Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Prologue – grief

Derek paces back in forth in the loft. Braeden stands next to the table, leaning on it. She looks just as fiercely beautiful as usual, but Derek doesn’t need to take a whiff of her to know that she’s frustrated and angry. Documents and various other papers are spread on the table top, and she’s flipping through them restlessly.  Dark circles bruise under her eyes and her hair is slightly frizzy, pulled back out of her eyes in a loose ponytail. She snaps her cellphone out and begins to dial a number.

Derek slides down the nearest wall and sits on the floor, elbows on his knees. Even after being back in the loft for the miserable past six months, it still feels strange to be back. He’d been ready to leave Beacon Hills for as long as he could. The large looming windows stare down at him, small snowflakes melting and dripping down slowly. It’s late December, exactly five days before Christmas, and the last time Derek had dreaded the holidays this much, it had been the year after his family died. In his head, Derek replays Scott’s voice when he told him what happened, reminding him why he was here.

“Hello? . . . Yes, this is her. Do you have the information I asked for? . . . No. Don’t say anything. . .I realize this. . .Thank you for your help, please alert me when you lock in on the location. Happy Holidays.”

Braeden’s sentences are short but polite, and Derek hadn’t tried to eavesdrop on the other side of the call, so it surprises him immensely when Braeden slams her phone into the table. The entire pack, even Derek himself, had offered paying for her services. Braeden took one look at them and angrily shook her head. This was something she wanted to do, she didn’t need their money. In an instant, he’s standing in front of her, hands on her shoulders, his eyebrows hunched in worry.

She gives him a look Derek wishes he didn’t recognize. Almost the same look she’d given him as he bled out in Mexico. The hopelessness shone sadly in her eyes. Derek knows how strong the woman in front of him is. She’d been through things that were comparable to the things he himself had had to deal with. And he’s had to deal with a lot.

“He’s not the first one, Derek. Over a hundred of them have been taken in the last three years.”

Her voice is steady, but he sees the way her shoulders slump.

A hundred. A hundred teenagers missing, taken away from friends, families, and their lives.

As Derek begins to form a reply, the snow outside turns into loud and pouring rain. When lightning flashes a couple seconds later, they both look out the window and almost miss the sound of the alarm as thunder strikes.

Almost like the pair had done it a thousand times, Braeden grabs her gun and hides in the shadows next to the wall, Derek sliding into the shadows on the other side. When the door slides open, Derek inhales the scent of human and misery, so strong it almost makes him stumble.

It’s a blonde boy. He’s wearing dirty white clothing not suited to the weather, water droplets dripping from his tall and lanky frame. His brown eyes search around in panic, and the boy – he looks about seventeen – limps and trips into the room, failing to notice the two people behind him. He mumbles something.

“Braeden. . .Brae—”

The werewolf has the blonde pushed up against the wall in seconds. “Who are you? What do you want?”

The boy’s lips are blue and he coughs nastily when his back hits the wall. “Derek,” Braeden chastises behind him. He lets his hold on the boy loosen a little. As he breathes in, he senses the boy’s pain, but there’s also something else, something that Derek knows well. The boy’s voice is rough, like it hasn’t been used in days, but there’s a certain accent to it too, almost British.

“I – I know where he is,” the boy gasps. “I know where – where Stiles is.”

Letting go of the boy in shock, he almost doesn’t notice when the blonde slides down the wall and stops breathing.

Like always, Braeden is there; calling 911 and performing CPR.

Taking another step back, Derek lets out the breath he was holding. Underneath all his pain and misery, the boy was drowning in grief.

Chapter Text

1 – paradise

Paradise lasts two weeks. Two weeks of peace, if Thomas could even call it that. The last fourteen days had been night of nightmare after nightmare, either crying or screaming himself to consciousness. It seemed like the moment all the adrenaline of constantly fighting left his body, Thomas finally succumbed to what he was feeling.

He wasn’t the only one though. Minho and Gally grunted and thrashed at night. Brenda woke up sobbing. Some of the others were worse for wear, but most were doing okay.

Thomas felt the guilt swallowing him whole.

“Thomas, you klunk-head! We need you by the waterfront, there’s an issue.” Minho’s voice snaps Thomas out of his daze, and the brunette stands up from the secluded rock he had been sitting on. “Coming!”

As he emerges from the trees, Brenda immediately bounces up to him. Thomas lets her hug him and kiss his cheek, ignoring the raised eyebrows and look of worry. Her hand traces the circles under his eyes wearily. Behind her, there are people fluttering about, washing, hunting, building, cooking, laughing and just. . .living. Thomas’s heart stutters. He can’t even imagine what they must feel like.

Brenda follows him to where Minho, Gally, and Frypan stand.

Its sundown, the fourteenth day on paradise, and Minho alerts Thomas that someone spotted something moving on the skyline, and everything goes to literal klunk. Thomas can see it. The white blob that leaves a trail of smoky clouds in its wake.

As it comes closer and closer, Minho attempts to calm down the masses, who have slowly begun to realize something is looming upon them. Frypan goes to cook a meal at some point, but the rest of them just stand there, the same dread filling them all up, in silence. Brenda squeezes his hand from where she’s standing next to him and finally breaks the silence. “What. . . what is that?”

Thomas moves closer for a better view.  Although it was clearly a flying machine, it looked nothing like a Berg. In fact, it kind of looked like a plane. Brenda comes up on his right and Gally comes up on his left.

“Is that. . .is that a plane?” Gally asks hesitantly. Him and Thomas still have it rough getting along at points, but something about surviving all they did changes how you hate someone.

“I- I think it is,” Brenda mutters, completely amazed.

“But. . .” Thomas mumbles, but doesn’t finish. Planes were a thing from before the Flare. He remembers them, knows he’s been on one before, but has no idea why or with who and how. The small amount of memories Thomas has received back since the Maze start to leave him more and more confused as time goes on. He ignores the way it bubbles discomfort and steps back, the plane is minutes from landing, looking bigger than ever and sounding louder and louder.

Behind them, they hear Minho yell angrily. “Thomas, Gally, and Brenda! Get your shuck asses back here and grab a weapon. I don’t care if it’s a bunch of unicorns driving or it’s more cranks. We’re gonna be shucking prepared when they get here.”

Thomas smiles fondly at his friend, nods, and jogs back to where everyone has lined up, shoulder to shoulder. The four of them stand in the front, leaving little room for the plane to arrive. Suddenly, he remembers something. Planes need a landing strip. He turns around and hollers loudly, maybe a minute before the planes estimated landing time. “GET BACK! MOVE!”

They listen. They always do. Thomas refuses to think about it.

Brenda pulls him back and the plane lands, taking a few seconds to fully stop, right in front of where the four of them stand bravely, hands on their weapons.

A million what if’s go through his mind, and Thomas swallows nervously. Whatever it is, they can handle it. He hopes.

When the door opens, a dark haired hunk of muscle jumps out, landing smoothly and looking towards the crowds, who Thomas notices have assembled behind them, some sort of weapon in their hands. He’s dressed in dark jeans, boots, a grey shirt and a simple leather jacket. He has a five o’clock shadow and green blue eyes. Thomas can’t see any weapons on him, but that means nothing. His wardrobe and appearance surprise him, and he can tell he’s not the only one wo feel that way.

Minho’s there before the man even has time to finish looking around. With a gun pointed at the man’s chest, he starts talking. “Who the shuck are you?”

The man doesn’t reply, and his gaze locks with Thomas’s. Something about the way the other man’s eyes widen and the stare intensifies makes Thomas want to hide. The man, probably in his early or mid-twenties, is looking at Thomas like he hung the moon.

Someone else jumps out of the plane door. Minho’s gun is pointed at the dark skinned woman, about the same age as the other guy, before she even looks up from her feet. She’s dressed in similar attire, and is obviously just as good looking as the man beside her. There are long scars covering her neck gruesomely and Thomas wonders how she survived them. Immediately, she locks her gaze on him. Her stare makes him feel even worse than the man’s does.

“Stiles.”

It was barely a whisper on her lips, but almost everyone hears it, the entire population quiet as the two strangers stand in front of Minho’s gun. Stiles, he repeats in his head.

Somehow, Thomas knows the woman’s referring to him, but he refuses to accept it. Minho starts.

“What the shucking shuck is a Stiles?” Minho looks exasperated and angry, unsure of who to point his gun at. He chooses the girl, since she’s the one who spoke. Also, there’s an obvious gun in a holster at her waist and she’s wearing a badge of sorts around her neck. Neither are good signs. “And answer my questions, now.”

As if Gally thought Minho wasn’t doing a good job, he moves forward and joins them near the plane, adding his own gun to the mix. “Talk.”

The strangers are still eyeing him up and down. Their gazes pause on his shoulders, his attire, his hair, and the confusion in his eyes. The man and the woman give each other a look. It’s the first time they rip their eyes away from Thomas. Stiles. . .

The woman starts speaking. “My name is Braeden Tandy and this is Derek Hale.” She pauses, looking towards Thomas for any sign of recognition. When none is rendered, and Thomas feels more confused than he did before, she continues, her voice loud and clear. “I am a United States Marshall. Whatever you think you know, it’s not true. WICKED fed you lies. The world is completely safe from the Flare, and there were no disastrous sun flares ever to occur.”

This causes an uproar. Everyone goes mad and starts yelling, throwing things and trying to condemn this woman, who thinks she can feed them another lie. Thomas has enough of it after a couple of seconds. He stomps up closer to where Minho and Gally are still pointing their guns in disbelief at the two strangers and holds his ground. Like earlier, he puts all his might into his words. “SHUT UP! CALM DOWN, AND SHUCKING LISTEN TO WHAT THEY HAVE TO SAY!”

Most of them are shocked into silence, and Thomas can feel the burning gazes of the strangers behind him. He hears someone else jump from the plane door. Thomas spins around and sucks in a breath. No –

It can’t be possible. It can’t. He feels and hears almost everyone fall quiet, except for murmurs of confusion or leftover arguers, Gally’s, Minho’s and Brenda’s shocked gasps.

It’s like Thomas’s lungs decide to stop working, because he can’t breathe.

“It’s true.”

There he is. His hair has grown back into the bald spot that was there the last time Thomas saw him. The bruises and sharp cuts there were before are gone, and Thomas looks at the side of the blonde’s head.

No gaping wound. No bleeding. Like nothing even happened.

His insides constrict and Thomas breathes out one word, almost choking. He feels a worried glance from the man named Derek. He ignores it. “Newt.”

Minho and Gally abandon their guns and run at the taller boy. Brenda runs up until she’s right beside Thomas; still, he can’t move, frozen in place.

Newt’s smile when he hugs Gally and Minho makes Thomas’s eyes tear up.

The world was okay again.

But. . . how? Somehow, Thomas hadn’t lost this friend. Hadn’t killed his friend.

Teresa. . . Chuck. . . but somehow not Newt.

When Newt’s warm brown eyes make contact with his own, Thomas feels lightheaded. Suddenly, there’s a body against his and arms around his back and- and Thomas is sobbing.

“Tommy.”

His voice is so warm, that rich foreign accent so kind and soothing. After what seemed like so long but not long enough, Newt pulls back. Thomas stutters, not sure of what is happening. “Wha- how? Newt.”

The boy looks a thousand times healthier than he ever did in the Maze. His skin is slightly pale, like he hasn’t seen the sun, but he looks like he has no scars, no fears, no worries. Only happiness. Thomas recounts what the boy in front of him had said as a crank begging for death.

Thinking of it springs new tears to his eyes and he feels his heart turn cold. A wound that had been recently numbed burst back into pain.

Newt’s eyes are just as teary as his own. “Tommy?”

Thomas takes a deep breath, steps back, and looks at Braeden and Derek, who are both staring with equal expressions of shock and pain. “Who are these people?” he whispers to Newt shakily. His voice sounds foreign and hoarse.

Thomas swears he sees Derek’s sharp intake of breath, as if someone had stabbed him. Suddenly, he knows the answer to his own question.

“They’re your friends, Tommy. You’re Stiles.”

Chapter Text

2 – memories

Since the first time Thomas can ever remember, his dreams are perfectly clear. He dreams of a boy named Stiles Stilinksi, a boy who consists of 147 pounds of skin, sarcasm, bones, and wit. A boy who goes to summer camp every summer, leaving the first week and coming back the last week, losing and regaining memories of building a maze, a sweet girl named Teresa, and numerous other friends that one by one he sent into the Box. Thomas and Stiles were the same person, Thomas could tell. But their memories never crossed paths. They had different parents, friends, goals, realities. But now, he will never regain his memories of Stiles’s life. Images of different people pass in his mind’s eye, some more than others. He can’t connect any of their faces to names, any of their words to memories.

Although it’s better than the constant stream of nightmares he’s been having, Thomas shivers awake feeling depressed and confused. Brenda is lying next to him in bed, her hair falling in her eyes sweetly and her hand intertwined with his. Minho and Gally are asleep on the next bed over, and Newt is awake, flipping through a magazine in a seat between the two beds. Thomas lets go of Brenda’s hand carefully and turns to face Newt.

So many people were left in Paradise, information and back up soon arriving to take them home, where these people belonged. Frypan had chosen to go back to his dad, who turned out to still be alive. Gally didn’t care about his parents, he was going where the rest of them went. Minho was an orphan. Brenda had only ever known W.I.C.K.E.D. Newt’s family died in a car crash the year he was sent into the maze, him and his sister being the only two to survive. But she had died with a lot of Group B.

Newt looks at him and sighs, but he starts talking anyway, as if he knows what Thomas is going to ask.

“I never died.” The words leave Newt’s lips the moment he makes eye contact with Thomas. They are full of regret, and, to Thomas’s assumption, pain. Newt continues uncertainly.

“I don’t know how, or bloody why, but the bullet didn’t kill me. The next thing I know, I’m at W.I.C.K.E.D. Headquarters, being offered a choice. ‘You’re important, Newt,’ they said. ‘Die, or choose to help us. We could use your help.’”

He pauses here, takes a shuddering breath, and his eyes are wet. He’s put the magazine down now and is completely facing Thomas. “I don’t know if it’s because they were being honest, or if it’s because they knew they were losing the fight against us, but I didn’t bloody care at the time. I saw a chance and I took it. I found myself in one of the prohibited areas. I found out the truth.

“I don’t know how long I sat there staring at all the shucking proof. It was all a lie. We were all guinea pigs in a radiation experiment. We all died for nothing. I- I made you ki—”

The blonde’s voice had cracked there, but Thomas ignores the mention of the subject of most of his nightmares. He ignores the sharp pain that blooms in his chest and looks at Newt expectantly. Newt reaches over to him and catches Thomas’s wrist in his hand, rubbing soft circles on his pulse point as he continues.

“You can’t handle the exposure? You have the Flare. It doesn’t affect you? Immune. They had handpicked the smartest and yet the least noticeable people. Every time we went through a Flat Trans? They would knock us out and wake us up somewhere else. It was all a lie, Tommy, a bloody lie.”

Both their eyes shone with tears. “Newt. . .”

Thomas had so many questions. Question after question that he stopped himself from asking, only looking into Newt’s eyes sadly instead. The blonde looked like he wanted to say more but he was shaking his head, so Thomas squeezed the other boys arm gently.

“I ran as soon as I could, trying to find someone who could help.” Newt’s stare becomes something filled with longing, and the boys squeezes back. “You have really good friends, Tommy.”

This makes Thomas want to scream. Braeden and Derek had gone to all this trouble to find him, to make sure he was alive, and Thomas couldn’t even freaking remember them. “I don’t even know them,” he spits.

Newt ignores his tone. “But you will,” he insists. “My parents died in a car crash the year I was put into the maze. Minho’s an orphan. Gally doesn’t want anything to do with his parents. Brenda grew up as a permanent part of WICKED, so everyone she’s related to is dead. The fact that you have anyone. . . it’s amazing.”

Thomas doesn’t reply. He retracts his arm from the blonde’s grip and leans his elbows on his knees, hands coming up to support his head. He thoughtfully observes the shoes he’s wearing, simple red converse. Everyone had been offered a change of clothes when they entered the plane, and none of them had refused. Thomas gazes at his friends.

Brenda, who breathes lightly behind him still asleep, is wearing something of Braeden’s. It’s a black tank top, a grey hoodie with a draw string, and ripped jeans. Minho is in Adidas track pants and a white wife beater. Gally is dressed similarly in grey sweatpants. Thomas himself is wearing what apparently seems to be his own clothing: a white shirt a size too big, a red string up hoodie, and sweats. At least, it’s Stiles’s clothing.

“Tommy?”

As he looks up, he observes what Newt is wearing. A cream colored sweater that reminds Thomas too much of what Newt wore in the Glade, and brown pants. “Yeah?”

“Thank you, Tommy. Thank you so shucking much – you have no idea what it meant to me, I was going ins--”

Thomas couldn’t deal with this right now. He knew they needed to talk about it, but it was too much, too soon.  “Shut up.”

Newt stood up and Thomas could see the others coming awake. “You need to hear this!”

Thomas whispers his next words harshly before making an exit. “Shut up, Newt. I-I killed you. Put a gun to your head and pulled the trigger. Just, shut up.”

He opens the compartment door and slams it shut, knowing Newt won’t follow. The blonde knows when he needs space. The brunette tries removing the blonde’s guilt stricken face from his mind but it’s nearly impossible. Since they’re still on the plane (a private jet no less, he wonders how rich Stiles’s friends are), Thomas can’t exactly go on a run, but he can’t stay still any longer. He goes into the room where he knows Derek and Braeden are sitting, hearing hushed angry whispers. His stomach grumbles hungrily as he pushes the door open.

Both Derek and Braeden are frozen mid whisper, and Thomas looks at them questioningly. He still doesn’t trust either of them, and it hurts that he may never trust anyone again, not completely. Braeden stands up suddenly, glaring at Derek. Thomas hasn’t spoken to either of them yet, well, other than some short, strained sentences when answering questions, but no real conversations. No talk of Stiles or how when they were in the same room the both of them couldn’t stop staring at him. What, was Stiles better looking than him or something?

“I was just leaving,” Braeden says and stands up, walking towards the door behind Thomas. “There’s still a couple of hours until we get to California, so I think I’m gonna take a nap.” She rubs her hands off on her dark skinny jeans and walks past him. Thomas can see how stressed and tired she looks. Both of them look like that, but he hasn’t commented yet. He wishes he knew what made them like this, wishes he remembered them.

 Braeden stops next to him and gives him a weak smile. She extends her hand out as if to pat him on the shoulder, but before she can he’s already flinching out of the way on instinct. He winces at the look of rejection on her face, but she steels herself and says, un-phased, “It’s nice to see you again, Stiles,” before leaving. Thomas manages a sad and sheepish nod at her before taking an empty seat. Once again, he refuses to acknowledge how helpless he feels.

He looks at Derek. The man is incredibly handsome and rugged, like he belongs on the cover of a magazine. His green blue eyes blink at Thomas warily from underneath bushy eyebrows.

“Are you hungry?” the man asks, and because it was the last thing he expected the man would say, a chuckle escapes him. Derek looks at him bizarrely, like he didn’t expect that either.

“You shucking bet,” Thomas nods, forcing a smile for the other man’s sake and Derek lifts a judgmental eyebrow at him. Moments later though, the man has placed a burger and fries in front of him. Thomas’s mouth literally waters. He thinks about how much he will miss Frypan’s cooking before he digs in.

Once he’s swallowed a monstrous bite of the burger, he tries to break the tension between them. He knows Derek is staring (when isn’t he), and he can feel the other man’s discomfort.

“So, I don’t really remember a lot,” another judgmental brow lift, “okay, that’s a lie, I remember close to nothing. But, my name is Stiles, I live in Beacon Hills, and I have friends rich enough to hire a US Marshall and own a private jet?”

He hopes sounding airy and careless will do the trick, but he knows he’s made it worse when his voice comes out questioningly instead. Derek blinks before leaning back in his chair. A moment of silence passes that makes him think the guy might not reply, so he takes another bite of his burger.

“Your name is Stiles Stilinski, you’re turning 18 in March, you live in Beacon Hills, the US Marshall is a friend and the private jet is a rental.”

Thomas channels all his energy and frustration into asking questions, random and mostly unimportant, but after talking with Newt, he needs some of them answered.

“What kind of name is Stiles? I thought I was sixteen, huh.” Derek’s eyebrows continue to lift whenever he says something. Thomas wonders how he got someone who looks and acts as fierce as Braeden. “Not that I am not happy with my current relationship or anything, but do I have a girlfriend? Do I have a lot of friends? Um. . . Do I have a lot of family?”

Derek looks personally offended with having to answer so many questions, but Thomas can sense the other man’s relief at his curiosity. “I don’t know, but it’s your nickname, not your real name. Yes, surprisingly so, you have a girlfriend -” Thomas’s heart drops “- and you may not have the most friends, but a lot of people put in a lot of effort to find you when you went missing. You live with your dad. Your mom passed away when you were younger.”

“How did she die?” Thomas asks first. His dread seems to seep into his burger, and he loses some of his appetite.

Derek looks unsure of how to answer. “Um. . .I’m not exactly the person to answer that.”

Thomas nods, but the dread becomes greater. “My, um, my dad. Is he. . . is he okay?”

Believing his father went crazy and was dead for so long awakens a fear inside him. What if his real father isn’t healthy either?

This, Derek doesn’t hesitate in replying to. Thomas assumes then that he and his father have a good relationship. “Your dad’s the sheriff, where we live.. . .Do you know what that is?”

The other man must’ve sensed his confusion. Some things, Thomas remembers and recognizes instantly, but other are still fuzzy, like they were removed from his mind with more intensity. “A cop. . . a head cop. Is he any good?” he asks unsurely.

“The best,” Derek says, and for the first time, there’s a flicker of something like happiness or hope on the man’s face. Thomas smiles slightly in return. He can see, in the other man’s body language, that something about Thomas expressing happiness sends relief shooting through his system.

Wondering why Stiles Stilinski would have a reason to be so happy about his life felt like poison sliding down Thomas’s throat. Once again, he only has to look at Derek to see the answer.

Chapter Text

3 – Thomas

When Scott McCall answers his phone on Christmas morning, he feels miserable, angry, and disappointed. Like he was somehow expecting to find his best friend wrapped up under his tree, smiling and laughing at a stupid joke.

“Hello?” he answers warily, not bothering to look at the caller I.D.

“Round up everyone. Make sure the Sheriff is there.”

“Derek? Wait, what’s happened?” Scott is frantic. Horrible possibilities on why the former Alpha would call him at 9 AM on Christmas day make him worry.

“We need to talk. The loft. Noon, Scott. Make sure everyone’s there.”

Scott wants to break his phone when he hears the beep that signals the call ending. He can feel his eyes glowing. Instead, he starts typing.

The loft at noon. Be there. Derek says its important.

Sent. A second later, Scott sends another text.

Merry Christmas

They’re all there early. His mom, the Sheriff, Malia, Liam, Lydia, Kira, Parrish, Argent, and even Isaac, who had returned from France shortly after Stiles went missing.

They all look worse for wear. There’s a thin layer of snow on the ground, but none of them shiver when they exit their vehicles.

Lydia wears a beautiful Christmas themed outfit, but her ever knowing smirk isn’t there and she looks like she is seconds from screaming. The dark circles under her eyes match his, but then again, they match everyone’s.

Kira is in a scruffy green wool sweater and dark wool leggings under a skirt. Her hair is up in a messy bun and she is frowning. Scott can’t physically remember the last time she smiled. Malia, not exactly in the same Christmas spirt as everyone else, is wearing a lacrosse sweater Scott knows is Stiles’s and ripped jeans, dark boots coming up to her knees. Her eyes are puffy and red.

Liam wears a blue wind breaker over his own lacrosse sweater, and track pants. The alpha feels how tired his beta is and a wave of sleepiness comes over him. It was a full moon last night, and Scott knows that without Stiles, his beta can’t even begin to control himself.

Parrish has an arm around Lydia’s waist and is wearing a simple sweater and blue jeans. His non uniform attire add youth to his visage, but the dark circles under his eyes age him. Argent, in his ever present jacket and grey cardigan manages to look even more serious and emotionally constipated than usual. Probably because his daughter’s birthday had been last week.

Isaac is more stylish now than he ever was before France, and his cardigans and scarves make him look warm. His hands are in his pockets as he looks down at the snow, eyes wide and desperate. Scott’s mom looks like she just left the hospital after a triple shift, restless and worried. She’s wearing blue jeans and a red winter jacket, squeezing the Sheriff’s shoulder and hugging him.

The Sheriff. He’s wrecked. He’s lost weight since Stiles’s disappearance. His eyes have lost their shine, and he constantly looks as though he’s on a case. In some ways, all of them are.

They all turn to look at Scott.

After the last two and a half years of supernatural drama and angst, the sight of all the people he cares about looking this depressed is probably one of the hardest sights to bare.

“Let’s go up,” he suggests somberly, eyeing the warehouse. “It’s almost noon, and well, Derek didn’t tell me anything, so I guess it’s important.”

Derek knew it was a bad idea the moment Stiles woke up.

The other four teenagers had already woken, all sparing their friend a glance before sitting themselves around the table to eat. Braeden had gone out early Christmas morning to buy them breakfast foods. They’d all arrived the night before and awkwardly drove down to Derek’s loft, which was only slightly too small for five teenagers and two adults.

Derek liked these kids. The buff Asian, Minho, had spirit, spunk, and a knack for questioning everything. The file on him says he’s only 17, same age as Stiles, but him and his friends all looked a little old and worn out for their age. The other boy, the one with the eyebrows, Gally, kept quiet. When he wasn’t keeping quiet, he was defending his friends or being an asshole. Worse than Jackson.

Although Derek wasn’t an expert on relationships, he could tell that the girl of the group and Stiles had a thing. He liked Brenda. Although she kept a little quiet and was usually invading one of the boy’s personal space, he could tell she was extremely intelligent and quick thinking. He could nearly hear her thoughts, literally.

By far the one Derek likes the best is Newt. Not only was the kid stupidly loyal and erudite, he’s honest and strong. The emotional turmoil inside him had only leveled slightly at the sight of his friends, and even now, it was still crazily unstable. The blonde had singlehandedly found out the truth and scaled thousands of miles to find Braeden and help his friends. The entire pack would probably be forever in his debt.

The former Alpha watches as the teenagers ate, quietly talking amongst themselves. He took a glance at Braeden, who sits beside him reading. The clock reads 11 AM. Derek had sent the text to Scott around ten, so he should probably wake up Stiles soon and explain what’s going on.

Stiles. Gone for six months, never returning from his summer camp, and finally coming back as Thomas. He smells different. His hair is flat against his head instead of annoyingly spiked up or buzzed. He has doubled his own weight with muscle. And although it’s probably the most familiar thing about him, he looks at everything like it’s a puzzle waiting to be solved.  

Stiles had come back with his own pack, and Derek could only hope that he’d like to relearn his old one.

A couple words from the teenagers’ conversation stand out to him as he walks to Stiles’s cot on the floor:

“. . .how bad are yours?” Brenda, Derek guesses, asks.

“Not nearly as bad as Thomas’s, have you seen him?” Minho, this time.

Derek picks out Newt’s heartbeat speeding up, and the scent of guilt and immense worry spiking.

“. . .it’s like he doesn’t know he’s in a night terror until he’s shucking screamin’ himself awake.” Gally.

Night terrors. Stiles has nightmares. They sound almost as bad as the ones he had after the Nemeton. Derek clenches his fists and pauses above the sleeping brunette in front of him.

“Does. . . does it happen every night?” Newt asks, his worry increasing.

There’s a bit of silence, in which Derek assumes someone is nodding, from Newt’s reaction. He turns around and looks at them. Minho’s got a hand on his friend’s arm, “What happened with you two on the plane? You haven’t spoken to him since, only awkward nods.” Derek could feel Newt’s growing irritation at his friend’s inability to stop talking. “Did he say—”

Minho’s interrupted by a scream. It takes Derek a moment to place the source, and his mouth opens in shock to find that it’s Stiles. The boy is thrashing and sobbing in his sleep, peaceful moments before. His yelling is gurgled and sounds like a jumble of cut off words, frightened and panicked.  

Before he knows it, the former Alpha is being pushed to the side and Brenda is kneeled next to Stiles, her hand on one shoulder, holding him down, and the other on his cheek, wiping away tears.

“Tom, Thomas, wake up. Thomas,” Brenda says insistently, as if repeating her friend’s name will persuade him to wake up.

Stiles does when the girl calls him to awaken once more, sitting up rapidly and panting heavily. Brenda’s there, almost in Stiles’s lap, whispering nothings to him until he calms down.

Derek feels useless and stupid. He couldn’t do anything; he hadn’t reacted fast enough to help Stiles. Beside him, Minho stands in a defensive stance, as if ready to protect his friends from anything. Newt is crouched on Stiles’s other side, much further away than Brenda, and Gally stands a bit further back with Braeden.

When Derek looks back down at Stiles, Brenda breaks away from a kiss and pulls him up to his feet.

Poor Malia, Derek thinks.

“Um, sorry,” Stiles says, his eyes on the floor as he brings up his hands to wipe them. He’s wearing a slightly loose white t-shirt and grey sweatpants that hang a little loose on his hips, since their Derek’s.

A lot of Stiles’s old clothing didn’t fit him the way it used to. Derek could swear that Stiles looked more buff than Scott.

Stiles runs a hand though his hair and gives his friends looks that mean he’s okay. He kisses Brenda on the cheek softly before looking up at Derek once his friends had gone back to their breakfast, sending worried looks his way.

He looked like he was going to apologize again or say something about what just happened, but Derek beat him to it.  

“Are you hungry?” Derek asks, nudging his head towards the table behind him.

Stiles closes his mouth and nods slowly, biting his lip sheepishly. “Yeah. Yeah, thanks.” Derek can hear his stomach growling.

Stiles makes to move by him, but Derek stops him with a soft hand to his shoulder, waiting a split second before actually touching the boy, making sure he’s okay with it. The brunette looks up at him expectantly, his eyes looking much clearer than they did a couple minutes ago.

“There are-” Derek stops and thinks about what he wants to say. There are a bunch of people you don’t recognize who haven’t seen you in six months coming by at noon. Also, it’s Christmas. Do you know what that is? In the end, he says this, “Today’s Christmas.”

Thank god he sees recognition on Stiles’s face. The boy smiles softly, one of the first real smiles Derek sees on this new Stiles – this Thomas, and it makes him warm. When he looks back up, Derek continues.

“There are a couple of people wanting to see you.”

Derek pauses a second after this, waiting for some sort of response. He realizes the kids behind him have quieted down and are listening intently. Stiles gives them a look, and must see something reassuring because he stops sending out signals of dread and is now slightly relied, anticipating. If Derek lost his own memory, he’d feel relieved to know there were people who cared about him, even if he didn’t remember them.

Stiles nods slightly. Derek feels himself loosen up a little, some of his pent up tension dripping away. “They’ll be here at noon.”

He sees the other boy check the clock and swallow loudly. “Who?”

Derek pauses at this. He’d removed his hand from the teen’s shoulder a while ago, but he wants to put it back now. Instead he turns and walks towards the table, checking to see if Stiles follows.

When he does, they both sit down at the two empty seats at the table and Stiles sends his friends a soft smile. Derek slumps a bit in his seat when he feels Braeden slide up behind him.

She smiles at Stiles warmly. “A couple of good friends and people who helped find you. Your father too.”

Stiles takes a deep breath and Brenda holds his hand on the table. “Okay. Um, do they. . . Do they know?”

Braeden and Derek share a glance. They had both decided that they would only tell the others about Newt and his lead if it was true. If not, the hope would’ve probably crushed them. “No.” Braeden answers firmly, still smiling. She looks somewhat content with the situation, as if she knows it sucks but has made her peace with it. “They don’t even know your alive. It’ll be a little overwhelming for you,” she and Stiles both frown a little at this, “but it’s been six months, Stiles. They need this.”

Derek feels Minho’s and Gally’s discomfort with making their friend uneasy. They know that Stiles isn’t ready for this. Hell, even Derek knows this now. He wishes he hadn’t sent that text so thoughtlessly. It was almost 11:30, he couldn’t just tell them to not come. It’d be cruel.

This Stiles, however, is even more willing to put himself in pain’s way to make others happy than the old one. And that’s saying something.

Something resolves behind his amber eyes, which had become glassy in thought, and the boy nods before excusing himself to the bathroom.

 “If this hurts him, we have no problem with getting up and leaving,” Minho blurts out seriously, staring at Derek and Braeden. Braeden clenches her teeth nervously and Derek straightens up to say something in return. Newt beats him to it.

“Minho, l—”

“No, Newt. You don’t get it. You weren’t there the last few weeks. I’m not saying you had it easy, shuck knows how your even alive, but you weren’t there. Beating himself up for something he wouldn’t tell us about, watching Teresa shucking die right in front of him, destroying WICKED; he’s hurt enough. We all are.”

It was silent for a moment. This was the most information that the teens had shared about what happened to them in their presence. Derek’s stomach churned.

Brenda sits back in her chair and looks out the huge windows, swallowing. Minho breathes a little harshly from his rant, eyes boring into the table between him and Newt. Gally had scooted his chair out of the way, caught between the two, looking like he couldn’t distance himself from the argument further.

Newt finally speaks up, sounding angry and determined but overall calm. Derek realizes that he must’ve been their leader, at some point. Made the tough decisions.

“Whatever happens when Tommy’s old friends and family walk through that shucking door, if we give’em the benefit of the doubt, Tommy’ll be happier. It’s his family we’re talking about. These people searched through thick and thin for him. I searched through bloody hell for him; for you guys. We only leave if he wants to.”

It hurts Derek sometimes; the way his friends call Stiles Thomas so smoothly, like that’s his name.

Minho looks at his friend grudgingly. He sighs deeply before sitting back and smiling as if he can’t believe he is. “Klunk, Newt, I missed your shuck-face.”

Derek heaves a sigh. He thought he was done with teenage drama.

Stiles walks out then and noticed his friends all smiling at each other. “What did I miss? Why’s it look like you shanks just fell in love with each other?”

Immediately, Newt physically distances himself from the conversation and continues eating. Minho, however, points Stiles with a big fat grin. “Just talking about how much of a shucking shank you look like in those clothes. Man, who dressed you before the Glade? It hurts my eyes.”

It was a good topic changer, since Stiles had come back dressed in clothes that had been his. . .before this whole mess. Derek is still completely lost when it comes to these kids’ vocabulary, but Stiles seems to understand. He’s dressed in red plaid and a white undershirt, blue jeans and red converse. Derek doesn’t think there’s anything wrong with it, other than how where it once fit loosely, it’s a little snug.

Stiles looks down critically before looking back up with a sheepish smile, his cheeks a little flushed. “I don’t know, Min, it’s comfy.”

When Minho and Gally snort at him, Stiles gives them a faux hurt look and Brenda comes up and hugs him around the middle. “You look fine, don’t let those idiots tell you otherwise.”

Stiles kisses her forehead before they head back to the table and another pang of painful nostalgia hits Derek.

That’s how he treats Malia.

That’s how he jokes with Scott.

That’s how Stiles dresses.

Derek notices Newt wincing at Brenda and Thomas. Oh. Oh.

That explains a lot.

Braeden clears her throat, as if she’s thinking along the same lines as Derek, but speaks indifferently. “They’ll be here soon, Stiles; God knows they’re always early. Don’t be nervous. And you kids?” she addresses the other four.

Waiting until they’ve all looked at her she continues, “Don’t be shy. Most of them are your age. Feel free to talk to them, once they’ve been told what’s going on.”

While Brenda nods hesitantly and so does Newt, Minho and Gally share a look and gulp, nodding uneasily. Stiles beams at them through a mouth full of bacon.

They all begin to talk easily again, wondering about Stiles family and making fun of his name (“What kind of name is Stiles Stilinski?” and “I dunno, Derek told me it’s a nickname.”), so he turns towards Braeden.

He stands up to join her and they move towards the wall where the alarm is, leaning against the wall and keeping an eye on Stiles like he might disappear.

“Why do I feel like this is going to go very wrong, very quickly?” Braeden wraps an arm around his waist and asks up at him. Her hair is neatly down and she’s wearing one of her cleavage exposing tank tops and dark jeans that make him want to kiss her. He rubs his thumb on her waist comfortingly and sighs.

“Because it probably is.” 

Thomas’s dreams hadn’t been that bad since the first night in Paradise.

He had relived it again. The day he killed Newt. But he hadn’t been quick enough. Newt had ripped the gun away from him and began to cut Thomas open with his nails. The whole time, his dream self had been too afraid and emotionally shocked to do anything, so he just let Newt hurt him. He deserves it. And all the while, Newt would be saying things like:

“It’s okay, Tommy.”

“You’re a good friend, Tommy.”

“You killed me, Tommy.”

“You’re the reason I’m dead.”

“You were about to kill me, Tommy. How could you do that?”

“I thought you were my friend, To—”

Thomas jumps as an alarm goes off in the loft. Grabbing his butter knife, he’s quick to his feet and aims the weapon towards the sound. His friends had something of the same idea too.

Gally had stood up, arms at his side but fists clenched. Minho had pulled his chair out from under him and aimed it at the door. Brenda had jumped into a fighting stance next to him.

As it turns out, the alarm is just a replacement doorbell. They smile sheepishly before stting everything back where it belongs. Derek and Braeden send them amused looks, but remain tense. Thomas looks at the time. It’s 11:49.

Taking a deep breath, Thomas places the knife back on the table and picks up his trash. His friends look like they’re trying to be calm, but he can tell they’re just as nervous as he is. Probably more.

He didn’t want to think about what had occurred in the last six months, but since it’s all he can remember, quite literally, it’s a little hard. Every time he looks at Minho, he feels like he’s still lying. Guilt and secrets eat at him from the inside, and putting on a happy façade for his friends is tiring.

Looking at Brenda is good; she’s good for him.  But it also reminds him of Teresa. Thomas remembers the awful words he’d told Brenda at that crank party so long ago, and cringes. It’s true – she’s not Teresa – but that’s okay. She’s Brenda.

Gally and him don’t really talk. Never really did. But when Gally was given the choice to find his family or stay with Thomas, he’d chosen Thomas, and that meant something.

Everything between him and Newt hurt. Although it’s incredibly wonderful that his friend had survived, there was a wedge driven between them because of it. His heart still hurts a little too much around the other boy, and he’s subconsciously wondering when Newt’ll return to the crazy, begging for death version of himself. Will Thomas find an envelope waiting for him? Will he be forced to—

No. Newt’s alive. Minho’s alive, Brenda’s alive, and shuck, so is Gally. Thomas has to calm down and get himself together. He should be happy. He should be crying tears of joy. But still, there’s something missing.

Derek sends Thomas a questioning look that snaps him out of his train of thought.

He trusts Derek. Sure, the guy may be all grumpy and uses less words than he does clothes, but there’s something about him. Thomas can remember Derek’s face from his dreams and it’s a relief to put a name to it. To know who at least one of the people who he used to know and care about are. Even if does live in a shady old warehouse with alarms for doorbells and too little furniture (really, there’s a bed, a table, a couch, and a couple chairs. They slept on the floor and let Brenda have the couch last night.). Thomas nods at him slightly and mouths, I’m okay.

Derek lifts his eyebrows at him, but Thomas ignores him and makes his way to where his friends have taken a place on the couch, all their eyes on him. He catches Newt’s warm brown eyed stare for a moment and tires to send an apology through his eyes, swallowing harshly. The blonde understands.

Gally’s at one end of the green couch, not really paying attention as he looks at the door nervously. Minho moves over so there’s space for Thomas to sit between him and Brenda, even if it’s a tight fit, but the brunette shakes his head and leans on the arm next to Newt instead. The taller boy places a comforting hand on Thomas’s knee, as if he knows it’s exactly what his friend needs.

There’s a tentative but loud knock on the door and Derek goes to open it. The guy has some serious muscles, because his blue Henley and dark jeans cling to him when he unlocks the huge gate and pushes it open. Thomas wonders why the other man is so buff before his attention is completely diverted.

In the doorway, there are about ten people standing anxiously. There are three main things that he notices about them.

One, he’s seen almost all of their faces in his dreams, and it sends a wave a dizziness through him so harsh he has to stand up before he falls off the couch.

Two, these people all look worse than Braeden and Derek had looked, when Thomas first met them. Some of them are dressed cheerily enough, but they all send out the same vibe of dead on my feet and stressed out of my mind.

Three, Thomas is sure that the first person who notices him is his dad. The man is tall with greying light brown hair, soft eyes, and strong features. He is wearing a sheriff’s jacket, and Thomas vaguely recalls Derek telling him about his dad’s job.

However, Thomas waits for this man – his dad – to take a shocked step forward before meeting him halfway. Before he knows it, he’s breathing in a comforting scent, something he can’t quite land his finger on, but it’s familiar. Familiarity is perfect. It’s what he needs. He’s being squeezed by strong arms, but it’s never been easier to breathe.

He hears the gasps of people around him, the sound of a woman hiccupping, and shuck if he isn’t crying a little right now. This is his dad.

His dad isn’t a crank.

His dad loves him.

His dad doesn’t know Thomas has no idea who he’s hugging right now.

This makes him step away, regretting it immediately at the lack of warmth and wiping his eyes with a sniff. His dad’s stare is intense, looking him up and down, breathing like he’s in pain and his hands are still on Thomas’s shoulders, squeezing as if letting go means that he isn’t real.

Thomas grabs his dad’s wrist’s and pulls away until they’re holding hands between them.

“Stiles,” the Sheriff says the name like it’s a prayer, a confirmation, and a question, all at once. 

“Yeah—yeah, Dad, it’s me,” Thomas’s voice cracks, and before he knows it he’s nodding and pulling his dad in for another hug.

When they let go, he gets ambushed by another set of arms almost immediately. It’s the boy with the soft brown hair and a fierce puppy-likeness in his brown eyes. He’s also got tears in his eyes and Thomas can hear him saying Stiles under his breath like it’s a chant.

 All he can do is hug the stranger, try to comfort him. His presence also feels familiar, like that of a brother’s and it fills him with warmth.

“Stiles, Stiles, Stiles,” the boy pulls away slightly, looking him in the eye and klunk, Thomas is still crying from earlier. His heartache at not knowing this boy’s name eats him up miserably. “You’re alive.”

Thomas nods heavily. The boy’s name – it’s on the tip of his tongue, but – but – “Scott.”

The other boys light up and he’s being hugged again. Thomas doesn’t know how he did it, but this was Scott. He knows Scott. He loves Scott.

“Yeah, buddy, oh my gosh, I’m so glad you’re alive. I don’t think I would’ve survived any longer without you,” the boy says it sadly, but there’s a hint of a smile on his face and relief in his words. All Thomas can manage is a nod, swallowing hard against the feelings bundling in his chest. It’s too much.

When he breaks away this time, Scott steps back a bit more than before and all Thomas can see is blonde brown hair and tan skin before there’s a girl hugging him. A girl kissing him.

“Malia,” Thomas hears Derek growl – yes, growl.

The girl in his arms gives him one last smooch before stepping back and looking him up and down.

She’s in his dreams too. Soft tan skin, smooth pink lips, and loving smiles. Her name is Malia, Thomas recalls that that’s what Derek called her.

Thomas tries not to think of Brenda, and how he is not ready to do this whole love triangle thing again, his heart’s been broken enough as it is by now.

Malia’s mouth is in this little unbelieving pout, and her hands grip his and her eyes stare up at him with so much love and adoration that it’s too much – he steps back a little harshly, pulling away and taking a deep breath.

Panic rushes and suddenly Derek’s there in an instant – so is Scott, but Derek kind of gives him a look that warns him to not come closer. Thomas sees his dad coming up behind him. He tries to make apologetic eyes at Malia, tries to find where Brenda is, but none of it works. His vision’s going blurry and the only thing stopping him from falling is Derek’s grip on his shoulder, face a couple inches from his.

“He doesn’t remember.”

Thomas doesn’t know who says it, but the voice is feminine and slightly raspy with pain.

“Thomas,” Derek’s saying, and maybe it’s because he’s never heard that name from Derek’s mouth before, or if it’s being reminded that he isn’t Stiles, not really, but it all snaps Thomas back into reality painfully.

“What’s wrong?”

“What do you mean, Lydia? What doesn’t he remember?”

“Why’d you call him Thomas?”

“Is – is he okay?”

“Tom?”

“Derek, get him on the bed.”

“Klunk, he’s havin’ a shucking panic attack!”

“Tommy, bloody breathe. Please, Tommy.”

Newt.

“Please, Tommy, please.”

Thomas takes a deep breath before his eyes close and he’s out.

Chapter Text

4 – WICKED

Newt has no idea what to make of Tommy’s friends and family.

They’re a strange group – about twelve when including Derek and Braeden, and if Newt remembered what it was like to have a group of friends and family of his own, maybe he’d have a little better of a grip on the situation.

Cause right now, he can’t even find the bloody handle.

Derek had just about picked Tommy up like a rag doll and softly dumped him on the bed he and Braeden had shared the night before. His mouth is slightly open and his nostrils flare with each breath the boy struggles to take in. He’d passed out cold after that girl (Malia, if Newt recalls correctly) had kissed him.

Mentally, the blonde shakes his head at that. Of course Tommy has another girl waiting for him at home. The boy’s former girlfriend reminds Newt of both Teresa and Brenda alike and the thought makes his stomach churn.

As soon as Tommy had hit the mattress, all sixteen of the people in the room had crowded around him. The curly haired woman dressed in nurse garbs took his temperature with a hand to the forehead. The man in the Sheriff’s coat had taken the spot next to his son, and the second person Tommy had hugged – Scott – had just about climbed onto the bed and sat on the other side. Malia leaned on the bed next to him. Derek stood behind the Sheriff, and while the rest of Tommy’s friends also crowded about, they gave Newt, Brenda, Minho, and Gally a wide berth. 

The redhead is the first to speak after that. She has a very crazed yet focused look to her eyes and if Newt were to go by her expression and body language alone as she turns away from Tommy to face Derek, this girl does not like to be uninformed of a situation.

“You,” her voice is slightly shaky and the way she says things reminds Newt of how he described her eyes. “Derek. You brought us here; explain. What’s wrong with Stiles?”

Newt still isn’t used to Tommy’s real name, even after learning it weeks ago. 

The redhead points a perfectly manicured finger into the older man’s chest as she says this. It still amazes Newt how normal everything is – how not utterly destroyed and trashed the world is, free of chaos.

Derek, the blonde still remembers the guy pounding him into a wall the first time they met, never seemed like the kind of guy to take someone else’s klunk. However, his face turns fierce for a second, like he’d like to shove this delicate little doll of a girl halfway across the room before he shudders out a deep breath and his shoulders slouch. Everyone else in the room sees it too, and Newt notices Scott’s eyes widen comically before shrinking back into a puppy eyed gaze.

Due to the lack of response or just impatience itself, the redhead begins again, turning from Derek to Braeden, and then to the four of them. “Who are you? I’ve never seen any of you in Beacon Hills before. What do you have to do with Stiles? Did you do this—”

Gally seems to have had enough of the redhead, cause he interrupts her. “Look, girl, I don’t know who the shuck you think you are, but we didn’t do anything to your precious Stiles here. We’re his friends, and half the reason the shuckface’s even alive so how bout you shut your pretty little ho—”

“Enough,” Braeden cuts Gally off with an air of authority. “Gally, Lydia, stop it.”

She turns to face Newt. “Newt, why don’t you and your friends introduce yourselves.” It isn’t a question. “It’s time we explained.”

Newt nods. When no one moves immediately after Braeden’s words however, Derek growls “move it, give him some space” and they all, including himself, Brenda, Minho and a still seething Gally, find a spot that isn’t crowding around Tommy.

The four that were on the bed remain there – although Malia does pull up a stool for herself – and the redhead Braeden had called Lydia still stands stiffly at the foot of the bed. The rest relocate to the blue futon Brenda had slept on, or sit on the spiral staircase at the far side of the room. Some just lean on one of the pillars near the couch. Newt, Minho, and Gally lean on the industrial table by the window and Brenda pulls herself on to it between Newt and Minho.

For what happened earlier with Malia and Tommy, she seems okay, but Newt thinks she may have just worried herself out of thinking about it. Also, he knows better. Her and Tommy have been inseparable since Newt had reunited with them only yesterday. When they fell asleep holding hands in the jet’s dorms, Newt had wanted to vomit, sharing a moment of disgust with Minho and Gally at the couple’s utter mushiness.

The blonde took this opportunity to study everyone. Although most people looked comfortable but worried in Derek’s loft, a couple stood nervously as they kept their eyes on Tommy – as if they might not be welcome here. What looked to be the youngest one here, maybe a 15-year-old, was so full of nervous energy Newt found himself biting at his fingernails just watching him.

Stepping onto his bad leg to distract himself, he introduces himself when the look the redhead is giving him becomes a glare. “I’m Newt.”

When the entirety of those listening except Derek and Braeden move their gaze a little to the left of him, Newt turns to send what he hopes is a reassuring glance at Brenda.

“Brenda.” She says a little huffily, and straightens up slightly from her seat on the table.

Next is Minho, and Newt can see the others in the room sending the buff Asian wary looks. He did look the most threatening of them all, he supposed. “Minho, pleased to meet ya.”

If Newt didn’t know any better as he sent a questioning look Minho’s way, he’d assume the tone of his voice was flirtatious, slightly playful – trying to break the tension. However, there’s a threatening glint in his eyes and the way he’s postured. The idiot shank is trying to look menacing.

Had he not noticed the five weapons the man with salt and pepper hair and the leather jacket was carrying? The pistol on the Sheriff’s waist? The shucking sword the Asian girl in the room had strapped to her bloody belt? Or even Braeden’s large array of assault rifles littered through the loft?

Newt made eye contact and sent him a furious glance. Stop trying to get us all killed.

Hell, Tommy was gonna be answering a lot of questions about the crowd he hung out with once he got his memory back. If he gets his memory back, a voice in the back of Newt’s voice reminds him.

Newt must have spaced out as Gally grunted his name, because next thing he knows Brenda’s placing a small hand on his shoulder and nudging him. All eyes in the room are on him.

“Newt?”

“Yeah, sorry.” Newt clears his throat. How does one explain a fake reality to a room full of people who’d never even left theirs? It makes him feel small and insignificant when he ponders on what they went through. He feels stupid to fall for lie after lie that W.I.C.K.E.D fed them. He knows his train of thought is irrational – he didn’t have anything else to compare their lies to at the time, nothing to prove they were lies. Shuck, it had taken him nearly dying by the hands of his best friend to find out the truth.

So he starts at the beginning.

“I’m assuming you know that Tom– Stiles wasn’t the only kid who was taken.” At the nods and wary glances around the room, he keeps going. His accent rings out in the silence. “For the last three years, an organization made up of several former North American government scientists, agents, and leaders fired for conducting forbidden and unorthodox radiation testing and experiments kidnapped and replaced the memories of over 100 kids; double that number in adults.”

Newt doesn’t think he can finish if he’s interrupted, so he speaks on, ignoring the outbreak of voices in the room.

“The testing they did was for a certain kind of radiation. It only affects the brain, and it affects everyone differently. It. . .it—”

Brenda, Newt thanks whoever the bloody shuck there is to thank for her, comes to his rescue with a comforting squeeze of his arm. “Slowly, it deteriorates your brain. In the first stage, where the levels of radiation only affect you slightly, you begin to lose track of what’s too much, too little, not enough. . . You can’t control yourself and you haven’t got great common sense but – you can manage. If you’re lucky, you live like that for months. . . going crazy but just holding on.”

Brenda gets a look in her eyes as she stops, and Newt wishes he could come up and continue for her, but their audience has fallen completely and eerily quiet, all staring expectantly. He knows Brenda’s remembering. Knows she’s blaming herself for not knowing it was all a lie, for lying to everyone and pretending to have the Flare, for everything that had happened to them – to Tommy.

He knows this cause he’s doing it too.

“We called that stage half-gone.”

Everyone’s stares fall to Minho as he clears his throat. “After that,” the Asian continues, “you weren’t yourself anymore. In fact, you were nothing but a gone and crazed shuckface try’na kill ‘emself. Or anyone else that tried to come too close.”

It isn’t exactly bitter, but there’s a tone in Minho’s voice that sparks hurt in Newt’s chest.

He pushes himself from the table and crosses the room into the small and secluded kitchen before he can look at the face of everyone’s disgust. He hears Brenda and Gally angrily whisper at Minho before the rest of the room turns into an outbreak of confused, angry, and hurt voices.

He turns around from where he’s leaning on the counter with both hands to come face to face with Braeden.

She gives him the bitchiest most arrogant look anyone’s ever given him before. There’s no pity, and it makes him wonder why the hell he ran out of the room. What right does he have to be mad at himself?

“I don’t care what you think you’ve done that’s worth distancing yourself from your friends and feeling sorry for yourself, but whatever it is, guess what, Newt?” she says, and Newt steps forward to glower at her. She’s a good couple of inches shorter than him, and he all but spits out, “What?” with the worst glare he can muster.

She doesn’t even flinch.

“It’s not your fault.”

She leaves him alone with one last glowering look.

Slowly, he fills himself a cup of water and pushes away the tears building in his eyes. He follows her, moving back to his position, mumbling that he was just thirsty. He gets unbelieving looks from Brenda and Gally, and is surprised to find Derek’s eyebrows furrowed in concern.

He sends a meaningful look at Minho that he hopes portrays that the other boy isn’t to blame himself for Newt’s behavior, but only gets an ashamed glance back.

The group had fallen silent yet again, waiting for them to continue their explanation. Scott is fidgeting nervously from his spot next to Tommy.

“Look,” he says from the bed in a rather loud and frustrated voice. “I’m not the kind of guy to look a gift horse in the mouth, but. . .why Stiles? And how did you guys find him? We’ve been looking since August.”

“Newt’s the reason we found Stiles.” Derek says pointedly. “These people they’re talking about. . . he was important to them.”

Newt nods. “They called themselves WICKED. Years ago they established themselves in secret under the disguise of a summer camp. They discovered that some people were immune to the effects of the radiation they experimented with, and that it was mostly young people. Kids.

“Their goal was to duplicate this immunity in others. The radiation could only be used as a weapon if it wouldn’t affect them first. One by one, they recruited kids to attend a summer camp that didn’t exist. WICKED sought out smart, quick thinking, athletic, and unnoticed kids.”

Immediately, Newt knew it was the wrong thing to say.

The Sheriff all but launches himself off the bed. “Are you saying I don’t pay enough attention to my son, kid?”

With just one observing glance, Newt can tell that the older man had not eaten, slept, or thought of nothing but his son for ages. He looked dead on his feet, like the only thing keeping him awake was Tommy’s hand the man still held onto even as he stood.

Brenda hops off the table and is there in a second. “No, sir,” she insists with a certain level-headedness that seems to calm Tommy’s dad, “but think about it. How old was your son when he started going to camp?”

“He’s gone since he was five,” the Sheriff states, still looking wary and on the defensive, but slightly defeated.

“And did he have a lot of friends at the time?” Brenda lifts a single eyebrow, looking curious.

Scott answers her question. “Not really. Mostly me.” He looks reluctant to say it, like it’s a hard truth.

Brenda nods, but seems to be unsurprised by the information. It makes Newt wonder how much she knows about W.I.C.K.E.D.’s true nature. “Did he ever talk about camp, sir? Ever mention the friends he spent his entire summer with, June to August?”

“No. You’re right,” the man says tiredly. “You’re right.”

“But,” Malia starts, looking confused, “what did they do to him? You said they experimented on kids?”

Many people nod at this, interested. The Sheriff, nurse, Derek, and Scott perk up anxiously. The Asian girl bites her nails and wraps her arms around her knees. The heavily armed man sits back with a suspicious glance. The cop next to Lydia looks afraid of the answer, and stares into the floor like he’d be glad if it swallowed him up. The other two teenagers, a boy who looks just as old as Scott and one a little younger copy his stance, only seated. Lydia is still, she has not moved from where she stands next to a pillar, and her icy stare burns Newt’s vision.

They all look like they’re swallowing words, questions hanging unsaid on their lips.

Next to him, Gally lets out a defeated sigh and Minho shifts on his feet. The boys look like they’d rather be anywhere else. Newt agrees on some level.

Brenda looks at Malia with a certain ignorance in her eyes. He assumes she is simply ignoring the occurrence earlier; it’s easier to ignore it. It would be easier to ignore everything. Unfortunately, they bloody shucking can’t.

Tommy’s still out cold.

“Stiles was important to them. Every summer, kids would come from all over, get their memories removed and replaced until they were mere puppets in WICKED’s hands. They named them after important scientists or historical figures.” Brenda pauses. “I’m not named after anyone, and Brenda is my real name, but Newt,” she gestures to him, “is a nickname for Isaac Newton. Gally,” she turns to the other boy, “is a nickname for Galileo. Stiles’s name was Thomas. Thomas Edison.”

Everyone’s face clouds up in some sort of emotion. Scott perks up and looks at Derek. “That’s why you called him Thomas.”

The other man nods.

“So,” the Asian girl asks, “he. . . Stiles doesn’t remember anything?”

Minho looks at his feet. “Anything he does remember is fake.”

“But. . .how did he know my name?” says Scott. “And – his dad; he knew who his dad was.”

The Sheriff is quick to look at them for answers. Newt shakes his head helplessly.

“We don’t know. Probably instinct. You can’t remember something you’ve never well seen or felt before, can you?”

The younger boy in the group jumps onto his feet, looking at Scott with huge eyes. “He—” the boy all but exclaims, looking sick, “he doesn’t remember werewo—”

“Liam.”

Newt, Brenda, Gally and Minho share a glance, eyes wide. What was that about? What doesn’t Tommy remember? Why is it so important it would make this boy – Liam – look sick? All it took to make him stop talking was Scott standing up and saying the younger boy’s name. The show of authority from Tommy’s friend, and the way Liam reacted so quickly, so like a little kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar, it was unsettling.

The lot of them send each other significant looks, and it only adds to the confusion. Newt wonders when he’ll stop feeling confused.

He averts his eyes from the younger boy when he realizes they all expect him to keep talking like nothing happened. “Any who, as I said, Stiles was important. One of three actually.”

“Newt, Minho and I – we were just a bunch of lab rats. But Thomas, he was the one calling the shots.” It’s the first piece of information Gally adds to the conversation, and it brings interest to many eyes. Newt doesn’t miss the bitter tone either. “He was part of WICKED.”

Lydia steps forwards in disbelief. “But Stiles wouldn’t—”

“Well, we aren’t shucking talking about Stiles anymore, are we?”  Gally interrupts her with an offensive step in here direction. “That shank there?” he points to Tommy lying on the bed. “His name is Thomas.”

“Thomas,” the Sheriff echoes, sliding a hand through his son’s hair.

Suddenly, Newt feels guilty. Would it have been better to leave everyone to their own devices? To let them think Stiles was still missing? To not bring this group of broken and unbelieving teenagers into their midst, making them their responsibility.

“Gally,” Minho puts a hand on his shoulder, “calm down.”

When Gally steps back to his side on the table, Minho reaches around Brenda to pat Newt on the back. He faces the other people in the room. “Anything else?”

Lydia steps back somberly.

“Then, get on with it, you shank.”

It’s directed at him, accompanied by a friendly smile, and Minho’s voice reminds Newt of why the boy had been chosen leader instead of Newt. Minho was good at it.

“Four kids in particular, including Tommy, were handpicked to be brainwashed and turned into minions for WICKED. The technology was extremely advanced, and it played with all sorts of things in your brain. They called the brain the kill zone, because that’s the only thing the radiation effected.

“When I say advanced, I mean they were able to make kids telepathic, and erase only certain and specific things from someone’s memory, as well as add as much as they wanted. With the technology, they tested us. There were probably over 100 of us at the start. Many of us died. Me, Gally, Minho and Tommy are all that’s left of the original boys group.”

Newt rushes through the explanation, and he could tell many of those listening are still confused.

“Point is,” Minho starts, seeming to get bored and frustrated with the conversation, “we destroyed WICKED, the five of us survived, the rest are being returned to where they came from, and if Tom-boy here regains his precious memories as your supposed Stiles, maybe we’ll all live shuckingly ever after.” Minho massages his forehead. “Questions?” he adds almost snarkily.

“Cut it out, Minho,” Brenda snaps quietly next to him. “I know it doesn’t explain as much as you’d like to know,” she addresses all of them, “but there’s honestly too much to say and it’s- well, it’s not easy to talk about.”

There is a lot of somber nodding and irritated sighing going on after Brenda’s statement, so it surprises all of them when Tommy goes flying into a sitting position.

The boy is quick to make himself small at the head of the bed. He pushes away from Scott faster than if the other boy was a Griever.

“Dad,” Tommy says, sounding scared. Newt’s eyes widen, he’d never heard the teen sound like that, unless someone was dying.

The Sheriff is there in an instant, hand on his son’s arm. “Stiles, son, what is it?”

He jumps out of the bed as if he had been hit by lightning. “Werewolves,” Tommy says, small and uncertain. Newt barely catches the word, but Tommy sounds like he can’t even believe himself as he says it.

“They’re werewolves,” he whispers, like it’s a secret, and Newt’s two seconds away from asking if he’s hit his head too hard.

Tommy’s looking at Scott now, before glancing at Derek, the boy named Liam, the tall one with the cardigan, and the girl who’d kissed him. He looks terrified.

Newt feels Minho, Gally, and Brenda straighten up in shock, but they all look at their friend in scared curiosity.

“What’s he talkin’ about?” Newt asks the room, wondering why they all looks so scarily calm. “Tommy, what are you bloody goin’ on about?”

Tommy rips his stare away from Scott to look at him with wide eyes.

“Newt, I’m friends with a pack of werewolves.”

Chapter Text

5 – werewolves

As Stiles’s friends had talked, Scott’s brain wandered.

Stiles remembered me. He knew who I was.

He also knew who his dad was. The last six months of stress and pain all seem worth it to be able to look over at Derek’s bed and see his best friend lying there.

It’s not until Liam mentions werewolves that Scot starts worrying. Everyone in the room has something to do with them. When did Stiles’s social circle get so small? How could Stiles be friends with any of them if he didn’t know about werewolves? If he didn’t know about Scott?

But at the same time, he feels selfish and nostalgic for the old Stiles. The Stiles from before the Nogitsune and before the Gerard. The Stiles whose biggest priority was that he got to be Batman in a situation, and that no one be Robin.

Observing the tired boy lying on the bed and listening to Newt talk, he realized that if that Stiles even still existed before, he’s now gone. Stiles is gone. They say that this boy is Thomas, and that he’s WICKED. Whatever that means.

So when Stiles gets up and out of bed with a lurch about werewolves, Scott is on the cusp of jumping up and down like an excited little kid.

Once the words register, Scott lunges forward in a fit of excitement. He grabs Stiles’s shoulders in his hands. “What,” he gasps, “what else do you remember?”

It’s the wrong thing to do because, in a fit of very Stiles-like dramatic flair, the boy pushes Scott back, slips from his dad’s hold and nearly trips over himself before escaping to the space where his new friends stand.

He grabs the girl’s hand in his, puts his hand on Minho’s shoulder, and takes another step so he’s standing slightly in front of Newt. The other one jumps up, alert, next to Minho.

“I—” Stiles shakes his head sincerely, looking distressed, “I don’t understand. How?”

His friends are still looking at him like he might be going nuts, but everyone else in the room has jumped up, worried for Stiles’s reaction.

“Stiles,” the Sheriff reaches out towards his son, “Stiles, son, calm down.”

“What? How am I supposed to calm down? I – I don’t even know any of you--”

Wow, Scott thinks, that one stung. The whole room breathes in sharply, like it has taken Stiles actually saying it for them to believe it. Scott sees his mom tearing up, Malia growling under her breath, and Derek tightening his hand around Braeden’s wrist.

“—and, and, you’re shucking monsters! Werewolves. . . How- how is that even possible?”

Scott hadn’t noticed Isaac coming up to stand next to Malia, until he decides to cut in. “And I thought that Stiles couldn’t be more annoying than when he actually knew who he was,” the tall boy snarks un-quietly.

“Isaac!” Scott, Derek, and Melissa all say at the same time. The teenager looks a little bashful, but not guilty. The entire room, minus the four strangers, who’s heads go back and forth between them, give Isaac a cold look.

In the silence that follows, Minho steps forward with an air of authority. Scott admires his protective stance, but the guy gave bad vibes. He looked like a punch from him could do some damage, human or not human. “Okay, I’m sorry, but what are you shanks going on about?”

“Yeah, what’s this whole ‘werewolves’ klunk about?” the blonde with the eyebrows – Gally? – adds, looking even angrier then he’d been previously. Nobody answers, and the loudest thing in the room is the sound of Stiles breathing heavily, sweat dripping down his forehead.

The girl, the one who had kept sending looks at Stiles the entire time he was passed out, Brenda, puts a hand on his shoulder. “Tom, are you okay? You don’t look so good.”

Stiles seems to be more confused and worse, now he looks hurt too. He backs away from his new friends, and at the same time, tries to keep his distance from us. “No! No, I am not okay. They’re lying to us, Brenda! Shuck, I can’t even tell what’s real anymore.”

He sounds desperate, and Derek is the first to make a move.

“No!” Stiles breathes out harshly, and the Sheriff hovers worriedly in the corner of Scott’s eyes. “No, I’m sorry, Derek, just don’t.”

Derek backs away hesitantly, and Stiles brings his hands up to cover his face, his friends looking worried behind him.

Scott feels the pity develop deep in his chest. What did they do to him? What did they do to Stiles?

He forces his heart beat to slow down in order to stay in control. He wants to rip out the throats of everyone who hurt his best friend, and he’s pretty sure he’s got an entire pack behind him on that front.

Lydia, not taking no as an answer, approaches the breathless boy, and although Stiles sees her coming, he doesn’t stop her.

Progress, Scott thinks. If anyone can get through to Stiles, it’s Lydia.

She steps close to him, and all he does is drop his hands a little. His eyes are still brown and whiskey like, but they look shadowed by bad memories and horrible dreams. Other than his hair, which is matted down like it usually is during Lacrosse practices, he looks the same. Stronger and more damaged, but the same. He’s still Stiles, Scott has to believe that.

“Breathe, Stiles,” Lydia says kindly.

The boy’s breathing quickens, and there are tears in his eyes. “Thomas.”

She corrects herself. “Breathe. . .Thomas.”

Stiles looks down at her through his eyelashes and it pains Scott to see the unfamiliarity. “What’s. . . what’s your name?”

So maybe not so much progress.

“Lydia,” it looks like it shocks her that she has to answer, but there’s nothing in her voice to prove that she’s fazed. She brings her hands up to cover Stiles’s cheeks and wipe his tears. He looks at her curiously, but accepts her touch. “Breathe, Thomas.”

Stiles obeys. “Lyds. . .Lydia.”

“Yeah?” she asks. The room is quiet and although Stiles’s friends still look nervous and jittery, they hold their ground. The girl doesn’t look overly pleased with the attention tiles is getting, but overall she just looks worried. Stiles’s breathing gets a little harsher and he nearly hiccups. Scott worries a little when his heart rate beats and thumps uncoordinatedly.

“Lydia,” the boys starts, looking more anxious, if that’s possible. “– don’t, don’t kiss me, okay?”

Definitely wondering what that was about, Scott leans forward, watching for the strawberry-blonde's reaction.

“Huh,” she breathes out, ever delicate and feminine. She drops her hands and takes a small step back. Stiles looks confused at her actions – he kind of looks confused with his own as well, but doesn’t chase her. “No. No, of course not. I wouldn’t dream of it,” she pauses, looking unsure. “I’m sorry.”

“Why are you sorry?” Stiles asks, and wow, Scott didn’t think he’d ever seen Stiles look so confused for this long of a period of time.

Lydia fixes her skirt and looks down with a tight smile. “Because I can hear it.”

Everyone in the room perks up, some more audible then others. Stiles swallows loudly, and he drops his hands to his sides. It makes him look more mature, and more in control. “Hear what?”

“Lydia,” Parrish warns.

 But Lydia’s shaking her head minutely and her smile is still tight, lips trembling. At first, Scott thinks she might scream, and how horrible would that be – Stiles dying now – but no, all that comes out when she opens her mouth are words. “No. No, Jordan, he’s gonna find out eventually.”

Stiles looks pensive, trying to figure out what she means. He asks again. “Lydia. .  .what can you hear?”

“You can’t tell, can you?” she says, and now she looks curious. Her eyes glint, and Scott thinks it might be tears.

“Tell what?”

The Sheriff speaks up, irritated. “What can’t he tell, Lydia?”

“I can hear you, Thomas,” Lydia points to her head. “You’re in here.”

Thomas’s face pales. He steps back. Lydia kind of regrets telling him, but she knows she’s right in doing it. She’s often right.

Stiles is so loud now that he’s awake. She could hear tidbits while he slept, but she’d been ignoring it, assuming he was sleep talking. She knows it doesn’t make the most sense, but Lydia has also driven to a gas station when her tank was full so that she could find a dead body. It all makes sense at the time.

Stiles takes a step back and his eyes widen in outrage. “But. . .you’re not part of WICKED. How can you hear me? I – I can’t hear you.”

She’s WICKED. It’s still WICKED. It will never stop being WICKED. This is all my fault.

Poor thing, Lydia thinks. What happened to you?

“I know it doesn’t make sense, Thomas,” Lydia tries to explain, attempting to ignore how loud he is in her head. “But you were right. Some of us--”

It can’t be. I’m safe. We’re safe. We have to be—

“Lydia!”

She ignores Scott. He doesn’t understand. Stiles need to know this. So she breaks it to him.

“Some of us are werewolves. I’m a banshee. That’s how I can hear you.”

They’re lying. They have to be.

She feels Derek rolling his eyes, Scott holding his breath, and in the dead silence that follows, Lydia looks up at Stiles hopefully, but he just backs up. One of his friends come up next to him, the one who picked a bone with Lydia at the start of the afternoon. Lydia still couldn’t believe this was how she was gonna spend her Christmas day.

“Okay, we’re leaving. Now.” he says, looking done and like no would not be an acceptable answer to his request.

The blonde, the cute British one whom Lydia is almost positive has a thing for Stiles, or if not, is at least gay, steps forward with a frown. “Gally, wait!”

Newt doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Gally’s right.

“Shut up, Newt! We tried it out, and I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but Thomas’s friends are complete psychos!” Gally is harsh with his words, and Lydia can see Stiles processing the information by the way his face darkens.

Newt looks like he might punch Gally before Minho comes between them. (In any other situation, Lydia would probably make some sort of flirty come on to a guy like Minho, but she’s currently pre-occupied. Amnesiac best friend and all, you know the stitch.)

What do I do? What do I do? They listen to me.

“Hate to agree with Gally, but he’s got a point.”

Gally seems relieved to have someone say it. “Of course I have a shucking point! Werewolves!”

“Banshees. . . ” the girl whispers, looking half lost.

It can’t be true. It can’t. But. . . Lydia – Lydia’s something. So is Scott. So is Derek. And Malia, and Isaac, and the other one, and the girl. 

Gally shakes his head and grabs a bag from behind the table. Minho grabs another one off the ground behind the couch and they stand, looking ready to leave. “C’mon, Thomas, we’re leaving – it was nice meeting you all, really, a pleas—”

“Stop!” The Sheriff is quick to cut him off. “My son stays here.”

Yes. That’s my dad. I can’t leave him. He’s alive.

Lydia has officially lost control of the situation, and she looks between them in confusion. How could things get so out of hand? Right, because werewolves.

Minho looks exasperated at the Sheriff’s firm tone of voice. “What, old man, you believe this klunk?”

Both Newt and the Sheriff look affronted. Newt calls out his friend. “Minho!”

The Asian boy seems to have no qualms about it however, and he gets into Newt’s space, hand on his shoulder. They have the power, Lydia notices. Those two and Stiles. They’re all in charge. “No, Newt, listen to me. I told you we’d give Tomboy’s friends a chance. We did.”

No. They- they should prove it.

Lydia’s eyes find Stiles’s as the boy is snapping out of his own head and turning to his friends. “Shut up, Minho.”

Minho looks like he can’t believe Stiles just talked. “Not you too, Thomas,” the boy pleads, sounding disappointed.

It’s not like Stiles has a connection with these people or anything; it’s not like we're his family, Lydia thinks bitterly.

Stiles rubs his arms and his breathing is steady, for what seems like the first time tonight. He looks scared but confident when he says, “I – I think they can prove it.”

Scott steps forward like on a mission. “We can.”

“Than do it, because I’ve had just enough of you shanks—”

With a growl, Scott rolls his neck and flashes his eyes, facial hair growing. Derek follows, blue eyes looking cooler than ever. Malia jumps forward, her claws and fangs extended. Liam’s eyes burn and he grumbles deeply. Isaac follows his cue, standing next to Malia. Kira flashes her eyes as well, for what Lydia assumes is effect.

Werewolves.

Drama queens, Lydia adds mentally in a sudden burst of dry humor.

Looking a little like he just pissed himself but brushing it off quite smoothly (Lydia is now officially impressed), Minho nods his head. “Okay, but we’re still leaving.”

Scott sends him a disbelieving look. “What, why?”

“Because! Do you hear yourself? Even- even see yourself? We just got away from the monsters WICKED created for us, we aren’t that shucking eager to hit it up with new ones!”

None of the others say anything to this, but the way they look down, it’s as if they’ve resigned themselves to living a constant nightmare.

Grievers. Cranks. Ourselves. We’ve had enough monsters for a lifetime.

You shouldn’t have come to Beacon Hills, then.

Scott looks desperate when he changes back. Lydia sees the tears shine in his eyes when he steps towards Stiles and Stiles steps back. “But we’re not monsters!” Scott keeps trying. Oh, Scott. “Stiles! Stiles, you remember, don’t you? We’re not monsters. You’re my best friend, Stiles, you know that.”

Melissa, looking worried, places a hand on her son’s shoulder. “Scott, calm down—”

Stiles. I’m not their Stiles. Not exactly, and not anymore.

“My name isn’t Stiles.”

Brenda takes Lydia's best friend's hand in hers and that’s it. Lydia can see it now, and it doesn’t have anything to do with being a Banshee.

They aren’t – they can’t be. . . this isn’t my family. Maybe they were. . .but right now – no.

“C’mon, Thomas,” Brenda pulls on Stiles’s hand and grabs a bag off the ground with her free hand.

Stiles gives them one last look. “I’m- I’m sorry.”

It’s directed to his dad, but he makes eye contact with Scott, Derek, Malia, and Lydia as he says it. Lydia feels the tears roll down her cheeks, and she swallows harshly when she looks at Stiles. At Thomas.

The five teenagers push through them and out the door, the sound of their thundering feet down the stairs the only thing proving they were here.

She sits on the bed Stiles had so previously occupied. With them gone, she can’t hear him anymore, and now the unmistakable sound of rain clattering on glass fills the room. She looks out Derek’s huge windows, when had it started raining?

She follows one of the droplets as it makes its way down and as it reaches the bottom, she knows. Because things simply couldn't get worse, Lydia uncurls from where she’d sat, defeated on the end of the bed, and screams.

Thomas looks up at the sound of screaming. He knows it’s Lydia, and that doesn’t scare him as much as he thinks it should. The entire warehouse goes pitch black, light flashing a few times before it all goes dark. The lights must’ve burnt out, or something, he assumes, glinting to get a better look through the rain.

He feels dread at the pit of his stomach, and looks around to check on his friends. Gally is slightly behind, Newt limping beside him, and Minho’s ahead. Brenda is by his side, hand in his.

They’re running again, the rain pouring over their shoulders half a curse and half a blessing. Thomas can’t say that running’s ever felt worse than it does now, as he makes his way through what was once a surely familiar town.

Hopefully, he can still lead his friends to safety. He owes them that, if anything.

Chapter Text

6 – monsters

It’s got to be hours later, but Thomas finally leads them to the woods before coming to a stop. Newt looks drained, and Minho has half the mind to make a joke about carrying him, the other half of actually doing it. He looks healthier than the last time they’d seen him, but almost as bad as he had after his accident in the Maze. He stands next to Gally, who never the fastest, as a builder, is short of breath but still looking like he could go for more. Minho takes a deep breath to slow down his own heart rate, feeling out of shape.

Minho observes as he catches his breath. There’s a small patch of fresh dirt with distinct signs of being the site of a previously demolished building. The ground is muddy, but tire tracks are still clearly visible.

“Tommy, you don’t happen to know where we buggin’ are, do you?”

It’s still raining, quite harshly now, so Newt has to shout to be heard. Minho can only see his mop of blonde hair from where he stands under a tree a couple paces away. Brenda is next to Thomas in the clearing, and Gally stands beside him, trying to keep warm.

Minho knows it wasn’t a good idea to run out like that. In fact, it was a really stupid idea.

But, klunk. What were they supposed to do?

Werewolves.

Better than grievers, at least. They were human, Minho thought hopefully, just not completely.

So were cranks. This was so jacked.

Shuck, he thought, deciding that this train of thought was better left un-boarded.

“Um,” Thomas replies uncertainly, trying to be heard over the rain, “I know we’re in a preserve, but not much else.”

“Whose great idea was it to run out of there, again?” Brenda barks, and although Minho knows she’s partially joking, he can’t help but send a glance Gally’s way. The slinthead just pouts and knocks a brow at him, daring Minho to say something. Before he can, Newt’s coming out from under his tree and shouting.

“It doesn’t matter whose bloody idea it was; we need to move, preferably before we get hypothermia.”

Thomas, shivering and still breathing harshly, jeans soaked to the bone and white shirt gluing to his skin, doesn’t look convinced. “I could’ve sworn there was a house here. . .”

Minho can see Brenda step closer and take Thomas’s hands. “It’s okay, it’s not your fault.”

“Listen to your girlfriend, Thomas, she’s right. Whether there was a house here or not, don’t stress yourself, we just need to get out of these damned woods and find a – a shucking motel or something.”

They’re all standing in the clearing now, big water droplets rolling down their shoulders. “You don’t happen to remember where any no longer standing motels are, do you?”

“Shut up, Gally,” Newt snaps.

“Let’s follow the tracks, alright?” Brenda suggests, adjusting her backpack on her shoulders.

“Sounds as good as its gonna get,” Gally huffs.

“Good that,” Minho says, ignoring the boy’s snark and clapping Thomas’s shoulder to get him moving. He’s still frozen there, looking at the ground.

“Yeah,” he murmurs half-heartedly, “good that.”

It feels like an understatement, but Minho is worried about him. He didn’t take any of today’s events very well. Thomas had always seemed like the kind of person to jump right back into it and not let anything bother him. Something about Paradise, his new friends, Minho doesn’t know what, has really effected the shank.  It makes Minho feel like he did when Thomas had been shot and then taken away – anxious and lost, like he had no idea where his friend was.

Nothing he can do about it momentarily, so they walk. The cold is a bit of a pain in the ass, the windy rain stings to the touch, and the trees shudder. At a couple points, the rain is so thick Minho can barely see a foot in front of him, and he doesn’t think any of them are following the tire tracks any longer.

“Stop!” Newt yells. “Let’s regroup at that bridge!”

“What bridge?” Minho asks, but as he looks up to find where Newt is, he sees it. It’s a dark outline over an overflowing stream.

The trees are sparser in this area, with a lot more mud on the ground, and it’s a relief to feel his feet plant themselves of the wood. The others catch up to him shortly, and with just a glance, he feels something amiss.

“Where’s Gally?” he shouts over the storm.

The other three come closer to Minho. “What?” they shout collectively.

“Where’s Gally!” Minho tire again. He runs off the bridge, trying to get a look around. Shucking klunk, he can’t see more than five feet in front of him. He does a 360, and spots something by a tree. He sprints for it, not hearing the calls of his friends from behind him.

“Gally, you shuckface! Gally, where are you?!”

No response, but Minho goes a little farther, jogging after he almost slips on a patch of moss.

He can’t really hear anything, but there’s a flash of movement on his right. He thinks it might be his friends, so he turns around. Out of nowhere, an animal runs right by him, and Minho jumps back, startled and he follows the animal with his eyes until he can’t see it any longer and turns around.

Three more of them – they look like coyotes now that he’s paying attention – are running right towards him. He panics for a second, and that’s all they need to get past him.

“What the. . . ?”

Why were those animals out in the rain? And why did they run right past him? He can’t recall too much, but he’s never heard of woodland predators running right past humans on their territory. . .unless. . .

Unless something bigger is coming after them.

“. . .shuck.”

There’s another flash of movement on his left and Minho swallows, hoping it’s more coyotes. There’s a quick flash of red and he hadn’t realized he was shaking this hard until he forces himself to start running back the way he thinks he came from. It feels like a Griever climbed its buggin’ way down Minho’s throat, he’s so nervous.  

Oh klunk, he’s totally gotten himself lost.

Peachy.

Minho keeps running, and then he’s knocking into something – someone, and he breathes hard in their direction, squinting and wiping his eyes to see who it is.

Gally.

Recognition lights up in the stupid shank’s eyes and Minho takes Gally in. He’s muddier than before, which he guesses they both are now, since they just fell into the mud when they hit each other. Something else catches his eyes.

Gally looks about ready to klunk himself. He’s saying something, but Minho doesn’t catch it.

“What?”

“It’s them. It’s the werewolves.”

There’s a movement behind one of the trees, and Minho doesn’t get to respond. The two boys stand up, back to back.

“It can’t be, you dong! They’re Tom’s friends!”

“Well, the slinthead needs to rethink his friendship making abilities!”

There something running towards them now, and Minho feels Gally stiffen up behind them.

“Run!” he shouts, already taking his own advice, Gally not far behind.

It’s no use. The thing – creature, monster, werewolf, the tooth fairy, whatever it is – is all stomping paws that Minho can now hear over the rain, and the red eyes only seem to get closer in his peripheral vision.

There’s a raking pain down his shoulder and he trips, sending himself sprawling into wet dirt.

“Minho!”

His shoulder is burning and he spits out mud, groaning as he flips onto his back, trying to see what got him.

Red eyes flash back at him before they change course. Gally has stopped slightly ahead, and Minho doesn’t think the other boy could any dumber. “Run! Gally, go!”

It’ too fast, and soon, Gally has the whole of what looks like claws going through his back and out onto his chest, from what Minho can see. “No!”

Then Minho’s running, running towards the thing that just killed one of the few of Minho’s remaining friends and launching himself onto it’s back.

The creature pulls it’s claws out of Gally’s back to reach behind itself, grab Minho off its back, and throw him against a tree. His vision becomes fuzzy, and Minho thinks it’s a miracle he doesn’t hear or feel anything breaking.

He hears Gally’s body wheezing a couple meters away. The monster – no, the werewolf – Minho can now see through his clouded vision the distinct wolf like features on the monstrosity’s body. Fur all over, glowing red eyes, a nozzle, longer ears, and canines. Large canines.

His shoulder burns, the rain stings in his eyes, and he tries getting up again. The monster is looking at him now – all grimacing teeth and glinting eyes – and it looks contemplative. Minho tries scrambling away, towards where he thinks Gally is, but he’s stopped by a hand on his chest. The creature smiles – that’s the only way Minho can describe it – and bites.

Minho’s howl of pain is deafening even to his own ears, and when he feels the jaws release from his midriff, he breathes harshly, eyes opening. The creature is gone and Minho crawls pathetically over to Gally.

The boy is already dead. His face is stuck in a fearful scowl and his eyebrows are arched in shock. Minho feels for a pulse, surprised when his hand is bloody as he brings it up to Gally’s throat.

There is none. Of course there isn’t.

There was no way Minho would be allowed to keep his friends alive for more than three weeks. No. The universe was truly adverse to his happiness. He felt a sickening lurch of anger towards Thomas, WICKED, and Newt. This was in no way any of their faults – it had been a shucking werewolf.

But he still feels the anger. He throws one of his fists into the ground next to Gally’s face and is disappointed by it just sinking into the mud there. He lets out an angry sob and does it again.

Minho stands, ignoring the pain in his shoulder and in his stomach. The rain is still pouring hard, but he can now see. He picks Gally up and throws him over a shoulder.

It the lease the shank deserves. He’s not leaving him here, for that beast to come back and take its kill.

He’s not.

The trek is painful, and Minho’s not even sure where he’s going anymore. After what seems like hours, the rain has almost stopped. The moon is bright in the sky, looking nearly full. Minho turns away from the sky – it’s too beautiful for what just occurred.

He’s almost surprised to find he’s still walking when the sun makes an appearance, barely peeking out from the trees. Gally is getting heavier and heavier, and Minho is shivering and aching, but when he hears it, he’s sure.

Voices.

“Thomas?” he chokes out, throat raw, since he’s pretty sure he had yet to stop crying, trying to be loud. “Anyone? Newt?”

There’s movement behind some trees up ahead. Only a couple more meters. He can make it – he can. Only a few more steps left.

Minho drops Gally when he sees them. 

He falls down too, but it doesn’t feel like it. It feels like the world has finally just decided to have mercy and swallow him whole.

They’re sitting on what looks like to be the remains of what was once a huge tree, and that’s not wat makes Minho’s arms go numb or his breath catch.

He strains his ears, trying to make sense of the scene he sees in front of him.

Thomas is crying, there are tears streaming down his face, what looks like a huge claw marks on his shoulder – where he got shot, Minho almost clearly remembers – and his tears are falling onto Brenda.

Brenda’s neck is a mess. There’s blood and – black? – liquid oozing from it, she’s also crying, and there is more black liquid streaming from her lips and nostrils.

Newt, whose once cream colored sweater has been covered in grime, and whose ankle looks to be twisted at an irregular angle (the same ankle, Minho thinks, it’s the same leg) is applying pressure to Brenda’s neck, his hands covered in the mystery liquid.

Thomas has both of Brenda’s hands in his own, and he’s kissing Brenda’s forehead, her cheeks, her lips, her hands, not seeming able to stop.

“No, no, Brenda, you can’t,” Thomas whispers distraughtly, “I won’t let you.”

“I’m sorry, Tom. . .” Brenda’s saying, and Minho can only hear because he’s moved about twenty steps without realizing it and is now leaning onto the huge trunk. “I’m sorry I wasn’t – I wasn’t her. . . I’m sorry that this happened to you.”

“No, no,” Thomas kisses Brenda like he’s trying to drown himself in the black liquid staining her lips. “You’re Brenda, she never had anything on you,” the boy reassures, pushing Brenda’s hair out of her face.

She. Teresa. Although he doesn’t know what went down between those three exactly, he knows it couldn’t have been all love and kisses.

“Your. . .your family -” Brenda coughs out more liquid and she’s shuddering harder now, her body seemingly fighting itself, “- you have to. . .you have to give them another chance, Tom.”

Thomas doesn’t say anything, just hugs Brenda harder.

“Thank you, Newt. . .” Brenda smiles with black teeth at the blonde. Her eyes catch Minho’s and she’s the first to notice him. The other two boys look up, and while Newt’s eyes widen in fear and he looks surprised but relieved, Thomas just spares him a relieved glance before looking back at Brenda. “Thank you too. . . Minho.”

Minho’s eyes sting with fresh tears. Newt’s eyes water as well, but no tears fall – not yet. He looks like he wants to say something, but it’s not coming out. Minho tries for him.

“Our pleasure, m’lady,” he chokes out, before he can’t talk anymore. There’s a knot in his throat and he can’t imagine how Thomas feels.

“Tom. . . Stiles—” she coughs again and Thomas wipes her tears “—thank. . .thank you.”

“No, Brenda,” the brunette shakes her in his arms. “No!”

“I’s. . . okay.”

“I’m so sorry,” Thomas cries, “I am so so sorry. This is all my fault, Brenda, I’m sorry--” he chokes on a sob and doesn’t speak again, expelling muted sobs into Brenda’s cold chest.

Newt reaches over and closes the girl’s eyes before placing a hand on Thomas’s shoulder and squeezing.

Minho coughs, trying to get the knot out of his throat. “Gally. . .”

He glances down at the blood on his hands, and he knows they’re looking at him now, Brenda still dead in their arms, but he can’t find their eyes. Minho swallows down on more grief.

“Gally’s dead.”

Chapter Text

7 – bitten

Downing a glass of whiskey this early in the morning isn’t healthy. However, once he swallows it down, the Sheriff is finally ready to call Scott and apologize for his behavior yesterday. He picks up his phone and stares at it hard for a couple minutes, thinking of what to say.

When Parrish’s name flashes on his screen as his thumb moves to press call for Scott McCall, he has half the mind to decline and call him back later, but he picks up, breathing out a tired hello.

The voice on the other side sounds a little high strung. “Sheriff?”

“Yes, Parrish?” he asks, annoyed. He has to call Scott.

“Well, there was a—”                                                                                                                                                                    

Rubbing his temples and playing with his empty glass, he interrupts. “Can this wait?”

“Um, sir, I think you’ll want to hear this.”

He sounds hesitant but worried, so the Sheriff sighs.

“What is it, Parrish? Spit it out.”

 “We found your son and his friends twenty minutes ago.”

That’s not the answer he was expecting, so he stands up so quickly that the table shakes and his empty glass falls over.

“And? Where are they?” he grabs his jacket and puts it on, damning drunk driving. “Parrish, bring them in to the station. I’ll be there in—”

“Sir.”

“What?” he grabs his keys and heads to the door.

“Two of them are dead.”

He pauses, dropping his keys and feeling his heart accelerate.

“Stiles?”

“He’s shaken, but fine.”

He picks up the keys and opens the door. “Then wait there, what’s the address?”

“Sir, you’re still missing something.”

“What, Parrish?” he asks hastily, annoyed. He puts his seatbelt on.

“It was an animal attack.”

The Sheriff’s hand freezes in its place, keys moments from turning the engine on.

“Jesus Christ, not this again,” he mutters under his breath, starting the car. “Parrish, what’s the address?”

“We’re at the Nemeton, sir.”

Shaking his head and changing gears, the Sheriff takes a harsh breath. “Be there in fifteen.”

Newt doesn’t know how long they stay there, but before he knows it, there’s a jogger coming through the woods. The girl sees them, puts a hand to her mouth, which is hanging open, and holds her stomach, but doesn’t scream. “Oh my gosh, are you guys okay?”

Newt kind of wishes she’d screamed.

None of them really apply, slightly surprised that they’re no longer alone, so the girl takes a few steps closer. “Stiles, is that you? Oh my gosh, you’re all covered in blood. I’m calling 911.”

Tommy nods numbly.

Newt sees Minho tense up as the girl makes her call. “What do we do?” the Asian boy asks.

“I don’t know. Just. . . just play along.” Tommy sounds tired, and Newt can’t stop himself from feeling feels scared for him. How is he going to be okay after this?

“Okay.”

The girl comes closer after she ends the call, looking panicked. “What happened? Was it an animal attack, oh my god. Stiles, are you okay? Are – are they dead?”

Tommy coughs. “It was an animal attack. Yeah, they’re dead.”

The girl looks on the bridge of tears. “I am so sorry. Are you guys okay? An ambulance is coming too, they’ll get your cuts and stuff looked at. What was it?”

“A. . .  a mountain lion.”

Newt and Minho nod their agreement, and stay quiet. Tommy doesn’t let go of Brenda, and neither of them stop sending glances Gally’s way.

After the deputies bag Gally’s and Brenda’s bodies, Newt, Minho and Thomas sit in an ambulance waiting to get their statement taken before being driven to the hospital, none of them in truly critical condition. The girl, whom they found out was named Caitlyn, had given her statement and left, with a pat to Thomas’s shoulder and a sorry. He felt kind of bad that he didn’t know who she was, but oh well. He had picked Newt up and sat him down on the ledge of the ambulance, Minho following behind slowly, none of them really talking.

One of the people they had met yesterday, the cop who had looked pretty young, had approached, asking them to wait only a little longer and giving Thomas a curt nod. “I’m sorry for your losses.”

“Whatever,” Minho muttered.

A paramedic came up to them and offered food and water, as well as started cleaning some of their cuts. The antiseptic stung, but at the moment, Thomas was a little relieved at the pain. He needed to feel something that wasn’t grief.

And then his dad arrived. Before Thomas knew it, he was getting up and walking towards the man. His dad’s arms were already open, and Thomas tried to ignore the faint scent of liquor on his dad’s jacket as he hugged him. It made him feel safe, and it made him feel bad, and it made him feel okay.

“I’m sorry for running out,” he mumbles into the hug.

“Don’t be, kid. There was a lot happening.”

Thomas swallows harshly and pulls away, eyes searching for judgement in his dad’s eyes. There is none, only love and care and it makes Thomas ache in a totally different way. 

His dad looks him in the eye a little longer before taking in his appearance. “What happened?” he asks, looking serious and tired.

“Animal attack.”

His dad knocks a brow at him, affronted. “That’s what happened?”

Thomas feels a wave of bitterness wash over him as he glances over to where his friends’ blood still coated the scene. “Am I allowed to talk about how a crazy werewolf killed two of my only remaining friends here?”

The Sheriff flinches. He has the decency to look ashamed and sheepish. “No, no, I’m sorry. We’ll talk at home.”

“Home?” it’s his turn to look affronted.

“After you three get taken to the hospital, yeah,” the Sheriff makes sure to sound slightly sarcastic, “the three of you are coming home with me. I’m not letting you out of my sight again. Not after this.”

“And if my friends and I don’t want to go ‘home’?” Thomas asks, adding air quotations to “home”. He doesn’t know why he’s arguing, a warm home feels like exactly what he and his friends need and no matter how little of the man in front of him he remembers, he can’t help but trust him.

“Stiles,” his dad replies, unimpressed.

Rolling his eyes in brief annoyance, lips set in a tight line, the brunette corrects him. “It’s Thomas.”

“It’s actually neither.”

Thomas gives his dad a weird look but the man just shakes his head, looking exhausted. “It doesn’t matter. Your coming home with me, and that’s final. You’re still under age and I am your father.”

Thomas lets out a deep breath. “Newt and Minho coming too?”

“Didn’t I say that?”

Thomas glances back at his friends, before nodding at his dad. “Making sure.”

They give their statements, and get packed into the ambulance. Minho is tired; either he passes out or he gets knocked out when they arrive at the hospital, but the last thing he remembers is Newt being taken to get his foot fixed and Thomas walking into a room with the woman from Derek’s loft, talking about stitches.

When he wakes up, by some miracle – considering what happened last night – nightmare free, there’s someone he doesn’t recognize right away in his room. Two people actually. They’re arguing.

“—he was bitten!” a woman says, and when Minho squints, he recognizes her as the woman from Derek’s loft.

There’s a pause, and Minho assumes some sort of non-verbal conversation is going down. The other person in the room is the boy: the werewolf who’s name Thomas had remembered – Scotch or something. “So was the girl, she just didn’t make it,” Minho hears him say.

There’s a slight tremor in the woman’s voice when she replies. “Does this mean there’s another alpha?”

“A rogue, by the looks of it.”

Another pause. “What are we going to tell Stiles?” the woman asks, wide eyed.

“I don’t know!” the boy exclaims, sounding like a child throwing a tantrum. “He’s Stiles. . . but he’s not. He called us monsters, mom.”

The woman is Scotch’s mother, then.

“Sweetheart, I know, I was there. It doesn’t change the fact that two of his friends died because of a rogue Alpha and one of them was bitten. He needs to know.”

Minho thinks he might like this woman. Staying quiet, he listens for more information.

“What do you want me to do? Just tell him?” Scotch sounds whiny, but also withdrawn, like a leader being faced with a decision he has no idea how to make.

Minho hears a clap, the distinct sound of a hand meeting clothed skin. “Yes, Scott! Preferably now!”

He definitely likes this woman.

Scotch is rubbing his shoulder from what Minho can tell, and he looks indecisive. “Okay, okay. . .just, give me a second, okay? I should talk to Minho first, right? He was bitten.”

“Fine, but don’t stay too long, it’s not even visiting hours yet.”

Right, they were still in the buggin’ hospital. The guy’s mom must be some sort of Medjack – like a nurse. Is that what they were called? Minho could hardly remember.

“Okay, mom, thanks.”

Minho hears footsteps and the door opening, but the Medjack lady talks again. “Just do what you think is right, sweetheart. I know you can do that, Scott.”

Scott then, that’s Thomas’s friend’s name. He hears the door shut and sits up right away, startling the shuck out of the boy. He doesn’t really care, he’s not really in the mood to deal with any klunk right now, and rightly so, taking into account what just happened. “What’s an Alpha?”

“You heard that?” the guy looks shocked, studying Minho. Minho’s already sitting up with his legs over the bed, checking his shoulder to see the damage.

“Some of it,” he mutters distractedly. The wound looks so much smaller than what he’d expected, and the pain is barely there. “What’s an alpha?”

“The kind of werewolf who can turn humans.”

Minho turns to look at him, trying not to show how startled that information makes him. “Turn? Like make them a monster too?”

Scott nods enthusiastically before he realizes what Minho said. “Um – well,” the boy tries, “we’re not really monsters. But yes, pretty much.”

“That thing in the woods last night,” he tries not to think about the creature’s red eyes and its monstrous teeth, “that was an Alpha?”

“Um, yeah. . . It kind of—”

“Bit me?” Minho interrupts, scowling at Scott.

The boy rubs a hand on his neck and looks at the ground. Minho can see how uncomfortable he looks. “Yeah.”

Minho is kind of ashamed for losing his cool so quickly, but he can’t seem to calm himself. “So that’s it,” he bites. “I’m a shucking werewolf now?”

The other boy frowns, surprised at the outburst. “Well, I wasn’t too excited about it either when I was bit, but it usually turns out o--”

He’s cut off by Minho grabbing the collar of his shirt and pulling him into his face. “I don’t care. A werewolf just killed two of my last surviving friends. So just answer the question, shuckface. Am I a werewolf?”

Scott gulps and nods, his hand going to Minho’s side without touching, but obviously hovering over where he was bitten. “Look for yourself.”

Minho lets go of him and exposes his mid riff. There are no marks; not even some sort of scar. He looks up at where Scott’s still staring at him. “The ones on your shoulder would usually be gone too, but they were made by an Alpha so--”

Minho pushes him away and scowls. “Get out.”

“What?” Scott asks, looking angry and confused. “Why?”

“Because, I don’t care right now. Go talk to your precious Stiles or something, just leave me alone,” Minho spits out, sitting on the bed and putting his head in his arms.

“Oh. . . okay. Just, Minho?”

“Yes?” he looks up at Scott through his hands, wondering why the boy hadn’t taken a hint yet and scrammed, preferably before Minho punches him in the face.

“Try to keep your heart rate down, okay? And if you don’t want to talk to me, I don’t know, but Derek can help too.”

Minho presses the tips of his fingers into his temples harshly, trying not to lose his temper. “Okay,” he says, taking the werewolf’s words into consideration.

“Okay,” Scott says. The door opens and Minho is about ready to sag in relief that the boy’s gone. Before he can though, Scott pauses once again. “And, um, Minho? I’m sorry about your friends. I am.”

Minho doesn’t dignify him with a response, and it doesn’t look like he’d wanted one, because he’s already out of the room by the time Minho looks up. Throwing his head back until he’s lying across the bed, he clenches his fists in anger. A werewolf.

And he thought his life couldn’t get any more interesting.

With a roll of his eyes dedicated solely to the world, Minho tries to think. He needs to talk to his friends.

When Newt wakes up, Tommy is asleep in the chair by his bed, and the ugly mug is holding his hand. The first thing Newt notices about that is that Tommy’s hands are clean. No blood, no black liquid – just smooth calloused skin and dark hair strewn across his knuckles.

Newt wants to rub his thumb over those knuckles, hold Tommy’s hand forever, and just sleep, knowing the boy would protect him from anything. Or help him with anything, as Tommy had already proved he would.

If he regrets anything more, it’s the words he’d spat at Tommy that day. The words he’d used to manipulate his friend. The cruel and blunt way he’d made Tommy carry his burdens and put their faults on him. Newt still recalls telling Tommy that none of what they’d done before the Maze mattered, and he wants to snort. So much for holding on to that promise.

He’d been such a coward.

It makes him want to climb the nearest Maze wall (not very near, but you get the point) and shuck himself off it, actually succeeding this time.

If it weren’t for the hand holding, Newt would believe that Tommy could never forgive him for that. But it’s obvious he already has. He’s already sacrificed even more for his friends.

An echoing pain goes through Newt, starting from his leg – that is now in a cast going from his mid-thigh to his toes – and spreading. It’s the same one he always feels when he thinks too much about Tommy; even before he asked the boy to kill him. Newt knows it’s heartache, maybe even heartbreak. There’s nothing he can do about it now, all of them need years to heal from this, let alone try for more relationships. At least, that’s what Newt tells himself.

He squeezes Tommy’s hand and lets his fingers slip out of the hold, pulling away and resting them on his stomach. He’s quick to tangle his own hands together, if only to stop himself from reaching out and touching.

Tommy blinks awake at the squeeze, eyes scrunching as a hand comes up to cover his yawn. Tommy has the looks of an old wrinkled dog, but the blonde still looks away in order to hide his blush.

“Newt?” he asks, voice weary.

“Yeah, Tommy?”

The boy meets his eyes and Newt knocks a brow, trying to look unfazed.

“And here I thought nobody could be more of a shucking idiot then myself.” Tommy says, and he’s looking at his hands while he talks, speaking only slightly louder than a whisper, voice hoarse from what Newt assumes is the aftermath of crying. The boys lips curl downwards. “You proved me wrong. What, what you did. . . that was so buggin’ stupid, Newt. So buggin’ stupid.”

If Newt looks more closely, he can see that Tommy’s eyes are definitely still a little tinged and that unlike his hands, which are pristine, his cheeks have faded tear tracks on them. He stays quiet and waits for Tommy to continue.

“But. . .” he pauses, looking conflicted. Newt tries to hold his gaze, to say I’m sorry in a way he’s sure his voice could never really portray, but the boy doesn’t look up. “I’m glad you’re not dead, you shank. Don’t do that again.”

The slang still sounds uncharacteristic on the boy, and it irks a reminiscent smile out of Newt. He knows he shouldn’t be smiling, but it’s either that or crying, and well, he thinks both of them have done enough of that for the next couple of years. “Good that, Tommy.”

The boy stands, nodding. “Good that.”

Blinking as if to clear his eyesight, Tommy seems to have snapped out of whatever daze he’d put himself into.  Newt is slightly disappointed that he seems to be leaving. The boy must notice, because he quirks his lips slightly to one side. “Don’t worry,” he says, “I just need to take a klunk, I’ll be back in a minute.”

The blonde nods with a sheepish look before relaxing again, the sound of the brunette closing the door coming seconds later. He finds himself engrossed in the wallpaper that coats the ceiling, but he feels restless, squirming in place.

Tommy was right about what he did; it had been stupid. So bloody stupid that Newt knows he’s lucky to be alive.

After the monster – which Newt now realizes was a werewolf (still hard to believe, even after cranks and grievers) for sure, the teeth and claws couldn’t really be confused for any other creature – had caught up to them as they looked for Minho and Gally, it went straight for Tommy, probably identifying him as the biggest threat. Which made sense, Brenda was a head shorter than Tommy and while Newt is pretty tall, his lanky but not unmuscular frame isn’t exactly threatening.

As the creature leaped, Tommy had pulled Brenda behind him and told her to run, attempting to do so himself. However, the clumsy shank tripped, face-planting right into the mud, the monster paces behind. Newt had grabbed the closest thing he could find, a rather large stick that hadn’t been completely submerged into the mushy ground, and thrown it as hard as he could.

Once it’d made its mark on the creature’s backside, Newt charged, running as fast as he could on his already tired legs and sliding between the beast and Tommy. He can’t recall exactly what happened, kind of like he can’t really remember climbing up the Maze walls oh so long ago, but next thing he knows there’s a clawed hand on his leg and he’s being thrown upside down, his leg letting an awful crack loose as he’s catapulted into a tree trunk. He lands on his feet, and well, he blacked out from the pain at that point, and when he woke the rain was lighter, the moon was nearly full, and a sick looking Brenda as well as a worried looking Tommy were looming over him. It was soon obvious that the bite on Brenda’s neck wasn’t getting better – not that gory bites on the neck were exactly healthy – and well, neither of them refused to leave Newt, even after Newt had incoherently begged, still feeling extreme pulses of pain from his leg. So he’d applied pressure to the wound while Tommy begged Brenda to get better and she didn’t talk very much. At first they thought it was bad lighting, but her blood was black and compared to Tommy’s and Newt’s skin, hers was even colder and paler by the second. Newt had started blocking out what came out of Tommy’s mouth, half in pain of hearing it and half in giving him privacy as he spoke his last words to Brenda.

Minho had appeared soon after, and neither of them really noticed until Brenda spoke to him. He didn’t look good, but there was nothing to be done, so they said their goodbyes to Brenda and sat there. If it weren’t for that jogger Tommy supposedly knew, he thinks they might’ve stayed there all day, injured or not.

Two more deaths.

Two too many at this point. Newt had started to lose track. It was him, Frypan, Minho, and Tommy left, it seemed.

Thank the bloody universe, he’s brought out of his thoughts by the door reopening, and Newt’s about to let out some sharp comment along the lines of “one minute my bollocks, Tommy” when he realizes it isn’t Tommy.

“What are you doing here?” he asks, and winces when it comes out sharp and cold. He hadn’t meant for it, but well, those thoughts hadn’t really put him in a good place.

“I was looking for Stiles,” Scott says, and he looks unsure, grinding his uneven jaw. “I was told he was here?”

“Yeah, he’s in the bathroom, said he’d be back in a minute.”

“Oh.” The boy nods, looking around the room, as if Tommy will magically appear. “Okay. Do you mind if I wait, then?”

Not really thinking he has a choice either way, and wanting to make up for his earlier rudeness, Newt gestures to the chair. “Go ahead, shank.”

Scott sits and his eyebrows scrunch up in confusion. “Shank?”

Newt tries for a smile. “Kind of like friend or pal. Not really sure how to explain it.”

Scott nods, looking awkward. “So. . .um,” Newt can tell he’s looking for a way to fill the silence. Why is Tommy taking so long? “How did you meet Stiles?”

Newt sighs. “How ‘bout you tell me how you met him? I have a feeling that story will be way less bloody complicated.”

Scott looks like he wants to protest, but he doesn’t, instead sitting back more comfortably and getting a lazy smile on his face – the type that comes with good memories. If Newt had more than a select few, he imagines he would make that face too. In fact, he has to keep his jealousy at bay, because even before the Flare, Newt had a short temper.

“In a sandbox, actually.”

Newt doesn’t follow.

“It’s like a box full of sand,” Scott says, smile sheepish. Newt isn’t impressed. “But it’s usually at playgrounds, and we were at school, and well, we knew each other before, but we weren’t really, friends, I guess?”

Newt gives him a nod to show that he’s following.

“But that day, Stiles wouldn’t stop talking to me – all about Lydia of course –”

Newt takes that in and stops Scott in surprise, sending the other boy a look. “You mean the redhead? Tommy had a crush on the redhead?”

He rubs the back of his neck before replying. “Well, I guess he still has one, but I’m not sure now, with you know. . .”

Newt nods in understanding. “Yeah, okay, well, keep going.”

“So this other boy who had a crush on Lydia, Jackson – he lives in London now, he’s a werewolf too –” how many of them are there? Newt wonders. “– he comes over and pushes Stiles’s sand castle over. Before Stiles can start rambling or crying, I punch Jackson in the nose.” Scott sounds like he’s somewhere else completely, and Newt has to jab the jealousy away again.

He smiles at the other boy, approving. Scott continues. “After that, I think Stiles kind of adopted me, I don’t know. He used to always say he was an acquired taste, and well, it’s pretty true, for the most part.”

Newt ponders this. He can see it, but at the same time, Scott is talking about a different person. The blonde wishes he could meet him. He must’ve drifted into his own thoughts, because next thing he knows, Tommy has come back.

“Scott?”

The boy in question is out of his seat and hugging Tommy the moment he’s in the room. “Stiles!” he exclaims over the boy’s shoulder, “I am so sorry – I, I overreacted and then you ran and then – then your friends –  I’m so sorry, Stiles. Your friends. . . I’m so glad you’re okay.”

Newt is slightly surprised, although he shouldn’t be, when Tommy hugs back. This is the same boy who out of all his friends, he knew the name of. Scott has to be special.

“I’m sorry too,” he mumbles into Scott’s shoulder, and huh, Newt hadn’t realized he was this insecure about himself. He pushes his thoughts away. He can’t remember the last time he got a hug – well, no, that wasn’t true; when he came back from the “dead” he got a hug.

Pulling away, Scott smiles at his friend, but it slowly falls away. “We need to talk,” he says.

Tommy nods, biting his lips and wringing his hands. “That we do. Do you,” he hesitates, eyes dropping, “do you know who it was? The werewolf?”

Scott pulls further away and shakes his head fitfully. Newt isn’t exactly happy about being left out of the conversation, but he wants to hear what happened so he remains silent.

“Well, it was an Alpha for sure—”

“How do you know?” Tommy asks

Scott’s hesitant to answer. “Because it bit someone last night. Two people, actually.”

“Who did it bite?” Newt cuts in, done with being ignored. Self-consciously, he notices that both himself and Tommy check themselves over with furrowed brows; they don’t recall being bitten.

Wait.

Tommy beats him to it. “Brenda.”

Scott nods slowly. He can’t meet either of their eyes. “And. . .”

“And?” the brunette inquires.

“And Minho,” Newt realizes out loud. “He had blood on his side, remember?”

The boy’s eyes widen and they look at Scott for confirmation only to see him nodding. “Shuck,” they both mutter in horror. 

Scott doesn’t ask what that means. “The girl, Brenda, she rejected the bite, that’s why she died. Minho didn’t, so he’s one of us now. Because I’m an Alpha,” he continues, “he can join my pack, and he doesn’t have to be connected to the rougue—”

“Wait, wait, wait,” Newt interrupts, not really feeling sorry for the amount of times Scott has been interrupted so far. “You’re telling us that you and whatever bit and killed our friends, you guys are the same thing?”

“No, I’m not rougue. I have a pa—”

Tommy takes a step back, turning the boys’ attention to him. He looks utterly betrayed. “How can I trust you?” he cuts in, and his words echo some of what he said the other day. Newt can see Scott’s flinch from across the room. He has a sinking feeling about where this is going.

“How do I know that it wasn’t you out there, then?” Tommy continues, his face flashing from expression to expression: shock, betrayal, confusion, hurt, disbelief, betrayal again. “Killing my friends and making sure I’d stay, like you wanted me too! You just said it, you and that – that beast; you’re the same. You might even be the same person.”

“Stiles, no! I have a pack, and I don’t, I don’t look like that when I shift, I showed you! You saw me, I look nothing like that.” Scott looks about ready to pull his hair out, voice unsteady.

“I still don’t know if I can trust you!” Tommy yells, shaking his head in disbelief.

The boy looks like a kicked puppy and his voice cracks on his next words. “Please, Stiles, just. You gotta believe in me, dude.”

“It’s Thomas,” he replies coldly. “The name is Thomas. And – and I don’t.  . .I still don’t even know you, Scott,” Tommy adds, voice slightly warmer. Newt sees the water welling in his eyes as he says it, sympathizing. “I’m sorry.”

The other boy doesn’t really say anything, just looks at his friend in disbelief. Newt guesses that Scott has never had to handle his friend not believing in him, and he gets it, he does. He can’t imagine having Minho or Tommy not trust him on something, it’d be dreadful.

They’re quiet for a second or two more, and then Scott turns to look at him, fidgeting slightly. “Newt?”

The blonde frowns, but looks at him all the same. “I’m sorry about your leg. And your friends.”

Newt nods.

“You guys have to believe me when I say it wasn’t me,” the boy continues, and it feels like a last attempt. “I – I don’t kill people.”

Newt sees Tommy flinch, and just like that, all composure his friend had shatters.

“Well, I’ve had to,” he exclaims, hands flying. “I’ve had to kill monsters, and enemies, people I didn’t know, and even my closest friends!”

Scott’s expression mirrors his own: shock at the outburst and horror at the words.

“So – So I’m sorry I can’t trust you! I can’t trust anyone!” Tommy takes a deep breath and steps back slightly from where he’d gotten in Scott’s space. “I’m sorry,” he mutters again, slipping out the door and into the hallway, his back tense in a red t-shirt. It’s the last thing either of them see of him through the window as he walks away.

Scott goes for the door.

“Don’t,” Newt says, and the boy looks back at him, astonished.

“Why the hell not?”

“Because, you bloody idiot. He’s not okay.”

Scott stomps his foot loudly, a movement of despair and recklessness. “None of us are okay!”

The blonde glowers at Scott until his eyes are apologetic.

“I wonder why? Until he gets the whole werewolves thing out of his shuck head, Tommy ain’t lettin’ this go. You have to give him time. He’ll come to you when he’s over it. I know he will.”

Scott stares at him.

“. . .his name is Stiles.”

Newt swallows. “I’m sorry, Scott.”

Scott nods, one hand on the door. “I’m sorry, too.”

Chapter Text

8 – torn

When they find him, Thomas is in the private records room.

Melissa finds him, his dad not far behind, but they’re both shocked to see him holding Claudia Stilinski’s file open and reading it, sitting in a corner of the badly lit room.

“My mom – the one I can remember, the one they created – she gave me away to WICKED. My dad had died from the Flare and she panicked. She probably died soon after, but well, hope is. . .it’s irresistible.”

Scott’s mom holds a hand to her mouth and the Sheriff holds her shoulder, like he’s trying to support himself on her petite frame.

“Stiles. . .” Melissa starts, faltering.

Thomas gets up, brushing off his pants and moving past them to the S section. “It’s okay,” he says, putting the folder back. “They weren’t real. You guys – you guys are.”

The drive home is awkward.

Newt told him that he’d spoken to Minho, but that the boy wanted to talk about it later, and Thomas agreed. Right now, they were too wrung up; still grieving, still on high alert. One issue at a time, he encouraged. When Minho starts growing fur and claws, they’ll talk about it.    

The Sheriff is quiet as he drives, the radio off. Thomas, in an effort of preventing his mind from wandering, is concentrated on studying him. Driving seems easy, and he’s taking in every detail, attempting to understand the logistics of something he suspects he already knew once.

“Do I have a car?” he asks, realizing its an abrupt way to breach the silence. His dad is startled, sending a quick glance his way. He can feel Newt and Minho knocking their brows from the backseat.

Newt is clean again, in some of Thomas’s/Stiles’s clothing that happen to be too small for him, even though the shirt hangs loosely off his shoulders. His cast is huge, mid-thigh to his foot (Thomas had assumed only the ankle had been damaged, but the doctors found extensive damage in the rest of leg, probably resulting from a fall from a high altitude, they said. He’d had to resist the need to punch the wall when they told him, his whole body shaking.), and his metal crutches lie on the seat beside him.

“Yeah, actually,” his dad replies. “A little old, but you bought her yourself.”

“Old?” asks Minho.

The Sheriff smirks at him through the rear-view mirror. “1980 Jeep CJ-5.”

The Asian boy sits back in his seat, nostrils flaring in defeat.

“While you were gone,” the Sheriff continues, talking to him now, “I kind of got her fixed. Figured that you’d need her when you got back, and it was a way to keep the hope, you know?”

Thomas nods, not knowing what else to do. He swallows too, because he hadn’t expected that. “Thank you.”

“No problem, kid,” his dad smiles, satisfied with his response. “I’ll have to make sure you still know how to drive her, and maybe teach these two, but it’s all yours after that.”

Thomas doesn’t reply, instead looking out the window. The neighborhood was pristine and new looking. Nice and comfortable houses; no cranks, no fire, no trials. His stomach churned.

“Here it is,” the Sheriff says, nodding his head towards the house they were about to pull into.

There wasn’t really a moment of recognition, but Thomas shrugged in approval. It would do. Large but not overly, nice but homey, and definitely lived in. the grass was a little overgrown, and the yard looked like it needed a leaf sweep.

Before he got out of the car, Minho and Newt waiting for him before exiting themselves, he asks, “Where are we staying?”

His dad exits, so Thomas follows him out. “There is a guest room,” the man dwells, “but we’d need to get that cleared out, so for the time being, two of you on the bed and one on the floor. Or on the sofa downstairs, but it’s your choice. How’s that sound?”

The boys nod, and enter, observing their surroundings. It’s a little messier than Thomas expected, but the Sherriff is quick to address that, reassuring them it’s not usually like this, he’s just gotten used to Stiles doing most of the cleaning. His friends send him and his father a pitying glance.

When Thomas wanders up to his room – which he finds by himself, not really surprised – he takes a deep breath before going in.

The paint is light green, there’s a chess board set up on a table, the bed is roughly made, there’s a sheen of dust on everything, and the walls are littered with posters and ornaments. Half of them mean nothing to Thomas, but he accepts them as part of the room, nodding. He exhales a little, slightly relieved that the room is normal.

Newt and Minho aren’t far behind him, and when they enter, they make sure to voice their opinion.     

“How much klunk do you bloody own?” Newt wonders, already grabbing at a random object on his desk. Thomas shrugs, eyes scanning the somewhat unfamiliar space.

“There’s a TV!” Minho exclaimed. “Did I tell ya ’bout the time we asked the box for one?”

Neither of them reply, and Newt has limped forward to where a black backpack sits on the floor near the bed, crouching down with his clutches before spilling its contents.

“Wait,” Minho voices from where he’s flipping through the books on shelf. He eyes the textbooks Newt has pulled out and is currently studying. “Does this mean we’ll have to go to school?”

Thomas isn’t sure how to answer that, so he bends down next to Newt and grabs a book for himself. He opens it to the cover and reads the names there. Below a couple others, there he is: Stiles Stilinski.

“I guess so,” he mutters as Newt leans over to see what he’s looking at, blonde hair falling into his eyes. Thomas sits back onto the floor, leaning on the bed.

Minho drops the book he’d been holding back on the shelf and joins him there, taking the textbook from his hands. The cover reads Advanced Placement Trigonometry.

“All easy stuff for you, ain’t it, Thomas? Even I know this stuff.”

Having his “higher” intelligence level addressed by his friends made Thomas feel a little bit like a stranger again – the greenie on his first day. He falters on how to reply.

“Let’s see,” Newt says, interrupting the awkward pause, carefully sitting with them and gesturing across Thomas for the textbook. He smells like hospital and fresh grass. Thomas breathes in greedily, leaning out of the way.

Minho passes the book over to the blonde, reaching across the brunette for the rest of the school bag. The Asian boy smells like hospital and mint. Thomas puts a hand on his arm and reaches for the bag himself, pulling it into his lap.

Inside the bag is all the school stuff you’d expect, as well as gym clothes that stink like a thousand-year-old sweat and some moldy remains of curly fries.

Thomas guesses he didn’t have enough time to unpack his school bag before he disappeared.

“Bloody hell! Tommy, get that away from me,” Newt exclaims, pushing Thomas off the floor and towards the door. “Smells worse than the shuckin’ klunkhouse.”

Careful not to trip over Newt’s leg and his discarded clutches, Thomas licks his lips, curling them slightly as he leaves, carrying the musty clothing to the bathroom. He finds it next to his room, and when he goes inside, the mirror catches his eye.

The dark Henley he’s wearing, something he borrowed from Derek and happened to be in one of the bags they’d taken when they’d ran, displays part of the stitched up claw marks across his shoulder. He knows that if he pulls the shirt down just a little he’ll find the bullet wound WICKED had so conveniently treated for him. The scar has always made him want to throw up a little, and this new one wasn’t faring much better.

He can still feel Brenda’s pulse dying on his fingertips.

His reflection’s hair is long. Not unbearably so, just different. He hadn’t had much time to worry about his appearance previously, and well, he hadn’t even known what he looked like for so long that it didn’t really matter to him anymore.

Thomas places a hand on his forehead and pushes the hair back. It falls flat back into his eyes. It’s the color of tree-bark. He’d probably need a haircut soon. There’s stubble growing on his cheeks, and he desperately wants to take a shower. He’ll have to wait till tomorrow because of his stitches.

“Son?”

He drops his hand from where it’s studying his own face and looks into the doorway. His dad is standing there, brows lifted in concern.

“Yeah?” he replies, swallowing the lump in his throat.

“It’ll be alright.”

Thomas wants to believe him.

“So,” Sheriff Stilinski begins, “school.”

It’s January 1st, a Friday, and Newt is tired.

The boys had stayed up till very early, drinking the bottle of whiskey the Sheriff had ignored them steal until they could no longer see straight. The alcohol had tasted much better than Gally’s mix, and they had all toasted to him before taking their first sip.

Brenda, second sip. Teresa, third sip. Alby, Chuck, Winston, Ben. . . Newt had lost count. At one point he swore he saw Tommy say his name before a sip, but his memory is shot.

It’d be appropriate, Newt thinks, if Tommy had said his name before toasting.

Shuck, his head hurt. The painkillers for his leg weren’t helping.

“School,” Minho points, smiling goofily at the man. He’s acting very cheery this morning, Newt thinks. So far, the boy hadn’t had any werewolf like problems. He’d heard the two boys whispering about the probability that Minho was immune or something. Newt wasn’t so keen to buy it; Minho’s wounds had completely vanished.

The Asian boy had drunk the most last night, and after he’d swallowed a third of the bottle in one go he’d looked at his friends and frowned. “I’m sober,” he muttered.

Tommy had let out a laugh so joyous and carefree that Newt had felt compelled to join in. “It’s cause you’re a dog now,” he’d giggled, too loud. “Minho, you’re healing yourself sober!”

The boys had laughed. Minho’s frown slipped away and although he didn’t stop drinking and reconsidering how he felt, he had looked like he was having a better time.

And if Newt had kept his side pressed to Tommy’s all night, arm around his shoulder as they talked, well, it was his own bloody problem.

They were all sleeping in Tommy’s room, the three rotating between two on the bed and one on the floor. The Sheriff had tried to argue them out of it, but they’d insisted. Newt was glad they’d won that argument, there were somethings you couldn’t try to fix right away.

Tommy has all the reason to love his father, and Newt respects Sheriff Stilinski very much, but out of all of them, Minho had made the fastest connection with the man, joking and trying to, well, ignore the last six months.

He hears his name and Newt blinks, realizing that he’s being talked to. “What?”

The Sheriff chuckles loudly, eyes glinting. “Must have had more than you could handle last night, didn’t ya?”

Newt felt his face flaming and put a hand to his head, massaging his temples in embarrassment. “Bloody hell.”

“Newt,” Minho nudges him and the blonde looks at his friend expectantly. “I asked you what you thought.”

“On?” Newt asked, sarcastic.

Minho gives him an unimpressed look. “School,” the boy elongates the word until it sounds like sh-cool. “You think we can handle it?”

“High school,” Tommy corrects, smile cheeky, eyes sparkling. Newt thinks that the boy might still be a little drunk. He’d drank nearly as much as Minho, and they’d only slept about 3 or 4 hours. Tommy hadn’t smiled this much since . . . well, Newt couldn’t exactly recall. Looking at Tommy’s father, the sheepish and exasperated quirk of the man’s lips said that he agreed.

Newt tries to consider it. What would school be like? He barely remembers it. “But I’m a year older than the two of you,” is what he ends up blurting out, gesturing towards his friends and sounding like a whiny child.

“Not an issue,” the Sheriff replies, taking a sip of his coffee. “We’ll say you started late as a child.”

“You didn’t answer the question, shank,” Minho nudges him again, smiling sleepily and taking a bite of pancakes. “Aye s’cul,” the boy says, his mouth full. Tommy hits him on the back roughly and they both end up laughing when Minho chokes. Newt sighs and places his head down on the counter.

“Calm down, boys,” he hears the Tommy’s father reprimand jokingly. “I just need to know. It might be good for you three to start re-establishing yourselves into society.”

Newt lifts his head up slightly to look at his friends. Minho tones it down a bit, sitting back and swallowing another mouthful of pancakes. Tommy glances at him before nodding at his dad.

“Whatever you say, Dad.”

“Great then,” the man nods, looking satisfied. “You all start on Monday.”

Minho groans and Newt sympathizes. He’s not sure he’s up for handling other people his age. However, he’ll do whatever Tommy is doing, and the blonde knows Minho will too.

The Sheriff stands, hand on the holster by his waist. He’s in his uniform, and Newt remembers that he has a shift till 3 PM today. “We’ll go to the school later to pick out your schedules. Son, I suppose you’ll be getting a new one?” the boy bites his lip, nodding. “And we’ll get you two settled in as well. Should probably go shopping soon,” the man adds, more to himself, “– I don’t think just borrowing from Stiles’s old stuff will suffice – your all so buff.”

Minho grins smugly, sending a playful nudge Thomas’s way, but looks intrigued. “Shopping? Like, going out and choosing what we want to wear?”

Newt looks down, ignoring the huge cast on his leg, to the too short sweat pants and falling off his shoulder sweater he’s wearing. Clothes he gets to pick out would be nice. He glances to Tommy, and almost snorts. The boy’s old clothing is very smug on him, and as far as Newt knows, he’d given most of Derek’s old stuff to Minho.

“Exactly like that, Minho,” The Sheriff says as he puts his plate away. The man sends his son a look, as if to remind the boy that they’ll have to clean it later.

The Asian boy looks thoughtful, eyes squinting before he bursts into a hopeful smile. “Can I get running shoes?”

Tommy sits up straighter. “Yeah, me too.”

The blonde sighs, head still not up for this. “I just want longer pants; yours are short as shuck, Tommy.”

He receives two laughs and an apologetic smile, Tommy’s cheeks flushing.

On Saturday morning, the three get out of bed, dress, eat, and pack into the car. Thomas’s car.

Minho can’t wait till he can learn how to drive.

The Sheriff sits in the front seat with his son, giving the boy instructions on how to get the car moving. After a couple failed attempts of getting the Jeep (“Roscoe,” Thomas had muttered earlier, shaking his head and climbing into the driver’s seat. Minho thought the boy was talking jack before he heard the Sheriff agree.) to even start, they’d succeeded, and they were moving down the road and towards Beacon Hills High School.

Thomas’s father had said that they’d already cleared Thomas’s missing person status, as well as determined backstories for Minho and Newt.

Thomas had agreed to register as Stiles, in order not to raise suspicion, and if asked, the matter of his disappearance was none of anyone’s business. The Sheriff had made an official report about the true causes and it had all already been handled, so he told them that no one else needed to know.

Both other boys agreed to keep their names as they were, being allowed to choose reasonable new last names. The Sheriff had to become Minho’s legal guardian, since the boy was not yet 18. Minho decided on the last name Greenie, which gave the other two a great laugh. Newt chose to make his last name Isaacs to honor Isaac Newton, someone he had looked up intensively once he got his hands on a laptop. Minho had laughed at him, but agreed. After all, the man was his namesake.  

“So I’m a friend of Stiles’s from summer camp whose parents died, right?”

The Sheriff turned back to nod at him. “Yes.”

The car jerked a little aggressively and the Sheriff hopped back around, hands steadying Thomas. Minho laughed, glancing over at Newt to make sure he hadn’t hit his leg. “Tragic much?” he joked. He’s ignored but for the roll of Newt’s eyes.

“I’m a family friend from England who decided to finish his Senior year of high school in America and also managed to break his within minutes of getting here. Mine makes me sound like some rich boy whose parents don’t give a shuck.”

“True. However, I’m sure a slinthead like yourself won’t have trouble playing the part.”

Newt cuffs him on the shoulder. The car makes another swerve.

“Jesus Christ, Sti— son. Loosen up on the gas, foot on the breaks, will ya?” The Sheriff ran a hand through his hair, looking a little fearful at his son’s driving skills. Minho hadn’t heard the man call Thomas anything but son in the last couple of days, and he could tell it made the boy feel better. No matter what, the man was Thomas’s dad. Minho yearned for that kind of connection.

“Sorry, Dad,” Thomas mutters, doing as he’s told. The driving becomes much smoother.

They arrive to the school eventually, and to Minho’s disdain, there’s someone waiting for them there.

“What’s he doing here?” Thomas asks.

“Relax, son,” The Sheriff walks around the vehicle and places a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “I called him. I’m not having a newly bitten and most likely aggressive werewolf sleeping in the same room as the two of you without any control.”

Minho feels a little betrayed. He helps Newt out of the car and frowns, crossing his arms over his chest. “I don’t know if you noticed, old man, but my control is fine.”

Newt elbows him for the disrespect, but Minho ignores the blonde. He’s not the one being called a monster.

“I understand, Minho, and I’m sorry for not telling you Scott would be here, but this is important. How would you feel if you hurt one of them? Huh? I know you boys said you’ll handle one problem at a time, but well, this is a problem. And now there’s time. Come on.”

Thomas is silent. Minho sympathizes. “Just. . . just tell us next time,” he hears the brunette mutter quietly to his father.

The Sherriff’s frown deepens, seeing he’s hurt him, but he doesn’t relent. “Come on.”

He sees the silent question in Thomas’s eyes when the boy turns to nod at him. Minho blows out a breath, nodding. He starts walking forward, making sure Newt can keep up. Thomas comes up to him and bumps him slightly on the shoulder. A silent thank you and I’m sorry at the same time.

When they get to where Scott standing by a green dirt bike near the entrance to the school, the boy is studying them. He can see the pain behind his puppy like eyes as he watches how the three friends interact. Minho stands closer to Thomas. Damn right you should be jealous, he thinks, Thomas is theirs now too.

“Stiles,” the other boy says hopefully, fidgeting with the helmet in his hands. Do werewolves even need helmets?

Thomas acknowledges him with a slight tilt of the head and hurt filled eyes. “Scott.”

Scott rubs the back of his neck, looking disheartened. Minho should wait for him to say something, but he’s too anxious. “So what? Other than healing up pretty nicely, nothing’s been wrong with me.”  Other than not being able to shucking drink, he adds mentally.

The boy looks surprised. Minho feels Newt straighten up beside him, interest piqued. “Really? Have you not – I don’t know, gotten angry at anyone?”

“I’m getting pretty angry at you right now,” Minho snarks, re-crossing his arms, stance irritated.

He swears he hears Thomas mutter “Derek” under his breath. He’d think he made it up, if not for the sharp look Scott sends the boy.

Looking back at the Asian boy, the Alpha tries again. “Have you heard anything unusual? Had a strange dream or something?”

“I have plenty of strange dreams,” he replies, “but none of them include howling at the moon and going furry all over.”

Newt snorts. Minho can sense Scott’s patience thinning, and he feels smug. Serves him right.

“Minho, this is serious. You haven’t felt anything unusual? At all?” Thomas asks, and Minho can feel his own brows raise. What was the boy playing at? When he caught his eye, the boy just gave him a look to go along with it.

“No, alright?” he grinds out, facing Scott again. “Other not being able to get drunk and my shoulder healing, I haven’t felt a shucking thing, you shank.”

Scott looks like he’s turning the information over in his head. “You’re not lying,” he finally says.

“Of course he bloody isn’t!” Newt exclaims. “Why would he?”

Thomas places a hand on his shoulder. “Newt, keep your shucking pants on, this is all pretty jacked.”

Newt says something unflattering to the brunette under his breath and Minho huffs. “I’m not lying – no. What’s your point?”   

Scott is still focused on the interaction between Newt and Thomas, and it takes him a second to process Minho’s words.

“Just, be careful. The Alpha who bit you will most likely try to recruit you on the full moon, but until then, I don’t know. You either have amazing control or the bite didn’t take or something.”

Minho nods, joking, “Shuck right, my control is amazing. I have to put up with Tom-boy, over here.”

The two boys roll their eyes. “So we’re done then, right?” he asks, eyes to the Sheriff, who’d stayed quiet during the exchange.

“Wait,” Scott says, and Minho is halfway to looking at him when there’s a black blob flying straight at Newt.

Minho catches it out of the air in milliseconds and hears a loud crunch as his fingers grasp the metal of Scott’s helmet, he realizes. Newt looks terrified, eyes wide and breathing short.

“What the hell?” Minho asks, moving forward to push at Scott’s shoulder. “What the shuck was that for?”

The boy barely pays attention to the hand aggressively grabbing his collar. He’s more focused on the helmet in Minho’s hands.

“Bloody hell,” Newt murmurs under his breath, and Minho doesn’t really consider how he can hear it till Scott’s exhaling next to him. “Holy shit.”

He loosens his grip and looks at the twisted and torn metal of what was previously Scott’s helmet.

Dropping it, he almost screams like a little girl when he notices the claws extending from his fingers.

“Shuck,” Thomas says behind him, and Minho nods his head shortly, swallowing.

“Shuck.”

Chapter Text

 9 – hell

“I might not remember a whole lot, but I’m pretty sure high school is just another word for living hell, am I right?”

“You’re exaggerating,” the Sheriff huffs. “Now, son, please take it easy on the accelerator, and boys,” he waits until all three of them look his way, his voice serious and a little shaky. “Thank you for doing this. I’m – I’m proud.”

He clears his throat and the boys nod, glancing at each other.

“Now, I’ve got to get to work,” the man nods back, voice firm. “Sti- son, please take—”

“Take it easy on the accelerator and drive safely,” Thomas interrupts. “Yeah, I got it, Dad; it’s the fifth time you say it. Today.”

“I’m sorry. Okay, boys – I’ll see the three of you for dinner. Go ahead and order pizza or something equally unhealthy, I’ll probably be getting home late. Just, you know, leave leftov—”

“Thank you, Sheriff,” Newt cuts the rambling off, Minho moving up to pat his friend’s dad out the door.

“Yep, good that. We’ll see you later if this shank doesn’t drive us into a shuck tree.”

The man’s face lights up with concern, but Minho kind of pushes him out the door and shuts it on him before the man can speak. “Klunk, and here I thought Newt was a mother hen.”

Newt adjusts his crutches and stifles a giggle. They both of them punch the Asian boy on the arm. “Hey!”

The moment that they park Roscoe and Tommy cuts the engine, none of them move to exit the car, all silently agreeing that this was a bad idea.

Newt leans in from the back, his crutches out of the way, and looks at the papers in Minho’s hands. “Well, time to get it bloody over with, ain’t it?”

“Shuck this,” Tommy mutters, hand moving to turn the engine back on.

Minho places his hand over the boy’s and says, “No way, I did not sit through hours of false paperwork to shuck it all.”

Tommy drops his head onto the wheel. “Klunk, I can’t believe you’re serious.”

Minho pushes the boy’s shoulder, and Tommy looks up to glare at him. “Dead serious. We’ve all got History first period, don’t we?”

“I suppose. Anyone have any idea where room 121 is?”

The clank of Tommy’s head falling back onto the wheel echoes in the jeep.

It’s the stares that Thomas notices first.

Some people might be convinced that the high school students of Beacon Hills are really staring at the lanky blonde with a broken leg or the buff Asian boy behind them, but this isn’t the case.

Everyone stares at him as he walks by, whispering rubberish that he can’t hear under their breath. “Almost worse than Gladers, aren’t they?” Newt whispers in his ear. He hears Minho snort behind him.

“Definitely worse than Gladers,” the Asian boy mutters, tone a little mean.

One of the stares catch his eye. If he remembers right, it’s the Asian girl from Derek’s loft. “Hey, Stiles,” the girl says, just audibly enough for him to hear it, her voice sad.

Thomas bites his lip, smiling awkwardly. He couldn’t even remember her name. “Hey,” he replies, eyes down. He walks faster, and he hears his friends try and catch up. he hears Newt curse as his crutches clank on the ground.

“Slow down, you slinthe—”

Thomas doesn’t hear the rest of Minho’s complaint, because the bell rings just as he crashes into someone, papers and bags flying towards the ground.

He drops down automatically. “Sorry,” he exclaims, trying to collect the person’s items. He feels so out of place – so awkward. What if the person recognizes him?

“Stiles?”

Thomas looks up at the girl’s voice. Klunk.

“Malia.”

Thomas jumps to his feet, knocking the top of his head into the girl’s. They both cry out in pain, and Thomas falls back to his knees. Who he assumes to be Minho and Newt pick him up by the shoulders, and he adjusts his bag on his shoulders, trying to get his bearings.

The girl stands with her hand harnessing her chin, her belongings forgotten on the ground. “Stile—”

“I’ve got to go to class. I’m sorry.”

“Wai—”

Thomas rushes away from her.

He doesn’t mean to be so rude, but he’s already so in over his head after talking to Scott on Saturday that he feels a little justified.

He finds room 121 with his head down, and sits down in the seat closest to the back, the environment so familiar and strange at the same time. He knew he’d had to have gone to school at some point in his old memories, but he barely recalls school as Stiles.

Well, with all this supernatural stuff going on, he’s not so sure he wants to.

When he hears familiar clanking down the hall does he remember that he ditched his friends again.

Minho’s furious as he stomps down the hallway, hand firmly holding onto Newt’s bicep and making sure he doesn’t fall. He doesn’t realize how loud his heart is beating in his ears until Newt rips out of his grip, looking taken aback.

The blonde stops in the hallway. “Minho, slim yourself, you nearly poked bloody holes into my arm!”

Minho looks down at the hand that had been previously holding Newt. He was right, the claws were out. Shuck.

“Calm down, your eyes – Minho—”

He hates this so much. The moment he’s gotten control of himself, of his life, it gets taken away again. “I’m fine,” he grits, relaxing when he doesn’t feel fangs on his tongue. He puts his hand back on Newt’s arm, hold looser and clawless. “Sorry.”

Newt sends him an understanding glance and gestures to where Thomas ran off. “Come on, we have to get to class to yell at Tommy.”

After the boys make sure Thomas knows that he shouldn’t ditch them again, they sit next to him and try to look busy. A girl turns around to ask Minho what school he transferred from and he replies with Glade High, much to her confusion. The teacher doesn’t introduce them when class begins, and it’s a relief.

Mr. Yukimira asks them to take their books out, and Thomas sees Newt knock over his crutches in an attempt too.

“Dude!” a boy says, wide eyed at the cast on Newt’s leg. “What happened to your leg, like, your cast is huge!”

Thomas sees Newt take in the exclamation, wondering if he’s supposed to answer the question or not. The blonde sends him a look.

“He got into a motorcycle accident,” Thomas nods, trying to sound convincing. “Nasty one, too.”

“Yeah, bloody – um – truck hit me,” Newt agrees, rather unconvincingly. Thomas sees Minho roll his eyes, hand coming up to stifle his chuckle.

“Oh!” another girl says. “You’re British! That’s so cute!”

Newt flushes until his ears match the red running shoe he wears on his good foot.

“Where are you from?” the guy from earlier says, turning around completely in his seat. The girl who spoke earlier has begun giggling and whispering with the girls around her.

Newt stutters. “Brit- I mean, England. I’m a friend of To-Stiles’s.”

“Stiles!” another girl says, a brunette who while previously had her full attention on Newt, now turned to him. “Oh my god, there were rumors that you were kidnapped! Are you, like, okay? That must have sucked so much! Like, it’s so good that you’re back in school already.”

The girl seemed to answer her own questions, so Thomas was mildly confused on how to answer. He was getting a headache. Is this how the Gladers felt when he’d come up in the box, asking question after question?

“Um. . .yeah,” he replies. “Those rumors though. I’m back now, so. . .”

Someone clears their through loudly and the whole room drags their eyes away from Newt and Thomas to look to the front.

Mr. Yukimira knocks a disapproving brow at them. “Class, if you could all leave the boys alone and turn to page 492, it’d be greatly appreciated.”

Casting the boys sad glances, like it was a pity to stop interrogating them and actually get to work, the class abided. Thomas let out a sigh of relief, shaking his head in horror. Minho looks at him from the corner of his eye and mouths something he barely makes out.

“Worse than greenies.”

Thomas drops his head onto his desk loudly. He feels curious eyes on him, but doesn’t look up. Shuck, if he kept hitting his head like this, he’d get brain damage.

The rest of the day goes similarly, and other than the whole experience being equally dreadful, there are a few moments that stand out the most.

For example, in AP Biology, a mandatory pop quiz was handed out to make sure everyone had kept up with their studies during the break. Both Lydia, Kira (as Thomas had learned her name was), and Scott were in that class, so it had already been awkward to start, but the surprise on Lydia’s and Mrs.’s faces when the three boys handed in their quizzes first were priceless. Even more, the teacher chose to mark them there to make sure the boys hadn’t cheated, and to her immense joy, they’d all gotten perfect.

Thomas was a little shocked himself, and he could see the same surprise etched on Minho and Newt’s faces. The moment he’d began the quiz, it was like his head knew all the answers without him having to consider it. Scott, for the most part, had been avoiding any contact (served him right, after Saturday), but after the quiz, Thomas would catch him looking away every time he looked up. A few moments later Lydia handed hers in closely, followed by Kira and the rest of the class. Mrs. Marked the redheads, announcing she’d gotten a question wrong. The reaction was nearly comical, but Thomas just shied away from the class’s and his old friends’ gazes.  

Later in the day, two girls came up to Minho and asked for his number, only for the Asian boy to tell them he didn’t own a phone. Newt had snorted, and Thomas had laughed for the first time that day. “Shuck, Minho,” the blonde had snorted, “that was a klunk move. Now they’re gonna think you’re were being rude.” The boy sent them an exasperated glance. “I don’t own a shucking phone, you shanks. What was I supposed to say?” They laughed, not deeming him a reply.  

Gym class was a little hectic, and while Newt had a valid excuse for opting out, Minho and Thomas were forced to participate. Thomas is almost sure that Minho was actually a little excited, the physical energy that seemed to make the boy getting an outlet. Minho strips right away in front of his locker, changing rapidly in a way that it’s obvious he’s done it before. So has Thomas, but he was feeling slightly self-conscious about his stitches. He walked to the toilets, but they were both occupied, so he took his shirt off as quickly as possible, looking for his change.

It wasn’t on top of his bag like he thought it was. Ducking to see if it’d fallen to the bottom of his locker, he hears a catcall.

“Damn, Stilinski, wherever you’ve been it’s obvious you’ve been going at it.”

Thomas blushes and hurriedly pulls on his found top, trying to be invisible. It was not working.

“Stiles!” another voice says, and he looks up, his face hot.

“Yeah?” he answers hesitantly.

The boy that addressed him has a nice tan and a good build, short dark hair and a dimpled smirk. “If you still need to – well, if you still need someone to cuddle with after, call me up, yeah?”

Thomas has an embarrassing feeling about what the boy is suggesting that the green V-neck shirt he pulls off only confirms. If possible, he blushes harder, and hears a couple laughs around him. “Um, uh, yeah, I’ll keep it in mind,” he tried, forcing a little laugh to make it sound convincing.

At that point, he thanked everything in the world when Minho grabbed his arm and pulled him out into the gym. “Come on, shank,” the boy said, joking, “leave some of ‘em for me.”

Thomas punched him, a second time when the boy just chuckled. Other than realizing that the two of them were the two fittest kids in class and having the coach beg them to be on Lacrosse this term, nothing else exciting happened that period. Thank God.

Afterschool, he’s lucky enough to dodge Malia again and avoid eye contact as he slips into the jeep with his two friends. There is a awkward moment when he looks in the rear-view mirror and it looks like someone with dark hair is blocking his way, but he blinks and it’s gone.

The boys are quiet for a moment after Thomas turns the engine on and backs out, waiting behind a couple cars to get to the exit. As they finally exit, there is a collective exhale, and then Newt talks.

“Bloody hell.”

“Good that,” Thomas and Minho say collectively.

“We don’t have to come tomorrow do we? Or ever again?” Minho asks.

“Never again sounds pretty shucking good to me,” Thomas nods.

“Good that, Tommy. I don’t think my leg agrees with all those klunk stairs. And that slinthead gym coach, shuck. I had to tell him my leg was broken three times before he finally noticed. Even asked me if it was ‘cause I was gay. What’s that bloody have to do with anything?”

Minho snickered, brows raised at Newt in the mirror. “And what’d you say?”

Newt falters. “To what?”

“The gay thing, shuckhead,” Minho says as he runs a hand through his hair, and Thomas gets a good look of his smirk while driving. “We all know you’ve got a thing for ugly shanks like—”

“Oh, shuck off, Minho,” Newt snaps, hand shooting out to cut the Asian off with a push. Thomas spares a glance at him through the rear-view mirror to see the blonde blushing. Newt doesn’t meet his eye.

The rest of the ride home is calmer, and when they arrive, Minho gets out of the car first, slowly freezing up on the spot. “Wait,” the boy says, hand out. “Someone else is here.”

“Who?” Newt asks, slowly lowering himself out of the jeep on his crutches. Thomas takes the blonde’s backpack from his and stands behind Minho, alert.

“I’m not sure. Thomas, take Newt’s right and give me one of his crutches. Whoever it is, maybe I can hit ’em over the head.”

That how they enter, Newt leaning on Thomas, and Minho leading. As he glanced at the blonde, Thomas could tell Newt didn’t like this, and probably hated feeling so powerless, but it didn’t matter to the brunette. Newt was momentarily helpless, and there was no way Thomas would leave him to his own devices.

They go up to the stairs, when Minho nods his head up there, eyes glowing.

If he was being honest, the eyes freaked him out a little. Now that he remembered werewolves, his dreams were always full of them and other hideous creatures, nameless monsters and people. He felt Newt stiffen against him, and patiently, he kept a hand on his back as they climbed the stairs.

Minho pointed to Thomas’s room. There, he mouthed.

Holding the crutch tightly to his front, Minho opened the door just an edge.

Nearly letting go of Newt in surprise, he quickly recollects himself and pulls the boy tighter. “Derek?”

The man in question was sitting in the desk chair, reading a book. He looks up, reminding the boy of a bunny. “I apologize. Didn’t hear you coming. It’s just me.”

Minho lets out a bark of a laugh and passes the crutch back to Newt. “And you couldn’t have called? Or waited downstairs?”

Derek knocks a brow. “I came in through the window.”

The boys are quiet to that.

Thomas drops the bags on the bedroom floor and helps Newt to the bed. “What are you doing here? What do you want?”

Derek puts the book down and stands up. Minho stands like a guard dog at the door, arms crossed and eyes protective, never drifting from the man.

“Heard the three of you aren’t so keen of Scott at the moment. Thought I could help.”

“Help what?” Minho spits.

Derek drops his head a lets out a huff of laughter, smile amused. Thomas doesn’t like it.

Quicker than a flash, Derek is in front of him, a claw out by his cheek, barely a finger’s width away.

Minho growls and launches himself at him. He hears Newt’s crutches falling over the sound of his heart in his throat.

Derek, who is uncomfortably close, extends his right hand, grabs Minho by the collar, and has the boy pinned to the floor and under his knee before he can blink.

It’s strange to see Minho with side burns, gold eyes, and long fangs, but Thomas just swallows in relief.

Derek is still smiling. “I was thinking that.”

Thomas pushes Derek off of Minho and pushes the man up and back against the desk with an elbow to his chest. “You call that help?”

Derek has stopped smiling, and he looks pretty surprised. Thomas has a feeling that Derek is surprised at him. He swallows hard and pushes the though down; whoever he was before this doesn’t matter. That’s not him anymore.

Spontaneously, the shock evaporates and Derek is glaring. “The Alpha that Scott’s trying to warn you guys about? He’s still out there. The full moon is in two weeks, and if Minho isn’t in control of himself by then – he’s just as bad. He’ll kill the two of you in a heartbeat.”

Minho, still fangy, gets up off the ground and butts Thomas out of the way. “So what? You gonna shucking push and kick me around ‘till I snap?”

Derek’s stare hardens, eyes icy blue before they go back to normal, and he moves, pushing the boy away. “If that’s what I have to do, then yes. I don’t know if any of you noticed, but we’ve already lost Stiles, here, once. It’s not happening again.”

Minho’s eyes fade out and he steps back. He looks defeated. “Okay.”

Thomas takes one glance at his friend and lets out a rough snort. “Okay? None of this is okay! You can’t just come here and – and—”

“Text me when you’ve figured yourselves out,” Derek interrupts, moving to the window and placing a leg out. Thomas’s eyes widen. “I’ll be at the loft.”

He’s gone, and Thomas wants to punch something.

“What the bloody hell have we gotten ourselves into?” Newt asks, speaking up for the first time since they entered the room, and Thomas looks at Minho, sensing that the other boy was thinking along the same lines.   

Chapter Text

10 - void

He wakes up in a forest.

Looking around, he notices that it’s the same tree they’d found Newt on, and cringes. He looks closer, and is surprised to see there are no bloodstains – black or red. 

“Hello?” he calls, just in case someone is out there. It’s eerily quiet, and he wonders where the forest sounds are. There are no coyotes howling, no wind whistling, and no leaves crunching under his feet.

But there is buzzing.

It’s coming from the tree, he realizes.

There’s something else too. Light. Bugs.

Lightning bugs. Thousands of them.

The lightning bugs are buzzing as they emerge from the tree.

Stiles screams.

He tries to wake up because this isn’t good, this isn’t real, this has already happened. It cannot happen again. Not again.

He closes his eyes, praying, hoping, pleading under his breath to wake up. There are tears streaming down his face.

The bugs swarm around him, until suddenly, they stop.

“Stiles!”

He opens them again and he’s no longer at the tree. He doesn’t recognize where he is. There’s a girl in front of him. She has shoulder length dark hair and a very pretty angular face.

He pushes down his earlier panic and ignores the guilt he feels flow into his bloodstream like ice water. 

“Who are you?” he calls, assuming she’s the one who said his name.

The girl doesn’t respond, and he notices what she’s holding.

A bow and arrows.

They glint in the moonlight and suddenly he’s moving, legs striding forward on their own. A sword – there’s a sword in his hand – it lifts into the air and the girl faces him sharply, pretty brown eyes wide.

He impales the sword into the front of her dress, unblinking, and oh my god, he thinks, because Stiles wants to laugh. Wants to sing. To dance.

She falls to the ground, the sword still in her, so he pulls it out.

The girl falls to the ground and her eyes fill with tears as she dies.

He leans down and checks her pulse.

A hand grabs his wrist and the girl’s eyes are wide open, not a a sign of life in her pulse.

Her nail polish is red.

“Stiles,” she says, shocked but accusing.

He laughs.

She grabs a fallen arrow with a silver tip and stabs him in the shoulder – where his bullet wound is.

It's an afterthought, but he thinks, what bullet wound?

He’s still laughing when his body begins to crumble, making dust of himself.

He reassembles in a classroom.

Specifically, the front of a classroom. Only the back seat is taken, and the person is looking out through the window. He tries to focus on what’s behind the glass, but there’s nothing there.

His feet take him forward and his hand reaches out, putting a hand on the person’s shoulder.

In front of him, he sees himself - nasty smirk, gelled hair, crazy eyes, pale skin dotted with moles, baggy clothing - turn in his seat, playing with a silver arrow.

“Nasty, isn’t it?” the copycat smiles.

He swallows roughly, and it bites its lips.

“What we did to Allison, I mean,” it explains, looking like the whole thing has got to be the funniest joke in the world.

Stiles turns around and throws up, but chokes.

He’s throwing up cloth.

He uses both hands to pull – to help - but it never seems to end, and then his copycat walks around him, kneeling in front of him.

He can’t see anything but it’s face, cant smell anything but it's betraying familiarity, and cant feel anything but the burn in his throat.

It grabs the cloth out of his fingers and pulls, but instead of more coming out, it feels like the cloth is a part of him, and he stands with the copycat, tears streaming down his cheeks, whole body aching with pain and effort.

It leans into him, and puts it’s lips next to his ear. “She was our friend, Stiles. She helped us, Stiles. Why did you do that to her, huh? Why’d you kill her, Tommy? Why’d you kill me?”

Newt pulls away, and Thomas falls to the ground, cloth nowhere to be found.

There's no classroom around him and the blonde smiles, leaning in with the most reassuring smile in the world. 

Newt pushes him and then he’s falling down a wall covered in vines and beetle blades. There is a griever groaning below him. No sun above.

“Tommy,” he hears, but the blonde is no longer above him. “Tommy, wake up.”

“Allison. . . Allison-”

“Who the bloody hell is Allison?” Newt asks, and Thomas realizes he’s woken up. Making sure, he grabs the blonde’s hands and counts the fingers, Newt’s face worried in the faint light.

It reassures him to see ten, and he isn’t sure why.

“Allison?” Thomas recalls. “I said Allison?”

Newt adjusts his leg between them and Thomas leans away instinctively.

No. No, you're awake.

“Yeah. Tommy, that was. . .pretty bad,” Newt states, hesitating. “What did you dream about?”

Thomas deflects. “Did I wake up my dad?”

Newt shakes his head, eyes growing more worried. “No,” the blonde glances at the door. “He went to work again after you fell asleep. Told us to tell you.”

Thomas exhales slowly. He’s in his bed – with Newt, it was the boy’s turn. The shirt he is wearing is stuck to his skin and without thinking, he pulls it off, hearing fabric tearing but not caring. He still feels like he’s puking. He throws it to the ground, and places his hands next to his hips, trying to support himself.

His throat burns and he can feel the stinging in his eyes.

No, he thinks. He was done crying, done.

“Tommy,” Newt insists. “Talk to me. What was that?”

“Nothing.”

Newt leans on his good leg to face Thomas more straight on, eyes hard. “Like shuck it was nothing,” he says angrily, giving Thomas deja-vu. Newt could be so cold when he wanted to be.

Ha. The thought makes him a little dizzy, and Newt immediately softens. “You can talk to me, Tommy. Please.”

Please, huh.

“Newt. . .” he tries. “Newt, even before WICKED, even before all of this. I wasn’t – I’m not—”

“Spit it out, shank,” the boy says, words so opposite to the patient and gentle tone of his voice.

How could this boy ever beg for death? How could he ever want to kill himself?

Thomas swallows, avoiding Newt’s eyes. The tears are flowing now, and he couldn’t stop them, his breath and voice croaky. “I still did horrible things."

Newt stays quiet. The boy brings a hand to wipe his eyes, spitting out, "I killed so many people, Newt.”

“Still? Wait, what do you remember?” Newt asks, seeming like a different person.

Did the boy even hear him?

The blonde’s hand comes to rest on Thomas’s thigh anxiously, and it’s a good reminder that this is all real.

Thomas breathes out, and it feels like his lungs hate him.

He pulls his knees up to rest his elbows on them, and ducks his head. When he replies, it’s muffled. “Nearly nothing. I don’t know. I just feel it,” he says. A thought occurs to him, and he says it right away, not quite thinking. “Even before WICKED brainwashed me, I wasn’t good. That's what I remember.”

He must sound so pathetic. So helpless.

It was his job to save people, to comfort them. He didn’t deserve any of this. He didn’t deserve a rest – not after everything he’d done with and after WICKED.

“That’s jack, Tommy and you know it. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again.” The boy shakes his head desperately as he talks, but reaches out with a warm hand to Thomas’s shoulder. Thomas can feel his gaze now. “The people we were before?”

Newt goes still, eyes intent, and waits till Thomas looks at him. “They don’t exist anymore.”

Thomas drops his head back down, not able to stop shaking it. Not able to stop his own shaking.  “Whether you’re Stiles, Thomas, or the bloody pope! None of it matters. What matters is what we do now, and that we stick together.”

He’s quiet for a second, and then Newt moves, reaching across with his hand on Thomas’s far shoulder, and leaning his chin on Thomas’s knee. He licks his lips before he talks, whisper sounding as loud as a yell in Thomas's ears. “Listen up, shuckface. Me and Minho – we need you. Sometimes we might not act like it, but you’re the reason we made it this far, okay? You are so good, Tommy.”

“Newt. . .” the brunette shakes his head, still trembling.

The blonde readjusts himself to place both hands on Thomas’s cheeks, and the brunette doesn't try to continue arguing. Newt's brown eyes are fervent with emotion and Thomas gives up trying to fight it.

Thomas leans his forehead against Newt’s, and he’s able to buy into the blonde’s words for a little bit. To let their breathing fill the room and let his thoughts drown out of his head with every exhale. They close their eyes, and Thomas feels like he could fall back asleep.

He begins to drift off when Newt moves. “Sorry,” he apologizes, “have to take a piss.”

Newt’s voice is soft and warm with sleep, so when the blonde gets up, Thomas lies back down and closes his eyes, trying to breathe in the smell of grass and warm sun. He follows the reassuring sound of crutches clanking on the ground with his ears.

He hears the door reopen and Newt limps back and lies down seconds later, rolling onto his good side and facing Thomas’s shoulder. He can feel the blonde’s breathing on his bare chest.

He’s almost drifted off again when he hears the other boy. “You should prob’ly talk to som’ne – ’bout your dream. Learn what really happ’d.”

Thomas thinks about it. “Yeah. . .yeah. Maybe.”

He’s about to fall asleep again, when he feels a sharp breeze. “Newt? Did’ya leave the win. .dow open ’gain?”

The boy moves closer, t-shirt against Thomas’s arm. “I closed it. Go to sleep, Tommy.”

Painful realization drops in his stomach. “Newt,” he repeats, suddenly wide awake. He nudges the boy with his shoulder.

“Tommy,” the blonde says, throwing an arm over Thomas to keep him still, “let me sleee—”

There’s something obvious missing in the room now.

No one is snoring.

“Newt. Minho’s gone.” Thomas tensely unwraps himself to sit up and Newt follows abruptly, wiping his eyes.

“Minho,” the blonde repeates, realizing.

The cot on the floor is empty and the previously shut window is wide open.

“Minho?” Newt calls out, but the only answer is the wind whistling.

Scott.

Kill Scott.

Minho runs.

Kira wasn’t supposed to stay the night at Scott’s, but her dad and mother thought she’d gone over to Lydia’s for homework and when she asked, they let her stay. At Lydia's, which isn't where she was.

She closes the homework she just finished, because they’d fallen asleep earlier and she woke up in the middle of the night and realized she hadn’t actually finished her homework earlier. They might have been a bit more busy. Now it was done, and she was ready to crawl into Scott’s lacrosse sweater and roll back up into his side, when there was some sort of noise outside the window.

Leaning over the bed to peer out, there was nothing in sight. Must’ve been the wind.

She'd noticed the fox inside acting up lately, and she felt more aware than she ever has before. Kira thinks it has something to do with Stiles being missing, and it making the pack restless, but now that he's back she still feels tense - constantly on the alert.  Maybe it was some kind of omen. She'd ask Lydia when she saw her at school tomorrow. 

It was so weird to see Stiles back - what with his new build, new clothes, new friends, new attitude. It was almost like the boy had his own pack now. If it felt bad for her, she couldn't even begin to think about how the others must feel, them knowing him longer. How his father must feel. Scott has definitely been calmer since they'd found him, but before that he was a nightmare. The whole thing has been a nightmare. She hopes it doesn't happen again.

Changing quickly and deciding to go to the bathroom again before bed, she isn’t expecting the huge shadowy figure in the hallway outside Scott’s room.

Definitely not just the wind then.

She pulls out her sword and feels it elongate in her grip. She feels like a mouse caught trying to steal cheese.

“Scott,” she calls nervously, voice slightly squeaky in fear, taking small steps back as the figure stands in the shadow, breathing deeply. Its eyes are bright gold.

It’s Minho, she realizes. Stiles’s friend.

“Scott!” she calls again, louder and braver, because the figure has started moving, and she does not want to injure Minho. 

Oh god, she will not be the reason another one of his friends die. No way.

“Kira?” she hears, and thank god, it sounds like her boyfriend has realized she isn’t waking him up for a booty call, and in fact, isn't even in the same room.

The figure speeds up and she puts a hand on the doorway and throws herself inside the room, back to Scott, sword at the ready.  Scott has jumped up and is next to her. “What’s wrong?”

She doesn’t take her eyes off the figure in the door, and moves until she feels the warmth of Scott’s shoulder on her own. She can feel it when he realizes what’s happening. “Minho. He’s here.”

“Minho? What would Minho be doing he—”

“Watch out,” she yells, ducking under the blow coming at them. She feints to the left and spins back, trying to hit the Asian boy over the head with the butt of her sword. He turns around in record time and she takes a punch to the gut, flying back into Scott. They collapse onto the chair in the corner of the room and Minho moves in.

When she'd first gotten a good look at the boy, she had already felt threatened. Minho's presence was so strong and he was already so buff and dangerous looking - like he'd be the first to go head first into a fight. As a werewolf, the feeling was only intensified, she noticed as he looms above them. The boy was downright terrifying, Kira could admit, and she had a Alpha werewolf boyfriend.

“Minho!” said boyfriend yells at him, eyes flashing to assume power over the boy, but it didn't seem to make a difference. “Minho, snap out of it!”

Scott barely escapes the claws reaching for his throat and Kira uses her sword to dig the butt in the guy’s shoulder. He falters back, growling. “It’s the Alpha, he’s controlling you!”

Minho swipes a clawed hand across the desk and everything – including a computer – goes flying. Kira jumps back. “Your mom isn’t home, is she?” she asks faintly, a hint of humor in her tone.

Oh god.

“No!” he yells, jumping over Minho and grabbing the boy from the back, holding his claws in the air.

Minho growls and his eyes flash. He pulls Scott over his head and throws him to the ground. Kira rushes forward to intercept a strike with her sword but he rips it out of her hand and throws her into the window.

She falls out of it. Scott leaps to catch her, but he’s much too late, and Minho’s clawed hand is already arcing down behind him.

Thomas isn’t handling this well. The nightmare left him shaken up, and now he’s getting into a car and trying to think straight. He feels unlike himself, like maybe he’s watching himself do this, but he can’t stop, feeling out of place in his own body. “Oh god, oh god," he mutters under his breath uncharacteristically. "Where is he?”

Newt gets in the car, putting the crutches in the back. “Have you called Scott?” 

No. Thomas had blearily gotten a shirt and shoes on before they were out the door. He puts the key in and shakes his head. “No, here, take my phone, his number should be on there.”

“Password?” Newt asks.

Thomas cringes. “Dad told me it was sourwolf.”

“Of course.”

Thomas doesn’t reply.

They both hear the dial, and Thomas tries to remember where Scott lives. The Jeep lets out a disgruntled noise at a sharp turn, and he tries to remember his dad’s instructions on keeping her happy. “Hello? Stiles??” Scott answers loudly, and it sounds like he’s been running, voice slightly strained.

“Scott!” Newt exclaims with urgency, sending Thomas a worried look. “Is Minho there?”

There’s a huge crash that even Thomas hears clearly.

“You could say that! It’s the Alpha—” there’s a sound like a wooden shelf breaking, a thousand more things catapulting with it “—it’s controlling him!”

“We’re on our way.”

“Great! Can you make sure Kira is okay on your way in?” There’s another crash. “Minho threw her out the window!”

“Shuck, okay. We’ll be there.”

Newt hangs up. “Did you hear all that?” he asks Thomas.

The light turns red in front of him and he stops a little late, turning to face Newt. His hands can't stop tapping on the wheel, but he nods, feeling deja-vu so headache inducing that he felt like he might pass out. 

“Yeah.”

When they arrive, Newt is glad that he’d been smart enough to throw on one of Tommy’s old plaids before rushing out the door. The air is cool on his exposed toes, and he shivers. He can’t believe Tommy’s out in a t-shirt.

However, the cold doesn’t keep him distracted long, because there’s Kira, looking much like she had that day in school, but passed out on the lawn of Scott’s house and in her pajamas. Tommy runs to her and leaves Newt behind.

From here, the blonde notices the wind making his friend seem smaller in his clothes, and the way his hair flaps on his forehead. His eyes are wide in fright, and he kneels next to Kira, shaking her awake.

When he touches her, the girl lights up like lightning and sits up, hand on Tommy's shoulder before blowing him back a couple yards.

The boy lands in a heap, and Newt cant see him clearly anymore, still too far away. “Tommy!”

No response from him, and Kira sits up startled. He's almost to her now.

“Stiles! Oh my god, are you okay? I am so sorry!” she apologizes immediately, not fully coherent yet.

“Kira!” Newt calls, and he sees the moment she registers him limping his way over. “Are you alright?” he doesn’t wait for her nod, and she’s already standing when he yells. “Go help Scott!”

She barely nods at him before taking a leap back onto the roof. The leap is incredible, and Newt almost forgets what he's doing. Shouts that Newt can’t decipher bring him back to reality, and continues limping to Tommy.

The boy is lying there breathing harshly, almost like he's stuck in another nightmare, but his eyes are wide open. He looks, for a lack of a better word, shocked, hair sticking up and smoke curling off of him, and Newt is painfully reminded of Minho being stricken by lightning.

They’d already been through so much.

Minho feels like he's floating. He has no control over his body or thoughts.

He can’t stop, world a red haze.

He wants to run, run so badly, but all he does is push and growl and bite and claw.

Kill Scott.

“Tommy! Tommy, are you alright, shank?” Newt drops the crutches and all but falls to the ground, catching himself on his hands. There a loud crash from upstairs, and out of the corner of his eyes the blonde sees that the three figures have moved their fighting into the front lawn. He absentmindedly thinks that he hopes the neighbors don’t come out and find two werewolves and whatever the hell Kira is having a fray on the street.

That'd be the eggs to Frypan's bacon. 

Tommy hasn’t answered, and instead, is lifting his shirt up – which sticks grossly to his flesh – face molding into horrible angst as he sees the huge burn marks down his shoulder; those of which nearly perfectly lining the claw marks from the Alpha.

They look like crank self-committed injuries – gory and merciless – and Newt turns around and pukes his dinner into the grass. He can’t remember his stomach ever being this weak, bloody hell.

The blonde recovers and pulls Tommy’s trembling hands back, making him let go of the shirt. He hasn’t talked yet, and his face is so concentrated in a painful grimace that Newt doesn’t think he’ll ever be able to make another expression.

A loud roar is heard behind him, so Newt keeps his hands firmly on Tommy’s shoulders, wishing he could take away the pain, and diverts his attention.

There’s another flash, and then he sees Minho crumble to the ground.

Kira’s eyes burn like pure power. Scott’s red ones melt away behind her, features human, but Kira suddenly looks like she’s glowing.

Newt wants to cower; to drag Tommy and Minho away with him and never come back.

Scott checks on Minho and sends a wary look at his girlfriend. “Don’t worry,” she says, voice deep but unbothered, honestly terrifying, “it isn’t fatal. Werewolves don’t get along well with electricity.”

Scott nods and she seems to shake herself off. He walks forward, towards Newt. “I’ll call his dad, is he okay?”

The blonde laughs instead of crying. They look at him like he’s crazy.

He pulls into the deep resent, bitterness, and anger he has for the world and spits it out. “No! None of this is buggin’ okay, Scott! Tommy was right.”

Scott drops his head, and stops midway. Kira places a hand on his arm. He turns around and calls the Sheriff, but Newt can’t hear him over the angry blood pounding in his ears.

Tommy has feinted in his arms, the breathing still raspy and loud but slightly diluted now, and Newt keeps a hand on his pulse point the whole time until Sheriff Stilinski comes. It takes maybe five minutes, but Newt has yet to calm down, the smell of his own puke making him irritable and cranky.

Cranky.

Newt closes his eyes and concentrates on ignoring himself. 

As the Sheriff approaches, he opens them. The man looks disdainful and broken when he sees the four of them. Newt feels a bitter frown curl around his lips.

Kira, still glowing faintly, eyes locked in a point in the sky, Minho and Tommy passed out, Scott looking sorry, and Newt seething: quite the scene.

It’s clear to Newt that the man has dealt with this before. It’s clear in his posture and demeanor, clear in the way scoops his son up like a doll, getting Scott to help.

“You alright, son?” the man asks him when Scott takes over.

Newt barely acknowledges him, nodding slightly and staying tense on the ground.

Kira comes over to help Newt up. He tries to control himself, because he’s not mad at her – he’s mad at the situation, and himself.

He’s always so helpless, he thinks bitterly. Always useless and in need of saving.

Scott drops Tommy into the passenger seat of the cruiser and takes Newt from Kira. He’s says something about the girl heading home or just staying here till he gets back, but the next thing Newt knows Scott’s taken the Jeep’s keys and is driving him and a passed out Minho home, the Sheriff handling Tommy.

“Thank you,” Newt says when they both exit the car, because he’s not a complete git, and without Scott they wouldn’t have stopped Minho, let alone could Newt have carried him upstairs and into Tommy’s room with his crutches.

Scott nods at him in acknowledgement, lips pursed. He’s been quiet the whole ride. The boy rubs the back of his neck, and Newt wonders when it’ll stop being awkward. “I’ll take him to Deaton’s tomorrow morning before school, so we can make sure he’s alright, but he should wake up fine in a couple hours. I’m sorry.”

It’s Newt’s turn to nod. He sits by Minho’s out cold form on the bed, and tries to ignore the blood on his clothes and hands. Is this what he looked like as a crank? 

Covered in blood and barely controlling his anger.

Scott tries to smile. “I’ll um, I’ll call the house if I hear anything about Sti-Tho- Stiles,” he decides, pausing awkwardly, and heaving a sigh. “Let you know.”

“Good that,” Newt murmurs, barely looking away from his friend. Scott jumps out the open window and leaves, one last look at Minho before sprinting away through the woods.

Chapter Text

11 – doubt

Tuesday afterschool finds Minho, Thomas, and Newt at Derek’s loft.

“We want your help,” Minho grudgingly admits.

Derek’s brow raises in what Minho’s starting to think is his signature look. What a slinthead.

The older werewolf nods, hands in his pockets. Minho nods back, and takes a step forward, but Derek talks again.

“Those two leave. And then I’ll help,” he says, hands in his pockets as he stands there expectantly.

Thomas steps up, facing him down. “I think we’ll stay, actually.”

There’s a hint of the same smile Derek had given them in Thomas’s bedroom – the oh look at the cute little dumbasses one that made Minho want to crack his knuckles menacingly and throw one at the guy.

“And make sure your friend helps in killing his remaining friends as well?” Derek asks, surprising Minho with how easy he can become a total shuckface.

Newt slams a crutch down on the floor, leaning on his other leg. He shakes his head and looks out the window, angrily blurting, “Shut up. Minho wouldn’t—”

“Your right,” Derek cuts him off. “Minho wouldn’t. But a werewolf controlled by a rogue alpha who has killed two people and we still have no idea what he wants might.”

The boys are silent for a second, but Minho has already decided what he’s going to do. “Newt, Thomas, get out of here, you shanks. I’ll be fine.”

He tries to sound confident, but his friends either don’t buy it or don’t care.

“No, Minho, I’m serious. Derek, we’ll go out in the hall, we’ll go upstairs – I don’t care. But we’re not leaving.” Thomas pauses, and Minho is stunned at how heartfelt in sounds. How desperate. He might even be bluffing, Minho can never totally tell with the guy. “Please,” his friend continues, and Minho totally buys it, if it’s an act.

He glances back at Derek, and sees that the guy is having issues dismissing it as well. Finally, after a long pause and pulling a hand down his face, the werewolf drops his shoulders. “Fine. But if he uses either of you as chew toys, this wasn’t on me. Understood?”

Thomas nods, and grabs Newt, helping him up the stairs. “We’ll be upstairs.”

Derek looks like he’d rather they not, but doesn’t protest. “Watch what you touch,” he grumbles, and Minho has a small realization. Thomas – or well, Stiles, - is a soft spot for Derek. It makes sense, since he’d been the one to find them and all that, but seriously, where the guy had been an slinthead moments earlier, he now looked concerned and carrying, if a little annoyed.

Minh takes a sharp look around the loft, and while the cots for them had been cleared up (thank shuck, he doesn’t think he’d be in control if he saw the two beds missing owners), the place seemed cleaner, a little neater. That’s when it clicked.

“Hey, where’s Braeden?” he asks, a little interested. The woman had been nice, and apparently, Derek was less of a klunkhead when she was around.

“She went back to Mexico.”

“Back?” Minho repeats.

“Yes. Back.” Derek grunts, and the man is already moving furniture out of the way, making a big area in the center of the room. It’s amazing, Minho thinks, barely any effort. He wonders how fast he can run now. Since he can only remember fleeting seconds of last night, he feels a little sick at the thought, but still intrigued. Like how the maze felt, in the beginning.

Immediately though, he feels bad. That same strength killed Brenda and Gally, it hurt his friends before and now, last night. He’d used it to hurt his friends last night.

“Why Mexico?” he stalls.

Derek gives him that look again, the eyebrow one, and Minho actually cracks his knucles this time. Derek rolls his eyes. “She has some unfinished business to attend to. Why do you care?”

Minho tenses. Why does he care?

“I don’t know, she’s just, one of the people who saved us, right? Saved Thomas. Didn’t get the chance to thank her,” Minho shrugs, satisfied with his own answer.

Derek nods, letting it go. He moves into the center of the space, and gestures for Minho to follow. “I’ll pass the message along to her –  if you pass my first test.”

The Asian boy frowns. “What test?” he asks, looking around.

The older werewolf takes a step closer, glint in his eyes.

“This one.”

Minho barely blinks before he’s in the air.

Derek lifts him with one arm and throws him against the wall. Minho grunts with the impact, and suddenly, he can hear his friends breathing upstairs, their quickened hearts at the sound of the crash.

The Asian looks up from his ball on the floor and turns his stare on Derek. He feels the heat in his eyes, and the fangs on his tongue. He starts to see red. It’s hard to focus.

Derek. He needs to attack Derek.

Why? He tries to analyse, growling. He feels his nails lengthen sharply.

No. No, it’s a test.

In pure instinct, Minho pulls back his chest until the red haze of his glare is directed above at the ceiling. Two heartbeats thump steadily above him. Two voices whisper.

Minho clears his head and it take shim a minute, but he looks towards the other werewolf with clear brown eyes and regular teeth. His claws have disappeared.

Derek looks a little surprised, if not proud. He nods, coming over to pat him on the back. Minho only lets him because his head is still echoing with the sounds of his friends’ hearts.

“Consider the message sent. Congrats, you just found your anchor.”

When Derek goes upstairs to call down Minho’s friends, the boy awaiting them downstairs, Stiles is asleep in the hallway, head on Newt’s leg.

“I don’t really want to wake him,” the blonde says when he notices Derek. The werewolf feels like hes intruded on something private, and brushes off that feeling.

He contemplates what the boy said. “So don’t.”

Newt looks at him funny.

“I’ll drop him off at his house when he wakes up. You and Minho can head home,” Derek says, surprised at how much the idea pleases him. It would be good to speak to Stiles on his own. The boy wasn’t looking that good, and how much he needed sleep was very apparent, dark bags under his eyes and disheveled hair that reminded Derek a bit too much of the Nogitsune. 

“I would, but Tommy’s the only one of us who can drive,” Newt says regrettably, interrupting his thoughts.

Derek walks over and picks Stiles up from where he’s half on Newt and half on the floor. He weighs more than Derek expects he did before WICKED, but still not as much as his wide shoulders and bulky arms would suggest.

“What are you doing?” Newt asks, reaching for his crutches.

“Putting him on the bed so I can drive the two of you home.”

Newt doesn’t seem to like that idea. “It’s really okay,” the blonde insists, “we’ve got school tomorrow and his dad probably wants us ho—”

 “He’s obviously not sleeping enough. I’ll talk to his dad.”

“But—”

“Newt.”

The blonde pauses where he’s finally gotten on his feet, heavily leaning on his good foot.

“Maybe I can help.”

“What are you bloody talking about?”

“With the nightmares.”

This makes him frown. “How’d you know ‘bout those?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Derek deflects, the stench of anxiety and stress heavily surrounding the body in his arms. “As I said, maybe I can help.”

Newt’s quiet for a second, and the loudest sound in the hallway is Stiles’s openmouthed breathing.

The blonde looks conflicted, but he must make his mind up because he makes his way to the stairs. He stops before making the first step down and swallows loudly at Derek “In the last one, he woke up yelling Alison.”

This makes Derek swallow. If Stiles is dreaming about the Nogitsune, this could be bad.

“Thank you.”

Newt nods, and makes his way down the treacherous stairs slowly on his crutches. Derek hears him call Minho a shank before asking for help.

Derek follows them downstairs and sets Stiles on the bed. The boy is still asleep, and Derek hopes that’s still the case when he comes back.

“Derek!” he hears Minho call, “You coming?”

Thomas doesn’t talk to anyone the entire next morning. The silence isn’t exactly comfortable, but he prefers it over talking.

After Derek dropped him off at home the night before, he’d walked straight past his dad, Minho and Newt and onto the cot on the floor of his room, even though he still had another night on the bed, according to schedule.

This morning before school was much the same, and after him ignoring multiple conversation attempts, the others had given up. His father angrily sighed before kissing his forehead and going to work.

They get into the car and drive to school, and it feels so different from just two days ago, that it gives him a headache. Minho and Newt talk a bit amongst themselves, but Thomas barely hears them. He knows they’re angry at him, and probably at Derek too, but he doesn’t have the patience to deal with it at the moment.

He’s kind of pissed at them for leaving him at Derek’s, if he’s being honest.

He brushes it off, but still doesn’t say anything.

In fact, he manages not to talk to anyone (although probably only because Scott looks distracted) until 3^rd period.

None of his friends, old or new, are in the class and he’s sitting by himself until a boy runs in late, looking apologetic. The female teacher gives him a look and ushers him to the seat beside Thomas, and he immediately gets a weird feeling about the guy. He’s about to return to reading his book and ignoring the world (something he didn’t think he’d be this good at) until the guy turns to him with a bright smile of someone greeting an old friend.

“Stiles! It’s been so long, man, do you remember me?”

“No talking,” the teacher snaps loudly, and they both turn to look at her, startled. Thomas sits up and turns to the guy, a little nervous.

Shuck, what was he supposed to do?

“Um, can’t really say I do,” he whispers, trying to sound sincere, but not nearly convincing enough. “Sorry.”

“Oh, really?” the guy asks a little loudly, and the teacher gives them a look. He leans in closer to Thomas and lowers his voice. “Theo Raeken, we went to elementary together, with, um, Scott McCall. Don’t tell me you guys aren’t attached at the hip anymore!”

Thomas feels sweat form on his brow. “Um, yeah, I think I remember you,” he lies, ignoring the jib about Scott. “Did you move away or something?” he asks, so that he doesn’t feel so lost in the conversation.

“Yeah, yeah, for a while,” Theo replies, talking pretty fast. The feeling Thomas got earlier grows stronger, “After my sister died my parents didn’t really want to stay here, you know. Bad memories.”

“Oh,” Thomas says, definitely still lost. “I’m sorry.”

“Yeah. But you know, I’m back now – parents decided they missed it. Anyway, how are you?”

There was something about how cool and confident this guy sounded that put made him uneasy. Thomas didn’t like it at all. He leaned back a bit.

“Been better,” he answers, somewhat honestly, frowning at his book.

Theo sounds apologetic. “It’s a shame. I heard about all the murders a while back; has it got anything to do with that?”

If Thomas had been looking directly at him when the question was asked, maybe he’d have seen the glint. Maybe.

Thomas feels his throat constrict.

Theo was talking about the murders he – well, Stiles, void!Stiles – had committed. He had to be.

The reminder made him sick to his stomach and brought up the conversation he’d had with Derek – the one he was urgently trying to ignore.

“You’re having nightmares.”

“Was that a question?”

“Thomas.”

“Yes, okay? I just went through multiple traumatic experiences, had two more of my friends die, almost got killed by another, and got out of a shucking maze no less than three months ago! Of course I’m having shucking night terrors.”

“. . . A maze?”

Thomas shook his head in exasperation. “I know you mean well, Derek, but I can’t do this.”

“I’m not asking you to tell me what you went through, or expect me to understand,” a flicker of a exasperation lit up his face, “I just need you to tell me what your dreaming. I can help you understand. There’s so many things that you’ll blame yourself for if you don’t get the right story.”

“What’s the right story for Alison, then? What did I do to her?” he asks, and for a second, he feels like a jigsaw puzzle that’s finally been fitted together correctly. Like in his dream – like Stiles.

Thomas snaps out of it. “Um, yeah. Sorry, Theo, I’ve got to go. It was nice talking to you.”

He gets out of his desk as fast as he can, grabs his bag, and leaves.

“Mr. Stilinski!” he hears the teacher call behind him. “Where do you think you’re going?”

Thomas doesn’t reply.  

Scott’s the one who finds him, because of course he is.

“I, um, I talked to Theo,” he starts, holding up a familiar book in his hands. He must’ve left it back in the classroom. “This is yours?”

The copy of Heart of Darkness he’d picked up this morning at his house in order to have an excuse not to talk to people looks small in Scott’s hand. Or maybe Scott just looks big holding it.

It’s bizarre; every time he looks at Scott, he feels love and home and trust and happiness and family. When he uses is head to process what he’s seeing, he can’t wrap himself around this stranger, can’t come up with an unbiased thought, and it frustrates him to no end.  

He nods, “Thanks.”

Scott sits down beside him against the Jeep. The other boy doesn’t look at him, seeming to be gazing out into the woods. His hand is drawing circles in the dirt between them, a smaller one inside a bigger one.

It’s the stupidest two circles he’s ever seen, and he can’t quite pinpoint why he thinks so.

“Thomas,” Scott says, and it startles him.

“Stiles,” he whispers, and this time Scott looks startled.

“What?” the boy asks, and he sends him a forced smile.

“That’s what I’d like to know.”

Scott stares. It’s quiet for another couple seconds, and he starts flipping through pages in Heart of Darkness.

Scott doesn’t relax, but it’s like the fight goes out of him. He hadn’t even noticed they were fighting in the first place.

“You hate that book.”

He thinks about how to reply to that.

Stiles hates that book.

I’m not Stiles.

“I do?” he decides on.

One of Scott’s legs, which were up against his chest, slide down and he rubs the two circles away with his hand. “Our evil English teacher, who also happened to be Derek’s girlfriend at the time, made us do a ten page assignment on it. After she killed over like a dozen of people, we defeated her, but we still had to hand in the stupid paper to the supply.”

He doesn’t know what part of that he’s supposed to reply to.

“What was she? An abominable snowman?” he tries.

Scott’s chuckle sounds like he’s choking, and he’d look up to check, but he’s too focused on rubbing the pages of the book thin beneath his fingers.

“A Darach.”

When he looks up to make an incredulous face, it’s the first real moment of eye contact they have, and Scott clears his throat. “Don’t ask.”

He nods, dropping his gaze back to the book. The words blur behind his eyelids every time he blinks.

“Lydia was so worried she’d scream in those six months. She misses you, you know. She once called me the night before one of our tests, it was god knows what time in the morning. She was hysteric, cause she didn’t know the answer to a question, and she couldn’t call you to check. I didn’t know the answer either. You and your friends, their smarter than her now. That’s weird. She all but had a hissy fit when she saw the marks—”

“Scott.”

He can’t listen to the hope in Scott’s voice knowing he can’t help. He knows the pain of losing a friend, and he tries to picture Minho or Newt not remembering him like this, and it surprises him how much that would hurt.

The boy ignores him, but the direction of the conversation changes. “Calling you Thomas wouldn’t be that hard, man. I just, I need to know you are still you. That you’re still in there. We’ve been through this before: I couldn’t tell then, and I can’t tell now.”

He swallows. “Void.”

Scott’s surprised, and his other leg drops, his hands falling between them. “Yeah.”

He drops the book and draws a circle in the sand between them.

“Derek talked to you?”

There’s jealousy in his voice, and he supposes its only natural, but it rubs him wrong anyway. He’s annoyed by how touchy he is. Anything feels like it could set him off, and since when is he this weak?

“Theo talked to you?” he parrots, and it’s wrong, but he lets the poison escape because it’s too hard to be gentle about this. He rubs his palm into the circle in the dirt until the terrain is smooth underneath his hand.

The difference in Scott’s posture is obvious. It looks like someone has just stabbed him in the stomach and no – why does that image feel so wrong to him. He blinks long and hard and the answer is there, in a flash of memory that hurts his head and makes it feel like he should stab himself in the stomach to feel better.

The world goes dizzy.

“Stiles? Can you hear me?”

There’s loud reverberating music in his ears – music he can’t hear – but he hears Scott.

“Yeah?”

“Are you okay, you don’t look so good.”

“I’m sorry,” he closes his eyes.

“Stiles, what are you sorry about? Stiles?”

Stiles clears his head, tries to focus on the dirt under his hand, the book on his lap, the trees around them, the sharp stinging winter wind.

It helps. “Sorry,” he repeats.

“Stiles! There’s nothing to be sorry about.”

His vision isn’t focused, but he can tell that Scott’s holding onto both his shoulders, shaking.

Stiles must look like a mess.

“Scott, Scott, buddy, relax, okay? I’m fine. Lay off, I can’t breathe. It’s just – you looked like someone stabbed you in the stomach, and that – that is something I can’t stomach, okay? Relax.”

Scott has gone completely still in front of him, arms dropping to his sides.

“Stiles?” he asks, looking bewildered.

“Yes. Yes, man. It’s me. I’m fine.”

He’s quiet. After a few moments, in which Stiles has recovered his breath and is also trying to understand, eyes wide.

“And Thomas?” Scott asks, and unlike before, he looks scared for the answer.

Stiles thinks about it, for a second. It’s kind of like having a nickname, he realizes.

“I am Thomas,” he says, and the words feel right in his mouth.