inhuman [2] // teen wolf

39. bombshell

During lunch, when everyone were putting their books away and getting ready to eat, Riley found herself standing in the middle of the hallway with Olivia while her and the new girl talked each other's ears off. Honestly, she had never felt so awkward in her entire life. There was also something about that girl, Kira, that Emma had a hard time with. She felt tense whenever Riley looked at Kira, and Kira looked clueless as to why Riley looked like she wasn't breathing, but nevertheless, Riley pushed the feelings back and decided to make friends with this girl, since Olivia had already spent most of her time with in their history class together.

Yeah, Olivia takes History.

"I absolutely love your fashion sense; so out there and... Ugh, I love it! I wish I had the courage to wear something like this, you're so cute!" Olivia gushed, and Kira's cheeks blushed a light pink as she smiled down at her outfit. "Honestly, Riley could definitely learn something from you."

"Liv, standing right next to you." Riley interrupted, smiling at her best friend who paid no attention to her remark.

"You have to come meet my friends, they will absolutely love you! And Riley's friends, I guess, but trust me, they are a bit on the weird side." Olivia commented, to which Riley slapped her on the arm. "Ow!"

"Again, standing right next to you." She repeated, which earned a little giggle from the new Kira. Riley smiled back and Olivia gave her scathing look, before taking Kira by the arm and pushing through the crowd to the cafeteria, where Olivia's other group of girlfriends hung out. While Olivia tried to befriend her friends with Kira, Riley went to go find Stiles and hopefully he was free to hang out with her.

* * *

The next day was just like any other day at school. The gang riled up and continued to wonder about how to fix these ongoing nightmares and hallucinations that seemed to be ruining their lives. The more Riley thought about it, the more she realised that she was the most normal person in her group, excluding Lydia, who seemed to be very sane compared to the die-then-come-back-to-life trio. Lately, Scott hasn't been able to control his transformations and is seeing things that aren't actually there. Stiles is having mad night terrors where he literally has to "scream himself awake" -- Riley knew about that one, since a few nights ago they were skyping on their laptops and they both fell asleep, then woke up to the sounds of screams coming from Stiles' mouth. He also says that he can't read properly, as if he can't see the words. Allison has been seeing her dead aunt, Kate, who was killed by Peter. Riley, at the time, never knew of the woman, only hearing about the funeral through the newspapers scattered across her front lawn.

"Okay, so what happens to a person who has a near-death experience and comes out of it seeing things?" Scott asked, looking around the table for any answers. Of course, no one had any. They were all as clueless as each other.

"And is unable to tell what's real or not?" Stiles added, joining in on the questionnaire.

"And is being haunted by demonic visions of dead relatives?" Allison jumped on the bandwagon as well. Riley secretly rolled her eyes. Lately, she hasn't really been feeling all that warm towards Allison, for some known reasons relating to Isaac.

"Those people are all locked up because they're insane." Isaac replied, smiling at the end as he looked at Stiles.

"Can you at least try to be helpful, please?" Stiles groaned, and Riley nudged him on the shoulder. Stiles shook his head in frustration as his arms were held in the air.

"Well, for half my childhood, I was locked in a freezer. So being helpful is kind of a new thing for me." Isaac shot, and Riley's lips and eyebrows straightened out into a fine line.

"Really? Are you still milking that?" Stiles replied, watching Isaac with a sneer.

"Yeah, maybe I am still milking that." Isaac snapped, crossing his arms on the table. It was obvious that Isaac didn't like Stiles all that much, which made it a lot more perfect for Riley.

"Hi." A sound came from beside Riley, as all heads turned to the girl clutching her book against her chest and smiling shyly. It was Kira. "Hi, sorry. I couldn't help overhearing what you guys were talking about. And I think I actually might know what you're talking about." Everyone around the table looked at each other nervously. "There's a Tibetan word for it. It's called "Bardo." It literally means "in-between state." The state between life and death."

Everyone looked scared, until Lydia spoke up in a sassy tone. She brought the tip of her pen to her red lips and lightly bit it.

"And what do they call you?" She asked, her dark eyebrow slightly raised. Kira looked intimidated, but then again, when does she not? 100% of the time she was either embarrassed by her history teacher slash dad or very pink in the face from being so shy.

"Kira." Scott spoke up, smiling lightly at the girl in front of him. She smiled back. Something was connected between the two, and Riley was sure to find out what. "She's in our History class."

"So are you talking Bardo in Tibetan Buddhism or Indian?" Lydia asked cunningly, wanting to be the smartest girl in the room. No matter what, she would always be the smartest girl ever, but of course she doesn't like competition. Kira tucked her skirt with her hands as she sat down on the bench next to Riley and she quickly took her bag off of the seat.

"Either, I guess. But all the stuff you guys were just saying? All that happens in Bardo. There are different progressive states where you can have hallucinations; some you see, some you just hear. And you can by visited by peaceful and wrathful deities."

"Wrathful deities? And what are those?" Riley asked, staring at the girl beside her. Kira's eyebrows raised and her gaze floated around the group.

"Like demons." She replied.

"Demons. Why not?" Stiles nodded, grimacing at the pen in his hand.

"Hold on, if there are different progressive states, then what's the last one?" Allison interrupted, looking genuinely scared.

"Death. You die." She replied, seemingly unfazed by the bombshell she just dropped onto the group.