Chapter Text
Stiles return to Beacon Hills was terribly anticlimactic if he said so himself. Granted, most of the town had been leveled by a freakish earthquake that could only be supernatural in nature, even if the news had merely called it a “phenomenon” and the ultra-fanatic religious associations had declared it the end of times, who knew religious fanatics could have a semblance of reason? But still, after being legally dead for five years he had expected a bit more drama, at the very least some coverage from the local newspaper, he had been the Sheriff’s son before his untimely death. Fine, a giant hole in the ground was more important than Stiles, whatever.
…
The Nemeton was gone and it had only taken half of Beacon Hills along with it. Derek counted it as a partial victory, Lydia agreed with the sentiment and so did Allison, but not loudly. There was no reason to upset Scott any more than necessary.
It all started as it usually did, with an innocent dying.
Whatever unknown forces were being drawn by the tree stump this time, they were less physical than a werewolf pack or a druid, Deaton had warned them while looking as unflappable as he usually did. The new town arrivals were in fact little more than mist, a spiritual/demonic mist, and as non-corporeal beings that they were, they immediately started looking for hosts.
Luke Davis, the new grave digger, was the first to be declared missing and that was only after his neighbors had called the station over a suspicious smell coming from his house. Closer inspection revealed that the source of the smell was none other than a decomposing Miss Davis, killed by what appeared to be a frying pan to the head. One of the younger deputies had lost his lunch over that one.
Normally a case of domestic violence wouldn’t call for supernatural intervention, and this particular case didn’t until it started happening on a daily bases. All over town there were similar occurrences, spouses arguing violently, parents hurting their children and children hurting their parents, groups of friends attacking each other for no reason. And then there were the acts of random vandalism. The Sheriff department was scrambling to answer all calls and stop the increasing wave of violence. Even so, the pack had seen no reason to get involved, until deputy Miller had gone to the Supermarket to break up a fight between two costumers and ended up unloading his service weapon on the unsuspecting bystanders, all while sporting a set of alarming pitch black eyes.
Isaac had been unlucky enough to be among the shoppers, and after picking out a bullet from his shoulder he had ran straight to Derek with the news, and an emergency pack meeting was immediately called.
“Demons!” Scott was not prone to outbursts, hadn’t been for a couple of years, but every now and then something got away from him. Kira put a calming hand on his shoulder while Allison looked at them with soft eyes.
She had resented the relationship at first, had felt unimportant and easily replaced. It took many hours of moping on Lydia’s bedroom to realize that yes, she had been Scott’s anchor and first love, but she had to be honest to herself and admit that she had gotten closer to Isaac almost before breaking up with Scott for good. And Scott had the right to move on from their relationship.
It had hurt her, of course, but things with Isaac were so much more relaxed that she couldn’t help but wonder why she and Scott had tried so hard when clearly romance could be simpler and healthier. Besides, whatever post breakup sorrow any of them had felt had been quickly eclipsed by loss, and Scott was terribly lucky to have met Kira when he did, as Allison and Isaac were sure she was the only reason he was still standing. Her and having to look after the then newly turned Liam. Even though Derek had been the one to bite the kid after he’d been caught in the crossfire of a wendigo attack, he’d pawned him off to Scott almost immediately. Allison was sure it was done precisely to distract him from his mourning and unlike many of his other plans, that one had shockingly worked.
Mending Scott’s already rocky relationship with Derek had taken years, and was possibly only because of the need to fill the void in his life with the feeling of pack and familiarity that Derek and his wolves could provide, all the while knowing it would never be enough to replace what was lost, not that anyone would ever dare to try.
“Not quite but close enough.” Deaton was being as clear and to the point as he always was, and from her vantage point on a far end table, Allison could tell nobody was in the mood for it, herself included. Derek, who she had to admit had gone to great efforts to tame his temper over the past few years, was very close to growling. So far almost fifty people had been injured or killed in the attacks, and everyone knew these things weren’t solved in a matter of hours. Just planning a strategy would take a few days, so it was safe to assume that more people would die before everything was over. No one in the pack was big on the strategy part, and as much as they tried, it took a while for them to figure out a course of action.
“They are spiritual beings, that much is clear and they need a host to act. The problem is that without knowing exactly what they are we cannot exorcise them, and since the hosts are completely innocent we can´t just kill them. It is likely that they would just jump to a new host if we did that.”
The pack was settled in the vet’s office, having been summoned by an emergency howl, the phone lines had gone down the night before during a freak storm that left a residual cloud that blocked all cell phone reception. All of the elements of a good horror story were present, as Erica had so kindly pointed out.
It was also luckily coincidental that the evil forces of the week, as they had been jokingly dubbed by Isaac a few summers before, happened to attack at a time when the entire pack was in town. Because, while Scott lived in Beacon Hills along with Kira, Liam and, obviously Derek, the rest had decided to study out of town and embrace the chance to have a life away from the supernatural. They had stayed very close though, only Lydia had crossed the country and settled in NY with periodic visits. Allison, Isaac, Erica and Boyd had actually rented an apartment together just two hours out of Beacon Hills, close enough to race over in case of emergencies. It was a strange arrangement, unthinkable during their teenage years when everyone was so distrustful of each other, three werewolves and a werewolf huntress. Erica once said that Stiles would have tried to pitch it a sit-com, luckily nowhere near Scott’s hearing range.
When it became clear no one was going to contribute to the conversation Allison asked the question that would, retrospectively, lead to one of the worst plans ever made but also the best possible outcome. “So what can we do?”
….
Scott wandered around the ruins of what had once been the bowling alley, one of the only places in Beacon Hills that had had only good memories attached. One of the walls had toppled over and the roof was completely caved in, the insides had been ransacked during that first night when their carefully crafted plan had fallen apart around them and everything was chaos and death. Another failure to add to his ever growing list.
At least his own home had been spared the destruction. It would have been a shame for it to be destroyed, considering all of the work the Sheriff had put into fixing it over the last few years, needing a project to maintain at least a semblance of sanity after losing the only family he had left. Scott had spent many weekends helping him.
The side of town Scott was currently walking through was out of the area marked as “secure”. The sheriff station had cordoned the whole area with bright yellow tape to prevent people from hurting themselves when trying to walk across the rubble, and it served the additional purpose of separating the residential area from what had been informally dubbed as “No Man Land”, the place where those who had lost their possessions during the sinking of the town went to try and get something back.
The initial riots had subsided and the looting had ended when there was simply nothing left to take and the authorities had arrived to remove the corpses of those who hadn’t managed to run away from the destruction on time. As post apocalyptic as it looked, the area was far from abandoned. There were daily patrols and heavy surveillance in place, but the entire sewer system was still flocked with people. Scott could hear their heartbeats from where he was standing, and Sheriff Stilinski suspected some of them had even come from out of town looking for opportunities and to take advantage of the ever growing chaos. Scott knew he feared the National Guard might get involved if he didn’t manage to calm the population soon, which could be deadly both to the residents of Beacon Hills and its many supernatural inhabitants.
Walking was safe for him, being a werewolf and all, and it served as a sort of penance. He could look directly at the mess he’d caused and all of the people he had failed, so many lives lost or ruined beyond repair. Because even if the Nemeton was gone forever, as Derek would often remind him, it had certainly caused a fair amount of damage. Not even the pack had come out that night unscathed.
Allison had almost lost her father during the fight when a possessed Mr. Jones, his mechanic, had flung him out of second floor window. He’d survived, however, it was uncertain whether he would be able to walk again and was, for the foreseeable future, the fourth member of the McCall-Stilinski residence, since Allison’s apartment was cramped and four flights of stairs away from the ground.
Derek and Peter were once again homeless as the loft was among the buildings that were leveled to the ground when the Nemeton had almost literally exploded following the ritual Deaton and Miss Morrell had used. The ritual, aimed to sever the magical energy from the tree stump and drive the spirits invaded the town away, had worked. Scott also accepted that there was no way Deaton could have predicted the size of the magical backlash. A very costly mistake.
Most terrible of all was the loss of Lydia’s mother, the only parent who had managed to remain ignorant of the whole supernatural mess, right until the very end.
Scott sighed as he walked the border of the once park and made it out of the No Man’s Land without incident, just as he did every night, knowing full well that others before him hadn’t been so lucky.
The trek was actually necessary; delivery was a thing of the past. So here was Scott, entering the only still working dinner in town, separated from his home by about fifteen blocks of pure destruction. The dinner itself was crowded, all tables taken and a long line of costumers waiting for their take out while the haggard looking employees ran around like headless chickens. He chose to focus on them and not on the memories of Saturdays spent with Stiles in that very dinner back when they were teenagers, back when Stiles was still around.
They would sit in a corner booth and talk about anything, mostly Allison. Or rather, Scott would talk about Allison and Stiles would nod at the appropriate times, munching on fries. Every now and then he would interrupt to argue that while Allison’s auburn locks were comparable to the richest of melted chocolate (“nice Scott! Be sure to mention that to her, she’ll love it” followed by an outrageous wriggling of eyebrows), Lydia’s cherry blond curls were nothing if not divine.
A phantom smile found its way into his face. He could remember those days clearly, Stiles laughter and carefree attitude both before and after the bite, less often after the bite but still present. He could recall the sound of his voice and his scent, and he had saved a few of Stiles t-shirts in his closet and sniffed them on occasions. He knew Erica had done the same thing and couldn’t be too sure about Derek, as it was a pack thing, a way to cope with loss.
The Alpha had explain that a pack member’s scent would forever remain in the packmates memory, and even if his voice faded little by little over time, Scott could close his eyes and almost and pretend Stiles was around.
Scott’s eyes opened and flashed gold for a second.
That wasn’t pretending. Stiles scent was around, as fresh as if he’d been there just a few minutes before.
“What….” He practically raced among the tables looking for the familiar face he knew couldn’t be there, tripping patrons and almost knocking over a waitress in the process. “How?”
Scott bolted from the dinner without picking up the order.
----
Stiles had been pacing the room furiously. Scott could hear him from the hallway just as he could smell the faint scent of tears that only cemented his resolve.
“It’s for the best” after a deep breath he walked into Stiles room ready to deliver Derek’s news.
The supernatural was destroying Stiles’ life; everyone in the pack could see it. He was getting hurt constantly, what with the Kanima, Gerard, and that damn Deucalion that almost broke his arm. He couldn’t heal like they did, he wasn’t as strong, but he kept taking these responsibilities to himself and risking his life to help them, nerve caring about the danger he put himself on. So if Stiles wouldn’t take care of himself, Scott would have to do it for him.
The Sheriff had managed to keep charges from being pressed after their last havoc-wreaking, and only because there was not definite prove, but the school might still try to expel him. Stiles was a perfect student and he was getting his entire future ruined because he was covering for the pack and their stupid inability to stick to a plan. Scott couldn’t let it happen and apparently neither could Derek.
The only way Stiles would be safe was if he the pack stayed away from him. If Scott convinced him not to seek them out, to work on getting his life back to something normal, to the life he deserved.
Stiles would be hurt, they would all be hurt, but it was for the best. Scott made up his mind and walked into the room where his best friend waited.
So after all of the pack’s efforts to keep him away from danger, that Stiles would go and die in a completely human accident was the ultimate irony.