. "That looks painful."

"What do you think?" Claire asked dryly as she tried to stand. She needed to help Derek and the rest of them.

Once upon a time, when she was a child reading fairy tales, she'd ached to have her own adventures. Not that she wanted to be some dippy heroine languishing in a tower, awaiting rescue. No, she wanted to be the knight, charging into battle against overwhelming odds. As she got older, she found out the hard way that adventures are rarely anything like the books say. Good not always won. Half the time you are scared out of your mind, and the rest you're bored and your feet hurt. She was beginning to believe that maybe she wasn't the adventurous type. But she wasn't one that was going to back down from a fight.

Maybe when she was dead.

No, not even then.

She could see Derek was getting weak, she could sense it.

She needed to help him.

Allison stopped her, her hand on her arm. Claire turned to glance at her, raising an eyebrow. "If you want to help me, then help me. Don't shield me, don't protect me, help me."

She pulled her arm out of Allison's grip and with her remaining strength, charged after the bald-headed Alpha that had slashed at Derek, taking a shot at body slamming the Alpha. She might have been little and a woman, but goddamn it, she wasn't going to have one of her loved ones hurt.

The Alpha went about 15-20 feet down from them and it gave them a few spare seconds of time to gather strength.

She was the oddest combination of contradictions he'd ever met - innocence and sensuality, candor and diplomacy, anxiety and utter fearlessness. He hadn't even begun to figure out how her mind worked. But she was damn well going to live long enough for him to try. But his face was drawn and his eyes were pained as he looked down at her, and there was a strange expression on his face: defiance and fierce pride and something that looked like wonder, all jumbled up. Claire couldn't place it. And she didn't have time to. The Alpha had charged, slashing his claws, ripping her back wide open. Claire lay there, no longer fighting, since her head was spinning too much. Fresh blood pooled around her beaten body. Her mind was fogged and her whole body ached. Claire thought this was what Death felt like. She hoped she was wrong.

She heard Derek growl in the distance as his body slammed the Alpha into the ground, hand around his throat, squeezing tightly. He'd kill for her, destroy for her, savage anyone who dared attempt to take her from him. And he would never let her go...even if she begged for her freedom. They didn't understand that she held his heart, held it so utterly that there was nothing he wouldn't do, no line he wouldn't cross to keep her safe. And that's just what Derek was going to do. With his bare hands, Derek pierced the Alpha's neck with his claws, squeezing until he heard the sickening CRACK! of the werewolf's spine.

There is a dark music in the screams of your enemies.

Three down.

Two to go.

Author's Note: ...dundundun. Tell me what you think? Reviews are awesome! :)