I Confide in Wolves at Night, Angels Call Me By My Name (1/15)
Name: I Confide in Wolves at Night (1/15)
Rating: R
Length: 2,500
Spoilers: technically AU, but up to Rumours
Summary: "So which one do you think you are?" The girl whispered, her head shifting toward Quinn. "Angel or wolf?"
Author's Note: This title is a weird hybrid of two songs - "Wolves at Night" by Manchester Orchestra and "She Talks to Angels" by The Black Crowes. The first person who successfully mashes those two together deserves a prize of epic proportions because they're not similar. Um, anyway, yes this does say 15 chapters which I have not actually done...ever. So let's hope this flies. And this chapter is mostly introductory and generally mysterious and probably slightly boring.
Quinn bursts into being in the middle of nowhere, smashing into the ground and groaning as she feels the crunch of corn sprouts under her small and battered body. While she was happy to lie there and contemplate why she could never drop without hearing the crunch of bones or ligaments anymore, she still didn’t want to mess up someone else’s life by destroying valuable crops.
Speaking of someone else, she could hear the screech of girlish screams originating somewhere to her right, a nervous tittering settling into the dark...somewhere...night. From what Quinn could tell, it sounded like a group of people somewhere in the middle of this field. Hoping they weren’t the adventuresome sort who would go searching for whatever had gone bump in the night, she crawled forward for her backpack, which had flipped open in the commotion of her arrival.
Shoving the medical kit and the GPS back in the bag, and zipping it closed as quietly as possible, she shrugged it on and buckled the straps that reached across her waist and her upper shoulders, wincing as the bottom strap pushed against a painful bruise that had developed when she had been dropped into a tree and fallen down to the sidewalk.
Flipping her black jacket’s hood up over her blonde hair, she glances down at the watch wrapped around her wrist and then to the glowing green third hand on the watch, which was stopped at the twelve, refusing to move. She tapped at it with a questioning finger, wondering if the thing was finally malfunctioning. If it was, she would know soon enough.
A small round of voices started up in the same area as before, one bold voice ringing out through the cornfield.
“Come out, come out little alien!” a girl’s voice jeered, slurring along until it dissolved into gasping laughter. Another girl’s voice joined. “Santana!” it yelped, followed by the sound of something landing in the cornfield.
Quinn knelt up onto her knees, moving slowly toward the noise and smiling when she spots a small glow shining through the corn stalks. She grabs for what it appears one of the girls has thrown, a bottle of Jack Daniels.
Quinn’s watch shines its customary words up at her, and she contemplates it for a moment. Protect. Save. Serve.
She sighs, standing up slowly and smiling in the darkness as she realizes the stalks for the most part reach above her head. She steps forward, finding herself at the edge of a clearing in the middle of the field, a dark elm tree resting silently in the center, warding off the encroaching corn. She finally sees the people she’s been hearing - a set of people all gathered on a trampoline. They look her age, which would make them...juniors or seniors in high school. Bottles of alcohol were all around them, but most of them didn’t look like they were new.
She was supposed to be helping one of these people. But who?
She looked down to her watch, which was still not running. Cursing under her breath, Quinn reached blindly for her GPS, flipping it on so it would tell her where her ride was. She’d figure this out tomorrow, after she slept and got a night’s sleep, especially if her watch wasn’t ticking down yet. She had time.
Her GPS shined up at her, declaring proudly that her Ducati was waiting for her on the edge of the field, not that far from her. Why her Ducati was the chosen vehicle for this was beyond her, but she couldn’t say she minded.
She glanced one more time at the group of teenagers gathered on the trampoline. They were laughing, a few of them having conversations amongst themselves, and a few more were snuggled up in what appeared to be couples. One girl was staring off into the distance, up towards the constellation Orion, her fingers tapping slowly onto the edge of the trampoline.
Quinn blinked at the strange picture the girl made, before she winced at the pain in her eyes. She had forgotten about the bruise on the bone around her eye.
Quinn turned in the darkness and burst for the edge of the field, weaving through the corn stalks and finding the Ducati parked right where the GPS had pointed her to, not too far from the clearing. They weren’t that far in the corn field, as it had seemed when she first landed.
She pulled on her helmet with another wince, realizing the entire left side of her face still felt the damage from the time a few days ago she had been thrown into a brick wall. The key was already in the ignition.
She peeled out of the field and onto the road, passing a sign that proudly invited her to the city of Lima, OH.
--
The GPS had pointed her to a house on the edge of town where her Range Rover was waiting, along with her Audi Roadster. It seemed conspicuous to have three of her fanciest vehicles in one place, in a town like this, but she figured it was necessary.
The things given to her were always necessary.
It was easy to see that the house was meant to be hers when she spotted the wolf symbol on the mailbox, just under the name: Wilke.
Pulling into the driveway and further into the open garage, she smiled as she spotted her cars, both black and shiny on the other side of the very large room. Her Ducati’s purr quieted as she pulled her keys out, walking over to the door leading into the interior of the home and pushing the button that would close the garage door. The wolf symbol painted on the door leading into the house made her smile, glancing down at her watch and tracing the familiar shape where it was engraved onto the watch band.
Opening the door, she steps up into her new home.
There’s a stack of books and a high school class schedule stacked on the kitchen island that is immediately visible, along with a list of activities from the school that she would be attending for the moment. William McKinley High School, Lima, OH. Her first class was AP Chemistry.
Quinn closed her eyes, recalling her previous encounters with chemistry and smiling when she remembers the victorious look on Chris Thornton’s face as he successfully completed his master degree research on stem cells. Her watch had only been minutes from hitting twelve, and she had smiled and laughed, and said goodbye.
She had walked to the lab’s locker room and grabbed her stuff, waiting patiently. With a jerk, she had been dropped right into the middle of a golf course in Wales, and nearly thrown her back out with the fall.
Quinn opens her eyes once again, rubbing along the healing bruise on her ribs from that trip. The bruises on her face hurt the most, and she ventured slowly over to the fridge and dragged out an ice pack, placing it gingerly on the bone around her eye.
Her backpack was tight against her back as she walked through her new home, smiling up at the pictures of a family that was obviously not her own. She was meant to be a lonely high school child whose parents were away for some reason, all the time. The cars were theirs and she had free reign.
It had been so long that the lies were coming easily now.
She passed by an office that had a large, dark wooden desk dominating a corner of the room, with a beautiful collage of photos hung up over the very large computer set-up. A row of cameras was settled along the desk, and she smiled as she grabbed her favorite. She had contemplated taking it with her more than a few times, but she had figured taking pictures of all parts of the world and keeping them in the camera until she could get to somewhere with a printer or computer again would be complicated and risky.
Another door lead down to a basement that was quite expansive - a game room complete with two pinball machines, dartboard, and pool table took up what seemed like a third of the floor, while in another room, there was a small theater, with leather seats and a large screen. The other room was, to Quinn’s surprise, a music room. It had a baby grand, and a few of her guitars hung up on the walls. A drum set lurked in the corner, and mic stands littered the area.
Grabbing her favorite guitar, she hiked back up the stairs, and further up the stairs to the second level of the house. She passed by the door that had an amusing sign on it labelled ‘Who’s the boss?’ and smiled as she looked in on the hardfloored room with a dry erase board on one side and a desk in the center - she was going to be a good student, tutoring kids at the school and helping them.
But who was she sent here to help?
She paused in the doorway to her room at the thought, looking around for some sort of clue, a picture or indication other than William McKinley High School and the children in the clearing.
There was none, and she sighed as she set down her black acoustic and her Canon. The room was decorated, but not excessively so. The full windows on one side of the room faced out on her backyard - a pool and soccer goal were out there. It was August, so school was starting very soon - the calendar on her wall actually pointed to Thursday being the first day.
Today was Tuesday.
Quinn sighed as she set her backpack on her bed, unzipping it and pulling out all her things. This seemed like a longer-term mission, and her watch showed no signs of ticking.
Her GPS was placed on her desk, along with her iPod and phone. It was already showing signs of life, a signal appearing on it for the first time in a few drops. Her medical kit slid under her bed after she wrapped some new gauze around her forearm for a cut there. She gingerly lifted her Glock out of the bag - despite it being in a metal case, she hated having to carry it around. She set it under her bed too, finding it easier to breathe now that it was out of sight.
Her book of translations was tossed in the drawer of her nightstand, along with her notebook and space pen (which she was quite proud of for no other reason than it not having any scratches after all this time). Her medication bag was unloaded in her bathroom.
The titanium case holding her different glasses and sunglasses was set on the nightstand, ready to be dealt with tomorrow. The eternal glasses vs. no glasses debate was always tiring.
She finally pulled out the items tucked into the bottom of the backpack - they rattled around in the metal case and she popped it open and glanced over the array before her.
IDs, passports, and bank cards were looking up at her, all different colors. She reached for the bank card labelled Quinn Engel Wilke and flipped it over a few times in her hands. She had seen her school ID and Ohio driver’s license already, with her school things. The picture in the corner was different for each of them, a feat of detail that she never failed to appreciate. Her black card was finally set on her nightstand, along with the wallet she fished out from the case.
Quinn kicked off her shoes and reached for her ice pack once again, collapsing onto the bed and reaching for the remote on the nightstand, clicking the off button for all lights in the house.
She fell asleep to the slight sound of the seconds ticking away on the clock hung up on the wall, the familiar wolf insignia on the face watching over her.
--
Quinn dropped out of the sky right onto a roof. It was rather painful, to say the least, but the drop was made all the more painful by the crackling in her chest that signalled her ribs had not quite forgiven her for the last drop. Onto a pile of bricks.
She had barely sat up when she lost her balance and rolled off the roof, landing with another groan of pain on what was thankfully a soft pile of blankets. Quinn decided not to contemplate why a pile of blankets was being stored outside and rolled off them, bouncing up onto her feet to look around.
She seemed to be in a trailer park.
It also seemed completely deserted, which made sense because it was February and noon, meaning most everyone was out doing something, and the kids were in school.
But she was here for a reason, and she started ambling around. She had passed through several winding streets in the park before she heard what sounded like a cry.
Quinn jerked forward, starting to run as the cries got more insistent, intermixed with moans and groans of pain.
“Hello?” she called, before she turned a street corner and spotted what was happening. A girl was stumbling through the streets, clutching at her stomach. She didn’t look to be much more than fifteen, and she looked at Quinn for a moment in curiosity.
“Are you an angel?” she whispered, her voice sounding wondrous.
Quinn glanced down at her all-black outfit and the backpack on her shoulders, and felt at the hood draped over her head. She didn’t feel much like an angel, especially when the girl moved her hand and the white shirt she was wearing was revealed to be staining with blood.
Quinn moved forward quickly, barely catching the girl before she hit the ground. She dropped her bag and unzipped it, tossing out her metal gun case and her GPS before she ripped out the medic kit, before the girl speaks again.
“Why are you here?” she whispers, her eyes opening and closing as they try and focus on Quinn. Quinn lifts the edge of the girl’s shirt up and gasps as she sees what’s causing so much blood loss - gaping holes. They look like a shotgun blast straight to the stomach.
“Who did this to you?” Quinn whispers, and the girl shakes her head slowly as Quinn attempts to wipe away the blood. But it keeps coming quicker. “Why did they do this to you?!” she yelps, before she searches around in her bag with shaking, bloody hands and comes out with her phone. It is thankfully showing bars.
“I was gonna have a baby,” the girl whispers, and Quinn’s blood feels like it runs to ice as she tries to cover the holes in the girl’s stomach with her one hand as she yelps into the phone for paramedics, for anything.
“Okay, okay, you’re gonna be okay,” Quinn whispers, dropping the blood caked phone into her bag and stuffing her other stuff back inside, her hands reaching up for the girl’s dirty blonde hair, trying to soothe. But it’s more for herself, as the girl looks content. Happy even.
“Nice watch, angel wolf,” the girl whispers, tapping on the black band with the white wolf she can see in the side of her vision. She smiles up at Quinn.
“So which one do you think you are?” she mumbles, her head shifting toward Quinn. “Angel or wolf?”
“I don’t think you should be moving,” Quinn whispers, pulling down her hood and reaching for the girl’s hand as sirens start to echo in the distance. “You’re gonna be okay - ”
“Which one?” the girl says insistently, her breaths starting to turn into gasps. Quinn tries to answer, tries to give the girl what she wants, that one little bit of saving that she’s meant to impart. But she doesn’t know what it is. She doesn’t know.
“I - I don’t know,” Quinn whispers.
The girl blinks up at her and smiles dreamily.
“Either way,” she breathes out. “You shouldn’t be here.”
Quinn hears the sirens close in around her, and watches as the girl’s eyes close and breath stop. She grabs her backpack and stands, running off around the corner when she feels the pull -
She gets dropped into the middle of a monsoon, on the outskirts of a Bangladesh town.
Over the roar of the rain, Quinn can’t hear her own sobs as she stumbles a few feet before she collapses to the ground and lets the water wash away the blood and tears.
Rating: R
Length: 2,500
Spoilers: technically AU, but up to Rumours
Summary: "So which one do you think you are?" The girl whispered, her head shifting toward Quinn. "Angel or wolf?"
Author's Note: This title is a weird hybrid of two songs - "Wolves at Night" by Manchester Orchestra and "She Talks to Angels" by The Black Crowes. The first person who successfully mashes those two together deserves a prize of epic proportions because they're not similar. Um, anyway, yes this does say 15 chapters which I have not actually done...ever. So let's hope this flies. And this chapter is mostly introductory and generally mysterious and probably slightly boring.
Quinn bursts into being in the middle of nowhere, smashing into the ground and groaning as she feels the crunch of corn sprouts under her small and battered body. While she was happy to lie there and contemplate why she could never drop without hearing the crunch of bones or ligaments anymore, she still didn’t want to mess up someone else’s life by destroying valuable crops.
Speaking of someone else, she could hear the screech of girlish screams originating somewhere to her right, a nervous tittering settling into the dark...somewhere...night. From what Quinn could tell, it sounded like a group of people somewhere in the middle of this field. Hoping they weren’t the adventuresome sort who would go searching for whatever had gone bump in the night, she crawled forward for her backpack, which had flipped open in the commotion of her arrival.
Shoving the medical kit and the GPS back in the bag, and zipping it closed as quietly as possible, she shrugged it on and buckled the straps that reached across her waist and her upper shoulders, wincing as the bottom strap pushed against a painful bruise that had developed when she had been dropped into a tree and fallen down to the sidewalk.
Flipping her black jacket’s hood up over her blonde hair, she glances down at the watch wrapped around her wrist and then to the glowing green third hand on the watch, which was stopped at the twelve, refusing to move. She tapped at it with a questioning finger, wondering if the thing was finally malfunctioning. If it was, she would know soon enough.
A small round of voices started up in the same area as before, one bold voice ringing out through the cornfield.
“Come out, come out little alien!” a girl’s voice jeered, slurring along until it dissolved into gasping laughter. Another girl’s voice joined. “Santana!” it yelped, followed by the sound of something landing in the cornfield.
Quinn knelt up onto her knees, moving slowly toward the noise and smiling when she spots a small glow shining through the corn stalks. She grabs for what it appears one of the girls has thrown, a bottle of Jack Daniels.
Quinn’s watch shines its customary words up at her, and she contemplates it for a moment. Protect. Save. Serve.
She sighs, standing up slowly and smiling in the darkness as she realizes the stalks for the most part reach above her head. She steps forward, finding herself at the edge of a clearing in the middle of the field, a dark elm tree resting silently in the center, warding off the encroaching corn. She finally sees the people she’s been hearing - a set of people all gathered on a trampoline. They look her age, which would make them...juniors or seniors in high school. Bottles of alcohol were all around them, but most of them didn’t look like they were new.
She was supposed to be helping one of these people. But who?
She looked down to her watch, which was still not running. Cursing under her breath, Quinn reached blindly for her GPS, flipping it on so it would tell her where her ride was. She’d figure this out tomorrow, after she slept and got a night’s sleep, especially if her watch wasn’t ticking down yet. She had time.
Her GPS shined up at her, declaring proudly that her Ducati was waiting for her on the edge of the field, not that far from her. Why her Ducati was the chosen vehicle for this was beyond her, but she couldn’t say she minded.
She glanced one more time at the group of teenagers gathered on the trampoline. They were laughing, a few of them having conversations amongst themselves, and a few more were snuggled up in what appeared to be couples. One girl was staring off into the distance, up towards the constellation Orion, her fingers tapping slowly onto the edge of the trampoline.
Quinn blinked at the strange picture the girl made, before she winced at the pain in her eyes. She had forgotten about the bruise on the bone around her eye.
Quinn turned in the darkness and burst for the edge of the field, weaving through the corn stalks and finding the Ducati parked right where the GPS had pointed her to, not too far from the clearing. They weren’t that far in the corn field, as it had seemed when she first landed.
She pulled on her helmet with another wince, realizing the entire left side of her face still felt the damage from the time a few days ago she had been thrown into a brick wall. The key was already in the ignition.
She peeled out of the field and onto the road, passing a sign that proudly invited her to the city of Lima, OH.
--
The GPS had pointed her to a house on the edge of town where her Range Rover was waiting, along with her Audi Roadster. It seemed conspicuous to have three of her fanciest vehicles in one place, in a town like this, but she figured it was necessary.
The things given to her were always necessary.
It was easy to see that the house was meant to be hers when she spotted the wolf symbol on the mailbox, just under the name: Wilke.
Pulling into the driveway and further into the open garage, she smiled as she spotted her cars, both black and shiny on the other side of the very large room. Her Ducati’s purr quieted as she pulled her keys out, walking over to the door leading into the interior of the home and pushing the button that would close the garage door. The wolf symbol painted on the door leading into the house made her smile, glancing down at her watch and tracing the familiar shape where it was engraved onto the watch band.
Opening the door, she steps up into her new home.
There’s a stack of books and a high school class schedule stacked on the kitchen island that is immediately visible, along with a list of activities from the school that she would be attending for the moment. William McKinley High School, Lima, OH. Her first class was AP Chemistry.
Quinn closed her eyes, recalling her previous encounters with chemistry and smiling when she remembers the victorious look on Chris Thornton’s face as he successfully completed his master degree research on stem cells. Her watch had only been minutes from hitting twelve, and she had smiled and laughed, and said goodbye.
She had walked to the lab’s locker room and grabbed her stuff, waiting patiently. With a jerk, she had been dropped right into the middle of a golf course in Wales, and nearly thrown her back out with the fall.
Quinn opens her eyes once again, rubbing along the healing bruise on her ribs from that trip. The bruises on her face hurt the most, and she ventured slowly over to the fridge and dragged out an ice pack, placing it gingerly on the bone around her eye.
Her backpack was tight against her back as she walked through her new home, smiling up at the pictures of a family that was obviously not her own. She was meant to be a lonely high school child whose parents were away for some reason, all the time. The cars were theirs and she had free reign.
It had been so long that the lies were coming easily now.
She passed by an office that had a large, dark wooden desk dominating a corner of the room, with a beautiful collage of photos hung up over the very large computer set-up. A row of cameras was settled along the desk, and she smiled as she grabbed her favorite. She had contemplated taking it with her more than a few times, but she had figured taking pictures of all parts of the world and keeping them in the camera until she could get to somewhere with a printer or computer again would be complicated and risky.
Another door lead down to a basement that was quite expansive - a game room complete with two pinball machines, dartboard, and pool table took up what seemed like a third of the floor, while in another room, there was a small theater, with leather seats and a large screen. The other room was, to Quinn’s surprise, a music room. It had a baby grand, and a few of her guitars hung up on the walls. A drum set lurked in the corner, and mic stands littered the area.
Grabbing her favorite guitar, she hiked back up the stairs, and further up the stairs to the second level of the house. She passed by the door that had an amusing sign on it labelled ‘Who’s the boss?’ and smiled as she looked in on the hardfloored room with a dry erase board on one side and a desk in the center - she was going to be a good student, tutoring kids at the school and helping them.
But who was she sent here to help?
She paused in the doorway to her room at the thought, looking around for some sort of clue, a picture or indication other than William McKinley High School and the children in the clearing.
There was none, and she sighed as she set down her black acoustic and her Canon. The room was decorated, but not excessively so. The full windows on one side of the room faced out on her backyard - a pool and soccer goal were out there. It was August, so school was starting very soon - the calendar on her wall actually pointed to Thursday being the first day.
Today was Tuesday.
Quinn sighed as she set her backpack on her bed, unzipping it and pulling out all her things. This seemed like a longer-term mission, and her watch showed no signs of ticking.
Her GPS was placed on her desk, along with her iPod and phone. It was already showing signs of life, a signal appearing on it for the first time in a few drops. Her medical kit slid under her bed after she wrapped some new gauze around her forearm for a cut there. She gingerly lifted her Glock out of the bag - despite it being in a metal case, she hated having to carry it around. She set it under her bed too, finding it easier to breathe now that it was out of sight.
Her book of translations was tossed in the drawer of her nightstand, along with her notebook and space pen (which she was quite proud of for no other reason than it not having any scratches after all this time). Her medication bag was unloaded in her bathroom.
The titanium case holding her different glasses and sunglasses was set on the nightstand, ready to be dealt with tomorrow. The eternal glasses vs. no glasses debate was always tiring.
She finally pulled out the items tucked into the bottom of the backpack - they rattled around in the metal case and she popped it open and glanced over the array before her.
IDs, passports, and bank cards were looking up at her, all different colors. She reached for the bank card labelled Quinn Engel Wilke and flipped it over a few times in her hands. She had seen her school ID and Ohio driver’s license already, with her school things. The picture in the corner was different for each of them, a feat of detail that she never failed to appreciate. Her black card was finally set on her nightstand, along with the wallet she fished out from the case.
Quinn kicked off her shoes and reached for her ice pack once again, collapsing onto the bed and reaching for the remote on the nightstand, clicking the off button for all lights in the house.
She fell asleep to the slight sound of the seconds ticking away on the clock hung up on the wall, the familiar wolf insignia on the face watching over her.
--
Quinn dropped out of the sky right onto a roof. It was rather painful, to say the least, but the drop was made all the more painful by the crackling in her chest that signalled her ribs had not quite forgiven her for the last drop. Onto a pile of bricks.
She had barely sat up when she lost her balance and rolled off the roof, landing with another groan of pain on what was thankfully a soft pile of blankets. Quinn decided not to contemplate why a pile of blankets was being stored outside and rolled off them, bouncing up onto her feet to look around.
She seemed to be in a trailer park.
It also seemed completely deserted, which made sense because it was February and noon, meaning most everyone was out doing something, and the kids were in school.
But she was here for a reason, and she started ambling around. She had passed through several winding streets in the park before she heard what sounded like a cry.
Quinn jerked forward, starting to run as the cries got more insistent, intermixed with moans and groans of pain.
“Hello?” she called, before she turned a street corner and spotted what was happening. A girl was stumbling through the streets, clutching at her stomach. She didn’t look to be much more than fifteen, and she looked at Quinn for a moment in curiosity.
“Are you an angel?” she whispered, her voice sounding wondrous.
Quinn glanced down at her all-black outfit and the backpack on her shoulders, and felt at the hood draped over her head. She didn’t feel much like an angel, especially when the girl moved her hand and the white shirt she was wearing was revealed to be staining with blood.
Quinn moved forward quickly, barely catching the girl before she hit the ground. She dropped her bag and unzipped it, tossing out her metal gun case and her GPS before she ripped out the medic kit, before the girl speaks again.
“Why are you here?” she whispers, her eyes opening and closing as they try and focus on Quinn. Quinn lifts the edge of the girl’s shirt up and gasps as she sees what’s causing so much blood loss - gaping holes. They look like a shotgun blast straight to the stomach.
“Who did this to you?” Quinn whispers, and the girl shakes her head slowly as Quinn attempts to wipe away the blood. But it keeps coming quicker. “Why did they do this to you?!” she yelps, before she searches around in her bag with shaking, bloody hands and comes out with her phone. It is thankfully showing bars.
“I was gonna have a baby,” the girl whispers, and Quinn’s blood feels like it runs to ice as she tries to cover the holes in the girl’s stomach with her one hand as she yelps into the phone for paramedics, for anything.
“Okay, okay, you’re gonna be okay,” Quinn whispers, dropping the blood caked phone into her bag and stuffing her other stuff back inside, her hands reaching up for the girl’s dirty blonde hair, trying to soothe. But it’s more for herself, as the girl looks content. Happy even.
“Nice watch, angel wolf,” the girl whispers, tapping on the black band with the white wolf she can see in the side of her vision. She smiles up at Quinn.
“So which one do you think you are?” she mumbles, her head shifting toward Quinn. “Angel or wolf?”
“I don’t think you should be moving,” Quinn whispers, pulling down her hood and reaching for the girl’s hand as sirens start to echo in the distance. “You’re gonna be okay - ”
“Which one?” the girl says insistently, her breaths starting to turn into gasps. Quinn tries to answer, tries to give the girl what she wants, that one little bit of saving that she’s meant to impart. But she doesn’t know what it is. She doesn’t know.
“I - I don’t know,” Quinn whispers.
The girl blinks up at her and smiles dreamily.
“Either way,” she breathes out. “You shouldn’t be here.”
Quinn hears the sirens close in around her, and watches as the girl’s eyes close and breath stop. She grabs her backpack and stands, running off around the corner when she feels the pull -
She gets dropped into the middle of a monsoon, on the outskirts of a Bangladesh town.
Over the roar of the rain, Quinn can’t hear her own sobs as she stumbles a few feet before she collapses to the ground and lets the water wash away the blood and tears.