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.*･｡. AN ODE TO CLARK KENT .*･｡.
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018.
A SILENCE
LOUDER
THAN WORDS.
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——

Lois Lane was getting sick of being asked how to stop Jared from throwing up, all over the bus.

"Just tell him to look at the horizon!"

"I've already done that!"

Exasperated, the girl fell back into her seat and kicked her legs up. She was getting a headache from being on the bus for too long and the amount of questions she kept getting, and she was feeling queasy from watching the blood seep through Scott's shirt. Since stopping Boyd from ripping Ethan apart, he had gotten worse.

"Jared, I'm warning you!" Coach said with a hard glare, "I'm an empathetic vomiter. You throw up, I'm gonna throw up, right back on you. And it will be profoundly disgusting!"

The poor kid held a hand over his mouth and gagged, his face green, "Please don't talk about throwing up.... it's not good—"

"I might throw up on you just to make a point, Jared."

"It's not good—" he wheezed, "It's not good..."

Lois grimaced. She redirected her line of sight, away from any vomit that may soon occur, and instead opted to stare at the back of Isaac's curly head. He seemed to feel her eyes upon him and turned in his seat, raising a brow. Lois shrugged. After all, she was only focusing on his giant head to stop herself from throwing up at the discussion of throwing up. If anything — his head was being used as a means of throwing up about, rather than throwing up about the topic of throw up.

Did that make sense?

The beta sent her a wink, to which Lois had rolled her eyes and looked away. She didn't need Isaac Lahey to act cocky right now, not when Scott was close to bleeding out, Jared was close to being sick, and they were nowhere near close to the cross country meet.

"Now, the rest of you— don't think we're gonna miss this meet because of a slight traffic jam..." Finstock shook his head, "...or a minor tornado warning... or Jared." He cleared his throat after he sent another glare at the boy who was pretty much ready to puke all over his lap, seat, and everything else in that bus as soon as he got the chance to. "We're gonna make this thing! Alright— nothing is gonna stop us!" Coach then made a sour face and looked at the back of the bus, unamused with the kid that held his hand high in the air above him. "Stilinski, put your hand down!"

"Y'know— there's, like, a food exit about a half a mile up." Said boy called across the bus, "I don't know... if we stop, and then maybe—"

"We're not gonna stop."

"Okay, but if we stop—"

Blowing into his whistle obnoxiously loudly, Finstock shook his head and his hands about in a wild manner. Stiles scowled at him.

"Stilinski!" He yelled. Lois groaned at the volume and threw her head back against the seat, letting it roll around until her forehead met the window with a light smack! She didn't even try to move it but Scott leant his arm around the seat and lifted her head, it now resting in his palm. "Shut it! Seriously— it's a little bus! Stop asking me questions!"

Stiles bit his knuckles, "I hate him."

"Did you call Deaton?" Lois asked, but she didn't take her head off of Scott's palm.

A small part of her figured that he was taking some of the pain of her headache, even though he should have been focused on his own pain and healing himself, but she couldn't have been sure. It might have just been the weight of her head off of her neck as it rested somewhere other than the seat, which went straight up and had no form of recline to it. Either way, Lois had gotten far too comfortable to tell him to stop. She had tried to help Scott with his wound a plethora of times; the boy was stubborn, however, and he didn't want her to help him when he insisted he was fine. But it was clear to anyone that he was the total opposite of fine — Scott was swaying in his seat, hardly awake, and black blood stained his shirt from the inside, out. That didn't seem fine, to her.

"I keep getting his voice mail," Scott muttered.

"That's it. I'm calling Luna, Lydia and Allison."

"How are they gonna help?" The omega furrowed his brows as he looked over at Stiles who was typing away on his phone, then hit ring on his girlfriend's name. "They're back in Beacon Hills?"

"No, they're not." Yawning, Lois pitched in. "They've been following us for hours, Scotty boy. I've been texting them."

Stiles nodded, "Pathetic."

The phone rang for a few moments and then Luna picked up seemingly surprised that he had called.

    "Hi, honey."

"Hey, Stiles! We're just about to walk into a movie."

Lydia piped up, "Yeah! Uh— you know, with all the popcorn and—"

"I know you guys are right behind us." He scoffed, "And no, Lois didn't tell me; I figured it out because I'm the genius in this scenario and and you guys aren't, okay? You couldn't have been any closer to the bus. Put me on speaker."

"Okay, okay..." Luna sighed, "You're on speaker. What's wrong?"

"Look— Scott's still hurt."

"What do you mean, still?" It was Allison who spoke. Lois made the effort to finally sit up and lean over the seat, despite her head banging, and carefully place Scott's hand back at his side. She bit her lip and briefly debated giving his wound another look, just to make sure, but decided against it. "He's not healing?"

"No, he's not healing." She sighed, "I think he's actually getting worse... I mean— the blood's turning black, and I've never seen it do that before. Not even when Derek got him."

"Wait— it's turning black?" They told Luna that she was right and she stayed quiet for a moment, "Well, why? What's wrong with him?"

"What's wrong with him? I don't—" Stiles echoed, "—do I look like I have a PhD in lycanthropy? Does Lois have one? No— not really." He pointed between him and his best friend incredulously, even if the girls couldn't see the movement. Lois sighed but let him get on with it. She knew that this was how he dealt with all of the problems that he didn't know how to fix: sarcasm. "How the hell are we supposed to know that?"

"We need to get him off the bus."

"And take him, where? To a hospital?"

"If he's dying— yeah." Allison sighed, "Guys, there's a rest area about a mile up. Tell the coach to pull over."

    "Yeah, I've been trying!"

    "Well— reason with him, Stiles!" Luna added.

    "Reason?" He mocked, "Have you met this guy—?"

    "Just try something!"

   The girls hung up and Stiles groaned, rubbing his face. He took a look at Lois, who was busy feeling Scott's forehead and dabbing his face with her sleeve. After a moment she turned to her best friend and shook her head. "We gotta make him pull over, Stiles."

   Knowing he had no other option, Stiles stood up.

   The bickering between him and coach went on, for a while.

    "Coach, it's five minutes for a bathroom break— okay?" The boy said, "We've been on this thing for, like, three hours—"

   Finstock blew his whistle.

    "It's sixty miles to the next rest stop—" Stiles was cut off by the whistle, "—being cooped up for hours is not good—" another blow of the whistle, "Y'know, our bladders aren't exactly—!"

   Cackling wildly, coach continued to blow his whistle in Stiles' face every time he tried to speak. Lois could tell that Stiles' tether was wearing thin, and he was slowly cracking, but she couldn't exactly intervene, just yet. She couldn't leave Scott — even if it was just for a second, she couldn't risk it. If she left before Stiles sat back with him, Lois feared he would die right in his seat.

    "Coach, this is—"

   Whistle.

    "Can you—?"

   Whistle.

    "Please— let me talk!" Stiles yelled. "I'm— every time—"

    "Get back to your seat, Stilinski!" Coach snapped; he blew his whistle on last time, the sound making their ears ring. The only bright side was that Scott sat up, covering his ears tiredly. Lois moved to cover them, for him.

    "Okay!"

   Heaving for breath after the argument, Stiles stomped back to his seat with a moody expression. He threw himself into the seat and crossed his arms.

   Lois rolled her eyes, "Seriously? Do I really have to do everything myself?"

   She jumped out of her seat and walked up the isle, passing Boyd and Isaac on the way. Both of the betas watched, knowing that if anyone was going to succeed in getting coach to pull the bus over it was going to be Lois Lane, and remained ready to stop her if she tried anything too extreme — like pushing the bus driver out of his seat and pulling the bus over, by herself. It sounded crazy, but Lois was kind of crazy. All types of crazy, actually. Isaac and Boyd didn't have a single doubt that she would pull some sort of stunt that they would all regret later. Although, perhaps not; not if she managed to pull the bus over in the next ten minutes and keep Scott McCall very much alive.

    "Coach, we need to pull over."

    "Not you too, Lane." He rolled his eyes.

    "Pull over." Lois glared at him, "We gotta pull over, old man."

    "We're not—!"

    "Look, coach— it's that time of the month, and you know what that means? That means that blood is pouring and it isn't gonna stop until we pull over in at least sixty miles! Okay?" She spat. His eyes went wide and she could feel the whole bus staring, but she didn't care. This was Lois Lane; she didn't care, at all. "If you don't pull this bus over, I swear—!"

    "We're not pulling over!"

   She gaped at him for a moment, then her jaw clenched.

    "Jared, keep your eyes on the horizon!" Coach told the boy and turned back to the front of the bus. "Eyes on the horizon!"

   Lois froze.

   Her eyes lit up.

   Spinning on her heel, Lois slid into the seat beside Jared. Isaac was staring at her from across the aisle as she did so, she could feel his eyes on her, but she ignored it. Instead, Lois smiled at Jared and leaned in close.

    "Jared..." she hummed, "Wanna feel less carsick?"

   He nodded, albeit it nervously.

    "Great!" Lois grinned, her eyes set on him. "Head between your legs and count to ten."

   Jared appeared too scared to say no to her, and whether he knew that it wouldn't work, and just make him worse, Lois wasn't sure. But Jared put his head down to his knees and started to count up to ten, nonetheless, and the girl scooted away to a safe enough spot at the end of the seat. It was a distance far enough away that Lois would be able to make a clean getaway when the bomb blew and the vomiting started. It was also a distance that she could warn the two betas to block their noses and take cover. Both of them took it quite literally, and covered their noses and mouths.

   They had been smart.

   Within ten minutes, the bus wreaked of puke and they pulled into the nearest rest stop. All of the team poured off the bus in fits of coughs and gags, and Lois grinned to herself.

    "Jared, you suck!"

   She felt a bit bad for making the poor kid puke as she watched him rush to the tree line in embarrassment, but his humiliation had been for a good cause. It gave Lois and Stiles time to drag Scott off the bus and onto solid ground; they met Allison, Luna and Lydia half-way and together, they carried him into the public bathroom that was close by.

    "Hey— somebody grab some towels, or a mop, or a new bus!"

    "How did you make him stop?" Lydia asked.

   Lois cringed, "I don't wanna talk about it."

   Once in the bathroom, they set Scott down beneath the basins and Allison and Lois lifted his shirt.

   The girls visibly recoiled, while Lois and Stiles sighed.

   It looked even worse than it had before, and that had been saying something — the wound had already looked awful. A sudden and fleeting thought crossed Lois' mind and she wondered whether they would be able to help him, or whether this kind of injury was far beyond the pay grades of six teenagers in a rest stop bathroom, but she tried to take deep breaths. They wouldn't be able to help him if they panicked, and they needed to help him.

    "Why didn't you tell us?" Allison asked Scott, teary eyed.

   The boy was barely there, "Sorry..."

    "It's okay," Lois hushed him gently, "Just— just give us a second, okay?"

   The five that were standing huddled a little ways away, but kept casting concerned glances in his direction. Scott looked weak, and Lois worried he would shut down.

    "This shouldn't be happening," shaking her head, Allison tried not to freak. "We've seen him heal from worse, than this."

    "What do we do?" Luna bit her bails, "Do we just call him an ambulance?"

    "What if it's too late? What if they can't help?"

   Stiles rubbed his face, "We gotta do something!"

    "You know..." Lydia hummed. She thought back to a book she had read on the way, and hoped it could be of some use, "...it could be psychological."

    "What do you mean, like— psychosomatic?"

     "Somatoformic."

   When they all blinked at her, Lydia explained; Stiles: "Yeah, somatoformic. A physical illness from a psychogenic cause." It was silent for a second longer, and she rolled her eyes and put it into even simpler terms, "Yes, it's all in his head."

    "All in his head?" Stiles repeated.

    "Because of Derek..." Eyes wide, Lois looked back at Scott. Her heart strings tugged painfully. Scott thought that Derek was his fault, when it wasn't. It wasn't his fault, at all. She had always said that, one day, his big heart would get him killed — but Lois hadn't meant it literally, "He's not healing because Derek died, and he blames himself."

    "So, what do we do?"

   Lydia pulled a sewing kit from her bag, "Stitch him up."

    "Maybe all he needs to do is just believe it's healing..."

   All eyes cast to Lois and she paled. She shook her head and took a step back, already feeling the vomit at the back of her throat. It threatened to escape, "No— no! I can't do that! No way—!"

    "I'll do it," Allison volunteered, "Don't worry, Lo. I've got this; go outside, and make sure Isaac and Boyd aren't killing Ethan."

   Lois nodded and made a beeline for the door. It was a close call but she had managed to get out in time to miss Allison pulling out needles and thread, as well as push the bile back down. She leant against the wall and sucked in three deep breaths. Breathe, Lois.

   Scott was going to be fine.

    "How's he doing?"

   She pushed away from the wall and looked up at Isaac.

    "He's..." the girl grimaced, "...doing."

   Isaac crossed his arms and stood up straighter. It was clear that he was concerned. After all, Scott had taken him in when Derek had kicked him out. Given it was for a decent reason, but at the time that Isaac needed somewhere to go, when he had shown up at Scott's door drenched and homeless, Scott had given him a place to stay. Despite any past tension, despite any gripes that the two packs had ever had with each other, Scott had taken Isaac in and Isaac considered him a friend. He was his brother, now.

"Doing? What's going on?" He asked again, "What does that even mean?"

"Well..."

"Lois." Isaac ducked to her height, "What's wrong?"

"He's not healing," she eventually caved. Lois wished that she hadn't subconsciously looked over at Ethan, "Whatever they did to him, he's not healing."

For a split second, Isaac's eyes lit up amber.

His head shot around to glare at Ethan, and his hands clenched into tight fists. Isaac's shoulder squared and his jaw set.

"This is their fault."

"Isaac—" Lois tried to reach for him, but he was already gone.

"I'm gonna kill him!"

With those words, Isaac darted towards the bus and hurled his body at Ethan. The two werewolves hit the ground and began a scuffle, though Ethan let Isaac overpower him easily. Perhaps he was just acting frail, or maybe he wasn't as strong without his twin, but either way the alpha boy allowed Isaac to punch him in the jaw, repeatedly. He didn't even try to pull away.

Lois wasted no time in rushing after him. Although, she wasn't able to do much more than watch helplessly as Isaac beat the living daylights out of Ethan — what she'd been told to prevent.

"Boyd! Boyd—" she grabbed his shirt, "—you've gotta make him stop! Boyd!"

The beta looked at the fight, "I should be helping him."

He shrugged her off and proceeded to watch the fight, and Lois was left with no choice but to shove her way to the front of the crowd that had formed. When she broke through, she noticed the amount of blood on Ethan's face as he stumbled back up.

"Isaac!" She screamed, "Stop it!"

"Isaac! Hey— Lahey! Lahey, back off!" Coach instructed, but Isaac punched Ethan again. Ethan hit him back, "Cut it out!"

Looking around helplessly, and finding no sight of Scott, or any of the others, Lois cursed to herself and dropped her jacket to the floor. She counted to ten and then pushed herself closer to the fighting werewolves. Ethan was fighting back now, and she knew if she didn't stop them soon, then claws would be drawn and one of them would end up far worse for wear, than the other. She couldn't let that happen — Scott wouldn't have wanted her to let that happen. Not if she could stop it.

"Isaac!" Lois yelled, pushing in between the middle of them and placing a hand on his chest. "Stop it! It's not worth it! You both have to—"

As she turned, a fist caught the side of her face.

Lois stumbled back and the crowd went silent. She placed a hand on her cheek while two arms steadied her from behind, and she pulled her palm away to see a small trail of blood. Lois could taste it in her mouth.

Her nostrils flared as she shot Ethan a dark glare. He seemed shocked at himself too, and he gulped when Isaac let out a low growl from where he stood behind her. But it wasn't Isaac that Ethan should have bene worried about clawing his eyes out; it should have been the small girl that was seething with anger.

"Big mistake."

Because Lois launched herself, at him.

She served a hard right hook to his cheek as they hit the ground with a thump! The last time that she had punched someone so hard was when she had socked Jackson for paralysing Isaac.

It felt good.

Lois hit him right in the nose and felt the blood splatter onto her knuckles. She then gripped his hair and pounded his skill into the concrete — for a moment, the world fell quiet around her and a high-pitched ringing filled her ears. Lois felt his brain rattle in his head and she gave him another punch. She felt no guilt; Ethan had been part of the reason that Scott McCall was almost dead in the rest stop bathroom, why she had nearly been ripped apart by Isaac in the storage closet, and the reason that she was bleeding from her bust lip with a bruise forming on her cheek. Ethan was a werewolf and he would heal. Lois, however, wouldn't.

"Lois! Lois— get off him!"

She ignored Danny's desperate pleas and continued to hit and punch Ethan in every place that she could.

"Quit it, Lane!" Coach yelled, "Cut it out!"

Lois managed to get another smack before she was yanked off of Ethan by two large arms that wrapped around her waist. The girl kicked and screamed, fighting to hit him one more time, but a loud yell of her name pulled her back to reality.

"Lois!"

   For a split second, eyes flashed blue. No one saw.

"Scott...?" She breathed. He was alive.

Isaac tugged her away from a bleeding Ethan, and set her on the ground a few metres left. He tilted her head up with his finger and thumb at the base of her chin to inspect her face.

The rest of the pack rushed to join them as Finstock saw to the boy left on the ground. Scott looked both concerned and let down.

"Lois..." he sighed, "Why did you do that?"

"Hey— it wasn't her fault. He hit her," Isaac defended. He used his sleeve to dab at her lip, "And I started it."

"Woah— he hit her?"

"Well done, Stiles. You can listen and repeat," the beta sent him a tight smile, eyes squinted. Lois was yet to say anything as they all watched her cautiously. They were worried that she might explode if she was quiet, any longer. Lois Lane seemed to get the brunt of things, lately. Catching her eye, Isaac spoke softly. "Lois?"

"They're loading the bus." She rasped.

They all turned to see that she was right. Scott pursed his lips but sent her a reassuring nod, while Allison and Lydia helped him back onto the bus. Stiles and Luna followed, both with a hesitant glance at Isaac and Lois.

It was quiet, as Isaac and Lois stood there. She wiped her bloody knuckles on her pants, her fingers shaking with tension and anger from the hits, and she knew they would bruise. His face was hard.

Without a word, Lois made for the bus. Isaac followed behind, a three second space between them, and slid into the seat next to her. Neither of them said anything. There was nothing to say. The pair simply sat and waited for the bus to continue the journey, a silence in between them that spoke far louder than anything either of them could have possibly said in that time.

——

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