Who: Isaac, Allison, Scott Where: Isaac's room When: Late Monday night What: Waking up Warnings: The starter has mentions of blood/almost dying, drowning, memories of child abuse. Afterwards it'll be all the OT3 Feels <3
Things had stopped making sense for Isaac when he felt Hayley's hand ripping through his chest in the most literal sense possible and her hand was actually grabbing onto his heart so easily, proving exactly what she had threatened with and what Isaac knew was going to happen anyway. The surprise of her sinking her fangs into him earlier had been forgotten, and it felt like a huge understatement compared to the shock of her hand in his chest, but Isaac hadn't been able to fight her off anymore. Not that he had ended up needing to, since both Hayley and Elijah disappeared before Isaac's body slumped to the floor, but by that point he wasn't even coordinating anymore. Voices were muffled echoes that he couldn't make sense of, Scott and Chris hovering over him became nothing more than shadows that he couldn't quite distinguish, and all Isaac kept thinking was that this was it. It was done. It was over. He was gasping for breath, as if whatever oxygen he was able to inhale kept escaping out of the hole in his chest that Hayley had left behind, but he couldn't talk no matter how much he tried. He could taste the blood in his mouth that was pooling in his throat and making him feel like he was drowning, and then everything had gone still.
There were no noises. No shadows. No struggle, no pain. He wasn't choking, he wasn't drowning. There was just nothing, as if he was detached entirely from his body and floating away...
...until Scott's voice filtered in. He was telling him to breathe, to stay with them, his voice desperate as if that would make Isaac's lungs remember how to function again, and in some way it did. Every sound and every sensation came back at once, making Isaac choke as he finally took a breath and he opened his eyes, but the moment of lucidity didn't last long. The pain dragged him under hard and fast, his chest feeling like it was getting crushed and it would collapse with each breath he took, but Scott was there, and he seemed okay, and he was his last thought before darkness took over.
The darkness felt different this time around, though. Before he had almost felt relief, that nothingness managing to soothe him, but this time it was as if he was sinking. Slowly, his body heavy and sluggish as the water claimed him and kept pulling him under.
"Isaac," his father's voice barked somewhere above him. It was muffled, and as Isaac opened his eyes he could see his shadow as he stood by the side of the pool, just how he had done when he was teaching him how to swim, and he remembered. He remembered his father's words, how he kept testing just how well he had learned how to keep himself floating. It was then that he remembered he was sinking, he was drowning, he couldn't bring himself to the surface, and panic began to overtake him. His dad wasn't going to be happy if he didn't come to the surface, but as hard as he tried to swim he just kept drowning, and when he opened his mouth to speak he could only feel the water rushing into his lungs. It kept making his body heavier, he could feel the water weighing him down. He was going to drown, he realized.
"Isaac," somebody else was saying, the shadow of his father gone and suddenly replaced with two other ones. They weren't barking his name as they called for him, though, and even underwater he knew who it was. Scott. Allison. He tried to call out to them, tried to reach them, but just as he was going to someone grabbed him by the back of his neck and he was getting thrown on the ground. His father was back, towering over him before he crouched down to be closer to his level. The motion made Isaac flinch physically, ready to protect himself in case his father was going to strike him while he was on the ground since that wouldn't be the first time he had done it, but he just stared at him in apparent disgust. "Pathetic. Get back in the water."
"Dad, I can't--"
His dad grabbed him painfully by the arm, dragging him up to his feet before Isaac could continue speaking. "Did I ask you to get back in?"
No, Isaac almost answered, but his eyes scanned everywhere around them because he could hear other voices calling his name. He tried to recognize them, tried to find where they were coming from, but the grip in his arm tightened and Isaac almost whimpered in pain as he felt nails digging into his arm.
They weren't nails, though. They were claws, and it was then that he realized it wasn't his father standing in front of him. It was Hayley. She was saying something he couldn't understand before her hand reached into his chest, the sound of the chest cavity cracking open making him nauseous as it filled his ears, but Isaac couldn't make another sound. He couldn't speak. Not even when she pulled out his heart with a wicked smirk on her face, that crazed look back in her eyes before she let go and pushed him back in the water.
Except, it wasn't water. It was blood. He was drowning in blood, he could taste it and it made it impossible to breathe or see, but as he tried to keep himself afloat he felt something dragging him down. Faster and faster until everything was gone, and the pain in his chest was the only thing he could feel. It hurt. He couldn't breathe, he couldn't think. He wanted to hear Allison, he wanted to hear Scott, but there were no more shadows. There were no more muffled voices. It was just darkness all around him, that darkness and the pain that felt like it was overpowering everything else he could be feeling. It made him stop moving, it made him stop struggling because he knew it was a losing battle, and just as his body went limp everything felt like it disappeared all over again.
Until another voice reached him. Despite his enhanced senses, it felt like he couldn't hear her well enough at first to know who it was, but it didn't last long because he knew that voice better than he knew his own. Allison was speaking, she was saying something, and Isaac tried to hold her hand as she held his, but he could barely make his fingers twitch at first. His body felt heavy, and some part of him kept expecting his father to appear and yell at him again, but as he finally managed to open his eyes just enough to see, he could only see her. Allison. Was he dreaming? She wasn't staring at him blankly, or as if trying to remember who he was - she was watching him how she used to, and there was recognition in her eyes, and...
Was he still asleep? Isaac tried to ask that, but his throat felt like it still wasn't working just yet. He could just breathe a sigh of relief even if it felt like it was driving a sledgehammer against his chest, but he didn't care. She was here, he could see her and she could see him, and he held her hand again as best as he could. Because he didn't want to let go. He didn't want her to disappear, he didn't want her to go.
"Please don't go," he said quietly, his heart twisting painfully in his chest but this time Hayley had nothing to do with it. Not this time, anyway.