Summary: Scott and Derek attack Oak Creek to rescue Lydia, but Kira's fox fire catches the whole place on fire. Meanwhile, Stiles wakes up alone in the woods with no memory of how he got there. Hurt / comfort, angst, drama, friendship. Written after "De-Void" but before "Insatiable."

The Demon's Shadow

PenPatronus

Part 1 of 3

Proof of Self

Stiles' fluttering eyelashes felt like a centipede scurrying across the top of his hand. Liquid bounced off his cheeks when he coughed. Prying open his eyes, he found himself lying face down in shallow water that smelled like old pennies. His throat was dry but his teeth tasted like blood. Drawing a deep breath into his lungs felt like swallowing razorblades. Stiles coughed, accidentally inhaled some of the dirty water and choked on it. Coughing only made it worse so Stiles swallowed. There was blood in the puddle. He was thankful for the dim light. If he couldn't see how much blood there was he was less likely to vomit.

"Ugh," Stiles moaned. The whole world felt heavy. His whole body felt waterlogged. Slowly, in stiff, robotic movements, Stiles pulled his arms under his chest and, elbows trembling, pushed until he rolled over onto his back. Cold water went down his collar and into his ears but Stiles barely noticed the temperature.

The full moon glared down at him. A woodsy smell – bark and grass and dirt – filled his nose. Tree branches came into focus. An owl hooted in the distance. A sharp wind yanked goose bumps out of his skin. "What the hell…?" Stiles whispered. The wind brought a scent. Something nearby was burning. Stiles rotated his head left until his cheek landed on the soggy ground. There was an iron fence about a lacrosse field's length away, just beyond a dark tree line. Stiles saw rectangular shapes that might have been buildings with smoke billowing from shattered windows. "What the hell?" he repeated.

Someone screamed. A woman. He recognized the voice but couldn't place the face. Adrenaline made Stiles dizzy. He sat up and immediately regretted the movement when one of his ribs nudged a lung. Stiles yelped and bowed his head but remained upright. Another scream came from the buildings. Whether it was from fear, pain or surprise, Stiles wasn't sure. He was just sure that he had to help.

More pain greeted him when he climbed all the way up to his knees. The blood came from three places: a horizontal slice across his stomach, four stab wounds in the back of his neck and a bite mark on his left forearm. An animal bite.

A wolf bite.

"Scott," Stiles whispered. "Scott." Shadowy memories emerged. Stiles heard a werewolf howling but knew that it was in his memory, not in the forest. The last thing he remembered was that howl. That howl and a white room. That white room and a white stone in his hand. That white stone and a demon – the demon – crouched across from him on the Nemeton. He saw Scott. He knocked the game over. The Nogitsune shrieked at him and then – then, darkness. Blackness. The next thing he knew he was waking up in the woods a hundred yards away from a burning building.

Flames appeared. They spouted out of the side of the building like fangs. Stiles saw his own footprints in the mud and started to crawl back towards the iron fence. More screams – several voices, now – and the clanging of swords and the zips of bowstrings and the cracks of guns all encouraged Stiles to get back on his feet. His friends were behind those sounds. They were the victims of those sounds.

Stiles half-jogged, half-stumbled towards the fence on muddy, uneven ground. He followed his own footprints clockwise towards a narrow gate no taller than his waist. Five feet from that open gate a figure appeared. Black cloak, black mask, black everything. An Oni, Stiles remembered.

"Oh, crap," Stiles gasped.

The Oni unsheathed its sword.

Derek couldn't breathe. Lydia's arms around his neck were that tight. He carried her blindly through the smoke filling the burning Oak Creek internment building. She sobbed into his shoulder and he only caught a couple words: Stiles… fox fire… trap… And then she really got her voice back and shouted "What about Scott? Where's Allison?"

"I'll go back for them," Derek barely managed to say. "I'll go back for them after I get you out."

Derek's eyes watered from the smoke. The last whiff of forest air vanished when the fires around them grew hotter, grew wider. The werewolf leapt over a pile of burning bunk beds and ducked under a wall collapsing like a Jenga tower. Sparks singed his skin. Lydia shrieked and tried to fold herself smaller against him. Derek lifted her higher in his arms and protected as much of her bare skin as he could.

"Left!" Lydia suddenly yelled. He looked down and saw her eyes wide and sure, and Derek obeyed. A left turn, a pivot around a burning table and a staircase came into view. Derek stumbled down it, kicked open the wrought iron gate at the bottom and sprinted out.

They emerged from the rear of the building, the section facing the forest. Derek swung Lydia onto her feet but kept his arms around her. He was surprised she stayed upright. He was doubly surprised when she grabbed his hand and led him towards a narrows gate in the outside fence. "What are you doing?" Derek yelled at her.

"Trust me!" she replied. "Trust the banshee. New motto: trust the banshee." Her feet kicked dirt up into his face as they ran.

"What about the others? They're trapped in there!"

Derek was about to pull on her hand to stop her when she suddenly halted right in the doorframe. A figure crouched on the ground a few yards away. A familiar figure clutching his head and wincing. It was Stiles. A Stiles. One of the two demon-twin-Stiles running around Oak Creek. This Stiles slowly raised his eyes and asked, "Where – where did that thing go?"

"Stiles?" Lydia took a step forward but Derek yanked her back.

Stiles' hurt feeling showed on his face. "Derek, it's me."

"No way. We've been fooled too many times."

"Derek—"

"There's no way you can convince me!"

Suddenly, Stiles' eyes doubled in size and he shouted, "Derek, behind you!"

Instinct possessed Derek like a demon. With that instinct he shouldered Lydia aside and ducked under a sword that was so close to his head he felt the blade slice off a clump of his hair. Derek waited that quarter second until the sword's momentum opened up the Oni's torso and he squatted on his right knee and punched his left fist towards the being's stomach. The "ninja" expected it. It blocked the punch, twisted around Derek and slammed him into the iron gate.

Derek spit blood. Dizzy, vision blurred, he barely noticed the Oni march towards Lydia. She was on the ground with her arms braced behind her. Backpedaling cornered her against a tree. Tears escaped her eyes a second before she closed them so she wouldn't witness her own beheading.

Lydia heard the sound of sneakers through fallen tree leaves. She felt a breeze, witnessed the darkness behind her eyelids get blacker, and heard a gasp-grunting sound. She looked up just in time to see the Oni retrieve its sword from Stiles' stomach. Bizarrely, it thrust the sword into its own chest and then disappeared in a puff of inky black smoke.

"Stiles!" Derek bellowed. He raced forward and caught Stiles under the armpits right when his knees gave out. Lydia steadied Stiles' body as Derek folded to the ground with him, cradling Stiles in his arms.

The hole in Stiles' chest was as wide as Lydia's hand.

Stiles chuckled and blood appeared on his lips. "Believe me now?" he whispered.

To Be Continued