A/N- Hey folks! My God, what a jounrey this has become. Let's start off with the trigger warnings. This story will be heavily rated Mature 18+ with strong themes of surviving numerous versions of trauma. So if this is something that you are not comfortable in any sense, please leave this fic be. I will personally answer any DMs, questions or concerns sent here, on AO3 or on my twitter Nightly1602. With that being said I will list off the triggers here: Sexual assault, Miscarriage, Kidnapping, Familial and Parental Loss, Adoption, Abortion, Child Soliders & War, Graphic depections of violence and war crimes.

With that said, to those who have read the original fic, thank you for putting the faith in me to return and see how this heavily OC inspired story has changed. Without The Sheriff and The Soldier (2016-2020) I would not have a wife, or have met some of the most amazing people and friends who have helped reignite my passion for Vi and Caitlyn. For those of you who are new, Hi! Welcome to the story. Take a seat, have some tea and get cosy. I will try (new goal) to release a new chapter every Thursday. Follow me on Twitter Nightly1602 to get updates! As always, please let me know what you all think in the reviews. Oh! I also have a spotify playlist with all of the songs that are listed that inspired the fic. Alright, I'll shut up now. Much love everyone, I hope you enjoy this ride.

Chapter 1: Wild Predators and Prey

(Freya - Christen Reindl, Lucie Paradis)

There was something about the way prey moved. Docile, elegant, unintimidating; all gentile characteristics that explained something so…fragile.

But what could be as fragile as something like that?

A family of great hierarchy? Political opposition? A new nation growing from the underground it was seeded in? Raging screams of war and destruction?

Even in the heated moments, when adrenaline coursed through a system, it's an easily fragile thing. All it takes is a cooled hand, a trusting voice, a distraction from the center emotion, the catalyst one would say.

And as suddenly as the rage begins to boil, it is ebbed away like a riptide.

Fragile, unbalanced, knife's edge. All it took was a small gust of wind, and it would all...tip… away.

He wouldn't say it was exactly a plan.

It wasn't his doing that they fought. It wasn't his doing that a breath of air was needed when knife-like words screamed like whirlwind tornados. It wasn't his doing that the vulnerable became fragile.

Wolves know when mountain lions are near. But would foxes be so keen to know when they're being stalked in the shadows?

And so the hunting ensued.

Once proud, clever creatures, now forlorn and frightened. Bleeding and bruised, tail and ears flat to something more cunning and dangerous. Who knew foxes could fall so easily to the brush of wilderness and carnage?

Indeed, a successful hunt.

Indeed, a family crumbling from the inside out.

Indeed, fragility used as the perfect tool for the growth of power.

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(Urchin - Labyrinth Ear)

The utter silence was what woke her.

It was ominous in a sense, and gruesome all the same. Every piece of her body felt as if it had been shattered and bruised amongst stones. Breathing was labor enough, but the cracking of her sternum and ribs was visceral work. Lulling her raven haired head to the side, her glacial blue eyes regarded a strange sight.

It was innocent, vulnerable, fragile. The velvet warmth of its tongue smoothed over the bruised skin of her wrists. The fawn sniffed toward her bloodied finger nails, its soft nose tickling the numb skin. Its white spotted back gleamed in the low light of the setting sun. The soft hum of a dusk spring breeze pushed cooling drops of dew over her tired body. The trees whispered along to the soft winds.

It was as if nature had collected her senses; holding her true and promising that she had endured enough. It swore to her, as the fawn eagerly stepped forward, tail wagging vigorously and limbs unstable underneath it, that she was safe. For now.

The wild could be cruel.

And men could be crueler.

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(Dh'éirich mi moch, b'fheàrr nach do dh'éirich - Julie Fowlis)

Sarah Sampson took a seat in her veranda. The crickets sang toward the dark sky, where clouds covered over the bright full moon. The long grass whipped in the cool night breeze, whisking away at the long boughs of the grand willow tree nearby. She shouldn't be drinking the amber scotch. Not with the pain medication she had today, but the world seemed bleak, and sometimes a woman deserved to be alone with her thoughts and a dram. It was a long night full of loss and hospital tests that sucked the very soul of happiness out of her body.

Her husband, Eli, had taken their four year old son to bed, making sure that his wife had the time to stop and process.

The future had been ahead of her. It was such a great feeling being someone else's mother and now it left with a heartbreak so heavy she wasn't sure at the moment how she could pick herself back up. Right now it was hard to be the wife and mother she would need to be.

Her rocking chair creaked with every swift change of her weight, letting it ebb away the pain, the loss, the mourning. The chance had been there and now it was gone. But it did not mean it would not happen again. And of course, she had Elric, her pride and joy and love and light. She had him and that was more than enough for her.

For a moment, she stopped rocking.

In the distance, an orange glow blazed into the twilight sky. Stars and embers shimmered together in a polarizing dance of endings and eternity. Sarah slowly rose from her rocking chair, placing her glass on the banister of the robin egg blue painted veranda. She squinted toward the fields behind her large house in New Piltover. Usually the spring brought damp weather but it seemed to have been a dry season, giving the tall grass an uncharacteristic golden sway. Even in the low light of twilight, night hunting down the darkness, the area was a vivid frame. Her heart nearly stopped, when a figure, so frail, stumbled out from the pines and birch.

"Eli." It started as a whisper. As if she couldn't believe the sight before her, unsure if this was all just a nightmare. "Eli!" A bit louder, less uncertain. Panic crawled up her neck when a raven cawed in concern. A deer scattered from the trees beside the figure, a small fawn quick to be at the doe's side. "ELI! ELI! ELI!"

She shouldn't be running. Not with what her body went through.

But Sarah Sampson threw her caution to the growing wind. The lights of her large house were put on behind her, illuminating her path toward the back fields.

"SARAH!?" She could hear her husband screaming after her. His large footsteps pounding down on the porch stairway.

"SOMEONE IS INJURED!" She screamed, using every bit of breath she had to make her voice echo out into the night. Sarah Sampson had always loved a good chase. The days she had spent hunting, bow in hand, gave a peace unlike any she had ever encountered.

A balance.

Both struggle and ease. Both terrifying and enjoyable. Both life and death.

It was out of respect that she rarely used her bow now, mostly enjoying the experience as a way to get closer with the animals that dwelled in her forest.

Her first love, before Eli.

She understood the survival, coming from the fissures herself, she crawled her way up the cliffs, begging for the fresh air.

It was ironic. The faster she ran toward the fallen figure in the back fields, the more she smelled the fissures. The acrid scent burned the sides of her throat, reminding her to hold her breath, to hide herself from the chemicals that must've been the cause of the orange glow slowly making its way to her home.

Her love.

Bringing the collar of her shirt up to her nose, Sarah sprinted through the grass. She vaulted over the fencing, her body screaming in protest.

"Sarah, wait!" Eli called behind her, his large frame not as agile as hers. His shoulders lumbered him onward. He moved faster when his wife, his love, his best friend, screamed a scream so blood curdling that it shook him to his very core.

She was down on her knees, hands pressed down firmly onto a gaping wound. Soot, dirt, moss, chemicals; it all covered over the body. In all of his years in the medical field, a combat medic to a top general practitioner, and not once had he seen such brutalization. He took his shirt off, giving the material to his wife. "Stop the bleeding with this. I'll get Rose to call the ambulance, she's bringing my bag over as we speak." He instructed calmly, doing a careful look of the barely alive form before him. "Has she spoken?"

Sarah shook her head, taking a moment to reign her breathing in. Her hands stayed clenched to the linen material, doing her best to maintain proper pressure.

Eli, for all his clumsy demeanor, worked over the bleeding form with the careful affliction of a watch master. "Her pulse is slow. She is going to bleed out." He spoke mater-of-factly. He hovered over, moving Sarah's hands and replacing them with his. He used every bit of strength he had to apply pressure. "ROSE!?"

"Here…master…Sampson." The maid huffed and puffed. She delivered the bag of medical supplies right next to Eli's thigh.

"Call the ambulance. Explain the urgency." He instructed firmly. "Fourteen year old female, stab wound and bleeding profusely! Multiple injuries! Tell them it's the Kiramman girl."

Rose nodded her head and picked up her skirts, taking off as fast as her fifty-five year old self could go.

"Eli?" Sarah mumbled in shock as she pushed aside the young girl's soot covered bangs to the side. Her skin was so pale and thin. Marks of abuse littered her naked form. "She's…Oh my Gods, she's pregnant, Eli."

The man swallowed hard and brought his eyes to the trees ahead of him. A deep sigh filled his lungs. "She's malnourished too. How long has it been since they reported her missing?"

Sarah counted in her head, trying to keep the protective rage down. "About six months now I think?"

"With how skinny she is, I could say she's five months, but I have a feeling it's less than that, maybe three. She's just so small." Eli deduced with a sad hum. "This isn't right."

"It sure as hell isn't right." His wife growled protectively. A caring hand pressed into the young girl's cheek. "Will she make it, Eli?"

"I don't know, love. But I do know that the Kiramman's are going to be stern in correcting 'll shake the whole city upside down to find who did this."

"The forest is on fire." Sarah spoke in whispered words. "What if…did she…did she set something alight?"

"I don't know, but they did say something of a field fire happening in the east side. I didn't think it would have gotten here so quickly. I thought they had it under control."

"What do we do, Eli?" Sarah asked, the world suddenly on her shoulders. "Elric? We would need to wake him up and evacuate if it comes closer."

"We do what we can, love. For now…we have to wait for the ambulance. We can't move her or she'll bleed out faster. Hopefully, Rose will be back and we can get her to sort out Elric. I need you to stay here with me. It may take her some time to be okay with men. The last thing she needs is to be alone with one."

A part of Sarah shattered at that. Her husband was right, the young Kiramman girl had been…Gods she couldn't even think about that. She dipped down, gently pressing her lips to the girl's forehead. "You're safe now, darling. We are getting help, just please….for valoran's sake, please hold on." She whispered tenderly.

For as long as Sarah Sampson was beside Caitlyn Kiramman, she vowed to keep her safe. She vowed to get her out of this.

Forest fires, media storms and important families be damned.

It's what a mother would do.