Tares City

18. When The Levee Breaks

~

Walking out of her temporary room, Arrow walks into the living room spotting her brother, Bell, and Beau sitting on the couch, looking at a video on Andrei's laptop. She walks over to the couch, sitting on its arm – Next to Bell. As she peers over, to see what was on the screen, Bell gets up from her seat to head out of the room.

Seeing this, Arrow jumps off the arm of the chair, reaching out to Bell, grabbing her gently by the shoulder. To everyone's shock, Bell spins around, pushing Arrow's hand – Subsequently sending a fist flying at her. Arrow ducks, Bell's fist passing over her head. Bell lets out a growl as Arrow takes two steps back from her. Taking a large step towards her, Bell aligns herself to deliver a blow at Arrow. Seeing the attack coming, Arrow was ready – using her hands to block Bell's punch and push her away. Bell goes to advance again but this time Beau intervenes. He stands between the two girls acting as a wall. Standing with his back to Arrow, he holds Bell off with his hand. "Bell, what are you doing?" He asks in shock. Bell lets out a growl in response.

"Did, did you just growl at me? You growl now?!" Beau says in shock staring at his sister wide-eyed.

Realizing what her brother had said to her, tears begin to fill up Bell's eyes. With a sniff, she turns and runs out of the room, going straight to the front door.

"Bell, wait!" Beau shouts out to his sister's retreating form – But it was no use. Not slowing, Bell runs out of the house and out of their sight.

~

NAOMI REID

"Today looks like it'll be just as busy as yesterday!" Naomi comments to Avery as they drive off from the firehouse. Naomi expertly maneuvers through the streets, speeding towards their destination. "Something 'Lycan-y' is going on isn't there? All those scratches and bite marks we saw."

"The bites and scratches are Lycan related, yeah, but I have no clue what's going down. I've never seen or heard anything like this happening before," Avery says to Naomi. "It doesn't make sense to me though."

"Which part?" Naomi questions.

"How so many people have bites and scratches - I mean, just looking at the persons from our call alone, none of them live relatively close to each other," Avery elaborates. "Even the guys from the other shift said they saw a lot of cases like those and spread out through the city too."

"All these people, are they Lycans now?" Naomi asks softly.

"Pretty much, yeah."

"How does that work," Naomi asks in return.

"We'll explain it when you and Calvin come over again later. He's probably seeing a lot of cases like this too." Since the day of their talk, Avery and Sean had taken it upon themselves to educate Naomi on all things Lycanthropy - An by extension, Calvin as well.

~

Having picked up their victim, Naomi and Avery rush him to the nearest hospital which happens to be Oak Crest Medical. They wheel him on their gurney, assisting the doctors with the transfer before exiting the room. "We're low on some stuff. I'm going to restock. Wait for me by the ambo, yeah?" Naomi says to Avery.

Avery replies to her with an "Mmhm" before walking out of the hospital to the ambo. Naomi makes her way through the hospital walking to the supply closet. The room was located next to a patient room – A man and woman inside arguing in hushed whispers. Naomi presses the buttons on the console to input the door's code just as the two of them barge out of the room.

"You caused this! You! Vanessa, I can't believe you would do something like this! To Yara! To me!" The man says to her angrily. "She hasn't woken yet, the Yew from that damn bullet..." He says trailing off at the end of his sentence. Unconsciously, Naomi had stopped inputting the code at the man's words. She'd remembered Avery telling her Yew was one of the poisonous herbs used against Lycans. Realizing that these people were Lycans she couldn't help but continue to eavesdrop.