"Heroes get remembered but legends never die, follow your heart kid, and you'll never go wrong."
Something about dying from a cheap shot in her side and a blow that she didn't see coming didn't sit right with Allison Argent, or the fading spirit of her soul. In fact, as she lay dying in Scott McCall's arms, every single fiber in her body repelled death itself. It wasn't fair that this was happening to her, it wasn't fair that she would be going too soon, it wasn't fair because it wasn't over yet, and she knew something that the rest of them didn't.
And yet, there was nothing she could do to stop the bleeding in her stomach or the life from fading out of her eyes, and so as she laid dying in the arms of the first boy she ever loved, the words started tumbling out.
The coppery taste of blood began to fill her mouth, but Allison ignored it. "I love... I love you, Scott," she choked. "Scott McCall."
She needed to say these words. He had to know. Because she knew that she would have given anything to hear her mother say them to her one last time before she died.
Allison's thoughts then drifted to her father. "You have to tell my dad," she gasped. "You have to tell him... tell him..."
The words stopped coming. Allison couldn't breathe. She had to tell Scott, but she was choking on air and she knew this was the end.
"Not like this," she pleaded, but the strength was leaving her bones. "It's not supposed to end like this."
Eyes wide open, yet unseeing, Allison felt her hand drop to the ground and suddenly she couldn't breathe. She couldn't see. She couldn't...
The next time she awoke, Allison was standing in a pure white room. She had been here once before, when she had died the first time in the place of her father. She was at the nemeton.
The deceptively normal looking tree stump was waiting for her and a wave of deja vu swept over Allison. She cautiously reached out to touch the tree when a sharp woman's voice rang out behind her.
"Allison!"
She spun around quickly and saw a very familiar looking ghost in front of her.
"Mama?" she whispered.
Her mother stood in front of her. Same sharp blue eyes, same fiery red hair, same air of authority surrounding her.
"Allison," her mother said sternly. "Don't you dare touch that tree."
"I was just going to--," she stuttered, but her mother interrupted her.
"Allison, you touch that tree and you will stay here forever. Do not touch it," Victoria Argent hissed.
Automatically Allison backed away from the tree.
"What is this place?" she asked. "What am I doing here?"
"You, my daughter," her mother said in a flat tone, "are nearly dead."
"Nearly dead?"
"Mostly dead," Victoria corrected. "Your friends probably think you're dead, the doctors will have probably pronounced you dead, and everyone you knew is now wondering how they are going to continue on living their lives without you."
"Then why won't you let me pass on?" Allison asked suspiciously. "Why shouldn't I let myself become fully dead? Why am I here?"
"Because you have a choice to make," her mother replied. "Changing our family code didn't just change history, Allison. It changed the hold of life and death itself."
"Me?" Allison asked, sounding stunned. "I did that?"
"Your new code," her mother explained. "'We protect those who cannot protect themselves.' By establishing that code with your father, and then officially graduating as a hunter, you were given a duty to Beacon Hills. You signed on to protect the people living there who cannot do it themselves and even though you are gone, people still need you in that town. Not even death cannot interfere with an duty as powerful as that."
Allison felt her mind spin. Her heart was reeling and her breathing came a little faster.
"Are you saying," she began slowly, "that I don't have to stay dead?"
Allison's mother gave her a tight lipped smile that quivered at the edges.
"Mom, what's wrong?" she asked, horrified when tears began to well up in her mother's eyes.
"I am so proud of you, Allison," her mother said. "I'm proud of the young woman you have become-- of the leader you have become. I made a terrible mistake leaving you and your father behind, but you have the chance to choose your own destiny, Allison."
"How?" Allison asked. "How do I get back? I don't understand."
"If you choose to return to the land of the living, she will find you"
"Who will find me?"
"Lydia. She has a powerful connection to the dead. She will find you, Allison."
Allison nodded and turned away from her mother, then turned around once more.
"Mom?" she asked quietly. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry I didn't listen to you, I'm sorry I didn't stay when you wanted me to, I'm sorry for everything."
Tears started running down her face, but Allison couldn't hold them back and she flung herself into her mother's arms one last time.
"You have nothing to be sorry for. Return to Beacon Hills, help save your friends, avenge your death, Allison," her mother said, squeezing her tightly before letting go. "And tell your father that I love him."
Allison nodded before blinking once. When she opened her eyes a second time, the world around her had completely shifted. The bright and open room had been replaced by a small and dark enclosure.
"Oh, God," Allison thought because she knew where she was. The claustrophobia of the area she was trapped in caused her to begin to hyperventilate. Small wooden walls boxed her in and she was willing to bet that six feet of earth was piled on top of her.
Allison Argent had been buried alive.
She had tried to stay calm at first. She began with counting her heartbeats, relishing in every single breath that she took in. Blood was coursing through her veins and she pinched herself hard every few seconds to make sure she was alive.
But, as time began to drag on, it kept getting harder and harder for her to stay calm. Were her friends safe? Had her mother been wrong? Was she too late?
Sweat began to gather behind her neck and on her upper lip. Her arms and legs began to twitch and she felt a scream building up in her throat. She had to get out of that box. She had to get out of it now.
She began kicking and clawing at the wooden surface in front of her, unable to see a thing in the darkness surrounding her. In the back of her mind, she pictured Isaac locked in a freezer by his father and she suddenly knew how it felt to be trapped and completely helpless.
A scream tore through Allison's lips as she tried to claw her way out of her own grave.
Miles away from the Beacon Hills cemetery, Lydia Martin sat up straight in her bed.
"She's not dead," she whispered.
