Chapter Text
Isaac comes to consciousness with a shock. It’s not a steady, gradual thing. The electricity pulses through him, bringing Isaac right up to the surface with no warning. He groans in pain, body convulsing and eyes flickering between gold and blue.
“Quiet,” a girl Isaac has never met before hisses, peering over his body.
There’s a burning sensation around Isaac’s ribs. When he reaches down he feels torn fabric and wet blood. There’s a large slash on Isaac’s side that isn’t healing. His head spins. He claws at the ground beside him, reaching for… reaching for something.
The girl helps Isaac get to his feet. Isaac feels fuzzy around the edges, like he’s floating somewhere between sleep and wake. The girl pulls Isaac along, “Stay with me. We’re almost there.”
Isaac’s head lolls to the side. The movement causes a stinging sensation to run up his spine to the base of his neck. Isaac reaches up to feel punctures at the back of his neck. “My neck…”
“From their claws,” the girl says. “It’s how they share memories.”
“But I don't remember anything,” Isaac says almost immediately, like an instinct. He hadn’t fully realized it before, but it’s true. He doesn’t remember anything. The last thing he remembers was being at Derek’s loft. So how did he get here?
“Also how they steal them. Listen to me, no matter what happens, you hold on, okay? You hold on tight.”
The girl helps lift Isaac onto the motorcycle. Isaac tries to be helpful, but his body is too weak. It takes a moment of maneuvering to get him steady, then the girl climbs on the front. She revs the engine and Isaac’s grip around her waist tightens. They take off.
Isaac rests his head on the girl’s back, fighting hard to stay awake. He may not remember what happened, but he knows that if he passes out again, they’ll never make it out alive.
They manage a few blocks before Isaac picks up on a quiet sound coming from behind them. It’s too soft for the human girl to hear, especially with the volume of the motorcycle engine to compete with. Isaac lifts his head to try to get a better listen.
“I hear something,” Isaac says, sitting up fully. He focuses his wolf hearing as best he can in his incoherent state. Footsteps. “Someone’s coming.”
Isaac turns to look behind them as a figure appears out of the shadows. As it approaches them, the figure takes the shape of a man, silhouetted by the mist. Dread settles in Isaac’s stomach. It’s only a matter of moments before the man catches up to them, baring claws and fangs.
“Faster!” Isaac shouts desperately.
The girl speeds up. They gain a little bit of distance, but it’s not enough. When Isaac turns his head in the other direction, the man is already there, ready to attack. The werewolf lunges at Isaac who ducks just in time to miss the impact. Instead, the claws collide with the back of the motorcycle once, twice. Then, with barely a second in between, the claws scrape up the opposite side of the motorcycle.
Isaac turns his head, an eerie feeling settling over him. This time he sees two figures.
“Two of them,” Isaac informs the girl.
The twin werewolves continue to gain on them, one coming from each side. Each time they swing at Isaac, he dodges. Their claws continue to hit the motorcycle, making it increasingly difficult for them to stay balanced. The girl turns a sharp corner hoping to shake them, but werewolf superspeed is hard to compete with. One of the twins is already waiting for them on the other side. He claws the front of the motorcycle causing sparks to flash from the metal.
Isaac keeps his eyes behind them, watching for the twin’s next move. He turns frontward just in time to see a giant truck coming right at them. Isaac squints his eyes closed and flinches inward. He braces himself for impact. The truck horn blares, and, somehow, the girl manages to steer them around with only a hare’s breath between them and the truck.
The girl pulls the motorcycle into an alley, as Isaac checks behind them for any sign of the twins. When Isaac looks forward again, they’re barrelling right toward a brick wall.
Isaac shouts, “No!”
The girl steers the motorcycle to the side, and they skid to a stop just in time. When Isaac looks up, the twin shadows are looming in the distance like a symbol of death. Isaac and the girl are cornered. He can’t see how they’re going to get out of this.
The girl twists the motorcycle around to face the twins. She flips her visor helmet up. “Remember what I said before?”
“Hold on?”
“Hold on!” the girl shouts back. She slides the visor back into place and starts revving the engine. Isaac tightens his grip.
One of the twins runs at them, sliding down onto the ground in a kneeling position. When the other twin starts sprinting, the girl accelerates. She aims the motorcycle directly at the werewolves. The twin uses the other’s back as a mount and leaps at them. For a moment, Isaac feels everything in slow motion. The twin is soaring through the air. The motorcycle isn’t fast enough to make it out from under him. The twin is going to crash right into them, and there’s nothing Isaac can do about it. His body is drained and he’s not the one steering.
But then, at the very last moment, the girl cuts to the right. The twin hits the ground, fist coming down hard enough to fracture the pavement. Isaac nearly winces.
Isaac can hardly believe they survived, but they’re not out of the woods yet. He turns to look ahead and sees a huge wall of windows. Isaac yells, “Wall!” but it’s too late.
The collision hits hard. Glass shatters all around them. Isaac’s exhausted body finally starts to give out. He tries to fight it, but there’s nothing he can do. His vision blacks out. He tips forward. He loses all consciousness.
Isaac hits the ground violently, the impact pulling him back up from the blackness. He looks around, quickly trying to reorient himself. The first thing he looks for is the girl. He sees her taking off her helmet, and relief floods Isaac at the knowledge that she’s alive, at least for now. Isaac’s vision is blurry but not so much that he can’t see the twin silhouettes coming in through the shattered glass wall. Isaac struggles to try to move away, but his body is too weak. All he can really do is watch.
The twins tear their jackets off and, okay, that is a little odd, but Isaac also lives with Derek. So. Shirtless werewolves are certainly not the strangest thing he’s ever seen. But then one of the twins crouches down and the other shoves his arm into his back. There’s a sickening crunching of bones as they start merging together. Morbid curiosity and fear mix together inside Isaac forcing him completely still. He can’t bring himself to look away.
This is definitely the strangest thing he’s ever seen.
The mega werewolf roars with bright red eyes, and Isaac is startled back into action. He tries to squirm away, but he knows he’s done for. Isaac can’t outrun or out-fight this thing. He’s going to die.
“Isaac! Get down!”
Fortunately for Isaac, the girl – he really needs to learn her name – survived the crash. Isaac plasters himself to the ground as the girl pulls a gun on the mega werewolf. Isaac stays dead still. He doesn’t dare move until he hears the crackling of electricity and the alpha howling in pain. Isaac looks up, but he quickly has to shield his eyes from the flashing lights. The electricity is all but blinding. All Isaac can see is the vague shape of the merged body falling to the ground. When the lights are gone, so are the twins.
Beside him, the girl pants, “I thought I told you to hold on.”
Isaac collapses in relief.
Isaac is the one that calls 911. The girl had tried to tell him not to, but when she immediately passed out, he had no other choice but to call for an ambulance. It’s a bit of a mess because Isaac has no idea where they are, but, with a few key descriptors and the help of modern technology, the paramedics are able to find them.
Isaac has never been in an ambulance before. It’s far less glamorous than he expected it to be. It’s cramped and Isaac is practically strapped to the stretcher. If Isaac was any less exhausted, he probably would have panicked by now. Luckily for the paramedics locked inside the vehicle with him, Isaac is completely depleted.
When they arrive at the hospital, Isaac does start to panic a little bit. He’s hurt and tired, but he is going to heal. He’s going to be okay, but the girl might not be. Fortunately, Melissa McCall recognizes him instantly.
“Hey, wait. Wait a minute. I know this one,” Melissa says as she approaches Isaac’s stretcher. She leans down close to him and asks, “What happened, Isaac?”
“Listen, the girl, all right. She’s worse, okay?” Isaac says in a quiet rush. He needs someone else to know. He needs to pass the responsibility off into more capable hands.
“Are you not healing?” she asks.
Isaac grunts in pain, starting to feel a bit frantic. “I will, will you just please – would you just help her, please?”
“Okay, can you take him?” Melissa orders the EMT.
The paramedics start pushing Isaac deeper into the hospital, and he has no choice but to let it happen. He wouldn’t protest even if he could. Isaac finally lets the fatigue take hold of him. He closes his eyes.
—
The next morning, Sheriff Stilinski comes to speak with him. Isaac instantly feels a little flurry of panic rise in his chest. He and the sheriff don’t necessarily have the best track record. Despite all the proof that it was Matt who killed Isaac’s father, Isaac still gets the feeling that Stilinski doesn’t quite trust him.
“Mr. Lahey,” the sheriff greets. “Are you sure you don’t remember anything from before the accident yesterday?”
And there it is. The sheriff doesn’t believe him. It’s not really a surprise. Nobody trusts Isaac these days. It’s frustrating. Mostly because Isaac has no idea how to regain trust he never had to begin with.
The sheriff must see something on Isaac’s face because he continues, “Even if you only remember something small, it could help us piece together what happened.”
“Sheriff, I swear I don’t remember anything. All I remember is waking up on the pavement and seeing the girl next to me. Then I called 911.” It’s not necessarily a lie. Isaac certainly can’t tell him about the werewolf twins. None of that would be helpful to Stilinski anyway.
The sheriff sighs, “All right. If you remember anything…”
“I’ll tell you,” Isaac says. The sheriff leaves, and Isaac exhales a breath of relief. He really does wish he had his memories back. Partly because he wants to help, but also because it’s disorienting. It’s scary to know that there’s a black spot in his memories. He doesn’t like the feeling. It’s disconcerting to say the least.
Not long after the sheriff leaves, Melissa comes to check on him. She has one of the warmest smiles Isaac has ever seen, and it momentarily breaks his heart. From the doorway, Melissa asks, “How are you doing, Isaac? I came in earlier, but you were completely passed out.”
“How’s the girl?” Isaac asks, ignoring Melissa’s question. Isaac knows he’s going to be fine, but the girl was only human. Isaac needs to know if she’s okay, it’s been tearing at the back of his mind all day. He needs to know.
Melissa’s warm smile turns a little pitying. “She’s stable, so she’ll be okay. But, more importantly, Isaac, how are you?”
Isaac gives a small shrug, “I can feel the scratch healing already.”
“Let me take a look,” Melissa says, coming around the side of the bed and putting on a pair of gloves. Isaac rearranges his hospital gown so that she can have easy access to the wound. Melissa slowly peels the dressing back and Isaac hisses at the uncomfortable sensation.
“Yeah. Yeah, that’s healing, visibly. Wow. They – They can’t see this. Nobody can see this,” Melissa says, sounding equal parts awed and worried.
Isaac glances at the still slightly ajar door. “All right, cover it, cover it up.”
Melissa does, but she shakes her head in disbelief, saying, “I don’t think that’s gonna matter. I mean, you’re scheduled for surgery, which is obviously going to be very confusing for a lot of people.”
“Okay, can you do something?” Isaac asks, looking up at Melissa. He has no idea what he’s supposed to do in this situation, and he trusts her. Sure, he doesn’t know her very well, but she raised Scott, so she must have good instincts.
“Me do something?” Melissa asks, looking confused. “I’m relatively new to all of this, and there’s a sheriff’s deputy that’s stationed right outside the door.”
“Have you tried calling Derek?” Isaac asks.
“Like, five times,” she says. Isaac tries to push down the hurt that causes. “Do you have any other emergency werewolf contacts?”
“Yeah,” Isaac says, despite the fact that Melissa sounds like she might be joking. “Call Scott.”
Melissa looks taken aback at first, but, eventually, she nods. Then she leaves too.
Alone in his hospital room, Isaac tries to ignore the ache in his chest. Where the hell is Derek? Now that Isaac is less exhausted, the context for his missing memories has started to come back to him. Now, Isaac remembers he was looking for Boyd and Erica who were kidnapped by the alpha pack. Isaac, Derek, and Peter have been trying to track down the pair ever since things with Gerard and the kanima calmed down. Derek knew Isaac had gone looking for them. So where is he?
—
As the scratch in Isaac’s side continues to heal, his energy replenishes. With each passing moment, the gravity of the situation starts to dawn on him. Isaac is almost fully healed, and when he is, he’ll have numerous medical professionals to answer to. Not to mention the deputy posted outside his door. Isaac is trapped inside this hospital room waiting for certain doom, and there’s nothing he can do about it. All he can do is hope that Scott comes through for him. Luckily, Scott has never failed Isaac before.
Just then, the door to Isaac’s room opens, and an unfamiliar nurse walks in. “Hello, Isaac.”
Isaac immediately moves to sit up, “Hi.”
“How are we feeling?” the nurse asks.
“Good, listen,” Isaac touches the IV on his hand, seriously considering just ripping it out. “I think I could probably just–”
The nurse places a firm hand on Isaac’s shoulder, cutting him off and stopping him in his tracks. Isaac looks up at the nurse. Before he has the chance to protest, she slides a needle into the injection port of his IV. The nurse pushes the syringe plunger, administering the unknown medicine.
“What is that?” Isaac asks, concerned.
“Just an anesthetic.” Isaac watches as the nurse pushes the last few drops into his IV line, sealing his fate. Any hopes of Isaac getting out of the hospital unnoticed vanish in the blink of an eye.
“We don’t want you getting in the way again,” the nurse says, drawing Isaac’s attention towards her. The look on her face can only be described as sinister. Isaac quickly starts to realize that something is wrong, but drowsiness is already creeping up his spine. As the anesthetic kicks in, Isaac’s head rolls to the side, putting the ground in his line of sight. It’s then that Isaac notices the nurse’s bare feet and her clawed toenails. Isaac fights against the sedation, slowly and with great effort, turning his head to look back up at the werewolf.
“Count along with me, Isaac,” the not-nurse says. Fear plays at the edges of Isaac’s awareness, but it’s dulled by the sedation working its way through his bloodstream.
“One,” the first clawed finger. “Two,” the second clawed finger. “Three.”
Glowing red eyes are the last thing Isaac sees before the anesthetic takes over.
—
Isaac comes to on an uncomfortable table. It takes him a long moment to reorient himself. Isaac knows that it must have been hours since the alpha attacked him at the hospital, but to him it feels like seconds. Slowly, he sits up, taking in his surroundings. It’s easy for Isaac to recognize the old Hale house, especially when he hears Derek’s voice filtering in from the next room over.
Isaac slowly turns his body in the direction of the noise. The anesthesia is still lingering in his system causing his movements to be sluggish and clumsy. Isaac sees Derek, then Stiles, and, lastly, Scott. A feeling of safety swells in Isaac at the sight of Scott, one he can’t say he feels around Derek.
As Isaac regains his bearings, he realizes with a start that the girl who saved him is nowhere to be found.
“Where is she?” Isaac asks. Three heads turn to face him at once. “Where’s the girl?”
There’s a long pause, and then Derek asks, “What girl?”
The question instantly fills Isaac with dismay. It starts in his stomach like a lead weight, then spreads to the rest of his body. Isaac swallows. “The girl who rescued me? She was at the hospital?”
Isaac looks between their three blank expressions. Isaac’s stomach tightens. She saved his life, and they have no idea who he’s talking about. Isaac runs his fingers through his hair, “The alphas were after her too. We have to… She– We–”
“Okay, Isaac. We’ll find her,” Scott interrupts before the panic can fully take over. “I’ll call my mom. She might still be at the hospital.”
Isaac nods. If the alphas got to her, it’s his fault. Isaac doesn’t know how they ended up together that night, but he does know that if she had left him behind, she would have made it out. She would have had no problem outrunning the alpha twins without his dead weight. Guilt floods every corner of Isaac’s mind.
Derek approaches him. “What happened?”
“I don’t know. The alphas took my memories,” Isaac says. He reaches up to touch the back of his neck, but the puncture marks have already healed over.
“So that means you must have found them?” Derek questions. Unsurprisingly, Derek’s bedside manner leaves something to be desired. When Derek asks questions they always come out like an interrogation.
“I – I don’t know. We just – We have to find the girl, okay? She knows where they are,” Isaac says. He doesn’t actually know that for certain, but if finding the girl can help them find the alphas, then Derek will be much more inclined to do so. Besides, even if she doesn’t know exactly where the alphas are, she’s bound to know more about them than they do. She might be able to help. Although, she’s already helped Isaac plenty. And it might have gotten her killed.
Scott enters the room, “The girl isn’t there. My mom said she was highly sedated before the fight broke out and… and the deputy in her room was killed. I’m sorry, Isaac.”
Isaac shakes his head frantically. “We have to look for her.”
“Isaac,” Derek says, somehow sounding both pitying and scolding, as if Isaac is behaving like a child. “If the alphas were after her, then she’s dead.”
“Derek!” Scott exclaims, looking scandalized.
“Well, I would’ve put it a bit more gently,” Stiles says, glaring at Derek. “But… he’s right.”
Isaac can’t believe what he’s hearing. She saved his life. She saved his life, and now she’s dead. She’s dead, and it’s his fault. Isaac wants to tear his hair out. He wants to scream or cry.
Instead, he just nods. “Okay.”