On the Outskirts of Manhattan

Ava was in shock. She knew she was. She was sitting in a puddle of blood in her wolf form and hadn't moved in two minutes, even when the Council's soldiers showered up. She knew them, she had fought alongside most of them, however that didn't snap her out of her revery. She just sat in her wolf form, in a puddle of blood and stared straight ahead. She could faintly hear Dawson giving orders to disconnect cameras. Call headquarters. Clean up the mess. Still, she didn't move. She sensed as Nolan moved out of the room after being looked over by various guards and ran to her side, burying his face in the thick mane of her neck, but she still didn't move.

Dawson acted cool and collected, but he noticed Ava's behaviour. He had watched as she had ripped everyone in the room to shreds. He had seen the horrible things she was capable of. The first thing he ordered the new guards to do upon arrival was check over Nolan; give Ava time to recover. However, after several extensive checks, the little boy got away and attached himself to his mother. As Dawson continued to give out orders, he noticed how the little boy wasn't particularly phased that his mother wasn't reacting to him.

“Can someone move her outside?” Dawson finally barked. They tried to remove Nolan, and Ava finally let out a sign of life: a low, protective growl. “Let him go with her!” Dawson insisted. One guard lifted both of them into his arms and moved the two outside where Dawson could see them through the door. The little boy curled himself up so that he was leaning against the wolf's chest, between her front legs. He looked content, sitting there in the protective enclosure of her body, even if she didn't say anything. Didn't do anything. Didn't move.

Eventually Dawson's ear piece chipped. “What's up?” he asked, pressing to activate the communication.

“Make sure the bodies are being disposed of, make sure the place is going to be cleaned up and bring Ava back here. ASAP. You don't have to supervise the actions. Just make sure they'll be getting done. Caroline needs to treat Ava for shock.” Riley. The communication was disconnected. It wasn't supposed to be a conversation. It was an order.

***

Ava had eventually transformed back into a human on the ride to the Chambers. Dawson had rummaged around in one of the Council's vehicles, driving with one hand, until he found a blanket to put over her, and Nolan simply sat snuggled into her side, not saying a word and keeping her warm. It was like the little boy knew that something had happened and she simply wasn't ready to face the world yet. But he also knew she was there to love and protect him no matter what.

Once they were at the Chambers, Dawson wrapped the blanket around her and lifted her into his arms. Nolan hopped out of the car quickly and grasped onto the blanket his mother was wrapped in for fear of getting lost. It was the only form of clothing either of the adults were wearing, and Dawson walked purposefully into the front doors of the Council's Chambers, stark naked. Two seconds later, Riley burst from another set of doors, quickly followed by Caroline and Jane, the Council's Doctor and her nurse.

“Did you notice her hurt anywhere? Any cuts, bruises, broken bones?” Caroline quickly started into her medical questioning as Dawson strode toward her office.

“I didn't notice any, but she had a lot of blood on her. Not necessarily hers,” Dawson supplied.

Caroline nodded and picked up the pace. Once they had Ava into an examination room, Caroline got to work unwrapping the woman from the blanket.

“Alright sweetie, Dr. Winters is going to make sure your Mommy isn't sick, why don't you come with me and I'll show you some awesome cars we have here!” Jane grinned at Nolan, grabbing his hand quickly and leading him from the room.

Caroline looked up from her inspection of Ava's body to see both men still in the doorway. “Both of you are going to have to leave. You're distracting me. I'll let you know what I know when I know it. Now leave.”

The men shared a glance, then left the room. They sat down in chairs and watched as Nolan raced some cars across the wooden flooring. Jane handed Dawson a pair of hospital scrubs to hide his nudity. He had been a wolf for a long time, his nudity didn't bother him, but he put them on anyways.

Caroline inspected every inch of Ava's body until she was convinced that Ava had nothing wrong with her. Besides a couple of scrapes and bruises, Ava was completely healthy and physically perfect. Caroline cleaned the cuts, added bandages and then led Ava to the hospital bed, tucking the woman into the blankets to keep her warm.

“Ava, I'm going to need you to drink this,” Caroline held a bottle of water to Ava's lips. “You're in shock. I'm going to bring your son back in here and put on a movie for the both of you. Someone will be by to check on the both of you every once in awhile in case you need someone.” Caroline grinned at the young woman. She was, after all, Caroline's own creation. Caroline had been the one who had performed surgery on Ava's body after the fight to the death with Logan; her mate's murderer. Caroline had created and very carefully implemented her own medical altercations to Ava to ensure that the young werewolf was more agile, better, faster and stronger. Caroline was proud that her medically manufactured muscles and bones held up against an attack. She was proud there were no trial errors. First time's the charm.

When Caroline called Nolan back into the room, both men stood, ready to go inside.

“Nothing's wrong with her. She's just...shocked. I'll have Jane check in on her every ten minutes. Both you men can go and do some work or have a nice rest,” Caroline looked meaningfully at Dawson. “And a shower.”

Riley nodded at Caroline, then turned to Dawson. “Before you go do that, I'm going to need to talk with you in my office.”

They walked silently and quickly towards Riley's office, not saying a word. People nodded as they past, some giving Dawson a worried look, some grinning as if they didn't see the angry, determined look on Riley's face.

They paused outside the office as Riley punched in the code on the keypad. Looking both ways, Riley nodded at Gabriel, his fellow Councilman who was walking past, before walking into the office, letting Dawson in behind him.

He shut the door, motioned for Dawson to sit down at the chair in front of his desk, and then walked calmly around to his own chair. He took a moment, rubbed his hands over his face, looked up at Dawson, then snarled.

He jumped up from his chair, hands slamming down on the desk in front of him and glared at Dawson. “Why weren't you there?!” he snarled out. “Do I have to get her a new bodyguard? I was already thinking of it. You know you're not supposed to have any sort of romance with someone you're guarding!” Riley ran his fingers through his hair and started to pace. “She could have been killed!”

Dawson blinked at Riley as he paced and calmed himself down. He opened his mouth to speak.

“How could you let her go?! And deliberately disobeyed my commands to return to base when she took off?!” Riley huffed.

“Are you done? Or should I wait some more to answer your questions?” Dawson asked.

Riley growled, lunging across the desk and snarling in Dawson's face. “Don't talk to me that way. I will not hesitate to rip your head off.”

Riley's aggressive behaviour made Dawson's calm demeanour disappear. He pushed up from his chair and growled right back at Riley's face. “Don't threaten me!”

In a second, Riley lunged at Dawson, pressing him up against the wall. His mouth had changed; transformed into a wolf's muzzle. Riley's anger was consuming him. Dawson had disobeyed a direct order to keep Ava safe. Ava was his. His and only his. She was perfect, and Dawson had threatened her life.

“Calm down!” Dawson growled out at the snarling, drooling half-wolf in front that had him by the neck.

Riley heard the man speaking, but the blood was thumping in his ears. Death. He wanted to kill the man in front of him. His jaw opened, ready to puncture the man's neck in front of him.

“RILEY!” Dawson yelled out, but when the older man moved to lunge forward and puncture his neck, Dawson made his hand into a fist and quickly slammed it into the other man's stomach. Riley fell backwards, let out a growl, then burst fully into his wolf form.

Dawson's wolf recognized the threat and transitioned smoothly, growling at the other wolf. He could feel the dominating presence of the older wolf. He knew that he wanted to stick his tail between his legs and cower before the animal in front of him. He also knew that if he did that, he'd be saying goodbye to his life.

***

Ava and Nolan were snuggling together on the bed. The television wasn't on. There were no toys on the bed. There was absolutely nothing going on except Nolan snuggling into Ava. His legs were straddling her waist and his small torso rested against her chest with his head on her shoulder, just like when he was a baby.

Both of their eyes were shut. They were simply using each other as comfort. Ava knew that Nolan needed to be comforted. She didn't know how much he had seen of her ripping apart those people apart piece by piece. She had pushed him pretty far into the room and her wolf had been all over the place attacking. But the door had been open and he didn't leave until she had been sitting in the pile of blood; something had kept him in the room whether it was the noises of her fighting or his view of her killing people. The one thing she was thankful for was that he wasn't terrified of her after that.

Soft snores were coming from Nolan's open mouth, and Ava was sure that he was drooling on her. She stroked his hair and listened intently to her surroundings. She was picking up on all the little things people were doing. Felix was in a technical room she had never seen before. He was staring at monitors on the wall and ever so slowly, he reached up and picked his own nose.

Ava giggled as her internal vision narrowed in on Jane who was typing out something on a computer. Caroline was laying down on a couch in the same room, looking at a folder, a concentrated look on her face.

Ava's acutely tuned ears picked up vaguely on the sound of a snarl. Her internal vision jumped quickly to the courtyard to see if anyone was training. When her sense told her it was empty, she listened closely until she heard another snarl—this one she had heard before; many times. Dawson. Her ears twitched as she followed the noise and his smell to Riley's office.

She let out a gasp and her eyes shot open. She slowly sat up from the hospital bed and set Nolan back down on it, giving him a quick kiss, then dashed out of the room. The snarls and growls were getting louder and more viscous as she grew closer. People were smiling at her as she ran past. Some noted her speed. By the time she got to the door she found it was locked with no entry except a passcode.

She banged on the door “LET ME IN!” she screamed. She looked around frantically for someone who would know the passcode. Felix was too far away in the technical room, Caroline was back where she had come from. She didn't have time to find anyone else. With a snarl of her own, she ripped the keypad off the wall. An alarm blared through the building as she grabbed onto the door handle and ripped that off as well, pushing the door in.

In front of her, two snarling wolves growled and bit at each other. One's ear was bleeding along with the right side of his flank. He was limping as the other wolf attacked—seemingly unharmed. The unharmed wolf was pitch black, just like Ava. She had never seen it before, but the bleeding white wolf she had seen—Dawson. She let out a snarl of her own. The surrounding crowd let out a gasp as she leapt into the midsts of the fighting wolves, transforming on the way.

She landed between the two, pushing Dawson out of the way and snarling at the advancing black wolf. The wolf growled back at her, baring its teeth. She let out her own growl, advancing and continually pushing Dawson out of the way when he tried to get in front of her.

She was up to the other wolf's nose, growling down at it when the wolf blinked at her, let out a snarl and then transformed back into a man.

He looked up from the place he was sitting in and Ava immediately recognized him as Riley. She let out a snarl again and turned her back on him, going over to Dawson and nuzzling his now human face. She licked at his bleeding ear as he hissed.

“Ava, stop,” Dawson mumbled. Ava let out a whine of protest, continuing to lick where his naked thigh was dripping blood. “STOP!” he growled at her. “You're the one that got me into this mess! You never listen to me! I have a tactile plan! One that wouldn't have made you destroy several innocent wolves! You wouldn't have been touched! Riley wouldn't be flipping out on me! YOU NEVER LISTEN!” Dawson yelled at her.

Ava's wolf blinked at him, took a step back then huffed at him, turning from him and leaving the room. She had to weave her way through the large crowd who had been standing around, including several guards who had come running when the alarm went off. But she didn't care. She wasn't staying there with him.