Elvin
`Let the people who love you, love you on my behalf til I can return to love you all on my own,` Freddie had written to him. Olivia had held him, his big sister had seen him for what he was in that moment; a terrified boy in need of his parents. The Cooper parents, both William and Miriam, had always been there for the Barca three. Barca two, now... _I'm so sorry Liv..._ Miriam Cooper was there now, for both of them. Florian crying in her arms, stumbling over his words as he told her everything that had happened. Freddie's plan, Valerian's leaving, the promise him and Valerian had made to take revenge, a promise he regretted now that it had caused such harm to the very people who made it. How it was all his fault, how he wished he could undo it all. He wanted to rewind time to a point where it hadn't been too late yet. 

He had opened a letter not meant for him, one addressed to Alma. He had to know what it said, Florian was clinging onto every tiny thing of Freddie's that he had left. Every word that could tell him where his love had gone, details of the plan he hadn't shared with Florian out of some drive to protect him. _Anything_ that could aid in helping find Freddie. `If you find me and I'm gone, then I hope I went out fighting.` Alive, he was alive, he had to be, he had to be. He had to be...

Miriam Cooper had served both Olivia and him a warm breakfast and tea, Florian had been unable to get himself to eat much, but he wouldn't let her efforts to feed him go in vain. He had to eat, he needed energy if he was going to go through with the horrible plan forming in his head. He was going out into those woods, somehow. Scream at the rocks and trees to give him his love back. Beg the creeks and ferns to release their hold on the other half of his heart. Demand the mountains and earth below let go of Freddie, to bring him back home where he belonged. Bring him back into Florian's waiting arms.
_ _

Miriam told him there was still hope, that Freddie might still be alive. He nodded. "He, he's a resourceful man, he knows those woods, he told me he did." She reminded him of Francis, who was found, that the sooner he left, the better. His mind spun. Francis, who was found ripped open. _Freddie screaming as claws tore into him._ Francis, who was dead now. _That woman's voice._ Francis, who didn't make it. _Violet!_ `If you find me and I'm gone, then I hope I went out fighting.` "He cain't be like Francis," He said with a shaking voice. "Francis ain't alive no more Miss Cooper." Florian, who used to see light in the dark, the best in everyone, was now struggling to see anything but darkness. "But you're right, we gotta find him," He said, wiping the tears from his cheeks. "I'm goin'ta find him, I reckon I can ask Alma and the Coalition for help," He stated. "Just won't tell 'em about Valerian, not yet." If he didn't say those words aloud again _Valerian is a werewolf_ then maybe they wouldn't feel so true. Maybe he would still be back, maybe he wouldn't be a monster. "You'll keep it secret, right?" She had done so for William, she would do so for Valerian. 

Olivia had left to fetch something from the kitchen. "If I don't come back, look after for me, she ain't deservin' of none of this pain," He asked. "She's strong, and I'll try my damnest to make it home again, I promise, but I need ta know she won't be alone if I fail." A promise was made there, unbeknownst to his sister. The same promise had been made by Charlie Cooper a few months back, regarding the hypothetical disappearance of the eldest Barca brother. Coopers and Barcas, forever connected, no matter what.
_ _

He needed to find Alma, needed to give her the letter, he needed the Coalition's help if he was going to bring Freddie home. She was at the hospital, Rhett had been attacked, and it was _bad._ "Alma?" He asked, trying his hardest to keep his voice steady. He'd cried enough, he needed to stay strong for Freddie now. `Tell Florian I love him and not to give up.` His tears wouldn't bring him home, Miriam was right, he had to _do_ instead of think, instead of spiral. "I have a letter, it's from Freddie," His voice wavered when he spoke his lover's name. "I need your help. We both do." He didn't trust himself not to start crying again, better to let that letter do the talking for him. He held it out to her, his face and the weakness of his voice should tell her enough. Something was horribly wrong, and he'd been crying.
Ann
Alma never wanted to be back here. 

She never, ever, ever wanted to be back here. 

If she never heard the voices of Dr. Ashworth or Nurse Roswell again, she'd die a happy woman. 

But here she was on the tiled floor again, her heart broken in so many ways that she didn't even know how to begin to piece them back together. 

They had to cut his hair. 

There had been so many times in the past few months where Alma had made a show of strength so resolute that she might as well have killed herself in the act. She'd learned how to set her jaw just right after bein' punched in the fact. She'd learned how to twist her words with enough venom to strike fear. She'd learned how to keep her gun hand steady as it pointed at the head of someone she cared about. She'd learned to be something and someone so awful that those moments weren't hers anymore. They were done by a woman who shared her name and shared her face, but not her heart. 

That belonged to Rhett. She placed it in his hands every time she walked out that door to commit her most awful of sins. His hands kept it warm and his laughter kept it beating. She could be brave in this world because she could be gentle in front of him. 
_ _

She shouldn't have ever left his side. The first moon they ever allowed themselves to be separated since the fall. It was her fault for choosing to guard Shady instead. Her fault for letting him place that extra silver bullet in her hands with a kiss to her temple instead of staying there and using it on that wolf when it attacked. Her fault for ever letting him get involved with Akira Hirano's stupid ritual. It was all her fault. 

Shady'd done what he could to sweep up the broken pieces of her. He was the only thing keeping her sanity in place. Ironic, wasn't it? 

Florian Barca found her sitting on the cold, tiled floor still wearing the same dress she'd worn the day before. She still hadn't dried off completely, but someone'd shown her a bit of kindness and put a towel around her shoulders. Her long, black hair was undone and hung around her like an early funeral shawl, falling to the floor around her. Her arms were wrapped around her knees and her face was buried in them, but her shoulders weren't shaking. She'd already cried plenty. 

His aunts were in there. She wasn't sure where Shady was. Probably findin' somethin' to eat or catchin' a wink of sleep in the backseat of his jalopy. There were so many people in and out of the ward that morning that needed chairs. Alma didn't want one. That meant taking one step further away from Rhett than she needed to. Although she knew Linda and Bonnie saw her as their own flesh and blood by now, she let them have their time with their kin. Respected and acknowledged. So, Alma was alone when Florian's voice cut through the soft murmurs drifting through echoing rooms around them. 
_ _

The face he saw was not the Coalition Leader's. It was a broken woman at the end of her rope. She didn't have a thing left to give him. Still, she turned. Found it in herself to lift her head from her quicksand of mourning to look at the man she would've quickly called friend before this Hell broke loose. 

*"I have a letter, it's from Freddie. I need your help. We both do."*

Alma caught the way Florian's voice trembled on Freddie's name and a spark of understanding entered her eyes. A lover in need. Florian had been crying, too. She could see it in the way her pain was reflected in his own eyes. Her hand uncoiled from around her knees and slipped the outstretched letter from his grasp wordlessly. She brought the letter down to her knees and delicately pulled it open. 

*This letter making its way to your hand means I ain't come back after the full moon. *

Oh, no. No, no, no, no, no. 

"Freddie," She ended her silence with a broken whisper of his name. One hand came to her lips in shock while the other clung to the paper, her big brown eyes scanning faster and faster and fas—

***Kill 'em all if it comes to it.***
_ _

Alma Cooper thought she was going to throw up. She dropped the letter like it'd burnt her as bad as a silver bullet and looked away. She couldn't bear the sight of Florian. Anything but Florian. She wasn't strong enough for this. She couldn't do this. She couldn't! She-! 

A nurse slipped out from one of the rooms, prompting Alma to look back at her lap before they could see the horror on her face. *Freddie Lovejoy was dead.* How could she possibly be entrusted with this? Why her? Why did she ever have to let responsibility fall upon her shoulders? She was such a nervous creature. She should have faded into the background of the Coalition after it was formed. She wasn't built to be a leader. She wasn't built to be a weapon. 

Slowly, as if moving too quickly might make her fall apart at the seams, Alma picked the letter back up before it could be stepped on. She brushed it off with shaky fingertips and folded it back nice and neat, following the same lines Freddie's had once crossed. Then she slipped it back into its envelope.

"He said... He-He said he loves you," She whispered, her voice just barely audible over the din and panic around them. "He said... Said not to give up. A-And that you ain't allowed to g-go after revenge."

Those words tasted like bile. She knew that she would kill every single wolf if the doctor hadn't been able to save Rhett. Justice would be the only word that mattered. There would be no cure, no peace, no patience. Only blood. 

Then Alma Cooper proved herself to be Miriam Cooper's daughter. She got up on her knees and wound her arms around a Barca. "I-I am so sorry, Florian," She pressed her face against his shoulder, trembling slightly as she tried to offer what little strength she had left to him. Her last inch could go to him.
Elvin
Alma had that same broken look on her face. A woman he once saw as a sister, theirs was now a friendship weakened by jagged claws and the coal-stained actions of brothers. Valerian had called her a witch (he'd meant to say bitch, but Olivia had been there to hear it). Florian hadn't defended her in his undying loyalty to his brother. He had seen her as too forgiving of the werewolves, of being blinded by the deceitful whispers of Shady and that blasted cure. And now? Now he wished he could take those words back. 

_He said he loves you._ Look where that love had gotten him. Attacked by a werewolf and lost in a cave with that voice, that horrible voice. And yet, both of them drew strength from that love. It was a force so strong in both men that it had created an invisible, unbreakable string between them. A string that would remain even when they were separated by miles of woods and mountains, ~~or death.~~

"I was so blind, we both were. I don't want _revenge,_" He said, his voice breaking on that now bitter-tasting word. "I just wan'em back," He said softly, stumbling over his words and unable to hold his tears back any longer as Alma embraced him. _I want them back..._ Her words sounded almost like condolences. Freddie wasn't dead. He couldn't be. No! No. No... "He ain't dead, he's still out there in those caves," He insisted, as if even entertaining the thought would lead to the death of his lover. "I know where he went. I-I could lead people there, if there's folks who's willin' to take me with them." He wasn't staying behind this time. They could try stopping him, and they would fail.
_ _

He wanted Freddie back. He wanted his brother back. He wanted to rip that vile hatred from his veins and hurl it into a fire. Revenge could have killed Valerian. Revenge might still kill Freddie. ~~Revenge may have killed him already.~~ Revenge had killed the kindness in Florian, and Florian in turn killed it in Freddie. Vengeance was an empty promise he wanted nothing to do with anymore. `Kill 'em all if it comes to it.` He had more than enough blood on his hands already, even if he never did pull that trigger. He had been part of the reason for Valerian and Freddie's fingers squeezing those vengeful triggers and sending silver into their neighbors. Multiple times. That blood was on Florian's hands too. It hadn't been revenge they wanted, it was safety, and they foolishly thought that that could be obtained through payback and an endless loop of bullets and death. How wrong they were.

"Alma, I made a mistake. I was wrong about all of it," He admitted. "I can't do it no more, I can't hurt them. These people, they're our friends, they're family." He couldn't tell her about Valerian, even if he really, _really_ wanted to. She would tell the Coalition and he still needed their help. Freddie still needed their help. He knew how people felt about his brother, even if he had turned his back on S&C. Even if he had been trying to make amends. He feared that if people found out his brother had been infected, it would push them even further from him and that they wouldn't want to help him anymore. William Cooper had been shot without a trial and April had been shot during the full moon. Florian couldn't bear thinking about Valerian joining those bullet-riddled few who were open about being cursed. _Aki, was Aki okay?_ 

"What are we doin'?"

_What have we done?_
_ _

He'd seen Alma change, turned from a shy withdrawn person who would never wish harm on anyone into the leader of the Coalition; someone who took control, who called for wolves to be shot on sight should they be outside of a cage. He'd changed too, he used to see good in everyone, he used to be a balance, a means with which to reign in Valerian's ruthlessness and he didn't even know it. And now Florian wasn't sure what he was anymore. _What have we done?_ The Coalition had killed, he had made poison, he had wished for death. _What have I done?_ Did Alma still wish for death, would she have shot his brother? Would she see Florian as a traitor if he didn't tell her? Wasn't Florian already a traitor?