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——

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TW: SUICIDE

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.*･｡. AN ODE TO CLARK KENT .*･｡.
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020.
MONEY WHERE YA
MOUTH IS.
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——

    "Last time I saw Scott act like that," Allison said, "It was during the full moon."

    "Yeah, I know..." furrowing his brow, Stiles rubbed at his jaw and tried to focus on what was going on. It was a little distracting with Lois getting changed in the bathroom — after what he and Luna had walked in on, she needed to change — and her not being by his side, but he needed to concentrate. "He was definitely a little off with me too, but y'know— it was Boyd who was really off. We watched him put his whole fist through the vending machine,"

    "See— it is the motel!" Lydia told them, arms crossed.

   From where she stood in the bathroom, Lois leant against the wall with a heavy sigh. She had no clue what was going on, and it made her feel sick to her stomach. What was going on?

   Following her being found by Stiles and Luna, the trio had soon been joined by Allison and Lydia who had burst in with a bunch of news paper clippings and logs about deaths. Apparently motel GLEN CAPRI kept a tally that counted the amount of suicides that had taken place in the motel — it was a horrifying thing for them to have been proud of, but Lydia had said that the woman at the front desk had been a horrifying individual, so it made sense. When she had heard gunshots in the next room, only to find no one in it, she and Allison had ventured back to the front desk and discovered that it was no longer 198 suicides on the tally. Rather, it was now 201. It had gone up by three, and they had a feeling that they knew why.

   Hence why they were all gathered in Lois and Luna's room, with the exceptions of Scott, Boyd and Isaac, and were figuring out a solution to the current problem. It seemed that all the werewolves were going crazy. Although, it appeared that so was Lois Lane, yet she was no werewolf, at all.

   Lois had tried to forget the predicament that she had been found in, for now. Being that she didn't remember — or, at least not it in the way that it was told to her — she was very willing to leave it at the door and come back to it, another time. Right now, all that she wanted was to find a way to stop Scott, Boyd and Isaac from doing something similar. In this motel, they were all at risk.

    "Okay, just hold on— alright?" Stiles shook his head, "What if it's not just the motel? The number in the office went up by three, right?"

   Luna paled, "You mean— like, three sacrifices?"

    "What if this time it's three werewolves?"

    "Scott, Isaac, and Boyd..." Allison breathed, nodding.

    "Maybe we were meant to come here," Lydia suggested. It was hard to believe for most, but not after what they had all seen.

    "But, that still doesn't make sense." Luna sat down on her bed for the night and bit at her nails, wrapping her head around their current theory. It did make sense, but it also didn't. "What about Lois? Last time I checked, Lois wasn't a werewolf."

   A silence fell over them.

Lois reached for the doorknob, but she stopped just shy of the metal. Part of her didn't want to go out and face them. Part of her didn't want to hear what they had to say, and rather stay safely in the bathroom, tucked away from harm. Lois didn't want what they could say. None of it made sense. She wasn't supernatural — she definitely wasn't a werewolf, at least. Her eyes had shone blue, but she now wondered if she simply imagined it. A lot had happened to the girl that hadn't actually happened — the faucet, the water, the doorknob — and now she questioned everything. Was it all in her head? Had the blue lights been fake? There was an unsettled feeling in her chest, and she hoped that Deucalion had been lying to her when he had claimed that she was it. Perhaps he had just been trying to worm his way into her head; it was working.

    "Last time I checked—" Lydia sighed, "—she wasn't anything supernatural. But, neither was I...." she hummed, "But then I resurrected Derek's uncle, and now I can hear people dying."

"We can think about Lois, later." Stiles sighed, rubbing at his face with his palm. He tried to rid himself of the sight of his best friend choking on water, her face pale and unmoving. They'd had to give her CPR. "What matters is we knocked her out of it, and she's fine— alright?"

"So, what do we do now?"

Sucking in a breath, Lois grabbed the doorknob and swung the door open.

"Now? We need to get out of this crummy motel."

All of the teenagers swung around to face her. They were quite relieved to see her all in one piece. Her hair was damp and tied up in a loose bun, but her new shirt was dry and there was colour to her cheeks.

"Allison, you and Lydia go find Scott." Lois instructed as she turned to Stiles and Luna, "We can go grab Isaac and Boyd, see if they're still acting strange." She didn't mention the prior events to which Isaac and Boyd had acted very strange, mainly Isaac. They all nodded and made for the door. "Right now, the best thing we can do is get them all out of this place. I really don't wanna see what happens to us, if we don't."

   Before they hadn't gotten too far down the hall, the teenagers slowed to a stop when they heard a strong hum from the vacant room next to Lydia and Allison's.

    "Can everyone hear that, this time?" Lydia croaked.

   The group turned on their heels and rushed back down the hall and to the empty room, the same one that Lydia and Allison had gotten into and found no sign of a couple shooting each other. But this time, when they tried to open the door to get inside, it had been firmly locked. Stiles tried to wiggle the handle and force the door open, but to no avail. With a breath, Lois began to help him by shoving at the wood with her shoulder, though it still wouldn't budge. They stood back and shared a concerned glance — it must have been locked from the inside, meaning it was deliberate.

    "It wasn't locked, before." Allison noted, biting on her lower lip in worry. "It sounds like someone turned the handsaw on,"

    "Wait—!" Stiles did a double-take, "—there's a handsaw?"

   Immediately, Lois' first thought had been Scott. But she recalled that Stiles had said he'd left him in their room, thoroughly zoned out and showing no signs of moving, so she started to wonder the likelihood of it being Isaac, or Boyd who had somehow found the room and gotten ahold of the handsaw. Although, she knew the vending machine that Stiles had said Boyd put a fist through was on the other side the motel, near him and Scott by the reception, and Lois highly doubted that Boyd would gone all that way for a vending machine if it hadn't been close by. It was possible that any of the three werewolves had made their way to the room, but she didn't think that it was likely.

   Lois ran a hand across her face while Stiles tried to find a way to get into the room, wincing when she rubbed at the bruise on her cheek. The girl mentally cursed Ethan for his werewolf strength, and then she froze. Werewolf strength. Wait—

    "Ethan."

    "What?"

    "There aren't three werewolves in this motel," Lois shook her head rapidly, "No— there's four!"

   Eyes widening in realisation, Stiles cursed. It then became more of a panic to get into the room, each of them putting their heads together, while Luna rushed to the front desk to find a spare key.

Soon enough, Luna has returned with an array of room keys she had swiped — no one had been at front desk, and the blonde had no time to find to correct key, so she had grabbed a handful of the keys from that floor and prayed desperately that the vacant room would be one of them.

It hadn't taken long for the girls to rummage through and find the correct key, while Stiles continued to kick the door. He swiped it from them and eventually shoved the door open, presenting the teenagers with a horrifying sight. It was the sight of Ethan, face dead and vacant, with the handsaw in between his claws, ready to slice his stomach open and sparing no second thoughts. Lois froze in the doorway; she couldn't move. She felt sick.

"Ethan, no—!"

Luckily, Stiles had acted quickly and launched himself at the alpha twin — the two boys wrestled, Lydia and Luna following.

Before Allison could throw herself into the violence, Lois had snatched her wrist to stop her. Allison turned to her confused, and asked what was wrong, but Lois didn't respond.

If this was the state of Ethan...

Then, what was going to happen to the others?

Without a second thought, or another word, Lois pushed away from the room and headed towards the stairs. She stumbled over her feet in the blind hurry, but managed to recover before she had fallen down the staircase completely. She scrambled down each step, taking them two by two, her mind kicking into overdrive.

"Lois? Lois!"

    "Find Scott!" Lois yelled, "Allison— you need to find Scott!"

"What?" Allison's eyes were wide. "What about—?"

"If Ethan found a handsaw— then, what about Scott? What about Boyd and Isaac? What else is there for them to find in this freaking motel?"

Lois hadn't stuck around long enough to know if Allison had listened to her and gone to find Scott, but judging by the footsteps that sounded above her, she could only assume that she had. After all, Stiles, Luna and Lydia could deal with Ethan — there were three other werewolves to be located, and if Ethan had gone crazy enough to try and gut himself, who knew what the boys would get up to? How did they know that they wouldn't try the same thing?

How did they know that they wouldn't try worse?

They didn't. And that was why Lois Lane rushed from room to room, asking fellow teammates if they knew where Isaac and Boyd were staying. It had been a wild goose chase, but she eventually found their room and slammed her fist on the door. No answer.

   She ignored the pain in her bruise knuckles and tried again, then again, and then again.

   Still nothing.

    "Isaac? Boyd? Hey—" Lois tried the handle, "Open the door!"

   Another failed attempt, no answer from either beta; Lois pursed her lips. She grabbed the pin from her hair and separated it with her teeth, crouching down and sticking the small piece of metal into the lock. It was a rough battle with the mechanism — being that her pin was no good substitution for a key — but with a lot of wiggling, Lois heard a satisfying click! and let herself in.

What she had found surprised her: nothing.

Nothing, at all. The room seemed completely empty. There was no sight of Isaac, nor Boyd, and if it weren't for the two gym bags on the floor, she likely would have figured that the room wasn't even occupied.

    "Isaac?" Her voice was light as she stepped into the room, her eyes flickering about. "Boyd? Uh— anyone home...?"

   It was eerily quiet, and Lois found herself questioning whether she had been too late. Perhaps the motel had already gotten to the two betas and they had already lost it; perhaps they were gone.

   For a brief moment, she was ready to turn around and decide that they had gone elsewhere, until she heard water dripping. Her brows knotted together and her nose crinkled, and Lois turned her sights back to the room, and her eyes focused themselves onto the bathroom door. Lois waited, holding her breath. The water was so faint that she might have missed it — she would have missed it, if Lois had been her old self. But the droplets of water were intent on finding her ears, and they were intent on being heard. It was as if the water had spoken to her, as if it had told her to follow their voice and open the bathroom door. She would want to know what was in it, they told her. She would want to know who.

   Lois inched towards the bathroom, slowly. She held her breath as she reached for the doorknob, twisting it clockwise and pushing.

"Someone's drowning!"

Her head snapped to the left, and she spotted Lydia, Luna and Stiles racing towards Isaac and Boyd's motel room, their figures
deep silhouettes in the night. She wasted no time in shoving the door open and falling into the bathroom. A hand flew to her mouth as her jaw dropped, lips parted, and her eyes welled with tears.

"Boyd?"

Reality set in and Lois screamed, sinking to her knees in front of the bathtub and shoving a hand to find the plug. There was no way that she could get the safe off his chest, but it seemed that her shaky hands were no use, either. She couldn't find the plug.

    "Stiles— Stiles!" She cried, "Help me! I can't— I can't unblock the drain!"

   In seconds had the boy moved her aside, pulling up his sleeves and taking her place. "He blocked it. He blocked the drain with something— I can't get to it!"

    "What do we do?" Luna asked, "What do we do, Stiles?"

   He seemed to panic for a moment, but then set his gaze upon the safe on Boyd's chest. Stiles waved his hands and pointed at it, nodding to himself as he placed his hands under it. It felt as if his fingers were being crushed by merely wiggling it away from Boyd's ribs enough to grip it, though he pushed on.

    "Here— help me!"

   The four of them started to lift the safe, but it didn't do much.

   It didn't do enough.

    "Is he dead?" Lydia stressed, her wet hands pushing her hair out of her face. "How long can a werewolf breathe underwater?"

    "You think I know that?"

   Lois rubbed at her wet cheeks with her wet hands. At least her tears would be masked by the bath water; still, it made her feel no better about the drowning werewolf. It was Boyd. Vernon Boyd; the kid who had used to annoy her at skating practice, who she hated, who she had no idea had been in love with her for years, until that very night. Lois had no idea about Boyd liking her, and now he was drowning. And they couldn't save him. They had to save him.

    "Come on! There has to be something we can do," eyes welling up with new tears, Lois tried to move the safe again. When it did not budge, she cried loudly and hit the bath, "Come on!"

Stiles wrapped an arm around her from behind and tried to stop her from hitting the tub once more, but she pulled out of his grip. The boy moved and slipped on water but caught himself, wincing when his elbow hit the heater propped on the wall. "Ow!"

"Are you okay?" Luna rushed to help him stand, and he nodded numbly.

"Wait, a sec— the heater..." Peering between the heater and the bath tub, Stiles started muttering to himself. He suddenly clapped his hands together, "The heater—! Ethan came out of it when he touched the heater!"

"What?" Lois wiped her tears, not understanding.

"It's heat! Heat, fire— heat does it, alright?"

"So..." Lydia guessed, "We need something hot?"

"We need fire."

Scoffing, Lois spoke in exasperation, "He's underwater, Stiles!"

"Yeah, I'm aware of that!" He retorted.

"Wait, wait..." brows furrowed, the redhead thought aloud and nodded once, "...the bus. On the bus, they'll have emergency road flares. They have their own oxidisers; they can burn underwater!"

For a moment, Stiles didn't believe that even existed.

"Are you serious?"

"Yes, go!"

He didn't waste any time before darting out of the door, limbs flying as he scrambled to get to the bus in good time — that left the three girls to try and heave the safe off of Boyd, where he had gotten it from they didn't know. After a minute or two, they all fell away, huffing and puffing, having hardly moved it an inch.

Lois breathed in deeply, feeling her chest constrict. She knew that she was already panicking and if she didn't stop herself now, it would only escalate, and then what help was she? If she didn't calm herself down now, Lois knew that it would only make their attempts of saving Boyd even more futile. If she didn't calm down and wait for Stiles to come back with those flares — if that would even work — it was likely that the situation would only get worse. Boyd's life depended on this. It depended on them. And if they didn't save Boyd, then what chance did they have of saving Scott before it was all too late? Of saving Isaac?

    "Isaac..." she murmured.

    "Lo?" Lydia looked concerned, "You okay?"

    "Isaac—" Lois breathed. She then repeated his name, louder, standing up from her knees. "What about Isaac?"

    "Wait, you didn't find him?"

    "He wasn't here!" She defended herself to Luna's words, which weren't accusing, but Lois knew that it was her fault, anyway. He hadn't been there, and she hadn't looked for him. Rather, Lois had temporarily forgotten about Isaac. "I— I need to find him!"

"You don't even know where he—"

"I don't care!"

"Lois, wait—!"

But, she didn't. Lois stumbled up and away from the bathtub and out of the bathroom. She slammed the door behind her and twirled on her heel, gasping for air and a glimpse of sanity.

Lois was about to leave when she heard whimpers, her body stiff and frozen as she tried to figure out why she could hear them — it was only her, Lydia, Luna and Boyd in the motel room, wasn't it? And the whimpers certainly weren't coming from them. Nor were they coming from Stiles seeing as he had yet to return, and that only really left one person for it to be...

Slowly, the girl lowered herself onto her knees. Lois gripped onto the edge of the sheet that hung over the side of the bed and then counted to three, mustering up enough courage to lift the sheet to see who was underneath.

"Please don't be full wolf," she mumbled, "Please don't be..."

To her relief, she didn't find a fully turned werewolf.

To her dismay, however, what she found was much worse. Under the bed, Lois found a trembling and teary-eyed boy: Isaac Lahey.

A layer of sweat soaked his forehead, and his top set of teeth were chattering against his bottoms. He was red in the face and his whole body was shaking, as if he were very cold but also very hot, all at once. She had never seen Isaac in such a state, only when he had changed on his first full moon and Derek had been the one to gain control — but, this was different. Isaac hadn't turned. At least, not fully. The only thing wolf-like about Isaac right now, was the glowing amber of his eyes. Other than that, he simply looked like he was having a breakdown. Which, if she were honest, did hurt Lois' heart — although she wasn't entirely sure why — but she supposed it was better than him trying to kill himself, as Boyd was. In that sense, Lois was glad he was having a breakdown.

"Hey..." Lois near-whispered. He flinched, cowering away and letting out another whimper. Trying not to startle him, the girl made her tone even softer, "It's okay— sh..."

It was a stark contrast to how she had seen him, earlier. When Isaac had come to her room, he had been silent and sinister. The amber glint in his eyes had been conniving, whereas now it was fearful. Isaac looked afraid, terrified even, and it occurred to Lois that this was the motel making him act both ways.

Her heart sank in her chest.

He'd played her as a pawn in a game, yet again.

Shaking it off, she tried again; "Isaac, it's okay. You can come out, alright?"

"No— no, no... no, I— I can't—" Isaac stuttered, "No, I can't. I can't fix it, I can't— I can't fix it, Lois. He said I can't come out,"

"Who? Who said that?" She gently pried.

"My— my dad," he cried, a sudden sob passing his lips. It broke Lois' heart to see him this way, and she felt a tear trail down her cheek. "Lois, I— I can't fix it."

"I— I'll help you,"

Isaac looked up.

"You will?"

"Yeah— of course," Lois nodded with a tight smile, "If you come out, I'll help. Whatever it is... we'll fix it together."

He seemed tempted by the offer. For a split second, Lois was sure that Isaac was going to slowly wriggle out from under the bed, but he then flinched and covered his ears as Stiles flung his body back into the motel room while juggling two flares in hand.

"I got them! I got them!"

Lydia and Luna came out of the bathroom and watched in anticipation as he played with the flares nervously. He didn't know what to do with them, "What do I do? How do I do this?"

"The cap— it's like a match!" Lydia breathed, "The cap's a match!"

The boy nodded and dropped one to the floor in his fumbling, pulling the cap and began to strike it like a match. It didn't work to begin with and Luna rushed over to help him. She snatched it from him and gave it a try, managing to create a small spark. The two gave Lydia a sharp look when she clapped her hands and told them that they needed to hurry, but they soon succeeded in setting the flare alight, and a bright red hue cast over the room. Lois put a hand over her eyes as the other three made for the bathroom to try and save Boyd. Rather than following them, the Lane girl glanced at the discarded flare on the carpet — without anymore thought, she pushed herself towards it and tore off the cap.

Lois nearly dropped it when Boyd roared from the bathroom and the safe went flying into the wall, though she managed to keep herself together enough to ignite the flare. She stared at the light, only for a moment, completely entranced, and then turned back to the bed. Lifting the sheet, Lois Lane nodded to herself; it wasn't time to be the damsel.

It was the time to be Superman.

"Isaac?" Lois called, watching him turn to her. She grimaced.

"Got something for ya..."

His eyes widened at the sight of the flare — this wasn't going to end up well, was it?

——

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