Shapeshifters ¹ [Isaac L.]

JUUICHI

JUUICHI —
" I said I'm fine! "

—

Her ears buzzed with white noise as she struggled to form a coherent sentence in the jumbled mess that was her mind.

" What— " Miya's mouth felt like cotton as her arms slipped limply from their place around Isaac's neck "— what do you mean Lyds is missing? " Stiles bit his lip so harshly he tasted the iron tang of blood in his mouth.

" I can't find her anywhere, " he said in a rush. " She went to find Jackson but he hasn't seen her, and I just— " he sucked in a shaky breath "— I have this feeling, Miya... " She could only nod jerkily, for suddenly she had it too. The dark forboding mass that sat heavily in the pit of her stomach.

" Okay, " she breathed, trying to assure herself than the pale boy.

Tearing her gaze away from the panicking human boy to settle them on the confused one she had her arms wrapped around not moments before.

A part of her prickled at the sight of his lost ocean eyes as he struggled to put together the pieces. If she hadn't been so wrapped up in Isaac and in the... things, he did to her, she would have never let Lydia Martin walk out of the gym alone. The more rational side of her, the side that was more human than wild animal, bit back her harsh words and glare for he didn't deserve them. It whispered to her that Isaac was not to blame for her mistakes— it was her failure and hers alone.

Her failure to watch Lydia. Her failure to keep a distance between herself and Isaac. Her failure to remain emotionally uninvested. Her failure of not taking Peter Hale's head that day in Macy's.

Most of all: her failure to remember exactly who... exactly what she was.

The fox that brings calamity.

Harbinger of chaos.

She-who-ended-a-thousand-lineages.

When had she become so... soft?

" Okay. " She repeated more surely. Evenly. Cold.

Nodding with some finality, she stepped back from Isaac and discarded whatever feelings he invoked in her.

Okay. The word sounded to Isaac more like a goodbye than a simple acknowledgment. He didn't know it then but that was exactly what she had meant it to be.

Nodding once more at Stiles, she turned her attention to the boy who had a stranglehold around her heart. For the first time, she didn't meet his searching blue eyes. The sly shine to them hardened into something Isaac couldn't quite recognize. Deep brown into impervious onyx... she was someone he could no longer recognize.

" I can't give you an explanation— " her voice was flat and lacked warmth "— but I need you to stay here. "Isaac swallowed hard, eyes darting between the stone figure of the girl he idolized and the twitchy boy who was always stealing her away.