SEVEN.

∘₊✧──────✧₊∘

STILES STRUGGLES to carry the two girls at once. With Illa's legs screaming at her after every step and her head pounding, and with Lydia like a bomb threatening to explode, he has his hands full— both literally and figuratively.

The three of them trip over their own feet. Stiles is an already clumsy person, and with the added weight of two others, their limbs are a jumbled mess beneath them.

"Okay," Stiles says to Lydia as they messily round a corner, "you've got to try and stay on your feet. That goes for you, too, Illa, okay? You hear me? Neither of you are falling."

Easy for Stiles to say. He doesn't have voices screaming in his head, increasing in volume with every passing millisecond, or shooting pain coming from his bleeding knees. Lydia's whimpers are enough to shut Illa up about her own pain. She doesn't have it nearly as bad as the Banshee does; she can't complain.

"You had a plan?" Lydia weakly questions.

"Uh...yeah," Stiles half-lies after a moment's hesitation. "The plan was to get Illa. It looked good on paper, not so much in reality."

"Not my fault," Illa hisses through clenched teeth, shutting her eyes so tightly that she sees colors. Purple, green, and yellow dots merge behind the darkness her eyelids provide.

She snaps them back open just in time to be shoved to the ground.

Stiles, who'd also been pushed, rushes to catch her elbows before she falls onto her face. Illa glances up in horror, spitting her hair out of her mouth just in time to see what she's been dreading most this entire night.

Lydia drops to her knees with her entire body heaving from the heavy breaths she's inhaling. "I can't hold it!" Her hands cover her ears, eyes looking desperately toward the ceiling as if it could somehow provide some condolence. "I... can't... do... it!"

"Lydia—" Stiles tries to cut in, only to be interrupted by her heart-wrenching plea.

"Stiles, Illa, run!"

This is it. This is the moment she's been anticipating ever since she first saw visions of Stiles Stilinski. His refusal to leave Lydia will kill him in a matter of seconds – and result in her own demise as well if she doesn't get them both the hell out of here.

With a determined growl, Illa pushes herself to her feet in one fluid motion. Sheer adrenaline makes her movements stronger. Her limbs seem to be filled with lead as she stands up and shields Stiles' ears with her arms, knocking them both back just as Lydia's lethal scream begins to pierce her eardrums.

It's louder than before, if that's even possible. The doors and cement walls had saved them the first time, but now, without anything between her and the wailing woman's amplified cry, Illa feels her very eardrums begin to debilitate at the piercing noise.

And just like that, a man encased in flames pushes them even farther back and wraps his arms around Lydia to nullify its effects. The screech becomes muffled. Stiles and Illa crash into someone's arms, a tangle of hands and legs. She doesn't know how she's standing upright anymore as a cloud of dust and debris showers over them. The structure of the sewers quivers at the sheer force of the scream.

A flannel, soft to the touch, grazes her arm. Illa glances up to meet Stiles' widened eyes. There's something different about the honey-brown of his irises, and it takes her a second of thought to decipher it— realization. Stiles' face is full of understanding as if he knows why she'd taken so much precaution to shield him instead of herself. Why she hadn't looked at him when Lydia had predicted their deaths. His mouth is slightly open in a gape, but no words come from him.

A feather-light touch brushes against her hairline. She spins to see Scott staring at her in concern, brow wrinkled and eyes soft as he assesses her appearance in a quick once-over. "Are you okay?"

Illa is still too dazed to respond. Her ears ring so horribly she can hardly comprehend the words that have come out of his mouth. It's like a swarm of bees is mercilessly buzzing around her head and getting closer the more she tries to force them away. She can only stare at him, too stunned at what has just happened to do much else.

Scott clasps her hand without a moment's hesitation. After a second, a cool, soothing wave washes over the girl. The stabbing pain in her knees is gone. Her head no longer pounds like someone is beating it with a hammer. And, to her astonishment, her ears feel almost normal; the buzzing fades to a light ringing sound.

She reaches up to prod her throbbing earlobe. When she pulls her hand back toward her face, rivers of blood coat her fingers.

Illa is scarcely aware of Liam's presence and the fact that Parrish is picking Lydia up in his arms somewhere in the dust behind them. All she can think about is the fact that she actually did it– she saved Stiles. This is an alternate future she's never seen before. History is being rewritten at this very second, full of agony and heartbreak that he'll now have to endure. And she knows that the next time he looks at his face and sees all of that, she'll feel responsible.

It takes her a moment to realize she's shaking from head to toe. Scott's veins are ink-black as he continues to take her pain from her even as he whispers, "Hey, it's okay," and pulls her into a comforting embrace.

Illa doesn't remember the last time she hugged someone. Normally, her mind would be attacking her, fighting Scott's touch and vehemently shoving him away. But everything in her body is so cool and calm that she can't help but accept it. Even as she shakes, she sobs, he continues to hold onto her.

After a second, Illa wraps her arms around his shoulders and returns it.

She wonders if he understands how much trust this takes. How, after almost a decade of being shunned and abused, she never thought she'd ever be held like this again. And even if she's technically only just met Scott McCall for the first time since she was ten, her brain has kept up with him all these years.

"Thank you," he mutters. She knows what it's for without him needing to elaborate— he knows what she's done.

Scott pulls out of the hug and winces as the loss of contact pulls her pain from him. The thrumming in her head returns as a dull ache, her knees bearing half of the agony as before.

"Get to Mason," he orders Liam. "But first, take Illa back safely."

The Beta nods before waving her down the corridor with him. Illa turns while she walks, trying to catch Stiles' eye as she does so. It's no use; he has now snapped back into the present. But she catches one small detail that's enough to make her eyes grow wide and her heart to fall out of her chest as she swings around a corner.

"Liam," she gasps, causing the boy to screech to a stop in front of her. He's still hyper-sensitive due to what had just happened; the urgency in her voice doesn't ease his nerves.

"What?"

"Look at me." The command falls from her lips so quickly there's almost no pause between his question and her answer.

When Liam turns to face her and the lightbulb above catches his face, Illa notices his confusion first. It creases his thick eyebrows together and makes a frown apparent on his lips. His skin is pale in the harsh lighting of the single bulb. Crystal-blue eyes stare into hers, perplexion lurking in them. His nose is crooked as if it's been broken before.

"Never mind," she sighs, forcing her voice to stay level and for her heartbeat to continue being steady through the lie. "I thought I saw something."

But what's truly the problem is what she doesn't see. Stiles, Scott, Liam. She'd looked all three of them in the face and seen nothing but their facial features staring back at her. No gory deaths, no anguish, no broken hearts. No visions. Nothing.

For once, Illa is the one in the dark.

THE END.

_________

old a/n:

*yeets forever*

part one is incredibly short, mainly because it's only been two episodes. prepare for the other ones to be longer now that illa will be around for a full season!

the next part will hopefully be up soon (:

-kristyn

new a/n:

again, THERE IS NO PART TWO! if you want to hear me talk about my former plans for illa (and 6b in particular), then you can watch the Q&A i filmed a few months ago. you can either watch the whole thing or skip to 7:33 for the part where i talk about this book (:

[There should be a GIF or video here. Update the app now to see it.]

thank you all so much for reading, and if you want more illa content, be sure to check out my meet my oc's book! she's #8

–kristyn