So sorry for the delay! Aaaaaand go!
She opened her eyes. Everything was so quiet. Everything except for her short, shallow breaths. Had she been here for hours? Years? Was she breaking apart and feeding the roots of the forest floor and inviting the winding vines to wrap around her ankles?
"The vines," she croaked. "Isaac…the vines."
Isaac was still, his eyes were open and empty, but they found her. "You're shivering," he said quietly, but it must have taken most of his strength to muster up because he then closed his eyes and released all of his work in the form of a heavy pocket of air from his lungs.
Shivering. She was shaking and her teeth were talking; clattering. The peaceful quiet of the woods was broken and she couldn't sink into the earth anymore. It wouldn't let her.
The vines!
She wanted to sleep, but she knew she had to untangle herself. First, she unplastered her cheek from the ground and lifted her head, which was heavy and filled with sand. Her vision went blurry as she hoisted herself up to a seated position and bent her knees to her chest. Digging the heels of her boots into the earth, she lifted herself up just enough to pull her arms under her and forward. The maneuver was trying on her muscles and she groaned. Her head sloshed.
"Allison," she heard him whisper, but she was busy. She outstretched her arms and compressed her legs so that she could slip them over her feet and once again have them in front of her. Crawling on her tethered hands and knees, the brush tore at her tights and slashed them open, like artificial symbols of what Isaac's arrows were truly doing to his flesh.
When she got to him she collapsed once more, but this time by his side. The small journey to close the gap between them seemed to have stretched on for miles and taken the will of her body and the strength of her mind.
Her staccato breath held his name upon it as it left her. "Isaac." It was a whisper. A completion.
"We have to get them out," he said. "Or I can't heal." An ongoing pain poured out from his eyes and strained his pupils. An excruciating pain that must have coursed through him and yet he was immobilized.
But soon her own eyes mirrored that same pain. "Isaac, those arrows are like tire spikes. You can go forward but not back. They're made so you can't tear them out."
His eyelids descended in resignation. There they were, n their sides, facing each other and inches away. Yet all they could do was lay still. Allison knew there was something more that could be done, but she couldn't figure out what. She chased it, tried to pin it down, but she couldn't concentrate. It was floating away from her and it took all of her focus left in her mind to finally grasp it.
Her phone. She fumbled her bound hands at her side as she tried to retrieve it from her jacket pocket. Her fingers wouldn't work. They were clumsy and wouldn't listen to her. Over and over she tried, the simplest of tasks evading her, to the point where she yelled out in frustration. She squeezed her eyes shut and screamed through her teeth, finally gripped the phone between fingers and pulled it out. It flung to the ground beside her.
With her final faculties she called the most recent number she'd dialed and let her heavy head rest once again on the ground, the phone by her face. When it stopped ringing she knew to speak.
"Lydia. Tell Scott. Where I train. Isaac. He's hurt. I hurt him. Please. Help."
And she let herself drift into the fog.
She woke again to the sound of her name. It was yelling. It was yelling at her. It was yelling for her. No, she thought. Not me. Scott's voice grew closer and descended upon her. His blurry frame ran into crisp focus.
"Isaac," she cried out and was surprised to hear her voice coarse and small. It came out like a whimper and fell. Scott's eyes flew to Isaac on the ground behind Allison and as she heard the running rustling of the others' steps she looked up at him. "Go," she pleaded and he obliged.
Soon Lydia was crouched down beside her and took her in. Whatever she saw reflected concern upon her face and Lydia promptly sat down on the ground along with her. She hoisted Allison up to a seated position so that her back rested against her own. Lydia stroked her damp hair and held her. Soon Allison registered that she was speaking, but was too engrossed by how Scott and Derek lifted Isaac's limp body off the ground.
"The tire spikes. Don't forget the tire spikes," Allison called out at them.
"What's wrong with her?" Derek's surly voice asked as he gripped Isaac's calves.
Lydia felt Allison's cheeks, but she hardly noticed. "Allison? Sweetheart?"
"Is she okay?" Stiles voice sounded from behind her. "Lydia?"
"She has symptoms of hypothermia," Lydia said. "Give me your jacket."
"Where are you going?" Allison suddenly urged. "Where are you taking him?" The strain in her voice matched her sudden confusion as to why Isaac was leaving her sight. A heavy cloak fell upon her shoulders and she felt suffocated, lost in the whirring chaos of the moment when just before things had been so quiet, so peaceful.
"She has to go to the hospital," Lydia sad quietly, but insistently to Stiles. Like a parent talking about an unruly child under her breath.
She heard it off in the distance, but her focus remained resolute. "Isaac!" Allison yelled. Scott and Derek were carefully unloading him into the car, but dashed back down the hill to convene with the others.
Voices whirled around her, clattered against her and confused her.
"…and I will take him to Deaton…" Scott said.
"…how bad…" Stiles said.
"…touch and go…" Derek said.
"…her lips are blue…" Scott said.
"…call your mom…Stiles and I…to the hospital..." Lydia said.
Allison's chest lurched forward. It swelled and she tried to claw at the earth with her fingernails, but Lydia held her up. "Don't," she said, cold tears welling up and smearing her dirt stained face. "I want to go with," she said.
Lydia tried to soothe her with a shhh. "Sweetie, we've gotta get you to a doctor, okay? Scott and Derek will make sure Isaac's alright."
A swelling rage curbed in her throat at the sound of Derek's name. And Derek's presence. And Isaac in the car. A different car. And she let it tear out through her esophagus and into the night air, guttural and raw. She flailed and tried to wriggle away with the little energy she had left. But her coordination wouldn't let her wring free from Lydia's embrace.
"Stiles…" Lydia pressed and soon Stiles was in front of Allison, trying to restrain her.
"We're fine," Stiles looked at Scott. "Go."
"Please let me go with him," Allison cried. "Please. I love him."
The woods were quiet again then.
The moon radiated heat and bounced off her skin. She, on her back staring up at it, let the thick summer night air fill her lungs. Tall grass from the meadow caressed her exposed skin. She was naked.
"Mmmm," she sighed, heavy and thick like molasses. "I've always liked warm summer nights better than hot summer days."
She looked down, a warm cheek lay upon her bare stomach and she played languidly with the loose, brown curls that stared back up at her.
"What is it with you and night?" he mumbled into her skin. "I can hear the crickets thrumming in your chest."
"Good," she sighed and stretched out her limbs. "I wake in starry heaven when the sun is sunk in slumber. The moon upon my forehead."
The grass pricked and tickled at her skin, rendered taught and sensitive by the ministrations of his lips, which began to worship her moon drench skin from her naval up to the underside of her breasts. His head lowered to revere her flesh. The sharpness of his broad shoulder blades pierced the night sky.
He parted her legs, and she lay open to the moon and stars and earth.
"My Artemis," he whispered and positioned himself at her entrance. She gasped. "My huntress," he said and thrust himself inside.
Allison lurched forward with startling momentum and a heaving, desperate gasp of air to fill her lungs. She remembered warmth under her skin. And radiance. But she felt cold now. Florescent lights beamed down on her and structured cement walls met her at every turn. She was weighted down by something heavy, like a sandbag, and she looked down to find herself in a hospital bed, draped by a blue sandbag blanket contraption.
She began to struggle to peel it off, yanking her arms out from under it and letting them free.
"Allison-" Lydia's voice urged as she walked through the door with a foam cup of steaming tea. She set it down and rushed to return the restricting weight, right up to Allison's neck. "Sweetie, please keep it on. We've got to bring your body temperature back up to normal, okay?" Her voice was like honey. A raspy, lovely honey.
Allison nodded, but her eyes filled with irrational tears. "I hate it," she said and her voice quivered. "I'm trapped."
"You're not," Lydia reassured.
"I'm weak," Allison returned.
"A hundred pound girl went outside on the night of the first frost with wet hair, a leather jacket and tights with shorts. And then got tied up in the woods. It happens," Lydia said matter-of-factly with a shrug and a slight smile.
Allison smiled too, and her body eased before clamping up again. "Isaac," she said with alarm and tried to shift again, but Lydia planted a firm hand on her shoulder.
"Is in surgery at Deaton's vet-for-wolfiness," Stiles' voice sounded in the doorway. He didn't come in, but leaned against the frame, tapping his foot on the tile. He darted a look at Lydia, and they seemed to share a conversation in silent expressions.
"And?" Allison asked expectantly.
Stiles' eyes burned and Lydia's dropped. "Allison, do you remember what happened? Specifically how this happened?" Stiles asked solemnly, but with a biting ferocity.
"Aiden," she said and then searched within her for the memories, the images and feelings that were mushed together. "He got my arrows. Lured me…"
"Why Isaac?" He pressed. She looked at him with wide, frightened eyes. "Do you remember what you said?" Stiles interrupted. His foot tapped harder against the tile.
"Stiles," Lydia chided.
Allison shook her head. She was like a doe; a blanketed doe that didn't know there was a trip wire at her feet of her own doing. She squeezed them shut, trying to squeeze out the memories and make them more clear. "I don't…I don't…there was…they made me watch. And then the rope and…" she couldn't, and felt frustrated and angry and tired again. "Please," she said softly. "Just tell me he's okay."
"You said you loved him," Stiles blurted out. His face was gloomy and angular, shadows hitting below his eyes, his lips taught.
"Really?" Lydia called him out indignantly. "Now is not the time," she whispered under her breath.
Worn. She was so worn. "Just tell me," she said. She had no fight left in her.
Stiles clenched his jaw and crunched his nose before resigning. "We don't know yet."
She slumped her head to the side and into her pillow. She wanted to sleep again. She wanted to sleep and return to the meadow and the warmth and-
"You should get some warm liquids in you. The doctor said so," Lydia said and pressed the cup of tea on her lips. "Here," she said softly and Allison obliged.
She slept intermittently for what seemed like days, though they told her it was just through the night. Her dad arrived and sternly fretted over her. Stiles remained the surly deliverer of news from his phone, reporting what Derek sent his way. And Allison sent everyone out of the room to sleep except for Lydia, who would stroke her hair and hold her hand under the heated blanket.
After a while her mind was more clear. Her blood pumped faster and stronger and fueled it, returning to her her faculties, including her decisiveness. She would go to him, she told Lydia, with or without her help. Her jaw was set, her resolve was unshakable. Lydia tried to appear disapproving, but a mischievous sparkling in her eyes gave away that she was all too happy to oblige Allison's return to trailblazing.
And so Lydia dressed her in sweatpants, a sweatshirt, Uggs, and a heavy winter hat; she was swimming in the getup, almost lost within it. Good, Lydia said. She'd be damned if she let Allison pass out on her watch.
They set out in the dead of night, as Stiles slept in his familiar bed of pieced together waiting room chairs and Chris upright in the corner. Armed with a thermos of hot tea and a blasting heater in the car, she kept her teeth from chattering, but as they grew closer to the clinic she felt a chilling in her bones.
Her face was pallid, and when the gear shifted into park she was immobilized. Lydia got out and walked around, opened Allison's door and helped her out. Her legs shook, from weakness and fear and uncertainty.
When the bell clanged as they opened the door, Derek greeted them.
"You shouldn't be here," he said, arms crossed.
Allison glowered. "You shouldn't be here," she countered and found her legs suddenly steady, powered by anger. She stalked up to the waist high gate that separated the waiting room from the real quarters of the space, but Derek blocked her entrance. "Don't," she warned.
"I'd heed the warning," Lydia piped up. "She's quite obstinate at the moment."
Derek's lips curled down at Lydia's flippant remark, then he zeroed in on Allison. "Haven't you caused enough trouble, already?"
She squinted her eyes and nodded tersely, a sardonic smile creeping up. Along with it came her right hook, which connected with his jaw and caught him so off guarded that he stumbled back with a grunt.
"Me, Derek?" she jeered and advanced through the gate. "He wouldn't be in there if it weren't for you. Don't you dare pretend to care." She jutted her chin up as she passed by him in defiance, and a haughty Lydia followed suit.
"I was trying to protect him," he said. "Look what good your method did."
The hair on her arms stood up at his statement, but she shot him a disdainful, passing look and opened the door to the back room with steely intent. Intent that dispersed as soon as she took in the scene before her. She paled as she took in the dark pool of blood on the floor, traced it back to the body on the aluminum operating table, still and lifeless and white, like a statue.
"Allison," she heard and Scott's arms shielded her, wrapped around her so that she could bury her face in his shoulder. She wanted to scream, but if she opened her throat she feared she would vomit. She remembered how her father held her like this-exactly like this-when her mother was on a table in the distance, a cold, blue sheet drawn over her. "It's okay," she heard a reassuring whisper in her ear. "He'll heal."
Deaton pulled up an uncomfortable steel chair and she sat beside the table. She sat as he and Scott mopped up the floor. She sat as the others stood, and whispered. She sat as the color slowly returned to his body, even as hers grew more ashen. She sat as Lydia fed her coffee and as her eyes grew dry; as she fought off her chattering teeth; as his chest began to rise and fall with more might. She sat as Lydia's phone rang and as her father arrived; as the sun rose and as the bright, golden rays warmed his skin. She sat as they tried to pull her away; as she intertwined her fingers with his, as she felt him squeeze.
As he opened his eyes.
"Hey," he whispered.
"Hey," she whispered back, a broad, bittersweet smile sweeping across her face before being ushered back to her hospital bed.
This was plot heavy, I know. It got away from me, logistically speaking. It was long for barely any interaction, so I hope hope hope to get the next chapter up asap. Work has been insane, but very very good things are coming. xoxo.
