METAMORPHOSIS • DEREK HALE [COMPLETED]

Chapter Twelve

Under the low hospital light. Derek remained by Alex's bedside hoping for any sign of her improvement. But she continued to stay in the same condition, slowly growing worse. He eyed her now stitched bullet wounds underneath the thin hospital gown and knew they weren't going to heal on their own.  She needed help, but he didn't know what could.

He look up from her pale, still face when Melissa walked in the room with a stethoscope around her neck and a needle in hand.

"What's that," he asked, rising to his full height and out of her way.

"Naloxone. We need to wake her up," she answered, injecting the clear sedative counteracter into Alex's IV.

"I thought you said she needed to rest," his tone slightly on edge, but then again, Alex's life was on the line, and he felt helpless.

"That was before I found out the CDC put the high school under quarantine with Scott and Stiles still in there." Her voice was as equally agitated and nervous. Seconds after Melissa finished speaking and the drug had a chance to run through her blood stream, Alex shot up from the bed, gasping in a panic. Her eyes, still the amethyst purple, darted around the room, dazed. The sudden movement caused her stitches to flare and she winced.

"Alex, look at me," Melissa said, placing her hand on her shoulder. When Alex's shining eyes focused on hers, Melissa continued, "You were shot, but you're in the hospital now, but you're fine." She lied for the brief moment, but all three knew she was far from it.

Alex glanced at Derek standing behind her and nodded, feeling more at ease.

"Good. Okay," the nurse breathed, "Last night, you were in the woods, and you came across another pack? Do you know what happened to them?"

"I told you they were poisoned," said Derek.

"No," Alex respired, her voice thick, "No, they were infected. He designed a virus to kill werewolves. And it did. It killed them all."

"Wait- you said he. Did you meet him? Did you get a name," Melissa inquired, needing to gather as much information as possible.

Alex weakly nodded, "They called him The Chemist."

"Okay, thank you," she squeezed Alex's shoulder before saying, "I'm going to call Scott."

"He said- he said he was going to the school. You need to get them out."

Melissa then left, hastily dialing her son's phone number, but none of them knew that no form of communication would be permitted in nor out of the school.

"Derek," she looked up at him, away from her clawed hands, "I can't change back."

He couldn't find any words to say, but his expression full of worry said everything. He moved to sit on the side of her bed, and his hand reached up to wipe a trickle of black blood from the corner of her feverish mouth.

She was beginning to feel the on-set symptoms of the virus. When she was first shot, all she could feel was the pain from the non-healing bullet wound and weakness. But now, a burning fever began to sit in along with the unwanted and uncontrollable shift.

"He called me a Demontra," her brow furrowed, "Do you know what that is?"

"No," he mirrored her confusion expression.

With the recollection of what she did last night and the grief mixed with the guilt still lurking, she admitted to him, "I killed someone, Derek." Her voice heavy as a tear slipped from her eyes. "It was like the same thing that happened with Scott. Only- only she died. It felt cold. I don't know how to describe it. I felt her heart become cold and heavy; mine did too. It was as if they were freezing solid, but only hers stopped. He made me put my hands on her, and that's when it happened."