Posted originally on the Archive of Our Own at works/8772361.
Rating:
Teen And Up Audiences
Archive Warning:
Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Category:
F/F, F/M, M/M, Gen
Fandom:
Teen Wolf (TV), Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Relationship:
Stiles Stilinski/Malia Tate, Malia Tate & Peter Hale, (reluctant), Stiles Stilinski & Peter Hale, Buffy Summers & The rest of the Scoobies, All the Scoobies basically, Stiles; Malia and the Scoobies, Scott McCall
& The McCall Pack, Lydia Martin & The McCall Pack, Liam Dunbar & The McCall Pack, just The McCall Pack basically, oh and Theo, he's there being all fake friendly for a bit sorry, Faith Lehane & Buffy
Summers, Ambiguous or Implied Relationship(s), Faith Lehane/Buffy
Summers, Stiles Stilinksi & Theo Raeken, Stiles Stilinski/Theo
Raeken
Character:
Stiles Stilinski, Malia Tate, Peter Hale, Alllll the Scoobies, Buffy Summers, Willow Rosenberg, Xander Harris, Rupert Giles, and eeeveryyyoonneee else, also pretty much eeeveryyyooneee else from Teen Wolf, Theo Raeken, Scott McCall, Lydia Martin, Liam
Dunbar, Mason Hewitt, Et cetera et cetera, Cordelia Chase, Faith
Lehane, Daniel "Oz" Osbourne, also play significant roles
Additional Tags:
Post-Nogitsune Stiles Stilinski, AU, Post Season/Series 5 AU, I've never actually watched seasons after 3B, So Bear With me, this is all research and recaps, anyway, BAMF Stiles, BAMF Malia, kinda useless Peter, to start with, also he's as sassy as I am capable of writing, which is probably not enough but whatever, stiles is something, Season/Series 03, of buffy, i think, Season/Series 04, we'll see how this goes., Ambiguous Relationships, are prevalent so know that, Tags Are Hard, Swearing, Blood, general teen wolf and buffy warnings, sorry about the tags being so badly done whoops
Series:
Part 1 of The Dimension Travelling Jeep and It's Inhabitants.
Stats:
Published: 2016-12-06 Updated: 2017-11-29 Chapters: 12/? Words:
35907
Runaway Road-trip. (Aren't we cowardly?)
by CescaLR
Summary
Stiles panics.
Stiles runs. Malia (and an unconscious/unwilling and unwanted Peter) go with him.
Stuff happens.
Notes
I came up with this on the fly. Mixture of their mythologies. We'll see how this goes.
The Runaways, Running Away.
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
Stiles isn't sure where he's going or what he's doing or why his Jeep isn't dying a - let's be honest long due death. You know, with smoke and stuff. All the goodies that would lead to a car accident and a way out of this, except no, bad stiles. Malia's already lost family due to a car accident, a car accident stopped dad from getting to mom on time (which he's privately glad of, for reasons gained via the dread doctors book - which, hey; at least it was useful for getting back suppressed childhood trauma!) and Scott can't have your death on his conscience, no matter how not involved he was.
But still. He drives.
His phone is in the glove compartment, and he knows he put it on silent with no vibrate yet he can hear it, clear as day, malia's ringtone buzzing through his ears.
He pulls up, realises how fast he'd been going, and winces.
He grabs the phone, but it is silent.
He then realises he can see the sign designating the border of the town, and comes to an understanding of what he'd subconsciously nearly done.
Without clothes, or money, or anything, just the cold wet hoodie and jeans he's wearing and a bloodstained wrench in the passenger seat.
Yeah. That could have gone badly.
Stiles sighs, and frowns, contemplating.
He should go back. He knows this.
You killed Donovan? Scott demands in his memory, looking at him and not the bloodstained wrench he'd handed over moments before.
It's not a question, really. Stiles knows this.
Stiles shakes his head. Swallows, licks his lips in nervousness. Taps frantically on the steering wheel.
Looks in the rear-view mirror. Looks away.
Do you see the way he looks at me? She - His mo-moth- Claudia hisses, grasping onto his dad's forearms with all her might.
Claudia, he's ten years old, his dad replies, desperate and exasperated. They've had this conversation more than once, Stiles knows this too.
He's trying to kill me. She insists, and looks over to StilesHe blinks. The roof is gone, he's in his Jeep, she's not here.
He almost hates being relieved. He hates almost hating being relieved.
Fuck, first it's me in Donovan's place and now it's full scenes, I'm goddamn crazy.
Stiles breaths. In, out. In, then out again.
He looks down at his phone, then to the sign. To his phone again.
Maybe it would be best if I left.
He would leave without a note, of course, without saying anything he would just not without a note. Without a change of clothes and some money... some supplies, he has stuff left over. From the deadpool, from mexico, from -
Well. The nogitsune had to get it's stuff somehow, and not all of it was by stealing.
(There was blood money in his account, all of it blood money but right now he can't bring himself to care)
He'd need to transfer it, he thinks. First chance he gets. Get a new name, or something.
He's made plans without even realising it, and he's driving home.
He enters through his window, even though he knows his dad is at work, and pauses.
I'd never leave without you. She says, blunt and truthful and the first time he's ever heard a promise like that. 'You still got me' leaves room for the future, Scott's relatively new (over half a decade, but despite brotherhood and the fact he can't loose him) and doesn't have to promise that he wouldn't leave. Lydia ignored him for the better half of most of his life, and the rest -
But Malia. She's known him for a few weeks, really, and yet-
Really? He finds himself asking, the surprise obvious in his tone, in the way he looks at her rather than the road for a moment.
No, I'd never leave without you. Malia tells him again, and he knows he shouldn't but he can tell she's not lying, she's not gonna-
He pauses. Looks at his phone, sees he's already brought her contact up.
His hand is shaking, and he watches impassively as he presses the call button.
It rings. And rings.
And picks up.
"Stiles?" She asks, static on her end. She must be in the preserve, then.
He doesn't know what to say, but she knows what to do. She hangs up, but he knows she isn't gone.
He doesn't wait; he packs up. Puts everything he'll need in a suitcase; clothes, toothpaste, his laptop (Which he'll reset later), and all else that fits.
He looks at his crime board and sighs, because there would be no way he'd get to take that with him.
The essentials packed away, he crawls under his bed and grabs the bag he hides there, pulls it out and drops the heavy thing onto the bed. He opens it, and it's full of cash and expensive jewels and jewellery, and he still wonders how the Nogitsune Well. He knows, really. He's always known.
If he tried, he could be exactly how it was. They were. It wouldn't even be that difficult, aside from the morals and the fact that he's actually a good person, thank you very much, he just has a few problems.
They all do, he thinks. He zips the bag shut just as Malia enters through the window.
Good. He thinks. He carries on packing, and he knows he looks frantic but right now he doesn't even give a single fuck, thanks, and would you pass the mountain ash? Thank you kindly, Mal.
She stares at him, knows it's best just to wait out his frantic energy, knows he's probably either overdosed or forgotten to take his Adderall.
(Side effects include; restlessness, excitability, nervousness, excitability, dizziness, headache, fear, anxiety, agitation, tremor, weakness, blurred vision, sleep problems (insomnia), dry mouth or unpleasant taste in the mouth, diarrhea, constipation - thankfully he's never gotten those two stomach pain, nausea, vomiting, fever, hair loss, (or those three) loss of appetite - which he's also never gotten - and weight loss. (Which he had when he was younger. At least now it's not so bad, lacrosse means lean muscle so it's not so obvious anymore) Blood pressure and heart rate may increase - take that, (fucking) werewolves; you gonna use my heart as a lie detector now? - and patients may experience heart palpitations. Adderall is habit forming and chronic use may lead to dependence. Stiles would know; he's memorised the warning labels. And probably has dependence. But whatever. Malia's memorised them too.)
And so, Malia waits. Stiles eventually slows down; his frantic movement is still there, but he's not packing everything he owns away into his cases.
All her clothes and things she's left here are in a bag as well. She doesn't assume anything, of course, because Stiles would never do what you presume as the first assumption.
He stares, fingers tapping rather quickly against his leg, eyes darting about and doing that nervous thing where he constantly bites and licks his lips.
It's annoying, but she's learnt tact and learnt patience and he never faults her habits (like always yelling deer rather than meat-lovers pizza when people ask her favourite food - which actually is one of them, go figure. But still. Deer.)
She steps forward and he doesn't step back, and for once it's him who's acting like the cornered animal. The role-reversal is odd, she feels awkward but Malia knows Stiles, better than she knows the back of her hand (and what's with that phrase, anyway?) and as much as she knows the woods of California, knows the easiest way to catch pray unawares and how to read people.
Because people are animals, really. And she spent nine years as a coyote. She knows what people are like, in their baser instincts.
And now she also knows about the Japanese Camps of world war two, knows about deadpools and how to calculate a person's worth in money. Knows how to write English essays to get decent marks but can't fathom how to get any better than a D in math.
She knows him like that. She knows, but can't fathom. It's odd, she thinks, because she knows he knows her better than that. And so she tries.
For him.
Again, she steps towards him, reaches out this time and touches his arm. He looks at her, eyes of whiskey brown boring into her own like those tools her father uses to make holes in things.
Like he stopped Oliver doing to her head.
He deflates, all of a sudden, and drops to the floor, leans against the side of his bed.
She sits beside him, and waits, hand in his much larger one.
"I'm leaving." He says, as if she can't tell by the state of his room, but as humans sometimes need to for some reason or another he states the obvious.
"You want me to come with you." Malia replies, answering the question he'd never ask of her.
Because he wouldn't want to rip her away from the life she's built, here.
As if he isn't her anchor. As if he wasn't the one who helped her settle in, who helps her learn who taught her everything, everything she'd forgotten.
Or hadn't needed to know, at the age of nine. So had never known.
He doesn't say anything, but she scents his agreement, the signals of approval. The only reason she does this is because sometimes Stiles never says what's on his mind. If he did, she wouldn't have to.
She wonders at why people can't be as simple as animals, and yet are so much easier to read at times. She supposes she'll never know why, and she's alright with that.
Stiles'll probably tell her anyway, on one of those days where he just spouts random facts he found on the internet, which he's of course checked over and over and over and over until he knows they're legitimate.
It's good. She learns stuff; that's always nice.
Malia squeezes his hand. He squeezes back, and without any words a decision is made. She stands, and takes three bags easily. He makes a noise of protest when she goes for a fourth, so she lets him take the last four.
(She took the heaviest anyway. He knows this.)
They look around the room. The wardrobe was half empty, the dresser ransacked. Keepsakes were gone, and his desk was clear if a little dusty,
The bathroom was similar; all of her's and Stiles' stuff gone into one of the bags, and the downstairs fridge has enough healthy stuff for one person, but all the rest is gone.
So is all the alcohol. She pretends not to notice.
Everything else is still there, though. He says he copied the album, and copied some stuff onto his laptop while he'd finished packing. After resetting it, of course.
They'll need to leave their phones, he tells her. She knows this, places it down on the kitchen table. He puts his next to hers, and balances a letter on the top.
He places three more, shorter ones, next to the phones and the letter for his dad.
They look at each other, two barely-adults and not even high school graduates and know that this is the last time they'll be in Beacon Hills, at least in this decade.
They'll need new identities, she knows. Stiles already had some, and they look pretty real to her. They'll have to do, for now, the documents. He hasn't made anything other than birth certificates, and new email addresses, after deleting all previous accounts he still had access too.
They couldn't do anything about the school, she thinks. He tells her that's one of the detours, and she thinks again.
Okay.
They leave the house, put the bags in the back, and get in. He drives, Malia never having finished her driving licence.
Right now, that's a blessing. Stiles is going to have to fake his.
Malia stares at the passing houses, and knows they're at least going to have to paint Roscoe, give her a new name. Stiles won't be happy, but it's too recognisable and he knows this.
They pull up at the school. He knows it better, and she knows this too, so she waits as Stiles goes
in.
About fifteen, seventeen minutes later, he's back. Stiles nods to her, and Malia knows their records are gone.
He's gone one step further and wiped all the school's CCTV, and destroyed all the old tapes, CDs.
Everything is gone, now, as much as they can get rid.
Malia knows why he did that, more than anything. It was to check if Donovan's death had been caught on camera, but Stiles says there was not a single shot from that night. If he's worried about what that means, he doesn't show it.
Stiles tells her the next detour is the hospital. this time, she goes in and distracts Melissa, while Stiles finds and deletes all of the footage. It takes a lot longer than anticipated, and when he arrives back in the foyer they make a hasty exit.
"What took you so long?" She hisses, and he mutters. "My dad was there," And that's all she needs, really. She pries no further into it, not now at any rate, and he relaxes slightly.
Well. She needs to ask this, at least.
"Does he know?" She murmurs, glances at the hospital. Gets in the passenger side.
Stiles starts the ignition. "Never know with my old man." He says drily. "Maybe. Maybe not.
Uncanny sense of intuition, that man."
She sighs. He didn't tell his dad, then. Malia wasn't expecting him to, really. They might not leave if he did.
He knows this more than anything. It's why he hid from him rather than confronted him, like some sort of coward.
Running is cowardly. His mind supplies. A voice that sounds suspiciously like Malia replies it's survival.
And with the final stop done with, stiles puts the Jeep into gear and floors the gas.
Malia sighs, looking out of the window.
It's overdue time they left the town. People might catch them if they wait any longer.
Chapter End Notes
So. Wha'd'ya think?
Also the promised crossover won't be for a few more chapters, sorry.
Setup is necessary, after all.
And Two Becomes (unwillingly and unwantedly) three. And Three? That'sa crowd. Chapter Summary
Stiles swears in reply, swerving the Jeep dangerously to the side.
At least it has a roll cage, Malia thinks as it tips dangerously.
And at least we didn't run it over, she thinks again, listening to the sluggish heartbeat of the man in the middle of the road.
They're halfway down the road out of town (which coincidentally has Eichen House precariously placed down a small road to the side of it) when Malia senses the heartbeat.
"Look out-!" She yells, pointing at the figure in the road.
Stiles swears in reply, swerving the Jeep dangerously to the side.
At least it has a roll cage, Malia thinks as it tips dangerously.
And at least we didn't run it over too much, she thinks again, listening to the sluggish heartbeat of the man lying in the middle of the road.
Stiles curses again as the Jeep tips further to the side, even more precarious, and slams both feet down onto the floor of it, as if that would help.
It does, miraculously, and Roscoe lowers to the ground quickly with a loud bang that must have been audible for miles.
Stiles sees who he almost ran over. Malia looks, and understands his "Ah, fuck."
Peter Hale, the man -
Well, bluntly, her sperm donor, half of her biological makeup, whatever you want to call him (but not dad, not father, never either because she's a Tate far before she's a Hale or whatever the Desert Wolf's last name was) -
He was passed out in the middle of the street. How he got out of Echo, she'll never know. Neither will Stiles, even if he's cursing the heavens above for their luck.
"Fine." He grumbles under his breath, "Goddamn Creeper Hale and his uselessness just became our problem, did it? Fucking Echo house, can't even hold this guy? Jeez."
Stiles goes into the back of the Jeep and grabs one of the backpacks, and opens it. Inside, Malia can see wolfsbane (Thankfully she's not a werewolf, or that would have been bad), mountain ash, basically everything anyone who wants to subdue the supernatural in this town would ever need.
The were-based supernatural, anyway. Mainly werewolves.
Stiles grabs a small handful of wolfsbane powder, some falling through his fingers onto the seat, and takes a rope she can smell is covered in mountain ash.
"Glue." he explains. "Lot's of glue, lot's of crushed and burned Rowan wood, bada-bing badaboom, magical were-creature trapping device."
Malia nods. He grins, but it's not as pleasant as he tries to make it. She knows it's partly because of where they are, what's recently happened, the memories of Eichen and all the things that entails.
She also knows the other reasons. She's known them most of her life.
(She's a were-coyote that has a problem with not saying 'kill it' to each monster of the week. She won't judge.)
He nods, smirks in that amused way where his mouth turns down at the corners rather than up, and stalks off in the direction of Peter.
She gets out of the car and stretches her legs, then leans against the side of the Jeep.
(She hates cars. Evil fuckers.)
(She hates being cooped up too.)
Malia watches as Stiles kicks the man on the ground to see if he'll wake. She knows it's part vengeance, as well, and simply watches uncaring.
Stiles shrugs, crouches down and blows the purple powder in the man's face, before tying his wrists and ankles together like some terrible criminal.
Oh wait. He is. She thinks.
Malia goes over and helps him hold the man upright. They push the bags onto the floor of the Jeep, and drop him unceremoniously into the back seat, uncaring of his level of comfort.
The two of them get back into their respective seats. Stiles shivers, and she remembers it had been raining earlier, realises the condition of his clothes she hadn't noticed (somehow, how?) in the chaos, and sighed. She turned back, and grabbed some things from the bag that contained his clothes. She passed them over, and with a long-suffering sigh he put them on, the soft flannel much better than the heavy, sort-of dry hoodie and wet t-shirt.
She bundles them up and drops them in the back. She's cold, so she takes a hoodie of his and puts it on.
Considering, she takes a jacket and hands it over, and he puts it on with no complaint.
His hands are colder than hers, she realises. She hopes that doesn't mean anything.
They drive, and Malia doses off without realising it.
"And we're still in Kansas, what the hell."
Malia wakes up. Stiles is outside the jeep, and daylight shines through the leaves of Beacon Hills' preserve.
"Oh, wait, no, we're in 'get the fuck out of this clearing, you idiot', because look - the nemeton!" Stiles is complaining, sounding sarcastically happy to see the stump.
She looks up, and sees why.
"Crap."
Stiles looks back to her, eyes weird and smile slightly hysterical. "I know, right? Oh look-!" He points, and she follows his arm, and can't stop from blanching.
He flinches, of course, minutely, but it's there and so she gets out of the jeep.
Malia takes his hand, lowers it to his side as they stare at the body.
It's Donovan. Donovan Donati. His jaw is broken, hanging open enough to see a few cracked teeth, some human some not. One eye is open, one is closed and there is mercury leaking - or, there was mercury which had leaked, rather, from the eye sockets. Blood stains the lower half of his face and is splattered all over the rest of him, smeared and splattered and some that had spurted out of his wounds.
There was a great big gaping hole in his chest, just below where his heart is. It's why he didn't die straight away, Stiles knows this now.
He stares. Malia stares as well.
Stiles steels himself and looks away from the gaping hole in the man's torso, and instead sees the hand - and the mouth is there, he knows. Suddenly, Stiles wrenches away from Malia and walks over.
He picks up the hand and places his thumbs on the palm, next to each other, and pulls.
The skin tears easily, the body a few days old already (Though he's not sure if that means anything right now) and the teeth are there, ready to spring out and bite through skin and muscle and fat and bone and everything anyone has.
Malia walks over.
"He was part were-wolf, part lamprey." Stiles informs her, voice calm in a way he is very much not.
"See these," and he lifts the hand, pulls the wound wider. She stares at the teeth, then looks at him, glances at his shoulder.
"Yeah." Is all Stiles can manage, yet she knows what he's agreeing with.
She pulls down the shoulder of his t-shirt, and sees the bite.
It's still red, but not as raw as when he'd first gotten it.
It's still fresh, but it doesn't hurt as much. They're both relieved it's still there, honestly, because if it wasn't they wouldn't know what that would mean.
Stiles drops Donovan's hand, and Malia knows he wants some space. She gives him it, goes to the jeep and closes the doors in the pretence they both know is one that she can't hear him if she does this.
"Not the best idea to leave your boyfriend next to the man he's quite obviously killed, darling Malia."
She turns her head, having already scented him being awake and so therefore not in anyway shocked.
"Then you don't know him very well." Is all she says, clipped and short and standoffish.
Peter tuts, slightly. She hears him look outside.
"Now that seems odd." He comments, and against her better judgement she looks out to see what he means.
The bodies are either gone or invisible, now. Knowing this town, they could simply have phased into another plane of existence.
Stiles staring at the nemeton however, isn't very good at all.
Malia get's out, ignoring her biological father's gaze.
"Stiles?" She calls out, questioning. He either doesn't hear (unlikely), ignored her (even more so) or isn't aware enough to answer. (Most likely.)
She steps forward, warily, at the same time his outstretched hand reaches the Nemeton's surface.
It touches it, and for a second nothing happens.
She doesn't relax, and it pays off, because Stiles' hand is caught in roots that wren't there before. Malia runs forward and grabs the roots, but no matter how hard she tries its no use; they simply won't break.
"Wake up," She demands of Stiles. "Stiles, wake up." He blinks at her, at the roots.
"Let go, Lia." He mutters. She does, and the roots relax. Stiles takes his hand out, and of course there's blood on it, when is there not?
From injuries, of course. That's what she means.
Stiles' hand is shaking slightly, but everything else is just far too still. "What was that?" She asks, demands, rather than useless condolences and 'are you okay's because he's obviously not. But what happened is something she needs to know.
"I don't know- well, I do." Stiles starts then backtracks, frowning.
Malia blinks, and the world is a white endless room. There is a go table on the nemeton, the pieces scattered everywhere. She blinks, and it's gone.
The shadows the trees cast make the place look darker than it is, the shadows cast on Stiles' features make it hard to make them out.
Stiles is holding a berry she hadn't seen before. There is a small plant on the nemeton, very young but miraculously alive despite it's choice of growing place.
Little, luminescent fireflies are dancing around it. She remembers reading somewhere that the luminescent type aren't native to California. Lord knows this is the only time she's seen any.
When the sound comes back (when had it left?) Malia hears her breaths, loud as day.
She hears Stiles crunch the berry - the only one on the plant, she realises - between his teeth, and then swallow it.
The fireflies swarm around him, but he is calm. His eyes are distant and dark, clouded and aren't bright amber like in the sun or burnt whiskey like she normally sees.
They're cold. Brown, but empty, and she knows he's not really there right now.
She wonders how long it's been since he was always, one hundred percent present.
It must have been a while.
Stiles grabs a firefly, crushes it in his palm, and drops it to the ground. The rest stop attacking, wary now, then fly back to their bush.
She blinks, and the bodies are back. So is the white room.
It's messing with us. Malia realises. The Nemeton. It's messing with our heads.
Malia's heard the stories. She knows with Stiles, that it has an easy in.
Why with me, then?
"That's a good question." A voice replies. It's Stiles, yet somehow she knows it's not Stiles. her instincts flare up in a way they haven't for a while, and she spins around, then growls at it.
Stiles. Not Stiles. Whatever.
It smirks at her, and she's annoyed at how easily it wears his skin; how confident and evil it manages to be in a body that's not used to it under normal circumstances.
Sure. Stiles has bravado, yeah, but listen and you'll know that's all it is.
(But Stiles does scare the other students, sometimes. Malia hears things. He's scared them long before the supernatural was in the picture, she knows.)
"Of course he has." The thing says smoothly, and crap it can read her thoughts.
"That's all you are, here. All I am, all Stiles is." The being grinned. "Thoughts. That's all you're made up of, in here. I? Have memories, feelings. Stiles is more... substantial, than I, but still." It shrugs, grinning in such a familiar way. It makes her thoughts-blood boil.
It smirks. "Malia." It greets. "I'm what you'd call a 'Jungian shadow'."
He says this as if she's supposed to know what that is. Her eyes flash bright gold (not blue, why not blue?) and she growls.
"They're not blue, Mal, because here? Stiles governs certain things, and he's never thought you guilty. And so..." The 'shadow' gestures broadly, indicating her whole self.
"No pretty blue eyes for you. Such a shame..."
The creature's grin was sharp-edged, it's angles jagged and facial features shadowed.
"We always liked the colour blue."
She growls again, because she knows he knows what blue means to weres, to those whose eyes change because an innocent death was caused by them.
She blinks, and knows her eyes are blue again. She looks at him, accusingly.
He just smirks. "I do have some authority, you know."
Tired of this one sided back and forth, she demands, "Where is he?"
"Who, Stiles?" It asks, mockingly questioning. "Hmm... around here somewhere, I would say. I think all you really need to do is wake up, but still."
It was curious, she noted, that he'd yelled to the surroundings the part about waking up.
It's eyes were the cold brown-black lifeless orbs she'd seen before entering this place, Malia realised.
"Yes, Lia." It nodded, using her nickname in a mocking manner. "He can't really handle that side of things, so if I seem a little cold - well, it's because I am the worst parts of him wrapped tightly in a little bundle and vacuum packed into a box under his bed where he keeps the rest of his monsters."
She frowns. The rest?
"Oh, yes." it almost purrs, as the thing near prowls its way towards her. Unconsciously, she takes a step back. The shadow chuckles, low and deep and unlike any laugh of Stiles' she's ever heard.
It's eyes flash, a dark black-purple. She knows she pales, as the grin spreads across his face.
"He didn't leave nothing behind, you realise." It informed her. "She left us, yes, but He left us with a token of Their appreciation."
She sees the glint of silver in his mouth and then its gone again, and she knows what this is.
"Void." She states, simply. It nods. "Clever girl." The creature - because that's what it is, isn't it? murmurs. It's eyes flash red. She pauses.
"A void," it starts to explain, "Is endless." The thing sits on the stump, and waves it's hand. The go pieces are put back into place, and Malia sits in front of it, legs to the side. The thing is cross legged.
"It has one purpose - To take things into itself, and not let them leave... in short, to absorb. To feed."
It smirks again, for an unknown reason. Malia can't help but be curious.
It's eyes flash blue.
"The trickster stories are all about food, my little coyote. You would know."
And then - a flash, the forest beneath her powerful paws, the strength and dexterity in herself and she hunts, her one, main purpose aside from finding a suitable mate-
She blinks, and is back on the Nemeton, the game of go and the Jungian shadowsitting before her.
"And I - We? Are no different." It pauses, then gestures for her to move a black piece.
"Intruders first." He smiles, teeth human yet shining silver all the same despite their normal appearance.
"I don't know how to play." She says. He nods. The board turns around, and he moves.
"Learn as we go, then." It flicks it's eyes up at her, startlingly whiskey brown, and makes a move. She stares, then moves a stone. It hums, and moves it's own. The Jungian shadow continues it's story.
"However, we also have the void to contend with. And that? Is insatiable."
The way he says it, the way he lowers his voice and changes in a way that makes it almost unrecognisable shakes her, even if she would not admit it.
The game goes on. So does his story.
"And so - how does a being with the void feed without the power She had? Well, He knew what They were doing, let me tell you. See - our Stiles, the man is a Spark." There is a lull. She moves, and looses a piece, and learns a little.
It's lips twist and his face morphs into what she knows is what scares the kids at school who've known the boy all his life - even up to now, now he's a man and has done many things, including saving their lives, they seem to be more wary than ever.
The creature turns the corners of it's mouth down in amusement.
It captures some of her territory.
"A spark," He starts, "Ignites. And so, the void absorbs, and the spark ignites. Do you know what kind of power that is?" He demands of her. Malia knows what he's getting at just as she always knows what Stiles means, and nods.
A slow smile spreads across it's face. The thing is anything but pleasant.
"Many would kill for it. Stiles, unknowingly, unwillingly in his conscious mind, has done." "The No-"
Before Malia can continue, the other has a hand on her throat and over her mouth and nose, cutting off her air supply.
"Never," It hisses, really hisses, "Say that creatures - that things name, understand? It - They She - He - All are acceptable. But do not say it's breed, understood? The door is only recently locked; a simple bash and it'll open wide rather than just ajar."
It steps back. She realises she hadn't needed the breath, but had needed it to talk.
The way this place works is confusing, but that doesn't matter right now. She swallows, and nods.
We can't let that happen, goes unspoken.
"Alright." She says, and It calms. The thing - the aspect of her boyfriend walks over to the stump, and she sits across again, leaning on one knee.
He waves a hand, and it starts again. The go game, she means.
The darker parts of her boyfriend continued talking.
"You were right; it is what left all of this behind. The go table, certain aspects of my personality, the void; that's what it left. The abilities were given - whether knowingly, willingly, or not they were so.
But so much power is dangerous for the wielder. He is only human, after all." Malia nods, understanding. Sort of.
"He could use them easily, if he wished." The man continued. "He doesn't know they exist, however, and therefore only come out in times of need - or like this, when the Nemeton forces his denial out of his system with a trance and - you." It looks up. She's captured one of his pieces.
He hums. The board fizzles out of existence.
"Ah." It smiles. It's not a nice one. "Looks like our man is waking. Do greet him for me, will you?"
The white engulfs her vision, and she fades away from her boyfriends... mindscape, is all she can think of calling it.
Malia blinks, and puts her hand in front of her face. The sun had made it through the canopy enough to blind her well and truly.
Stiles sits up. It is then she realises they'd been lying down in a pile of dead bodies. Grimacing, they help each other up.
Stiles still has blood on his hand, but the cuts are gone. His eyes are their usual burnt whiskey, though almost golden in the direct sunlight.
(Malia may or may not love his eyes, it's debatable.)
Stiles has a few specks of blood on his face. She points this out, but he only succeeds in smearing them further.
They must be a sight to behold, she thinks. She wonders why her friends haven't already found them.
Stiles sighs. For some reason, she wonders why he hadn't answered her, and then the memories flood back.
Ah. She'd played go with his 'Jungian shadow' on the Nemeton in her boyfriend's mind-space while he was god-knows (but probably doesn't) where.
Right.
Malia sighs too, though her's from exasperation rather than tiredness.
Stiles frowns at the Jeep. "Looks like Zombie Wolf is awake." He murmurs. Shaking his head in annoyance. "That's going to be fun." He comments, sarcastically.
Her boyfriend moves towards the jeep and gets in the driver's side. With one final look at the pile of dead bodies (Just how many Chimeras were dead already?) she followed, and entered the passenger side.
Peter was silent, for now, and Stiles thanked the world for small mercies, and started driving.
They needed to leave now, anyway. It was around midday, and they'd set off last night and had gotten as far as the Nemeton... which was further inside Beacon County than the fucking town itself was.
(to be fair, the place was mainly woods and back roads and backwaters. But still.) Stiles drove in a direction he'd decided to be vaguely north.
Malia stared out of the window.
Peter... observed.
The Jeep would be silent, it seemed, for a while.
A Motel In California. Which, surprisingly, doesn't try to kill them. Chapter SummaryStiles sighs, and rubs his eyes.
Malia frowns at him.
"There's a motel just down the road..." She says, then yawns. The laugh her boyfriend barks out is anything but pleasant.
"Right." He says. "A Motel. In California. That's not a recipe for disaster."
There's a story behind that attitude, Malia knows. She also knows that now - they're all to tired to talk about it.
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
Peter isn't too sure how long the boy - a man, now. Peter's missed all their birthdays locked away in Eichen House as he was for -
Well. He had tried to kill Scott... but his reasons were sound. They'd agree if they knew, if they understood.
Unfortunately, he'd forgotten how sickeningly loved the young McCall alpha was. And so he'd failed.
Again.
Peter refused to sigh, to show even the slightest hint of what could be perceived as a weakness. Also, he was pretending to be asleep - it would be the only way the other two would talk about anything with him close by.
That might be his fault. Or their stupidity, he hasn't decided yet.
But that's wrong too, because his daughter (and isn't that an odd thought?) and Stiles - they are not stupid people.
But Peter knows he's never wrong... he has been in the wrong before, but he's never wrong.
(It was just so rare for someone to not survive the bite. How was he to know she wouldn't?
Everything would have turned out perfectly if she hadn't been so useless at living. Damn her.)
Peter pauses. He must be - something must be off, since the last time he'd thought about that was when he'd been asked a few months back. And twisted it right around the bend.
Mentally, he sighs. It felt more like years; his time at Echo - Eichen house seems to have warped his sense of time.
He sees Stiles quirk an eyebrow at him in the rear-view mirror.
Peter thinks back, and this time actually mentally sighs.
The wolfsbane's still in his system enough to confuse him, it seems.
Stiles has gone back to driving, and the jeep is still quiet, aside from the three breathing people inside of it, obviously.
Stiles sighs, and rubs his eyes.
Malia frowns at him.
"There's a motel just down the road..." She says, then yawns. The laugh her boyfriend barks out is anything but pleasant.
"Right." He says. "A Motel. In California. That's not a recipe for disaster."
There's a story behind that attitude, Malia knows. She also knows that now - they're all to tired to talk about it.
Peter raises an eyebrow, then lowers it and ponders the motels he knows -
Ah. The Glen Capri; now there's a place you shouldn't go. It makes sense as well; from what he remembers, it's close by.
Perhaps it was a pit-stop on the way to Mexico, he wonders. But that can't be right, either, because they went straight there.
Stiles takes a glance at Malia. Peter can see her pleading eyes from the back of the car, and is amused by the fact Stiles seems immune.
Almost.
Stiles drags a hand down his face, eyes tired. "Fine, alright." He mutters, and switches lanes; changes gear and presses down harder on the accelerator for a moment.
It's good driving, Peter knows. At least he won't ever have to drive. That's relieving.
(It would be rather dull; and he wouldn't be able to observe. He wonders if Malia can drive... if Stiles has taught her.)
(She is almost nineteen, after all. He thinks.)
Stiles pulls into the motel's car park, and it couldn't be further from the Glen if Stiles had tried. For one, the place didn't stink of death, and for another Malia wasn't looking any more a danger to herself than usual, so it should be alright here.
Peter decides to speak up. He despises being trapped, just after escaping from that hell hole.
"I don't suppose you'll be happy to answer the questions about all the blood and the hostage,
Stiles?" He says, falsely pleasant. "And dear Malia; you have blood on your cheek."
Malia blinks, and flashes blue eyes. She looks in the passenger's mirror, and curses, before grabbing a tissue from the glove compartment and wiping at the smear furiously.
Stiles grimaces. "Fuck."
Peter raises an eyebrow. It seems the young ones have upgraded from teenage TV program friendly language to the sort that any young adult would actually use.
This is an amusing improvement.
Stiles sinks back into his seat, hiding in a way that shows he's done this before.
Sitting in the jeep and hiding from things, that is.
Stiles sighs. Abruptly, he turns off the ignition, takes out the keys and gets out of the car.
Malia glances back at Peter. "Stay there." She snaps.
Peter feels amused. "As if I could leave, my dear."
She glares, then hurries after Stiles. It must be annoying, Peter thinks, to have to guess at what he's doing constantly.
With a sigh, since no-ones there to hear and his darling daughter isn't listening in - since she's focusing on Stiles - he sits back, relaxes into the car's seat.
And waits. Bored.
(The two others are speaking too lowly for him to be able to make out their words. Damn them.)
Stiles grumbles to himself.
Fucking - goddamn nemeton, and it's goddamn dead bodies, and fucking Creeper Hale and the whole crap-tonne of problems that asshole brings along-
Malia grabs onto his arm. He sighs, and stills. Turns around, but avoids eye-contact.
She hands him the wet t-shirt he'd been wearing a few hours back. It's only damn now. He raises an eyebrow. She scoffs. "Your face, Stiles."
And yeah. Blood. Nervously, that stupid habit of his happens - the one where he licks his lips.
Stiles grimaces, and spits out the blood, the tangy taste of iron lingering.
Malia's eyes soften, and she takes the T-shirt, gently wipes away the blood.
It's amusing, Stiles thinks, how he should by all rights be horrified by all the blood and things.
(To think, he once fainted at needles. They're still awful things, but he's seen so much now that this - standing in the middle of a motel car park, while his girlfriend wipes other peoples, dead peoples blood off of his face, his own off of his hand -
He's not even slightly surprised that this isn't shaking him. Not even a little.)
Stiles sighs. Malia's breaths are quiet yet audible in the silence, and she pulls back, having gotten rid of all she can.
Stiles takes her hand. She nods, a half-hearted, tired smile graces her lips.
He squeezes tightly, turns and they walk into the motel.
There is a man manning the front desk; middle aged with greying brown hair and grey eyes and sallow skin.
Stiles sighs. At least there's no suicide counter, this time.
"Room for two?" He says, bored. "Three." Stiles corrects, and the man looks suspicious but shrugs and hands over the keycard. Malia pushes the money towards him, and he grunts.
The older man picks up a cigarette. Ignites it, then sits back.
Stiles sighs and pockets the card. The two of them go out the door, and over to the jeep.
"Don't try anything." Malia says, warning. Peter scoffs, and waits. Stiles unties the rope binding his legs, but leaves the man's hands bound.
Peter gets out of the car on his own, and raises an eyebrow at them.
"Well?" He states, and Stiles glares then turns and stalks away in the direction of the room.
"He's in a good mood."
Peter sounds amused. Malia growls at him, grabs him by the arm and drags him after Stiles.
I do not have the lack of tiredness to deal with his shit right now. She thinks.
Really? A voice purrs, sarcastic, in the back of her mind.
I'd've never guessed.
Malia steadfastly ignores it.
Dawn breaks and the light seeps in through the curtain-less window - and it seeps because of how grimy the window is; the light is a murky off-yellow, and the room is no better.
The only mostly-probably-clean things are the beds and the sheets.
Obviously, Peter slept in the bathtub. Because that's what he deserves. The asshole.
Malia turns, and groans into her pillow.
She frowns. Stiles isn't in bed.
With a sigh, Malia sits up, wiping the last vestiges of sleep from her eyes. With a yawn, she looks around - but still; no Stiles.
She flops back down onto the bed.
"Ah, crap."
Of course, she needn't have worried, as Stiles enters back into the room after a few minutes. He's got a change of clothes for her and himself, and the two of them quickly get ready.
After a quick bite to eat (thank Stiles; if it were up to Malia they'd've packed so light they'd be hunting deer) and retrieving Peter, they got into the jeep.
"Am I going to starve, dear daughter?" He asked, drily, and Stiles rolled his eyes, but did nothing.
"You can eat later." She said.
"Of course. You wouldn't mind my death at all, would you?" He asked. They wondered if it was genuine curiosity.
Stiles scoffed nonetheless. Malia did not deign to answer him back.
For a few hours, the ride was silent. Malia spent the time dosing on and off, whilst stiles kept his eyes on the road.
Peter kept complaining on and off, and with a growl Malia threw him a squished granola bar that had been in the bottom of the glove compartment.
"... Lovely." Peter commented, "Due date;... a month ago. Dear Malia; are you trying to poison me?" He questioned. She glanced at him in the rear-view mirror, and he was smirking.
"I'm so proud."
Stiles pulled the car to a sudden stop; shifting gear and screeching to a standstill on the side of the road, perfectly parallel parked.
He turned to Peter.
"You know," he started, conversationally, but Malia could see the bags under his eyes and could smell his chemo signals. Stiles wasn't taking any of Peter's shit, not right now, not since they'd been driving for hours, including yesterday.
Well. Stiles had been driving. And thus, he wasn't in the very best of moods.
"We could very easily tie you up again and knock you out, so if you would just shut up for pretty much ever, that would be great, thanks."
Peter had that curious expression on his face again. Malia felt like growling; this man never meant anything but trouble.
"Because dear Scott would so approve of that method." Peter said smoothly, sarcastically.
Stiles' mouth curled downwards.
"He isn't here." He replied. Malia sighed, and picked up the jar in the left-hand side cup holder (Which Stiles had had installed.) then handed it to her boyfriend.
He smiled kindly in thanks, then took a pinch of the purple powder and blew it behind him.
Peter coughed, then passed out.
Ah. Malia thought, relieved. Peace and quiet.
A few more hours later, and from the map book thing Malia knew they were approaching a small-ish town that surrounded the exit road of California. Which, Damn.
Stiles sighs, and looks out the window, occasionally moving the car forwards.
The traffic is in full force tonight, it seems. Malia growls, and if Stiles were... well, a were of any kind, he probably would have done the same. But he isn't, so he didn't.
"So." Peter starts, having woken up from the wolfsbane induced nap about half an hour earlier.
"What made the two of you leave town so suddenly?" He inquired, needled.
Malia glared at him through the rear view mirror, but his useless face showed only curiosity, and his heartbeat gave nothing away.
Fucking sociopath. Malia thought. Everything Morell had talked about (and, Malia thought angrily, tried to make Stiles worried about) applied to her dear old sperm donor quite well, she thought. Though, don't really take her words for it; Malia's not some psychology major, or what have you.
She hasn't even graduated high school. Come on.
"Never you mind." Stiles said drily. Peter raised an eyebrow, blue eyes glinting. Malia was very glad she hadn't inherited them. In the genetics sense.
"You did decide to drag me along for the ride, Stiles." Peter pointed out and - yes, they did. She's not gonna deny that. "And?" Malia demanded, knowing full well Peter was waiting for a dramatic cue to continue.
The fucker.
He smiled, and of course it wasn't pleasant and most definitely did not reach his eyes.
"I wonder what the point of that was, is all, dear daughter."
Malia growled. She figured it was an instinctual reaction to this asshole and his commentary.
Stiles scoffed. "We weren't gonna let you try and kill Scott again, asshole." He told the older man.
"Leaving you there would have just been ridiculously stupid."
Peter pursed his lips slightly, almost un-noticeably. He did not reply.
And so the silence continued. The traffic decided to move, finally. Stiles and Malia shared a glance.
Maybe it would be alright to stop over in Sunnydale. At least, for a month or so. Maybe more; it'd be expected for them to go far, far away, after all.
Chapter End Notes
Aaand next chapter will be them setting themselves up in a place; a kind of safe haven ish thing. You'll see.
Setting Up Shop. Without actually setting up a shop. Chapter SummaryStiles, Malia and the asshole that's tagging along with them get set up.
It takes the entire chapter.
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
Stiles drives around the town's streets, whilst Malia and Peter (though him, unwillingly) keep an eye out for either a motel they can stay in for a short while, or a building they can squat in.
Really, they're not picky. They just need a place to camp out.
After an hour or so they make it into the more... shall we say, less favourable parts of the town.
"Deceptively small, isn't it?" Stiles muses aloud. "It's like the abandoned parts of Beacon Hills all over again."
Malia grins. "Look," She points.
It's pretty much the perfect building. An old, run-down three-storey police building with some boarded up windows, some with metal shutters. The only access points are on the ground and in the roof - but there's a balcony on the second floor, for some reason.
Stiles then realises it looks shoddily built; like it was tacked on.
"Someone used to squat here." He pointed out. "What if they still do?"
Malia sniffed, an obvious thing, as Peter rolled his eyes and said "The only organic scents there haven't been renewed for months. The people who lived here are most likely dead."
Stiles frowns. "Why?" He asks, suspicious. "I smell blood." Malia tells him, nose scrunched up in distaste. "But it's old. Rotten."
Stiles grimaced. "It'll do then." He decided. "People seem to stay away from this place. This part of town."
Peter's reflection in the rear view mirror looked amused. "What?" Malia demanded. "Nothing dear." He said, offhandedly. "The signals of fear are still tangible in the air, is all."
Stiles looked determined. "Then we'll set the place up properly." He told them. Malia nodded.
Peter rolled his eyes.
"Obviously."
The two younger adults glared. He smiled disarmingly.
"Shall we proceed, then?" He inquired. Malia sighed, grabbed three bags and dropped out of the Jeep.
Stiles shouldered one, took another and grabbed the two jars - mountain ash and wolfsbane, Peter could smell it.
With reluctance and continued being glared at Peter picked up the last two bags.
"Packed quite heavily, didn't we?" He mused, hefting the duffel bag onto his shoulder and extending the suitcase's handle so that he could drag it along more easily.
"Never know what we might need." Stiles replied, a hint of defensiveness in his tone. Peter chuckled, and with a huff Malia grabbed him and pushed him in front of them.
"Better you than us. Or can't you handle yourself in an abandoned building?" She challenged.
Peter sighed and rolled his eyes, before moving forward.
"Dear Malia - If you wanted me in front so you could make sure I wasn't doing anything untoward, you could have just asked politely." The man commented, before pushing in the front door.
The smell was stronger here. Malia's nose wrinkled further, and Stiles started to be able to smell it.
"Ugh." he muttered, before ploughing on, into the darkness.
Malia's eyes turned blue, and with the red haze of her coyote's improved vision she could see her boyfriend navigate the darkness better than he did the light.
Considering his clumsiness, this was slightly unusual, to say the least. She narrowed her eyes, and followed.
Peter had gone upstairs. If he ran off, he'd have some trouble getting the binds off. She knew he wouldn't, anyway. The chance to mess with them was too good to pass up, for him.
Stiles flicked the light switch, and they were both surprised when they flickered on, a weak hum filling the air and breaking the silence.
The front office looked quite different from the Sheriff's department back home, but Malia could tell that it served the same purpose. She dumped the bags on a table which was hazardously placed in the middle of the room.
Dust was everywhere; it was obvious the place was abandoned. And had been for a few months.
Stiles had dropped down to one knee, and was inspecting the dust on a particular part of the floor.
"It's..." he paused, and turned his phone on, the flashlight allowing better illumination than the shitty mostly broken light bulbs.
He squinted in the brightness. "A different colour..."
Malia frowned. "... Probably nothing, Stiles." She said, tiredness seeping into her tone of voice.
He looked up at her, and his eyes softened.
"We need to set up some defences before we rest, Mal." He informed her. There was a concerned crease between his eyebrows, though, and she knew he'd rather let her sleep.
She nodded, smiling slightly. "Yeah, that's fine. What first?"
Stiles looked around. "Make sure all holes in the walls are boarded up." He decided. "I'll put a mountain ash circle around the building. Roof, second floor, ground floor. In case one of them is broken. And around each room... except for Peter's." He sighed, adding the last part on as an afterthought. "I'll have to let you guys out though..." He told her, slightly worried. "That's fine." She agreed. "It gives us protection; I'm not gonna complain. And it's not like we'd leave without the other anyway."
He nodded. "Can't help but be wary of what sort of plotting he'd get up to in our absence though." Stiles grumbled. Malia huffed out a short laugh. "He always fails," She said breezily. "We'll be fine."
Stiles nodded, and dropped everything except the jars. "See if you can get some boarding up done." He said, uncapping the jar of mountain ash and taking a pinch, then holding the small amount in his fist tightly.
"I'll get some circles put down."
Stiles went up to the roof. He'd left Malia boarding up holes on the first floor, and Uncle Creeper was hanging around being all - creeper-y on the second, so he figured it was safe enough.
Stiles got onto the roof, which wonderfully had a low wall surrounding it he could drop the mountain ash behind so that it wouldn't be obvious. Awesome.
He went to a corner, and relaxed his shoulders, rolled his head and stared forwards.
"Imagine." He muttered, as he had at the tender age of sixteen in the car park of the jungle.
He took a deep breath, and walked. As he did so, he loosened his grip on the mountain ash slightly, letting the smallest amount trickle from between his fingers.
Concentrating as he was, he didn't notice the presence hiding in the shadows, watching.
Stiles finished, and rather than letting go as he had done the last time he did this, he closed his grip on the ash. He turned his hand over and opened it - and the amount there was the same as he'd started with.
He breathed. In, out.
This is fine.
Stiles closed his hand again, grip tight on the ash.
"Well this is new." A voice commented, as a man emerged from the shadows.
Stiles spun around, and thanked the heavens for the fact he didn't flail ridiculously.
"Peter." He greeted. The older man inclined his head.
"Did Alan show you that trick, perhaps?" Peter questioned. Stiles inclined his head.
Sort of.
"Belief." Peter continued. "Is what they usually say you need for that - however..." Here, he smirked.
"Personally, I've always felt imagination is a much more useful tool. Don't you?" Stiles said nothing. His fist tightened.
Woah there. Peter's not as... weird as Theo. He won't just let you throw him around. Calm the fuck down.
Peter's smirk did not leave. His eyes lingered on the clenched fist. "You might want to keep an eye on that." He commented. The older man looked up. "Anger's a powerful emotion, Stiles. We both know why."
And with that, he travelled back into the shadows and down the stairs like some - creepy-ass stereo-typically dramatic TV villain.
You know, the kind that like to try and make the good guys- You know what, Stiles isn't going to finish that thought.
He goes downstairs, and repeats the circle. Repeats on the first floor as well.
He is not interrupted.
"Are you going to talk about it?" The man who has half of her genetic stuff asked.
Ugh. Would he just leave them the fuck alone?
Nope. She thought, sighing mentally.
Externally, she growled.
"Now now, dear, darling daughter of mine - that's not very socially acceptable. People don't generally growl at each other, you know."
He's messing with you Malia. Snap out of it.
To prove she did not give a shit about his shitty opinions, she growled again.
"I also don't know why on earth you're boarding up the windows. The Mountain ash and wolfsbane traps should be enough."
"That's if you're stupid enough to think wolves are the only things after us." She snapped. Peter smirked.
Shit. Fucking asshole.
"That is true." He acquiesced.
"And no," She replied to his earlier question, her tone conveying her beliefs that that was the obvious answer, and did he really have to ask?
No. Malia thought. He did not.
"I would, if I were you." He continued on, as if she hadn't spoken. "Leaving things to rot as you are is... unpleasant, for everyone involved."
Malia resolutely did not pay attention. She swung the hammer a little too hard, and the nail embedded itself through the wood. She growled and grabbed another, and started hitting that one, though more carefully.
Peter sighed, and wandered over.
He was doing this to keep his own skin safe, she knew that. Still, she could force him to do all the work, and that was a plus.
Malia dropped the hammer into his hand and walked over to the wall, then settled down to observe.
They wouldn't want him messing up or escaping, after all.
It took them a few hours, but the building was now secure from supernaturals.
Stiles was sitting on a bench - more lying down on it. Malia was curled up on a table they'd pushed against a wall because having it in the middle of the foyer was just annoying, and peter was once again tied up and - even more so - in one of the holding cells, with mountain ash lining
it.
If either of them thought for a second it was a bit much they'd slap the other and remind them that he's tried to kill them all on multiple occasions. So far, they haven't had to yet.
Stiles sighed, and pulled a hand down his face, before sitting up. "We're not done yet." He said, tiredly. "Humans are a problem, and we know Chimeras aren't affected by mountain ash. And wolfsbane - however poisonous - isn't deadly to anything except werewolves, so that's a highly specific trap. I've got some other stuff." He waved a hand at the junk.
"Some of those high pitched signal things the hunters use, some tripwire and bits and pieces of electronics and a fair few blueprints... we can get this done soon and be asleep before one... am."
Malia groaned. Despite this, she sat up and hopped off of the table. "Fine." She grumbled, and pushed her sleeves up to her elbows. Malia then stalked over to the bags, and then raised an eyebrow at Stiles.
Belatedly, he got up and walked over, before picking up two duffel bags.
"These ones." he instructed.
They opened them, and Malia was surprised at the sheer amount of stuff that he had.
"Where'd you get all of this?" She wondered.
Stiles grimaced. "It wasn't me who got it," He replied, ominously. Malia understood what he meant.
"Well, at least it'll be used for good." She pointed out, optimistically.
Stiles sighed. "Yeah. Yeah, you're right."
Malia grinned. Stiles smiled slightly, and they got to work.
They got on with it and didn't rush, and were done for just past half past midnight. This was good timing, Malia thought. They could get some other stuff done now as well.
"Anything else?" She asked, flopping down onto the floor, leaning against a wall.
"Setting up somewhere to sleep." He said, "But nothing permanent right now. I saw a couch in the main office - it looked clean enough."
Malia nodded, stood up, and took his hand. "That sounds fine." Stiles nodded.
The two of them walked upstairs, and settled in on the couch.
Stiles seemed happy enough, Malia decided. The chemo signals weren't worrying, at any rate.
Slowly, they fell asleep. It was to be a restless night, for the both of them.
Malia blinked awake, drowsily. She sat up immediately, recognising her surroundings.
"Back again?" A voice purred into her ear. Turning onto her side she saw It laughing, leaning against one of the numerous pillars.
Malia sat up, and glared at him. It. The Jungian Shadow.
"Not willingly." She grumbled. Malia got up from her sitting position, and found their game of go to still be there, though a few moves had been played since her absence.
"We play without you here." He informed her. "A subconscious thing, if you will."
"We?" She demanded. He smirked. "Stiles and I, of course. Who else would we play with? I, I play with?" He asked rhetorically.
She frowned at his stumble.
It glared at her. "So, maybe She left some stuff behind. So what?" He demanded. "'S'not like I'm a whole thing anyway. Just - parts of a person. And not the good ones, either. So it makes total sense I'd get the stuff They left behind when He split from us. Stiles. Me."
Malia cocked her head, an action she'd done as a coyote to express confusion, curiosity. It inclined his head. "Multiple pronouns, some abilities, the void as you well know, yada yada." He flashed red-blue-purple-whiskey eyes. She frowned.
"And sure." He added. "The void and the spark and being bitten makes for some weird shit, not gonna lie. But that's part and parcel for the course. Of being - us. Isn't it?" He asked.
She murmured, "I wouldn't know." in reply.
His smile was sharp.
"No." He agreed. "You wouldn't."
Stiles was awake when Malia came to. He handed her a bowl of milk-less cereal. She raised an eyebrow. "Unless you wanted warm, congealed milk, you're gonna have to wait 'till I can get some more."
Malia grimaced. She ate her dry cereal.
"What are we gonna do next?" She asked.
Stiles sighed. "As much as I hate to say this - We never did graduate." "No." She said flatly. "Yes." He replied in kind.
Malia sighed. "Your idea's suck."
He nodded. "I know."
And so they decided they'd enrol in school. What else were they going to do, without any qualifications?
Peter smiled as they entered.
"Ah, if it isn't my captors. What do you wish for, Stiles, Malia?"
Stiles glared. "We were wondering if you knew anyone who can make good fake IDs." Malia nodded. She glared at him as well.
"And here I was, thinking you'd like my company." Peter said drily. "Ah well. It appears you are in luck; for I know how to make them myself. So long as I have the correct equipment, of course."
Malia pushed the cart towards his cell. Peter shuffled over as dignified as possible, and looked inside. He looked surprised at the contents.
"Where did you get this, if I may ask?"
"I've had it for a while." Stiles said, shortly. Peter looked at him, curious.
"You mean-?" "Yeah." Malia interrupted, rushed. "Yeah. He got it during all the stuff that went down."
Peter raised an eyebrow, but nodded all the same.
"Then free me." He demanded. "Or I can't do anything."
Stiles did. Peter made them all new identities, with similar names. Made them all ever so slightly younger - a few months, weeks.
He gave himself a year or so. Neither of the others cared about the ages, just that they were getting believable ones.
Peter took stiles's licence and remade it. Kept it as a generic State of California one, and Stiles hoped beyond hope these would pass inspection.
He'd throttle him if they didn't. And that wasn't an empty threat.
Peter had been forced to drive them to the School - "As carefully as fucking possible" - to hold up appearances.
Peter was - unfortunately - Malia's guardian, after her family's death. Car accident.
(They were keeping it as close to the truth as possible, so as to avoid slip-ups.) Malia's new name was Leah. Really, that wasn't so difficult to remember.
Peter was still Peter, of course. But he was Peter Tate, as much as Malia despised this change.
Stiles was still Stiles - despite it's uniqueness. This was mainly because he refused to give his first name so that they could change it to a similar one. Instead, he wrote down the name to give him Some ridiculously long thing, for the first name, and no middle with Stilinski as his last - and refused to say why he wouldn't tell at least Malia what his first name was.
With a sigh, Peter turned of the ignition.
"Remember." He said disarmingly. "I'm the wonderful uncle of yours, dear Leah, who took you in when your parent's died. And Stiles, when your mother was deemed unfit for childcare, I took you in as well. You stay with us-"
"Because I'm dating Leah." He said drily, emphasising her new name. "Yeah, I get it."
"Now shut up and go find a job."
Stiles got out of the jeep and grabbed his bag. Malia growled at Peter in warning, then followed
suit.
She got around to his side of the car. "Bye, Uncle creeper" Stiles hissed lowly, loud enough so that Peter would hear but not so much that anyone else would.
"Let's go." Malia commanded, before linking arms with Stiles and leading him towards the registration office.
They had a school to enrol in.
Chapter End Notes
Crossoverrrr timmmmeee.
Also scoobies next chap. probably-maybe-definitely-possibly.
And So They Meet.
Chapter Summary
She smiles brightly at them, but it doesn't reach her eyes.
"Welcome to Sunnydale High!" She chirps.
Malia raises a quizzical eyebrow at the bubbly blonde.
The girl's smile falters slightly.
Chapter Notes
Timeline for buffy is a bit skewed, sorry. They arrive after S3/04 - Beauty and the
Beasts, but before Ep. 5, homecoming. I'm extending the timeline slightly. Whoops.
See the end of the chapter for more notes
Stiles and Malia are herded into the principal's office.
"New students, sir." The woman simpers, before hurrying off.
The man behind the desk reminds Malia rather strongly of a rat. She instantaneously doesn't like him, and she can tell Stiles doesn't either.
"More of you?" The man asks rhetorically. "Well, brats - let me tell you now. Sunnydale High expects the very best of it's students. No smoking, no drugs - especially not PCP - no murdering the other students in vicious ways, and pay attention in class. These are very simple rules.
Do not break them."
He sneers at them. "Now, get to the Library. The librarian will give you your books."
The two of them turned to leave, but before they could, Principal Snyder added, "And avoid the people there. That is a crowd you do not want to be involved with, if you don't want a hard time of it in this school."
Malia scented his chemo signals.
His emotions were anything but pleasant, and she grabbed Stiles by the arm before pulling him out of the room.
Stiles blinked down at her. He placed a free hand on her shoulder, and they stopped in the middle of the hallway.
"He's harmless." Stiles soothed. "And it's not like we won't be leaving in a few anyway." Malia sighed, and he put his arm around her shoulders as she put hers around his waist.
"Fine." She muttered. "He just - rubbed me the wrong way, is all."
"No, he's an asshole." Stiles agreed. "But he won't do anything. A lot of posturing, I think. Sure he would follow through on kicking us out, but we'd leave town anyway after that, so it doesn't really matter."
"I want to graduate here though. So we don't have to do this again." She grumbled, as Stiles led them in the direction of the Library.
A bell rang, and students filed out of the classrooms. The two of them pressed up against a wall so as not to be caught up by the sea of students.
"Excuse me." A girl demanded. "But you're in front of my locker. And that is so, like, totally rude."
Stiles grimaced, and turned his head. "Sorry." He said.
The girl frowned at them, looked Malia up and down and turned her nose up slightly.
She looked Stiles up and down and her eyes lit up. Malia instantly did not like this girl. At all.
The teen brushed her blond hair behind her head, and smiled brightly at them, but it didn't reach her eyes.
"Welcome to Sunnydale High!" She chirps.
Malia raises a quizzical eyebrow at the bubbly blonde.
The girl's smile falters slightly, before coming back full force.
She grabs them by the arms and links with Stiles, before dragging them down the hallway.
"I'm Harmony." She tells them. "And you are?" She directs the question at Stiles. He frowns.
"Stiles." He said, flatly. "Leah." Malia tells her. "Leah Tate." "That's nice." She demurs, talking to Malia.
She turns to Stiles. "What an interesting name." She smiles. Her eyes are glinting again.
Stiles shrugs. "You couldn't pronounce my actual one."
The other girl looks offended. "Why not?"
"It's Polish." He told her drily. "Have you ever spoken in polish?"
She takes pause. And shakes her head. They've arrived at a sign, and 'Harmony' stops clinging to them.
"Here's a map of the school." She tells them. "It's not that hard to remember, really. We're only a small place, after all."
She laughs, as if that was supposed to be funny. A small, light, tittering thing.
Malia grimaces. She stops laughing.
"And this is why I do the introductions, Harm." A voice says, faux-sweetly.
"Cordy." Harmony replies in kind. "You weren't there, see, and so i-"
"Annoyed them." 'Cordy' finished. "Now run along, Harmony. Wouldn't want to be late for lunch."
The other girl glares, chastised. She hurries off, embarrassed.
"Sorry about her." The brunette says breezily. "She's a pain, dear Harmony is."
"I'm Cordelia Chase. You must be the new people; 'Stiles' Stilinski and Leah Tate, yes?" Stiles says "Yeah. That's us." As Malia nods, belatedly.
Cordelia smiles. It's almost invisible, but it does reach her eyes.
"Nice to meet you both then. Obviously, you'll need books; the library is this way. Follow me."
And they did. Cordelia quizzed them on a whole manner of things; from clothes (which they both knew thanks to Lydia), to animals (Scott, and Malia's time as a coyote), and random general knowledge, which Stiles knew most of thanks to Wikipedia.
"Do you know how to defend yourselves?" She asked bluntly, as they arrived at the double doors to the library.
They looked at her as if she was crazy.
"Of course." Malia scoffed. Stiles said "Yes." at the same time, with a tone that made it seem he thought it obvious.
Cordelia smiled. Her eyes were sharp.
"Against what?" She inquired.
There was a pause, and they snuck a quick glance between themselves.
Cordelia's smile grew sharper.
"You'll need to speak to Giles, then." She said. "He's the librarian."
The other girl spun around and dramatically pushed both doors open, before striding confidently into the room.
"Hey, losers." She called out.
Four people were sitting at the main table of the library. A blonde, tanned girl. A redhead female, a dark haired male and a light haired male.
From the office, a man whom Stiles assumed to be Giles emerged.
"Two new people. Giles, be a librarian for once." And with that, Cordelia Chase left the room.
Another girl emerged from the caged off area. This one had dark, curly hair and leather trousers.
"What's up, B?" She asked of the blonde. 'B' replied. "Some new people. Who we haven't greeted yet." She prompted.
"Oh!" The redhead smiled slightly sheepishly. "I'm Willow Rosenberg. This is Oz, and that's Xander. Buffy Summers is the one who just talked, and Faith is - uh - the other one that... just talked."
She smiled. Malia smiled half-heartedly back.
Stiles smiled. It was more convincing.
"Good to meet you then." He turned to Giles, the librarian, who cleared his throat and cleaned his glasses.
"I will just go retrieve your books, then." He said, before walking off into the shelves.
"So, what's your names?" The Willow girl asked them.
Stiles looked to Malia. "Leah. Tate." She said, belatedly. Stiles turned his head back and smiled awkwardly. "Stiles."
The curly haired brunette nodded. "Well, B - I'm gonna go - run." She seemed to hesitate, if only for a moment, before saying 'run'.
Her heartbeat sped up. Malia narrowed her eyes, and Stiles looked at her warily.
"You gonna meet and greet the newbies, yeah?" Faith asked of Buffy. The blonde sighed, and nodded. "Yeah, Faith."
The brunette sauntered out of the room.
The doors swung shut behind her.
The group all looked at each other awkwardly.
Stiles wandered over, and cocked his head at the books they were reading.
"... rituals: Witches and Limitless Power?" He asked, intrigued.
Buffy slammed the book shut. "School project." She muttered, averting her eyes.
"...oh-kay.." Stiles replied. "What on?" He prompted.
"Mythologies. How people throughout history have... depicted magic?" Willow stated - more asked.
Stiles raised an eyebrow. "...Right."
Malia scoffed. "Because that wasn't obvious." Buffy glared. "It's true." She insisted.
"Sure." Malia shrugged. It wasn't her business anyway.
"Why did Faith have a knife?" Stiles asked. "More importantly - why are there weapons in a library?" He inquired - more demanded.
Buffy winced, then looked away.
"...They're props?" Xander asked as an answer, weakly.
Malia rolled her eyes.
She thought about it, before looking to stiles. He looked at her flatly, almost as if saying, are we really gonna get involved?
Yeah. She replied. Yeah we are.
Malia flopped down onto a chair.
"Werewolves exist." She says, flatly, just to see their reactions. Stiles sighs and sits down next to her.
Buffy looks uncomfortable, Willow looks nervous, Oz looks... unflappable, and Xander looks like a weak link.
She glares at him, full force.
He shifts, nervous. Stiles rolls his eyes upwards, then looks at the others flatly before placing his hand on Malia's arm.
"What she's trying to ask - do you believe in the supernatural?" He asked.
Willow's telltale secretive smile and Xander's half-suppressed laugh is all they need.
Buffy looks exasperated. Malia would be as well, if her friends were this bad at keeping secrets.
Oz speaks. "Yes." He says, simply, expression staying the same and tone pleasant but leaving no clues. His heart did not skip a beat or speed up or anything, but Malia figures he's the kind of person who's so completely unflappable that that would be a useless method anyway.
Stiles nods.
"I'm a werecoyote." Malia blurts out into the silence. She grimaces and shrugs at their looks - and frowns at Buffy's now tense frame.
Stiles stills, looks at the small blonde out of the corner of his eye.
All of his instincts scream at him to be wary of her. He's never ignored them before, and he isn't going to now.
"Really?" Willow asks, interested. She glances at Oz.
"Is it anything like being a werewolf?" She asks.
"Pretty much the same, yeah." Malia replies. Oz suddenly looks interested.
It's the most expression she's seen out of him. Malia realises that these people probably have no idea how to deal with lycanthropy properly.
Buffy asks, "Are you safe? Do you have a place for the full moons?"
Malia looks at her weirdly. "I've got my anchor sorted out. Full moons aren't really anything now."
"Anchor?" Oz asks.
"Something that let's you control it." Stiles says. Oz turns his gaze towards Stiles.
"Control it?" Oz repeats. "Yeah." Stiles says, then extrapolates. "It can be anything. A feeling; like anger, control. A person, like a loved one. An object, or a mantra... anything that lets you focus... or let go of focus."
"Mine's control." Malia pipes up, then glances at Stiles. "And him." Stiles smiles slightly, a genuinely pleased little thing.
"How did you find it?" Oz asks.
Buffy and Xander are looking at him weirdly. This might be more speaking than he does usually, Malia wouldn't know.
"I was chained up during a full moon, Stiles gave me a speech and wrestled me for a few and then
- done." She waved a hand. "Control accomplished."
Buffy took a second glance at Stiles, and Malia could tell she was re-evaluating him.
Xander whistled. "Wrestled a werecoyote?" He repeated, obviously impressed.
"While she was trying to kill you?" Buffy asked bluntly. Malia grimaced and Stiles frowned.
"I guess, yeah. But she didn't want to, either. Though she did."
Xander looked a little confused. Buffy nodded, and Oz looked contemplative.
The librarian returned with their curriculum.
"Hey Giles?" Buffy asked. He looked up. "Yes, Buffy?" She pointed at them.
"Supernatural. Any books on the lowdown?"
"You still haven't read Vampyre." He commented. "And yes. I can loan them that, if they wish?" He turned to address Stiles and Malia. Malia shrugged and Stiles nodded.
Giles sighed, then went back into the shelves.
Buffy smiled, and shook her head.
"I know some other useful books." Willow said brightly. "hold on a sec-" And with that, she got up and went into the stacks. Oz followed.
Xander shrugged. "I don't know anything. Sorry."
Buffy nodded in kind. "Yeah. I should... but they all kinda overlap and it's a whole mess of info so really Will and Giles are your best bet." Stiles nodded. Malia sighed.
"Are you anything?" Buffy asked Stiles.
"150 pounds of pale skin and fragile bone, yeah." He grinned, jokingly. It was a clever diversion, yet an obvious one, and it was obvious to Malia that Buffy didn't buy it.
"Do you know what I am?" She asked instead. Malia shook her head, and Buffy took that as a sign to continue.
"A Slayer. Into every generation a girl is born, she alone will fight the darkness, and whatever evil stuff has risen that week. Blah blah, prophecies, super strength, heightened senses, et cetera." She shrugged. "Usual chosen one things."
Stiles inclined his head. He provided no further insight as to himself, though.
"And you." Buffy turned to Malia. "What things do you get, werecoyote-wise?"
Malia shrugged. "Same as a werewolf really. Flashy eyes, fangs for teeth, claws, super strength, better senses."
"A demonstration?" Buffy inquired. Malia shrugged.
She flashed her eyes, bright blue, growled and showed teeth. Turned that back to normal, before holding up her hand and watching as the nails turned to claws, then back again.
Buffy turned her head, looked at them warily.
"...That's nothing like Oz." Xander comments. "He's this big, hairy thing." Stiles blinks in surprise, before flicking his eyes up in remembrance.
"...Ah. Possibly a - full shift werewolf then?" He mused aloud. Obviously, the other two wouldn't know, and neither would they, having never seen the transformation themselves.
Malia and Stiles locked eyes, and she knew the words he stumbled over were corruption of a full shift wolf.
Malia looked away. Stiles sighed, took her hand.
"Are you dating?" Buffy asked, a genuine, almost kind sort of curiosity. "Yeah." Stiles said. Malia smiled. "How long?" Buffy asked, an almost wistful, sad smile on her face.
"A while - months, at least." Malia replied. Buffy nodded, and that was the end of that conversation.
The missing people wandered back in from the stacks, and a few books were placed carefully down onto the table.
Stiles immediately grabbed the biggest one, and carefully leafed through the pages.
He looked up. "Old english?" He asked, drily, before continuing looking through.
"...Vampires..." He muttered, chuckling. Buffy raised an eyebrow. Malia answered for him.
"We didn't get any back home." She told the other girl. "Werewolves, Werecoyotes, Chimeras, and a bunch of others. But no witches, no vampires."
Buffy looked disbelieving. "I don't believe that."
"Oh, it's highly likely." Giles disagreed. "Witches, vampires... they all tend not to get along well with Shapeshifters. The Were-creatures think that the others are encroaching on their territory... they are rather territorial beings, considering the animal side of them."
"Hello." Malia said drily. "Werecoyote right here, all human and non-territorial and everything." Stiles looked amused, as did a few others. Giles coughed. "Ah. Well, yes."
The bell rang. The other students deflated, and started packing up. Stiles bundled all the nonschool books into his bag, whilst Malia put all the school books into hers.
Xander asked "Isn't that-?" as she did so, but stopped when she shouldered it easily. "Oh." He said belatedly. "Super strength. Right."
The teen shrugged. "Well, see you later G-man. We've got a hell called lessons to go to now. You might as well follow us, by the way." He added to his goodbye.
The other's called out farewells in kind, and Stiles and Malia shrugged before following behind.
Classes may be unhelpful currently, but they will let them get jobs and not be stupid later on in life. Malia must remember this.
The two of them arrive in history and almost immediately walk right out again, damn the consequences.
Because, of course, Peter is standing up at the front with a 'charming' smile on his face.
"Welcome." He greets. "I'm Peter Tate, and I'm your substitute History teacher for the foreseeable future. Everyone, take a seat."
Peter pretends to look down at the register. "It seems we have two new students, as well."
He looks up, and smiles. "Leah Tate, and Stiles Stilinski. Welcome to Sunnydale High; now take your seats with the rest of the class."
Stiles was glaring, and Malia felt the threat of a growl coming on.
Buffy looked at them warily and dragged them down into two empty seats before taking hers; between Xander and Willow and behind Stiles.
The fucking goddamn asshole Teacher smiles.
"Shall we get started then? The topic were seemed to be almost finished on was - World War two, interesting."
He smiled. The two that knew him well enough could see the vicious glint in his eyes.
"I think we'll learn about the Japanese Detainment camps in today's lesson." He said. There were a mix of looks of confusion and looks of horrified understanding in the room.
And some fucking assholes who didn't seem to give a shit either way, despite how absolutely fucking disgusting those camps were.
Stiles would know, though he hates why and how he knows.
He also knows that this is some kind of sick game, a way to mess with them on Peter's behalf.
Stiles has to hand it to the man, as he clenches onto his desk with white knuckles.
The fucker picked the perfect topic.
Malia looked at Stiles worriedly from the corner of her eye.
Buffy could see his white knuckles, but she couldn't get another detention this soon after being allowed back into school, so she sat tight despite her wishes not to.
Stiles' grip tightened as the lesson went on.
"... There were many of these camps in America." Peter continues. "All of them rather terrible places. Officially, the reason for this was because, and I quote 'there was indeed concern in official quarters and panic in public circles about the loyalties of Japanese Americans and the possibility of assistance that might be given to the Japanese Empire, given the shock and fear that followed the attack on Pearl Harbor'. However, many consider the internment to have resulted more from racism than from any security risk posed by Japanese Americans. It was obviously quite the terrible state of affairs.
There were many of these camps, of course; from the Fresno Fairgrounds, to Forest Park to Fort Stanton and Oak Creek. Many of them were in this very state of California. Most of the people incarcerated in these places were taken from the West Coast..."
And so it went on. And Stiles dug his fingers further into the desk, not even noticing because of how focused he was on not simply bolting.
"Is there any questions?" Peter asked after finishing.
Fuck no. Nobody talk.
"Mr. Tate, I've heard about Oak Creek before, from my Aunt." a girl with dark hair spoke.
"There's this folk tale surrounding it; she wouldn't tell me though." Fuck you. And rightly so, she didn't.
Peter sighed. "Yes. Oak Creek. I don't know much of the folk tale; but I do know some of the facts - I wouldn't be a very good history teacher, if I didn't." He smiled.
Stiles hated him viciously.
"Now, this is not a happy story." He told the class. "This is a story of love, of loss, and madness. From what historians can gather, One of the camp's soldiers fell in love with one of the camp's prisoners, and vice verca.
You can all tell where this story is going, so I will spare you the small details.
Suffice to say, there isn't much evidence as to how, but the Corporal died. And, in turn, his lover went... how shall I put this?... homicidal. She killed nearly everyone in the camp, doctors, soldiers, and the other incarcerated Japanese.
Eventually, she realised what she was doing, and committed what is known as Seppuku. She used a sword belonging to another of the incarcerated to do so.
In these days, you would call it suicide.
And that, of course, is how the tale of Oak Creek goes. Now. Does anyone else have any questions?"
the mood in the room was sombre.
Stiles was shaking, slightly. His fingers were digging grooves into the desk, and his left foot was tapping fast and quiet.
Peter pretended to just notice, and looked at him with faux worry.
Nope, fuck this, I'm out.
Stiles stood up, abruptly, and did not care in the slightest if his crazy reputation got started all over again because fuck him, and fuck his mind games.
Stiles bolted.
"Stiles!" Malia called after him. She glanced at Buffy, and followed.
Buffy stayed put. She wouldn't know what to do, anyway. And she had a bad feeling about this teacher. She was keeping an eye on him.
Stiles stormed out of the school's front doors.
"Go back to class, Mal." He grumbled, and she grabbed him by the arm and spun him around.
"Nope." She said flatly. He wrenched his arm free. He was still shaking, still vibrating with unspent nervous, angry energy.
He couldn't decide which. They both went hand in hand, these days.
Malia dragged him towards the gym. They went inside, and she broke into the store room.
Malia grabbed and pulled out a punching bag.
"Punch it." She commanded. He looked at her like she was crazy.
"Think of someone you hate." She demanded. "And punch the fucking bag, Stiles." He did. It snapped, and crashed backwards.
"fuck." He cursed, and glared at it. Malia did not in the least bit look surprised, she just grabbed the bag and held it.
"Punch it. Again." She commanded. He did, and his hand went through.
Malia dropped it.
She folded her arms, and glared at him. "Feel better?" She asked.
He didn't reply.
She glared. "fucking- Goddamn it Stiles!" She punched him in the arm, and he felt the slightest twinge.
"Fight me." She demanded. He looked at her, incredulous.
"No." He protested.
"Kiss me then." She demanded.
He did.
Faith strolled on into the library. Buffy and the rest of the Scoobies were reading.
"Hey B. The newbies are gettin' it on in the boy's locker room. Thought you'd like to know they didn't just run off." Xander blinked.
Giles looked scandalised, for a moment, before sighing. He cleaned his glasses.
Willow closed her book. "... oh." She murmured. "Okay."
Faith grinned at Buffy, who sighed in response. Looked at the brunette flatly.
"What?" The girl grinned. "He's hot, by the way. Hides that body under baggy clothes. Shame they're attached at the hip, though."
There was a pause. "She's hot too, though."
"I would prefer if you refrained from this whilst an adult is present, Faith." Giles said, drily.
She grinned. "O'course, Watcher."
Giles sighed, and entered his office.
He closed the door behind himself.
Faith was still grinning as she dropped down into a chair, and threw both her legs over the armrest.
"So." She started. "What's with the research, Red?" She asked. Willow shrugged.
"Buffy want's to know what Stiles is." She says, and Buffy frowns. "Not - exactly. He just there's no sign of anything, he avoided telling me earlier, he pressed finger-shaped grooves into the desk in History - I don't know. I just... weird slayer vibes."
Faith grinned. "Well, that sounds like fun. Why don't you just ask him again?"
Buffy looked at her flatly. "Didn't you hear Faith? I tried."
"Not well enough. You're a slayer, B. Don't take nothin' for an answer." A light glinted in the back of Buffy's eye.
Faith smiled.
Chapter End Notes
Aaaahhhh! Finally. the Scoobies have been met, along with some others.
(Ugh, Harmony.)
also, peter is the legitimate worst. Fuck him.
Peter; the asshole that should be punched in the face. Many a time.
The rest of the school day went by without so much as a hitch.
Stiles and Malia blended right back into the crowd just at the end of lunch (having snuck out to get some food) and went to each of the rest of the classes, entering just as the bell rang and being the first two to leave at the end of the lesson.
This was in part because the evil eye they were getting from Buffy unnerved them slightly. But then, she wasn't even in a few lessons, and they weren't even slightly surprised when she skedaddled out of the window one lesson - a glimpse of curly brunette hair following behind the blonde's departure giving evidence as to why.
The two of them, however, did not relax. This behaviour, obviously not paranoia, paid off when they were cornered at the end of the day. The two were herded into an empty classroom by the group from the library, who had surrounded them and drove them into the room.
They let the others do so. After all, Stiles didn't want to cause a scene in the crowded hallway. Malia would rather the rest of the school not know about the whole supernatural thing, so she went along with it.
They weren't going to be passive, however. Malia dodged Buffy's arm and smacked it away resulting in a grunt of pain and a wary expression from the blonde.
"Don't even think about it." Malia said, flatly. Stiles folded his arms, leaned against the teacher's desk. The group was across from them, blocking the exit - if the one they decided upon was the door, that is.
Malia ignored the others in favour for the blonde. Stiles kept a wary eye on the brunette, but also flicked his vision in the direction of the other members of the interrogation squad every now and then.
Buffy huffed, her blonde hair moving aside. "Who are you really?" She asked. Demanded, rather; her countenance was confident, though she directed suspicion at the pair.
"Chill, B." Faith laughed. "We just wanna know if you're here to kill us." Faith - the curly-haired brunette in leather pants - informed them. "If you aren't, then 's all five-by-five, yeah?"
The blonde huffed again, whereas the red-head; Willow, and the Brown-haired male; Xander (if they remembered correctly) both looked a tad bit dubious in their belief of that statement.
Willow spoke up. "You can tell us. I promise nothing bad'll happen." She said brightly, perhaps hoping to gain their trust from one sentence.
"We're not here to hurt anyone." Malia replied, angrily, eyes flashing blue. "And we are who we say we are." the werecoyote folded her arms.
"Really." Stiles added. "We aren't saying any lies, alright?"
"You still haven't told me what you are." Buffy grumbled. "Describing facts about yourself isn't very helpful. Be more..." She seemed to struggle to find a word to describe what she meant. "Be more helpful." The girl shrugged. "I just want to keep this town safe. And my job description is to
- what, 'save the world from the forces of darkness' or something."
Stiles laughed, a little, as did Malia. "We're not that." She assured the slayer.
Stiles' smile didn't reach his eyes. "Yeah."
Faith's eyes, for a second, narrowed. The teen brushed it off, and nodded. "Well then, s'pose you'll need some stakes and shit, right?" Buffy sighed, and willow looked scandalised. "Faith!"
Faith looked flatly at the redhead. "really, Red?"
Willow shrugged, uncomfortable. That was that, it seemed, as the other group seemed to drop it.
"Come on." Buffy beckoned. "There's stuff at the library."
"Interesting base of operations." Stiles quipped, drily. "We used our houses."
Buffy looked at him weirdly. "Well, we can't. So come on."
Stiles and Malia shared a glance, before shrugging and following behind.
They might as well, after all. And it meant less time spent in a run-down police station with Uncle Creeper, so stiles was all down for that.
As was Malia. She'd rather not spend time with her dear old sperm donor.
The library was, indeed, stocked to the brim with an arsenal of weaponry. Stiles supposes he should be impressed, however...
"Where's the guns?" Malia asked, a tad confused.
Buffy got this... look on her face; Stiles could tell she had a rather strong distaste for them. He figured, in her line of work, a friend might've been shot once or twice. And yeah, he gets that, but really. Guns are just tools - the intent is solely the wielders. And stiles (probably) isn't about to go bat-shit crazy (again) and murder a whole bunch (more) people, so she should probably come to grips with the idea that he ain't getting anywhere near the undead, no sir.
Stiles hearted up an axe, and felt the strain of his muscles. He raised an eyebrow at the blonde.
"Not the most practical." He said, drily - because, in all seriousness, it wasn't.
Though he'd be fine with a baseball bat, or - hell. Maybe even, oh - a lead pipe wrapped in barbed wire.
Or maybe even a wrench. Y'know, for the symbolism.
Stiles grimaced, and put the axe back.
"Careful with that." The librarian-watcher guy: Giles, warned him. "That is one of the older pieces, it would cost a fair fortune to replace, let alone repair it."
The blond got a dawning look of realisation on her face, then nodded to herself.
Apparently, that explained something to the slayer. Stiles doesn't have a clue what, and truly couldn't care less about it.
"Still." Malia demanded, "Guns?"
The watcher dude frowned. "I would have thought you wouldn't require one... what with the, ah claws and fangs and such."
Malia looked at him weirdly. "Well, for one; I don't just go around biting people, they taste nothing like deer - and -" here, her gaze turned flat - "I wasn't asking for me."
Giles blinked, then nodded. Stiles was having a hard time getting a read on the man; his instincts were all... out of whack. Both trusting - like with Parrish, and not - but not like, in the same way as they had been for say, Peter.
Ack. Stiles had almost supressed the knowledge that the Senior Creeper Hale was here with them.
Now that, that, could have been dangerous.
Stiles felt the frown he hadn't noticed deepen. They shouldn't have untied him; They're old enough for emancipation, they should've worked with that.
Breaking out of his thoughts, Stiles blinked at Malia; she'd been tapping his shoulder for at least a minute.
Oh great. Now he was getting weird looks. Today was going wonderfully.
"Oh good, you're there." Malia cocked her head. "You alright?"
Stiles waved her off. Later, his gaze read - and his chemo signals weren't worrying, per say, so she let it pass for now.
Malia shrugged, righting her head. "Sure." she grimaced, still not very good at - eh, 'segues' - so she simply barrelled on, as was still intrinsic to her nature.
"Buffy asked if you know how to shoot." She said frankly - though her eyes sparked with amusement.
Stiles grumbled unflatteringly about the ex-us marshal before sighing.
"I ah - kinda?" Stiles shrugged. "I mean, if the thing isn't thrown at me, and I don't have to catch it, and actually get to use it I don't think I'd be so bad."
Malia ignored the others. "Knew you'd never actually used one." Stiles scoffed, and rolled his eyes. Malia grinned, a little.
"Fine, fine." Stiles let out as a sigh, reluctantly.
"Got a bat?" He asked the gathered group. There was confusion, he could tell - and Giles sighed, most likely exasperated, then cleaned his glasses rather unnecessarily. "Might I ask why a... a bat would be your second choice?"
Stiles blinked. "Got most experience with a bat. Though metal is better..." Stiles frowned, tilted his head. "Know what? Never mind; we brought one."
Stiles glanced at Malia, who was frowning. "Remember? When, on the road - " he gestured vaguely, throwing his arm out to the side and jerking his head slightly, quirking his eyebrows upwards for a moment.
This, of course, made no sense to the scoobies; since they weren't there, nor were they very well versed in Stiles.
Malia was, however. She nodded in understanding, an annoyed grimace and slight frown decorating her face.
There was silence in the library, for a moment. Mental snorts happened in the heads of the Doctor Who fans.
The silence was uncomfortable - quite obviously - and stiles shifted; restless and uncomfortable.
Malia nodded awkwardly in goodbye to the gang of Sunnyvale locals, who gave their own awkward farewells in return.
Malia lead her boyfriend out of the library- again, he seemed lost in thought.
Her frown deepened. She'd rather deal with that Jungian shadow thing, before he has a chance to discover it.
The tightening of her grip went unnoticed by the both of them, focusing on problems inside their heads as they were.
The two walked to the jeep on autopilot, entered, and drove.
Peter could make his own way back, they figured; perhaps vindictively hoping he'd not find the station.
Wishful thinking, the couple agreed, and the drive back went in comfortable silence.
Peter was rather happy with the trouble he'd managed to stir up without being openly antagonising to Stiles and his dear daughter.
Well... perhaps a little. Peter smirked to himself, eyeing his handiwork.
The tripwire ran along the window sill, thin and hard to spot, sans super senses. Peter co'' owed it, noting where it was connected and the traps it would both trigger and active, and smiled to himself - in what no one in their right mind would deem as a nice way of doing so.
Peter nodded. His helpful deed done for the week, the man left the building via the front door, tipping the mountain ash jar to close the line, before wandering over to the car he'd... borrowed, opening the door and getting in.
He had a job to do.
some weird shit is going on with the text-input area thing, and so I'm posting this as-is. Sorry it's so short, but at least this is proof i haven't like, died or some shite.
A little bit of something.
Chapter Summary
Not much happens. Sorry for the 'filler', but there always is calm at some point in a story. Chapter Notes
Sorry it took so long. I'm mostly trying to figure out plot, hah. Maybe another chapter or two before the next buffy episode comes into play. We'll see.
The next morning was warm; Stiles still hadn't figured out how to fix the AC in the police station, so the office he and Malia were sleeping in (for now) was pretty much boiling hot. Stiles grimaced; as he shifted to get up off the couch, his t-shirt stuck to his skin in uncomfortable ways.
Stiles stood, and stretched.
"Come on Mal." He said, tapping his girlfriend on her shoulder. It was an odd occasion when he woke up first - simply because her ingrained clock woke her up at the crack of dawn, usually.
Leftovers from her time as a coyote, he knows. Stiles brushed strands of hair which had fallen over her eyes, and pressed a soft kiss to her forehead, before going to his bag and grabbing some clothes.
They'd found an abandoned gym with still working showers a short walk away. Stiles grabbed a pen and scratched a note into the table, before switching clothes quickly and leaving the room.
He wondered why Malia was still out cold, but decided she was most likely only tired. It had been a long few months - being able to finally semi-relax must be even more surprising for her.
When Malia and Stiles had gotten to the station the previous night, the building had been cool enough to fall asleep in - at least, for Malia. She liked her warmth (of course she did) but she preferred a cool breeze on her face and a warm body to curl up against; be it around or as the little spoon. (although she preferred the opposite usually, it was nice to be held. It felt safe, and she admits to herself the life she's led so far has left little time for that.)
So. The two of them are curled up on the couch, and Malia feels drowsy. It doesn't take long for her to fall asleep, but by god she wishes it had.
The white, endless room is starting to annoy her.
"Why do I always end up here?" She asks, and is not surprised in the slightest to hear the shifting of fabric, the other leaning against one of the infinite columns evenly spread around the 'room'.
He chuckles, slightly - as per usual, there's something... off, about it - something she can't quite place.
(Malia never met the Nogitsune. Not properly. She could place it if her only meeting hadn't been him saving her life in a dark basement. At least it kept that deal with Stiles - though Malia hates she's the real reason It got in stiles properly in the first place. Enough to feel guilt for the deaths it caused afterwards... she's a werecoyote. Even then, when she hadn't been able to access that part of herself properly, she shouldn't have been so easily dropped by some guy.)
"I suppose it's the connection Stiles made with you." He says. "You were invited into our space. And now you can't get out again." The shadow muses, prowling forth towards the stump, gently placing a hand on it, near reverently.
Malia glances at it. "I don't know why it's still here." He admits. "It should have gone once we left it's... territory, so to speak."
The fraction of Stiles smirks at her. "I suppose that happens when you sacrifice yourself to such an old being. You can never quite rid yourself of it." Malia can't help but ask; call it morbid curiosity.
"How many times has...?" She trails off. Death is still a sore subject for her. But if she knows, and knows that despite all this, he's still here, maybe it'll calm her nerves.
(Sometimes, Stiles smells... odd. Off, in some way - like he's not really there. Like a fleeting, phantom scent of what once was, but isn't anymore. Malia wonders if one day, that'll be permanent.)
(She thinks she might go truly crazy if it does.)
The smirk hasn't left the shadow's face. "Technically, twice. But really, only once... unless you count dying inside - mental breakdowns, and the like - in which case, possibly many, and yet none
at all."
Malia rather despises this being - but she knows it's only a twisted version of her boyfriend. This talking in circles thing is something she knows well. She hates It, this being, but could never hate him.
Although she glowers at him, he never stops looking faintly amused. "Fine, fine." He relents. "The sacrifice, and his original body was destroyed in the process of trapping Them." He cocks his head; animalistic in a way Stiles' usual head tilts just aren't. "But that's not important, because he's as alive as he can be right now." The other points out, then sits cross-legged on the stump between them.
"Shall we continue?" It asks, and she concedes. Malia approaches the stump, sits on it, her legs to the side.
The go table appears in front of them, a few moves onward from when she left last. Stiles has given her some breathing room in this game, it seems.
"He's better than you are." It says, amused still. "But then, he had to fight a thousand year old being off with this little game." The expression turns darker. "I don't think he had much choice."
Malia inclines her head. The other moves a piece, and she moves hers, capturing a little more territory.
The other looks... pleased. Malia still doesn't know what this game is even for - or if she truly wants to know in the first place.
"We're playing for knowledge." The shadow states, regardless. "The little parts of himself Stiles doesn't want to acknowledge - since he's always been rather fond of ignoring his problems - that I have to keep." He admits. "Abilities and such that you'll - he'll, need." It says, the shadows on his face darkening despite the lack of any real light source.
It's just ambient lighting, in this room. Malia's not sure why it's so bright - or even why it's white. And empty. If this is stiles' head in the first place anyway, but she'd always figured (if mind spaces existed) that his wouldn't be so...
Bland.
The shadow inclines his head, and moves a piece.
Malia realises he's trying not to win. The other smirks, and the game continues.
Stiles uses the gym for more than a shower, of course - after all, it's a gym. He might as well use the abandoned buildings' resources for his own benefit; after all, they'd go to waste if he didn't.
And it's not like Stiles is a stranger to exercise. He was on the lacrosse team, no matter how... not really on the team he was.
(He means that he's literally had to exercise previously, even if he didn't want to. And he does, because he needs to be able to keep up with the supernatural, even if only a little bit. Since it's not like he's got supernatural strength, or anything like that.)
Once stiles is done using the equipment, he uses the facilities they don't have in the station, gets ready and dressed and (since he's got shit to do) dries his hair with the one remaining and working hand dryer.
Once that's done, he leaves the building, re-seals the mountain ash and re-arms the wolfsbane trap at the side door entrance they use.
He hears the movement before anything else - a crunch of feet that are trying to be stealthy but not quite managing it. Stiles stills, hand on the kanima venom spray he keeps with him these days.
"Relax." An amused voice says, and stiles rolls his eyes in annoyance. "Peter." He greets, dry and obvious in his distaste.
"I see you found a working bathroom." He says without preamble, and Stiles nods. "Going to let me in?" The older man asks. "I haven't had a shower in days; Malia's starting to glare and others to notice." Peter states. "It wouldn't be good for people to blow our cover now, would it?" Stiles glowers, but the mountain ash breaks at his will anyway.
Peter smirks, and enters. Stiles rolls his eyes, and clambers onto the fire escape of the building next door.
Stiles grimaces. They really need to build some proper routes around these roofs. It would be much easier for him to mountain ash everything that way.
Stiles sighs, and manoeuvres his way around the rooftops until he gets to the one opposite the police station. Stiles drops down to the fire escape, and climbs down the the bottom, entering the building through the door. Stiles Makes sure all traps are working in the building, then exits and crosses the road, carefully closing the door behind himself and making sure there's no-one watching from the street.
This road is... oddly quiet. Stiles hasn't seen any signs of vampire nests, or any other kind of supernatural hanging around the area.
He doesn't like it. The silence is upping his paranoia every second he's not absolutely certain they're safe.
Stiles closes the door. He knows Peter probably couldn't get in the Station last night - considering the Mountain ash, but doesn't much care. Stiles also knows they should be keeping an eye on the asshole, but also doesn't much care about that, either.
Malia's downstairs; this station has a kitchenette - but not one that was original to the Station. It's a small, downstairs office turned food space, and Stiles is grateful to whatever squatter did this even if he feels a little anxious as to what killed said squatter.
Stiles walks into the kitchen, and can see Malia meandering around and checking if the appliances still work well enough to not need replacement.
"Microwaves a bust." Malia says. "Gas oven flickers a bit but doesn't light... that might just be me not doing it right, though." She admits, and they share an amused glance. He never had gotten around to teaching her cooking properly, and that needed fixing once they were all settled in. Malia carries on. "The fridge isn't working, which isn't good, and I cleaned out some old food from the cupboards. None of this was in good shape anyway; whoever set this up knew what they were doing, but all of this is really old - stuff they found in a junkyard, I guess." She figures, and Stiles nods because that is likely correct.
"Need me to break the ash so you can get the broken stuff out of here?" Stiles asks - fully aware she could carry the fridge with little effort. Malia flashes a smile and nods - a little proud, he knows, and she has right to be, Stiles understands that.
So Stiles breaks the ash, and Malia carries the fridge to the side alleyway. She unceremoniously drops it, returns in side and he closes the barrier. The only thing that worries him about this set up is that she can't get out herself if necessary, and that if he breaks the barrier on the ground floor at any point, someone else who's affected can then get into the ground floor.
Case in point; when they re-enter, Peter is just inside the doorway - having gotten in prior to Stiles closing the barrier.
"We need a better system." Malia sighs, then enters the kitchen. She pauses, then turns to Stiles.
"Any books on fixing microwaves?" She asks, not expecting him to say yes. Of course he doesn't, and she sighs.
"I'll try not to fry myself then." Malia half-jokes, then enters the kitchen - no door to shut behind her.
Stiles turns to Peter, who is looking amusedly after Malia. "What?" Stiles demands, and Peter chuckles. Stiles is still grating from earlier - well, the other day - and Peter knows this; Stiles knows he knows, and it just irritates him further.
The man turns, and goes into one of the offices that he's claimed for himself. Stiles hears the click of the door (and knows he shouldn't.) sighs, and goes upstairs.
The sheriff's office is similar but not quite the same to the one in Beacon Hills, and for that Stiles is glad. The board here is empty, because there's nothing Stiles needs to put up there yet. The string is on the cabinet next to it, and papers from previous mysteries are filed away in draws devoted to those events.
The room is familiar without being the same. Stiles finds comfort in this.
He closes the door behind himself, and blocks it with mountain ash - closing the line that goes around the room.
Stiles moves over to the desk. On it, is some papers regarding events in Sunnydale; strange deaths and obvious cover-ups.
And anything and everything to do with what he's dubbing 'the scooby gang' for pseudoanonymity.
Stiles doesn't know why, but he needs to figure these things out. Not be retold them in a biased manner by biased people who will give biased retelling of half-remembered events, but the truth about them.
He opens his laptop. Well, it's not really his - but it is now, and it's not like his dad can stop him using it anymore.
Stiles wonders how difficult it would be to get the police records from Sunnydale using a Beacon Hills Sheriff's department's laptop. Stiles doesn't even know if that gives any advantage over just any other old laptop - but having this here is a kind of... memento, he supposes, of Beacon Hills.
Of his dad.
Stiles opens a privet browser, and does what he does best.
Research.
In the Interim.
Chapter Summary
Buffy really doesn't know what to make of the new students. On the one hand, they seem like genuinely decent people - but on the other, her slayer senses tingle in ways that make her wary of them both.
Chapter Notes
Sorry it's been so long. Thank staliaaf for kicking me into gear, whoops. So yes, thanks for kicking me into gear with this chapter, lol. Again, apologies for the long wait.
See the end of the chapter for more notes
Buffy really doesn't know what to make of the new students. On the one hand, they seem like genuinely decent people - but on the other, her slayer senses tingle in ways that make her wary of them both.
"I get ya, B." Faith says, responding to Buffy admitting her concerns. "The guy definitely feels off, but sometimes slayer senses can be more objective than necessary. Like with Oz; mine are telling me he's bad news but the guy's pretty decent, right? So I just tend to only listen to the vamp side, unless any demon or otherwise is being obviously evil."
Buffy inclines her head, because that does make sense - it's a good way to look at it, she thinks.
"I just..." Buffy shakes her head. It's hard to put it into words, but there's something that's just plain off about both of them. Like they don't belong, or something, but that's ridiculous. Because what she means by that, is that they don't belong here, in this reality, which quite frankly is way freaky, and Buffy really does not like that, because it's weirder than what she signed up for.
It's like the idea of meeting a decent demon. Freaky. At least, to Buffy.
She tells Faith this, and the other girl shrugs, glances down at the grave beside them.
"I guess." The brunette says. "It seems like something's off with them, anyway - even without that feeling."
Buffy nods, because it does. One thing she has to admit is that 'Stiles' being 'Leah's' method of controlling her coyote side seems... unreliable. What if something were to happen to him? Would she go on a rampage? What would, could, might happen?
Buffy doesn't know, and that frustrates her.
And then, for another thing, 'Stiles' himself is a puzzle. Firstly, he says he's '150 pounds of pale skin and fragile bone' and avoids 'human', for another he can dig groves into wooden desks with his fingers without noticing, and thirdly her slayer senses are screaming at her that he's dangerous, but the guy appears to be nothing other than plainly human, in the same way that Willow and Xander and Giles and Cordelia do.It's bewildering, and Buffy hates that - hates not knowing if she should punch him or befriend him, or the girl 'Leah', or whatever because she's super confused, alright?
Super confused. Buffy tells Faith this, because she needs a sounding board and Faith gets the slayer stuff in ways Willow or any of her other friends simply cannot.
"Well, you could work all this out by a good old fistfight if this asshole would get up already." Faith said, nodding down to the grave next to them.
"I'd sit back, give you pointers while you ranted." Faith offered. Buffy shook her head.
"I got the last one," She replied, "It's only fair you fight this guy."
Faith huffed out a laugh, smiling. "Yeah alright B. You can vent while I stake the vamp."
They look to the ground. "If he ever shows up." Buffy adds, dubiously. "Are we sure this is the right guy?"
Faith squints at the gravestone. "Good ol' Billy Rogers; yeah, this is the guy."
Buffy sighs, leans back against the gravestone behind her - a cross, with the name 'Lily Dawson' scrawled across the horizontal part. Buffy wondered what she might have been like in life.
"Wonder what people would think if they saw this." Buffy laughs, a little - a thought she's had since forever, really, even back at her old school. She cared a bit more about it though, then.
Faith's grin is back. "Probably that we're a bunch of weirdos, honestly. Two girls that hang around in graveyards, chatting about vampires and weird mythology." She raises an eyebrow. "Maybe they'd even think it was a date."
Buffy laughs. Faith shrugs, and turns her head, frowning in the direction of the ground where the vamp should come out. "Well," She segues. "This lowlife is takin' a lot longer than expected." Her mouth twists. "I say we go bronzing, see if there are any lurking about in there and get a couple rather than just one."
Buffy pauses, looks up to the sky and thinks, for a moment. "Yeah," She agrees. "that's probably a better use of time anyway."
Faith grins. She stands, and offers Buffy her hand. "Come on then B. Sun won't wait for anyone." Buffy nods, and takes her hand, is pulled up to a standing position. "Sure." She says, and lets go.
The streets are quiet, at this time of night. The day had been a normal one after yesterday's events almost boring, actually. Stiles was adding traps and defences against vampires and a few other supernatural types around the building, as Malia read over the book on what amounted to fixing appliances she'd gotten from the library at Sunnydale High.
Frowning, she huffed, and strands of hair were buffeted away from her face.
"I think I got it." She said - a little dubious, but nevertheless she nodded to herself, grabbed the microwave and the toolbox, and got to work.
"Careful," Stiles warned, as he hammered the cross to the windowsill.
Malia nodded absently as she worked on the appliance.
"What do you think of the scoobies?" She asked - using what Stiles dubbed them in his research.
"The usual paranoia," Stiles said drily, "but also some concrete evidence that they are definitely the good guys."
Malia hummed. "Good; that's a nice change."
"You're telling me," Stiles replied. "I found some stuff on PCP gangs and serial killers that use those weird two-pronged forks and stab their victims necks with them, oddly like vampiric bite marks if you think about it for long enough." He chuckled, slightly. "It seems this town is just as oblivious as Beacon, possibly even more. But anyway, those guys seem to be behind a lot of the evil demons deaths, and any good or neutral or self-preserving ones stay under the radar and are left well alone."
"Any humans?" Malia asked, frowning. "...Sort of," Stiles replied - also frowning. "There was this one guy not long before we arrived who died, along with his girlfriend. Buffy was the last to see them, and a room was found with a load of chemicals and shit. Real Jekyll-and-Hyde scenario, that was, I think."
He laughed, in a way that wasn't humorous. "Kind of like what happened with me, but he actually made it happen and wanted it, which makes him kind of a terrible person."
"It's nothing like what happened with you and It." Malia says. "What happened then was not your fault and you know it."
Stiles shrugs - hits a nail a little harder than necessary. "Yeah," he agrees, unconvincingly, and the topic is dropped.
"What else did you find?"
"A while back," Stiles begins, "There was this thing that happened with the swim team. I can't quite find everything out about it, but I figure that the coach disappearing when the team did - who were turned into weird aquatic monsters - doesn't bode well for him."
Malia winced. "Okay, so some humans as collateral damage then."
Stiles nodded, sighing. "More than Beacon hills ever got... before I got possessed, murdered a whole hospital and blew up part of the Sheriff's department anyway."
Malia sighed, but didn't press the topic. It would be a long while before Stiles was ready to talk about that, she knew.
'That's why you push.' A voice says in her head, exasperated. 'He has to talk about it, or I get more of his suppressed shit, and I get... darker. The less of a Jungian Shadow you see day-to-day, the worse they are.
She ignores it.
Giles sighs, pinches his brow. So far, since the two new students have arrived, he's been approached by Buffy, for information on them, Willow, for information on werecreatures obviously a newfound drive to helping Oz with his lycanthropy - and Faith, surprisingly, for information on Slayers.
He'd been able to help Faith's query with no issues, and Willow's request only took a slight detour into the stacks to find some of the older books in order to complete.
But Buffy's...
So far, he hadn't found a single record for either teenager, aside from the ones on file at the school. Birth certificates, the usual forged id that teenagers use for going to bars and the like (which was of surprisingly high quality, he'd noticed), a drivers licence for the boy and literally nothing else. The general footprint left behind by people who exist in the system, such as prior schooling, just wasn't there.
Apparently, according to some physical documentation, the new teacher Peter Tate was the uncle of Leah Tate (likely on her father's side given their shared last name, if that family followed the traditions of the lady taking the fathers name, but it could be that the father took the mothers name, or the child has either parents name but the parents didn't take each others names, or any other combination that makes finding out her heritage incredibly difficult) and her legal guardian after her parents death in a car crash when she was around nine years old.
But there's no documents on Peter Hale aside from the bare minimum, and there's certainly no records of him having a job, or going to school, or having a place to live.
And all this had taken him today and yesterday to find out with Willow's help - it would have taken longer if he'd had to go find the physical documents... this is one situation in which he will accept that computers may indeed make certain things take less time.
The thing is, the boy also has the bare minimum documents, but he has no record of any parentage whatsoever, just the papers that the school has and the note that his guardian is also Peter Tate since his mother was deemed unfit for childcare (and there's no mention of his father whatsoever, which is suspicious in and of itself, unless he'd been living with his mother because she was the one that won custody, or he'd never known his father, or his father was dead, there were too many options), that was all there was.
Giles let out a frustrated sigh, and the doors to the library opened at the same time.
He closed the printed-out documents and placed them under some other files, and moved into the main library, wondering which teenager had decided to visit this time.
It wasn't a teenager, thankfully (because Giles can only stand so much time around children, truthfully). Unfortunately, it was the new teacher; one Peter Tate.
The man looked around the room, and Giles winced as his eyes passed over the cage; one of the antiques was still out... he must have forgotten to put it away due to his preoccupation with the research on the three new people.
"Hello." He says, "I'm the new teacher, Peter Tate. You must be the librarian - Rupert Giles, was it?"
Giles nodded, smiled in greeting and held out his hand. "That would be me. Good to meet you."
The other man shook his hand, and stood back, took in the library. "Please, call me Peter," He said, smoothly. "This seems like a decent set of books." 'Peter' comments.
Giles' smile is strained. "Yes. Some of them are quite old, and many I brought over from my family's collection back home."
Peter raises an eyebrow. "These are all yours?"
"No," Giles disagrees. "Just some of them. The majority in the front shelves are the school's textbooks."
Peter nods, stalks over to the shelves at the base of the library. He picks up a random tome, and flicks through it absently.
"Interesting topic," He muses. "Is there a lot of this fiction here? I wouldn't mind borrowing a few books, it seems... interesting."
Giles coughs, and cleans his glasses. Fiction indeed.
"Yes - well, I suppose there's nothing that says books can't be leant to teachers." He allows. "The school's policy is no more than five at a time, however."
Peter nods. "A pity," He says, and puts the book he was holding back, having flicked to the end.
His eyes scan the room, and land back on the antique sword propped up in the cage.
"I was wondering what that was for." He indicates the sword.
Giles forces back a grimace. "A simple prop; they keep a fair few fake weapons in here from time to time."
"Doesn't look fake to me," Peter disagrees. "Rather genuine, actually. But regardless, I should probably get going. Leah is rather bad at cooking and Stiles, while better, has probably forgotten all about food." He offers a civil smile to Giles. It doesn't reach his eyes, and neither does Giles' own returned one.
"I'll be back tomorrow," Peter promises. "To borrow some of this rather interesting... fiction, of yours."
The man leaves the room, and Giles narrows his eyes.
He knows something, Giles thinks. And Giles has a hunch that 'Peter' doesn't have the usual motives of a decent human being.
The Bronze is loud, as per usual, and Buffy's senses are going haywire, so she tunes them out. When she doesn't, it makes her antsy and reckless, and right now Buffy can't afford that - not when she's looking for some vampires to stake.
Faith looks lively, and Buffy knows that the girl never tunes out her Slayer instincts. Not if she can help it, and Buffy wonders what that's like. Because Buffy does that at school, a lot of the time, and at the Bronze, and in pretty much any place that's full of people, indoors or at night. Slayer senses can be pretty overwhelming, and Buffy doesn't know how Faith has managed to deal with that without having to tune it all out at least once.
"I'm gonna go grab us a drink," Faith says, close to Buffy to be heard above the noise. "You go up, scout the floor from above, I'll mingle, yeah?"
This is how they've been doing things, when out patrolling. Faith mingles and uses her senses, and
Buffy observes, finds a vampire, and goes down, notifies Faith, who takes her vamp outside as Buffy does the same with hers. They fight, the Slayers win, and they go back to the graveyard, stake any stragglers, then go their separate ways home.
"I think it's time to find some girl vamps. We leave too many of those wandering the streets, yeah?" Faith says. Buffy has no idea how she'd get one outside, but she shrugs, since Faith has said this many times before but still ended up finding and fighting a guy vamp. "Sure," Buffy says - knowing that at least for herself, that won't happen regardless of her intentions. It looks to be that the Bronze generally has a higher male vamp population that female vamp, weirdly.
Faith slinks away, and Buffy climbs the stairs and leans on the balcony, scours the dance floor for signs of vampire activity.
Slowly, so it's not a sudden rush, Buffy tunes into her Slayer senses as she looks around. It takes a moment or two, but she soon spots a guy in a bright freaking orange shirt with semi-normal hair chatting up a blonde chick.
Concentrating, Buffy gets that the guy is the vamp, and is weirdly relieved for that. Frowning, she shakes her head and moves on. Buffy descends the stairs quietly and quickly, passes past people on the dance floor and ignores roaming eyes and flirty remarks. On her way, she taps Faith on the shoulder and makes eye contact for a second, (the vamp she's found is some blond teen with green eyes and a god awful jacket), and moves past, saying sorry as if she'd accidentally bumped into the girl.
After that, she makes her way towards the vamp, who is currently sitting alone - Buffy spies the girl walking off in the direction of the bar and guesses that she's gone to get drinks.
Buffy pretends to have been dancing, slides into the seat next to the dark-haired, orange shirted vamp. "Sorry," She 'pants', pretending to crack her neck and in the process showing it to him.
"Hope you don't mind me sitting here."
He grins at her, and if she ignores the terrible shirt and semi-awful hair she can maybe see the appeal. "That's fine." He says - no awkward pet name or flirty remark; it might be more difficult to change his sights from the other girl than she'd thought.
Or not, Buffy thinks, as the girl sees them, sighs, and walks off with her drinks. Score.
"You come here often?" He says - having also seen his previous prey wander off, he'd obviously decided that she might as well do.
Ugh. Second best vampire food, how low can you get? Thank god she's a Slayer, this would be the worst way to go.
She smiles at him, nods. "Yeah. Something about the atmosphere, it's a great place."
He agrees, slides his hand over and with a mental shudder she makes her smile turn more flirty.
"And the men are cute, too."
He smirks, and nods to the door. "Wanna have some fun?"
She tilts her head, blinks, and shrugs. "Sure, " Buffy says, a sour taste in her mouth. "Why not?"
This is the act she hates - pretending to be the party-goer who has 'fun' with lots of people, because that isn't really her, and there are other Sunnydale high students that come here, and probably see this, and she kinda hates that a lot.
She turns her arm over and takes his hand, winks at him, and leads the way. Across the room, she spies Faith exiting the bar through the same door, catches her eye for a moment.
Faith smiles and exits hastily, and Buffy ups her pace subtly.
It doesn't take long to cross the dance floor, and the vamp seems a little impatient. She smirks at him, pretending to think that it's because she knows he can't wait to 'have fun', but it's actually because this is the last time he preys on people ever again, which is a good thought.
Cleaning up the supernatural streets, that's Buffy's job. It's great; twenty-four-seven and no pay, she couldn't ask for anything better.
Except, you know, pay and vacation time. That would be nice.
The two reach the door, and before he can say anything about the violent sounds coming from behind it, she pushes him through with - to the vamp - surprising strength. Buffy enters and immediately doges a punch thrown her way (sloppy; he's not used to fighting his prey) and grabs it, twists his arm and throws him down on the floor.
"Atta girl B." Faith calls - leaning against a wall, dust on the floor at her feet. Damn, she got hers
first.
The vampire on the floor groans.
"What the hell, lady?" He says, and Buffy raises an eyebrow at him. "Seriously?" She demands. A dawning look breaks out on his face as he gets a proper look at the two of them - horror becoming his main emotion.
"Ah, shit." He says. "Slayers."
Faith smirks and Buffy kicks him in the groin before staking him, so he can't try anything.
Buffy doesn't really feel like quips tonight, so she doesn't make one, and the body crumbles to dust as she stands.
"No snark today B?" Faith asks, and Buffy shrugs. "Nah." She frowns down at the dust, kicks it.
"Not worth one."
Faith stands straight, and walks over. "Well," She muses. "I guess you're not in the best mood then?"
Buffy's frown stays. "There's still more out there," She responds - doesn't reply, ignores the question.
Faith nods. "That there are." She agrees, acknowledges the ignoring of her question and saves it
for later.
Buffy looks up to Faith, sighs. "We should probably go find some more newbies to stake."
"Graveyard time?" Faith asks, and Buffy nods. "Sure," Faith agrees readily, "I'll bring the chips."
"I don't know where they went." Scott says. "I don't know when they went, or why -" Here, his voice cracks, and he stops, before continuing, "- or where, and-" Scott actually growls, frustrated with himself.
"Scott," Lydia says, soft - places a comforting hand on his shoulder. "They couldn't have gotten far, Scott. We'll find them."
"It's only been a few days," Theo agrees. "They're probably not even out of California yet." Scott looks down at the map. "Derek, Braeden and Cora haven't seen them," He starts listing. "Obviously they aren't in Europe but regardless, Jackson and Chris and Isaac promised to keep an eye out. No matter how reluctantly on two of their parts." Scott sighed. "But that's it." He frowned, eyes tracing the road out of California.
"There's not many places for them to stay at." Liam pointed out. "We could treat it like, uh,
Mexico, right? And all go hunting for them?"
Scott closed his eyes, sighed. "That would take too long. There are enough places in even just Beacon County for them to have stopped at, we'd have to go through them all one by one and it just wouldn't be feasible."
"So what, we're just gonna let them run?" Liam demanded, and Lydia frowned at him. "Liam," She said, and he sighed. "I know it's not - sorry, Scott." He sighed, frustrated, angry. "I just -" He cut himself off, stared down at the map.
"We're scared for them, we all are." Lydia said. "But we will find them." 'We have to' goes unsaid.
"If anyone can look after themselves, it's Stiles and Malia," Theo says. Scott swallows, closes his eyes.
"You're right." He says. "You're both right."
Lydia makes a decision. She takes a dart from the table, and throws it onto the map.
"Nothing." She sighed, frowning. "Just the exit road from Cali."
"We might as well look." Mason said, understanding. "Who knows, there could be like, a ghost motel or something."
They shared glances. "Yeah." Scott said, finally. "The last thing we try before we get the Sheriff to put out an APB on them. Theo, I know this is a lot to ask-"
Theo smiles. "It's fine, Scott; you need to stay as Alpha of the territory. All of you do - you're stronger as a pack, and the Dread Doctors, not to mention the Beast and the Chimeras are still a problem. I'll find them, don't worry."
Scott offers a strained smile. "Thanks, Theo."
There's an odd glint in Theo's eyes. "Don't mention it."
He smiles at them, charming - and Lydia, for some inexplicable reason, suddenly feels more worried than she had before.
I hope they'll be okay. She thinks. And that Theo gets them home safely.
They need them home. They all do.
Chapter End Notes
Finally seen the rest of the TW characters now, haven't we? Now I gotta go change the tags tho, damn.
Interlude #1: A Motel, Thankfully Not That One.
Chapter Summary
A Motel in California, but thankfully not a horror movie. Unless you count the horrifically high prices and terrifying state of the bathrooms, that is.
Chapter Notes
The POV of this chapter is half OC and half Theo, so warning for that asshole and the OC, who is literally just here for the chapter and then will probably never show up ever again.
Sarah Donovan was not having a good few days. It all started about two days ago, when she was on desk duty for the night shift. She'd seen a baby-blue jeep that wouldn't have looked out of place in her family photos from the eighties drive past above the speed limit, and she'd been about to go out to the payphone (yes, they have a payphone, shut up) and call the cops, but nope, she was not touching that with a ten foot freaking pole.
Because, you see, the car had done... something. Before it did that something, she'd caught a glimpse of the two adults inside (but what with Beacon County being so close, she was never really sure about people's ages... half the fourteen year olds there looked in their mid twenties, for Christ's sake) consisting of a pale man with dark hair and a tanned girl with short-cropped light-ish brown hair.
Then, the thing happened. The thing where the jeep seemed to glitch, seemed to shift and change and suddenly with a pop and not a bang it was just - gone. Like it had hit some rift in space or some shit, and fallen through it.
So yes. Sarah was not having a good few days, because she was busy wondering whether or not she'd gone bat-shit crazy. The night-shift might've been so dull that she hallucinated the whole event just so something happened.
If that's the case, she's definitely never doing that again, hell no.
This day had been shaping up better than the last, however. Firstly, there had been customers, which was a nice change, and the night shift had been given to Tommy so she got to sit around in the air-conned front room, reading a book she'd snatched from her aunt's office.
Family run Motel, this was. Gah, Sarah really wanted to get out of this place.
A massive-ass car pulled, up, black and (in her opinion) suspicious-looking.
Great. Please don't disappear into thin air.
Thankfully, the car did as she asked. Unfortunately, that meant she'd have to help a customer.
Sighing, Sarah deposited her book onto the desk and sat up straight, looked at the door
expectantly.
It swung open, doing that little ding thing to the bell above it, and a guy entered. He was pretty cute, she registered - but again, age. And she definitely did not trust his choice in car, so she mentally frowned at him.
"Hello." She said, instead of waiting for him to address her. Get it out of the way and the like. "How may I help you? Room, or Directions? There's a coffee lounge just down the hall if you're here for a break from driving."
People tended to use their Motel as a rest stop, not a place to stay at long. It was how they got away with so few rooms, and having them be as... not great, as they did. They didn't really want long term customers, after all.
He smiled charmingly, and she knew that smile. It was the one her aunt used when selling business ideas to Phil, when trying to charm customers and when wanting something to go her way.
Sarah did not trust that smile.
"I was wondering if these two people stopped by here recently." The man (? Boy? Teen? Young adult?) asked, holding out a photo.
Sarah frowned at it, then truly registered what she was looking at and nearly dropped the damn thing.
That was the jeep.
It was unmistakable, really. Pale blue and old and slightly run-down, that was definitely the jeep she'd seen the other night. And that was the couple - for it was obvious they were a couple, especially in this photo - a candid shot of them talking outside the car, standing close and looking a little serious.
Vaguely, Sarah wondered why everyone from that area had to be so unfairly attractive, before she focused on the problem at hand.
These were the people.
The girl's hair was a tad different - a little longer, maybe, blonde highlights throughout - and the boy looked less tired. She gathered their age from the sign for a high school in the back, and wished for the thousandth time that she wasn't home-schooled.
Motel-schooled. Whatever. She's prepared a winning speech for why she should go to college rather than take online courses; Sarah's got this sorted.
"I - I've seen them." She admits, says slowly. Sarah's not sure she trusts this guy, but that's also the reason she tells him.
Self-preservation.
He smile becomes slightly more genuine and she relaxes. "That's good," He says and sounds relieved. "Did they stay or?"
Sarah opens her mouth to say they continued down the exit road, but stops herself, because that's not really true, and he does at least seem concerned for these people.
Maybe they're friends, she thinks, and immediately feels bad about nearly lying to him.
"You won't believe me." She admits.
"Try me." The guy says, and she doesn't know his name.
Part of her thinks maybe that's for the best.
"Alright." Sarah says. "... they disappeared." She admits. "Just down the road a ways, but still able to be seen from the payphone." Sarah pauses. "It was - like they'd gone through some rift in space or something."
When he doesn't respond, Sarah can almost feel the mocking coming on, or the saddened why did you do this these are my friends that she's truly dreading, but he just looks... curious. Concerned, yes, but curious.
"Huh." The teen - she figures he's about the same age as the two - says. "Well then." And with that, the guy leaves.
Sarah huffs, rude, and grabs her book, settles down.
She's had a really bad three days.
A rift, Theo muses, was not what he was expecting.
It was, however, a perfect situation. The two of them being on the run was already perfect, Theo allows, but this is even better.
Because they're not exactly going to be able to interfere from another dimension, and when he wants to get them in his pack he can do so after Scott's been... dealt with, and honestly this just makes things easier; not having to worry about the two weak links in his plan.
Although...
Theo leaves his car in the parking lot (Since he's planning on coming back for it) and wanders over to the pay phone, frowns up and down the road and scans for any visual inconsistency.
Knowing it's stupid but also knowing there are, for some reason, no cars around right now, Theo wanders into the road and looks straight left, sees nothing, straight right and What's that?
Theo wanders down the road a bit, curious, and sees it easier from this distance. Shifting slightly, the world becomes shades of red but that strange mirage solidifies and - Well, that's interesting.
Theo reduces the shift, and leaves the road, moves to his car.
Very interesting.
He sits in the driver's seat and wonders -
Wouldn't it just be easier to let Beacon Hills take care of Scott for me?
Because Theo... he knows - or at least, thinks he does - that he can beat Scott in one-on-one, if only because Scott wouldn't be fighting to kill. But if he never has to bloody his hands, if he has plausible deniability -
It'll be easier to gain the trust of the weak links, Theo knows. He knows for a fact that Stiles will never, ever trust him in any way, especially not in a pack sense, if the seventeen-year-old ever finds out about Theo wanting to kill Scott, so he can't imagine it would be any easier if he actually does.
And Malia, while not distrusting (thanks to the coyote in him) definitely doesn't like him.
Killing Scott personally won't help matters.
Theo turns the ignition, turns the car around and pauses before going onto the road.
Left, or Right?
The plan (which has more holes than mosquito netting) or...
Ah, screw it.
Theo puts the car into gear, and goes right.
This can only go well, after all. Killing Scott personally would make things so very difficult, even if he truly wants to watch the life leave his eyes.
He's always had what Theo's wanted. Theo wants, for once, to have what Scott himself lost.
And all because of me.
The smirk he leaves with isn't seen, and the girl who'd followed him out of the store sighed as she watched the car pop and glitch out of existence.
"Not a good day." She says, firmly, spins around and stalks back into the Motel.
"He's caught their trail." Scott says. "He texted me a few minutes back. He's following it now."
"And?" Lydia said. "It's unlikely we'll hear from him for a while." Scott says. "But this is good news, right?"
Scott seems desperate, so Lydia nods, but she can't shake that foreboding feeling in her gut.
(At least her throat isn't hurting. She really doesn't want to scream.)
Homecoming
Chapter Summary
The Slayerfest's in town.
Chapter Notes
finalllyyyy onto an actual episoddeee-
Malia looked around, and groaned in annoyance.
"I'll keep bringing you here until Stiles deals with me." The shadow points out. "Just a couple of questions, and then I'll be out of your hair." He wheedled, smirking.
Malia sat up, noting that the go board was gone from the Nemeton, and stared across at him.
"Look," she said, sighing, "I'm just trying to find the best time to bring it up, okay?"
"You should probably deal with Their effects on - on him first." He says, "Since Stiles won't accept what happened with Donovan or my existence until he understands that none of what happened was his fault."
"I don't think he ever will." Malia admitted. "So I'm just... waiting for the right moment, alright?"
Void's lips twisted, and Malia winced, slightly. The other came over and sat on the stump next to her.
"I don't want to get any more of his shit." He says. "Nor does he want me to take over whenever something happens. It'd be best if you got him to open up before anything... bad... happens." Malia narrowed her eyes at him, but Void just smirked. "Rise and shine, Mal." Malia woke up.
"Apparently Homecoming is coming up soon." Stiles said, as Malia blinked herself awake. "Which is honestly something I haven't thought about at all. What with everything that's happened over the years."
Malia sat up, groggily. "I don't suppose there's any coffee?" She asked, stretching then standing.
"Yep," Stiles nodded. "I got the kitchen set up last night... couldn't sleep."
Malia, a little disturbed by this - it meant that the Jungian shadow guy could take her into Stiles' mindspace thing whenever he wanted if she was sleeping - turned around to grab some clothes, in part so that Stiles wouldn't notice the frown on her face.
"Yeah, I didn't sleep well." Malia murmured. "Not the best night all around, eh?"
"Not really." Stiles said, drily. "Peter's already gone to the school."
Malia nodded, adjusted her top before turning around. "Alright. Let's eat, then."
"...think we should see each other anymore."
Stiles and Malia, were, admittedly, a little bit lost. They weren't exactly sure where their next class was (and, to be honest, didn't really care if they missed it) so they were just wandering around the hallways trying (at least a little) to find it.
That's when they came across this mess.
"You don't? When did this happen - where was I?"
Stiles glanced at Malia, who was grimacing. They stayed back but in sight, and the teen talking to Buffy glanced at them before carrying on.
"Buffy, it's just... Before we were going out, you, you seemed so... full of life, like a force of nature. Now you just seem distracted all the time, and..."
Buffy interrupted, and the two onlookers winced. This was not going well.
"Yeah, I know, it's... I'm getting better. Honest." Buffy then appeared to try for humour, which well, that really didn't seem like it would help, though Malia supposes she's just trying to deescalate the obvious tension. "In fact, from here on, you are gonna see a drastic distraction reduction."
The other teen just sort of stands there, and this is a scene that feels really awkward to be casually observing.
Buffy tried for humour again, tried to stop this from happening, but with an "I'm sorry." The other teen walked off.
"Sorry about this." Malia says. "We probably should have just left, but..."
Buffy turns to them, as if she hadn't noticed them being there - surprise on her face. "Oh! You you saw that." She states, perhaps embarrassed. "Yeah." Stiles says. Malia notes that buffy's chemo signals are all sad-smelling, and offers a small smile. "The yearbook photos are gonna be on soon."
Buffy grimaces. "Right, yeah." She pauses. "Let's - go do that, then."
Stiles nods, and the two follow Buffy off to wherever the photos are being taken.
Buffy goes into the lounge, and Malia and Stiles don't follow.
"Probably best we don't get ours taken." Stiles says, hand on Malia's elbow as if to stall her from going in."
Malia pauses, considering, and sighs, nodding. "Yeah, you're right."
The two wait outside, and after a moment, Willow, Xander, and Buffy exit the room.
"You have to help me pick out an outfit," Willow says to her friends. "I wanna wear something that makes Oz go 'Oh'." She grins, and Buffy offers a strained smile.
"Well, I don't have anything." Malia says, joining into the conversation. "Mind if I borrow something?" She asked, nodding to the other two in greeting.
"Of course!" Willow says, smiling. "You can come over, I've got plenty." Her smile dims a little.
"Though none of it's that great..."
"I'm sure that's not true." Buffy says. "I am going to wear something that makes Scott wish he hadn't broken up with me."
"So that was his name." Stiles mutters.
The five continue down the hall a ways, making the two new additions wonder where they're going, before they reach Cordelia.
"Whatcha doin'?" Xander asks, and Cordelia startles then turns to face them. "Checking out the Ilaughingly-use-the-phrase 'Competition'." She responds, glancing up and down the list with slight disdain.
Oz arrives as Cordelia spies one of the girls running for homecoming queen and starts explaining why she won't win. "Holly Charleston; nice girl, brain dead, doesn't have a prayer."
"So you've got it in the bag, then?" Stiles says drily. The girl's winning personality will surely help rather than hinder.
Cordelia scoffs. "Of course."
"Where's Faith?" Buffy suddenly asks, glancing around.
"In the library. Training." Cordelia says, absently, as she looks around, then mutters. "Michelle
Blake; open to all mankind, especially those with a letterman's jacket and a car." She glances at Xander and folds her arms. "She could give me a run," She admits with a little concern. Xander pats her shoulder comfortingly, though the both of them roll their eyes at this.
"Right." Buffy says, ignoring the part about Michelle. "I should probably be doing that."
"Well, at least you didn't miss the photos," Willow points out, and Buffy nods. "Yeah, true. See you guys."
The rest of the day up until lunch is pretty standard for a school day, which is something neither beacon hills resident has had for a long time, and so they're really quite grateful for that.
When they look for a seat, since the majority seem to be taken, they get waved over by Willow and, shrugging, go take a seat at the scoobies' table.
"Hi!" She chirps.
Malia smiles in greeting, and Stiles responds in kind, before starting to eat.
"Hi. I hope you'll consider me for homecoming queen." Malia glances about, and sees Cordelia chatting up some people in order to get votes. Rolling her eyes, she returns her focus to her food.
"I can't believe it." Buffy says, disbelieving. "My favourite teacher, and she didn't even remember who I was. I'm like a non-person." Stiles raises an eyebrow at her, but she doesn't notice and turns to Oz. "Am I invisible?" She waves her hand in front of his face. "Can you see me?" "Big as life," Oz assures her, as Willow nods vigorously.
"At Hemery," Buffy starts, "I was the Prom Princess, Fiesta Queen. I was on the cheerleading squad. The yearbook was practically a story about me. Now, I'll just be one crappy picture on one eighth of an equally crappy page."
"Hey," Malia says. "So will the rest of us."
Buffy blinks and winces, then shakes her head. "Still." She says. "I just..." Buffy trails off, frowning into the distance.
"You could always run for homecoming queen." Stiles says, drily, not really paying attention.
He glances up and sees everyone's focus suddenly zeroed in on him, and he cautiously looks around the table. "What?"
Buffy's eye light up, a little. "That's true." She says, "It can't be that difficult, I've done it before."
"Hello," Cordelia says, leaning down to the table with her hand on Xander's shoulder. "I assume you'll all be voting for me?"
There's an awkward pause. "... well, uh, yes." Xander says, shooting an apologetic glance at
Buffy. "I mean; girlfriend, right?"
"Good enough answer, Harris." She says, then glances around. "And the rest of you?"
Willow looks apologetically at Buffy. "Yeah..." She says. Buffy looks a little offended, and Willow winces, leans over.
"She needs it so much more than you," The red-head says guiltily, before leaning back.
"As Willow goes, so goes my nation." Oz says, nodding to Cordelia.
She smiles winningly. "Great! Now, you two?"
"What, us?" Stiles says. "We're not voting." He glances at Malia. "Right?"
Malia nods. "I'm not getting into this mess. We barely even know you guys."
Buffy inclines her head. "Well, at least you're not propping up the competition." Cordelia says.
"Willow, I'd love if you could get a database up and running about who would vote for me, who wouldn't, etc. Xander, flyer duty. And Oz, would you get those that normally avoid all social situations to kindly put in my name?"
Willow nodded miserably - obviously torn about her decision. "On it," Xander says, smiling thinly.
"Right." Cordelia says, standing up straight. "Good." She walks off, strides over to another table and starts talking.
"I'm going to win." Buffy says, determination clear on her face.
"So, uh, this is my house." Willow says.
Willow exits the jeep and nods towards the house in front.
"Nice." Malia says. "Suburban." She turns and leans into Stiles for a quick kiss. "See you back home." She says and he nods.
"Bye guys." Stiles says, and the other two say similar things, as he puts the car into gear and drives off.
"So," Willow says awkwardly. "Let's go on up to my room, shall we?"
The three walk through the house and up into Willow's bedroom. "It's not much," She says, deprecatingly, "It hasn't changed a lot since I was little."
"It's nice." Malia says. "Homely. Lived-in."
Malia wanders over to a dresser. "So, in here?"
"No, over there," Willow says, pointing to a screen. "I took out all my options and laid them out to choose from, even a few I would never use myself, in case they're more your kind of dress."
"Thanks." Malia says, walks over. Willow does the same, and grabs a blouse and a skirt. Malia looks over the pile for a moment, as Willow hides and gets changed.
"What do you think of this?" Willow says, and Malia glances over.
Xander shrugs. "Nice." He says, as he adjusts his sleeves.
"Not really the right style for a prom." Malia disagrees. "Maybe this one?" She hands over a black number, and Willow, after thanking her, takes it to try on. Malia glances over the pile once more and grabs a dress and a belt, then goes to try it on.
"Woah," Xander says. "Gonna... go... be behind something?"
"I'm not going to be naked, you know." Malia says drily. "But fine."
Malia goes behind the screen and strips before putting the dress on. "This works," She says, "And that suits you much better, Willow."
Xander glances over and nods, distractedly, before looking back down and trying to tie his bow
tie.
Malia rolls her eyes and goes over, quickly fixing it for him.
"It's my first big dance, you know?" Willow smiles, sits down on her bed. "Where there's a boy and a band and it's not just me pretending there's a boy and a band."
Malia sits down next to her. "Me too," She says. "Spent a long time in the woods; doesn't leave much room for things like prom."
Willow nods. "I just want it to be..."
"Special," Xander finishes for her. "That's why I spared no expense on the tux."
"Cordelia will appreciate that." Malia says. "You look good."
"Thanks." He says, smiling slightly. "I thought -" Willow starts, then glances at Malia and stops.
"I borrowed it from my cousin?" Xander says drily. "Yeah; expense to my pride, Will."
"I don't see how borrowing clothes is bad." Malia says. "That's exactly what I'm doing now."
Willow smiles at seemingly nothing. Malia raises her eyebrow at her, and Willow extrapolates. "I just - this is so surreal, you know? The last formal event of our school lives. I remember back in the eighth grade, at that catillion, when Xander had that clip on bow tie." She giggles. "Hey," Xander says, mock-affronted. "I happen to think I looked pretty stylin' in that clip-on." Malia grins.
"Well," She says, and the two look at her. "It's pretty late." She glances at Xander. "We should probably be getting to our respective homes." She says, and he nods. "Uh - yeah, right." He says. Malia rolls her eyes. "Or not," She says. "Any more embarrassing childhood stories?" She asks.
"Not really," Willow giggles, then freezes. "Unless you can count this upcoming Homecoming as one, because I don't know if I can dance in this - or, or if I can dance at all!"
Malia pats her shoulder. "Then go ask your boyfriend for practice if you're that worried."
Willow nods, shakily. "Right, yeah. That makes sense."
"Come on," Xander says. "It's a piece of cake." He reassures her. "Look, it's easy." Malia says." Place a hand on his shoulder and the other on his waist and he'll do the same in reverse, and then you sway on the spot for a few minutes if you're that nervous. You'll be fine."
Willow nods. "Yeah, you're right." She says. "The both of you. I'll be fine. Thanks." She smiles.
"Really should be getting home..." Malia says, and Xander awkwardly nods. "Yeah, probably should. Cordelia'll be really pissed if we don't help with her campaign tomorrow because we didn't get any sleep."
Willow nods. "Yeah, I should finish off that database. See you guys at school tomorrow." Malia nods and the two say goodbye before leaving.
"A campaign is like a war. It's won or lost in the trenches."
"That's a little dramatic, B." Faith says. "Being the Slayer is like a war. Winning a campaign is nowhere near as life threatening."
Buffy inclines her head. "True, but neither of us have ever tried to win a popularity contest without being popular."
Faith hops off the table. "I'd take Xander off as a weakness, and maybe mentally add Cordelia to his." She says, in lieu of agreeing to help. "Also why is brie a weakness?" Buffy shrugs. "It smells?" She offers. "Nobody likes to vote for smelly people." Faith snorts. "Alright then." She allows, scanning the board.
"Yeah, I don't know any of the rest of these people." "Then we're in the same boat," Buffy sighs, frowning. Abruptly, she groans, leans against the board. "God, I can't believe them."
"Look, B," Faith starts, turns and leans against the board in a more relaxed mirror of Buffy's position. "You and Cordelia are like night and day. Why are you even trying to win this - why do you want it so bad?"
"Because," Buffy says, exasperated, "I was her, back at Hemery. I was popular and I had friends and teachers knew me and people wanted to date me and it was just - easier, right? I was on the cheer squad, I was that prom princess and fiesta queen, I was a shoe in for Homecoming until all this Slayer stuff started going down and -"
Buffy stops herself, grimaces. "It's just that - is it so wrong for me to want some form of normalcy? To not just be a crappy picture on one eighth of a crappy page, but to be there, front and centre and be able to look back and say 'I was there.' What with being the slayer and all, I won't have that chance very often."
Faith inclines her head. "I guess I never really got all this stuff." She says. "Never did the whole high-school thing. Or any school, really." She shakes her head, cracks a smile. "But it can't be that hard to win at this, right?"
Buffy nods. "Yeah. I mean, I've done it before, multiple times. How difficult can it be?"
"Well this is a mess." Stiles says, frowning around the quad.
"I'm very glad we decided not to get involved." Malia mutters to him, glaring at the girls with flyers who try to come up to them. They back-track pretty quickly.
"It's all rather amusing. There's a lot of anxiety in the air, and fear, and petty anger." The two roll their eyes and turn to see Peter, who smiles 'charmingly' at them. "Hello, niece." "Uncle." Malia returns, forced and obviously a little uncomfortable.
"Apologies for the subject in class the other day." He says, smoothly. "If I'd have known someone in the class knew about Oak Creek, well, I wouldn't have done that until they were ill. We don't want to be found after all." He adds after the false apology, murmuring.
It was false because they could both see a glint of amusement flashing in his eyes.
"Yeah." Stiles bites out. "What do you want, Peter?"
"Nothing untoward, Stiles" Peter assures. "Just to know if you were foolish enough to get your photos taken for the yearbook. That would be an easy way to track your movements, after all."
Stiles stiffens, realises that they're talking about this in the open. "No, of course not, and this really isn't the time or place, Peter."
Malia agrees, frowning at her 'uncle', and makes this obvious by voicing her assent.
Peter smirks. "The question should really be how Stiles can hear me, since I'm just a teacher watching over the quad from the walkway, and he's far enough away that I'd have to raise my voice at least a small amount."
Peter turns and walks off, and Stiles stops.
"Alright, guess no time like the present." Malia says, annoyed.
"Come on," Malia grabs Stiles' elbow and guides him, "We need to talk." Fucking finally.
Oh, shut up, Malia returns mentally.
Malia looks around and then pushes Stiles into the library, then glances about and shoves him towards the stacks.
"Not exactly something we should talk about in easy hearing range," She murmurs to him, and continues guiding Stiles - who follows easily - towards the back rows.
"As much as we rightfully hate Peter," Malia says, "We can't ignore what just happened, Stiles."
"Oh we totally can," Stiles says. "It's very, very easy. I've done it a lot of times, we're cool. Can we go now?" Stiles looks more than a little nervous - anxious, and maybe even a little scared.
Malia can't scent him, she realises, and carefully tries to keep the surprise out of her expression.
"No." She says. "Of course not. Stiles, you need to deal with this, you can't just let it all be suppressed like you do."
"Of course I can." Stiles snaps, eyes flashing in a very human way; anger. "I can and I have and I will, because there's nothing, alright? I'm not like you or Scott or Lydia or - or anyone back in
Beacon, alright? There's nothing, I'm nothing, let's go."
"You're not nothing." Malia disagrees, frowning at him. "And I would let you simmer for a bit until you were comfortable talking about all of this if it weren't for your shadow."
Stiles freezes. "What?" He asks - demands, rather - quietly, stares at her, into her eyes, as if searching for any trace of a lie.
"The Jungian Shadow." She extrapolates. "That part of you which contains all the bits you don't like or can't accept about yourself and gets worse the more you don't see what it contains in the whole person. Personality traits are usually what it contains, but this is us, Stiles." She sounds exasperated. "You've lived through enough for it to have become something more than that."
Stiles' hand - the one she's not grasping - tightens on nothing, knuckles white, bitten, short nails probably digging into his palm.
Show him.
Malia blinks. What?
Bring him in here. You'll both be knocked out for the whole thing, it'll be private, and he can't run away if it gets too hard for him.
I don't want to push too much, Malia thinks back.
Fine. He can't leave unless you agree it's time for you both to leave.
Malia looks at Stiles, thinks and says fine.
Good.
Malia's eyes roll into the back of her head, and the two collapse to the floor, unconscious
"Ow." Stiles says, sitting up. Malia grunts, feeling as always a little groggy after waking in the room.
"That didn't hurt even a little, Stiles." A voice, eerily similar to Stiles' but not quite the same replies. "I would know."
Stiles' head snaps in the direction of the other voice, and Malia grabs his arm to stop him, just in case.
"Smart," Void says, nodding. "He's scared and angry, which is never a good combination."
"Where are we?" Stiles asks him. "I'm guessing you're that Jungian Shadow?" Stiles spits out, glaring across the white space.
"Oh, you know where we are," The shadow says. "You've been here so many more times than most people ever get to. And yes, you would be correct." The shadow flashes a smile, that, for a moment, Malia could have sworn was silver-lined. Stiles' demeanour changes abruptly - cautious to angry, all over again, and Malia knows he saw it too.
Her grip tightens.
"That shared subconscious Deaton put us in." Stiles says.
"Yes," It smirks. "But it's a shared subconscious. And you can't just create any old one, you have to use an existing one. You were in the centre bath because Deaton wanted to use yours. He could have used Scott's because of your individual connections to him being stronger, but I think he must have known about the nogitsune. It didn't have an easy access to Allison, so the only other options were you or Lydia. You fit more, and so here we are."
"But Lydia isn't human. Not exactly." Malia inclines her head, and watches the discussion. The answers might be enlightening for things that she missed.
"Oh really?" Void asks, amused. "I'm sure she'd love to know you think that."
Stiles frowns at him. "I'm not saying she isn't human, I'm saying she isn't human. There's a difference."
"Oh, I know." The other returns, smirking. "Most people don't think about that difference." Stiles inclines his head, looks around. "Why is it still here?" He asks, tapping the Nemeton.
"I don't know." The shadow admits easily, the slightest of frowns on his face. "It should have left when we got here, but it's roots are still buried in your head, it seems."
"So, what, I anchor it to this reality?" Stiles mocks. "Well, in a way." Void muses, ignoring the mocking and answering the question seriously. "It's also what brought you here. Don't you think it's odd that you've never seen Sunnydale on a map before?"
There's a pause. "Of course I did." Stiles said, finally. "But it just seemed so convenient and I was tired, so I didn't question it."
"And like everything else, your actual feelings about the whole thing went to me."
"Why?" Stiles demanded. "Because that's how your subconscious deals with things; it suppresses them so that you don't have to." Void explains. "Which stops being fine after the first thing it does that for and starts being worrying after the third."
"I don't have that many bad memories, surely."
"Not all of it's memories," He responds, frowning at Stiles. "Malia's right, you know. There's something... preternatural, about me."
"Like Lydia." Stiles says. "Malia, Scott."
"I'd say Lydia was more supernatural than preternatural," Void says. "What with a banshee's relationship with the wild hunt, and a few other things."
"The wild hunt?" Stiles asks. "Riders on a storm?"
Malia raises an eyebrow and Stiles shrugs. "It's a song," He explains, then turns to the other.
"What do they have to do with anything?"
"Nothing as of yet." Void says. "There are other currently more important things to discuss." "Such as?" Stiles asks, warily.
"This." Void says, then pulls up his sleeve.
Stiles hisses in pain, grabs onto the same spot on his arm and - Stares.
"What the fuck?" He asks, and Void - just smirks.
"You don't think a leftover link between the two of you would have done nothing?"
"I thought that thing was slowly killing me." Stiles returned. "It's gone, anyway, so what's up with - that?" He asks, demands, glaring at the other's arm.
"The link was open enough and large enough due to proximity that something slid right on through when They weren't monitoring it."
"... It's still there, isn't it?" Stiles asks rhetorically, resigned.
"Because I'm here." The other returns. "Once you accept all the things I am then I'll go and the door will close. It's that simple."
"It's not that simple." Stiles snaps back, pulls up his own sleeve and scowls, yanks it down.
"You didn't kill Donovan," the shadow starts, not pulling any punches. "You watched him die when you thought you could have done something. That's what you feel guilt for - not doing something to stop his death, not trying because, in the end, you didn't really want to."
Stiles stiffens. Malia frowns at the other, who shrugs. "It needed to be said." He says, and then -
"Their actions were not your fault." Void continues. "He did whatever She wanted to do, we - I you - neither of us could have done anything to change that."
Stiles frowns at him, says "I know that" With no real conviction. "You don't really believe it though, because of what They made you feel during that time."
"They didn't make me feel anything." Stiles says. "That was all me."
"At first." Void allows. "When you were screaming for them not to hurt your friends, family, people you barely know." He nods. "Sure. But he wore you down, over time, as she always does, and eventually it was just easier to enjoy it than to fight, because you could fight no longer." "Why are you saying all of this?" Stiles asks, resigned.
"Because you need to understand that whatever powers transferred upon defeating him aren't inherently evil."
"But I don't want them if there are any, and I don't need them." Stiles says.
"You have the abilities of a magically inclined human, in a world where your known magic will do jack shit." Void says, bluntly. "Do you want to die via vampire bite or something more disgusting, or would you want to be able to protect yourself? Some of the things seep through during times of intense emotion, and during times when you nope out of the situation I take over. It's not a fun situation for either of us, especially since neither of us are huge fans of possession." Stiles nods stiffly, but doesn't seem hugely happy about all of this.
"So what's the point of this?"
"To make you aware." Void says, frowning at him. "Obviously. And to do this." Void dives at the two of them, and everything goes black.
"... The worst thing to happen, ever!"
Malia frowns, gets up off the floor and grabs Stiles by the arm, hauls him up to standing.
"Willow?" She calls out, and Stiles is still unconscious, which isn't exactly the best thing, but she allows it and walks out of the stacks, drops him in a chair.
Willow and Xander stare at them. "What?" Malia asks. "He passed out. Does that a lot, it's probably not healthy."
"Probably?" Willow squeaks, then goes over to the computer, momentarily forgetting about whatever she was talking to Xander about. "I'll see if I can find something on that."
"It's fine." Malia says. "It's uh... you know." She flashes her eyes, bright-blue. "Supernaturally inclined."
"Oh." Willow relaxes. "Oh, okay." She turns around, then continues her tirade from before.
"What are we gonna do?" Willow whines. "I mean, we have to do something, this is all our fault."
"Why not split the votes?" Stiles says drily. "You vote for Buffy, Xander votes for Cordelia, Oz votes for nobody, we vote for nobody, let the student body decide."
Malia looks back at the chair. "Oh, you're up." Stiles flashes a smile her way, then looks back to the others.
"That's not very honest, though." Willow says, conflicted. "It'd give them a vote each from the group." Malia points out, and Xander seems to agree. Willow looks troubled. "Why are you talking about this in the main area of the library, anyway?" Stiles adds.
"Oh, Buffy and Cordelia just had... the worst fight, and it made me feel really bad," Willow admits. "Like what we chose to do is letting this happen. I had to get this off my chest."
"It might be." Stiles says, "Or it might not. They don't seem to like each other very much."
Willow nods. "I don't really like Cordelia very much," She says, looking apologetically at Xander, "She's actually pretty mean."
"Crazy Freak and Vapid Whore come to mind as the insults the two used against each other in the fight they just had," Xander informs them. "Buffy wasn't exactly being nice either."
Stiles grimaces. "To the right people, they can be pretty cutting insults."
Willow nods miserably. "Exactly."
"I don't think I've ever seen Buffy so mean." Xander muses. "There must be a reason for it, right?"
"Yeah. It's called being caught up in the moment and retaliating against an insult to her sanity." Stiles says drily. "If Cordelia was the one to say it first." Xander winces and nods.
"Neither of them are being all that great, from what I've seen." Malia says. "My bets are that someone else'll get the crown."
Willow blinks at her. "But Cordelia is really popular -" "Was really popular," Xander mutters, wincing.
"- and Buffy's really nice," She continues, "So I don't see why the wouldn't win." Malia shrugs. "Well, what do I know?" She asked.
"Classes are over, right?" Stiles asks, glancing outside.
"Yeah," Willow says. "Where were you anyway?"
"Skipping." Malia says drily. "We have history today, and - well..."
Stiles winces and looks away. "Oh," Willow says quietly. "Yeah, okay."
Xander shrugs. "Well, since Homecoming's tonight and still have homework, we should probably get going."
There's a pause. "Not that I'm going to do it." Xander adds. "I just don't want to stay in school."
Stiles rolls his eyes. "Right." He says. "Can I come over?" Malia asks Willow. "I need to borrow the dress..."
"Oh!" Willow says, as if remembering. "Yes, of course."
Malia nods. She looks back at Stiles. "You'll pick me up then?"
"Obviously." Stiles says drily. "Unless you asked someone other than your boyfriend to the dance."
She snorts, grins, and gives him a quick kiss before leaving the library, Willow following behind.
"Well, see you at the Homecoming." Stiles says. "I'd say tell Cordelia good luck, but then she'd probably be offended at the idea that she'd need it." Xander grimaces, nods and says goodbye, then leaves.
Stiles leaves shortly after.
The homecoming dance is alright, Stiles thinks. Better than the winter formal back in Beacon...
which was the last formal dance they had, thinking on it.
Probably because of what happened to Lydia that night, He thinks, and then glances at Malia.
She smiles at him and takes his hand, glances at the other two. "This isn't bad," She says. "I don't think I've heard it before."
Willow smiles, looking a little giddy. "He wrote it for me." She nods over to Oz. "Well that's sweet." Stiles says, looks over at Xander. "Where's your date?"
"I'm not sure," Xander says, slowly, then eats one of the finger sandwiches. "She, well, Cordelia and Buffy should be here by now."
"Maybe the limo got stuck in some traffic?" Willow offers, and Malia and Stiles look at each other, concerned. "Uh, so you put the two people who hate each other and could likely make each other not even want to come to the dance alone in a limo together?"
Willow nods, then says, "It was our best option. Friendships matter more than being Homecoming Queen."
At that, Faith emerges from the crowd.
"None of you lot dancing?" She asks, and Willow nods to the band. "My dates making the music." She grinned. "I'm swaying along."
"Mine's missing." Xander says, now looking a little concerned.
"Hmm." Faith hums, brows furrowed. Before she can say anything about that, she spots someone over their shoulders. Stiles and Malia glance back - and see that it's Scott dancing with a girl they don't recognise.
"Sleazebag!" Faith says, indicating Scott, then huffs and walks off.
"I'll be right back," Malia says, then follows the slayer. Stiles nods after her and stays standing with the other two.
Giles rushes up behind them, and says "We have to find Buffy, something terrible has happened."
He doesn't give them long enough to start worrying, as he smiles and says "Just kidding. Thought I'd give you a scare."
Stiles rolls his eyes as the other two nod - Xander distracted by his girlfriend and friend being missing and Willow by the fact that the song being played was written for her.
"Are those finger sandwiches?" Giles asks and Xander nods, gestures to the table. "Yep."
"I'm guessing you're gonna lay one into Scott for what he did to your friend?" Malia says to Faith, who nods and strides on over to the teen in question. "You bet." She mutters, anger clear.
Once they get to the two, Malia hangs back and Faith touches the couple, who pull apart.
"Scott!" She says, overly sweet. "There you are, honey! Hey, good news. The doctor says the itching and the swelling and the burning should clear up." She smiles, places her hand on his chest. "But we gotta keep using the ointment."
Scott's date looks thoroughly bewildered, as Faith turns to look at her. "Hi," She says, then turns back to Scott and pulls him towards her by the lapels, before letting go and walking back to Malia.
"Yikes." She mutters, grinning. "Your turn." Faith says, and Malia walks on over to the two. "Hi," She says to the girl, then turns to Scott. "Remember me?" She asks, then continues before he can say anything. "That was a really low blow, breaking up with Buffy the day after you asked her to the Homecoming Dance. Honestly, I'd be ashamed if I were you." She turns back to the other girl. "I overheard the thing about the ointment, by the way. Totally true, Buffy had to help with that on occasion, because she's just that nice sort of girlfriend, you know?" She returns her gaze to Scott. "Pity, you moving on from Buffy so quickly. I'd say you don't really care about your girlfriends, to be truthful." She pats him on the shoulder, then turns back to the other girl ."I'd get out while you can, before he breaks up with you on your birthday or something equally shitty. I hate to be honest, but you are just a rebound to him. I bet he asked you out either last minute or the same day he broke up with Buffy, and I bet he was really sweet - he was like that with Buffy, too." She looks back to Scott. "Did you vote for Buffy like you said you would, or?"
Scott looks away, and the girl is starting to look angry. "Thought not." Malia says coldly, then walks off.
"Nice." Faith says. "Embarrassment, and then the cold, hard truth." She grins.
"One thing," Malia says, and Faith frowns at her. "Buffy and Cordelia haven't shown up yet, and
I have this horrible feeling about that."
Faith nods slowly. "They should be here by now," She allows, "If they don't show up soon I'll go looking for them."
Malia nods. "Good." She smiles. "I'll go find Stiles and actually do some dancing, keep an eye out?"
"Yeah." Faith grins. "Have fun."
Faith wanders on into the school, cautiously. The two missing teens had been absent for what seems like a little too long, and so she'd decided that she might as well look for them, since there wasn't really anyone to dance with that interested her and nor was there anyone she wanted to talk to that wasn't dancing or missing their dates and thus moping around, so here she is, wandering the deserted halls of the school.
Faith hears a roar (she registers that it sounds like a grown man shouting 'Candy!' which - what?) and breaks into a run, skidding to a halt outside the library and then throwing the doors open.
There's dust on the floor and a cowboy vampire having a chat with Cordelia as Giles lies on the floor, unconscious. Faith notes that the teen appears to have it sorted, so she grabs Giles and drags him out of the way before turning to see if she's needed.
Faith picks up a stake from where the weapons are stored. When the cowboy turns and sees her, he stops for a moment.
"Surprise," She says, and stakes him.
Giles has by now woken up, and blinks from his seated position against the wall.
Cordelia grins smugly, and Faith goes over to Buffy, carries her to a chair and lies her down more comfortably.
"So." She says. "Wanna tell me what's going on, 'Queen' C?"
Cordelia raises an eyebrow at her, but starts talking regardless.
Buffy blinks to awareness, and Faith offers her a hand. "Hey B." She says. "How's the head?"
"Not bad." Buffy says, takes her hand and is helped to standing. "Thanks."
Giles is dealing with the mess made by the vampire duo, and Cordelia fills Buffy in on what she missed.
"That'll teach him for mistaking you for a slayer."
"Not quite sure how they managed to think you're me." Faith says, drily. "I mean, didn't they have pictures?"
Buffy shrugs as Giles makes his way over. "I must admit to feeling partly responsible," He says,
"I did give your friends tacit approval to make the switch in the limousine."
"Aw, it's okay." Buffy reassures him. "It did give Cor and I a chance to spend Some quality death time."
Faith snorts, then says, "I'm kinda mad I missed out on all the fun, though."
Buffy rolls her eyes fondly, before looking over to Giles. "Oh, that's nice," He says," Regarding the, ah, quality time, but I don't remember them mentioning corsages."
"I don't have one" Faith adds. "If we were gonna do the friend giving thing, You'd think I'd be remembered." She says, drily.
Buffy suddenly pulls her's out and inspects it. "Jungle Bob did say the Germans were 'wired', didn't he?"
She finds inside the corsage a small transmitter.
"And their computer system? Is hooked into us." She shows the others the corsage.
Cordelia pulls off her corsage and hands it off to Buffy. "Oh god, get rid of these things!" She demands, obviously a little scared.
"Giles, get some wet toilet paper," She says.
"I have an idea." Faith nods. "Need my help?"
"Probably best if we don't risk more than one life," Buffy says. "Go hide, all of you."
Faith grimaces but nods, drags Cordelia into the stacks. Giles returns with the wet toilet paper, and Buffy thanks him, as he goes and hides in his office.
Buffy runs out of the library, and it's an anxious few minutes before she returns.
"It's done." She says.
"What did you do?" Faith asks. "Confused their co-ordinates." Buffy admits. "I think they shot each other."
Faith nods, and Buffy calls for Giles. The four leave for the Bronze.
"I'm gonna go with mud wresting." Oz says, and the other four turn to look at them.
"You were right." Faith says. "Danger's been dealt with."
"Cordy!" Xander says, relieved, and goes over to her. "What happened?"
"It's a long story," Buffy says. Cordelia looks at her, rolls her eyes and says, "We got hunted."
Faith snorts. "Okay, apparently not that long," Buffy amends. Faith throws her arm around Buffy's shoulder and grins. "Something called the Slayerfest," She tells the others. "Not that important, all dead pretty much." She shrugs. "Same old, same old." The group nods, as the guy at the mic starts talking.
"In this envelope, I hold the name of this year's homecoming queen!"
"After all that we've been through tonight, this whole who's going to be queen thing seems..." " pretty damn important." Buffy finishes. "oh yeah." Cordelia agrees.
Malia shakes her head.
"Okay, I believe we have a first for sunnydale high - a tie!"
"It's not gonna be them." Malia murmurs to Stiles, who inclines his head.
"The winners are Holly Charleston and Michelle Blake!" Buffy and Cordelia look incredibly disbelieving.
Most people applaud as the two girls go to the stage, and start gushing about how grateful and disbelieving they are about being chosen.
"Oh, wow, that's just sad." Malia says, as one girl starts to cry.
"And utterly fake," Stiles agrees,
"Ah well," Faith says. "Wanna crash the after party?"
"I'd rather go patrolling." Buffy says drily. "No need to hang around here."
Cordelia agrees with the latter sentiment, and takes Xander by the arm and drags him away.
"Bye," He calls back, and the others echo him. "What's patrolling?" Malia says.
"Slayers go out, find vampires, stake vampires, rinse and repeat." Buffy says, "I guess anyone could do it really," She adds, "So long as they're skilled or powerful."
"I'd like to have a go then." Malia says. "It's good, right?"
"Course it is." Faith says. "Cleaning the streets of the jackasses that feed on people."
Malia inclines her head. "Alright then." She says. "Wanna take the jeep to - what, a graveyard?"
"Sure." Buffy says. "Come on then." Stiles says. "I'll drive. Since it's my jeep."
The four leave. (Giles goes home. They've exchanged goodbyes already.)
It's late - early morning - when Stiles and Malia get back to the station.
"We should probably patrol the area on a shift." Malia says. Stiles nods, and the two enter the office. "We should really set up an actual bedroom." Malia comments, drops onto the mattress that they found. "Once Peter get's his first paycheck." Stiles says. "I know when that is so if he does anything else with it.."
Malia nods, and stiles drops down next to her, leans against the desk they used as a headboard.
"So what do you think he did?" Stiles asked. Malia raised an eyebrow at him. "You know," Stiles explained, "The shadow."
"Oh, right." Malia says, nodding. "Probably transferred some powers over from him to you, since your conscious mind was at it's most agreeable?"
"I wouldn't say I was very agreeable," Stiles returned, drily, "But I was in the same space as him, so it was probably accessibility." Malia nods, considering.
"We'll just have to see what that's all about, then." She says, decisively. "Tomorrow." Stiles nods, and the two get up, get changed, lie down, and go to sleep.
Theo's jeep pops into existence and drops onto the road. He blinks, and looks around.
"Right," He says to himself, and drives onwards. Not too far down the road he comes across Sunnydale, and smirks to himself.
Found you.
Interlude #2: Finding His Way Around, Maybe Stalking Someone (Read:
Stiles) A Little.
Chapter Summary
Theo gets the layout of Sunnydale, the lowdown on the supernatural within it, bags himself a couple demons, and stalks Stiles.
All in a day's work, as far as Theo's considered.
Since Theo got into the other universe through a rift in space and time or some similar bullshit and hadn't exactly prepared for such an occasion, he decided to lay low that first night; go find a secluded place to park overnight, camp out in the back of his jeep, and figure out how he's going to handle this.
So that's exactly what Theo does. He drives around town a bit - keeps to backstreets as much as he can, and then finds an out of the way place that's probably their equivalent of that place in the preserve teens go to make out and look over the town (and also is where the occasional werewolf will end up so they can make their howl carry across the whole of Beacon Hills).
It seems suitable enough. Theo parks near the back and out of the way then turns his engine off and makes sure all of the doors are locked, and finally clambers into the back.
Theo takes category of what he has stashed back here; Theo's always been on the move, due to working with the Dread Doctors, and so he makes sure to keep all of his things close by.
He's had this jeep ever since he learned how to drive - sixteen, undercover in a larger city but not somewhere widely known that he's already forgotten the name of (because there was nothing for him there) - and therefore it's the only place he knows he can store things he wants to always have.
Provisions, for example. Non-perishable foods (or as close to that as you can get, at any rate), spare clothes, a bag of valuables and cash (the valuables for selling if they end up somewhere other than America, though that is unlikely) and finally a few spare disposable phones. Just in case.
Theo likes to be prepared.
The teen sighs, searches around for something like a blanket or a sheet or whatever but finds nothing, so resigns himself to sleeping without a cover (since his coat is nowhere near big enough to cover all of him and that would just be annoying.)
Theo takes off his top and switches his trousers for a pair of sweatpants, and lies down across the seats, knowing full well it'll take a while for him to doze off.
Theo is jerked awake by the sound of something walking around the area, trying it's best to be stealthy.
That would work, of course, if Theo didn't have super hearing and the whatever it was hadn't
tripped and banged against his jeep.
So, really, it's more that he's jolted awake by the sudden and unexpected rocking of his car and banging of something falling against it, but regardless of the how Theo is awake and royally pissed.
Theo grabs his shoes and throws them on, not bothering with getting properly dressed, and slams his door open, knocking whoever it was right back down onto the floor with a painful thump.
"What the fuck, man?" Whoever it is said, and they sounded pretty drunk. "I could ask you the same thing," Theo says cooly, glares down at - What.
What is he looking at?
Theo has seen some... strange things, being a chimera, working with the Doctors as he does - and while this isn't necessarily the strangest, it's definitely up there.
Whatever the creature is, it's rather disgusting. Theo's nose wrinkles and his mouth twists almost automatically.
"I'm just - minding my own business, looking for a snack, and then - Bam! You open your door on my face, man that's just not cool."
Whatever it is stands, brushes itself down. "However, this has given me a rather great opportunity for a bite to eat, so I'm not going to look a gift horse in the shirtless mouth, right?"
It pauses, Theo glares at whatever it is, because he knows for a fact that this - it's not like a wendigo, because it was never human, but human appears to be part of its particular diet.
No thank you.
Not that Theo's fully human, but then, it's not quite as obvious as - whatever this thing is.
"I - uh. Really messed up that turn of phrase, didn't I?" It asked, frowned, and then shrugged.
"Oh well."
The - Theo really has no idea but - the whatever it is strikes a hand out to grab him, and it's only Theo's enhanced reflexes that let him dodge it, diving out of the way but at the same time, leaving the semi-safe haven of his jeep.
"Well. You're a fast one, ain't 'cha?" The other comments as he turns around. The whatever blinks, taken aback, because Theo's having none of this, and has shifted (not fully - he needs the advantage of hands in this fight) claws out and eyes glowing golden.
"And... that's unexpected." The other frowns, shifts awkwardly. "How about - we just forget about this mishap, yeah?"
"No," Theo says flatly. "Let's not."
"Suit yourself," The creature shrugs, leans into a fighting stance.
They circle each other for a moment, and the - whatever - lunges, clumsy.
Not used to his prey fighting back, Theo figures, and sidesteps it, grabbing an arm and then twisting, using the other's momentum to throw it, and it crashes into a tree.
"Ow." It grunts. "What are you?" Theo demands, and the other blinks at him.
"What're you, eh?" The other demands. "No human ain't ever done that before."
Theo stares. That was terrible. "Werewolf." He says, default answer, and - while the other is dumbfounded for a moment - charges them, claws out, and then slams his hand into their gut.
"Well that's unfortunate," It says, coughing up blood. "I kinda needed that organ."
Theo doesn't respond; simply rips upward, and lets the thing drop to the floor, before crushing it's neck - since whatever it is is vaguely humanoid, he figures that will at the very least hurt - and stepping back.
He waits a minute or so, a strange greenish-black 'blood' dripping from his hand, and once he's assessed that the other has stopped being alive - no breathing, what equates to its heartbeat stopped, etc - he wipes his hand on the grass, grimacing, and then checks the - whatever over for something.
An ID, keys, phone, whatever - something that he can use. Theo comes up with jack squat for his efforts though. Sighing, the teen lifts the being up, walks over to the edge of the lookout point, and drops the body. Hopefully, that'll be that, since it isn't humanoid and the supernatural world gets ignored as much as is possible by the general public and the authorities.
But it does prove Theo can't stay here. Being out on the edges of society in this world appears to be annoyingly dangerous. He's going to have to go into the town tomorrow and find a place to stay - motel, hotel, b&b, Theo's not picky - on top of everything else.
And it means he's going to have to be extra careful not to be found by Stiles and Malia before he's ready and properly prepared with all the correct lies to confront them.
Theo wasn't attacked during the rest of the night, and he got enough sleep to feel fine if not revitalized come morning.
As it is, Theo has a lot of work to do. The first is to get a layout of the town, and that should be easy enough. It's not really a tourist kinda place, Sunnydale, but it is on the exit road from Cali, so people will inevitably stop over here - and so hotels and motels are commonplace, and so are maps, which appear to be sold in pretty much every store.
Sunnydale is one of those kinda towns. A layover, for most people - a single stop on a journey somewhere else. Theo's read about things like liminal spaces, and Sunnydale fits the bill quite well.
Still. It's not a single stop for him, and so eventually he does find the single shop which has maps of Sunnydale itself. It takes a lot longer than he would have liked, but it is what it is.
After that, Theo finds a small cafe and gets something to eat and drink, and ponders his options for a moment.
It took all morning to find the map, for fuck's sake, so Theo knows his next priority is going to have to be finding a place to stay, and a source of income.
Theo smooths the map out over the table he's at - in the corner of the room, can see who's coming in but not immediately noticeable from the front door itself - and scans it over. He spots a few that he deems too close to the center of town and a few too close to the outskirts, and immediately crosses out ones with occult-sounding names because he doesn't exactly want to push his luck and end up fighting a whole group of - whatever that was last night.
Eventually, he decides to go have a look in what seems like an abandoned part of town for a set of apartments that still have working water, at least, if not anything else, and folds up the map, and pockets it, leaves the money on the table and exits the cafe unnoticed.
Theo smells them long before he hears them or sees them, and he manages to hide far down an alley before Stiles and whoever the other person - a man, a few decades older than them and who vaguely reminds him of Malia - walk past.
Theo... can't really pass the opportunity to listen. He's not going to follow them - not while Stiles has unknown company - but he's going to listen.
"Your paycheck came in today," Stiles said. "Please tell me you got it in cash?"
"Unfortunately no." The other replied. "I had to open a bank account. Luckily for us, the bank in Sunnydale is as corrupt as they come. It did take most of the paycheck, but they opened the account without much fanfare under the name Pete Tate, which is the best they would allow for the money I had."
Stiles sighs. "That's something, at least."
"It does mean we'll need to wait until the next paycheck to start fixing the station." The man commented. "But I felt the need to lay low was more important at the current time."
The man stops, and after a few heartbeats, Stiles asks. "Earth to Peter. Seriously, what the fuck are you doing?"
"I'd avoid that alleyway." The man advises, smoothly, and Theo hears footsteps fade off into the distance.
"Fucking creep." Stiles mutters, just loud enough for Theo to hear - and so was probably meant for this 'Peter's' ears too - and then his footsteps faded as well.
Theo let out the breath he'd been holding. Whoever this Peter is has enhanced hearing; Theo's just very lucky neither investigated what the man had heard. Considering that was Theo, and Theo wasn't ready to be revealed quite yet.
Nor was he exactly pleased with the prospect of having to explain why he was eavesdropping on them in an alleyway, but that didn't have to happen, so Theo will just be more careful.
As it stands...
Theo opens the map and consults it. Yes - he was right; there was only one 'station' in the abandoned district Theo felt confident that they would be talking about.
Theo took out a marker he'd got from the same place he'd gotten the map, and circled the station.
He'd need to avoid getting too close to there, as Malia would surely recognize his scent.
That makes things a little more difficult. He's already circled the school as a potential no-go zone, because if these two were planning on properly running away, they'll need that qualification if nothing else.
And finally, Theo sighed, because now he had to look elsewhere for housing.
Damn it.
Theo finds an apartment complex that would be pretty perfect - not too recently abandoned but not let off the grid yet, furniture still in place in most apartments and appliances seemingly still in working order - if it weren't for the vampire he finds in the third apartment on the fourth floor.
"And a snack waltzes right on in like he owns the place," The vampire says, and Theo looks at it disinterestedly.
"I was looking for a place to stay," Theo said. "Unfortunately, you don't seem very agreeable to having neighbours."
The vampire licks her lips and smirks, shrugging. "Oh, I'm agreeable." She purrs, stalks forwards.
"So long as you know your own expiry date."
"... Never." Theo shoves her backward and she goes flying, an unexpected hit rendering her surprised. "Hey!" She says. "You wouldn't hit a lady."
Theo blinks at her. The vampire shrugs. "Worth a try, right?" She says, and Theo thinks she must be young, because when she rushes him her technique is sloppy and he sidesteps, throws her into the wall, the impact heightened by her own momentum.
While she's disorientated, Theo snaps the leg off of her coffee table.
"Advice: don't live with things that can kill you," Theo says, not that she'll really be needing the advice, and slams the makeshift stake home. The girl turns to ashes, and he drops the stake.
Well. He's certainly not choosing this particular apartment. But that doesn't mean he won't take her microwave.
Theo gets his place set up. He's on the second floor, with a window to the fire escape and its close enough to the ground that Theo's in little danger of death should he get thrown out of said window and crash to the ground.
It's safe enough, he figures, as Theo puts his one or two t-shirts, sweatpants and jeans away in the closet, then stores his underwear and socks in the dresser. It most definitely could be far worse, Theo knows. The whole complex could be taken over by a - whatever of vampires, and that would have been far too much for just Theo to take on.
Regardless, Theo's all set up now, and it's already pretty late. He grabs something to eat from his stash, and then gets changed and crashes on the pillow-less bed.
It's better than a car seat, he decides, and slowly drifts off into a light sleep.
Tomorrow, Theo's going to try and track the two he's here for and the extra he hadn't been prepared for. Theo's good enough to avoid them entirely if he tries, but if he bumps into them, he won't miss the opportunity.
Tomorrow will be either first contact or a whole day of following the two, he's decided. No matter how it plays out.
A Little Bit Of (Bad) Luck. (Looking Back At The Past Is Never Easy.)
Chapter Summary
Malia gives an explanation of Were-creatures and what it means to have blue eyes.
Theo confronts Stiles about a favour.
When Stiles wakes up the following day - the day after finding out Peter's pay-check had had to go towards hiding their lack of identities instead of fixing up their base - he's alone.
Gone to ask Faith & Buffy about vampire stuff. Willow asked to meet me at the library with Giles and Oz during lunch, despite it being Saturday and didn't say why. See you later.
- Malia.
Short and sweet and to the point. Yeah, that was Malia alright. Stiles' mouth quirked up to one side, fond, as he balled the note up and dropped it into the bin.
Alright. So Stiles doesn't really have anything to do today then.
Deciding his first course of action might as well be to make sure all the traps are set properly, here in the Station and along the route to the old gym, Stiles stands and dresses, grabs his bag of spare clothes, toiletries, and cash, then goes down into the kitchen.
Peter's there, messing with the microwave. He actually looks like he knows what he's doing, so Stiles leaves him to it and makes himself a bowl of cereal.
"Are you absolutely certain nobody followed us out of Beacon Hills?" Peter asks without preamble, and Stiles frowns at him. "I think Malia would have told me if they were," And he says it in such a way that is asking Peter 'Are you saying you think your daughter is incompetent?', Because Stiles knows Peter and his ego, and he knows that Peter would never be able to admit to his own or his child's own faults.
And Stiles trusts Malia. She didn't say there was anyone following them, so Stiles is damn certain that there wasn't. Regardless; Stiles would have seen them. He'd have known that they were there.
He just... wouldn't be able to explain how he knew.
Peter hummed in acknowledgment, and Stiles scowls at his cereal before eating it quickly, determined to remove himself from this conversation as fast as possible.
Once Stiles is finished eating, he gets up and he leaves the kitchen, leaves the Station (after checking the traps) and re-seals the mountain ash, uncaring of the fact that he's trapped Peter inside for the rest of the day.
It'll mean Stiles won't have to worry about whatever Uncle Creeper is up to, so honestly, that's a win in his books.
Stiles finishes checking the traps at the gym and is now certain their route is safe. Having also taken the time to set up some vamp traps, Stiles is even more sure of that now than he has been for the whole time they've been in Sunnydale prior to today.
Unsure of what to do next, Stiles washes up in the gym's showers and gets ready for the day, returns to the Station and gets in his jeep. Stiles ponders on his options for a moment - going to see what Malia is up to... and that's really it - before deciding not to do that and to simply drive around Sunnydale in order to get a lay of the land.
It seems like a useful way to spend his time, and so Stiles does exactly that.
When Malia arrives at the library, she's not sure what to expect. Finding Willow, Oz and Giles simply sitting around the central table relaxes her slightly, since it makes this seem like it's not an interrogation of some form. However, Malia is still wary.
Malia slides into a seat, and Willow appears to compose herself before speaking. "So," Willow starts, "You're a werecoyote, and my boyfriend is a werewolf, right? And we were wondering if you had - had any more knowledge of how that works compared to what we know." Willow glances at Giles. "And Giles is here because if you do, that means our books aren't - good, enough, and we'll need to record the new information... or something."
Malia nods. "Alright," She says. "Should I go first?"
"That would make sense," Willow says, and Oz leans forwards, face impassive but heartbeat raised ever so slightly above its usual tempo. Giles takes out a notepad and a pen, and then Malia starts talking.
"From what I know," Malia begins, "There is a wide range of were-creatures. Werewolves, werecoyotes, and I figure pretty much anything else you can think of. I've - or, well, we've fought a were-jaguar, for example. Were-creatures aren't inherently evil, though some can be, especially if they give in to baser instincts. Not were-specific baser instincts, but the baser instincts of the individual." Malia pauses. "Like the were-jaguar I mentioned; she gave in to - well, her instinct to hunt, I suppose." Malia's lips quirked upwards. "Considering she was a supernatural hunter previously, it's - fitting."
Malia pauses here, and Oz frowns at her. "Supernatural hunter?" He asks, and Malia nods. "People who hunt the supernatural. Out of hatred, fear, superstition. Or a simple liking for murder and a wish to do it in a way that's supposedly 'justified'."
Oz nods, and Malia returns to her previous explanation. "Anyway, so you have that. Then, of course, there's the different forms of each - Alpha, beta, omega. Alphas are leaders with red eyes, and they grow in power the larger their pack. Betas are pack members, and omegas are werewolves that lack a pack. You can have an Alpha that is an omega, and they're always the worst, since they have the boost in power that all Alphas have, and the incessant need for pack that they will fulfill in any way that they can, including biting and turning anyone and everyone no matter their consent in order to get betas. Omegas, those without a pack, will inevitably go crazy. I don't know if that's fixable or not, but it's fact all the same. There's also the case of True Alphas; betas who rise to Alpha-hood without the need to kill an Alpha or wait for the death of their Alpha to maybe get the power via inheritance. As far as I'm aware, some packs have a system where a specific beta is chosen and will be raised to be an Alpha, and will kill the previous one at a set time so that they will definitely be the one to gain the power."
There's a pause. Malia shrugs. "And that's all I know about the power system."
Giles finishes writing, and Willow and Oz share a glance. "I guess I'll just move onto the actual ramifications of being a were-creature." Malia continues, then starts up her explanation again. "So, with that out of the way, we'll go onto mechanics and the biological stuff. Some weres can do a 'full-shift', which means they can turn into a wolf or a coyote or whatever they may be. All werecreatures can do a partial-shift, meaning they can gain claws and fangs and extra hair for the guys and sometimes a lack of eyebrows for... some reason." Malia shrugs and demonstrates. "My eyes are blue. Most were-creatures' eyes will be gold, Alphas are red. Blue..." Malia hesitates here, frowns and loses her shift, but keeps her eyes glowing.
"Blue?..." Willow prompts, frowning over at Malia.
Malia swallows, and then looks up at the three in turn, before focusing on Oz. "Blue means you've taken an innocent life."
Willow lets out a rush of air, and Giles purses his lips at her. Oz's heartbeat spikes, but he shows no external signs of being affected aside from that.
"It doesn't mean you've committed murder." Malia continues. "It - it just means you're the reason an innocent is dead. For example, a - relative, of mine, from what I've been told, alleviated the pain of a slow and horrific death from his girlfriend at the age of fifteen by committing a mercy kill. Whether it was at her request or not, I don't know. I haven't been told the whole story." "Is yours a similar case?" Giles probes, and Malia - can't look at him.
"No," Is all she says, heavy and final. "But..." Here, she pauses.
(There's a reason she never pushes Stiles to understand that the Nogitsune's actions, that
Donovan's death wasn't his fault - that they aren't something he should hold on his conscience. Its because she gets it, Malia gets the inability to separate something you vividly remember doing yourself from your own actions. From something you can feel guilty about.)
Malia swallows. "Were-creatures," She moves on - ignores Giles' piercing look and Willows confusion, focuses on Oz's lack of a reaction. "Are affected by the full moon. As you well know."
Willow nods and Oz inclines his head. Malia takes in a breath and doesn't notice (and nobody points it out to her) that her fingers are digging into the wood of the table.
"If a were-creature doesn't have an anchor prepared, they lose control." Malia takes in a breath and closes her eyes. "They shift, and they - can't stop themselves. They hunt, or at least they want to if they're restrained, and they -" Malia stops.
"You don't need to continue," Willow says softly, and Malia looks at her, eyes glaring blue. "You should know," Malia says.
Malia continues.
"A were-creature can lose control and - and kill people." Malia pauses, takes a breath. "I, for example, experienced my first full moon when I was nine. I - wasn't prepared. I didn't even know I was a werewolf."
Malia opens her eyes and looks to Giles. "I killed my family." She said, calm and collected, a fact she's recounted more times than she has fingers. "I killed my family on a full moon, and I ate them."
Malia turns her attention back to Oz. "You need an anchor." She says. "And you need to figure out why you can't partially shift, and you need to figure out why your full-shift is corrupted. And you need to do it now before you hurt someone. Trust me, you'll never forgive yourself."
And with that, Malia gets up. She grabs her bag and she leaves, slamming the door behind herself and in the process damaging the hinges. Malia doesn't much care - she leaves, and she runs.
Stiles is driving around the town, mind wandering when he sees - No. No. Stiles refuses to believe It's just the same car. That's all.
But Stiles can tell, after he sees it, that the car - it's following him. And Stiles -
Stiles doesn't know anyone here. But he knows a person back home who (unfortunately) owns that Jeep. And if Stiles didn't already feel bitter, then the knowledge that Scott would send - when he knows perfectly well that Stiles -
Stiles shifts gear and drives into the abandoned part of town, pulls up at a small, empty gas station and hops out of his car, pulls himself up onto the hood and waits.
The jeep pulls in, and Theo gets out. Because of course Theo'd find them, of course Scott would send Theo, of course nobody would object.
Of. Fucking. Course.
"Well?" Stiles asks, short and cold and -
Angry. Because Stiles - he hates Theo. Hates him vehemently. He's hated him for a long time, and he will continue to do so until the day he dies. And by 'he', Stiles means either himself or Theo.
It's hard to hate dead people; believe him, Stiles has tried.
(And its impossible to hate someone if you are dead yourself. Obviously.)
"Alright," Theo says, holding his hands up in a placating gesture. Stiles glares at him, gives himself a moment to cool down before dropping off the jeep and folding his arms. "Well?" He asks again - snaps at Theo, maybe, and Theo winces, ever the actor.
"Look," Theo continues. "All I ask is that you listen for a moment, alright?"
"Why'd you come to me?" Stiles asks accusingly. "I hate you. You'd have more luck going to someone else."
"You mean Malia?" Theo asks, and Stiles glares at him harder. "Or the other guy?"
No, definitely not. Stiles wants Theo to stay as far away from those two as is supernaturally possible, for completely different reasons.
"Fine." Stiles snaps. "Go on then. What do you want?"
"I want refuge," Theo says. "In exchange for not going back to Beacon and telling Scott and the rest where you are, I want to have a place to stay while I finish my high school education, and I want a place to stay that isn't infested with vampires."
Stiles scowls at the other teen. "Why would you even need refuge?" He demands. "It's not like-"
"Scott knows." Theo throws out, abrupt and loud. He repeats himself, quieter and more earnest, and Stiles sneers and looks away because he can't -
"Scott knows about Josh. About what happened on the roof. He... wasn't happy." No shit, Sherlock, Stiles thinks and returns to glaring at Theo.
(That... was a mistake.)
Theo's expression is earnest - almost beseeching Stiles to listen, to care, to understand, and Stiles hates him.
He hates him viciously, because Theo -
(They know each other, these two. They've known each other at their best and their worst, as children and as teens and as just-barely adults, and they know each other.)
(Stiles hates what he's done. He hates who Theo is now. But he can't hate him, not really. Not with their history.)
"Please." Theo stares at him. He's a great actor, Stiles will give him that.
Still.
"Stiles."
Stiles looks back at Theo, askance.
(There was a time when they were younger, a time when if Stiles had just listened then maybe -)
(There was a time when they were younger, a time when if Theo had just asked outright then maybe -)
"Alright," Stiles says, heavily. "Fine."
Theo looks relieved. Stiles -
(He doesn't hate him. Not really. It's not that simple.
He can't hate him.And that is what he hates.)
wants to punch him in the face. He decides instead to get into his jeep, gestures for Theo tofollow in his, and drives.
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