Heh. Same here. I usually only get a cold once or twice a year. I haven't been sick in 2013 so far, though. I was last ill when I was attacked by chills before New Year's. Not being in school anymore could be playing a role, but I'm not sure.
Spoiler “So,” Claw asked, working to be casual. “How was your day?” “Great. Went for a drive. Hung out in the park.” “Sounds nice.” “Sure, sure.” Suddenly, Claw made a face. “Ienzo?” he asked. Mish heard the posh one chuckle. “Again?” “I think I’ve drunk two gallons in the last hour,” Claw explained. Forsaken and Mish both got out of the way while Ienzo came to lift Claw from the couch and take him to the bathroom. “Can I walk?” Claw asked. “My legs are so stiff.” “Are you sure?” Forsaken asked. “Ienzo’ll catch me if I trip over my feet. Which could happen pretty easily, since I can’t see them.” Ienzo set Claw carefully on his feet, keeping her hands right at Claw’s shoulders. Claw stretched his arms out in front of him, wincing a little. “That feels good,” he sighed. “Ugh, but I’m huge.” He really was. His stomach was its own continent. “One more day,” he said, and patted his stomach. Mish couldn’t help the pain that shot through her in a sudden, stabbing burst, but she tried to keep it off her face. She could hide it for one more day, right? “All righty, then. Whoops—oh, no!” The cup Claw had left on the sofa tumbled to one side, the dark red blood spilling out onto the pale fabric. Automatically, though three other hands beat him there, Claw bent over, reaching out to catch it. There was the strangest, muffled ripping sound from the center of his body. “Oh!” he gasped. And then he went totally limp, slumping toward the floor. Ienzo caught him in the same instant, before he could fall. Forsaken was there, too, hands out, the mess on the sofa forgotten. “Claw?” he asked, and then his eyes unfocused, and panic shot across his features. A half second later, Claw screamed. It was not just a scream, it was a blood-curdling shriek of agony. The horrifying sound cut off with a gurgle, and Claw’s eyes rolled back into his head. His body twitched, arched in Ienzo’s arms, and then Claw vomited a fountain of blood. Claw’s body, streaming with red, started to twitch, jerking around in Ienzo’s arms like he was being electrocuted. All the while, his face was blank—unconscious. It was the wild thrashing from inside the center of his body that moved him. As he convulsed, sharp snaps and cracks kept time with the spasms. Ienzo and Forsaken were frozen for the shortest half second, and then they broke. Ienzo whipped Claw’s body into her arms, and, shouting so fast it was hard to separate the individual words, she and Forsaken shot up the staircase to the second floor. Mish sprinted after them. “Morphine!” Forsaken yelled at Ienzo. “Jayn—get Chev on the phone!” Ienzo screeched. The room Mish followed them to looked like an emergency ward set up in the middle of a library. The lights were brilliant and white. Claw was on a table under the glare, skin ghostly in the spotlight. His body flopped, a fish on the sand. Ienzo pinned Claw down, yanking and ripping his clothes out of the way, while Forsaken stabbed a syringe into his arm. How many times had Mish imagined him naked? Now she couldn’t look. She was afraid to have these memories in her head. “What’s happening, Forsaken?” “He’s suffocating!” “The placenta must have detached!” Somewhere in this, Claw came around. He responded to their words with a shriek that clawed at Mish’s eardrums. “Get him OUT!” Claw screamed. “He can’t BREATHE! Do it NOW!” Mish saw the red spots pop out when his scream broke the blood vessels in his eyes. “The morphine—,” Forsaken growled. “NO! NOW—!” Another gush of blood choked off what Claw was shrieking. Forsaken held his head up, desperately trying to clear his mouth so that he could breathe again. Jayn darted into the room and clipped a little blue earpiece under Ienzo’s hair. Then Jayn backed away, her gold eyes wide and burning, while Ienzo hissed frantically into the phone. In the bright light, Claw’s skin seemed more purple and black than it was white. Deep red was seeping beneath the skin over the huge, shuddering bulge of his stomach. Ienzo’s hand came up with a scalpel. “Let the morphine spread!” Forsaken shouted at her. “There’s no time,” Ienzo hissed. “He’s dying!” Her hand came down on Claw’s stomach, and vivid red spouted out from where she pierced the skin. It was like a bucket being turned over, a faucet twisted to full. Claw jerked, but didn’t scream. He was still choking. And then Ienzo lost her focus. Mish saw the expression on her face shift, saw her lips pull back from her teeth and her black eyes glint with thirst. “No, Enzy!” Forsaken roared, but his hands were trapped, trying to prop Claw upright so he could breathe. Mish launched herself at Ienzo, jumping across the table without bothering to phase. As she hit Ienzo’s stone body, knocking her toward the door, Mish felt the scalpel in Ienzo’s hand stab deep into her left arm. Mish’s right palm smashed against Ienzo’s face, locking her jaw and blocking her airways. Mish used her grip on Ienzo’s face to swing her body out so that she could land a solid kick in her gut; it was like kicking concrete. Ienzo flew into the door frame, buckling one side of it. The little speaker in her ear crackled into pieces. Then Jayn was there, yanking her by the throat to get her into the hall. And Mish had to give it to the posh one—she didn’t put up an ounce of fight. She wanted them to win. She let Mish trash her like that, to save Claw. Well, to save the thing. Mish ripped the blade out of her arm. “Jayn, get her out of here!” Forsaken shouted. “Take her to Plums and keep her there! Mish, I need you!” Mish didn’t watch Jayn finish the job. She wheeled back to the operating table, where Claw was turning blue, his eyes wide and staring. “CPR?” Forsaken growled at her, fast and demanding. “Yes!” Mish judged his face swiftly, looking for any sign that he was going to react like Ienzo. There was nothing but single-minded ferocity. “Get him breathing! I’ve got to get him out before—” Another shattering crack inside Claw’s body, the loudest yet, so loud that they both froze in shock waiting for his answering shriek. Nothing. His legs, which had been curled up in agony, now went limp, sprawling out in an unnatural way. “His spine,” he choked in horror. “Get it out of him!” Mish snarled, flinging the scalpel at Forsaken. “He won’t feel anything now!” And then Mish bent over his head. His mouth looked clear, so she pressed hers to his and blew a lungful of air into it. She felt his twitching body expand, so there was nothing blocking his throat. His lips tasted like blood. She could hear his heart, thumping unevenly. Keep it going, she thought fiercely at him, blowing another gust of air into his body. You promised. Keep your heart beating. Mish heard the soft, wet sound of the scalpel across his stomach. More blood dripping to the floor. The next sound jolted through her, unexpected, terrifying. Like metal being shredded apart. The sound brought back the fight in the clearing so many months ago, the tearing sound of the newborns being ripped apart. Mish glanced over to see Forsaken’s face pressed against the bulge. Vampire teeth—a surefire way to cut through vampire skin. Mish shuddered as she blew more air into Claw. He coughed back at her, his eyes blinking, rolling blindly. “You stay with me now, Claw!” Mish yelled at him. “Do you hear me? Stay! You’re not leaving me. Keep your heart beating!” His eyes wheeled, looking for Mish, or Forsaken, but seeing nothing. Mish stared into them anyway, keeping her gaze locked there. And then his body was suddenly still under her hands, though his breathing picked up roughly and his heart continued to thud. She realized the stillness meant that it was over. The internal beating was over. It must be out of him. It was. Forsaken whispered, “Misty.” So Claw’d been wrong. It wasn’t the boy he’d imagined. No big surprise there. What hadn’t he been wrong about? She didn’t look away from his red-spotted eyes, but she felt his hands lift weakly. “Let me…,” he croaked in a broken whisper. “Give her to me.” Mish guess she should have known that Forsaken would always give him what he wanted, no matter how stupid his request might be. But Mish didn’t dream he would listen to Claw now. So she didn’t think to stop him. Something warm touched Mish’s arm. That right there should have caught her attention. Nothing felt warm to her. But she couldn’t look away from Claw’s face. He blinked and then stared, finally seeing something. He moaned out a strange, weak croon. “Mis… ty. So… beautiful.” And then he gasped—gasped in pain. By the time Mish looked, it was too late. Forsaken had snatched the warm, bloody thing out of his limp arms. Her eyes flickered across Claw’s skin. It was red with blood—the blood that had flowed from his mouth, the blood smeared all over the creature, and fresh blood welling out of a tiny double-crescent bite mark just over his left breast. “No, Misty,” Claw murmured, like he was teaching the monster manners. She didn’t look at him or it. She watched only Claw as his eyes rolled back into his head. With a last dull ga-lump, his heart faltered and went silent. He missed maybe half of one beat, and then Mish’s hands were on his chest, doing compressions. She counted in her head, trying to keep the rhythm steady. One. Two. Three. Four. Breaking away for a second, she blew another lungful of air into him. She couldn’t see anymore. Her eyes were wet and blurry. But she was hyperaware of the sounds in the room. The unwilling glug-glug of his heart under her demanding hands, the pounding of her own heart, and another—a fluttering beat that was too fast, too light. She couldn’t place it. Mish forced more air down Claw’s throat. “What are you waiting for?” Mish choked out breathlessly, pumping his heart again. One. Two. Three. Four. “Take the baby,” Forsaken said urgently. “Throw it out the window.” One. Two. Three. Four. “Give her to me,” a low voice chimed from the doorway. Forsaken and Mish snarled at the same time. One. Two. Three. Four. “I’ve got it under control,” Ienzo promised. “Give me the baby, Forsaken. I’ll take care of her until Claw . . .” Mish breathed for Claw again while the exchange took place. The fluttering thumpathumpa-thumpa faded away with distance. “Move your hands, Mish.” Mish looked up from Claw’s white eyes, still pumping his heart for him. Forsaken had a syringe in his hand—all silver, like it was made from steel. “What’s that?” His stone hand knocked her’s out of the way. There was a tiny crunch as his blow broke her little finger. In the same second, he shoved the needle straight into Claw’s heart. “My venom,” he answered as he pushed the plunger down. She heard the jolt in Claw’s heart, like he’d shocked him with paddles. “Keep it moving,” he ordered. His voice was ice, was dead. Fierce and unthinking. Like he was a machine. Mish ignored the healing ache in her finger and started pumping his heart again. It was harder, as if his blood was congealing there—thicker and slower. While she pushed the now-viscous blood through his arteries, she watched what Forsaken was doing. It was like he was kissing Claw, brushing his lips at Claw’s throat, at his wrists, into the crease at the inside of his arm. But she could hear the lush tearing of her skin as his teeth bit through, again and again, forcing venom into Claw’s system at as many points as possible. She saw his pale tongue sweep along the bleeding gashes, but before this could make her either sick or angry, she realized what he was doing. Where his tongue washed the venom over Claw’s skin, it sealed shut. Holding the poison and the blood inside his body. Mish blew more air into Claw’s mouth, but there was nothing there. Just the lifeless rise of his chest in response. She kept pumping his heart, counting, while Forsaken worked manically over him, trying to put him back together. All the king’s horses and all the king’s men… But there was nothing there, just Mish, just Forsaken. Working over a corpse. Because that’s all that was left of the boy they both loved. This broken, bled-out, mangled corpse. They couldn’t put Claw together again. She knew it was too late. She knew he was dead. She knew it for sure because the pull was gone. She didn’t feel any reason to be here beside him. He wasn’t here anymore. So this body had no more draw for her. The senseless need to be near him had vanished. Or maybe moved was the better word. It seemed like Mish felt the pull from the opposite direction now. From down the stairs, out the door. The longing to get away from here and never, ever come back. “Go, then,” Forsaken snapped, and he hit her hands out of the way again, taking her place this time. Three fingers broken, it felt like. She straightened them numbly, not minding the throb of pain. He pushed his dead heart faster than Mish had. “He’s not dead,” Forsaken growled. “He’s going to be fine.” Mish wasn’t sure he was talking to her anymore. Turning away, leaving him with his dead, Mish walked slowly to the door. So slowly. She couldn’t make her feet move faster. This was it, then. The ocean of pain. The other shore so far away across the boiling water that she couldn’t imagine it, much less see it. She felt empty again, now that she’d lost her purpose. Saving Claw had been her fight for so long now. And he wouldn’t be saved. He’d willingly sacrificed himself to be torn apart by that monster’s young, and so the fight was lost. It was all over. She shuddered at the sound coming from behind her as she plodded down the stairs—the sound of a dead heart being forced to thud. Mish wanted to somehow pour bleach inside her head and let it fry her brain. To burn away the images left from Claw’s final minutes. She’d take the brain damage if she could get rid of that—the screaming, the bleeding, the unbearable crunching and snapping as the newborn monster tore through him from the inside out. . . . She wanted to sprint away, to take the stairs ten at a time and race out the door, but her feet were heavy as iron and her body was more tired than it had ever been before. She shuffled down the stairs like a crippled old man. Mish rested at the bottom step, gathering her strength to get out the door. Ienzo was on the clean end of the white sofa, her back to Mish, cooing and murmuring to the blanket-wrapped thing in her arms. She must have heard Mish pause, but she ignored her, caught up in her moment of stolen motherhood. Maybe she would be happy now. Ienzo had what she wanted, and Claw would never come to take the creature from her. She wondered if that’s what the poisonous blonde had been hoping for all along. She held something dark in her hands, and there was a greedy sucking sound coming from the tiny murderer she held. The scent of blood in the air. Human blood. Ienzo was feeding it. Of course it would want blood. What else would you feed the kind of monster that would brutally mutilate its own mother? It might as well have been drinking Claw’s blood. Maybe it was. Mish’s strength came back to her as she listened to the sound of the little executioner feeding. Strength and hate and heat—red heat washing through Mish’s head, burning but erasing nothing. The images in her head were fuel, building up the inferno but refusing to be consumed. She felt the tremors rock her from head to toe, and she did not try to stop them. Ienzo was totally absorbed in the creature, paying no attention to her at all. She wouldn’t be quick enough to stop her, distracted as she was. RvR had been right. The thing was an aberration—its existence went against nature. A black, soulless demon. Something that had no right to be. Something that had to be destroyed. It seemed like the pull had not been leading to the door after all. She could feel it now, encouraging her, tugging her forward. Pushing her to finish this, to cleanse the world of this abomination. Ienzo would try to kill her when the creature was dead, and she would fight back. Mish wasn’t sure if she would have time to finish her before the others came to help. Maybe, maybe not. She didn’t much care either way. She didn’t care if the wolves, either set, avenged her or called the Staffs’ justice fair. None of that mattered. All she cared about was her own justice. Her revenge. The thing that had killed Claw would not live another minute longer. If Claw’d survived, he would have hated Mish for this. He would have wanted to kill her personally. But she didn’t care. He didn’t care what he had done to her—letting himself be slaughtered like an animal. Why should she take his feelings into account? And then there was Forsaken. He must be too busy now—too far gone in his insane denial, trying to reanimate a corpse—to listen to her plans. So she wouldn’t get the chance to keep her promise to him, unless—and it was not a wager she’d put money on—she managed to win the fight against Ienzo, Plums, and Jayn, three on one. But even if Mish did win, she didn’t think she had it in her to kill Forsaken. Because she didn’t have enough compassion for that. Why should she let him get away from what he’d done? Wouldn’t it be more fair—more satisfying—to let him live with nothing, nothing at all? It made Mish almost smile, as filled with hate as she was, to imagine it. No Claw. No killer spawn. And also missing as many members of his family as she was able to take down. Of course, he could probably put those back together, since she wouldn’t be around to burn them. Unlike Claw, who would never be whole again. She wondered if the creature could be put back together. She doubted it. It was part Claw, too—so it must have inherited some of his vulnerability. She could hear that in the tiny, thrumming beat of its heart. Its heart was beating. His wasn’t. Only a second had passed as Mish made these easy decisions. The trembling was getting tighter and faster. She coiled herself, preparing to spring at the blond vampire and rip the murderous thing from her arms with her teeth. Ienzo cooed at the creature again, setting the empty metal bottle-thing aside and lifting the creature into the air to nuzzle her face against its cheek. Perfect. The new position was perfect for her strike. Mish leaned forward and felt the heat begin to change her while the pull toward the killer grew—it was stronger than she’d ever felt it before, so strong it reminded her of an Alpha’s command, like it would crush her if she didn’t obey. This time she wanted to obey. The murderer stared past Ienzo’s shoulder at Mish, its gaze more focused than any newborn creature’s gaze should be. Warm brown eyes, the color of milk chocolate—the exact same color that Claw’s had been. Mish’s shaking jerked to a stop; heat flooded through her, stronger than before, but it was a new kind of heat—not a burning. It was a glowing. Everything inside Mish came undone as she stared at the tiny porcelain face of the halfvampire, half-human baby. All the lines that held her to her life were sliced apart in swift cuts, like clipping the strings to a bunch of balloons. Everything that made her who she was—her love for the dead boy upstairs, her love for her father, her loyalty to her new pack, the love for her other brothers, her hatred for her enemies, her home, her name, her self—disconnected from her in that second—snip, snip, snip—and floated up into space. She was not left drifting. A new string held her where she was. Not one string, but a million. Not strings, but steel cables. A million steel cables all tying her to one thing—to the very center of the universe. She could see that now—how the universe swirled around this one point. She’d never seen the symmetry of the universe before, but now it was plain. The gravity of the earth no longer tied her to the place where she stood. It was the baby girl in the blond vampire’s arms that held Mish here now. Misty. From upstairs, there was a new sound. The only sound that could touch her in this endless instant. A frantic pounding, a racing beat… A changing heart. Here, I wrote a story for you. <3
Lucky you. I get sick every winter. If you count dry-heaving then I get sick every couple of weeks. It's like a nervous disorder or something. Kitty, your dedication astonishes me. And oh my gosh, that was the best story ever!!
