Liquid Silver

Twenty One

"Promise me Scott?"

Jem tuned back into the conversation, swallowing her sick feeling as Lydia wrapped an arm around her shoulder in an effort to comfort her, though she seemed more freaked out about that episode than Jem did.

"I'll do everything I can to save her" Scott responded. "I promise"

Jem wished he hadn't said that.

Hayden interrupted suddenly and Jem turned to see her digging though her bag. "I forgot my pills" she winced. "I have a bottle in my locker, I can get them but-"

"I'll get them" Scott cut her off. Jem didn't like the idea of Scott leaving. She and Lydia were essentially zero help in the scenario where the doctors made their way in here, and Hayden was too unreliable to depend on for claws or fangs. Liam was just one kid. But Scott seemed to either not care, or not realise as he asked Hayden her combination.

"Scott-" she began to protest but he tried to change her mind.

"I'll be gone two minutes" he insisted, before heading to the door to the corridor and moving the lockers effortlessly. Lydia followed him over, telling him she'd keep watch, and just like that their alpha was gone.

Jem leaned back, wishing more than anything that Stiles or Brett were here. Her heart was hammering against her chest and it didn't matter what she told herself, she was terrified that she'd start to lose consciousness again.

"Hayden what are the pills for?" she blurted out. She knew it might have been rude to ask but she needed a distraction, something that was going to make her keep her eyes open. Hayden didn't seem bothered anyway.

"Kidney transplant I had a couple years ago" she responded, hugging her arms against her chest. Jem realised they were equally nervous of each other. While Jem was looking at an uncontrollable beta were-something, Hayden was looking at a girl who seemed to slip into psychotic fits every time they saw each other recently.

Something about the transplant was sitting weird in Jem's mind though. She knew if Stiles were here he would have gathered something from it, and it made her think it had to be relevant somehow. She just couldn't figure out why she thought that. Her mind couldn't put things together the same way Stiles's could, but she was so sure that it was an important detail.

"Jem your arm" Liam scolded her, cutting her out of her thoughts. She looked down at her school sweater, and immediately turned her wrist over when she realised the blood had soaked through all of her layers now.

"It's nothing" she muttered, folding her arms.

"Is that from me?" Hayden mumbled, evidently ashamed of herself.

Jem shook her head. "It's not your fault Hayden"

"But it was me?" she asked, though they both knew the answer already. Jem offered a pitiful look, trying to let Hayden know she didn't blame her or anything like that.

"Trust me I've had worse" she tried to joke, but Liam didn't see anything funny about it.

"Can you show me?" he asked, holding out his hand. Jem looked down at the floor but decided there was no point in trying to hide it anymore. She turned up her sleeves again and gave Liam her hand gingerly. There was nothing intimate about it when their skin touched, she just wished his warm skin against her cold hand could have belonged to someone else.

He turned her wrist slowly and drew in a sharp breath when he saw the cuts. Hayden stepped back, a cold and distant look washing over her face as she realised what she'd done.

"It's really not that-" she had to suck in a breath when Liam brushed a finger over one of the cuts. "-bad". Neither one of them believed her. When she looked down she could understand why. It had gotten worse since this morning, and since she'd shown Brett.