Michael took one swing at Selene, and knocked her high into the air, and she landed a decent distance from where she had been hit. She didn't know what to do; in spite of their rough patch lately, she didn't want to hurt him.
Michael was there in an instant, picking her up off the ground and hurtling her into the wall. She tried to get up, to at least defend herself, but Michael was there again, kicking her at the side with no end in sight.
But then there was a light at the end of the tunnel – literally.
A subway came roaring down the tunnel, and Michael had to back away to the other side of the tracks to avoid being killed by it. Selene took the opportunity to pick herself up, and she began to run away, and inhaled some vapor from the blood inhaler that gave her strength.
In the meantime, the subway had left the tunnels, and Michael had caught up to Selene. He grabbed her by the shoulders and pushed her to the ground, knocking the wind out of her. He leapt on top of her, and snarled as he went for her neck, as if to bite her.
"Michael, it's me!" she shouted, and Michael stopped his attack. He pulled back, puzzled. "It's Selene!"
Michael however, shook off his moment of weakness and tried to bite Selene again. Selene let out a grunt and kicked Michael in the stomach, sending Michael flying through the air. There's no way out of this, she feared.
Michael had ripped some wooden frame nearby, so that now he held a sharp-pointed stake in his hand.
Oh damn, she cursed in her mind.
"Michael, just—"
It was too late. Michael aimed and fired his weapon, right into Selene's lower torso. Selene let out a shriek of pain, and found herself being punched mercilessly by Michael's fists.
She finally slipped in unconsciousness, dead to the world, and to the fact that she may not wake up ever again.
Damien sighed outside in his car. Derek, James, and him had all agreed that they did not think that they should have been left behind. So they left James at Nueve Esperanza to keep an eye on things, and he and Derek drove out, following the road to the train station. But they'd found the strangest thing once they got there: Selene's car was no where in sight.
"Maybe they took someone else's car," Derek figured.
"No, it was definitely Selene's car," Damien said firmly. Damien pulled out his cell phone. Derek listened to Damien's side of the conversation. "Yo, James. Hey, yeah we got here, but Selene's car isn't… no, it was her car, for sure… Yeah, I know, weird. Listen, can you check to see where her car is? …The GPS system, nimrod. Yeah, use the… yeah. Alright, call back." Damien hung up. "Idiot."
"He's gonna check for us?"
"Yep." James called back two minutes later, saying that they were at a different train station.
"But that makes no sense," Derek remarked on their drive to the other station. "The other one has no entrances to the Death Dealer's territory. It's in neutral."
"I know," Damien agreed. "There is nothing there."
They drove into the train station, just in time to see a frantic Marc pull out of a parking spot with Selene's car.
"What the—"
Damien shook his head, not wanting to waste time, and ran into the station. Something's wrong, he fretted. He dashed into the track area, not caring if anyone saw him. If Selene was in danger and something happened to her that he could've prevented…
Derek was right behind him, when they stumbled across a Michael-in-Hybrid-form punching a concrete wall.
"Is that Michael?" Derek asked.
"Where's Selene, then?" Suddenly he spotted her; she was lying on the ground, her lower torso impaled by a large wooden stake, like Buffy the Vampire Slayer would have tried to take out a vampire. There were also two Lycan bodies, and Damien couldn't identify them as any of his fellow allies by scent. Death Dealer scum, he concluded.
He ran over to Selene, but Michael snarled and jumped at him, claws out.
Derek shot Michael with a tranquilizer gun, and when Michael merely fell but was still attacking in vain, shot him again. This time, Michael passed out.
Damien thanked Derek and rushed over again to check Selene. "Oh my God," he whispered when he saw her. She had a decent amount of bruises and scratches, not to mention the fact that her arm appeared to be broken. From the state of the walls, Damien observed that it must've been from her being tossed into them.
He checked her pulse, which was still strong. She was breathing fine, too. Probably just too weak to stay conscious, he guessed.
He picked her up and held her, her legs draped over one leg and her head cradled in the other. Derek picked up Michael and carried him the same way, cautiously. He carried his beautiful burden back to their van, briefed Marc, while Derek strapped them in the back of the van, putting extra restraints on Michael.
On their way back, Derek said, "I wonder what's wrong with Michael. How could he have attacked Selene like that?"
"He's maturing," Damien stated simply.
Derek paused, stopping at a red light. "So late?"
"All the signs point to that."
"I know Lycans are violent when they hit 'puberty,' but I didn't think it could be this bad."
"Apparently, it can," Damien said, looking over to Selene as the light turned green again.
"Don't be so worried about her," Derek said. "We just have to get her away from him while this is happening, then she'll be fine."
"She'll never go for that, you know that."
"Yeah, but I thought it might sound reassuring," Derek responded.
Selene felt strange, like she was floating and sinking at the same time. All she could see and feel was nothing, but she heard a lot – crying? sobbing? – and it made her want to wake up.
Slowly, her vision and sense of location returned to her, like memories long forgotten. Then, an enormous wave of nausea washed over her, and Selene felt like she might vomit. It quickly went away, but she still felt shitty.
She moaned, and the next thing she knew, someone's hands were in hers. Vaguely, she realized it was Michael's.
"Michael?" Her voice sounded alien to hers, like it hadn't been used in a while.
She realized now that he must have been crying; his cheeks were tear-streaked. "Yeah."
Her head pounded in sync with the thumping of the muscles, too weak to do anything but make her lay in bed.
"What happened?"
"Damien said… he thinks… you had a theory about me maturing?"
Of course. She had to be right about the one thing she didn't want to be right about. Great, she thought sarcastically. "Yes, but I wasn't sure I was right until today." She remembered the crazed look on his face, the loss of control he exhibited in the tunnel.
"You have to stay away, then," he said. "You're not safe around me."
Selene sat up – or tried to, anyway, since the motion sent her head spinning a million times. "Look," she managed. "I'm not going anywhere. I'm not gonna run away from you just because you're a bit testy."
"A bit?" scoffed Leon. "The guy broke you arm," he stepped into the room, counting on his fingers, "tried to bite you – from what the doctor could tell, and more. 'A bit,' is a lot less than that."
"Why do you have to be suck a dick?" Selene demanded of him. She sat up all the way, this time with no repercussions. "Was it the Australian air? Because you certainly weren't like this when you left."
"On the contrary, my sweet Selly. I was exactly like this before. You just didn't seem to realize it." He grabbed her arm – the one that wasn't broken – and slammed her against the wall, before Michael could react. "Maybe love does blind people."
Michael grabbed him and flung him to the ground.
Leon sprang back up, and smiled. He snickered. "Stay out of this, Hybrid."
Michael went to hit him, but Selene stuck her hand out and grabbed the back of his shirt to stop him. "Michael, please." He looked up at Leon, then at Michael. "I need to talk to him," she said, letting go of his shirt, "alone."
Michael opened his mouth to protest, but Selene placed her good arm around him. "Please?"
He reluctantly gave in.
Selene smiled a little, and gave Michael a kiss on the lips. She pulled away after a few seconds, and said to Leon, "Follow me."
He did.
When they got up to the roof, Selene leaned against the railing surrounding the roof's perimeter.
"When you left, I thought I'd die," she said quietly, her back to him. He walked up to her and gently stroked her back.
"I thought I'd stopped loving you. Turns out, I didn't."
She slapped his hand away. "Why didn't you come back, then? You were gone for four-hundred-fucking-years. You didn't think at all in that time, 'Oh, maybe I do love her'?"
Leon looked away ashamed. "I made a mistake, I know. But we had more than you and that Lycan—"
"His name is Michael, and he's a hybrid, not a fucking hybrid."
"Didn't start out that way."
Her gorgeous permanent electric azure eyes glistened in the moonlight. "Michael is twice the man you could ever hope to be, and you're not even half the man you could ever hope to be."
Leon looked hurt, but didn't say he was. "Tell me, Selly, did he help you through what will probably be the worst thing that ever happens to you? Has he held you when humans tried to burn down our building with torches? Did you lose your virginity with him?" His voice was soft, especially tender with his last question. Selene looked away, afraid that he eyes would show him what she'd been afraid to see herself – that she'd still had feelings for him.
"Leon," she said, "stop." There were tears in her eyes.
He held her in his arms, squeezing her just right, the way he always had. Michael still hadn't been able to do this, even after two hundred years. He leaned over and nuzzled her neck, ad Selene relaxed, unlike when Michael did it. She always had this fear that he'd change and just bite the whole thing off, which there was a possibility of, now.
She reluctantly pulled away. "You had your chance. Michael has done nothing to deserve this."
He hung his head and sighed. "I know. I'm not here to get you back, not anymore. I can see the way you look at him, it was the way you used to look at me. It's such a warm, loving look. I can tell you two are like, soul mates. I don't want to get in the way of that." He walked up to her, and held her again, perfectly. "But I'm here for you. Know that."
"Thanks," Selene said graciously, and leaned her head on his shoulder.
James suddenly burst through the door to the roof and saw Selene. She let go of Leon, and asked him "What's up?"
"We have good news," he said, choosing to ignore what he had just seen. "We can reattach a hand for you. Well, not we, we; Dr. Lockwood can."
Selene smiled. "I guess I'll have to get it done, won't I?"
Selene bowed to Leon, and said, "Thanks for the talk."
Leon waved it away nonchalantly. "It was the least I could do, Selly."
Selene started downstairs, with James following her. "Dr. Lockwood suggests we start the procedure immediately, so that the hand we're about to reattach doesn't have as high a chance of infecting you. Right now, it's sterile, and Dr. Lockwood wants to keep it that way."
Selene nodded. "Tell Adam I'm coming. I just want to tell Michael." A chill ran down her spine at the thought of facing Michael. Every time she closed her eyes, she had a strange feeling, like Michael would just attack her when she least expected it. Which is stupid.
James nodded.
Selene walked to her quarters, and hesitated before turning the doorknob. What if Michael attacks me again? She pushed away the fear and opened it, to find an empty room. Well, not empty, empty… Erika was in there. Selene had encouraged everyone to stop addressing her as Daisy, since that would imply that they respected their prisoner's wishes… which they didn't.
"Erika," Selene acknowledged disdainfully. "Where's Michael?"
Ever since she had been brought back to Nueve Esperanza, Erika had been either stuck in a chair, bed, or locked in a small room. When she wasn't, and was roaming freely, she was under constant surveillance. According to reports, the Death Dealers were not having a good time without a leader to follow. Thank God, she thought, happy that the war may not necessarily be over, but her side was winning substantially.
It was Selene and Michael's turn to baby-sit her
"Out for a walk, and he said he wasn't gonna be back until he-doesn't-know-when."
Selene hung her head in disappointment. I really don't wanna put this off…
James came up behind her. "Where's Mike?"
"Out for a walk," she repeated. "I don't think I can do this alone."
"You're not – you've got me, Damien, Derek, Marc…" Selene didn't seem convinced. "And Leon, I guess," he added.
"I'm doing it," she said, easily persuaded.
A/N:
I'm sorry if this story is a bit confusing. I'll clear it up (hopefully) in one of the following chpaters. I'd been meaning to, anyway.
As for Michael killing Leon, I already have an ending planned (and I hope it all goes according to plan), so you'll all have to wait to see about that.