♡ 𝙩𝙖𝙨𝙩𝙚 𝙤𝙛 𝙮𝙤𝙪 ♡
𝘤𝘩𝘢𝘱𝘵𝘦𝘳 seventy

somebody's watching me.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ──

"WHY THE LONG FACE?"

Elijah didn't respond to Klaus' taunts. He simply stood in the doorway with hands shoved into pitiful pockets while tracing the stitching along the hemline. He didn't turn to face Marilyn - who rubbed circles along James Garcia's back as she wiped the blood from his temples - nor did he bother watching the Sirens who glared towards his brother with bitter distaste. 

Marilyn widened her eyes at the man who wore her husband's face before narrowing them to face James. "Jim, what did you do?"

He avoided her look while the wet cotton pad sunk into his skin with its soft fibres. While his head remained dropped to the floor, his steady stare slithered across the wood - where he found them then climbing the figure of Elijah Mikaelson himself. 

His jaw clenched unevenly while rage simmered the blood that flowed through his veins. It boiled him alive and twisted every emotion into the same blistered shade of red. Although, despite his face steaming at the sight, the room suffocated in a blanket of silence and tipped into a state of frozen emptiness.

"You brought them here?" Marie spoke before Elijah could. Her hands slithered from Jim's shoulders as her sharp teeth bestowed an accent upon her words. His lips remained sewn shut but his mind ran rampant with apologetic voices that practically screamed back at her.  "To us? To Dallie?"

The Hybrid finally stepped into sight. His fingers gently traced the dusty picture frames while his yellow eyes cast a glowy hue beneath the dark shadows. The key marks had already begun to stitch themselves together beneath the glimmer of the light - but fragments of brittle metal nestled in the remaining scratches that defined his jawline.

Marilyn felt his eyes linger on her before pulling her eyes upward to hold his gaze.

And Marilyn made sure to hold it until it hurt.

"Where'd you think I got this parting gift?" He spat. "Dallas. Quite strong. Though, not strong enough." 

Colour began to drain from her face. Hands twitching at her sides and eyes crackling white, thunderstorms broke in and out of her irises between each word. She noticed how his claws had a red hue staining the nailbeds and a strong stench of saltwater etching the surrounding skin.

 The steady heart than thumped in her chest skipped a singular beat. Marilyn no longer wanted to think rationally. Reasonable, even. Staring into the Hyrbid's eyes like it were the barrel of a gun, she heard the clicks of reloading ammo stick between his teeth and his trigger finger rubbing salt in all her fresh wounds. 

"You should've seen the panic in her eyes when she realized that wasn't dear old Dad-"

Klaus flickered his eyes up in a vicious gaze - and met the swift sight of Marilyn's knuckles plunder his face. Blood coated the inner skin of his mouth and his lip busted upon impact, yet, he lifted his head back up in a merry fashion wearing nothing but bruises and an excited smile. 

His hand reached for her hair, wrapping his fingers around the strands before shoving her into one side of the doorway, then the other, before tossing her into the fireplace carelessly. Sybil grit her teeth as she swung at him - heaving and muttering curses - until she held his neck beneath her hand and she squoze as hard as she could.

Pain clouded her gut as a wisp of air shoved her away from her frame. The next thing she knew, she had collapsed into the coffee table and found herself clawing and kicking at Elijah's frame above her. 

Marilyn rose from the rubble, plucking shards of glass out of her forearms and shrugging off the plaster with a slim shiver. Klaus tore at her shoulders; bringing her up to his height before slamming her head into the walls she reached for. 

Red sticky liquid trickled down from her nose and soaked her top lip. Strong hands slithered around her lower jaw to snap her neck to the side, though, Marilyn resisted against him - pulling out her teeth and sinking them into the fingers that tried to silence her. The Siren had never heard Klaus scream as loud as he did then. 

As her teeth shred between the skin of his thumb and finger, Marilyn made sure to spit his blood back into his face.

He stumbled back, paralyzed by his own rage for a moment. A moment long enough for Seline Garcia to stab a broken broomstick into his left calf and bring him to his knees. Klaus tried to turn his head back to Marilyn but felt another sharp punch slide across his jaw. 

"Klaus!" Elijah yelped, eyes darting towards his brother and the ruthless Sirens that surrounded him. So much so, that he had forgotten about the one beneath him. Sybil swallowed the copper taste that plagued the back of her throat and adjusted her boot against the vampire's chest. 

Elijah flew backward from the kick, the walls behind him beginning to crack and split behind his heaving figure. Sybil winced as the broken wood planks that surrounded her feet failed to cushion her fall. Stealing one from the floor, the Siren tossed it from one hand to the other before raising it atop the Mikaelson's chest.

"Tell me when it hurts." She hissed. Her swing was rapid, reaching inches above his heart while the tips of broken wood began to pierce his skin.

Elijah's voice began to shake, as did his arms. "You first, love." 

Sybil felt his hands grasp around her wrists and snap them both to the side. The stake dropped from her shaky fingers and clattered an echo in her ears. She stumbled away from him. Cradling her wrists as the bone mended itself beneath the skin. "Klaus?" He used the moment to turn back to his brother, who in a way, was not prepared for the fight he had started.

He had pulled out the broomstick that had skewered his leg, only for Seline to wrap her fingers around it and pull the edge against his throat from behind. His eyes had fallen to a bright yellow now. Veins had already started to form underneath his eyes and vampiric teeth begged to shred at the women around him. 

"Shit, Klaus!" Elijah rose from the floor to dive toward his brother. Yet, a hand snaked around his collar and threw him carelessly over the couch behind him.  

James Garcia awkwardly sat alone on that same couch. Still motionless and speechless from Klaus' compulsion.

Elijah peeked out from behind it. "James, will you-" His words came to a halt as a plank of wood buried itself in the wall beside him. Then another. Then ten others. Sybil picked up the remains of the coffee table and aimed them all straight for his face. Some barely missing the similar one of James Garcia beside him. 

Klaus swung at Marilyn but she blocked each hit with one much harder than her own. When he stumbled back from one punch, Seline hit him with another one of her own. Then Sybil planted one. Then it all fell back to Marilyn once more, sending an array of punches that never seemed to end for Klaus Mikaelson.

He dropped to the floor while the mind-control of the Sirens around him frazzled his brain. He had come unprepared. And vastly underestimating the danger of messing with one of their youngest. 

Sybil pulled at his hair to bring him to his feet once more. James met Elijah's crazed look as he peeked out from beneath the couch, watching the three girls bring his brother to a grim understanding that they were not as easily overpowered as he thought. That there seemed to be a reason why Sirens always stayed together.

"Hey, Dallas."

 Elijah's voice murmured in a tone that sounded too much like Jim's. "How's that vampire blood holding up?"

Marilyn paused, twisting her head to see the Mikaelson holding her husband's phone and her daughter's very much alive voice echoing from the speaker. "... Good." The teenager's voice echoed as the supernaturals stood in silence. "Is there a reason it shouldn't be?"

Elijah wore a smug look. "No reason. Just wanted to hear your voice, kiddo. Nice talk."

"You're so weird."

His face scrunched up into one that wore offense but before he could speak, she had already hung up. Tension rose high in the Garcia family home as all three sirens turned to glare at Klaus - who himself, shrugged innocently. "I never said I killed anyone," he murmured. "Yet."

"This is the same Klaus that Katherine Pierce feared?" Marilyn mocked. "Surely not."

"I can still kill you-"

"If you wanted to, you would've already." Marie stepped backward while pulling at her strained shoulder. "You were pulling your punches. Why?"

Klaus tipped his head upwards while pressing his lips together. "I wanted to fight fair-"

"Bullshit," Marilyn pressed her finger against his chest as she pushed him further. "You never fight fair. Why are you here?"

"I was going to kill you all. Guilty." He wiped the blood from his nose as he spoke. "But your enthusiasm for family charmed me, I'll admit. I suppose incoming doom makes you very daring."  Klaus snickered while brushing off the bruises they caused - which barely even hurt. "Although, your worry for me, brother, very appreciated." 

Elijah blinked confusedly. As did James. 

"Incoming doom?" 

Klaus shook the dust from his suit jacket and clicked his tongue mockingly. "Like I wouldn't know what the Dread Doctors are."

Seline clenched her jaw. "We're handling it."

The Hybrid deadpanned the women and rolled his yellow-tinted eyes. "Very badly by the looks of things." He took an inch closer to her face. "I'll cut you goldies a deal, hm?"

"I'm sure you've heard about the Fork of Arcadius, no?" He circled them, bloodthirsty and shark-like. "I've been looking everywhere for it. Thought it was a myth. Imagine my surprise when a man with my brother's face shows up on my doorstep.. telling me about his Siren daughter."

Marilyn shot a glare at her ex-husband.

"Well, I'm sure you can work out the rest." He beamed before dropping his smile into something much more sinister. "Where is it?"

"What, so you can control us? Hard pass-"

"And witches, which everybody seems to forget. Anything with psychic power." Klaus grew more impatient by the minute. "I have mind-control of my very own, thank you. A hunger that drives me up the wall and strength that could crush you goldfish into dust. You prove useless. I am asking politely, which I only ever do once. Where is it?"

"What do we get in return?" Sybil crossed her arms. "You said you'd cut us a deal. What's the deal?"

Klaus ran his tongue over his teeth and held his hands behind his back. 

"Well, the Cure, of course. Humans are worthless to the Doctors." He pulled out the capped blood from his pocket and toyed with it between his fingers. "Thing is, I only have one dosage."

"So, who's gonna be the lucky Siren?"

⊱ ──────ஓ๑♡๑ஓ ────── ⊰

"Dallas."

The teenager shook her head from her thoughts. Ignoring the odd phone call from Elijah Mikaelson and instead fixated her eyes on the boy beside her.

"How is he?" Scott McCall lit up the room like a ray of sunlight. Ignoring the wounds that stained his own skin and helping those patch up their own. He always cared more about others than he did himself.

But Dallie couldn't even begin to think about his question.

And part of her wasn't too sure if she wanted the answer. 

Grief did a funny thing to the mind. Twisted idealistic membranes into indecipherable mazes, torturing the soul with remnants of the unknown and fear of the decaying future. As the universe held your fate in his steady hands - fingers carved from mountain rock and blood of riverbanks flowing through its veins - there was always a chance you might slip between them. 

She remembered how he gripped the edge of his seat. How he listened to the wind slip between hallways as if it held its breath with him. A pain even she couldn't soothe. 

Dallas could protect Stiles from demons, werewolves, vampires, and whatever else hidden in the woodworks of Beacon Hills. And she would do tremendously, as the thought of anything else scorched her once icy heart.

But as she felt the lingering hands of Klaus Mikaelson at her throat, Elijah Mikaelson in her shadow, Dread Doctors in her path, and fragments of boy in her teeth - she wondered if she brought more harm than her worth.

"He's good," She turned her head to the werewolf while platforms readjusted against the linoleum. "'Atleast... I think... I hope." Her words muttered through a sharp inhale that wavered cold air over her primrose lips. "I don't know. It's not like he'd tell me if he wasn't."

Scott frowned. He'd be the first to admit it - he had affinity for saving people. Destined to be that beacon of support that he never had. "Is he still here?"

Dallas quirked a singular brow before nodding. "Yeah, he's upstairs." The teenager trailed off; noticing his heavy breathing and panicked averting eyes. "Why... what's wrong?"

Scott noticed the red claw marks hide from beneath her hair and the worrylines begin to form on her face, but decided not to mention either. 

"Parrish found Lydia - he's bringing her in," Scott gently pulled at her arm while her head spun the other way to look for the Banshee. "Listen, I need you to stay with her while I go find Stiles. Her body temperature is way down and she's on the edge of hypothermia-"

He knew she'd object. To challenge whatever authority he had. As he always knew she would growing up. "Scott, I'm not a doctor, I can't-"

Interrupting her with a stern tone, Scott McCall lowered his voice. "Her mind's gone, Dallas, and you're probably the only person I trust that can bring it back." He kept a steady gaze on her. "To bring her back."

Dallas felt guilt sting at her ribcage and oxidize the bone. She hated the way Scott stared down at her with pleading eyes. She hated the unease in his voice. The way his chest rose and fell as he awaited her answer. The way they depended on her. The way she was afraid to let them down.

The way she knew she already had.

"Okay." Dallas inhaled sharply, dropping the coffee cup into the trash beside her and rubbing her hands against her jeans until they clammed up with warmth. "Okay, yeah, I will. I promise."

Dallas felt him place a hand reassuringly on her shoulder before nodding along with her before fading into the crowded hallways. Scott had no doubt in her whatsoever. Which sometimes felt misplaced. The Garcia, however, had heavy doubt in herself. With the world sitting on her shoulders and denting the muscles, she often wondered when she'd end up crumbling with it.

Her hands paused at her hips as the doors flew open. With squeaky wheels and misty eyes, Parrish steered in a stretcher filled up with pale skin and a tussle of red hair. Her hands draped over the soft cushions and her gaze remained still as she stared dimly at the labyrinth of hallway lights above. Dallas noted that she looked doll-like. Porcelain and capturing an essence of a hollow body. As though her frame lay there - Lydia did not.

The metal bars were cold underneath her touch while she towered over the Banshee. Her heart speeding at an accelerated rate almost as if it were trying to beat itself out of her chest. "Where was she?" The words flew out from behind her teeth as hands began rubbing up and down her arms to increase body heat. 

Dallas didn't react to the extreme coldness of the girl's skin, simply running her fingertips across each frosted molecule with ease. "The woods." Parrish swallowed anxiously. "Lay right next to this big tree stump."

Dallas felt the world sink that much lower into her shoulders. "God, what has Theo done to you?" She muttered beside Lydia's ear while crouching down to meet her height. As she expected no response came. Just the slow breathing that reminded her she was alive. 

A swarm of doctors surrounded Dallie. They pulled her hands away from her skin and fingertips away from her temples as they began prodding her with all kinds of tools. "Eighteen-year-old female, potentially hypothermic." The doctors commented while pushing both Dallas and Parrish out of view. 

Dallas cradled her hands around herself as she watched Scott connect eyes with her from the end of the hall. His hands fell to his sides and blood dotted the inner circle of his shirt, but she didn't pay any attention to her, just the firm nod that they'd have to set things right.

Even if it came with dire consequences. 

Scott ducked out of view as the iron doors slammed before his eyes, chipping away at the sight of Dallas and Parrish before him. His body instantly collapsed against the metallic walls while pain ate at his sore muscles. Winces managed to whisper from his cold lips as he tried to soothe his pulsating body - although, as the elevator dinged loudly in his ears and the desperate shouts of Stiles Stilinski entered his ears - Scott realized he could do no such thing. 

Stiles' face glimmered through the glass panels of the double doors. "Two hours ago, he was fine." He hissed to the doctors who tried to console him with gentle hands and understanding pleas. "Now it looks like somebody took a baseball bat to his neck."

"-There could have been some minor internal-"

Stiles snapped back. "Did you say minor internal? Since when is anything internal minor?" His voice boomed through the doors that Scott found himself approaching. 

Melissa tried to interrupt. "Stiles.."

"No, I need to know what's going on with him, okay?" The agitated teenager didn't notice his best friend linger in the hallway. "Dr. Geyer, somebody needs to tell me what's happening -- somebody needs to tell me what's happening to him!"

Scott caught a glimpse of his mother through the cracks of the doorway. A worried expression staining her features and a tired look veiling across her eyes. "We don't know." 

Yet, just then, Scott met the disgruntled gaze of Stiles Stilinski. His shadow crept closer through the doors and his feet practically buried themselves in the ground before him. The werewolf folded his eyebrows gently towards the boy he saw as a brother, but instead, felt hands grip his collar and toss him angrily into the wall before shoving him to the floor. 

Stiles hovered above him as he murmured out a cluster of pained groans. "Where were you?" he hissed as Scott struggled to relieve the pressure against his neck. "You trusted him. You believed him!"

Melissa appeared behind him and tugged at his flanneled shoulder. "Hey.. Hey!"

The Stilinski ignored her and continued to tighten his grip around the boy's neck. "Right, huh? So, where were you?" His voice darkened. "Where the hell were you?"

Multiple doctors struggled to pull the teenager from his best friend's thwarted body. "Stop it!" Melissa called out from the grunts as Stiles felt security officers snake their hands around his arms to restrain him. 

As Stiles finally latched away from Scott, burning glares into his head, he finally calmed his inner storm. "Okay, okay, all right." He swallowed dryly before feeling their grip on him loosen. 

Scott avoided his look while readjusting his jacket atop his shoulders. "Look, your dad's not the only one who got hurt."

Stiles rolled his eyes distastefully. "Oh, you'll heal." 

The werewolf flickered his gaze down to the trails of blood still seeping from his chest before pulling the jacket zippers over his chest. "I'm not talking about me."

⊱ ──────ஓ๑♡๑ஓ ────── ⊰

Dallas wasn't allowed near Lydia. Natalie didn't want any of the pack near Lydia. They had caused this, she said. They were to blame, she said. They were all nothing but monsters.

Dallas didn't blame her. As the sight of Lydia's stiff body being rolled away to Eichen House clouded her motionless eyes, there was no way she could dare to disagree.

"It could be a side effect of shock." 

Parrish's voice broke her from her thoughts as she looked up. "She's catatonic." Stiles shook his head in dismay while tired eyes rummaged over the faces he had grown to know so well. "It was Theo digging his way through her mind." 

Melissa quirked a brow. "Why would he do that? What's he looking for?"

Scott pressed his hands against the table and met Dallie's eyes. "The same thing he's always looking for. An advantage."

"And what did he gain by trying to kill Mr. Stilinski?" She leaned forward. "I don't get it."

"He did everything to make sure i'd be alone with Liam."  He chewed on his bottom lip. "Theo wanted to make sure no one would be there to stop him from killing me."

She felt Stiles stiffen next to her and the aroma of anger suffocate the room. "Okay, so he gutted my dad as a distraction." 

"We need to find this kid," Parrish murmured out while Melissa sent burning glares into his back.

"Isn't that a little dangerous? Especially since he almost killed my kid?" Melissa scoffed to the Deputy. Alpha or not, she always had her son's best interest in mind. Even if it came off as a little suffocating at times.

Stiles felt chaos erupt around him and didn't bother interacting with any of it. "Yeah, but he said he didn't want my dad to die." 

"And you believe him?"

"He told me where to find him." He took a step back and felt the doors dig into his shoulders. "So, maybe he also knows how to save him."

"So what, you just want to talk to him?" Dallas widened her eyes while turning to the lanky teenager. "And if he kills you?"

"If it saves my dad, then so be it."

Dallas couldn't believe the words she was hearing. But at the same time, she knew exactly why he said them. 

Scott stepped forward. "I'll come with you. He doesn't know that I'm alive-"

Stiles shook his head at both of them. "I'm going by myself." He reached for the door. "I just need to talk to him. Not fight him."

Dallas furrowed her eyebrows. "Stiles, you can't go alone." She swallowed with pleading eyes he had to turn away from. 

"We don't even know where to find him." Parrish reminded him through the tensed silence. 

Stiles paused infront of the exit doors and picked at the paint that chipped the wood. "We don't have to find him." he managed to spur out a weak smile. "He'll come to me."

Dallas didn't want to watch him go. He had promised they'd do everything together - that neither for them would ever leave. And while she had kept her cluster of secrets from him - and broke that rule for his own sake of mind, Dallas had never expected to be on the outside of things.

"Stiles-"

He disappeared through the doors quicker than she could mumble the words out. Leaving Dallas alone, yet surrounded by tons of people, like he promised he wouldn't.

"Let him." Scott appeared behind her with a consoling voice. "He doesn't need our help, Dallie."

That didn't mean she didn't need his. A part of her wanted to tell him about Elijah. About Klaus. About her fucked up family causing all kinds of problems these days and her comfort zone getting small enough to suffocate her. Stiles always did seem to make things seem alot better. Yet, Dallas had to keep the bottle sealed shut for now - and hope the glass didn't break too soon.

"I don't care."

The wooden doors were coarse against her hands, splintering wood and peeling paint resting against her palms as she pushed against them. She saw the Stilinski's flanneled back and gelled hair soak up her sight at the end of the hall. 

"Stiles-"

Her shoulders sunk into her back as he ignored her calls. Once Stiles had something in his mind, there was no changing it. 

Dallas chewed on her bottom lip while losing herself in her own thoughts. She was sick of sitting on the sidelines just because Scott and Stiles told her to. Don't get her all wrong, Dallas was torn up inside like trashed love notes and wanted nothing more than to make it up to the both of them for all the things she had done - but that didn't include sitting down and shutting up. That wasn't one of her strongest qualities.

Quirking a singular brow, the teenager pressed her glossed lips together and craved to cause a little mischief for the Chimera. 

Without their puppet orchestrating each attack, where would the Dread Doctors be?

The Siren blinked between the hall before her, Stiles still in view, and then blinked to the one behind her, a large exit sign hanging above. Turning in opposite directions - Dallas and Stiles split up - one walking towards the lion's den and one towards the very lion itself.

⊱ ──────ஓ๑♡๑ஓ ────── ⊰

Dallas muttered incoherent curses as mud soaked up around her boot and cold air pricked the fingers that held the flashlight. 

Walking around in the woods alone is never a good idea, Dallie. She thought. But who does she really have to be afraid of?

Her eyes narrowed as snapping twigs echoed through the chirpy hollows and hoped she didn't just answer her own question. Dressed in an attire that was not appropriate for hiking - a white sundress clipped underneath one of her boyfriend's flannels - the Siren shuddered as she felt goosebumps prick her bare skin.

A musky stench of death misted her nose and clutched every crevice of her lungs. With each step closer she took, the stronger it became. The teenager stood under a stiff overhang of trees while peering eyes watched her through the slender gaps of bark.

 A sticky eeriness clung to her skin and dug underneath her fingernails as she tried to scratch it away. Suddenly, treading in the woods alone became much stupider with every passing moment than it was before.  "You're fine, Dallie." The Siren lied to herself. "You're just fine."

"Are you?"

Dallas spun her head. 

"Who's there?"

The darkness answered, and for a moment, Dallas felt the same as she did inside the video store all those years ago. Alone and helpless. Stuck in a place she wasn't meant to be. A sickly case of the wrong place at the wrong time. 

Dallas then felt the mud sink around her as a stray boot took an inching step closer to her. Her eyes followed up the black laces, the dirty blood-splattered leather, to the gritty brown overcoat until they lingered on the rusty steam-punk mask that wore a wicked smile. His gloved fingers rose to her gaze and trickled fingers in a taunting wave.

She felt a lump form in her throat and her head shake to the side. Within moments, her steady creeping melted into a full-on sprint, dodging the creature that reached for her. It was a foul attempt, though, as she ran right into the chest of another that placed his slippery gloves across her skin to steady her - clearly infatuated by the tainted blood that ran through her veins.

Dallas hated the foreign fingertips that traced her skin and shrugged the hands off her. The wind around her felt much colder than before. The eyes that sunk into her were much deadlier than she remembered. Oh, Dallie, why couldn't you have sat down and shut up?

Gritting her teeth together, Dallas ducked the oncoming swing as one tried to slither its suffocating hands around her neck and pull her into its grasp. She dodged the other, not bothering to look back as she heard the shuffling sprint against the leaves behind her. All she had to do was run. Dallas was often fronted with the same choice.

Fight or flight.

With fresh claw marks sitting above the ones Peter Hale graffitied her with so many years ago, Dallas decided she'd rather run than be another pretty chew toy for Beacon Hills' baddies.

And Dallas had something to live for. Not that she didn't before, but this time, Dallas had begun to feel the wounds inside of her slowly patch up with each new person that entered her life. Each one pulled at the string to stitch her wounds up that much tighter than before. A family that was just as messed up as the town around her - but a family, no doubt. 

Derek Hale helped soften the bruising.

James Garcia kept the wound clean.

Malia Tate shared the trauma - comparing with a wound of her own. 

Scott McCall, Sybil, and Seline Garcia, all offered something to fall back on when she inevitably stumbled.

And Stiles Stilinski the heart-printed bandaid slapped on top to make everything feel that much better.

Dallas felt her legs carry her through the woods with the wind whistling against her ears and rustling trees whispering to never stop. Not even if her ankles buckled. Or if branches and thorns scratched her skin. Not even if her heart beat out of her chest and fell onto the muddy floor.

She'd have to leave it there. She couldn't stop.

Her feet ran without her body while stray roots slipped atop her boots and dragged her to the floor. Dallas could barely think as her fingernails dug into the dirt while shadows poured over her slumped slouch. He pushed her to the side with his boot while restraining her incessant clawing and kicking, straddling her and pushing down on her ribcage with his knee to keep her still.

Not the wounds, she thought. Don't rip them open again. Don't take her away from those she loved. 

Back pressed against the dusty leaves and previously white sundress becoming stained with mud, Dallas felt her hair fall behind her shoulders as she clawed up at the masked figures that leaned over her with sadistic glee.

Her boots kicked out - one landing right into the glass of a mask - and shuffled across the forest floor as they stumbled away from her. Dallas didn't care if she had to claw her way back to town. She'd do it with broken ribs and bleeding skin if she had to.

A gloved hand gripped around her ankle. 

Dallas could maul and slash her way through the masks of the Dread Doctors all she'd like. Nothing cut through. Not even a penetrating glare of white eye that brought every man she met to his knees.

These were not men - nor were they human.

And Dallie? Hope had fallen lost. The golden necklace snapped from around her neck as she was dragged across the muddy floor, the forest doing anything and everything to keep its clutches on her. Yet, with a chemical-soaked cloth pressed against her mouth and her aggravated kicking falling tired, Dallas Garcia couldn't fight the darkness hitting her.

And she couldn't fight off the Dread Doctors alone. Not when they threw her over their shoulder like old luggage and kicked away her necklace like a useless souvenir. They didn't care that she was hurt - bleeding over their jacket lining after having her throat tossed around by a Hybrid.

Dallas realized something as her hands grew limp over the back of the man who carried her. hey didn't want to rip open her old wounds. They wanted to create new ones. Physically and mentally, it didn't matter.

She was a bunch of broken pieces glued together anyway. Doll parts that nobody wanted. 

To them, Dallas Garcia was not a person - but an idea. An idea that all a Siren was, to them at least, was cursed blood and a feminine figure.  

Well, with a feminine figure came feminine rage. And rage was human emotion - something the Dread Doctors were obviously not. And something they could not possibly prepare themselves for. 

⊱ ──────ஓ๑♡๑ஓ ────── ⊰

Stiles Stilinski sat on the steps of his staircase as Theo Raeken's shadow poured over him. His hands were clasped together and fingertips tracing his knuckles just as his girlfriend once did. 

His eyes dropped to the sneakers before him as they stopped behind the thin line of mountain ash. Theo ran his eyes over his faulty attempt at protection before stepping it over with condescending ease. They then climbed the stairs behind him and sat comfortably next to Scott, who hid behind the wall above them. 

Stiles chucked crumpled black cloth towards the Chimera and forced tears - and while most were fake, real ones he had held in slipped through. "You killed my best friend?"

Theo ran his hand across the fabric suspiciously. "Let's be honest, Stiles. Was he still really your best friend?"

"Are you going to let my father die?" Stiles ignored his question and blinked rapidly from the blinding light pouring around the Raeken's torso.

"If I wanted him to die, I wouldn't have told you where you can find him." He tossed the fabric aside. Stiles rose to his feet - slowly, though. He kept a watchful eye on the supernatural before him.

"Then why are they saying his body is shutting down?" He questioned bitterly. "That some toxin's poisoning him and they don't know how to stop it." 

Theo split a grin. "Bet Dallie thought what she did would work, huh?" 

"Don't fucking call her that." Stiles quickly rose to his feet, chest rising and lowering as angered breaths escaped through his gritted teeth. He thought about how good it felt to punch Theo - and how much he wanted to do it again - and again. and again. And how many times he'd have to until he couldn't even form the words on his lips anymore.

The Raeken didn't take a step back. Instead, he seemed to adore the reaction and muttered it once more mockingly. "Dallie fed your father vampire blood. To heal his wounds." His lips dragged each word out after the other. "Which usually works, but not this time. I knew she'd have some trick up her sleeve."

Stiles didn't have the time to feel betrayed. To be angry with her. To be upset that she didn't trust him enough to tell him that. The Stilinski clenched his fists at his sides and let out a heavy breath. He didn't have the time to let his emotions get in the way. "Smarter than you, that's why."

Theo narrowed his eyes and smiled - almost as if he knew the irony of the words Stiles spoke. "Is she?" He quirked a brow. "I'm not the bad guy, Stiles. I'm just a realist. I'm a survivor. If you knew the things that I know.."

"Yeah, but what do you know?"

"I know what's coming." The Chimera hummed proudly. "I know what the Dread Doctors created.. And I know what Parrish is."

☆ word count: 5,939. ☆

a/n: (i hated this chapter so i decided to rewrite and change half of it! ignore anything that happened before this i wasn't the same person i am now) !! so i present dallie's damsel in distress era (yes ik shes capable of escape and she def will soon but i want stiles to go apeshit over it and be the secret overprotective and 'fuck everyone else' kinda bf he is  <3 )