𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐄𝐋𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐍

𝘞𝘌 𝘊𝘈𝘕'𝘛 𝘓𝘌𝘈𝘝𝘌

━━━ "BABE, COME ON! LET ME SEE THE PITCH, I MISS IT!"

Meilani McCall fondly rolled her eyes at her boyfriend, Stiles Stilinski, whose face took up her whole screen as the two FaceTimed each other. He had been at his school for nearly a week now and every day since he'd moved into his dorm, he's called Meilani every single night. Most of the time Meilani's best friend, Isaac Lahey, would poke his head into the screen to bother Stiles with a taunting smirk on his face. The two of them didn't need to leave for UCLA until the following morning and would be helping Coach Finstock out with his pre-season lacrosse practice. Something that gave the duo something to do with their remaining days in Beacon Hills.

The only free time Meilani had since finishing out her senior year and kicking into summer was probably when she slept. Every other moment had been spent with all of her friends as they all tried to squeeze out quality time with each other until they all separated for college. Though, Meilani and Isaac would both be at UCLA together so they didn't really mind much if they were together constantly. Meilani wasn't complaining, however, because it was probably the best summer she ever had and didn't even need to worry about anything supernatural coming out to kill her or her pack. It was probably the most relaxed she's been since sophomore year before she was bitten and turned by Peter Hale.

The past month of the summer vacation had been spent on the lacrosse pitch with Coach Finstock and the lacrosse team ( and Isaac who had all but demanded he helped Meilani ) while they got ready for the upcoming season. Finstock had practically begged Meilani to help him out until she left for college so that the boys could be at least somewhat good during the season now that Meilani, Isaac and Kira were now both gone. Meilani had tried to remind Finstock that Stiles and her brother, Scott McCall, were also on the team but he'd just laughed and carried on with his coaching after that. Even Isaac had snorted at Meilani's words, to which she punched him in the ribs with a bright grin.

"Stilinski, how can you miss a pitch you were never on?" Isaac commented, poking his head into the screen and squishing his cheek against Meilani's. He was bent over her shoulder behind Meilani as he was almost a foot taller than the McCall female, something he had always made fun of her for. "Can't miss it too much."

"Hey, I will have you know that I scored a goal that one time, okay?" Stiles fired back, jabbing a finger at the screen as if he were poking Isaac in the face in real life. "And get your face away from my fiancé before I come there and drag your little werewolf ass across the pitch and throw you in the goal."

"I'd love to see that," Isaac retorted, flashing Stiles a bright grin when the Stilinski male narrowed his hazel eyes at him.

Meilani chuckled softly at their banter and shifted her phone to her other hand as the current one began to cramp up. "Sti, the pitch looks the same as it always does. Filled with prepubescent teenage boys who are trying to play. I emphasize try here."

Isaac grimaced as his blue eyes flickered over to the pitch where the boys practiced and watched two of them collide into each other with loud groans of pain. "Yeah . . . Coach is not going to have a good time this year. I can tell."

"Coach already isn't having a good time!" Finstock yelled, walking over to the duo ( trio? ) as he blew his whistle at the two werewolves who flinched at the loudness of the whistle. "McCall, hang up with your boyfriend and help me out here."

"It's fiancé now, Coach!" Stiles called from the phone, waving frantically at the brunette haired man when Meilani turned the phone around for Finstock to see Stiles.

"I don't care, Stilinski. Goodnight!" Finstock barely even gave Stiles a minute to protest as he hung up the FaceTime call and jerked a finger in the direction of the pitch. "Coaching time, people!"

Isaac laughed as he watched Finstock walk away back towards the sidelines of the pitch to continue yelling at the boys on the pitch. "He's an angry coach."

Meilani bit her lip to stop the smile from crossing her features, weakly swatting at Isaac's chest as she made her way over to the sidelines where Coach Finstock stood. She pulled at her hair that was pulled up and away from her face for once while her black and white assistant coach zip up hoodie hung off over one shoulder to reveal the spaghetti strap of her cropped white tank top beneath it. She cringed slightly as one of the boys, Nolan Holloway, crashed to the ground after being tackled by one of the other boys who went strictly by Diaz.

"Nolan, stay in there, bud. You can take him!" Meilani encouraged the grunting blue eyed latino boy that struggled to push himself back up onto his feet. She cheered on another boy who wore the number eighty-nine as he shot the ball directly into the net. "Nice work! That's the best shot of pre-season so far."

"Thanks, Coach!" the boy beamed at Meilani as he jogged her by, high-fiving the McCall female as he went.

"Assistant coach!" Finstock corrected the running boy, turning his gaze back to Meilani and Isaac who both wore mirroring expressions of amusement. "What exactly are you doing, McCall?"

Isaac scratched the back of his neck while he gestured with the other to the boys who were scattered all around the pitch doing different work outs. "I think it's called drills, Coach."

"She's giving them hope. When did I ever give you people hope?"

Meilani hummed, pretending to think about it for a moment with her finger tapping her chin. "Yeah, I'm gonna go with never, Coach."

"Exactly! Nothing motivates more than withering criticism. Speaking of, um, losers . . . where's your, uh, where's your little protege?"

Meilani balked at the question, brown eyes instantly sweeping around the area for her beta, Liam Dunbar. She had seen him earlier when he'd shown up looking all depressed because his girlfriend, Hayden, had broken up with him and left Beacon Hills with her older sister to protect her. Liam hadn't been the same since and Meilani had tried to see him as much as she could over the past week but between helping Stiles pack and leave followed by helping Scott pack and leave for UC Davis, it was hard for her to see him as much as she wanted. Though, Mason had sent her hourly updates on the boy who barely slept or ate ever since she left. She swore it was like looking at Bella Swan when Edward left her.

God, she hoped Liam didn't bail on her as he promised her he'd keep his captain status that Coach Finstock had granted to him at the start of practices in the beginning of the month. If he lost his title, Meilani would throttle him because he had worked so hard to get it in the first place.

"Um . . . "

"Um? Is . . . is um a location? Is um behind me?" Finstock retorted to Meilani, squinting his eyes at her as if telling her he wanted an answer and he wanted it now.

"He'll be here. Okay? He's the backbone of this team and has stepped up in every way possible. A born leader who can handle anything that you throw at him," Meilani promised Coach, who didn't look like he believed her at all and went back to the practice. She cringed when another member of the team was sent to the ground, hard. "I hope."

Coach Finstock even showed some sort of pain on his face, watching the teen boy get helped up by two of the other freshmen from the team. "McCall, you better get your little son or whatever your friends like to call him out here in three or this is your last day as assistant coach."

Meilani raised an eyebrow at Finstock while she crossed her arms. "Coach . . . this is my last day as assistant coach. I leave for school tomorrow morning."

"I can still dock your pay."

"I'm a volunteer!" Meilani threw back at him, removing her whistle and holding at him to which he scrunched his nose up at in disgust. "You want my whistle?"

"Who gave you that anyway?"

"Stiles bought it for me the day I started helping you out," Meilani said, holding up the whistle and smiling softly at it. "Got me a ring and a whistle."

Coach Finstock opened his mouth to utter a sarcastic comment when Liam bounded onto the pitch out of nowhere and chucked one of the balls straight into the net with precision. He blew his whistle and clapped obnoxiously for the boy with a cheer. "Now that's how you play lacrosse, McCall! Who is that kid? He's spectacular."

Isaac stared at Finstock in disbelief, gesturing wildly to the number nine on the back of Liam's practice jersey. "Coach, that's Liam!"

Coach Finstock froze in his movements down the side of the sidelines and furrowed his eyebrows, watching Liam twist and turn his way around the other players with ease. "Well, how the hell am I supposed to them all apart? They're all wearing the same thing!"

"That's what the numbers on their jerseys are for, Coach!" Meilani reminded, pausing in her steps when she noticed Liam get knocked over someone's shoulder and land roughly on the ground. She could hear a low growl come from Liam's mouth as his heart rate accelerated and she cursed to herself, blowing her whistle as she ran over to her beta with Isaac close behind her. She crouched down before Liam whose eyes glowed yellow and small growls could be heard in between his panting breaths. "Hey, hey, hey. Li, baby, you gotta calm down. Your eyes are glowing."

"McCall, what the hell was that?!" Coach Finstock snapped from where he stood in the middle of the other players. "That wasn't a foul. That's called winning."

Meilani quickly hid Liam's face into her chest when she noticed Finstock making his way closer to her, Liam and Isaac. Her hand ran gently over his helmet in the hopes that it'd somehow help him, but her eyebrows furrowed when Finstock stopped next to Isaac and stared at something over her shoulder. Following both Isaac and Finstock's gazes, she glanced over to see a wolf randomly standing just a few feet away from the team.

Slowly standing up, Meilani pulled Liam up with her and only let him go when she noticed his eyes were back to their usual light blue. She pushed him behind her so he was stood with Finstock and Isaac, keeping a protective stance in front of the trio and the team while she stared down the wolf. Slobber dribbled down from its canines as it growled quietly, making Meilani tell the team to step back and away so they wouldn't get hurt. 

The wolf growled at the team for another minute until it finally turned back around and slowly made its way out of the pitch and back into the forest on the other side of the pitch. Without even needing to look at each other, Meilani, Isaac and Liam all walked out after the wolf and into the darkened woods. 

Liam kept close to Meilani's sides as he played with his lacrosse gloves and swept his eyes around cautiously. "Do you think it was just a wolf or was it like . . . a — a werewolf?"

"No, I think it was just a wolf," Meilani said to Liam, following the scent trail the wolf left behind. Though, it didn't take long for them to find the wolf as Meilani noticed it just a few feet ahead, dead. Flies already began to swarm around its dead body  and what looked like spiders crawled out of its eye and mouth. 

"Lans . . ." Isaac warned, slapping her arm rapidly until she followed his gaze further up ahead.

In the clearing just up ahead, other wolves could be seen in the same state as the one at Meilani, Liam and Isaac's feet. All of them dead with flies and the high stench of death lingering in the cool summer night air. It was like nothing Meilani had ever seen before and she tilted her head at the sight. As weird as it seemed, Meilani didn't think any of it had anything to do with the supernatural and decided to leave it be.

At least . . . she hoped it wasn't anything supernatural.

Later that night, Meilani found herself in her room with Liam and Isaac as the three of them all tried to get Meilani finished packing so she could be ready to leave for school the next morning with Isaac. Scott had left behind Roscoe for Meilani as he thought that Meilani should be the one driving her fiancé's car and not him. Their father, Rafe McCall, had been kind enough to offer to drive Scott to UC Davis the day prior and Meilani had said all but three words to the man before he left with Scott. As much as Meilani wanted to try and patch things up with her father, she just knew none of it would be the same like it was when she was younger and she'd grown to be okay with that.

"Meilani, whatever happened to those wolves was definitely supernatural," Liam argued to Meilani and Isaac who both tried to shove Meilani's clothes into a suitcase and get it to close. 

Meilani grunted softly as she used her alpha strength to push the suitcase closed while Isaac finally got the thing to zipper up and close. "Well, I wouldn't say definitely. It could have been a parasitic infection that had taken over that pack of wolves. I mean, we used to get dogs back at the clinic all the time that had botflies coming out of their skin. Hell, it could even happen to humans. They crawl under the skin, lay some eggs and eventually they burst."

Liam jutted out his bottom lip, almost like he was wishing that all of this could have been supernatural and they could have gone on an adventure together before Meilani left with Isaac in the morning. This earned him a suspicious look from Meilani.

"Do you wanna talk about it?"

"I thought we were already talking about it," Liam cleared his throat, motioning between them about the wolf situation.

Meilani shook her head at Liam as her features softened and she stepped around the bed so she could be stood before her beta. "Li, you know that's not what I was talking about. You know I meant what happened back at practice. Your fangs, your eyes, the growl."

Liam puffed out his cheeks and threw his head back, eyes squeezed shut as his face tilted towards the ceiling. "I guess we're gonna talk about this, huh?"

Meilani placed her hands on Liam's shoulders, squeezing them gently and making him look back at her as she offered him a small smile. "Just remember your mantra, okay? What three things cannot long be hidden?"

"Oh, come on, Lan. I haven't had to use that in . . . "

"Hey," Meilani sternly cut across him, shaking his shoulders when he tried to look away from her. "Come on, seriously. What three things cannot long be hidden?"

Liam exhaled heavily and shot Meilani a disbelieving look that she was making him do this. When he realized his alpha wouldn't be backing down from this one, he rolled his eyes playfully. "Okay, okay — the sun, the moon and the truth."

"That's my boy," Meilani praised, bringing the boy into her chest and hugged him tightly as his heart rate slowed down. She pressed a platonic kiss to the top of his head and leaned her cheek against it afterwards. However, their small moment didn't last long as the suitcase suddenly burst open again and caused the duo to break apart with a small scream from both parties.

Isaac poked his tongue into his cheek, tapping his slipper covered foot against the hardwood floor of Meilani's room. "Lans, I think you're gonna need a bigger suitcase."

Meilani sheepishly smiled and picked up the duct tape that Stiles left behind from her bed. "I got duct tape?"

"Okay, Stiles, duct tape can't fix everything," Isaac mused, snatching the duct tape from Meilani and went ahead and started duct taping the suitcase shut for her.

"I'm gonna miss you two bozos while you're gone."

The next morning came sooner than Meilani anticipated and since she still had some time before she and Isaac had to leave, she had practically dragged Isaac along with her to the hospital so she could Melissa. The woman had to do a double shift so she'd be working well into the night that night and Meilani wanted to see Melissa while she still could and make sure that she would be okay on her own without Meilani there. Which, naturally, meant Meilani brought Melissa a powerful stun stick to protect herself in case anything came into the hospital.

Melissa McCall had seen and done many things since finding out Meilani was a werewolf in Meilani's sophomore year, but she'd never had to really use a weapon before. So, it was no shock to Isaac or Meilani that the woman shook her head defiantly when Meilani told her to test out the stun stick on her. "Eight hundred thousand volts sounds pretty dangerous. I can't use it on you . . . not when Isaac would also feel it."

"I felt Meilani die twice now, Melissa. That was like feeling half of myself be ripped out," Isaac reminded the McCall woman. Even nearly two years later, it was still hard to wrap their heads around the fact that Isaac was Meilani's wolf mate and that the two could feel everything the other felt and speak to each other through their minds. It both came in handy and was also a curse upon the both of them. "I think me feeling this will be just fine."

"Just use it on me, Mom," Meilani sighed, sounding like a tired parent as she held the stun stick out to her mother. She groaned when Melissa stared blankly at her. "Mom, I'll be okay, I promise. I've faced things scarier than this thing."

Melissa rolled her eyes, but slid off the metal examination table in the morgue and took the stun stick from Meilani. She flipped it over so the side with the button was facing upwards and she held it outwards towards Meilani's chest. However, when Meilani jolted forward as if to attack Melissa, nothing happened as Melissa tensed up and looked away. 

Meilani slapped her hands to her sides and stepped back from the stun stick. "Mom, you kind of have to push the button to make it work, you know."

Melissa smiled innocently at her daughter, holding the stun stick up in the air and pressed the button down causing the shock to go through the metal rods on the stick. "See? I held the button down."

"Wow, I see where you get your sass from," Isaac commented, swinging his legs back and forth on the table he had perched himself