Liquid Silver

Twenty

Jem felt like crap for the rest of the day.

She'd left school straight after her argument with Brett. The school nurse had no issue in deeming her unwell, judging by her sickly pale complexion and the heavy bags under her eyes. She now had red rims around her eyes from crying to add to the deranged look, and her head ache was worse than ever.

Stiles collected her on his way to Beacon Hills High. She tried not to be too fragile when he told her they weren't going home, but really it made her feel like crying all over again. She leaned her head against the window for the whole journey, her eyes shut tight trying to keep herself calm.

She wanted to scream. She wanted to kick. She wanted to yell until her voice was hoarse. More than anything she wanted Brett to hold her, to make her feel like it was going to be fine the way he always did.

But he wasn't going to.

When Stiles asked if she was okay she didn't respond. She hoped he'd assume it was just the bad headache because the last thing she wanted to tell him was that she was upset over a boy.

When they pulled up outside the Beacon Hills High it was starting to get dark, and most of the other kids had left. Jem had been half listening when her brother explained what was going on. The doctors were after Hayden and they had to stop that. They didn't exactly have any safe houses so they were setting up at the high school, because it was apparently the best place to set up electromagnetic transmitters.

Jem didn't know how they'd come up with a plan like that, but she wasn't really surprised either. Apparently that's what had been keeping the doctors out of Eichen until Kira managed to interfere with the electromagnetic fields.It was supposed to mess with their frequency, or something scientific that would only make Jem's headache worse if she tried to make sense of. That was the reason Kira wasn't coming tonight.

Stiles left Jem in the locker room while the others finished setting up. Liam and Hayden were already there, whispering with each other and standing close enough so that there skin was always touching one way or another. Jem knew she should have been happy for him but it just made her feel worse.

It didn't help that Stiles wasn't even staying at the high school. He was going to watch one of the bodies with Theo, because Jem knew he didn't trust the other guy to do the job alone. The reason she had to stay at the school was so she wouldn't be home alone. Stiles was insisting that the doctors were smarter than they realised, and that they knew how to plot and scheme, so leaving her vulnerable was a dumb idea. Jem thought the concept of the doctors having any motivation other than monitoring their patients was a dumb idea but she didn't have the energy to argue.

The cold metal of the locker room benches was the only comfort to her as she lay down, still trying to ignore the pounding in her skull. She knew she wasn't being much help as the others moved the lockers around to block off entrances and kept setting up the frequency distributors, but she figured she didn't really have the strength to do much. She was glad they were all occupied though, otherwise they might have actually realised how much her 'condition was worsening', instead of focusing on Hayden's condition, and she didn't want to deal with their questions.

As lay down, her skin sore against the cold metal, she could hear Lydia and Scott whispering behind her.

"Is it just me or is Liam not aware of the second part of the plan?" Lydia asked. Jem turned her head sideways to see Liam and Hayden by the showers, gazing into each others eyes as he promised her everything was going to be okay. Her throat stung again, and her phone felt heavier than usual in her pocket because Brett hadn't text or called her.

"I'm not sure if there's even gonna be a second part of the plan?" Scott replied, quietly so Jem had to strain to hear him.

"Or if it's going to work" Lydia added, and the nerves in her voice made Jem want to know what they were scheming, because as far as she knew this was just a protection operation to keep Hayden out of the doctors hands.