(1) Wolf in Me (D. Dixon)

Chapter Twenty-Two

Jim might have told Diana that she didn't have to sit with him for long, but Diana choses to stay longer anyway. He gets worse. Quickly. Passing in and out of consciousness. Sweating and shivering all at the same time. His fever has progressively gotten worse even within the span of an hour. So much so that she does really consider attempting to take his pain. Just to give him a short period of peace before the end. She lets out a breath and takes Jim's hand in hers, sliding her other over the top. She takes a deep breath and focuses. She doesn't know how this works, but she can guess. Do her best to figure it out. She watches his arm as black veins start to appear and move, creeping along his forearm towards their hands. She cringes a little as the black veins appear on the back of her own hand, travelling up along her own arms. Almost instantly she feels unwell. But she assumes there is a trade aspect to this, so expected.

"Do you feel...any better?" She asks Jim who lets out a relaxed sigh, laying back on the bed, his eyes closing. She takes that as a yes. That it works. That she did it. She lets out a relieved breath and instantly regrets it. The way it makes her stomach turn. She might actually be sick. She takes a shaky breath as she pushes herself to her feet. She needs to leave the RV before someone comes to check on Jim and then asks her why she looks so unwell.

....

Diana takes the RV steps carefully but quickly, because she can feel herself getting worse with every passing second. She knows it will pass. It's just pain and there is nothing actually physically wrong with her. She knows that, but it sure as hell feels like it.

"Carol" Diana starts and Carol looks at her, almost immediately seeing that something isn't right with Diana. "Can you sit with Jim for a bit?" She asks, her hand on the side of the RV to keep herself upright.

"Are you alright?" Carol counters, moving towards her. Diana shakes her head.

"I'm just tired" She waves off the concern as she heads back to her own camp. She needs to sit down and for no one to ask her any questions. She shuffles her way along. Leaving the main camp behind her. However, she only makes it halfway to her own little camp when her legs threaten to give out. She stumbles, dizzy. She does not recall Scott or Derek or Malia explaining that it felt like this. There was no warning of this after effect. Maybe because it was a walker bite that she was pulling pain from. She doesn't know. But she doesn't like it. Daryl is suddenly at her side, his arm around her waist to hold her up. The two of them share a look before he tightens his hand on her waist and pulls her against his side, encouraging her to use him. She does, leaning heavily against him, allowing him to lead her towards her camp without a word. Just a firm hand on her to stop her from going over. She feels terrible. Her skin feels hot and her stomach is in knots. Her vision is blurred and there is a ringing in her ears. It has knocked her werewolf ass for six. It has to be because of the bite.

.......

Some time later, Diana jerks awake, sitting upright to find herself back in her tent, in her sleeping bag. She still doesn't feel great, but she feels a hell of a lot better than she did when she left Jim. But mostly, she is feeling hungry. She pushes herself up to duck out of the tent, but she doesn't really get far because she pauses when her eyes land on something. Daryl. He's sitting at her extinguished campfire and skinning a squirrel. He keeps his eyes on the squirrel and lets out a breath.

"You're a wolf" He points out before she can say anything. "Smelt ya" He motions back towards the main camp, implying when he caught her. She likely let her guard down with that influx of feeling from what she took from Jim. "Why didn't you say anything before?"

"You've met your brother right?" She asks as she sits across from him. He snorts and then pulls a face of agreement. She didn't know how they would react to her. And she didn't know what sort of omegas they were. If they were kicked out of a pack for reasons then they wouldn't be the sort of wolves she'd want to know. She knows a little better now. Daryl is not Merle. However, he is still a little rough around the edges, quick to resort to violence to fix his problems. As seen with Miguel, Amy, and Jim. His first thought was to deal with it by hurting or killing them. Diana's first instinct was to treat them as human beings and grant them some compassion.

"How did you do it?" He asks. "Hide your scent from us?"

"Practice" She answers. "Concentration..."

"Didn't know we could do that" He mumbles with a frown at the squirrel in his lap. It is quiet as he contemplates that information. He knows the basics because that is all he was taught to know. His dad didn't care to teach either him or Merle how to do things, Merle was often away at juvie or eventually prison. Daryl had to figure it all out himself and without an actual baseline to reach for, how was he supposed to know what they could really do? He had no one to teach him how to do this right. Diana turns slightly to pull her bag from her tent, taking a moment to realize that Daryl likely put it in there because she left it in the main camp. She shakes her head and drags it to her side so she can pull out her little snack box.

"Was it just you and Merle?" She asks him as she takes out a piece of beef jerky. "Did you...have a pack?" He shakes his head.

"Nah, was just us and our dad" He starts and glances out of the trees, not wanting to look at her as he talks about his history. It is not something he is comfortable doing. But she is someone he can share this with. The only person who understands what they are. Merle was never interested in talking about it or showing him how to do things. "Not that it..." Daryl pulls a face and then snorts. "He wasn't no alpha" He settles on and turns to look at her. "What about you?" She hums and nods.

"My mom," She answers. "She was an alpha. Then my older sister. Then my uncle. Then my brother" She lists off. "Then...he lost it" She scrunches up her nose. "It's complicated" She admits and shrugs. Pinning down a single alpha in her life seems to have been hard. It shifted so much and then disappeared. She isn't even sure if she would have called Scott her alpha. She was never really part of his pack. Just an ally of it. If that is the case, then it has been a long time since she had an alpha to follow.

"Does Shane know what you are?" He asks and she gives him a look.

"Of course not" She answers, leaning back onto her hands. "He has no idea about...any of it" Daryl snorts a little but makes sense given the way Shane has been with her. He isn't sure Shane would be so overprotective of Diana if he knew the truth. Well, Shane actually might be trigger happy towards what they are. He seems the type to shoot first and ask questions later. Maybe even with his own estranged daughter.