Authors Note:
More reviews again, thank you Caroline for your words of encouragement :) I hope this chapter isn't too sad for anyone, so enjoy.
Chapter Five: Bloody Encounters
"So which one of your dumbass friends is responsible for this?" Avery panted as the two siblings jogged in and out of alleyways.
"I have no idea. None of us have snipper rifles with us." Sam puffed too.
"Although I'm currently quite against them, I'm questioning why you don't have them in your arsenal. They are the best weapons to attack wolves from long distance."
"We had one, but Ilena snapped it half." Sam scoffed half heartedly, Avery could see he was worried about his girlfriend.
"Well it's good to know that she can handle herself."
"That's the thing though. The laser was trained on her, not us. If anyone was trying to kill her, they'd have a harder time if we protected her. Hunters can't kill humans and I fear that because we've left her alone they don't have to be cautious."
"Stop." Avery yanked at his arm and examined his expression. He was genuinely freaked out, "Right, we'll go back. I want you to take these." she opened her coat to reveal the chinese ring daggers.
"You brought weapons even after I begged you not to?!" he shouted, she was quick to cover his mouth.
"Yes I did, that's besides the point now." she handed him three, "We go back and find her, stand in the way of the bullets and talk down her would be killer, alright?"
"Uh-huh." Sam nodded, reluctant to take the weapons.
"Since I'm not in the business of killing hunters, we only attack our own on the limbs. Arms and legs that's all. I will not be responsible for a fatality of a hunter."
"Let's go." Sam said and, with a quick pivot, the two were back searching for Ilena.
xxxx
Ilena hid in the shadows of an abandoned warehouse, waiting for her pack to catch her scent and back her up. She could hear footsteps outside trying to find her, the hunters were faster than she had expected. She held her breath and held herself closer to the wall when the footsteps stopped and backtracked to the entrance of the warehouse.
"You take the back." one whispered, it sounded male.
"I'll wait out here for it." responded a female one. But their plan was short lived, as a rumbling growl echoed through the air, a sign that her rescue squad was there.
"Inside!" the female shouted as they kicked down the door and ran in. There were four other people with them, dressed completely in black.
Guns went off and crossbows began to fire violently. Ilena ran forward from her hiding spot to join in the fight. Her claws came out of her hands and her canines were bared for all to see. The hunters were using flares to try and fight the wolves off by blinding them, which would have worked until they ran out of them. Ilena counted four from her pack, not including herself, but two were missing! Where was Jarred and her alpha Kali?
xxxx
Despite the fact that their childhoods had been torture, with all the training and exercise regimes, Avery had never thanked her parents enough. Currently their mission to find Ilena had been put on hold, as two wolves had begun chasing them instead of the real hunters. It wasn't like she'd never run away from wolves before, that had been a given in her line of profession, she'd just never tried to outrun an Alpha before. Sam was in the lead trying to weave in and out of the alleys they'd once come through, while she threw bins down after her to try and slow the wolves down. They hadn't even given the two a proper moment to explain. All they had seen, was them holding the daggers and running towards where the howl had come from and put the wrong pieces of the puzzle together.
There was a terrible crashing noise up ahead which forced the Ventors to come to a grinding holt. Straight in front of them was a pair of yellow and red eyes. They stalked forward out of the darkness and approached the two with sneers. Their eyes had caught hold of the daggers in their hands.
"I should have guessed that'd it be you to turn your back on Ilena." the red eyed she-wolf said, as her face came into view.
"Kali, it's not what it seems. It's not us after her." Sam shook his head, he obviously knew the Alpha from past encounters.
"Shut it pretty boy." the beta snapped.
"We've had enough of you hunters murdering us for sport or whatever twisted fantasy you live in that justifies your actions." Kali started to crack her knuckles. Sam and Avery were slowly backing away.
"I'm not trying to murder anyone!" Sam cried as Kali growled, thinking he was lying. Avery was gripping her dagger tighter as the confrontation continued.
"I think... even if they're telling the truth it'd be beneficial to off 'em. We'll just have to tell Ilena that the other hunters mistook them as wolves and slit their throats." the beta lunged at the two. Avery jumped in front of her brother instinctively and slashed the attacking wolfs face, getting his eye as she did. He yelped backwards in pain which gave the siblings a chance to run for it.
They had almost lost sight of the Alpha when they could hear the sound of gunfire in a nearby warehouse.
"Do you think—?" Avery thought out loud
"I hope not." Sam responded as they headed towards the noise. When they reached the front of the place, there was black cars parked to block a quick exit. They climbed over one and held their daggers up in the air. They were ready to attack.
"Not so fast pipsqueak." said the familiar voice of the beta wolf as he grabbed her wrist and yanked her back. Before she had time to fight him again, he had taken the daggers from her hand and twisted her arms behind her back. Ahead, Kali had done a similar thing to Sam. Another shot was fired inside and they could hear one of the wolves being taken down.
"Looks like you two get to live." Kali smirked, dragging in Sam. The beta pulled Avery along too.
"So then." Kali stood in the doorway as the fighting halted for a second, "Shall we do a trade?"
The hunters inside froze, catching sight to the two captured siblings. They weren't random hunters at all. They weren't Sam's friends either. A couple of them Avery recognised as her parent's hunting partners and then, standing in the middle of all the fighting, was the devilish pair. They had guns held high and bloodied faces, determined to bring down all the werewolves in close proximity to them.
"Mum? Dad?" Avery questioned, in absolute shock that they were the hunters behind this.
"Oh don't look so innocent." Kali frowned at the girl, "I highly doubt that you weren't in on this."
"Avery?" Sam turned to her, convinced by Kali's words.
"I swear I didn't tell them anything." Avery pleaded, Sam didn't believe her until his dad spoke.
"She's telling the truth Sam." Brian reloaded his gun, "We put a tracking device in her necklace."
Avery looked down at the piece of jewelry hanging from her neck, feeling betrayed by her parents.
"We couldn't let this continue anymore." Andrea said, "You and that thing standing there, are over."
"I'm glad we agree on something." Kali taunted, tracing her claws along Sam's neck.
"Don't hurt him." Ilena called, going to race forward. Brian stepped in front of her and raised his gun to her forehead. She froze in fear and raised her arms in surrender.
"Dad don't!" Sam screamed, trying to get free of Kali's grip.
"I wouldn't do that papa bear." Kali raised Sam's arm up near her canines, "How would you like a werewolf for a son?"
"I know you don't understand this Sammy, but it's for the best." Andrea said moving closer to Ilena.
"Just DON'T!" he was screaming desperately, still trying to pull away, "I'll do anything. I'll leave Tallahassee, I'll drop all contact with her. I'll kill every other wolf you ask, just not her."
His Dad cocked the gun, ignoring his son's pleas. With anger the other wolves raced forward to attack, knocking over Brian and snatching the gun away from his hand. Ilena raced free to come to Sam's side, as the sound of gun firing resumed.
"Get the ripper!" Andrea screamed at one of her partners, who threw her a large gun with a claw-like attachment on the end. Andrea caught it in her hands and aimed steadily.
Avery couldn't move. She couldn't speak as she saw what was about to happen. Her mother had the gun pointed at Ilena, who didn't notice because she was too caught up in getting to Sam's side. Sam caught sight of it too and screamed out once again, anger and desperation taking hold.
"ILENA MOVE!" he cried with all his might. But before anyone could do anything, Andrea had fired the gun. The claw raced through the air, intended for Ilena's heart. She turned around at the last second, only for a ripping noise to resonate from her chest cavity. With a clink the claw bounded away from her body, a bloody heart in it's grasp, leaving the she-wolf standing momentarily before collapsing to the ground.
"NO!" Sam gasped, as the energy in his body dropped. He went limp and couldn't breath, his vision was blurring under the disbelief. In the middle of the floor Ilena's body was spread out, with a giant hole where her heart once beat. She was dead. All the wolves in the place stopped in their places as the event took place, feeling as if their own soul had been ripped from them. One of their own was dead.
"What have you done?!" Kali cried with vengeance, staring at the hunter that was still in her arms. She glared with rage at his parents, before launching her mouth into his shoulder blade. She pulled back with sweet delight as he dropped the the floor. Sam had been bitten. Brian and Andrea felt their own breath slip away from them as Sam fell. For all intents and purposes their son had just died. Brian screamed and resumed shooting, missing every shot. Kali signalled the rest of her pack that they were getting out of there, which they hastily obeyed. They ran past Ilena's body and followed their Alpha into the night, they didn't have a chance to mourn.
Despite the excruciating pain coming from his shoulder, Sam crawled forward to reach Ilena's body. The rest of the hunters allowed themselves to rest, trying not to accept what had happened. Sam's whimpering was the only noise in the entire place. He pulled himself up to look at the expressionless face of the woman he loved. The tears were falling from his face as he propped her back up and held her in his arms. Whispering was the word 'no' over and over again. He was cupping her face in his hands hoping that she would just heal and things would be alright. But she wasn't healing and everyone knew it. Her brown eyes looked up lifelessly, almost like she was watching him. Again, the 'no's' continued until Avery gained the confidence to walk up to her brother and place her hand on his shoulder.
"She's gone Sam. She's gone." she knelt down to his level as he shook his head.
"She's not. She'll heal. Just get me her heart, we'll put it back and her body will fix itself." he wailed, his hands trembling.
"Sam. Stop." she had to pull him back as he went to fetch the organ.
"She can't be." he looked into his sisters eyes, red with pain, "She..." he couldn't string a sentence together and fell into Avery's arms. She could feel tears welling up in her own eyes at the sight of him. He just stood there, slung over his sister and cried. They could have been there for hours before Brian and Andrea dismissed their partners. They stayed to talk things over with the vessel that used to be their son and their confused daughter.
"We need to get him home." Brian said after Sam had finally stopped crying, only because he had run out tears. Avery looked up at her father with disgust.
"Fuck off." she shouted at him, "How dare you."
"Avery, dear." Andrea tried to play peace maker.
"No, you get lost too. None of this was necessary." Avery gestured as Sam resumed holding Ilena in his arms, "Are you happy now? You killed her. You didn't stop and think that maybe for a second that she wasn't the bad guy in this."
"She's a wolf, of course she was." Brian shouted angrily at his daughter, enraged by her insolence.
"You used me to make this happen. She was good, I only spent an hour with her to know that. The only crime she was guilty of was being too infatuated with 'the enemy'."
"You're too young to understand." Andrea snapped. Avery bit her bottom lip to stop herself from slapping her mother across the face.
"Get out of here." she grumbled, refusing to make eye contact with them.
"Fine, but as a Venator you know what your duty is now." Brian held out his gun to his daughter. She shook her head and backed away.
"Regardless of your view on this night, it is still our code. If a hunter gets bitten we must stop ourselves from turning into a monster." Brian pushed it towards her again. With shaky hands she took it, glancing back at her brother.
"We're giving you a chance to make this as painless as it needs to be for him. Show him mercy. Do it before the next full moon." Andrea placed her hand on Avery's shoulder.
"And if I don't?" she glared up at them. They looked down at the dead body of Ilena and back to their own daughter.
"Then you know what will happen." Brian said coldly and took Andrea to leave.
Avery had sat watching her brother as he fell asleep with Ilena in his arms. She had the wolfsbane laced gun in her own. Her mind was ticking over what was the best thing to do.
As much as she hated her parents right now, they were right. It was the code that any bitten hunter took the noble option and took their own life before coming what they killed. Sam may not have been the most loyal hunter at this point, but he still would have wanted death. While he had loved a wolf, he wouldn't love the idea of being one. But Avery wanted to be selfish this one time. The full moon wouldn't be back for at least another month. There could be time to help him learn control? She could hunt down Kali and force her to help him. Or she could chain him up herself and sedate him with a small amount of wolfsbane.
She kept thinking of ways around it. He was her brother, her closest friend. She wouldn't allow him to go through with it, to end his life. She didn't care if it wasn't what he wanted. She didn't care if he thought it would bring him to Ilena. She didn't want to lose him.
As daylight began to peak through the dirty windows of the warehouse, she stared over at her waking brother. With the gun in her hand, she got to her feet. This was her moment of judgement.