Chapter One.
Rachel might have thought she was in heaven, if the bright lights were any indication. But then again, she wasn't sure she believed in that, and the steady beeping sound seemed to indicate otherwise. Her eyes were heavy and she couldn't find the strength to open them more. It was as if she couldn't fully wake up from a dream, in which she ran on steady feet across the forest. It was an odd dream for her to have, as most of her dreams consisted of New York streets and a Broadway stage. Perhaps she was dreaming about camping with her fathers or with the girl scouts, which admittedly happened once in a blue moon. That still didn't explain the slight pain on her side or her inability to move, and she started thinking that maybe it was a nightmare after all.
Eyes half open, she tried to sit on her bed, but to no avail. The beeping sound increased its pace, still steady, as she tried to sit again or simply move her head. With a thump, her right cheek hit the hard pillow and a body could be seen across from her. There were machines next to it and a white wall as background. The bed had a railing and the person in it was blonde. Rachel tried to speak, but a strangled noise came out instead. The person (a girl?) was asleep, long hair spread across the pillow. Where were they?
Rachel blinked and the room was dark, the beeping sound still accompanying her. Her head pounded and her side hurt, and as she looked to her right again, she could make out a silhouette on a bed. Closing her eyes, Rachel tried to figure out what was the last thing she remembered.
She'd had breakfast with her dad before he took her to school. She met the Glee Club at the school's parking lot and tried to avoid Finn as they waited for everyone to arrive. They got on the bus and she sat with Mercedes for the ride to the outskirts of Lima where they were staying for the night. Mr. Schuester had had another of his ridiculous ideas for them to bond, since everything seemed so tense lately. But the weather was awful so they had to settle for a bonfire and singing, which admittedly could have been done any school day just the same. Quinn had walked away soon after and Rachel had fought the urge to go to her all night. Half her mind was on singing and the other half stole glances at the blonde, who sat by the river sulking the night off. Mr. Schuester had assigned her a tent with Quinn and Brittany, but they ended up alone because Britt couldn't put up with their bickering. Rachel fought the urge to care for the blonde all night, but that had stopped sleep from coming and soon she found herself trying to make Quinn open up to her, which of course ended up with the blonde snapping at her. Then Quinn had heard a noise… Rachel tried to make her stay… but Quinn got up… she'd opened the tent… she screamed… there was an animal… Rachel tried to protect Quinn and Quinn tried to protect her… she'd felt pain… there were screams… Rachel screamed for help… everything shook… everything was shaking… everything hurt…
Rachel panted as a soothing feeling invaded her; someone was next to her gripping her shoulders.
"Ms. Berry, please try to calm down. Can you hear me? You're not in danger, the pain is leaving. Can you feel it? Can you hear me?"
"Quinn?" She asked. She knew that voice didn't belong to her, but perhaps the woman knew where she was.
"Ms. Fabray is right next to you, on the other bed. Do you want to see?" The voice was soothing and Rachel nodded. One of the woman's hands stayed reassuringly on her forearm as she walked away from the bed, and soon a dull light illuminated the room.
"Is she okay?"
"She's medicated and asleep. You're the first of you two to wake up. Do you feel any pain?"
"Just my head." Rachel tried to lift her arm, but everything felt so heavy. "What happened to us? We… there was an animal…"
"You were attacked, but don't worry, you're gonna be fine. Your friend here lost a little blood, but you seemed to have protected her very well." There was a hint of a smile on the nurse's face, her voice was quiet and very soothing and Rachel found herself being lulled to sleep by it.
The pain in her head diminished and her vision got blurry.
"Is she going to be okay?" She managed to whisper, but her mind didn't stay awake to hear the answer.
The next time she woke up, she heard noises before opening her eyes. A man was murmuring and a woman was murmuring back. Her eyes squinted against the bright light and she closed them with a groan.
"Rachel?" Someone whispered at her side.
"Quinn?" She whispered back.
"No, Baby, it's Dad. Are you okay? Can you open your eyes?"
She shook her head.
"Too bright." She murmured.
"Honey, close the curtains! Rachel, Quinn's asleep in the next bed, she's okay. Can you open your eyes now?"
Rachel obliged, the sight of her Dad greeted her and she smiled.
"Do I look horrible?" She murmured.
"No, Baby, you're perfect." Her Dad cupped her cheek and she heard the tears in his voice, filled with relief.
"Water?" Her Dad nodded and stood up. Rachel watched him heading for the door after stopping to share an embrace with her Daddy. She smiled at him before noticing the other woman in the room. "Ms. Fabray?" As soon as their gazes met, Rachel felt tears swell up in her eyes. "I'm so sorry, she heard a noise and wanted to go out of the tent, but we didn't…. I never saw… I tried to shield her…"
"Rachel, it's okay." Judy released her daughter's hand and stood up by Rachel's bed. "We already had this talk with Quinn, neither of you –"
"She woke up?" Rachel tried to sit up abruptly and her head spun, making her collapse to the bed again with a groan.
"Sit up slowly, Honey!" Her Daddy ran to her bed dramatically and helped her sit up, fluffing the pillows behind her back when she grimaced at the pain on her ribs.
"Yes, she woke up." Judy smiled, amused. "You seem to take turns to wake up and say the same things."
"So she's okay?" The hope and relief in Rachel's tone as well as her face made Ms. Fabray cup her cheek, endeared at the concern for her daughter.
"Yes, she's okay. And it's not your fault or hers that you got hurt. It was a wild animal, something beyond your control. What matters is that you're both okay and that you fought for each other."
Rachel nodded distractedly as she drank in Quinn's image. She seemed peaceful in her slumber, not a single crease in her brow, and her neck and shoulder were wrapped in bandages. She quivered as she remembered the mass of hair latched to that place.
"So what was it?" She whispered as her eyes moved up and down Quinn's body, as if looking for any other damage.
"What, honey?" Her Dad placed the cup in her hand, steading it with both of his as Rachel took it to her mouth.
"That thing… that attacked us. It was a beast!"
"The authorities are still searching the area, but they're not sure. The wounds don't match any particular –"
"Honey, she doesn't need to know so many daunting details." Rachel's Daddy reprimanded. "They're searching, Baby, but don't you worry about anything. It's over now and you don't have to worry about it anymore."
Rachel watched the concern latched in her father's eyes and slipped her hand under the blankets, fingers grazing the bandage. She tried to smile at them to ease their anxiety, but Quinn groaned in her bed and Rachel's expression turned into alarm, one leg already off the bed.
"Stay on bed, Rachel. She's just waking up." Her Daddy instructed.
Rachel sat motionless as Quinn shifted slightly, her hand moving to cup her shoulder and eyes opening. She could hear her heartbeat on the monitors speeding up as background sound as their eyes met.
"Rachel." Quinn whispered, a thousand different emotions crossing her eyes, settling on relief.
"I'm okay. Are you okay?"
"I'm okay."
"Okay."
There was tension-filled silence for a few seconds before Hiram spoke up.
"You're okay. So you believe us now?" He smiled.
Rachel nodded as she watched Quinn close her eyes slowly and lower her hand to rest on her stomach. She knew right away.
"How much longer do we have to stay here?" She asked softly as Quinn clutched the sheets.
"Just one or two more days." Judy smiled. "Just to make sure, the doctors said."
Rachel leaned back onto her bed, biting her lip.
"We'll be good to go tomorrow, I'm sure." She said to the air, but she knew the right person understood.
Quinn was on painkillers and wrapped in bandages for two weeks. Just looking at the wound was painful and reminded her of screams and growls and made her feel bile rise to her throat. She took to wearing scarfs after the bandages were gone because her wound was too ugly to look at. People at school still gave her looks and lingering glances, and she could see they were morbidly eager to see how badly her neck and shoulder had turned out. She was lucky, just a few centimeters in the wrong way and her jugular would be gone and she would've bled to death. Rachel had saved her.
Every day for the first week she approached Rachel at her locker and they would both ask the other if they were okay. The second week, they took to ask each other on Glee. By the third week, Rachel just smiled at her in the hallway and Quinn was good to go. Somewhere inside her she still wanted to talk to Rachel every day and make sure she wasn't in pain, because her wound still hurt, but that part burrowed itself deeper inside every day.
She watched Finn unnervingly for the first week and a half, carrying Rachel's books around, having lunch with her and undoubtedly trying to woo her and win her back. Rachel exploded on a Glee meeting, asking him "as politely as she could", to leave her the hell alone. Mercedes had taken book carrying duty after that, and strangely, Quinn couldn't have been more relieved.
Sam had carried her books for the first week at school, and that was it. There was no doubt between them that what they had was purely for popularity's sake, and that was a good arrangement between them. They felt secure and everyone else saw them happy. He was a really good guy, admittedly not boyfriend material for her, but they were friends. They walked around school hand in hand, watched movies at home and occasionally made out, when they were bored. He'd been concerned for her for the first week, but it eventually wore out when he realized she was okay.
It worked like that with everyone, even her mother, to some extent. She made sure Quinn took her medication every day for the first two weeks and made sure the wound was being taken care of. But everything went back to normal three weeks later. There was some residual pain and she felt self-conscious about the scar, and her Rachel thoughts went back to the normal amount. That was not to say they were few or far in between.
Rachel felt a little under the weather after the third week. Her wound still hurt and she couldn't practice ballet yet, and so she had taken to use the elliptical more in the month that followed the attack, but the last week had been odd. She'd had headaches in the morning and the afternoon, and maybe a little bit of fever on Thursday. She'd forgo the elliptical thinking perhaps physical work was affecting the wound and she didn't want it to get infected, but she still felt tired on Friday. She hadn't told her dads because she didn't want to worry them, but she swore that if she felt ill on Monday, she would go to the hospital. Thankfully, she had two weeks of winter to rest and enjoy the holidays, and to start school good as new.
Kurt had set up a "date" for her and Mercedes to go to his house and spend some time with him now they weren't occupied with rivalry competition, and she'd told her dads she was going. Now she wasn't so sure. Rachel woke up with a headache and chills. Her dads were at work and wouldn't be home until late afternoon, so she thought she should stay at home and wait for them to call the doctor.
When she took off her pajama shirt to take a shower and posed in front of her mirror as usual to inspect her scar, Rachel thought going to the hospital was a better choice. The wound, these days pinkish and smooth, was red, a little purple and swollen. The fever might be because it was infected and Rachel panicked. The shower forgotten, she ate a quick lunch and wrapped herself in a sweater, scarf and coat to go take the bus.
The cold wind to her face made her change her mind as soon as she got out. It felt exceptionally good on her feverish skin and so she opted for a walk. The exercise felt great after a week of inaction and her step fastened by the block, and soon she was jogging with the cold wind hitting her face and she could feel every muscle in her body working and warming and taking her faster and faster. There was no direction better than the one her body wanted to take her, and despite of still feeling warm all over, the fever didn't seem to make her sick. Instead, the heat made her fun faster, her feet hitting the pavement harder, her breathing not labored at all. Her wound was pulsating, but Rachel had long forgotten where she was going, or why she got out of the house at all. Running had never felt so good, the cold air and her hot body complementing each other and eliminating all sense of discomfort.
The sun was setting after a while, and that made her think perhaps she ought to go home, or to Kurt's, or the hospital, but nothing around her seemed familiar. She couldn't stop her legs from running and she had no idea where she was, but something in her brain didn't allow her to panic. Everything felt too good, her lungs weren't working hard at all, and her legs kept taking her faster. The night was coming and the Sun was hiding and the Moon… soon the Moon would come and that made her heart beat faster. Rachel smiled as the line of trees filled her visual and the laughter bubbled inside her chest, past her throat into the air. She felt so, so warm. Every muscle was beating and her wound pulsed in synch with her heartbeat and the Moon… the Moon was coming and she couldn't be happier. Rachel laughed out loud as she ran through the trees, her chest reverberating and her body heating. She took off her scarf, seeing it fly behind her into the wind. Her coat soon hit the floor, followed by one of her sneakers sliding off her foot, then her sweater, then her other sneaker. She couldn't stop running and laughing even as her clothes went missing, and the Moon… Rachel looked up as she ran, the Moon full and beautiful on top of her face as she fell to the ground, her body shaking, her laugher turned into a groan, into a scream… everything went black.
Far away, as a background, Rachel heard a scream… turn into a howl.
