It's not about the circumstances fate deals you, but how you meet them… An AU where the Argents are werewolves, the Hales are hunters, Sheriff Stiliniski is just a deputy, Isaac is Scott's humans best friend, but there are still an eerie amount of murders in Beacon Hills. Allegiances and motives have shifted, but it all still starts when Scott gets bit by a wolf on the full wolf. This is an ensemble story.

(1)

"Dude, I need to get out tonight. Let's get out."

There is an anxiousness to Isaac's tone that Scott immediately reacts to. He had spent too many younger years unobservant to the details of Isaac, missed things he shouldn't have, that he is always observant now.

Isaac is on Scott's front lawn by the time Scott gets downstairs. Isaac as his cell clutched in his left hand and a bottle-shaped paper bag in the other. Scott doesn't look forward to tomorrow, to the first day of school with a hang-over, but there are some things more important than the first day of school.

They take their bicycles to the nearest edge of the Beacon Hills Preserve, quiet they while ride. It's not until they walked several yards into the forest does the stiffness of Isaac's shoulders relax. He twists off the bottle. Scott doesn't even know what it is. That's not the important part. Isaac takes a sip, grimaces, hands it over to Scott. They do this for a while, walking with no direction. They know this corner of Preserve well.

"I can fucking breathe out here," Isaac says. He swears whenever he slides from tipsy to drunk and never any time else. Isaac dad hadn't let Isaac get away with swearing. It was a thing that stuck.

Isaac gets hit with bought of claustrophobia too, another thing that stuck. Only getting somewhere as wide open as the preserve seems to make him at ease with any repeat accuracy. No room was big enough, and even outside, the lines of streets and the upward walls of houses and buildings seemed to press in on him. Isaac tried to explain to Scott one time. Scott's not sure he understood completely, but he could understand enough.

They drink and wander and don't talk all that much. The preserve isn't that big as to get significantly lost. Pick a direction and walk, you'll find a road or a trail or the edge.

"Shit, is that the police?" Isaac says. Ahead, there are tromping feet, barking dogs, the glares of flashlights. Their teenage and alcohol-addled brains aren't smart enough in the fight-or-flight moment to realize that a group deputies out at this time of night probably weren't going to care that much about underage drinking, that they were dealing with more major crimes. Scott and Isaac take off running in the opposite direction.

Five or so minutes of sprinting on uneven ground and Scott's heaving uneven breaths. He digs his inhaler out of his hoodie pocket, shakes it, takes a huff. He looks around. Isaac's nowhere in sight. He's about to call out and then remembers the police. So instead Scott takes a guess in which direction the bikes are and goes for it.

The next fifteen minutes are an eternity and a blink of an eye wrapped up in what is something life changing. The pack of deer that nearly trample him to death. Then the thing – the beast, a predictor, a wolf— that scared the deer, coming after Scott. He gets away alive, but wounded.

…

He finds Isaac waiting for him at the bikes. Scott's head is pounding, his side hurts. There's a bite mark in his side. He shows Isaac, but refuses to go to the hospital. It's not bleeding that bad. His shots are up-to-date.

It hurts, riding back home. It takes them double the time to get back to house than it took to get to the preserve, going slow and having to stop to give Scott breaks. Isaac keeps looking at Scott with these wide, worried, guilty eyes.

"It's not your fault," Scott tells him point blank, more than once, during the trip. Isaac hadn't said anything, but he needed to hear it. Turns out coming out of an abusive home makes you blame yourself a lot for shit that's not really your fault. That was something Scott's Mom had explained to him. She was the one, after all, that had made that deciding phone call.

"Hey," Isaac says just before Scott sneaks back into his house. "Think of it this way. Maybe you'll turn into a werewolf." It's an attempt to lighten the mood, maybe more for Isaac than for Scott.

Scott nods. He just wants to crash in bed more than anything else in the world right now.

…

First day of school. The bite mark is still there, but not as bad as Scott remembered it. The idea that he even could get bitten by a wolf, in Beacon Hills of all places, sounds ridiculous and abstract in his own mind. It was like last night was a dream, though that might have been caused by the alcohol.

He hauls his lacrosse gear, though it's probably a hopeless case – like always – through the crowded hallway. Not being Jackson Whittemore, no one gets out of his way. Hell, not being Jackson Whittemore, no one offers to haul his gear to the locker room for him.

He totally rams into Stiles at one point. Which isn't all that surprising, because sometimes you just didn't see Stiles there.

"Sorry, man," Scott says, quickly. Then to say something more, "Have a good summer?"

Stiles shrugs. "Normal. You know."

Scott didn't know. He didn't think anyone knew what normal was for Stiles. They had been close friends ones, way back, but at one point Stiles had drifted away from Scott, away from everyone, everything.

Scott doesn't know what else to say, so he says nothing and focuses on getting to the locker room without any more collisions.

…

It hits him in homeroom. Everything stings too loud as he hears it. All the kids, their hearts and feet, an uneven, un-symphonic cacophony. Scott presses his palms over his ears to no avail. Isaac is looking at him funny, but the bell rings, and Isaac can't ask any questions. The bell pushes his head past those noises, but he now hears a fly in the corner like its right by his head. He screws up his eyes again, like when the bell had rung, pushes past the fly, and there's a solo voice of a girl.

"I can't believe I didn't bring a pen."

Scott looks out the window, where he just knows the voice is coming from. Out on the empty lawn of the school, there she is. Riffling through a satchel bag, late for class, a little frazzled – curly hair not quite tamed – but Scott thinks she's beautiful-looking all the same.

Ten minutes later she's introduced in their classroom as a new student. She takes a seat in the empty desk in front of Scott. He holds a spare pen over her shoulder. She looks over her shoulder at him, grins as she takes it. She's more beautiful up close. If there is anything odd behind her grinning eyes, he ignores it in favor of taking the sunshine that is a grin from a girl like her.

She turns around back front in her seat before saying, "Thanks."

"Welcome," he whispers back.

…

"I love your jacket," says a red-headed girl to Allison in the hallway. Allison instantly knows her type, can smell the layer upon layer of products piled onto her person. Allison had been in and out of enough high schools. This girl was popular, but perhaps not well-liked. Rich, fashionable, concerned with appearances in all possible ways. "Where did you get it?" the redhead finishes.

"My mom is –" Allison starts, then has to correct herself. "Was –" she starts again. It tastes sour in her mouth. She has to swallow to keep herself from vomiting. "A fashion buyer for a boutique back in San Francisco."

The 'was' could have been a lot of things. While this redheaded girl still smiles, there is a knowing in her eyes. Perhaps she's more intuitive than Allison's assumed 'type.'

"Well," the redhead says. "She had good taste."

No questions, no pity, just stating. Allison smiles, but she's sure it's a grimace. This girl is also kinder than Allison assumed.

"I'm Lydia." She links her arm through Allison's. "Eat lunch with me."

Part of Allison wants to recoil. She's not here to make friends. A bigger part of her protests, a familiar voice in her head, demanding, 'Fit it. Act normal. Don't draw attention to yourself.'

Allison lets Lydia lead her to the cafeteria by the arm. After the process of standing in line to get food, Lydia ushers her to a table where only one other person sits.

"This is Danny," Lydia introduces off hand, almost like she doesn't care. She doesn't bother with reverse introductions.

"Allison. I'm new."

"I know," Danny says. "You're in my homeroom."

Lunch passes. Lydia speaks enough for the three of them. No one else joins them. Again, for the third time, Lydia defies 'type.' Allison expected popular. Three strikes means something.

A pause in the conversation arrives and Allison asks if Danny and Lydia are a couple.

Danny's eyebrows shoot up in a 'oh, hell no' way.

Lydia just laughs. "I'm not his type," she says.

"And I have a boyfriend," Danny adds.

"Oh." It makes a whole of more sense than the couple option. Couples tended to smell more like each other than these two did. But they sure as hell didn't act like close friends.

"He's my ex-boyfriend's ex-best friend," Lydia says, but elaborates none. Instead she asks Danny his thoughts on potential lacrosse team first line.

…

Lydia is Allison's key to camouflage, being a normal teenager in high school. Or that's what Allison tells herself so she doesn't feel guilty about letting Lydia take her to watch the lacrosse practice after school.

It's hard to tell herself she's allowed to have friends with all the warning her mom had pumped into her mind. That every human is a potential enemy. That being safe, being strong, keeping the remaining threads of the Argent pack alive is the most important thing. All that counterbalanced with the need to keep up appearances: normal, happy, human.

Sometimes Allison wonders if her mother had ever been less, well, intense. Because the woman had her softer sides, Allison knew them personally, but she left little margin of error for her daughter. Having your entire family murdered by hunters changed you; it had changed Allison.

But there's an appeal to watch a lot of boys run around on a field and into each other. She doesn't understand lacrosse, but there is something about a team that is familiar, that is like pack.

The wind shifts. The scents of all the boys – their sweat, the dirt on them, the musk of their well-worn pads, a few colognes not worn off – overwhelm her. But something sticks out as distinctly non-human.

Her mind flashes back to the boy from homeroom. The one who knew she needed a pen, who heard her barely whispered 'thanks,' who had just felt off to her. Not human; not werewolf. Just… festering, even though there had seemed nothing cruel about him.

With so many people, with the wind, it was impossible to distinguish one person's scent from another, but it's quite clear when watching the players out on the field which is the one with the inhuman reflexes.

"Who is number eleven?" Lydia says, impressed. Lydia had said she was attending the practice to support Danny, but that reason was fake, or at least the least of her reasons. It was quite clear it had been about (a) scowling at her ex-boyfriend and (b) scouting out a new boyfriend.

"He's in my homeroom," Allison said automatically.

Lydia purses her lips, gives Allison an eyeballing. "You don't remember Danny from homeroom and you remember him? Have a crush much?"

"No, no." Allison doesn't have time for friends; she definitely doesn't have time for dating.

"Claim him now if you do. Or I'll go after him myself. I see a new lacrosse star right there." She's twirling hair around her finger and looks absolutely devilish as she does it. Allison finds herself liking this in Lydia when she had been turned off by it in other girls. But Lydia is so unabashed.

Allison likes Lydia. One day, and that's it. Even if she didn't, it would be no good to let an unsuspecting girl go after what Allison suspects is a newly turned werewolf.

"Alright, I claim him." Allison can't help it that the blush on her face as she says this feels real.

But she shouldn't be. She shouldn't be blushing over boys when less than twelve hours ago she was burying half her mother's body by the ruins of their old home.

"Invite him to my party this Friday," Lydia says.

"You're having a party?" Allison asks.

"I always have a party the first week of school. Oh, yeah, you're invited. And bring eleven."

"Scott," Allison volunteers. She knows his name for the time he got called on in class, because she was paying attention to him, even then.

"That's Scott McCall under the gear. Hmm."

"What?"

"Last year he sucked."

…

Allison stalked Scott after lacrosse practice to a veterinary clinic in town where she supposed he had an afterschool job. Then she waited. No one looked twice at her as she sat in plain sight. No one expected a pretty-faced teenage girl of much, much less wrong-doing.

Allison waited with the patience of a predator. It got dark. Eventually, the veterinarian left, leaving Scott alone in the building.

It was easy enough to snatch a dog from a yard. While only a beta herself, even the weakest of werewolves held some measure of alpha status over regular canines. It took more finesse to keep them calm then to get them scared, but Allison had finesse, for all the good it did her.

"I found this guy wondering around lost," Allison says lifting up the small dog in her arms. "I didn't know where to take him."

"You found the right place." This Scott has a nice smile.

He leads her back into an examination room. She places the dog onto the table. He fiddles with the dog's collar, which holds no tag.

"Most pets have a microchip these days." The dog begins to lick at Scott's hand.

"You're good with him," Allison says.

"It's sort of my job," Scott shrugs. "And you good with him too. I don't think a lot of people would stop in the rain to help a lost dog."

"I'm not most people," Allison says, but not with the meaning Scott had intended.

"I know." He's staring at her dazed, and it's almost too easy.

"Lydia Martin's having a party on Friday. Come with me."

…

"Christ, Derek, perk up. You'd think we were heading to a funeral with all your brooding," Laura teases from the driver's seat. As the oldest, she claimed driving the Camero all the way here. Derek was stuck as a passenger with nothing to do for the hours long drive but think.

"This is serious," he tells his sister.

"It's a hunt. Lighten up. It's supposed to be fun."

He gives her a raised eyebrow in response.

They're stuck at a red light. Laura wriggles in her seat. "Come on," she demands with a smile. "This is our first hunt with no chaperones. No parents, no Uncle Peter, just you and me."

Derek nods tightly, not wanting to give anything away. He doesn't see Laura keep glancing at him out of the corner of her eye.

Thinking got worse as he saw the name on the signs. Beacon Hills – 30 Miles. Beacon Hills – 5 Miles. Welcome to Beacon Hills. Beacon Hills Shopping Center. He might be getting a little dramatic.

A hunting lifestyle meant he moved around more than the typical kid growing up. He had gone to more than one high school, but Beacon Hills High was the one that stood out. He hadn't even graduated from there, but his time here was at the forefront of him teenage memories.

A lot of regrets, a lot of… but he couldn't show it. He couldn't let Laura know, let anyone know, and she was already suspicious of his behavior. Lock it up, Derek. Lock it up. Internalize it. Blame yourself, but don't show it.

…

There was someone coming towards her house. A teenage boy, completely human, Probably not a threat for he was both clumsy and gawkey in his own skin.

As he came closer it was obvious the house was his destination. He paused outside on the ground. Stared up at the old building, then at his foundation, then at the ground. He moved closer to something – the blooms of wolfsbane that grew over her mother's grave.

He crouched down next to it, examining. He reached a hand forward, and Allison didn't know if his intention was to examine or destroy. It was then she decided to make her presence.

"Don't." Her voice cut off his action. He stands.

They stare at each other for a moment.

"What're you doing here?" she says, but it's not with the harshness.

"Allison Argent," the boy says. It less to her than a label. He glances up at the ruined house. "Argent," he repeats.

Allison blinks, slowly. It's a weary gesture. "This is private property."

"Do you want me to go?" the boy asks.

She tilts her head when she looks at him now. He has suddenly grown interesting to her. "Why are you here?"

He tells her, no hesitance. "The fire… it happened two months after my mom died. My dad, he's a deputy. He was assigned the case. He had been getting better, and then… He never solved it. Not that I need to tell you that. He took it hard. He never got better after that."

Allison had stepped closer during his speech, but they are still far apart.

"Better?" she asks. Why? Because she sees something there in this boy's face, his posture, something she recognizes in herself. Beyond that, him coming out here, recognizing her name, making a connection, making a move… he had potential. Whether dangerous or friendly was yet to be determined.

"Less drinking. Less constant bouts of depression," the boy answers. He shakes his head. His fingers twitch at his sides. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't be making your big tragedy mine." He ducks away. He's about to leave, retreat, runaway. That would be the end of it. Allison doesn't want it to be the end of it.

"Wait." She knows him from school. Maybe there was a name to go with it. "Stiles, right?"

He nods. Yeah, Stiles.

"I lost my mom recently." Her tone is cool, crisp, and hard. There is little sadness and a lot of something else. It's the first person she had admitted this to out loud. "We were all we had left after." No need to clarify which after she's referring. "Yet, somehow losing her hurts worse."

Her hands are tucked in her jacket pockets, have been the whole time. She glances to the left, toward the house but not at it, then back to Stiles. "There's probably a whole of ways to analyze that." She's tried. "But really one thing I learned. It's not really worth it, to compare griefs. We all feel too much and too complexly to make a hierarchy out of it. You know?"

Stiles nods. It's an honest type of nod where the person is absorbing some knowledge.

He blinks, slowly. "I'm sorry for your lose," he says.

It was something Allison usually hated hearing. Somehow, people never seemed sorry enough. "For yours too," she says.

"Allison," he says, the first time saying her name to her rather than about her. He licks his lips, dares to ask, "What are you doing here?" It clearly means more than when she asked him the exact same.

"I came for answers," she says, steady as a rock.

He kneads his lip through his teeth. "If there is anything I can do." He offers, not as a teenage boy to a girl. But as Stiles to Allison. "I don't know if there is, but I'm… resourceful."

She doesn't accept this offer, but she doesn't reject it. It's not good to cut off potential allies.

"It's going to get dark soon. You should get home. It's not safe out here in the dark."

He starts to walk away.

"And Stiles?" she calls after him.

He looks over his shoulder.

"See you at school."

…

Friday night. Scott's dancing with Allison. Lydia Martin herself had welcomed Scott to her party. He was suddenly freaking amazing at lacrosse after being nothing more than a bench-warmer. Scott's not sure what parallel life from his own he had just stepped into.

Isaac was jealous. Not in a damaging friendship type way, but in a "Dude, I'm so jealous way." Isaac had been better than Scott at lacrosse before, but not first line good. He had also had a crush on Lydia, but so did most guys at the school.

He's so close to Allison now, can feel her body heat like it's searing him. Can smell her earthy perfume, and more, just her, that scent of a being, so different yet so striking compared to everyone else crowded around them.

In this moment, new and intense, Scott feels a certain animalistic quality in him. It must be a surge of lust or passion or more likely some mix of the two. The only explanation. But he feels on edge, like he's on some sort of drug. He doesn't understand it at all and suddenly, Allison is there, gripping his hand tighter than tight in hers.

"Let's get out of here," she whispers in his ear. He's not sure it is supposed to sound seductive or urgent, but he follows the order. Allison, he thinks, might be the cause of this affliction, but she also is the one thing that makes sense in detail through it.

…

Scott doesn't know what is happening to him. For Allison, that is more than clear. She was fairly sure he was a new turn, but this only solidified it. He had gotten almost full-on claws forming on the dance floor.

How cruel and irresponsible to turn a human and then not be there to help them adjust, to keep them from killing. Of course, Allison didn't expect much from the mysterious alpha that had killed her mother.

She's driving Scott's car and doesn't think he has even notices the incongruity, or where they're going. That they're driving out of town. Only when she parks does he jerk his head up from the coolness of the window to get his bearings.

"Where are we?" he asks, more confused than suspicious.

"Somewhere private," Allison responds. She gets out of the car and Scott follows.

She leads him up into the house, fingers interlaced. It's in ruins, the house, but it was what was left of her family.

"This is kinda creepy," Scott says, dropping her hand, looking around. His heart rates start to speed up.

"Calm down," Allison says, and it must have been the exactly wrong thing to say, or she said it in the exactly wrong way. She forgot her act. His heart rate doubles.

Shit.

Scott keels over in a type of pain. Allison stares. Approaching would probably only make it worse.

He looks up; his eyes glowing yellow. "What's happening?" he sounds scared, pathetic, and angry all at once.

"Scott, you really need to calm down"

It doesn't help. Her advice is left unheeded. Scott arches up toward the ceiling, lets out a scream that turns into a howl.

He is fully transformed.

Scott in his werewolf form stares at Allison and she stares him back down. They stand like this in a tenuous moment. If he came at her, she was sure she could take him. He might have some muscle on her, but she has years of training and control under her belt.

He doesn't charge her. He doesn't something worse. He runs.

But Allison brought him out here for a reason, because it was distant from the main population of Beacon Hills. Because he is more likely to run into an innocent animal to slaughter than an innocent human. Because she would have time to catch up to him.

So she runs too.

…

"It's like we're going looking for trouble," Derek comments as they tromp through the forest, now dim from night.

Laura rolls her eyes. "That's exactly what we're doing. Did you forget that we're hunters, and that someone was torn in two in these woods,… and not even near the full moon."

"I just think we're going in here a little blind," Derek says. He doesn't like these woods in particular. Put him in any other woods in the world and he'd be fine. He knows what's tucked away in this one.

"When did you become Mr. Reconnaissance?" Laura says. She pauses in her trek and peaks an eyebrow at him.

"It's – it's," He tumbles through excuses in his head until he lands on something passable. "It's our first solo hunt. We need to be thorough. Not make mistakes."

She drops her piercing gaze for which Derek is thankful. Somehow his big sister possessed the quality to make him feel more like a child than either of his parents ever did. Derek loved her, and she was easily one of his closest friends… But she didn't know, and there was no way he could explain – and he didn't want to explain – why this place was triggering his hesitance and sullenness.

"Well," she says, not too harsh, "I think the biggest mistake we could make –"

The conversation doesn't go on. Not when both of them detect the sounds of a running body in the woods. It's chaotic and loud, and too fast to be human.

Laura throws out a silent, 'come on' gesture toward Derek and they both start jogging toward the source of the noise.

Laura's ahead of Derek by a few paces. She throws up a hand to indicate for him, for both of them, to stop. The runner, perhaps animal, perhaps werewolf, is approaching.

"Look," Laura breathes. A figure is caught clearly in the moonlight between the branches. It's humanoid but clearly not human. Male, Derek believes from the silhouette. He's slowing in his run, but not stopping. If he continues the path he was moving in, he wouldn't intersect them, but would come within shooting range.

Laura readies her crossbow.

Derek grabs her arm. "The code," he whispers to her. His urgency and borderline panic doesn't overtake his training. He keeps his voice low. They are being the predators to a predator after all. That takes extra care.

"I'm not shooting to kill," Laura hisses back, yanking her arm away from him. She gets the crossbow aimed as the werewolf moves into the best position for her shot. She takes it. It's good.

There is a sound of surprise and panic that is all too human to Derek's ears as the bolt pierces through the werewolf's forearm, tacking him to a tree.

Laura raises her cross bow up to her shoulder, brimming with pride. "I got skills," she boasts to Derek. They both start forward, but barely make it two steps before someone else is running into the moonlight clearing. It's a young women, fast but untransformed. There are no details beyond the silhouettes of the two.

The young woman goes to the tree where the young man is pinned. She pulls out the bolt from his arm, from the tree trunk, with superhuman strength.

"Run!" Derek hears her voice shout. She shoves at the young man's shoulder – no longer in werewolf form – and they both are off and away faster than either of the Hales could hope to follow.

"Shit," Laura swears from next to him. "Two of them? A pack."

There hasn't been a werewolf pack in Beacon Hills since… Don't think about it, Derek. Just don't think.

…

They are maybe a mile or two away before they stop running. Scott is surprised by how not winded he is. He leans against a tree, though, as he catches the breath he was short on.

"What the hell was that?" he asks. Allison's unflustered, as least as Scott can read. In fact, her jaw seems tight in hard emotion. Scott's not sure if he trusts her, but she doesn't quite the enemy she had when they were in the old house.

"Hunters," Allison answers. She's looking slightly over his shoulder, head tilted like she was listening for something.

"Hunting humans?" Scott exclaims. What was going on in the world?

"No." Allison looks at him now. "No. Hunting werewolves."

This is my first teen wolf fic. I have a lot of logics for why the characters are the way they are and why certain things have changed. So if there is something that doesn't strike your fancy, please give the story the benefit of the doubt and wait to see how it plays out. Also, also, not sure what my update schedule will be because I am starting a new job soon.