Daniel hated bloodshed but there was nothing he could do, this was life and life was a jungle; only the fittest survived, it was kill or get killed.

He was just on his way back to the hospital when there came another complaint, a pup was missing - to be an alpha wasn't an easy job.

"Kaji " was an unruly pup who was recognized for his wild and mischievous plays. He was known to give the caregivers a hard time by hiding in places they couldn't find him- that was his idea of fun.

At first, they used to panic - thinking he had been kidnapped by a rival pack or ignorant humans who thought him as a wolf - and would turn the whole pack upside down just to search for him. However, the incident kept repeating itself which made everyone get used to it - they gave up on him. Moreover, he disappears and appears at the right time and place.

But tonight, something was different, he had not appeared his usual time and there was no sight of him in the pack; they could not catch his scent.

"His scent is faint and seems to point to the direction of the pack's exit," observed Daniel. He was thankful that his mate was asleep and didn't have to be burdened with this job- she was an excellent tracker.

Behind him, the boy's mother wailed.

"Kaji! My Kaji! Where did he go this time? I need to find my boy … I need to find my Kanji!"

Daniel cleaned the inside of his ear with his finger, "Take her away," he ordered one of his men.

He couldn't concentrate nor plot his next course of action with her distracting him with her screams.

"Get me Sam" Daniel ordered Ryan who gestured to one of his men to get the young werewolf. The twelve-year-old kid was the best tracker in the pack - aside from his mate, Lia.

In no time, the boy with tousled brown hair appeared with an excited twinkle in his eyes. As per children his age, he was giddy to help the Alpha out with his problem since it was a huge honor.

Ryan tossed a short to him that belonged to Kaji which Sam caught and took a whiff. After that, he tossed the short away and began to sniff the air, going in the direction he caught the smell of the boy.

"let's go," Ryan ordered his men when Daniel halted him by lifting his hand.

Ryan's brow furrowed together in both surprise and confusion, "What is it?"

"You are not coming with me" Daniel decided.

"What?"

"I'll go search for the boy with Sam, the rest of you should take care of the pack in my absence." was his command.

"But still-"

"No 'but' here, Ryan. Two leaders shouldn't be missing in action," Daniel added when he tried to protest, "It's an order from your alpha,"

"Fine, alright," He was given no choice but to give up. Any further protest would be misunderstood as blatantly challenging the alpha's command hence attracting punishment

So, Daniel left in his car with the boy who had his face out the window, tracing the scent till they got to Little Town and Ben's place to be exact.

"Why did you stop?" asked Daniel who was examining the best spot to sneak into the house unnoticed without setting off any security system. However, he noticed Sam's nose was twitching and wrinkling more busily than earlier.

"What is it?" he asked.

" He's not here,"

"What?"

"The boy who took Kaji is not home, well, he was once home but was out here moments ago - both of their scent's strong " the boy explained while taking a long inhalation of breath.

"And?"

He frowned," There's a third scent plus the scent of -"

"Blood," Daniel had already crouched down, observing the dried red spots on the cemented ground.

"I don't know what's going on but it appears whoever kidnapped Kaji has been kidnapped too" the boy surmised.

"Yeah, that seems to be the case," Daniel murmured, looking out into the distance. Who could have kidnapped Ben? The boy was the only person on earth Daniel could swear, had no enemy. Was he in danger because he was associated with them?

"Can you track them down?"

"Of course, What's my nose used for then?" he grinned.

"Then, let's get going,"

************************

The constant barking and snarling woke him from his short nap.

"Ugh," Ben stirred, opening his eyes. Where was he? His sight was blurry and the back of his head hurt like a bitch. What the hell happened?

Then it came rushing back to him, the memory of the whole incident; the pup and Eric turning out to be Alexa's murderer. Gosh, shame on him, why didn't he discover this earlier, and now he was in deep shit.

Ben looked around the shack to discover that the pup had been found out and chained to the leg of a table that had boxes of indistinguishable loads on top. It was obvious that the pup was against that inhuman treatment hence tried to get out of the restraint all to no avail.

That scene unsettled Ben so much that he fought against his bounds too, yet failed; he was tied to the chair.

"You're awake," He heard a voice and turned around to see Eric coming in with a camera stand in his grasp.

"You asshole!" Ben had never been so angry in his entire life than now, he wished he could be given a chance to rip that idiot apart.

"Let the little child go!" he yelled so loud that veins bulged from his neck.

"Oh, he's really a werewolf," Eric smirked, squatting down in the direction of the pup who was making a low warning rumble in his throat.

"I thought so, thanks for confirming that," He winked at Ben, getting back up to his feet and turned the camera to the wolf, recording the scene.

"It's quite disappointing that this is nighttime and there's no network over here else we would go live - I just never planned on capturing you today."

"You're an animal," Ben hissed at him, still struggling against the bind.

"No," Eric turned to him, placing both hands on either side of the armrest saying, " You're the animal for communicating with animals like them. Humans like you are supposed to stand and defend our kind against these evil creatures.

"But you, what did you do? Just because you liked the girl, you turned a blind eye to all their atrocities because she's one of them and you couldn't hurt her."

Ben's eyes widened," How did you know about us, umm, I mean them? " he corrected himself instantly. Eric had no idea he wasn't exactly human and he would rather keep it that way.

"I got all the truth I wanted from Alexa but the bitch didn't tell me everything - thanks to her though, I found out about Lia,"

"That's why you always hang around Lia, you needed her for whatever evil agenda you had in mind," Ben figured.

"Yes, I wanted her for my plans but then, you and that other stupid vampire - you to be precise- wouldn't leave the girl alone!"

Well, Ben wasn't going to deny that one. He just never thought that his closeness to Lia all this while was a disturbance to another.

"And Caroline? You glued yourself to her side because you needed information too, right " Ben figured out the rest.

"Bingo, I need knowledge about those creatures if I'm to handle them in the future. But then, that blonde bimbo didn't exactly give me what I wished for, instead thought I was one of her toys. But then, I used truth serum on her and got almost all I wanted, "

Oh great, sodium pentothal, how did that psychopath even get his hands on that psychoactive drug? It was banned from Little Town.

"Just a sip and she vomited all there is to know without keeping any from me. It's quite appalling to know that supernatural creatures make up half the population of Little Town and yet nobody is doing anything about it, why do you think that is so?"

"Because everyone is too lazy to handle that?" Ben joked but the deadly glare sent his way shut him up.

"The council did a good job of hiding them but don't worry, it's coming to the limelight soon," Eric smiled at him which made goosebumps climb his arms.

Oh crap, the psycho found out about the council too? What's next? He hated this kind of setting, he'd rather choose ghosts over this. Oh right, he'd be a ghost pretty soon - after the boy ends him. Eric killed Alexa, what's the possibility he'd let him go after seeing his face and knowing all this stuff.

"What's the point of all this?" Ben asked Eric who was taking a closer video of the pup, "Why are you doing this?"

"Because they killed her!" Eric roared at Ben with great anger that made him squeeze his eyes shut from fright.

Was it time for him to die? Shit.