IT WAS THE NIGHT OF THE LACROSSE GAME, and Jackson was playing.

"Why are you on the bench?" questioned the blonde as she sat down on the bleachers in her usual spot behind Stiles, ridding Isaac from her mind. What was unusual was that Scott was there with him and not on the field.

"I'm failing a bunch of classes, so Coach won't let me play," the McCall boy sighed before turning to the sheriff's son, trying to change the subject. "Your dad coming?"

Stiles nodded, pointing to the man on the bleachers next to Melissa. "Yeah, he's already here."

"Either of you seen Allison?" Scott asked.

Wren shook her head while the Stilinski boy answered, "No, you seen Lydia?" She fought the urge to roll her eyes at how sickeningly in love they both were.

"Not yet," the Carter girl told both of them before her eyes widened in realization, and she grinned at her best friends, wrapping her arms around both of them. Stiles looked at her like she was insane because she had never willingly touched him in her life. She was in a bouncy mood. "Oh, my God. You guys are bench buddies now. That's so cute."

"You know what's going on?" Stiles quizzed after both of them shot the blonde behind them a playful glare.

The werewolf exhaled deeply, bouncing his foot nervously. "Not yet."

"It's going to be bad, isn't it?" the Stilinski boy said, and when he didn't respond, he continued, "I mean, like, people screaming, running for their lives, blood, killing, maiming kind of bad?

"Looks like it," Scott answered grimly.

Running a shaky hand through her hair, Wren breathed out, "Well, that sounds like a pleasant time."

"Scott, the other night, seeing my dad get hit over the head by Matt, you know, while I'm just lying there and I can't even move, it just..." Stiles trailed off. "I want to help, you know, but I can't do the things that you can do. I can't—"

"It's okay," the werewolf told him, cutting him off.

The short-haired boy shook his head. "We're losing, dude."

"What the hell are you talking about? The game hasn't even started," came a confused and aggressive voice from behind Wren.

"Oh, my God!" the blonde girl yelled, almost jumping out of her seat at the sudden noise as she stared at the man that spoke in disbelief and slight fear. "Where did you come from?"

"Magic," Finstock responded sarcastically before turning to the Stilinski boy. "Now put on your helmet and get out there. You're in for Greenberg."

Stiles perked up, whipping his head around the field in confusion as if searching for someone lying on the ground in pain. "What? What happened to Greenberg?"

"What happened to Greenberg? He sucks. You suck slightly less," the man answered, using hand gestures to help along his explanation.

"I'm playing?" the sheriff's son exclaimed excitedly while Coach shook his head, already regretting his decision to put the boy in. "On the field? With the team?"

The older male sighed before responding, "Yes, unless you'd rather play with yourself."

"I already did that today — twice," Stiles told him.

Wren's proud grin quickly turned into a disgusted frown as covered up her ears and yelled, "Adding that to the list of things I need to wipe my memory of, right under seeing Jackson naked."

"Get the hell out there!" ordered Coach, and the Carter girl jumped again because of his volume as she removed her palms from her ears.

The Stilinski scrambled to grab his stick and other gear that he needed to play. "All right."

"Yeah, go Stiles!" Wren cheered as the boy ran onto the field with his lacrosse stick, getting ready to play. The Stilinski boy was so confused because she was actually being supportive. "You got this!"

"My son is on the field!" announced Noah to the entire crowd, jumping up from his spot on the bleachers while everyone around him shot him confused and judging looks.

All of a sudden, Scott goes tense. She can see his ears twitch as he looks around the stadium for something unknown to her. She furrowed her eyebrows. "Scott, what is it?"

"Sh, sh, sh," he quieted her, holding up his hand to stop her. When he saw her questioning look, he explained, "It's Gerard."

"What's he saying?" she asked in a whisper, as if that would help him hear the old man better.

He turned to her with a semi-jokingly annoyed expression. "Will you just shut up so I can listen? I'll tell you everything in a second. I promise." When she made the motion of zipping her lips, he turned forward to listen again.

After a moment and some not-so-good expressions, Scott snapped back into reality when the whistle blew, signaling the start of the game. Wren questioned again, "What'd he say?"

"He said that if we don't give him Derek by the end of the game, then he's gonna kill someone."

《❀》

"THAT LOOKED LIKE IT HURT," Wren pointed out as her and Scott watched Stiles get practically run over by about five huge players from the other team.

The werewolf tried to stand up, but Coach was already three steps ahead of him. He grabbed the boy's shoulders and shoved back down into his seat. "Sit down, McCall."

"But, Coach, we're dying out there," Scott told him as if he couldn't see it for himself, pretty much begging for the man to put him in the game so that he could stop Jackson.

"Oh, I'm aware of that. Now sit," the man ordered before walking away, still keeping his eye trained on the best friend pair to make sure they didn't try anything stupid.

"I can't watch this," the McCall boy groaned when Stiles lost them another point, and he looked over at her. "Tell me something to get my mind off of not being able to play."

She furrowed her eyebrows at him before shrugging. "Um, my neighbor's cat went missing the other day, and she spent all night calling for it. And then she found it hanging from her Christmas lights that she never took down."

"So, I was thinking of something more happy," he returned after staring at her in concern for a moment. He then just sighed and wrapped his arm around the girl. She placed her head on his shoulder, but they both whipped around when someone sat on the other side of her. Isaac was in his gear and ready to play. "You came to help."

"I came to win," Isaac corrected, and then they all turned to smirk at Gerard as he stared back at them. Wren would be lying if she said she wasn't really glad to see him. "You got a plan yet?"

"No. Right now, it's pretty much just keeping Jackson from killing anyone," Scott responded.

The blue-eyed boy raised his eyebrows at him before pointing out the very much obvious point that was their problem. "Well, that might be easier if you're actually in the game."

"No, really?" the Carter girl said sarcastically. "Man, we never would've figured that out without you, buddy. Thanks a lot."

"We have to make it so Coach has no choice but to play you," Isaac continued after sticking his tongue out at her.

Scott sighed, clueless to the exchanges between the two. "How do we do that? He's got a bench full of guys he can use before he ever puts me on the field." The crowd booed as the two best friends realized what Isaac was thinking. "Can you do it without putting anyone in the hospital?"

"I can try," the Lahey boy exhaled before pulling on his helmet and running onto the field. Then, the other two watched in shock as he took players off the field one after the other, and the line on the bench grew smaller and smaller.

"Lahey!" Coach yelled angrily after another injured player got tossed to the side. "Seriously, what the hell is your problem?"

Isaac just shrugged and got back to playing, but Karma got up to him when a bunch of players collided and he laid motionless on the grass. Jackson pulled off his helmet to reveal an evil smirk as he walked away, and Scott and Wren rushed over to the blue-eyed werewolf.

He grunted out while the paramedics carried a stretched over to him, "It's not broken, but I can't move it. I think Jackson nicked me 'cause I can feel it spreading."

"Aw, crap," Finstock muttered as they lifted Isaac onto the stretched, and he handed Scott a helmet. "Either you're in, or we forfeit."

"Okay," the werewolf replied, grabbing the lacrosse stick, and his mother ran onto the field to talk to him.

While they did that, Wren followed the paramedics that were carrying Isaac, and she was a little bit behind because she stayed with Scott while he talked to Coach. She reached the parking lot and looked around, but they were nowhere in sight. The ambulance that was on the scene in case of any emergencies was there, but the lights were off and the paramedics were leaning against it, talking.

She walked over to them, and they looked up when she asked them, "Hey, did you guys just carry a teenage boy out here on a stretcher?"

"No, ma'am," one of them answered while the other shook his head.

She just nodded before making her way back to the game — they were still losing horribly — and she headed into the school. She stepped into the hallway where the boys' locker room was and froze when she heard grunting and the cold voice of Gerard Argent.

"It was a good effort, Isaac. It was," the old man said, and Wren's eyes widened when she realized who he was speaking to. Then, she heard what sounded like a sword coming out of its sheath. "This would be so much more poetic if it were halftime."

The Carter girl quickly grabbed one of the lacrosse sticks that were leaning against the wall and held it over her head like a bat as she approached the locker room. She peeked in the doorway to see Isaac backed up against the sink and Gerard dragging a sword as he walked over to him. There were two hunters dressed as paramedics behind the older hunter.

Someone grabbed her from behind, and she almost swung at them until whoever it was put a hand over her mouth and grasped her wrist to stop her. She sighed in relief when she realized it was just Scott. He held a finger to his lips as he removed his hand from her lips.

The werewolf stepped into the room in front of the blonde, but she was still ready to attack. When Isaac saw them, he smirked at the Argent man in front of him. When Gerard noticed the look, he glanced in the mirror just in time to see Scott grab one of the hunters and Wren swinging at the other one.

She caught him by surprise, so she was able to hit him hard enough that he was a little dazed. That gave her enough time to grab his head and slam it into one of the lockers, rendering him unconscious. Once she was done, she saw the other hunter that Scott had thrown against the wall, but Gerard was nowhere in sight. Scott noticed it as well.

"Where is he?" he questioned, but he didn't give them time to answer before he went running out of the room and toward the game of cheering fans, leaving Isaac and Wren alone.

They stared at each other awkwardly until he finally spoke up. "Thanks for coming to my rescue. Um, that was very badass."

"I know," she responded, and he slid down onto the floor because of the Kanima venom. "I'm, uh, glad you stayed. I might've missed having you around." He grinned back up at her teasingly. She couldn't afford to lose anymore friends. Screams from the field dropped both of their smiles — scared screams. "That sounds bad. Will you, uh, be okay for a moment?"

"Sure," he nodded, and his head dropped to his lap when she broke their gaze by turning to the door. "I'll be fine."

"Stay here," she ordered before climbing to her feet and making her way to the door.

He sent her a sarcastic smile when she sent him one final look. "I can't really do much else."

She fought the urge to laugh as she rushed to the field to see the game was done. People were screaming and running everywhere, fleeing the scene, but there was a crowd in the middle of the field.

She got closer just in time to see Jackson lying motionless on the grass and the sheriff whipping his head around frantically and yelling with a panicked voice.

"Where the hell is my son?"