"I sense sin." Was the first thing Stiles says as he bangs open the door to his best friend's room.

Scott fumbled and almost dropped his phone. "Dammit Stiles, no."

Stiles was unrepentant, his grin wide as he played with the silver cross that hung from his neck. "I sense sin." He sing-songed before making grabby hands to the other's phone. "Now gimme."

"Stiles. No."

"Uh, Stiles, yes. C'mon Scotty boy let me see." The teen whined. But his friend remained firm, clutching his phone and whatever pornographic material on it, to his chest like it was the cure to cancer and Stiles was the evil doctor who would misuse it for ill gain. "Scott, Scotty boy, c'mon."

"You are actually the worst person in the world," Scott grunted as he hastily sat on his phone in hopes to protect it from his friend's prying eyes.

Stiles grinned, wagging his finger obnoxiously, "Uh, uh, uh, lying is a sin. You know you love me."

"Ugh, unfortunately."

Claudia Stilinski was always a religious woman. John Stilinski not so much, he was a more practical soul that preferred fact over any sort of fiction. But he loved his wife. Adored her enough to sit through dreaded Sunday church in his best suits when he could with barely any grumble or fuss. It helped Claudia had always looked so beautifully serene under the lights of colored glass windows, his very own angel he would tell her.

She always blushed so shyly at the name, so John naturally loved to use it all the more. He wasn't the most religious, nor the most devout man, but he thanked God for every single night that he had with her.

On the night Hieronim was born John Stilinski prayed. He prayed to God, he prayed to Claudia, he prayed to his angel. He prayed for his son to be safe, safe under the eyes of God and curled up warm in his mother's arms. To be as sacred as his name.

He wondered if it was the comfort of the thing, the relief to somehow share this responsibility of his family with someone far greater, far more reliable because that prayer was repeated each night. With gratitude, with joy, with tired hope. Safety for his son. Love for his wife. Eternity for his family.

It turned out that there was no eternity, there wasn't even a decade.

John Stillinski stopped praying after that.

"Wassup, Mr. Hale," Stiles greeted cheerily to the catatonic, scarred man sitting listlessly on his wheelchair. He tries to ignore the cold sweat that instinctively breaks out as he enters the room. There are souls he cannot see weighted down on this man, dark thoughts of bloodshed lurking in the shadows of the mind. There is the taste of ash and dust and smoke drying his mouth, the man's pain and hatred and grief cloying for attention.

It's less now that Stiles has taken it upon himself to visit weekly. Not exactly better but less. There's still so much of all the bad juju around that he has to bring extra holy water just to gargle his mouth out. And that shit is expensive and annoying to make.

It's worth it though. Ever since he accidentally passed by the ward on an exploration with Scott to find Melissa, he knew that this man was important, that this man was different. Stiles knows deep down in his bones that what he's doing now is right, just like knowing how to breathe, how to cry and how to laugh. It's a burn in his bones, a tingle under his skin, a shiver tracing the back of his neck.

It's a calling in his very soul. It's his calling.

"So you are not going to believe what happened today, well, you probably would, if you've been awake and listening to the Stilinski Saturday Radio this whole time, then congrats dude, you should get a sticker or something. Even Scott needs a breather once in a bit, but he's pretty much the best bro because he'll suffer through some of the most boring sermons I've ever given so I give him some leeway. Honestly, if you weren't in a coma, and therefore completely incapable of running to the hills screaming I would give you a gift card or something. Actually, I should hand out my own gift cards." Stiles babbles earnestly, filling the suffocating seething hatred in the room with his meaningless ramblings. He's pulling out an Adidas water bottle covered in rosary beads because he finds those are great for maintaining the potency of holy water. The beads, not Adidas. "Anyway-"

He continues on blathering on, switching from topic to topic like a fly buzzing all over the place. Between telling the mute man about Scott's latest hilarious blunder involving some crayons and a lamp, and the newest Marvel movie coming up, Stiles gently washes Peter's face and arms with the water, murmuring soft prayers as he does. It takes a while but the room slowly becomes less stifling and more breathable as the routine goes on. Stiles isn't sure what he does is working, he never is, it's not like there's a special manual for what he does exactly but sometimes he likes to think that behind that blank, vacant face, someone is in there is listening to him.

"Well, I think we're good for today Mr. Hale," Stiles concluded, satisfied at himself. With a gentle pat and squeeze on the comatose man's shoulder, Stiles made his way out with a quick promise of, "I'll see you next week, yeah?"

He doesn't get an answer. He doesn't need one.

Stiles missed his mother.

He missed her smile, the way she told him stories about angels and how she would always be patient in answering every single question he had. Even the ones he thought were dumb. He missed her laugh.

She died when he was eight and it felt like there was a tangible hole that she'd left in the Stillinski household. Stiles by then had given up his hair in solidarity to his mum, had given up laughter, had given up talking for a while. When Claudia Stilinski left earth, her son had given up so much.

The only thing he hadn't given up on was praying.

After all, God may have taken his mother, but there's no way God will be taken from his mother. Or something like that. Look he was eight and grief-stricken. It doesn't have to make sense.

The thing is, Stiles has the most passive-aggressive superpowers ever. Don't get him wrong. It's hella cool he has powers or magic or whatever belief fuelled miracle juice in his blood this was. He can tell when someone is lying, or when someone is thinking less than pure thoughts (which was tres awkward the first time he realised that particular revelation when he noticed his 'sin senses' tingling oddly every time Mrs. Ginade, his fourth grade arts teacher and Mr. Shinabachi, the music teacher, were in the same room together- they have currently filed for a divorce with their other halves and are apparently living happily in Australia).

He can recite the Bible, the prayerbook, and literally any holy based scripture when called upon. He can heal, kind of. Like he can do paper cuts and occasionally save someone's life from a dire illness, but there's not much for an in-between. That one is a little iffy to be honest. Animals tend to like him well enough, not to the extent that they'll come up to him and want to snuggle at first sight like a Disney princess, but if he goes up to them they don't shun him or scamper off.

Yeah. He's not exactly certain that the last one was a power as much as that animals don't seem to perceive the flailing skinny human as much of a threat to their very existence. Still. He likes to think so. It looks good on his resume if he ever wants to try his hand at being a superhero, or the pope or something.

One time he managed to call upon a plague of insects on Jackson. Scott would call it six butterflies, a really ugly moth, and a ladybug, but Scott doesn't know what he was talking about. That was totally a plague. And Jackson screamed like a five-year-old girl which is really all that mattered.

It's not enough to get him accepted to Professor Xavier's school for gifted children but it's pretty cool. It's useful. It's-

"Your still not going to the interrogation room with me Stiles."

"Oh come on!"

There was a small church in Beacon Hills.

It was nice and quaint, and warm, and if there was another house of god Stiles would've gone there instead in a heartbeat. His mother was always there in that church, with her smiles and stories and laughter. She was there in every sermon, in every hymn, in every page of the Bible. It had been unbearable for a long while. Stiles would pray, he would entertain the old ladies that went there on Sundays and he would chatter with Father Taylor, but he wouldn't step foot into the church.

Not then. It hurt too much.

If memories were weapons, that little church would be armed to the teeth. Vicious sharp teeth.

The first time he steps back in, it's because he's running like there's hellfire on his heels and Father Taylor was having a stroke.

"I'm just saying-" Stiles repeats for the nth time in the last five minutes but he immediately stops himself and turns around without warning, accidentally hitting Scott in the gut with his elbow in his haste to look nonchalantly. "Oh hey, Lydia, light of my life." He greets with what he hopes is a devastatingly dashing grin.

Lydia, light of his life, is unmoved. But that's okay. Stiles knows deep inside that she is slowly but surely falling to his charms.

Okay, no he doesn't. There is only so much his mystical holy powers can accomplish.

"Stiles," She greets coolly, and the fact she has addressed him at all makes him almost trip over himself despite the fact he has not moved a single step.

"Yes? Yes! Stiles, that is, in fact, my name." The teen blabbers, "Stiles." He repeats like he's confirming it. Distantly he can hear the faint but undeniable sound of Scott slapping his own hand to his face. He doesn't blame him. He sort of wants to do that too. Have Scott slap his face he means. Because he needs to stop talking, like, yesterday.

Lydia raises an eyebrow in a very judgemental manner, but the corner of her lips twitch upwards as if she is reluctantly amused by his idiocy. "Sometimes I wonder what Danny sees in you." Is all she says before leaving. But that is enough to spark enough hope in his heart to inspire a minor miracle.

"That was a lie!" He yells at her back gleefully, "You were totally lying!"

"Dude," Scott says disapprovingly as the everyone stares at Stiles like a moron.

"She was totally lying." Stiles says confidently, "I think I might even be able to shave off a year from my ten-year plan. Though that does mean I have less time to be able to be financially stable enough to afford the three alpacas for year four."

Stiles loves Father Taylor. He's like the wise, preachy uncle he never had, who secretly let him taste the wine from communion. The man was the priest for his parents' wedding, he baptized Stiles when he just a babe, he was the one who drove Stiles to meet his mum for the last time because his dad was on patrol.

He's one of the reasons why Stiles still held on to the church. A reason why he kept coming and coming, even when Jackson called him a 'sissy choir boy' when he was six or when Lydia told him that God wasn't real with the cynicism an eight-year-old really shouldn't have. Father Taylor is a reason for so many things but most of all, he's the reason Stiles went back. The reason Stiles knelt down next to the old priest, unmoving hand clutched in trembling ones, fear and grief, and anguish in his heart, tears in his eyes and pleas for God's mercy in his mouth. And finally, Father Taylor was the reason five other people in a quaint little church in Beacon Hills that day, witnessed a miracle.

Father Joseph Taylor is clinically dead for fifty-two seconds. He wasn't after fifty-three.

Danny and he, well, they aren't bros. Not like how he and Scott are. They aren't even great friends like Danny and Jackson. But they are tight for normal friendship standards. Somewhere above Facebook friends but about a level below Would Reluctantly Kill For You.

They officially hang out once a month, sometimes with Scott, sometimes without. Stiles, with great generosity, only spends five minutes asking about Lydia before they play computer games or watch a movie or, occasionally, hack the US government.

To clarify, it's Danny that actually does any hacking. Stiles is more the moral support and the warning signal who beeps when his special spidey senses tell him they're about to cross over into some serious shit territory.

How they became friends was actually quite an embarrassing story. Surprisingly more so for Danny than Stiles. They were both twelve and Stiles was working the confessional booth as his first ever, amazing, not really, summer job. Well, when he says 'summer' job it was more 'Father Taylor babysitting'. And when he says 'working the confessional booth' it was more 'hiding in the booth to play his Nintendo in peace'.

Bowser was about to get his ass kicked by Mario when Danny sat in front of him, nervous and completely unaware Stiles was one very thin wooden board away from him. Stiles doesn't do anything but stare at the familiar boy's face between the gaps of the booth, because newly found powers and even newer notoriety as the kid who claims to be the next Jesus aside, he was still a nosy awkward asshole.

"So, uh," Danny starts, "I-I think I might like boys." And wow, that was surprisingly to the point. The guy didn't even have the decency to let Stiles debate about running out of the confessional booth like the hounds of hell were after him, now Stiles has to stay put. He's like obligated to by the laws of every sitcom and romcom he's ever watched dammit. "I mean, Jackson told me about how he likes Lydia and how his heart gets funny and stuff but I don't think that way of any girls like at all. But then sometimes I think of guys that way and I don't know what to do." Danny confesses near tears.

"How would I tell mum and dad?" He whispers in a scared voice to the booth where Stiles is sitting wide-eyed and totally unprepared for this sort of sexuality crisis. Hell, he doesn't even have enough knowledge on sex to have a crisis about it yet.

But then again, it wasn't like Stiles wasn't going to do anything about it either. "Um." He begins because that's really as good a start as any. "I think you should just tell them the truth. Dad always says that's the best policy."

"...Stiles?" Danny asks with dawning horrified realization. Figuring the cat's out of the bag now, Stiles slides open the little wooden square that effectively blocks the view between booths. He tries to go for a friendly smile and wave. Danny looks like he's about to have a panic attack.

"Look, I totally get why you're upset." Stiles placates in the best way he can, which was letting his motor mouth run wild and free until hopefully the sheer amount of words that come out him push out any other thoughts in the room. "I mean, I would be a bit freaked out too if I started to spout all these personal things and found out it was like, my dad or god forbid, Jackson on the other side. But I hope you know I do take this whole church stuff kind of seriously and I would never, ever blab about someone's confession that they made in confidence. I mean, I honestly don't think I'm physically capable of that, seriously, I tried once to draw a penis on a bible because Scott dared me too and I literally couldn't do it! I had to get Scott to force my writing hand down so the pen could touch the page and then the marker didn't work- even though it worked just fine before and after when we used normal paper. We got so freaked out I cried and told my dad about it, but I think I was crying so bad it sounded like I said something about bad touch and penis and for like a week I think my dad thought me and Scott were stalked by a flasher or something."

Danny stared at him incredulously. Well, at least he didn't look like he was going to keel over in an anxiety-riddled mess. Improvement.

"So, you really won't tell anyone?" The tanned boy finally asks tentatively.

Stiles nods reassuringly, "Not until your ready to, uh, tell people." Then he looks Danny seriously in the eye, "But if you don't mind me saying, there's nothing wrong with dudes liking dudes."

Danny flinched nervously at that, "Er, what?"

Stiles sighs, "I can 'sense' certain things sometimes, don't look too closely into it. The point is, everyone is considered pretty damn equal in the eyes of God and it really doesn't matter if your gay, straight or weirdly into ducks or something like that. If your mum and dad love you- which they totally do, they'll accept you no matter what you are or into. Unless it's like serial murder stuff then that's probably not cool."

"I, uh," The young teen hesitates, looking so badly like he wants to believe Stiles, even if Stiles is considered one of the biggest weirdoes of Beacon Hills. At this time the people who really, genuinely believed Stiles had some sort of magical gift were few and far between, just another one of the many reasons why Stiles was holing himself up in the church on this beautiful summer day. Jackson especially was the worst. And probably the main reason why Danny was less inclined to believe anything he says.

"Look man, I'm just giving you my honest opinion and honestly, it's a pretty good opinion if I do say so myself."

"That's because it's your opinion." Danny points out dryly, a smile twitching at the corners of his mouth for the first time he's stepped into the booth. "But yeah, it is a good opinion." He finishes softly. "Uh, thanks.. man."

Stiles grins widely at that and playfully salutes the other, "No problem-o, just happy to be of service. And if for any reason your parents need some extra convincing, just send 'em to me for the special Stilinski experience." He tells the other genuinely.

Danny laughs as he leaves, "Maybe I will." Then, a little shyer he adds, "And maybe we can hang sometime? You know, since it turns out you're not a, well, you seem pretty cool."

"And Scotty said I would never make friends hiding in a box. Shows what he knows."

The Hale fire happened a year after Claudia Stilinski passed away. Stiles is eleven.

Back then he admits he never really knew the Hales. Not really. He knew them as that big family that lived in the woods and all looked like they walked out of a movie screen, much like how they probably knew him as the weird, spazzy Sheriff's son who recently claims he's magic. That doesn't mean he hasn't met a few of them before, you would have to be a hermit to not have bumped into one of the Hales in town at least twice.

Cora Hale was a year above him in school. She was sporty he thinks. Maybe.

Tahlia Hale chatted with his mum when they occasionally meet at the grocers. If forced to recall Stiles vaguely remembers seeing Peter Hale with a briefcase a few times around the station. And Derek Hale... He's personally talked to Derek twice. The first time Derek's ball happened to bounce in front of him and he had instinctively picked it up, intrigued by the mysteriously sudden appearance of the ball in the park. So intrigued was he that he hadn't heard anyone walk up behind him until Derek had, in retrospect, very politely asked for the ball back.

Stiles may or may not have screamed, threw the ball at Derek's face and ran to his laughing dad's arms.

Stiles is a bit of a pariah in Beacon Hills. Everyone knows who he is. No one really knows how to define him.

To the churchgoers, he's the sweet boy lucky enough to be touched by God. To the disbelievers, he's a very good liar who should put his intellect into better things than tricking people. To the ones who are afraid, who are jealous and angry, he's the freak. To the precinct, he's the nosy sheriff's kid who none of them can hate.

To the sheriff, he's the son who's just got a little extra special in him.

To Scott, he's the brother he never and always had.

Stiles is liked well enough by everyone though, however reluctantly, he helps out at the church, he learns to bless people and stay quiet enough to listen to their woes in the confessional he works on weekends and Wednesday afternoons. He makes the best slutty brownies in the world, and his cookie dough cupcakes are disgustingly good- much to the Sheriff's dismay because he's banned from even looking at a brown sugar cube much less that gooey delicious monstrosity. Stiles is the kid everyone knows about, hyperactive, has a loudly unrepentant crush on Lydia Martin, has a louder unrepentant mouth and can occasionally do the odd and unexplainable.

It's just another part of living in Beacon Hills.

When Stiles speaks to Derek for the second (arguably first) time, most people in Beacon Hills had heard what Stiles had done in that little church, how, ever since then he could uncannily tell truth from lie, lie from truth and spout the occasional minor prophecy or so.

A lot of people don't like it, a lot of people fear it, but they've all learned to heed Stiles' words when he tells them that the storm is going to damage their car if they park it outside, or that they need to dump Paul's money-grubbing lying ass, or to maybe not drive home alone tonight, or that Paul is cheating on them again.

Paul... isn't Stiles' biggest fan.

But Paul is kind of a dick so it's not like anyone cares.

Anyway. Derek.

It was a coincidence really. Stiles wanted chocolate ice cream with brownie chunks and rainbow sprinkles and he had gotten a helluva good grade on his chipmunk assignment even when Scott accidentally ate all two out of three of his frozen peanut butter acorns. His dad had an early day at the precinct and decided to reward him for not condemning his best friend to the third circle of hell for his gluttonous sins like he had threatened to do the last time Scott took the last cookie.

Scott may be sunshine and puppies but that cookie was quadruple chocolate chip and warm.

So, he got a great grade and he got his ice cream, and even better, he got a whole afternoon with his dad to spend in town. It was warming up to be a pretty awesome day in Stiles' very generous opinion.

Then he caught sight of Derek and immediately gagged.

Because next to the teenager there was some disgusting and horrible... "Monster!" He screamed in horror, effectively drawing the attention of the entire street. He'd dropped his ice cream in favor of clinging to his dad's arms like the human meat shield he was born to be. It would have been kind of funny if not for the absolute gut-wrenching terror on the boy's face.

"Stiles?!" John asks, suitably alarmed. A few people who'd recognized Stiles had gathered around him curiously at the hysterics. Stiles didn't notice. He's too busy staring at the sheer evil standing right next to a rather wide-eyed Derek Hale.

He's seen a few murderers in his father's precinct. There's a smudge on their soul that no good deed or intention can ever fully wipe away. They always look a shade darker, maybe a bit shadowy at the edges, like a reflection in an old, dirty mirror. It terrified Stiles at first, but he got over it soon enough. There was too much of it to really confront him. His dad has some smudges from being forced to take down criminals, the old man at the end of his street looks like he was constantly shrouded in grey dust from his days in the war, hell Scott has a smudge because he accidentally killed his pet goldfish when he was six. Taking a life, any life, for any reason, is still taking a life Stiles has found. But depending on the person you are, that stain you bear for it can pale with the decisions you make, the regrets you have, the resolve that's brought forth and the redemption you push yourself to.

Till that day, Stiles has always thought everyone could be redeemed in the eyes of God, in the eyes of themselves and others. He has spoken words of mercy and he has seen stains of others fade ever so. It was always a point of pride to know that he could do his part to save a person from possibly going off the wrong path. To nudge them somewhere better.

But never has he ever seen a person so completely pitch black. Stiles was always good with his mouth, he knew how to turn a one-word answer into a thirty page essay on how cool it would be to have horse legs, he didn't even have to think most of the time to keep up with a conversation, and most importantly, he had no trouble trying his goddamned best to explain what it's like in his head. Later he will try to tell his dad and Scott, and even later-er Derek, what he saw that day. He will try and tell them to imagine a person in a black latex body suit covered in tar and oil that was then furiously scribbled out by an incredibly frustrated four year old and then finally forced to roll in the fresh ashes of a burned down forest, to imagine that but three times worse and eight times darker.

So disgusting.

So… unredeemable.

"Monster," He had sobbed as he pointed at the pair blindly with his face and other hand buried into his dad's sleeve. "Monster, monster, monster."

The crowd that had gathered stares at where he points, and those that can't see the small boy stares where the others stare. They've banded together, muttering at the previously inconspicuously couple with suspicion and doubt because they know Stiles and they know that as dramatic as he is, he would never go so far without good excuse.

"It's that Hale boy isn't it? Talia's son?"

"Whose that with him? She looks.. older."

"She's new to these parts, I certainly don't recognize her."

"I know her! She's a new teacher."

"Teacher? Look at her clothes! All tarted up…"

"Does she have no shame?"

"Look at them clinging together, you don't think?"

"Pedophile."

John Stilinski curls his arm around his son protective and defensive as he narrows his eyes at the cause of his boy's distress.

"Derek... was it?" He asks smoothly, the teenager in question just nods dumbly, eyes wide like he can't believe this is happening right now. "And I don't think I know who you are Miss-?"

"That's not really any of your business." She snaps irritated, Stiles peeks back to look at the woman- he can see it was a woman now- and stifles a shriek at the sight.

"Well ma'am," John says coldly, "As an officer of the law, I am making this my business since this business looks a lot like statuary rape."

The woman smiles, Stiles can see the flash of teeth and it reminds him of the Cheshire Cat in Alice in Wonderland. "You have no proof, and I don't have to take this." She declares confident and cocky, she turns and sashays away. "Derek, hurry up!" She snaps impatiently, breaking the boy from his stupor.

The teen looks lost, as he hesitates.

"Son, you don't have to follow her," John says in a softer voice. Stiles peeks out to look at Derek with wide eyes.

"Derek!" The woman snaps, already halfway down the street. The teen jumps at the call and the moment of wavering was broken. He didn't even look back once.

"Don't go." Stiles whispers, voice raspy from his wailing. Stiles is sure not even his dad heard him but somehow he thinks Derek might've.

Three days later the Hale house caught fire.

Stiles woke up five minutes before the match was lit in a cold, clammy sweat. He had rushed from his room and shaken his dad awake while he kept sobbing relentlessly. Even as his dad ran out the door with just a jacket, his phone, and his gun, Stiles kept crying. He just kept crying and crying and crying. Because deep, down inside he knew. He knew that almost no one would be saved.