The Middle Child

Chapter 11

Once back at camp, Collin raced over and wrapped her up in a tight hug. "I wanted to come but Hayden said it'd be best for a smaller number." Alyson froze at the contact but soon hugged the amber-eyed boy back. She felt her legs give out and Collin held on tighter.

"Whow, Alyson? You okay?"Collin says slowly sitting down with her in his arms. Her head felt fuzzy.

"I'm fine just a bit fuzzy," Alyson says. Collin looked up at Hayden. Alyson struggled out Collin's hold and stood up again. Things slowly started to get fuzzier and she felt bile rise from the back of her throat. She stumbled behind a bush, not too far away. No one moved dared to move as Alyson started to hurl. It had blood laced in it along with all the contents of her stomach. Someone moved closer but she swatted them away. As she finished getting sick the fuzziness slowly started to disappear.

She righted herself and stumbled back to the group.

"I think I'm fine now," Alyson says taking the bottle of water Dustin offered with a thankful smile. Kai slowly came over to her and crawled into her lap. The seven faces of the group looked at her worriedly.

"Now, can you tell what the fuck that was all about?" Hayden says anger written everywhere on him from the way his hands kept curling and uncurling into a fist to the way his breathing increased. Something in her was scared to tell them what she saw, but a larger part of her told her to tell them.

She took in a long deep breath. Her eyes glued to the forest floor as she started her story, "Well, I guess I should start with my dream. It started with me being a wolf and I was running through the forest. The breeze flying through my fur and the cool air of winter ran through my lungs making them burn slightly. I thought this was just a pleasant dream until my wolf-self went to get a drink of water from the river and I saw a Skinwalker in the reflection."

"I didn't know it was a skinwalker but I knew it was dangerous so, I tried to fight it off. But as I fought it scratched me across my abdomen," Alyson says placing a hand on her own abdomen.

"I struggled to keep the thing away from my pups and slowly followed the Skinwalker inside only to hear a sickening crunch and saw my pups torn to shreds before me," Alyson pause and took another deep steadying breath.

"I honestly thought it was only a dream that I made up since I'd been having nightmares like that ever since I saw what happened to the pack," Nate, Luca, and Dylan looked at each other confused but didn't interrupt Alyson.

"But this felt so real and I felt the skinwalker rip my skin, and I felt the sickening feeling looking at my dead pups. This was only confirmed when I saw a woman while I was taking Kai out. She looked from another time. I followed her trying to help her since she looked incredibly lost. I tried to call out to her but she didn't seem to understand me. As I followed her the forest started to change and shift into something completely different. The mid-summer trees lost their leaves and changed from the birch trees and oak trees to heavy sturdy Maple trees. It seemed to turn into mid-winter."

"It turned into a completely different forest. The woman had a large gash in her side, I knew instantly that she was the wolf from my dream. I'd watched her die." Alyson paused taking a shuttering breath.

"She then showed me a campsite. The air felt heavy and sad as I looked around. I saw bodies strewn around as if they were nothing but broken children's toy. The woman told me this happened because they let their guard down. she was showing me all this she took me to another part of the clearing," Alyson says starting to break a bit and whipped away a few stray tears.

"There I saw all of you guys laying...d...dead your faces pale and eyes unmoving. She said this was my future if I didn't play my card right. Then as quick as she was there she disappeared. And I was back in my forest. And I felt like I was out of my body and everything ached. I decided to push through until we got back to camp. But it slowly started to get worse and worse until I got back to camp, and I well you know..." Alyson says snuggling closer to Kai her eyes never leaving the spot of grass.