Author's Note: I'm sorry for the long delay in updating CYOU. A few of my devout fans reached out to me pleading to continue. As promised, here is the next installment of CYOU. It's short but I hope you enjoyed it. As always I do not own the copyrights for Wolf Lake. I do however own my creativity and the original characters who help this story along.

Song: I'm Free (Heaven Helps the Man) Artist: Kenny Loggins Label: Sony Music Year: 1984

Tyler Creed could smell the impending battle in the air. This sort of chaos was something he'd wish for almost his entire life. However, with his beloved mate, Ruby on the run with that half-breed John Canin, his love for all things violent was in a funk.

Ruby was Tyler's mate. He knew it right down to his gut. Ruby, however, didn't feel that way about Tyler. She felt pulled to John from the very first nanosecond she met the ex Seattle Police Officer.

It was very rare for a wolf to have more than one mate. It was just as rare as having two white wolves in the same pack during the same generation. White Wolves were so rare that the last one in existence was about one to two hundred years ago.

Tyler was going to get rid of Canin if it was the last thing that he did. He wasn't about to let all of his hard work go down the drain. Ruby was his key to becoming Alpha and he wasn't about to let an ungulate infested mutt take that away from him.

Tyler was so engrossed in his thought process that he missed noticing the rustling in the woods behind him. Caught off guard, he had no time to react, no time to Flip. The impact was so fast, it knocked him to the ground. His vision slowly turned to black, his breathing rapidly becoming shallow and he felt a liquid substance slowly trickle down his neck.

In his last moments of life, he wondered. Is this how Willard Cates felt when I shot him at gunpoint?

His vacant open eyes watched a darkened figure walked away from his body not even turning to look at his prize.

Five miles away Ruby Cates Creed felt the air around her crackle with energy and felt some sort of electricity being pulled out of her body. She wanted to cry with happiness but felt a void at the same time. She knew Tyler was no longer a threat to her and John but at the same time, she was in sorrow for losing a pack mate. During their early adult years, Tyler may have been a loose cannon but at one point he had been a great friend to her. She felt sad for his unrequited love for her and she will never truly understand why her Goddess gave her two men.

John walked from the kitchen and sniffed the air. Then he heard mournful howls through the pack link. He looked to Ruby with concern in his eyes. "Tyler's dead. Isn't he?"

John didn't get a reply from his beautiful mate, he felt her run to him and his immediate reaction was to envelop her in his arms. He gently began rocking them and smoothing her hair, while her sobs started to dampen his shirt.

I don't know who killed Creed but I really want to personally thank them. He thought to himself.

"We are free babe. We are free," he heard Ruby murmur. This was probably the second best day of his life.

"Tyler's dead," Vivian announced as she walked into the Winery's conference room. The Belarus wolves would arrive any moment, so The Alpha Collective which consisted of Vivian, Matt, Lucas, Sophia, Sherman Blackstone, Chief Wildwind, Alec and Jeremy Willis.

The grief she felt was overwhelming. She thought she would have felt happiness at losing the source of most of her pack's troubles. All she felt now was the anguish of losing yet another pack member in less of a year of her late husband's death. "Tyler was a lot of things but most of all, he was a great warrior and defender of our people."

All the Alphas nodded their heads in mourning. Preparations for Tyler's funeral would have to be put on hold. Their threat was still out there and strategies must be made.

"I hear you were looking for a healer and another warrior," a familiar female voice asked.

The room burst out into cheers to see a very pregnant Ruby and John walk up to the Strategy table.

Chief Wildwind looked at John with shock. The young man looked the spitting image of one of his cousins. A cousin who perished in battle a long time ago. A cousin who he had made a promise to protect his son from the Wolven World.

"Chaska Howahkan Enapay," Chief Wildwind inquired.

John looked at Wildwind, frowned, and then his eyes widened. He had only heard that name in his dreams. "That name what does it mean?" John sought.

"The translation loosely in Lakota means 'Firstborn son in a very strong voice roars in the face of danger.'" Sophia answered for her grandfather. She never understood why her Dad made her learn Siouan but now she was grateful. She could see that her grandfather was stuck in a bygone era. "I think it's your birth name, John."

Lucas looked into his mate's eyes surprised by this new finding. "You know a Native American language?"

Sophia shrugged and nodded. "I can't believe I forgot but Sherman taught me for some unknown reason. When Papa said that… Siouan just came back to me."

John cautiously walked up to the Lakota Chief. "Is that my name sir?"

Wildwind could only nod. "Your father Mato Howahkan Enapay was my first cousin. He and his clansmen were slaughtered around thirty years ago. Mato is Matthew in Siouan. It means fiercely angry bear. "

John looked to Sophia and then to Wildwind. His strong need to protect Sophia from the young Cates boy seemed justified now. He always wondered why he felt such a strong connection. Sophia was a blood relation. Like knows like. He thought to himself.

"Ok, now that we have gotten the foreign language lesson out of the way, could we please get back to the task at hand," Vivian demanded. "John once our threat is over you can ask Wildwind all the questions you want about Mato. We need to come up with a strong defense against Father."

John coughed out his embarrassment and brought his attention to the task at hand. "Well, I can't have Ruby anywhere near the fighting. If you need a healer we have to set up a field clinic far from the battleground."

Sophia zoned out and saw flashes of images before her eyes. "They from the Mother World have touched New World soil. They will arrive at a fortnight at twilight." She announced in a strange voice. "Through the cover of darkness, they shall use the dense foliage to their advantage. There shall be no moon to light the field of fight."

Everyone looked towards Sophia and then to themselves. "That's new," Matthew murmured. Vivian and Lucas shook their heads in disagreement.

"That was a vision," Wildwind stated to the rest of the confused occupants of the conference room. "My granddaughter is coming into her Shaman powers."

"The dense foliage," Matthew deduced, "must be the forest surrounding the lake."

Sherman nodded, "Two weeks from tonight is suppose to be a new moon meaning…"

Sherman could leave the ending to his statement open because every wolf knew what a new moon meant. No moon rays would be cracking through the branches of the trees. This would be an advantage to their rising army. They could all mask their musk and hide high up in the trees' branches. This vision gave them a heads up. They would arrange booby traps all around the lake. They would use the poachers' bear traps to their advantage as well.

"I'll have the younger pack wolves start digging trenches, putting silver spikes in them and covering them up with light weighted branches," Lucas announced.

"We'll have the older pack wolves start setting up a minefield on the outskirts of the forest that should be the last line of defense," Vivian added.

"Silver Lake will set up flying arrow traps throughout the forest as well," Alec added.

"My warriors will help to train all of our clansmen," Wildwind finished.

"What about the poachers' bear traps," Sophia asked now that she was shaken out of her trance. "For once those moronic humans have left us some useful weapons."

Ruby waddled up to her sister-in-law and hugged her. "Sophia's right. Those sharp-clawed traps can tear apart a wolf's feet."

John was proud of this strategy meeting. It was the first time he felt like an actual part of a team since he was fired from the Seattle Police Department. "I'll carefully reset all those traps personally."

"We have to dismantle all of the CCTV cameras the poachers have hidden around those traps, we need a good hacker to do that," Matthew addressed.

"Leave that to me. I know just the person," Sophia stated. She sensed Lucas' discomfort. "It's not like I'm about to get kidnapped by a human again. It's him or Father. Take your pick," she challenged her mate with an arched eyebrow.

Father sat on his throne none the wiser of the strategic planning going on in the new world.

A trio of wolves walked into his throne room kneeling before him with their heads bowed in respect.

Father looked down on his subjects. "Rise," he ordered. "Have my warriors touched land yet?"

One of the trios nodded, "Yes Father. They have we have word that they will reach their final destination in a fortnight."

"The White with three ancient bloodlines is coming into her Lakota birthright." Another spoke up.

"Wildwind's granddaughter shall be a great asset to our plan for world domination. The humans will not know what hit them."

"But…"

"You shall not contradict me. We shall have the girl in our possession within two months time."

"Father there will be a bloodbath in the new world," the last wolf announced. "The white will be dead by the end of the battle."

Father looked to his seer. Hearing this news infuriated him. It had taken his troops months to get to the new world. "I'm going to ignore you said that. My plans never fail and any of my wolves who dare to harm the white will be put up to slaughter by myself personally."

Waddling up to the Nichols home, Sophia felt a lot of trepidation. She had a feeling that he had been behind her and Sarah's abductions. Placing a protective hand on her very swollen stomach, she blew out a breath of trepidation, she had to set the feeling aside because she had a risk to avoid. She tentatively held her hand up and rapt on the Nichols door.

The door slowly opened to reveal a very surprised, Mrs. Nichols. Rachel Nichols took in the sight before her. She hardly recognized the young girl she's met a few times. She remembered Sophia always had her hair in ponytails and wearing eyeglasses. The girl before her was heavily pregnant, her long hair freely falling around her shoulders and her eyeglasses were gone. "Sophia, hello dear."

Sophia gave a warm smile to Mrs. Nichols. The few times she met the woman before her, she had always been pleasant to Sophia. "Hello, Mrs. Nichols is Scott home. I need his help with something."

Rachel nodded, trying to hide her shock at seeing Sophia become a Wolf Lake statistic. She opened the door wider and gestured for Sophia to come into her home, "Please come in. You can wait in the living room while I go fetch Scott for you."

Sophia bowed her head in respect and smiled, "Thank you, Mrs. Nichols."

Sophia's wait was filled with exploration of the Nichols' living room. Photos of family vacations filled the fireplace's mantle. Photos of sports achievements filled up space on the end tables. Some of the photos filled Sophia's heart with a longing ache. She had never once been outside the state of Washington. The farthest place outside of Wolf Lake she had ever been was Seattle. That experience was still fresh in her memory.

She heard an awkward cough. She turned to see Scott leaning casually against the arch of the living room entrance.

When it was clear that Scott got her attention, he slowly approached her. "My god Soph, you're pregnant," he asked in disbelief.

Sophia gently rubbed her swollen belly and smiled up at Scott. She nodded, "Yes, with quintuplets. We don't know their sexes but Luke and I can't wait to meet them."

Scott's jaw dropped. If she was this far along, then when he and Presley had hired the mercs she was already pregnant. Scott shook off his shock and looked into her eyes. "So what brings you here Soph?"

"I need your help."