take a step back, look at the whole picture

I talked to my dad, Isaac. He's...not from where you are.

From:

[Oh. His face falls, just a little. He wanted to tell Chris it'd all be okay, that he was doing everything he could, that he wouldn't give up until he brought her home.

But hearing this from her is better than if he did talk to Chris first. Which probably would have ended up with a fumbling foot-in-mouth apology and then an even more fumbling explanation.]

So, he's-- Uh, when... is he from then?

From:

The night we spent at the Glen Capri.

[She hesitates, unsure if she should mention Matt. He's not here, he can't hurt anyone...but Allison really wants to head straight for Isaac's room, curl up with him, and go nowhere for a few days.

That, or hit something. Maybe someone.]

...Jackson's been around on comms, too.

[That seems safe enough.]

From:

Yeah, I know. He's kind of the last person I wanted to see on my comm, but hey.

[And he's pretty glad Jackson hasn't said anything to him yet... at least, he is until he gets Matt's reply halfway through replying to her. Yeah. Jackson would have been SO much better. Maybe you can see the way he goes tense and his eyes start getting the tiniest bit glowy as he checks out the new response, Allison?]

... Okay, no. I take it back. Maybe Jackson's the second-last person I wanted to see.

Edited Date: 2014-08-21 12:22 pm (UTC)

From:

[The flash of gold in his eyes is a warning sign, and immediately Allison's on alert. She peers at Isaac through the feed with concern, then checks the network...

So much for keeping things quiet.]

Isaac? Do I need to come over there? [There's a warning note in her voice, but it's not very heated. Really, Isaac, she wouldn't mind coming over to keep you from getting overly aggressive. And maybe collect a hug or ten while she's at it...]

From:

He's not on the Barge, right? He can't touch you. Or hurt anyone else. He can't do anything. So maybe you don't need to come over... [His jaw is clenched but he manages a tight little twitch of a smile. It shows sharp teeth.] ...but you could.

From:

[It's strange, but there's something about that glimpse of the beast...the flare of gold in his eyes, the flash of fang...even in Scott, there was something about it that made Allison's chest tight with a heady mixture of fear and...something she didn't want to identify as excitement, but there was no other word for it.

Because that beast lives inside a gentle, loyal, loving boy, and even now, all of its fury is directed towards protecting her. He's dangerous right now, his control is being tested, because he cares about her.

...and yeah, maybe it's just a tiny bit sexy.

So she smiles, rolling her lips together in a failed attempt to hide it, and nods.]

Okay, then I will. I'm on my way.

From:

[And Isaac's waiting for her, restlessly. Pacing. Before she arrives, he tosses the communicator over to the bed, reins in the glow in his eyes, retracts his claws. Tamps his fury down as much as he can. He doesn't want to be a monster around her, doesn't want to let that beast part of him take over completely.

He'll open the door quickly when she knocks, ready to let her in, make sure she's safe. A hug will be his first order of business.]

From:

[She knew he was tense, but when Allison arrives at his door and gets summarily whisked into his cabin, and then his arms, she's a little startled. It fades quickly, though, because...well, hug. She wanted one of those.

Like...a lot.

For a long time, they stand there wrapped in each other's arms, Allison with her nose pressed against Isaac's shoulder to just breathe him in, rubbing his back rhythmically in hopes of getting him to relax. Finally, she draws back and looks into his eyes, reaching up to cradle his cheek in one hand.]

He's not here. It's okay. [She says it for herself as much as for him, then slides her hand around the nape of his neck and pulls him in for a quick, but warm kiss.]

From:

I know. I know he's not.

[He answers when they break the kiss, hands settled at her waist, fingertips stroking her skin under her shirt. Her hands on his back drain his tension, their rhythm and their warmth settling him down. It's her hands and her presence and her scent, rolled into one, cooling his temper and soothing his mind. She wants him to calm down, so he's calm. He's not happy, exactly, but he is calm. The gold glow is nowhere to be seen in his eyes when he meets hers.]

I just-- Sorry.

From:

Don't apologize, it's okay. I just...I don't want you to worry.

[She doesn't want to waste time worrying about people that aren't there. She doesn't want to think about Matt and the lives he destroyed, she can't even let herself think too long about her own dad, can't let herself miss him of she'll fly apart.

Matt's hurt enough people she cares about. She's not going to let him hurt Isaac, too. He's dead, she's grateful for it...

Allison pulls Isaac down to kiss his forehead, the bridge of his nose, and feathers a gentle kiss against each of his closed eyelids.]

He's dead, and he's going to stay that way, communication glitch be damned. He's not worth losing control over. [She pauses, then sighs and hugs him again, tight as she can.]

...but maybe it's creepy enough that I'll just...stick around here for a little bit? Like...right here? [She smiles slightly, turning to press her face against his neck, where he can probably feel her lips curving upward as she whispers against his skin, like a confession.]

You just...give really good hugs.

From:

[ Instead you get probably the person you LEAST wanted to see, Isaac. ]

What? Are you you having a party without inviting me?

From:

[Scott is totally inviting himself to this party. Mostly to sputter internally.]

Matt?

From:

...McCall?

[ He sounded rather confused, himself. ]

From:

[How does he even. What does he do here. What does he say to this kid who internalized so much anger he turned into a supernatural revenge machine? Scott's throat works before he manages to say something.]

What do you remember? I mean, like - the last thing you remember.

From:

[It's not so much the fact Matt had been responsible for his father's death that gets Isaac's eyes glowing at the sight of him - although some part of him does still miss his dad, despite the violence and despite the freezer - but more the stuff he'd done to Allison and the rest of the pack. Allison, mostly. They hadn't been his pack then, but they are now. And that's what counts.]

Ooh, sorry, stalkers with weird pet lizards don't get party invitations.

From:

[ He put up a rather convincing show of being seriously confused and freaked out. Because he wasn't supposed to know about werewolves. Or kanimas. Or anything like that. ]

Whoa. Lahey. What the hell. I know we don't really talk anymore but...wait. What lizards? Are you feeling alright?

From:

[And yeah, maybe it'd be convincing if he didn't know for a fact that Matt had been behind the kanima.] Don't bother pretending like you don't know what I'm talking about, Matt.

From:

Seriously. Isaac. I don't. What lizards?

[ His other conversions may have prepared him to play dumb far better here. ]

From:

seizurings

Just hi? Nothing else? Really?

[Sigh.]

Fine. Hi.

From:

[Oh my god, it actually worked.] Erica? Holy shit. Hi.

[He grins at her, just the slightest bit brittle. He can't help flashing back to how Derek couldn't protect her and he couldn't save her. It's been a while for him now... but it still hurts. Okay. Be cool, be cool. No need to go jumping into the 'you're dead and it might not have been my fault but it kind of feels like it sometimes' thing right away and risk saying something he can't take back.]

I don't want to make this, like, weird or anything, but. It's... really good to see you?

From:

seizurings

It's okay, Isaac. I know... I remember.

[She returns the smile, though it doesn't quite reach her eyes. The vault had left an impact on her and this whole being alive again thing was just adding to it. It's gonna be weird, no matter which way you slice it.]

It's good to see you too.

From:

You do? [Is that better? It's probably not better. His smile drops into something more pained.]

I'm sorry. We tried to get to you. I-- [--found you, he manages not to say. Because it hadn't been her, it'd been her body.] We tried to find you.

From:

seizurings

[She watches him, a hand drifting through her hair. There's so much she wants to say, things she never had a chance to, instead settling on just a question - something that had been haunting her.]

Did-- Did Boyd and Cora make it?

[She wants him to say yes, to tell her that they found them at least - that her death hadn't been in vain. She wants him to say that they're okay, that they smile - they deserve to smile.]

Edited Date: 2014-08-21 12:52 pm (UTC)

From:

Um. Cora, she's okay, I think. She... She was hurt, badly, but Derek healed her and they left town. I haven't-- Derek came back but she didn't come back with him. And Boyd... [He tries to think of what to say, how to tell her and he can't find the words. He shakes his head instead, shoulders shrugging up, arms wrapping around himself unconsciously.]

From:

seizurings

[That tiny glimmer of hope she let show quickly flickers out. Boyd was dead. She tries to wrap her head around it, the news hitting her light a freight train.

Her voice is quiet when she finally speaks, rage overpowering her grief as tears slip out of her now glowing, yellow eyes.]

Was it the alphas?

From:

[She has a right to know, she deserves to know but Isaac just can't bring himself to lay down the details, can't explain how bad it all actually was-- how, yes, it was the alphas but it was Derek's claws that Boyd died on.]

Yeah. Yeah, they got him too. [And his own claws are out and there's pain in his palms where they're cutting into his clenched fists; his eyes match hers.] But they're gone now. All except the twins.

From:

seizurings

[She closes her eyes, reigning herself back in as best she can. Without an alpha or an anchor, anger was dangerous. She focuses on Boyd, on how he wouldn't want her losing control over his death. When she reopens them, they're still glowing, though the feral edge is gone. The twins aren't her focus, not as much as another Alpha.]

Did Kali suffer? She deserved to suffer after --

[She shakes her head, a hand drifting to rest on her abdomen - remembering the sharp pain, the feeling of the chill as she reached for Boyd, his name the last words to leave her lips. She can't hold back the tears any longer, her voice choked.]

I wasn't strong enough.

From:

[He doesn't know. He was busy holding up the roof of a root cellar while Kali was being killed and he never asked for exact details of how much it hurt her. So it comes as a slight relief - because he doesn't have the answers Erica wants - when she changes the subject without prompting.]

It wasn't your fault. They were alphas. A whole pack of them. How were you supposed to be strong enough for that?

[God, the fact he can only see her through a little screen is so infuriating.]

From:

seizurings

I should have-- The things they did --

[Her voice cracks, nowhere near ready to say any of it out loud. She can feel herself crumbling in front of him - she trusts him, one of the few people in the world she can say that about. He's someone she can be herself with - someone she can say this to that'll get it.]

There was no moon, Isaac.

From:

Erica--

[He has this moment where he wonders if he can change things, save her, tell her not to go for the woods, tell her to hide out somewhere safe - but he stops, and looks at the rest of her conversation with Isaac, and his shoulders sag a little. Oh.]

It's really - really good to-- [how do :c] Hi?

From:

seizurings

[She's still reeling from everything Isaac's told her, her expression distant and detached.]

Hi Scott.

[She sighs, not really wanting to deal with the unavoidable awkwardness.]

Isaac filled me in on a few things, it's weird... I know.

From:

Okay.

[He can see it in her face, that distant expression, and for a moment he's just quiet. They weren't ever close, not really, but she's a part of the ridiculous world he was yanked into. And he's felt some guilt for not stopping her and Boyd - and for not reaching them sooner.

So Scott nods, and shrugs.]

Are you okay?

From:

seizurings

[She just stares at him for a long moment, completely deadpan.]

I'm dead, Scott. I can never go home. I can never see my family - ever.

[She tilts her head, eyes narrowing.]

How would you be? Would you be okay? If you knew what they did,how much--

[She shakes her head, not wanting to get into it. She's not ready to talk about it, not by a longshot and not to Scott.]

From:

This is more alive than you've been in a while.

[He has no idea what it's like, and he's trying to say that he's glad to see her, even if it's just for a little while. But the words aren't coming out right.]

I'm sorry. You're right, I wouldn't be okay. I just - I guess I'm just happy you're here, for now.

Edited Date: 2014-08-27 05:56 pm (UTC)

From:

...Isaac, right?

[Well this is nothing short of odd.]

From:

[Oh man. Thank god Allison warned him or else he totally would have just blurted out some stuff that Chris Argent really does not need to know until he absolutely can't avoid it. Which, if Isaac manages to do what he's set out to here, won't ever happen. As it is, he manages to keep from looking too guilty or - hopefully - too weird.]

Hi, yeah, um. That's me. Isaac. Isaac Lahey. [Smooth.]

From:

You're on the lacrosse team.

[See? He knows you. Sort of.]

One of Scott's friends.

[There's a slightly harder edge to his smile at that. Something distinctly dangerous. I know what you are. But he's one of Scott's, so it doesn't go any further than that. He promised.]

From:

That's right.

[And god, this is weird. So weird. He likes Mr Argent, respects him. He's... well, he's the kind of guy Isaac wishes his dad had been, like, all the time. They're on the same page when he's from. He has to keep reminding himself that this is Allison's dad from the past, from before they got to know each other, before they fought together.]

One of Scott's friends. ["I'm house-trained, I swear."]

From:

[The runty one, the scrapper. No, Chris remembers him well enough, the one time they'd convinced him to throw in with them, with Derek. Lesser of two evils, if you could really even say that about throwing in with wolves. He frowns, but nods. Yeah, he knows.

He also remembers the wreckage left behind from where that hunt led, it's right in front of him, after all. So there's a long pause, a wry twist of lips, and it seems to take an extraordinary amount of effort to get the next out.]

I think this is the part where I'm supposed to say I'm sorry about Derek. You'll have to forgive me if it's not entirely sincere.

From:

[It honestly takes him a second to even remember why Chris would be apologising about Derek. That fight seems like so long ago and so much has changed since then, He covers his confusion by dropping his head, shrugging.]

No problem, man. Totally forgiven. Hunters and werewolves: not a match made in heaven, got it.

[He should stop talking, probably.]

From:

[That and he's a Hale, and the Hales and the Argents will never get along, so far as Chris is concerned, anyway. And Kate. But sure. Hunters and werewolves, that's it absolutely.]

Something like that, yeah.

From:

Uh.

[And he really, really should just stop talking. Cut the feed. Do the smart thing. But. He wants to explain, so badly. Compartmentalisation or not, he wants to offer whatever small comfort he can... but of course, this Chris doesn't need that comfort, not yet. Still, stupidly, he can't bring himself to break the connection yet.]

So. How-- [are you? How's Allison?] How's life?

From:

[...because that's not an odd thing to ask or anything. Chris watches him critically, as if assessing for weakness. Really it's just trying to find the answer himself, but it looks about the same.]

What do you want, Isaac.

[It seems the reasonable assumption; he asked everyone from Beacon Hills to make their presence known, and he knows Isaac is far from alpha material but that doesn't mean he's not up to something. Doesn't mean he's not asking on behalf of someone else.]

From:

lostlahey

Isaac? [The worst surprises are the ones you don't expect, the ones you can't even let yourself imagine.]

Where are you? Where's Dad?

[That's always the first question - where's Dad? What sort of mood is he in? Is it a good day, or one of the other ones? Camden has always thought getting shot at was the preferable option.]

From:

[Oh my god. Nope. Nope nope nope this is definitely something he didn't expect or even consider as a possibility. It's been so long and Camden's been dead for years; even with all the crazy weirdness of his life since taking the Bite and the time he's been on the Barge, he never, ever thought he'd see his brother again.]

Cam? Um. [He shakes his head, trying to work out what to do here. Their father's dead and so much has changed. He tries to keep his voice relatively normal as he says:] Dad isn't-- He's not here. It's okay.

Edited Date: 2014-08-23 12:34 am (UTC)

From:

lostlahey

Right. [He nods once, his shoulders easing in a looser stance. Talking to Isaac should be easy, but he's been gone a while, gone longer than he'd realised because his tiny little brother is big.]

Is that really what you're doing with your hair these days? [He teases, prods, because he doesn't know what to say and doesn't want his doubts to show. Big brothers always have the answers, right? Gotta keep acting like everything is fine.]

From: