"Layla, sweetie, I'm so sorry..."

.

.

.

WES HICKS watched as Layla rushed past him, darting into the hospital room that he had been standing outside of. He didn't expect her to say anything to him, especially since they weren't on the best of terms since it had became public knowledge across their friend group that he had a crush on her girlfriend. Well, ex-girlfriend now. He thought - he wasn't sure what Tara and Layla were at the moment.

Even if they had been on good terms, Wes knew that Layla didn't want to be there. She wanted to be here because of Tara but he knew that if it had just been one of their friends with a broken leg from falling off a bike, then she wouldn't have came. He had known Layla since she was born, having had playdates in the Woodsboro Police Station since they were small enough to walk and talk.

They were both cop kids. They both knew the dangers that their parents had been through by being a cop in Woodsboro - but Wes was lying if he understood the pain that Layla had associated with it. Her father had been just another number on a Ghostface kill count, whereas his mother was still here and breathing. That was something that they'd never be able to discuss.

Wes knew her, better than she sometimes knew herself. And he knew that Layla Torres hated hospitals. He also knew that it didn't take a genius or someone that knew her on a deeply personal level to realise that. From the second she entered the building, to the second she entered Tara's hospital room, it was obvious that being smothered by the chemical smell and white clinical walls of the building was her idea of hell.

Wes didn't know the full extent of why Layla hated hospitals. Only four people knew what had happened that night. Four people that had sworn to keep it a secret, what had happened in these hospital walls. What had happened the last time Layla Torres had been inside this hospital.

It all just reminded her of her dad.

It reminded her of how Dewey had picked her up from the station, in the early hours of the morning. Layla didn't understand why her father had dropped her off at his work, she didn't understand why she had been playing with the office duty police for hours on end. She didn't understand why some of the officers had excused themselves, or why the receptionist had burst into tears when she looked at Layla in the bullpen.

It reminded her of the silence on the drive to the hospital. Dewey's police cruiser almost made no noise as it had rushed towards the hospital that night. How he had gripped on tightly to her hand, how he had lead her straight to Gale's hospital room. How the woman had teared up at the sight of the girl, reaching her hand out and placing it gently against her face.

It reminded her of how Gale's face had scrunched up as she looked at her husband, a small worry line crossing her face as she slipped her hand down from Layla's shoulder to instead latch on to her arm, asking how Jill Roberts knew that they had sustained matching wounds from Ghostface. It reminded her of Dewey sprinting out of the room, Gale holding on tightly to her forearm and telling her to stand away from the hospital door. 

It reminded her of when Gale took off after Dewey, leaving Layla alone in the dark hospital room. Her dad was dead. Her mother was dead. Her aunt was lying down the hall in a hospital bed and they'd said they didn't know if she was going to ever recover. 

___

She'd walked down the hall, her bear still clutched in her hand as she trailed towards the noises that she could hear. She wasn't sure why she was walking towards the yells, but she'd just seen her dad's work-friend go into the room, so everything must have been okay? Right?

"What are you, deaf? Give me...your gun!"

Layla stood beside the doorframe, peering around so that her head was just able to be spotted from inside the room. She couldn't see Dewey or her aunt, but she could see her dad's friend holding her hands above her head.

"And get up. And keep your hands over your head!"

Layla recognised the girl with the gun. She'd met her a few days before, having been introduced to her by her Aunt Sidney. She wasn't sure why she was now holding a gun in her father's friend's direction and she suddenly regretted ever coming towards the noises.

"Don't do anything stupi..."

Judy Hicks was shot. She was shot, she was falling and then she was down.

"Don't f*cking tell me what to do."

Layla couldn't help the scream that fell from her lips. Stupid move, but to be expected from an almost-eight year old.

Jill spun around, fury on her face as her eyes connected with the child. She didn't want to have to kill any kids, but her story wouldn't stand if there were any witnesses. Gale yelled out from where she was crouched behind the hospital bed as Jill lunged forward, grabbing Layla and pulling her against her front.

The gun was rested on the side of the girl's head as Jill swung them both around to face Gale, her arm wrapped tightly around Layla's neck as the young girl had tears streaming down her face. She sobbed silently, too afraid to make any noise and have Jill press the trigger of the gun in her hands.

"Now, get up bitch!" Jill shouted to Gale, Layla flinching a little. "Come on. Let's go. Get your skinny ass out here before I blow little Torres' brains out! Senior Torres had to die to make this all work, but I didn't want to have to kill Junior here too. But what's best for the plot is best for the plot, am I right?"

As Gale moved towards Jill, the killer smirked. She shoved Layla away from her, moving so that both of her hands were now wrapped tightly around the gun that she was aiming at the woman. Layla slid to the floor beside Sidney, only just realising that the woman was awake and had lifted herself to fiddle with some medical tool behind Jill.

Her aunt looked back at her to make sure she was okay before nodding across at Gale who was trying to avoid giving away their plan.

"I'm gonna enjoy blowing your head off," Jill said to Gale, a grin on her face. 

"Layla's close your eyes," Gale said, looking over at the girl who had her hands over her ears and was curled up behind Sidney. Her attention turned back to Jill. "Ok, but can I just have one final word?"

"What? Please?"

"No..." Gale said, a fleeting moment of triumph crossing her face. "Clear."

"Clear?"

"Clear!"

Layla didn't hear or see anything, but she certainly smelt the horrible smell of burnt flesh. She was sure that it was something she was always going to associate with hospitals from now on. 

"You forgot the first rule of remakes, Jill. Don't fuck with the original."

She might not have seen her Aunt Sidney fry Jill, but she certainly saw as Sidney turned around and shot Jill in the chest. Dewey wasted no time in shuffling over towards Layla, scooping the crying girl into his chest and ignoring the blood that was coming from him.

"Layla, sweetie, I'm so sorry..."

Layla Torres would always hate hospitals.

_____

"Layla, I think it's best if you go home and get some rest. You have both have school tomorrow," Judy Hicks snapped Layla out of her trance, noticing the way her eyes had glazed over a little as she looked at Tara Carpenter. The Sheriff knew what was likely running through Layla's mind, especially as she knew that the girl had never stepped foot in a hospital since that night in 2011.

It was something that Dewey, Sidney, Gale and Judy had agreed on for once. Layla Torres, in the eyes of the rest of the world, was never in the room the night that Jill Roberts was killed. She wasn't present, and had never witnessed any damage caused to any of them. Judy was surprised that Gale Weathers out of them all had stuck to her word, even after she had continued to write books about the Woodsboro Tragedies (since she had said that she would stop doing that too, but apparently old habits die hard).

"Mom, you've GOT to be joking," Wes answered for Layla, taking the words right out of her mouth. "Tara was attacked by some... some psycho and you want us to just go back to third period algebra?"

"Honey, I know it's horrific but the safest place for you to be right now is within those school walls-"

"That's bullshit and you know it!"

"Wes, I'm not asking, I'm telling you! As your mother and as the Sheriff of this town, I swear-"

"Who did this to her?"

Wes and Judy's argument was interrupted by Layla. Her voice was cold like steel, and Wes had never felt scared of her until he saw the look in her eyes in that moment. He was on edge already, knowing more than what the rest of their friends and town did. He knew the facts that his mother knew, and it instantly had set his paranoia off.

"Layla," Judy started, but Layla turned her glare on the woman and she felt her blood run cold too. Not because she was scared of her in the way that Wes was, but because looking back at her was the spitting image of her father when he found out that someone had tried to remake the Ghostface killers just over ten years prior.

"Say it."

"We don't know who did it," Judy replied, looking to Wes before turning back to Layla and bracing herself for the next words to fall from her mouth.

"Judy, please," Layla breathed, clenching her jaw a little.

"Tara said... Tara said her attacker was wearing a Ghostface mask."

_____

"This is bullshit," Layla muttered towards Wes as she waited on the rest of her friends to meet them outside the school lawn. His mother was standing meters away from them, having been working her way through the student body with the rest of her team.

Layla knew she was a suspect. They all were - and she wouldn't be lying if she said that she didn't want to believe it. Her father had known Jill Roberts, her mother had known Billy Loomis and Stu Macher. It was always someone you knew - but she hoped to god that this time it was different. She loved her friends, and she couldn't picture any of them killing or trying to kill each other. Not even Liv.

"Have you called Sam?"

Layla turned to look at Wes, noticing how the boy already has his phone out and was scrolling to find his old babysitter's contact number. She swallowed a lump in her throat, a bitterness flooding her brain as she thought about Samantha Carpenter and her relationship (or lack of) with Tara. 

"No," Layla replied, standing to her feet as she dropped her bag at Wes' legs. He looked up in surprise, not sure why she was standing up and pulling her own phone from her pocket. "But I will."

"You still have her number, after all this time?" Wes asked, shocked that the one person he had expected to have Sam blocked, banned and banished from their life had kept on to her phone number for the past five years of her absence.

"Don't you?"

Wes stuttered, not sure how to explain why he also had her number saved. He watched as Layla began to move slightly out of ear shot as the rest of their friends came slinking across the grass lawn from different directions. He had text them all once Layla had arrived at the hospital, informing them of everything that had gone down and that it was probably best no one messaged Layla.

"I've always had her number," Layla told Wes as she moved away. She looked down at the caller ID, mumbling under her breath as she pressed the call button, only to be instantly hung up on. "Whether she answers is a different question.."

She angrily typed on her screen, gritting her teeth a little as she realised that it wasn't just her that had still been holding a grudge about that night back in late 2015. Layla wondered what her friends would think if they knew about it, and she knew that if Sam didn't tell Tara after all of this then she would. Even if she had sworn she never would.

pick up my fucking call, sam

we both know i'd only call if it was urgent and about your sister

you know, the sister you abandoned?

That seemed to hit Sam where it hurt, because she was calling back within seconds.

"Hey, what's going on?"

"Tara was attacked last night," Layla said, trying to keep her voice steady.

"What? Is she..."

"She's alive, but in bad shape. She was stabbed, Sam."

"Stabbed? What the fuck?"

"She made it through surgery and the doctor said it went well. She's resting now. I know you guys aren't on the best terms, but..."

"I'm on my way," Sam replied, before pausing. "Hey, wait, Lails!"

"Don't fucking call me that, Samantha," Layla replied, her voice coming out sharper than she must have intended as she noticed some of her friends turn around to look at her in surprise as she raised her voice a little.

"Do they know who did this?"

"It's probably better if you just come here."

"Layla, please."

"She said it was someone in a fucking Ghostface mask."

Layla hung up after dropping that bombshell, having no intention to stay on the phone with the girl any longer. She knew that Sam hated Woodsboro almost as much as she did, but it was no surprise that a Ghostface attack happening on her sister would have her rushing back to the town.

"Sam's coming?" Amber asked as Layla returned to the group. There was a bit of an awkwardness as they all looked at their friend for the first time since finding out about Tara. Sure, they all knew that the couple were currently broken up but the bags under Layla's eyes showed that she had barely slept at all. "Watch everything get worse."

"Listen, all I'm saying is, with everything going on right now,I think it's time we take our relationship to the next, most intimate level," Chad said, taking the attention away from Sam and on to him and Liv instead. Liv turned to look at the rest of them with an eye-roll, wanting to explain herself.

"He wants me to accept his Find My Fam request."

"It's the smartest option with a would-be killer on the loose. You know exactly where I am and I know exactly where you are - I already have Mindy and Layla on it."

"Aw, you can stalk me like a jealous boyfriend!"

"And you can stalk me like a jealous boyfriend," Chad replied, smiling at his girlfriend who playfully glared back. Wes gave a side glance to Layla, noticing that she wasn't really listening to the couple playfully bicker and was instead looking over at where his mom had begun to speak to another group of teenagers in their class.

"Is this because you two aren't having sex yet?" Amber asked, trying to hide the fact that she had also noticed that Layla wasn't listening to the conversation at all. She had developed a dislike for the girl after the constant break-ups that her and Tara put themselves through, but she was intrigued as to why she was watching Sheriff Hicks with such intensity.

"You actually bring up a very good point. Not that I want to sound like a stereotypical jock trying to get into his girlfriend's pants..."

"Don't do it, Liv," Wes replied, no humour on his face as he addressed the teens. "There's a psycho out there. You make yourself harder to find, delete social media, tape over your phone camera, disable GPS-"

"Yes, thank you very much, Edward Snowden," Chad interrupted, eyeing the boy with a hint of animosity. They had used to be joint at the hip but since Wes had declared that he was crushing on Tara while Tara and Layla had still been together, Chad wasn't so sure about where his friend's priorities lay. "Actually, your mother just interrogated me about Tara's attempted murder, which was very fun."

"I'm sure she's asking everybody," Wes replied without hesitation. "I mean, Ghostface is back."

"The press still isn't saying Ghostface," Mindy replied, chewing on a stick of gum as she continued texting on her phone.

"My mom doesn't want to cause a panic."

"It'll get out by the second or third killing," Mindy replied without any empathy, causing Layla to tense a little as her friends discussed Ghostface being back without a single care in the world. She knew that the twins and Wes' families also had a history with the variations of the killer, and they might not have known about that night at the hospital with Jill Roberts - but they knew about her father. They knew about him and how he died, and here they were saying this without a single thought.

"Jesus, Mindy, there wasn't a first killing Tara's alive!"

"That means she could still die."

"What the fuck?"

"Or the killer could come back for her," Mindy continued, not realising that Layla had begun to clench her jaw as she kicked the dirt at her feet. Chad looked at his best friend, noticing the way that her hands were clenching at her side and that she wasn't looking up at any of them.

"Fuck, Mindy, come on," Chad snapped, tilting his head and motioning slightly to where Layla was sitting. Mindy's eyes softened a little, realising that she had taken it too far without thinking about their friend's feelings. She'd completed not regarded the idea that Tara's attack hit very close to home for Layla.

"I'm just telling you, arm up, okay? Pepper spray, check. Taser, check-"

"Girlfriend repellent, check!"

They continued their friendly banter for a moment, all eyes occasionally flickering to Layla who was getting more relaxed as the conversation moved from Ghostface to Liv's creepy ex-boyfriend who was standing at the edge of the school grounds.

Amber's eyes fell on to Chad's arm, noticing the large bruises that rested on the surface.

"Tara says she fought back hard. You've got bruises," the girl pointed out, crossing her arms over her chest as she sized up the boy. He scoffed, rolling his eyes at her accusation.

"From football practice, Layla can vouch for that," he snapped back, turning his head to Layla as he waited for her to confirm what he had just said. Instead, the girl sprung to her feet as she stared at her phone with wide eyes.

The rest of the group sprung up, worried as to what had made her react that way.

"Tara's awake, she just texted me."