CHAPTER 9

THE VAULT WAS DIMLY LIT and incredibly humid. Rosyln hadn't found the strength to leave just yet. She hadn't cleaned herself up which left blood and sweat in different places on her body. Her head rested against a large pillar and the rest of her body trailed gently on the ground, slightly curved to fit the particular shape of the room. She stared at a spot on the floor and didn't stop. It was all she could focus on, all she could get her mind around.

There was dirt on the floor, the floor was made of stone. Those things made sense, they had science and evidence behind them. What didn't make sense was her and how she did...that.

Turning into a rabbit was one thing, but turning into any random organism was a wild fantasy that even her eleven-year-old self couldn't have predicted.  It was insane and all she wanted at that moment was reassurance. Reassurance that everything was going to be alright. That she was normal. That killing people due to your glowing white eyes was so ordinary it barely deserved to be discussed. That Finn and she would survive and there was nothing to worry about. Just don't reassurance.

She was far away from everyone else. The others were closer to the entrance and seemed to have other things on their minds. How did they deal with this so frequently? It was crazy.

She wondered if Finn had heard about the quarantine. Hopefully, he was above her with the many terrified families awaiting their children in full health and good sense. None of the freshmen had been in school, thank god.

Sharp stomps echoed through the chamber as Malia proudly and somewhat angrily exited. The other three followed the girl out with shocked and pitiful stares.  Ros didn't know what was happening and had officially come to terms with the fact that she probably wouldn't know anything ever. She was always going to be on the outside looking in.

A few minutes passed and eventually, Scott and Kira left. Rosyln sighed and put her head back. It touched the cold metal of the shelf and she sighed. Even though the mushroom had assisted in preventing her death she still felt sick to the stomach. Whether it was the blood splatted over her clothes and face or her own, she couldn't tell. She just felt nauseous.

"How're you holdin up?" A small voice echoed through the empty chamber. Rosyln lifted her head off the metal shelf and spotted Stiles, knees crossed as well as his arms. She hadn't realized he was still in the same room, presuming he'd left with Kira and Scott. Obviously, he'd opted to stay.

"Want the truth?" She sighed, pulling herself up so she wasn't slouched. They were very far away from each other but Rosyln felt weirdly close to him. They had been held at gunpoint together, which remind Rosyln about the incident. A gun had gone off, following an explosion of main and light from Rosyln.

Had the man's death been a result of the gun's bullet or her weird mind games?

"That's why I asked" he chuckled as Rosyln joined in softly. "Unless you don't want to, it's really none of my business"

"Everything is weird and I'm just angry all the time. I feel like I have no control over everything, like- I feel like I'm so different like I keep discovering things about myself I just, can't comprehend! It's jus, just-"

"Crazy" He finished for her with a smile. "You'll get used to it, after a while it just becomes normal."

"Aha! That's the thing! Why can't one bad event happen and that's the end of it? Like, like it must get tiring after a while right?" She said.

"I mean, maybe. Let's just say for now it's normal" Stiles smiled, toothily. Silence masked everything again for a while and the two just stared blankly at the many trinkets and walls around them. "So um, shape-shifting" Stiles brought up, after some careful consideration.

"Yeah"

"Quick thinking back there," He told her but he could see how uncomfortable she was.

"Look, what happened back there, it, it wasn't your fault- or mine, it was that dam son of bitch Simon," Stiles muttered coldly.

"That's the thing though. I didn't act quickly enough. We could have died"

"Hey no, I said it wasn't your fault. He had a gun pointed at your head. Give yourself a break"

"I guess you're right" She mumbled as they both progressed back into silence. Stiles stood up abruptly and took a few seconds to get over the sudden movement. He was still dizzy. He trudged over to the girl and extended a slinky arm to support her." come on, we should get going. You're families probably waiting"

Roslyn's head shot up and she grinned. Although she knew that half the sentence was incorrect, she couldn't help but wish it were true. The girl took his hand and gradually he helped her to her feet. They both laughed after the struggle and began walking.
He made her feel at ease. Their strides matched as they walked down the dingy hallway and their hands grazed a couple of times. Her heartbeat sped up and to change her focus she began to speak.

She began to confide in him. She told him about the night she saw Demarco and what had been going through her mind. He'd retold a few anecdotes from Scott's early days as a beta which made her feel better about everything new and confusing. She wasn't that bad at being a supernatural creature.

"Hey," Stiles stopped and held her upper arms, staring deeply into her eyes. All she could think about was losing control again. What if she hurt someone she loved? "look you're not doing anything wrong with all this supernatural stuff. It took me and Scott months. It can be a lot"

"You could say that again" She mellowed with a smile. He held her gaze a moment longer and they fell into step once more. Up the stairs, they went, carefully stepping. Rosyln was still a bit weak. They kept chatting and after a few jokes, everything felt smooth and good between them.

Stiles looked over at her as they passed through the empty corridors. "I'm sorry about like when we first met you. We weren't very helpful in introducing you to all of this when we should have been. It must be annoying not to know anything about yourself but I can promise Lydias looking."

Rosyln's small smile spread across her entire face. She too turned to look at the boy. "Thank you so much, Stiles, really." She told him, firmly. "But I have to tell you something".

"Okay?"

"Im a Pooka" She chuckled. "Funny word, I know"

"A what? sorry?" Stiles asked. He didn't know what she had said, it was a funny little word to him.

'A Pooka. It's a ghost in Irish" She began. "My Grandfather knew about all this stuff, I think, I think he might have been studying."

"Your grandfather studied the supernatural? Sounds like a cool job"

Rosyln punched his shoulder lightly. "let me finish!"

He squealed playfully and she ignored him. "he kept a record of every creature he came across including the pooka"

"He was one?" Stiles guessed. This record sounded similar to the bestiary, the Argents possessed. Could Roslyn's grandfather have been a hunter?

"No. My, My mother came across a dead one when she was younger and..." the girl explained all of the finer details Finn had told her the night previous.

"So Finn ain't really supernatural yet?"

"and that's why I have to keep him out of everything because if I don't, he'll get too caught up in it. I want him to have the choice"

"... because you didn't"

Rosyln nodded and the pair retreated back into that comfortable silence. Chattering filled the air as they entered what had been the 'quarantine' hall. Full of half-dismantled see-through domes and benches where the students had laid earlier.

THE AIR WAS extremely humid outside beacon hills high school where, presumably, a virus had broken out, taking the entire school with it. The crowd outside the front doors didn't help Finn keep cool as warm bodies closed in around him, suffocating him in heat. The boy had taken the nearest bus straight to the school immediately after he'd heard of the virus rumour.

Though, it had spiralled into something much more.

The boy watched as authority after authority made their way in and out of the building. The cops were stationed out front, refusing to give too much information. Finn's take on it was ;

they knew just about as much as the crowd.

He knew that Rosyln was inside but, to his dismay, the girl hadn't picked up her phone once. He didn't expect her to as he'd also been notified that all service had been down, whatever that had to do with the outbreak but Finn suspected something more on the... supernatural side, had to do with his sister's absence.

Everyone else was greeted by their family and friends outside the front. His mom had been held behind by a client and couldn't make it to the school so he'd taken her car, which was quite illegal since he was without a license. He kept his ears perked and his head as high above the crowd as possible. People entered and exited the building at random but no sign of his sister or any of her friends. The boy shuffled forward where a barricade separated the professionals that had been brought in to deal with the situation and the public.

He spotted one of the deputies circling the small area that he and his co-workers had been assigned to. Leaning over the barrier just slightly, Finn tried to grab his attention. The man walked over to the boy and he sighed. Good, maybe he knew something about the situation. He was tall, well-built and dressed in the usual deputy uniform. He looked relatively young. Placing a hand on the bar he addressed Finn. "What can I do for you?"

"Um, are there still some students inside?" Finn stammered.

The man straightened up and looked over to the door. "As far as I know, everyone's out. Some of the authorities are sweeping the building there was a small incident but nothing that concerns you, I'm sure" he smiled.

"What kind of incident" Finn whispered. Rosyln still wasn't out, he knew that. If she was outside, he would have gotten at least one text from her.

"And that's where I cannot comment any further" The man chuckled. "Afraid it's classified. What has you so worried anyway?"

Finn took this as his chance to explain it to him. "My sister, Rosyln, she was taking the exam today and she hasn't contacted me at all. I haven't seen her come out yet either" He ushered, peering past the man's head to attempt and look through the doors.

The man whipped out a small notebook and a pen. "You could give me her description and I could ask a few of the other deputies whether they've spotted her?" He offered, kindly. Finn's attention was elsewhere.

"Rosyln!" The teen shouted, wrapping his thin hands around the railing and hopping over it. His sister was covered in splatters of deep red blood and looked like she'd been dragged through the depths of hell. Beside her, Stiles was embraced by his father. He was also covered in a similar red pigment.

"Finn!" Rosyln smiled, somewhat shocked by the embrace. Deep down she knew he was going to be there.

"What, what the hell happened? Why are you covered in blood? What's, what's, what's going on?!" Finn muttered and mumbled, one after the other.

"Hey, hey, don't worry I'm fine now" She smiled. They hugged for a moment longer before breaking away and retiring to irritable siblings.

"You look like shit, Ros"

"Oh? I didn't notice!" Ros laughed as they both began to walk away. Some of the crowd's eyes followed Rosyln for obvious reasons but she ignored them.

"No, seriously, you like you were dragged by the devil himself-"

"Sounds like something Granda would say!"

"..and then shoved up a camel's asshole, only to come out the other end of a whale-like Pinocchio" The boy recited, in great and awful detail.

"You have a way with words" Rosyln joked. "No, seriously!" She mimicked. "You should like be the next Shakespeare or something!"

"Fuck off" Finn cursed, holding up two middle fingers as the two separated on either side of the car. "You also stink" Finn sighed as he dropped into the passenger seat.

Rosyln lingered outside the car with the door open and one leg in. From afar she saw Stiles still trapped in a lengthy hug with his father. When the two finished he swivelled around in her direction and waved. Finn mimicked her from the other side of the car with added mockery. Stiles smiled at them both. Grinning, the girl, slipped into the driver's seat. Finn looked from Rosyln to Stiles and from Stiles to Rosyln. His mouth dropped and his cheeks raised. "Oh my god, it can't be true!"

"What?" Rosyln whispered. "What can't be true!?"

"You, you and Stiles! You like him!" He screamed just as an evil laugh followed.

"What? No, I don't?"

"Shut up Ros, the way you look at him is the way you swoon over young Leo in titanic! Get a fricking room!" He laughed. "Oh my god! I seriously have some leverage now!"