She hates cold. Always has. Maybe it’s a function of her birthdate — summer child, summer named. So she wasn’t really sure why she’d gone walking through the forest on this bitterly cold day, except that she couldn’t stand being inside any more.
It might have been coincidence that had her looking toward the lake as the boy slipped under the surface. Then again, given her power, maybe not.
She waited, holding her own breath, for him to come back up. Waited until spots danced in front of her eyes, and then panic began to rise inside her. She practically threw her mind toward the water, and came up with near-nothing. Silence. Half a second after that she was yanking her coat off, shoes, dropping phone and wallet and keys in a heap on the ground, stripping down to nothing but underwear.
The water was /freezing/. Almost immediately it felt like it was crushing her, it was so cold. A few powerful kicks drove her to him, and she wrapped a hand around his wrist and tugged. It took two, in the end, to get them both up to the surface, and she dragged in huge, gasping breaths when they breached. Her whole body shivered under the cold, but she forced herself onward.
Finally they were both spilled onshore, and she dove for her clothes, stripping as much water off herself as she could before she dragged her clothes back on. She put her coat over him, and hoped she remembered her CPR. Ten compressions to the chest, ten breaths?
Isaac had been struggling in the lake for what seemed like forever, but in reality was around ten minutes. The temperature of the icy lake had drained him of any slither of energy, seeming to also render his wolf healing powers useless. It was only a matter of time before he’d inevitably have gone under, like he had, and passed out.
After being dragged back to the edge, he was still out cold, no more than vivid nightmares ringing through his mind. The coat brought a little, much needed, warmth to his body. He didn’t have long left, not unless his saviour knew what she was doing… His lungs were full of water, they needed be emptied fast or he’d die…his life was her hands now.
She forced herself to take a deep breath, and it tripped that switch inside her that made her calm in emergencies. She had no idea why she was like that, but she would take advantage of it when it happened. Snagging her phone, she looked up CPR quickly, then rolled the boy over onto his side, hoping some of the water would drain out of his lungs. If she was lucky, he wouldn’t’ve breathed much of it in.
Putting the phone on speaker, she dialed her sister, needing to get him off the shoreline and somewhere warm. While she spelled out the problem, she rolled the boy onto his back again, very carefully, and began to apply CPR. She’d never been more grateful for her twin’s strange ability, or her own, when her twin popped into view in the shadow of a tree after only one cycle of compressions.
His skin was still frighteningly cold. While her twin pulled the jacket tighter around his body, she checked the shore of the icy lake for his clothes, coming up with a pair of jeans and a sweater. No shoes. She hurried back to her sister, and the two linked hands, crouched over his still body, while her dark-haired twin teleported them all back to her apartment.
The dark twin hurried off immediately to find some granola bars and hot drinks, and the red-haired twin grabbed all the blankets off her couch and spread them over the boy. Then she bolted to the bathroom, pausing only to wind her soaking braid up into a bun and pin it there, before grabbing a towel to put under his head.
Then she started CPR again. Maybe a minute had passed. Thirty compressions, carefully measured, two breaths. Repeat. Pray.
Finally, long after she’d lost track of how long she’d been trying to save his life, he sputtered, and coughed up what seems to be half a lake.