Faced with the completely left sided question from Malia, Chris was left stunned for the first few seconds and after that feeling faded away, his face went taut as a spike of anger flowed through his bloodstreams and he had been about to lash out at her if not for Allison wedging herself between the two of them and forcing him to calm down.
"Come again." He gave Allison a hard stare before training his eyes back on Malia.
Unfazed by Chris' inner simmering, Malia reiterated her exact words again, confirming to Chris that he had indeed not heard wrong.
"Before you get the wrong idea, I'm not asking you to give me hunting tips-"
"I wouldn't even if you asked."
"Right. All I'm asking is how to go around it if I want to kill an Alpha." Malia said. In case she didn't make it clear enough for the Argent patriarch to understand, she further simplified. "I want to kill Aiden."
Chris looked between the two girls, his rising anger having greatly abated after claiming himself down, wondering what the hell the young teens of this generation were about without any appreciation for subtle boundaries.
Granted, he wasn't as blindingly hostile to werewolves and the likes like he had been six months prior, but the reminder that he now dealt with supernatural creatures more passively than he's ever done made him feel weird.
Looking at Malia and remembering what happened that night at the abandoned bank in her fight against the Alpha twin, he could understand the grudge she held to some degree. But taking on an Alpha-
"That's a tall order, even for me." He raised his hands to stop the both of them from speaking out any protest. "The reason for that isn't because I'm petty but rather that hunting an Alpha is something only exceptional Hunters with years of experience can do."
"He's right, Malia. Not just anyone can hunt an Alpha, even amongst the elder Hunters, only a handful of them have single-handedly gone up against an Alpha, and it's never a direct confrontation." Allison added. If just anyone could hunt an Aloha then they would never have been anything like a werewolf problem in the long history of Hunters.
"So no tips or pointers?"
Chris' eyes twitched irritably at Malia's disappointed look but the girl continued on just as easily with an unperturbed stride. "Then what about what would work for me as a werecoyote?"
At this, Chris looked at her as if she was an idiot. 'She definitely is, no doubt.'
"You are talking about your advantage against someone who's better than you in everything you can do? How about you start taking this seriously?"
Willful teens are a special breed of children within a particular age bracket whose sole existence is to piss off every adult they come across.
To Chris, Malia was a very good example and he couldn't exactly fault her because it was a characteristic that a lot of young werewolves had which made it very easy to kill them despite the stockpile of their innate abilities.
Even if some of them were killers, it doesn't mean that they have ever experienced what it felt like to dangle on the edge of death, something he could clearly see in Malia's eyes.
"Do you think I came here to meet you of all people just to tell a tasteless joke?" Malia snarled back.
"Guys, come on. It was going good for a few minutes there." Allison, acting as the neutral voice of reason, tried placating both sides.
"I don't think you understand." Chris said to Malia who now looked a little confused at where he was reaching at.
"What ever gave you the assumption that you could 'simply' kill an Alpha?"
Indeed. What created this notion in recent times that Alphas were just bigger wolves that you could hunt down with adequate preparation, was something that Chris really wanted to know.
Seeing their silence, Chris groaned and beckoned on both of them to follow. He led them to the practice room that was adjacent to their garage, where racks of guns and bows were openly showcased.
"You can't just hunt down an Alpha. It doesn't work like that, never did." His face was rigid as he explained, helping them do away with such a flawed mindset that would eventually get them killed.
"How do you guys do it then even when you're very weak? Is it the weapons? Because I doubt discipline can get you that far." Malia laid bare her mind. To her while the Hunters had nifty tricks and rigid discipline, that shouldn't be enough to bridge the wide gap between both races.
Instead of answering her, Chris looked at his daughter and Allison supplemented his look by giving Malia the answer.
"It's because we never go on a hunt as a means of simply attacking werewolves. We win because all we are taught is to target a werewolf's weakness. Everything about a Hunter's experience is centered on how efficiently he can damage a werewolf's weakness."
It was that simple. Something so common that everyone, even the werewolves, is aware of it. After all, even if they know, it is almost impossible to cover up a natural weakness.
"So mountain ash, wolfsbane, cured silver and mistletoe?" Malia asked in disbelief.
"And discipline." Chris said with a sarcastic smirk.
…..
[Tristan Hayes POV]
BAM!
Tristan exhaled slowly and opened his eyes, showing off his flickering iris that soon settled back to its normal color, only to find his hand halfway through the brick wall he had punched.
"Don't worry. It happens." A voice sounded from behind him causing him to turn around to find Derek standing there with a knowing expression.
"You are getting better. I didn't hear you coming." Tristan idly noted, not at all bothered because it was something experienced werewolves, mostly Alphas, could do.
Completely hiding their presence from other enhanced senses.
"Should I know why you're here?" He asked given how weird it was for Derek to approach him, which was something that only happened when he was caught in a bind.
"Not specifically but Scott wanted to meet." Derek said as he took a step towards Tristan until he was right in his face, staring directly into his eyes. "Are you having problems with your shift?"
Tristan shook his head, "Nah. I just wanted to vent and ended up with, well that." He said, pointing at the hold in the wall. "I gotta go, I'm supposed to be taking it easy today."
Leaving Derek, Tristan absentmindedly went about the day and continued like that even after going home.
…..
The next day, the whole grade went on a field trip. A much appreciated change of routine for Tristan as this excused him from practice and the occasional mingling with the other people he was somewhat acquainted with.
Following behind the school bus in his car which accommodated himself, Boyd and Isaac, with Malia opting to ride with Allison and Lydia in the former's car.
Isaac chose to ride with them because he had gotten close to Boyd in recent times because the latter had started hanging out with Erica for sometime now, having gone out a few times.
Isaac was also curious of how Tristan, who was the most socially recluse person he's ever met, managed to be friends with Boyd for this long.
Everyone who paid even the tiniest attention to Tristan would know that Boyd was his only male friend.
"How are they talking lodgings? I'm not getting paired with Greenburg." Isaac spat out disliking the idea of how Coach had arranged their sleeping arrangements, luckily they quickly voted against the arrangements and Coach, who couldn't be bothered by the reasons of hormonal teens, left them to their heart desires.
"I don't think they'll have a room with three beds so you could square with us. You don't have a problem with that do you, Tristan?" Boyd asked the silent driver of their car.
"Don't care either way, as long as he isn't sharing a bed with me." Tristan said. "And that he doesn't snore loudly."
"… I don't even know how I'm supposed to respond to that. To be offended or stunned?" Isaac stared speechlessly at the vampire teen, already used to how he spoke but never having spent over an hour with him in the same place.
"It's Tristan, just roll with it." Boyd chuckled, "Anyone knows how the girls are doing? The drive is going to take more than a few hours." He pointed out, not forgetting the fact that they would likely get stuck in traffic a couple of times on this journey.
"They are doing alright. They are currently talking about fashion magazines." Tristan said, shocking Boyd and making Isaac gape wide at what Tristan just insinuated.
"… How do you know that they are talking about fashion magazines? They are like three cars in front of us." Boyd asked, not minding Isaac's nervous chuckle.
To his credit, Tristan paused for a brief moment at Boyd's question before shrugging nonchalantly and replied in an even tone. "Because I can see Malia waving a fashion magazine at Lydia."
Boyd's uncertainty rose higher and he looked out the window at Allison's car where the girls were, having problems even making out a moving silhouette from this distance.
"How can you tell?"
"Good eyesight." Tristan said as if it was the most natural and obvious reason. "And I saw Malia packing a bunch of magazines before we left the house."
"…Oh."
"… Oh."
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