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Favors. Petty Officer 1st Class Ryan Dougherty hated them, he hated to owe anyone anything, but he was also a man of his word which was why he found himself in the radio room of the San Diego Naval Base in the early hours of the morning. He had made sure that no one knew that he was there and that he was making the call during his watch duty shift. There was a lot of risk involved and he could easily be put under investigation if it was discovered that he had bribed several high ranking officers to get a few minutes alone.

It took a few minutes to get the equipment on and properly calibrated, being an Electronics Technician, Dougherty was more familiar with the workings of a nuclear reactor than a radio, but he figured it soon enough.

Depressing the transmitter button, he spoke into the mouth piece. "What do you want?"

There was a moment of soft static before a reply came. "Right to the point. I like that."

Dougherty recognized the voice of the man who had saved his life back in eastern Germany. How a lone figure, dressed from head to toe in a thick winter garb had killed a massive wolf which had attacked him out of the blue when he had been out on a hike, enjoying his liberty for the weekend. How he regretted going out that day instead of simply staying back in the city with his shipmates. Now he was entangled in some sort of global conspiracy about werewolves. He didn't know much other than there had been a secret war going on for a very long time and that the man who simple referred to himself as The Coordinator would occasionally contact him with small assignments. They weren't dangerous or very big; deliver a message or a package and Dougherty did them because he owed the man his life.

"Sure, whatever. I'm tired as shit." Dougherty stifled a yawn. "I don't know what time it is where you're at, but it's too fucking early for this shit."

"Don't worry, this one isn't hard." The calm and collected voice of The Coordinator replied, it had a way of making Dougherty or anyone who talked with him, feel at ease, as if they were talking with a friend. "I need you to make a call and deliver a message."

"This could have waited until the morning." Dougherty took a sip from the energy drink that he brought in with him. It tasted horrible, but he needed the caffeine if he was going to be able to stay awake long enough to sit through the entire conversation.

"I'm afraid not. I need this done as soon as possible." The Coordinator urged and Dougherty rolled his eyes at the radio. "Just deliver the message and you won't hear from me ever again. This will be the last time."

Dougherty's eye brows raised slightly higher from their drooped posture. "Alright, I'll deliver your message."

The conversation ended a few minutes later after The Coordinator gave Dougherty a phone number and the simple message, "Xing." He didn't know the meaning of it at all, but Dougherty stopped caring the moment the phone on the other side of the line began to ring.

"Who the fuck is this?" A gnarled voice snarled out.

Dougherty was taken aback by the sheer rudeness of the reply. He hadn't expected some polite woman to answer and ask how his day was going, but this was quite a response.

"I'm going to hang up." The voice huffed.

"Xing." Dougherty quickly said to avoid having to call the number again.

There was a long silence and for a moment Dougherty thought that he had been hung up on. Then the voice came back in a more sober and calm tone.

"Well shit. Alright." The voice replied and then the connection cut out. Just like that, a weight that had been on Dougherty's shoulders for years was lifted. Whatever he had just done was over and his part in it was over as far as he was concerned. Whatever was going to happen was no longer his problem, though that would not hold true for long. Even as Dougherty returned to his bunk to try and get back the sleep he had lost, the pieces of the board were moving now and before morning, the first piece would be taken.

--

"Director Xing is dead." The announcement came quick and suddenly, silencing everyone in the room. Director Brennan had received word from one of her agents who was planted among Xing's staff. His body was discovered in his hotel room, he had been strangled to death and then shot in the head with a low caliber round. Somehow, someone had gotten past all of the security and killed the old man during the night without anyone noticing that anything had gone wrong.

"You sure?" The Alpha asked from his position across the room. He had been going over casualty reports. While they had taken most of Europe now from the Inquisition, it had come at a price. There were never that many werewolves to begin with, but the numbers were smaller now and each name on the KIA list hurt him deeply.

"His guards found him dead after he didn't show up for breakfast." Brennan crossed the room, ignoring all of the eyes that were on her.

"Someone got to him before us." The Alpha stroked his beard. For months a plan had been formulated to get rid of the now ex-director of China. Personnel had to be put at risk to even get in the same city as Xing, now all of that work was simply wasted. "How was it done?" He asked because it was easy to tell if the job was done by either a werewolf or a human from the amount of carnage.

Strangled and then a single shot to the head. Minimal collateral damage." Brennan said and sat down at the war table which showed a digital map of the world which showed all the assets that were available and known assets of the Inquisition. She had been so excited to see Great Britain finally come under their control after spending so long trying to find out where the Coordinator was hiding. Even though he had escaped, Europe was no longer a problem minus a few pockets of resistance here and there. Now old problems were being replaced with new ones.

"Expertly done." The Alpha nodded. He couldn't help but acknowledge a clean kill. "Any idea who would do this. Not many know about this conflict we're in."

Director Brennan shook her head. She couldn't think of anyone or any other faction that could possible get involved so suddenly. She didn't like the idea of a third party getting involved from the shadows. It also didn't help that Xing was also a known Chinese dignitary. That was part of the reason why it was so difficult to get close to him, they couldn't kill him outright since that would cause an international incident. They had originally planned to have his private jet crash in the pacific when he returned home. Now the situation would get much more complicated when the Chinese government got word.

"Xing was in San Diego visiting Director Caughey who will most definitely go into hiding by the end of the day." Brennan jumped right onto action. She wasn't about to lose her second target. Unlike Xing, Caughey was an unknown man outside of the Inquisition, There was still time to get him. "I want people on him now." She spoke loudly to make sure all of the right people in the room heard her. What was once a silent and still control center turned into a hive of activity as agents in San Diego were reassigned to track down Caughey.

"You think the people who killed Xing will go after Caughey?" The Alpha asked as he moved out of the way for some people who were rushing off to deliver the new orders.

Brennan was sure of it. "I want eyes on him yesterday. If anything happens to that man without my authorization, I want to know exactly what happened." This doubled the efforts of the people in the war room. There wasn't much space in the small room which was sitting two hundred feet under Berlin. Much of the Brennan's operations were run from the old Cold War era bunkers that littered the area, they were secured and easily defendable and kept them out of the public eye. They were a secret that Brennan had kept hidden from the rest of the directors, none of them knew where she even was at this moment.

After the fire in her died down form the spur of the moment, Director Brennan felt very old all of the sudden. She had worked tirelessly alongside everyone else for so long and could feel that the end was very near. She would be glad when the conflict finally ended and she would be able to rest, even just for a bit before the Inquisition would be reorganized into something new, something better. Until then, there was still plenty of work to do.

"Director? Are you all right" The Alpha asked, noticing that Brennan had gone silent.

Showing a weak smile, she addressed the person who had stuck with her the entire way. "I'm good. It's just hard to believe that we've come this far sometimes." She looked around at all of the hard working people, many of whom weren't even from the Berlin area. In the months following the split in the Inquisition, it became apparent at just how many people questioned how things were running. Hundreds left their posts and made their way to Berlin where they were picked up by some of the many agents that watched all traffic into the country. A few hundred swelled to several thousand and their numbers were still growing. Then there was the werewolves. All of the packs shared a common hatred for the Inquisition which had hunted them for so long. Now there were several hundred werewolves, belonging to a little under two dozen packs that were sworn to help. Never had she imagined that so much would be accomplished.

"It is impressive." The Alpha nodded. "I haven't seen a set up like this since the World War and even then it wasn't nearly as sophisticated as this.

"Time does wonders for technology." Brennan said and seated herself and looked over the war table. Much of the Inquisition's assets had been moved when it became apparent that they weren't going to be able to hold onto Europe effectively. It would be hard to get enough people and supplies into the America's. The Inquisition had a hold on the ports and had people in the government, watching all incoming traffic. "Now only if there was a way to move supplies into America faster."

"I'm already on top of that."

"Oh?" She looked up at The Alpha who was looking at the state of Washington.

"As much as I know he'll hate me for it, we need him."

"Who are you talking about?" Brennan asked. While she had heard about the events that took place in Russia, no names had ever come to her attention. It had been above her paid grade at the time.

"An old acquaintance to my son." The Alpha didn't want to reveal too much because he had no idea how things were going to go in Seattle. He had asked Rommel to get Trevor since he knew that the old wolf would do it in such a way that it wouldn't be too stressful. Though, when Dmitri had learned of what was going on, he had disappeared, though to where, was no secret. The Alpha only hoped that nothing drastic occurred, they didn't need another incident that would draw too much attention. He had to put his trust in Rommel and his ability to keep both Dmitri and Trevor in line.