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The Lone Wolf

If Selene had been asked, she wouldn't have been able to explain it, but for the last few days, she'd genuinely found herself enjoying Michael Corvin's company.

It was strange, but even though she'd never really thought about romance since she was rescued by Viktor, there was something about Corvin that appealed to a part of her she'd never consciously thought about. When he spoke about his work in the hospital, it was with a genuine sense that he appreciated what he was able to do for his patients, taking pleasure in saving lives when she'd grown so used to judging people by their ability to cause death. He was curious about his new state, but he always seemed to know when he was approaching a topic she didn't want to talk about when talking about lycans, and Selene in turn was starting to recognise when she was risking crossing the same lines when talking with him.

Selene would never have expected that she'd become this fond of a lycan, but everything she learnt about Michael Corvin made it clear that he was only a 'lycan' because he'd been bitten by one. He'd expressed no interest in learning more about his new species beyond what he needed to know in order to survive, and as strange as it was, Selene genuinely believed he wouldn't be a threat to her on his own accord. It was still possible that his transformed self would be a danger to someone if he couldn't work out how to control it somehow, but Selene wasn't going to judge Michael because of something his more feral counterpart would do.

The story he'd told her of how he had been turned was unusual, but for the moment Selene had no reason to believe that it was anything but the truth. It actually matched up rather well with the brief reports she'd heard about lycan activity in America. With the lycan gangs there relatively disorganised compared to whatever old lycans remained over here trying to uphold Lucian's vision, it wouldn't be impossible for a random wolf to get caught in a car accident like the one Michael had described. She had to wonder how Amelia let enough lycans come together for one to change Michael under those circumstances by accident, but it wasn't hard to imagine a few cunning lycans managing to stay undercover just enough so that even Amelia could underestimate their numbers.

For the moment, as interesting as new potential lycan targets might have been under normal circumstances, Selene couldn't afford to worry about the situation over in America. She had no reason to believe Amelia or the American coven were in danger of an upsurge in lycan activity when she only had 'evidence' of one idiot, but she could be fairly confident that Michael would be in trouble if any of her more impulsive fellow Death Dealers found out about him. If she was going to help others accept that Michael was an innocent victim who had never chosen to become part of this war, she needed to help him gain proper control of his transformation. She had a tentative plan to help him find a safe environment where he could 'practice', but it would require her to share a bit more with another party than she was completely comfortable with…

She shook that thought aside. She was a loyal Death Dealer who was making a rare personal request of a close friend to protect a potential asset; there was nothing about this situation that compromised her oath or the Covenant in any way, and everyone would benefit from it in the long term. She wasn't going to ask Michael to do anything he wasn't comfortable with, but if she could help him get control of his wolf side, there were definite possibilities.

Her mind made up, she found herself standing outside Kahn's office, prepared to make the request that would at the very least change how a man she trusted saw her.

"Kahn?" she said, amazed at how anxious she suddenly felt now that the moment had come to make her request. She had faced off against transformed lycans with little fear for centuries, but the prospect of revealing any kind of personal information to someone else…

Even if she was exaggerating the extent of her association with Michael, this was still putting herself out there in an emotional manner she wasn't used to, but it was the best way to get help without telling anyone something they couldn't know too soon.

"Selene?" Kahn stood up from his desk to look at her curiously. "Is something wrong?"

"Not… wrong, exactly," Selene said, hesitating for a moment before she fully entered Kahn's office and closed the door behind her, looking firmly at the Death Dealer's official leader. "Kahn… do you trust me?"

"Trust you?" Kahn looked at her incredulously. "Selene, how can you even-?"

"Kahn, this is serious," Selene looked solemnly at him. "This isn't just asking you to trust me in the field to save your life. This is asking you to trust me when I tell you that, even if my actions seem unusual or strange, I would never do anything to break the Covenant or jeopardise the secrets of the coven."

"…All right," Kahn looked tentatively at Selene. "I can't imagine why you'd think I'd ever assume something like that of you… but I trust you."

"Thank you," Selene nodded at him, before she gave her friend a tentative smile, hoping that he would interpret her next words the right way. "I've… met someone."

"Met someone?" Kahn repeated in confusion, before his eyes widened in understanding and an incredulous grin split his normally stoic face. "You have met someone?"

"All right, there's no need to make that big a deal about it," Selene shrugged self-consciously, cursing herself for sounding so uncomfortable. "Just because I think Kraven's a pig doesn't mean I'm completely against the idea of… something, you know…"

"True, but after all these centuries?" Kahn observed, still grinning at her. "I knew you'd had your flings to vent, but the idea that you met someone? Who is…?"

His voice trailed off as he looked at her with a new sense of understanding. "He's human, isn't he?"

"A situation that is not without precedent, as you know-"

"I get that, but it's still… I mean, it's a surprise that you'd connect with someone enough to even say something like that…" Kahn shook his head with a smile. "How did you end up meeting a human?"

"It's… still early, but I like him," Selene said with an awkward shrug. "I saw him when I was on surveillance at the hospital, thought that he might have something to tell me about something that turned out to be a dead end, and ended up… well, we started talking, and from there…"

"Things just happened, right?" Kahn smiled at her in approval before he looked more serious. "Anyway, you're not here just to tell me about your romantic life; what's this all about?"

"Well… for various reasons, Michael isn't interested in becoming one of us yet, but I would like to be certain that he's got somewhere safe to go if things… become difficult," Selene said; she obviously couldn't tell Kahn that Michael was a lycan, but she also didn't want to directly lie to him if she could help it. "If this goes beyond what you're willing to do, just say the word and we can pretend none of this ever happened, but if you…"

"Selene," Kahn cut her off with a warm smile. "I know you'd never ask me to betray the coven directly, so just tell me what you want and I'll see what I can do."

"A private safehouse."

"A private safehouse?" Kahn repeated in surprise.

"I know that they're not always easy to set up, but it would be… good… to know that Michael has somewhere safe to go if the wrong people find out about him," Selene explained tentatively. "We both know that Kraven would take it personally if he knew that I actually preferred someone else over him; I'm going to keep this quiet for now, but in case something happens before I'm ready… well, it would be good to know Michael has somewhere safe to go so we don't have to force him into anything."

"I see," Kahn said, his smile shifting as he looked more seriously at her. "You realise that I'm officially obligated to keep the coven in the loop about any and all safehouses in the area in case we ever need them for anything?"

"I recognise that."

"And it would cost a considerable amount to set up a safehouse that only you and I know the location of?"

"I'm willing to contribute to the funding myself-"

"Which is why I'll do it."

"You will?" Selene was genuinely surprised that Kahn had agreed that quickly.

"Selene, you've never made a personal request like this from anyone in the coven as far as I remember," Kahn explained with a reassuring smile. "If you're going against that for this man, he must be special to you, and if you want to be sure he's safe… well, I might be loyal to Viktor, but I'm not going to turn down a chance to play a discreet little 'trick' on Kraven."

"Thank you," Selene smiled at Kahn.

"Just give me a couple of weeks; I've got a couple of sites I've been keeping in reserve for the right opportunity to expand our local resources. Is there anything in particular I should include?"

"A secure panic room, an armoury, and local surveillance," Selene affirmed. "Anything else I can sort out myself, and I would be willing to cover the cost."

"Shouldn't be too difficult if I'm careful," Kahn nodded at her. "I'll let you know when it's ready."

"Thanks again, Kahn," Selene smiled before she left her friend, heading to the range for a bit of target practice before her nightly patrol.

She'd partly expected that Kahn would accept her cover story, mainly due to the relative implausibility of the idea that she would ever associate with a lycan beyond killing it, but the thing that surprised her most was just how easy it had been to sell her cover story to Kahn. She'd needed to imply that her interest in Michael went beyond a friendly, semi-professional relationship to justify her level of interest without attracting too many questions about him, but when she actually started talking about it…

The strangest thing about it all was that, when she actually started talking about the idea of her and Michael that way, it actually didn't seem that strange. As much as she had enjoyed his company so far, she actually wouldn't be that adverse to the idea of… taking things further…

She pushed that thought to the back of her mind almost as soon as it had occurred to her. Just because she was helping Michael stay safe from himself didn't mean that there could be anything more between them than their current professional dynamic.

He was a lycan, for the Coven's sake; just because she recognised that he didn't mean her harm didn't mean that she was… attracted to him! She was just helping him now so that he could be a useful asset later; there were too many possibilities offered by the idea of having an inside man within the lycans themselves.

She ignored the nagging voice in the back of her mind that reminded her that she didn't need to have some sick attraction to the wolf to appreciate the man she'd been getting to know these last few weeks…