Wolf cries in the night

Paige just smiled over at Corinne. Always the one to try and offer some sort of comfort to others. Paige honestly didn’t know what she’d do without her. “I think I’ll just take the meds and go to bed, it’s been a long day.” She murmured. If that wasn’t a sign Paige wasn’t herself at that moment…

For the most part, Paige was unharmed. She’d landed a bit hard on her bad shoulder, but aside from her scuffed knuckles, Keith and his pals were far worse off. “These are nuthin.” She said, trying to be funny, and she’d had much worse. Considering her track record on injuries, bruised knuckles were child’s play.

When they pulled into the driveway, Paige took her time getting out. Closing the door gently behind her as she hopped down. She wasn’t drunk by any means. In Fact the whisky has barely set in for the she-wolf, but she knew how the whole situation looked to others. She’d drank to much and caused a bar fight. At least she has behaved with the police. Callahan was in an even grumpier mood then usual due to his cold cheesesteak. He didn’t need Paige Anderson making it worse. “I’m good.” She told Corinne, noting how she was hovering and she really didn’t want her too. Everyone hovered lately it felt like. Or so it felt like it, as if they were waiting for something. Or maybe it was Paige’s own fucked up brain that imagined it.

She patted Corinne's shoulder, and then turned to head towards the door to Corinnes upper apartment. Despite her exhaustion she was still alert. Something she never lost despite being on leave. Her head turned to check both sides of the street, and her ears were attuned to any noises that shouldn’t belong.

Normally, Paige might have been her stubborn self right back to Corinne, but she wasn't in the mood. She just wanted to lay down and get the rest of the day over with, so she could forget about it. "I'm Good, seriously, Ri-Ri. I'll be healed come morning." Paige told her, but she didn't sound too convincing. Tired. She sounded tired.

She stopped at the door that Corinne was holding open and looked up at her. Funny how Corinne was the taller of the pair when Paige always felt tallest. But it was endearing. She sighed. Staring at Corinne, and knew there wasn't going to be any getting out of it. "Fine." She said quietly, not wanting to worry her any more than probably already was. She turned and then started to take the steps. Dragging her feet up them as she came to Corinne's door and then waited for it to get unlocked before she entered. She didn't even bother saying hi to the bulldog, that's how sad and bad she felt about everything that had happened that night. She pried her combat boots off and left them inside the door, and then shrugged out of her leather jacket. Tossing it on the arm of the couch before plopped down on the cushions and then held her hand out for the ibuprofen.

Paige pursed her lips and playfully glared up at Corinne as she handed her the ibuprofen and pretzels. To appease her landlord for the night, she stuck her hand in the bag and took a bite of a pretzel. Grunting at the pat to her head. Paige focused on eating the pretzel until she heard Corinne talking to her from the doorway, and she turned her head to look at her.

Her expression softened, and she paused mid-chew, staring at her best friend. It was like blow after blow, and finally- Paige felt she was at her breaking point for that night. “Love you too Ri-Ri.” She said quietly, waiting for the door to be closed, before she let a breath out. Feeling it catch in her throat, she gasped quietly as tears started to pool in her eyes, and she didn’t fight them as they fell down her cheeks. She sniffed, quickly forcing herself to eat a few more pretzels like Corinne wanted before got up and got herself a glass of water. Her bottom lip trembling as she tried to keep herself quiet to not alert Corinne that she was crying.

She took a few ibuprofen and then wandered back to the couch, plopping herself down before she curled into a ball, and then quietly cried herself to sleep.


Only, it wasn’t sleep that greeted Paige. She was in a war zone. She could smell the sulfur, the gunpowder, the chemicals. They flooded her nose, causing her eyes to water and she was gagging. Trying to get her legs to move forward. One step in front of the other, keep moving. Only, she wasn’t living it, she was watching it. Standing there in the middle like an innocent bystander as she watched herself moving. There was a flash of fur, and a Shepard came up beside her. Urging her forward. A cacophony of noises, mixed in with voices before bystander Paige saw what awaited the soldier version. One of her team members came from a building ways in from of her, and Tank had reacted, sensing something was wrong. He’d darted forward, doing the typical alert he usually gave, and she felt her heart beginning to race as panic set in. Stop him, don’t let him go, call him back. She thought frantically to herself, only the other version of her wasn’t listening.

Paige tried to move only to find her legs were frozen, no they were- The explosive sounded, and Paige looked to see she’d been too late. C.J had stepped on it, and she saw the blast. Tank caught in the crossfire, as her panicked screams soon started to fill the air. She couldn’t do anything, she was stuck, and she tried desperately to get to them. The bomb started then, and she felt her breathing heightening. She could hear a bark then that was becoming frantic, and she cried out again, thinking that it was Tank and he’d somehow survived, only now she couldn’t see. It was dark except for some basic shapes that she couldn’t make out.

She didn’t realize her own screams had woken her up, or that she was frantically sitting up. She felt hands suddenly grab her arm, and as a reflex, Paige reacted by shoving the person away so they couldn’t hold her down. The crash of the end table was enough to pull her back to the real world and she realized where she was. “Wha-” Her cheeks were damp, and there was a kick suddenly sounding as the door was kicked in.

With adrenaline already in her veins, Paige went into solider mode. There was a flash of gold suddenly, as her eyes shifted. Her vision improving incredibly to see in the dark as she vaulted off the couch. Her attention now on the intruder that dared break into Corinne’s house. He managed to make as far as the entry way.

“Corinne?!” He’d called, but it was too late. Paige’s primal need to protect her pact member over-rided her hearing as suddenly appeared out of the shadows in front of the intruder. Keeping her hands straight, she struck out as his wrist, pushing the gun away from body in an outward motion before she grabbed the muzzle and twisted. Twisting her body with the motion so he was forced to release the gun. With the gun now in her hand she expected him to panic and run, only he didn’t. Paige started to turn towards him when his elbow connected suddenly with her nose, flinging her head back, she let out a curse and felt him trying for the gun again, but she refused to let him have it.

Corinne was a deep sleeper--when her air conditioning worked. She'd been sound asleep in bed with Corbin snoring away at her feet when the screams began. Both witch and dog woke groggily and hesitated in bed until the second scream dragged them, stumbling, out of bed. Corinne's poor brain hadn't even gathered that it was Paige screaming until she had her feet on the floor and was crossing the room. When trying to parse reasons for her very best friend to be screaming like, that, Corinne didn't even have an answer. A really nasty spider? A centipede?

An intruder hadn't even crossed her mind; she was that confident in her wards...and in the fact that Paige would have kicked the ass of anything that tried to disturb her sleep.

It looked like, though, that Paige was still asleep. It was difficult to see in the dim light of the half-moon, but she thought that it looked like Paige had been crying. A nightmare! Corinne hurried to her friend's side, swearing quietly as she knocked her shin on the coffee table. Corbin 'helpfully' circled the couch, barking madly.

"Paige? Paige, sweetie? It's okay, you're safe," she cooed, brushing her hand over Paige's hair. That didn't seem to do anything. She was too deep in the dream. She was reaching out to shake her friend's shoulder when she sat up so sharply that Corinne barely got out of the way of colliding with her head.

"Oh tha--" she went to grab her friend's arm, to support her, and found herself being shoved backward. With a little "oh!" Corrinne stumbled back and hit the back of her knees on the coffee table. Her butt hit the far side of the crappy table with enough force to topple it, and over she went onto her back. Her head cracked against the floor with the sound of shattering glass. Wait, no. She hadn't shattered...there must have been a glass of water on the table. She could feel the water seeping under her.

A loud crash rang out, one that Corinne couldn't identify, and Paige ran toward it.

“Corinne?!” What? Was that Ryan?

There were the sounds of a fight, now, and Corinne groaned as she hauled herself to her feet. She ran past the couch, through the kitchen, to flip on the lights for the kitchen and the stairway. What she found was Paige, staring down the barrel of a gun at Ryan.

Well, fuck.

"Paige, Paige sweetie, that's just Ryan---you remember, the mechanic, from across the street? It's okay. He's safe." She rushed to explain, breathless. Instinctively she raised her own hands in a gesture of surrender, still unaware that they were beginning to drip blood and water. Her bare knees, too, were studded with little pieces of the shattered glass.

Hearing Corinne, made Ryan relax somewhat, and soon the woman’s identity was revealed. Corinne knew her, so she wasn’t an intruder. He glanced up at her and saw a chain around her neck, hidden by the tanktop she wore, wondering idly if she has some sort of military training. His eyes flickered back to find Corinne, and a look of horror crossed his face, as both he and Paige were suddenly jumping in action. Misunderstanding soon forgotten, as he hurried forward, gesturing for her hands, as Paige ran off probably to get a medkit.

“Are you okay?” He asked, concern was clear on his face and tone as he looked her over. She was dripped all over, and he didn’t know what was water or what was blood. “Sit down,” He nudged her gently towards the couch where he sat opposite her on the coffee table, he gently bent and placed a hand behind her calf, lifting her leg up so he could see her knee better. He grimaced at the glass pieces, and was about to ask for a first aide kit when Paige was sitting beside him, and apologizing.

He asked his questions then, his eyes going to Corinne where they stayed for a moment. Asking her a silent question of if Paige was okay. Hearing it was a bad dream, his lips pursed as he picked up one of the washcloths Paige brought over, and started to wipe away blood and water from Corinne’s leg. He heard jingling then, and glanced over to see that chain Paige had around her neck had fallen out of her tank top and was dangling down as she’d leaned forward, and he saw the familiar set of dog tags that he also wore around his neck. Only, she had three more tags then he did.

It made some sense then, the way she’d wrestled that gun from him. He reached for another washcloth and then held it out and up to her. “Here, you’re bleeding too Soldado.” Paige paused, and he saw the surprise cross her face as she remembered her own bloody nose. She took it from and he met a pair of green eyes. She nodded in her thanks as she held it under her nose, and then she seemed to notice his tags. “You serve?” Her voice was a bit nasally from her pinching her nose, and Ryan felt a grin spreading across his face as nodded. Reaching over to pluck the tweezers from her other hand since she couldn’t use them at the moment.

He turned back to starting to pull glass out of Corinne’s wounds. “Let me know if it stings too much, okay?” His eyes flickered up to her face as he spoke softly to her, and then started pulling a piece out. “Every day in the sky since I was eighteen. Been out for almost two years?” He told her.

“Pilot huh?” That seemed to peak Paige’s curiosity. “You work on the boeings?” She asked. Ryan’s grin returned and he shook his head moving onto another piece of glass. “Fighter pilot.” He corrected. Paige let a low whistle out, and he couldn’t see the look she was giving Corinne. “From the way you handed me my ass, I’m gonna guess Marine?” He asked her, looking over at her. A sly grin appeared on Paige’s face. “Damn right, though I got tired of those jarheads and joined up with the Army about a year and a half ago.” She explained. Ryan chuckled then, as the puzzle pieces started falling into place. From the tear stains on Paiges face, Ryan could only assume what she’d been having dreams about. And if she had been in active combat… There was a reason he drank himself to sleep...