Return ↠ Argent [2]

32. The Other Side

Drowning that night at the bridge and drowning in that tub of ice had it's differences; like how Allison was there with me now rather than before and how I was drowning now on purpose, but there was one similarity that still scared me half to death.

The never-ending void of darkness.

Either it was the whole "darkness will be around their hearts" starting to take effect on me, or it was the long stretch of emptiness that clouded my vision and my heart, but I knew that whichever it was, I didn't like it. When I had first died, I remembered sucking in that last bit of water and feeling that calmness wave rush over me, but this time, I felt nothing but pain; nothing but a dull ache.

I wasn't sure how long I had been feeling that, since when you're lost in the dark, you kind of lose track of time. It felt like one of those nightmares you have when you wake up in the middle of it and you can't move, because you're still stuck in the dream. You can't do anything but sit there and wait until you woke up, which was where I was now.

Still waiting.

Then the next thing I know, I feel water start to rush back into my lungs, enabling me to move again. When I finally snapped awake, I found myself still in the same tub, in the ice water, but only this time, I wasn't at the clinic. A bright white room stretched around me, reminding me of something similar to a parking garage; a nice one at that.

I cough and spit from the water in my lungs, but I was still breathing. Funny how after you die, you can still breathe. It wasn't until I stopped coughing when I realized that Stiles and Scott were awake now too, coughing just like me. My eyes find them next to me; soaked from head to toe, still sitting in the same bucket of ice as me.

"You guys okay?" I speak out, my voice sounding odd. I sounded like I had just smoked a pack of cigarets.

Stiles looks over at me, the most serious look on his face. "We just died. Of course we're okay."

"He has a point," Scott replies before his eyes stop on something in front of us, making me turn my head. I was confused at what it was for a moment, but then when I realized that it was a tree, I figured that it had to be the nemeton.

Scott moves first as Stiles and I follow, stepping out of the icy water and soaking the tile flooring below us. I try and ring out some of the water out of my shirt before Scott and Stiles start walking towards, starting to leave me behind. You bet your money I chased after them; no way was I going to get left behind in a place like this, wherever this place was.

We all stand around the tree trunk, staring at the largeness of it all. It amazed me that a tree could be this big, but then Deaton's voice rang in the back of my mind with how it had been a sacred place for druids. Scott's eyebrows dig as we stare at the rings around it, realizing that it looked similar to his tattoo.

I wanted to ask if we were sure we were going to do this, but it would have been pointless. We were already here, after all. Stiles and I watch closely as Scott reaches out and places his hand on the trunk of the tree, this fingers barely tracing the lines and grooves. The next thing I know, I'm blinking and I'm no longer standing in a bright white room, but instead a car.

My old car.

"The news said it wasn't supposed to rain," I hear myself groan as I stared out of the window, driving. It was strange to watch myself sit there in this old truck that was now in the bottom of that river, but what was stranger was the person sitting there next to me.

"I just wanted to go to that party," Kaitlin groans, crossing her arms as she stared out of the window. The trees fly by as she watches each and every one, her hair soaking wet as it trailed down her neck and to her shoulders.