Soul of the Night
Chapter 5 – Scattered Moonlight
Samantha pulled to a stop at a red light and looked at her phone where she had a text from Derek asking where she was at.
With a sigh, she texted back saying she'd just left Lydia's and was heading back to the loft –even though she wasn't sure why it mattered considering he wasn't letting her go to the bank with him that night.
Pulling in a deep breath she dropped her phone back down to the empty seat beside her before her vision drifted over and she realized she was right beside the bank.
As if that wasn't startling enough what shocked her, even more, was that she saw Allison's car right out front.
Apparently, she'd been able to figure out the symbol on her own and had probably just walked into some trap.
When the light turned to green she removed her foot from the break and tried to tell herself that she and Allison weren't even friends anymore so it shouldn't matter if she ended up getting herself killed.
Plus, she promised Derek she'd sit this one and she was pretty sure that promise extended to entering the bank on her own, but finally she turned into the parking lot and parked right beside the only other car in the lot.
As she approached the door, her eyebrows lowered in confusion when she saw the chains holding the door shut had been cut off.
Surely Allison would have had more sense than to just walk right in through the front door, right? Checking her surroundings she breathed out in defeat and quietly pulled the door open to step inside.
The air smelt of several different wolf scents, all of them strong and overpowering, she considered it had to be the alphas scents. There were some other scents too, including blood –though she couldn't tell who or what it belonged to.
Taking another cautious step farther inside the building she saw a large bolt cutter laying on a busted file cabinet.
Realizing it had to be what Allison had used to break into the bank, she carefully picked it up and closed her eyes as she smelled the handles until she got a lock on the scent.
Laying the cutters back down she quickened her pace down the hallway, determined to find Allison, get her out of there, and get out of the place herself but as she neared the closed door the teenager's scent was emanating from she paused with her hand outstretched towards the handle as another scent filled her nostrils and turned her stomach.
The scent of death and decay, in her guess later stages meaning it wasn't Allison's body.
She could faintly hear noise from across the bank, swallowing hard she pulled the door open to find a shocked and seemingly terrified Allison hiding in the dark closet.
The brunette opened her mouth to ask something but Samantha quickly shushed her and stepped inside, pulling the door shut behind her as she turned and whisper-yelled, "What are you doing here?"
"I tracked the symbol," Allison admitted, her own voice so quiet it was barely audible.
"You shouldn't be here-" Sam started to lecture, but Allison cut her off as she said, "Then neither should you."
"You have no idea what you walked into-"
Allison pulled in a breath as she explained, "That's the same thing Morrell told me, before practically pushing me in here and telling me to not come out until I heard fighting."
"Ms. Morrell? From school? What the hell was she doing here?" Sam fired off one question after another, not taking a breath or giving Allison a chance to answer in between.
"Your guess is as good as mine." She sighed.
They stood in silence for a few minutes until Sam closed her eyes and tried to breathe through the overpowering rancid stench of decaying flesh.
When she opened them her eyes glowed blue to aid her vision in the pitch black of the room, it was then that what she'd known all long and what Isaac said was confirmed.
In a back corner of the room was Erica's body, her skin discolored and head dropped forward in a lifeless pose.
"Oh my god," Sam whined, pinning her eyes shut and trying to hold back tears.
Her legs faltered and she nearly dropped to the floor.
She'd been told that losing a pack-mate felt more like losing a limb, an actual part of you.
That a piece of you died with them, but it wasn't until she saw her body that the crushing weight of loss finally hit her.
Leaning her head against the door, she tried to control her breathing as a single tear rolled down her cheek.
Not able to see in the dark, Allison had no idea what had affected the beta so much. Stepping closer she blindly reached out, trying to find her shoulder or an arm. "Are you okay? What happened?"
"I have to get out of here." Sam hoarsely replied, as she reached for the door but groaned as Allison moved closer and ran right into her.
Throwing out an apology, Allison said, "Sorry Sam. I can't see… I was trying to find the door."
"You need to stay here." She argued.
"I'm coming with you."
"No, I can't protect the both of us. You need to stay here." Samantha sternly said.
"I can protect myself." Allison confidently said but regretted it when the beta shot back at her, "Yeah, I saw that when you stabbed Isaac about a hundred times right in front of me, minutes before your grandfather slit my throat."
"I'm trying to make up for that. I can't say sorry enough." Allison whispered, sadness in her voice as she spoke.
"You want to help? Start by staying in here and staying silent. There's a bottle of ammonia behind you, pour some by the door once I'm gone –it should hide your scent. If we get into a fight only one of us has a supernatural healing ability and honestly, I don't trust you enough to fight beside you." She said as she started to pull the door open, knowing she needed to get away from Allison before something happened that she wouldn't be able to take back.
Her emotions were already heightened from the full moon and being in a confined space with her best friend's body was only making things worse. If she lost control, she'd probably end up killing Allison.
"Sam-"
"Don't forget the ammonia," Sam whispered before sliding out of the open door and shutting it behind her. She stayed still until she heard the bottle being opened and nearly choked on the strong scent as Allison tipped the bottle on its side and then threw her jacket down in front of the crack at the bottom of the door so she could use her cellphone for light and no one would know she was in there.
What started as a cautious slow walk farther into the bank soon turned into an almost frantic, stumbling run when she started hearing whispering voices. An indescribable amount of them, bouncing off every wall and echoing in her head but when Sam looked around she didn't see anyone or a source of the voices. Which could only mean they were inside of her head.
Nearing stumbling over an overturned file cabinet down a hallway, she grabbed onto the wall to steady herself as she held onto her head with both hands when an excruciating headache took over.
At that moment she understood why Derek had told her she was sitting the rescue mission off, she'd been in denial about how bad she'd gotten; he could see it when she couldn't.
As much as she wanted to save her pack, she knew she needed to get herself somewhere away from people because the influence of the moon was growing by the second.
Turning around to go back the way she came her plan was foiled when she saw someone jump in the air and spin so fast they turned into a blur before kicking her hard enough it sent her flying backward; she could feel blood seeping through the now shredded fabric of her shirt.
Her eyes glowed blue and her gums burned when her fangs started to extend, her claws dug into the floor, leaving deep scratches as she raised her head and growled at the approaching female werewolf.
She saw her eyes turn red and before Samantha could fight back the werewolf kicked her again, the claws on her feet ripping deep into her side.
It was only seconds later that she was roughly pulled to her feet and a clawed hand landed around her throat.
"Well, well, well… what do we have here, Kali?"
Samantha tilted her head forward to see a man she didn't recognize wearing dark glasses, he walked closer moving the walking stick he had on the floor in front of him to keep from running into any debris.
She knew he had to be Deucalion, the leader of the alpha pack and she'd recognized the female alpha from the nightmare she'd had of Erica being killed.
"Another of Derek's betas," Kali answered, her voice a little distorted through her fangs as she readjusted her clawed hand at the teenager's throat, ready to kill her in a moment's notice if ordered to.
"Ah… yes," Deucalion nodded, stopping just inches in front of them, his lips slowly curved up into a smile as he continued, "But this one is different from the rest."
Samantha's eyes continued to glow blue as they darted back and forth, taking in her surroundings and trying to focus enough to plot a way out of the situation, but there was no escape in sight.
She heard Kali's voice again, but this time she couldn't understand what was being said.
All she was aware of was the sounds of their beating hearts and her own heart beating violently against her rib-cage.
They'd killed Erica and now all she wanted to do was feel their blood dripping between her fingers, hear them crying out in pain and see the life leave their eyes knowing she was the cause of it.
But just as she was losing the last of her control; everything went black.
~()~
"She's awake."
Sam's eyes fluttered open again with a confused expression lining her forehead at the sound of the unfamiliar voice.
Raising her head from the hard cement floor she looked around, her eyes stopping on a teenage girl sitting against the wall not too far away from her. Her hair was stringy and stuck to her face, both from the heat of the room and from that night being a full moon.
"Who are you?" Samantha asked confused, but before the girl answered she heard a familiar voice when Boyd answered, "She's Derek's sister.'
"Boyd!" Sam excitably yelled as she jumped to her feet and rushed towards him, wrapping her arms around him in a tight hug.
After seeing Erica's dead body she'd thought there was no hope for any of them.
He hugged her back, wishing he could share in the same level of excitement his pack-mate had a seeing him, but he knew this was some kind of trap and he hadn't felt the full effects of the full moon in months.
Any tolerance he'd had built up was completely gone.
Stepping back she asked, "Wait, what? Derek's sister?"
"Cora." She nodded, her voice had a small growl to it as she swallowed hard and threw her head back against the wall.
It felt like every cell in her body was on fire and there was no dulling the pain.
Being a born wolf, control had been easier for her to master than a bitten werewolf –but right now she felt entirely out of control after being held in the bank out of the moonlight.
Sam's head was spinning, not only from the piercing headache but from the newly learned information.
She'd thought that all of Derek's family other than Peter and his sister Laura had died in the fire.
But she didn't have much time to dwell on that when Boyd stepped back away from her and let out a growl of his own.
He didn't want to hurt anyone; especially not someone from his pack but Sam's clothes were still drenched in her blood.
"Boyd?" She softly asked, taking a small step forward but he stopped her as he growled, "You shouldn't be here, Sam."
"The alphas-"
"No, I mean you really shouldn't be here… we've been in here for months."
"We never stopped looking for you." She assured him.
"Without the moon, Sam. I don't know how but we haven't turned in months and each time it gets worse." He explained, before admitting, "I feel like my head is going to explode and all I want to do to tear you apart… tear everyone apart."
Swallowing hard she took a step back and said, "You need to hang in there, keep fighting against your animal side because Derek will be here soon. He's going to save you." Looking over her shoulder to Cora she continued, "Both of you."
With a bitter laugh, Cora looked up at the teenager and gritted her teeth in pain, "I really hope not… because if he comes in here we're going to kill him. We won't be able to stop, you have no idea what it's been like."
Samantha watched as Boyd and Cora both moved to opposite sides of the vault, trying to put distance between themselves and between them and Sam.
Slowly she slid down the wall she was standing by as the reality set in that if they got enough of the moonlight in that vault and shifted it would be a complete bloodbath and if she had to shift to defend herself she was sure she'd lose control right along with them. She couldn't shift, no matter what he had to keep herself human.
The seconds painfully ticked by; each one feeling like an hour.
Pulling her knees up to her chest, Sam clutched onto her head, her fingernails dug into her scalp.
The growling from the other two trapped wolves was growing louder.
She had to stay human to stay in control; the problem with that was her only chance at surviving the night would be to give in to that animal side, or she was going to be torn to shreds.
Hearing a noise in the wall, Sam stood up and backed away.
There was a loud rumble and the wall started to crack from impact.
When she pulled in a breath, her nose was filled with one of her absolute favorite scents.
Usually, one that calmed her down -but today all it caused was fear.
Fear that Derek would get killed too.
"Derek!" Sam screamed at the wall, "Stop! You can't come in here!"
But if anything, her voice and the knowledge that now the alphas had her too gave him the strength to break completely through the wall with another hit.
As the wall gave way, crumbling and sending large chunks of rock scattering across the dusty floor, Derek fell in too.
Within seconds he was on his feet and at her side, looking her over and seeing the drying blood and shredded fabric of her shirt.
"I'm sorry."
Her voice shook.
"What?" Derek started to ask but then it dawned on him.
She wasn't in the vault because the alphas had taken her; she'd gone to the bank on her own.
Her eyes drifted past Derek to where Scott was climbing through the opening of the wall, moonlight starting to flood in with him.
When a deep growl erupted from the darkness, Derek looked over Sam's shoulder to see Boyd standing in the shadows, facing sideways and swaying in one spot.
"Boyd?"
Derek felt the hair on the back of his neck prickle.
Something was wrong.
When his beta turned and started to stagger towards them, Derek took a step forward but stopped when Sam quickly grabbed onto his arm to hold him back.
"Boyd…" He cautiously held a hand out like one does when a dog is baring its teeth, "It's me. It's Derek."
He had no idea what his pack had gone through in their months of being held captive by the alpha pack.
"He knows who we are."
Sam ran her tongue over her lips, looking back as Scott answered a call from Stiles on his phone.
"We're here to get you out, okay?" Derek tried to speak in a soothing voice, hoping to breakthrough.
He tried to take another step, but yet again Sam grabbed onto his arm.
This time with a growl of her own as her eyes glowed blue.
"What?"
He asked not understanding her reaction.
"We've got a problem," Scott announced after Stiles had explained the vault was built from a mineral that scattered moonlight, "A really big problem."
"They haven't felt the moon in months." Sam filled Derek in.
Realizing that any tolerance Boyd had built up was entirely gone, Derek understood why Sam was making him keep his distance.
"They?"
Scott questioned.
It was then that Cora stepped out from behind the shelf she'd been leaned against.
Sweat poured down her face. Rolling off her cheeks like she'd been caught in a rainstorm.
"Cora?" Derek stared at his younger sister in disbelief.
"Who?" Scott questioned as he stepped up beside where Sam and Derek were standing.
"Derek's sister."
Sam quietly answered his question.
He looked over at the alpha with wide eyes as Derek said his sister's name again, "Cora?"
"Get out," Cora quite literally growled at him, "Derek, get out… now!"
Scott's eyes fell to the floor as something caught his eye, a dark substance lining the edges of the room.
The vault door opened and the sudden shift in light caused his eyes to shut for a second.
When he opened them again he saw Ms. Morrell kneeling by the only opening of the mountain ash and with a handful of it, she sealed it up the rest of the way.
"No, wait, don't!" Scott yelled at her but it was too late.
The seal was complete and now they were all trapped in the vault together.
Staring at the two sets of glowing golden-yellow eyes focused on them, Scott looked between Derek and Sam, his voice was unsteady as he could feel the shift in the air, "Two against three?"
Sam looked over at him, getting ready to let him know that she was having enough trouble staying in control as it was, but before she could say anything Cora ran straight for her.
Derek flung an arm out and sent his sister flying backward.
She was back on her feet in mere seconds and this time Boyd was right beside her as they lost full control over their animal side.
Scott was right, it might have just been the two of them versus three, but Sam knew it wasn't that simple.
The difference was that she, Scott, and Derek didn't want to hurt Boyd or Cora; while they had lost all connection with their human side under the moonbeams and didn't care who they hurt or killed.
~()~
Sam landed on the floor with a hard thud, it was painful but not near as bad as the burning sensation on her leg where Boyd's razor-sharp claws had cut straight through the denim and deep into her flesh.
Raising her head she saw Cora had Scott pinned on the floor but Derek came to his rescue and flung her back across the room.
It was impossible, Sam thought to herself, there was no way they were going to last until the sun comes up at this rate.
Even Derek's alpha strength was only helping so much against the rage and bloodlust from wolves who'd been kept from shifting for months on end.
Back on her feet, despite the pain, Sam raced across the room and kicked Boyd away from where he'd thrown the alpha against the wall then slashed Derek across the back.
She struck a defensive pose as her pack-mate lunged for her and effortlessly picked her up, slammed her against the wall so hard she could feel bones breaking on impact before he let her body drop to the floor.
All of the time she's spent learning and training with Derek and her pack wasn't doing her any good at all.
Derek had told her that she'd never be as strong as Boyd but she was much faster and to use that to her advantage.
But being light and fast on your feet doesn't help much when you're sealed inside of a bank vault with nowhere else to run.
Raising her legs, she delivered a powerful blow to Boyd's stomach, so strong it knocked him off his feet -but only for a second.
"Watch out!"
Allison screamed as she made it to the open vault door and saw the horror unfolding inside.
There was blood splattered on the floors and walls.
Boyd was attacking Sam who was stuck on the floor with no way to wriggle out.
Scott climbed up the metal bars from the old gate in the room and dropped down on Boyd's back, getting him away from Sam.
Derek was trying to hold down and pin the arms of a female werewolf she didn't recognize.
Allison's eyes darted back and forth before they fell to the line of ash on the floor.
She knelt down, intending to break the barrier until Derek yelled at her, "No, don't break the seal!"
When she looked back up she saw Boyd had his claws deep in Scott's stomach, raising him in the air with just one arm.
Blood was starting to run from the corners of Scott's mouth as he flailed helplessly.
Allison looked over to where Sam was struggling to get back on her feet to go help him, but she was leaving a rather thick trail of blood on the floor from her cut thigh.
Knowing she had to do something or Scott could die, Allison screamed, "Boyd!"
And in one swift movement, she broke the line of mountain ash and jumped out of the way.
Within a handful of seconds, if even that long, both Boyd and Cora had fled the vault.
Derek was the next one out, he angrily grabbed onto Allison's arms and loudly said in her face, "What were you thinking?"
"That I had to do something!" Allison screamed back as she struggled but couldn't get out of his grip.
"Don't touch her!" Scott was screaming while stumbling his way towards the exit.
Both hands over the shredded skin on his abdomen, blood continued to run between his fingers.
"Stop it!"
Sam yelled as she made it out of the vault before Scott and shoved herself between Derek and Allison.
Allison stumbled backward, holding onto where both of her upper arms were throbbing.
She saved our lives, "Scott said, weakly leaning against the doorway and giving a nod of thanks to Sam.
"Yeah?" Derek yelled at him, "And what do you think they're gonna do out there?" He tossed an arm towards the front of the bank where the wolves had escaped on foot.
Sam looked over at Allison, she could feel the emotions radiating off of her.
Even if they weren't together, it was clear that Allison and Scott both still very much loved each other.
Allison had done what she had to do to save Scott's life.
Sam understood that, as much as she didn't want anyone else to get hurt or die, she'd have done the same thing to save Derek.
"Do you have any idea what we just set free?" Derek questioned the brunette.
"You wanna blame me?" Allison's voice raised, "Well, I am not the one turning teenagers into killers!"
She shook her head and started to walk away.
"No, that's just the rest of your family." Derek accused.
Tears burnt at her eyes and her voice lowered, "I've made mistakes, but Gerard is not my fault."
"What about your mother?" He countered.
"What do you mean?" Allison asked.
When no one said anything, Derek looked to where Scott was still leaning against the vault door for support to try and stay standing as he said, "Tell her Scott."
Sam wasn't sure if it was the effects of the moon or the anger pouring off Derek and Allison so much that it was feeling like her own emotion, but she was suddenly just as mad as everyone else seemed to be.
She shot Derek a look.
All along she had agreed that Scott should tell Allison what really happened the night that her mother had been bitten, but Derek did that out of anger and spite.
"What Sam?" He tossed his arms out to the air when he caught the look she was giving him.
"That was a dick move."
She said exactly what she was thinking. With trying to keep her claws and fangs in, she had no strength to put towards a filter for her thoughts and words.
"Really?" His brows raised and he stepped closer to her, "What the hell are you even doing here? I told you-"
"To sit this out?" Sam's voice raised, fists clenching at her sides, "This is my pack too, Derek. I can't just sit at home-"
"I told you I was taking care of it!"
His voice boomed through the barren space, echoing off the walls and radiating up from the floors.
"I know you're the alpha-" it was Sam that aggressively stepped forward this time, "But I have been here since the beginning! I helped you build this pack every step of the way. This is just as much mine as it is yours."
She pulled in a deep raspy breath, "I'm the one who brought Erica in, and now-"
Her voice cracked and she wiped the tear that slid down her cheek away with the back of her hand, "She's dead."
She saw the look change on his face. No longer full of rage. That emotion had been traded in for a slew of others; guilt, loss, pain, concern.
Tilting her head to the side, Sam's chin quivered against her best effort not to, "She's… she's really… she's gone… she's dead."
"We don't know that," Scott spoke up, starting to heal and get his strength back. He was now able to stand on his own without leaning against the vault for support, "Maybe they're keeping her somewhere else?"
"No." Allison cleared her throat, "We, uh… we saw her body in a storage room."
She leaned her head back towards the left in the direction of the room.
Sam nodded, her vision steadily blurring with tears.
Now that the flight or fight burst of adrenaline had passed she was starting to feel the loss of her good friend even more.
Pulling in a gasping breath, she swatted the tears from her cheeks as Derek moved closer to her.
"Sam…"
He breathed out her name, closing the distance between them and pulling her trembling body against his.
"She's gone-" She cried, her voice muffled against his shirt while she clutched onto him, feeling like her legs were going to give out.
"We can't-" She choked out, her shaking fists balling up and twisting the already shredded fabric of Derek's shirt, "We can't lose anyone else."
"I know." Derek nodded, his voice was quiet. He pressed a kiss to the top of her head.
Scott diverted his eyes away from the couple, staring down at the floor until Allison moved closer to him.
"Scott?" She kept her voice low, "What was he talking about?"
He swallowed hard, knowing he was going to have to tell her the truth.
That the night her mom had was bitten, she'd been trying to kill him.
He didn't want to soil the memory that she had of her mother, but now he didn't have a choice.
A/N -Hello! I know it's been forever a day since I updated Sam's story... here's to hoping some of you guys are still with me! Lol
And if you're new to The Phase Series, welcome!
You can always find me on tumblr at: twofacedharveydent
It would mean so much if you'd take the time to leave a review and let me know if you're reading and enjoying the story.
xx