As of yet unbetaed. English isn´t my mother language, therefore there may be some mistakes.
I tried to research as much as possible. Because it has been some time since I last saw Teen Wolf, please excuse any discrepancy between my story and the series.
WARNING: Mental Health Issues; Mental Instability; Mental Institutions; Panic Attacks
I have no experience with the issues mentioned above. If anything is depicted wrong or offensive in any way, please tell me.
There were two people in the room.
The room itself was quite nice to look at. On the one side a big window front allowed the inhabitants to gaze upon a lush meadow, encompassed by old and sturdy oak trees. A little trail cut through the grass and led to a little pond at the edge of the meadow, right where the trees began to grow. A bench invited the stroller to sit down and to allow the serene atmosphere of the clearing to clean ones mind from all the sorrow the hectic human society brought.
The walls next to the windows were painted in a beige tone that went perfectly with the dark brown parquet floor, seemingly continuing the theme of nature and calmness that already begun in the little garden outside. The ceiling was high – at least three meters – with a grand chandelier hanging right in the middle of it. Its lights bulb shone in a warm yellowish tone and – together with the large window front – took care that the whole room was suffused with light.
The room itself was furnished rather spartan. A big grandfather clock stood at one wall, its pendulum always swinging back and forth. On the other wall a big shelf filled with books of many kind. Dickens, Hemmingway, Tolkien, Goethe and Shakespeare stood side by side, the letters on their spine already faded away due to the sunlight constantly streaming in through the windows.
Two couches stood right in front of the windows. And on each one a person sat. On the right couch was a woman. Of black skin tone she wore her hair in a tight knot at the back of her head. Her chocolate brown eyes were hidden behind black glasses, intensely scrutinizing the person on the other couch, while her mouth was pressed into a thin line. Around her neck was a necklace made of white pearls – an heirloom that always went to the firstborn girl in her family. Her blouse was of pink colour – not that terrible garish pink young girls liked to wear, but a more muted tone – and her well-manicured nails were painted in a similar hue that went very well with the blouse. A black skirt and black stilettos finished the ensemble and gave the woman an aura of sophistication and professionalism.
In one hand she hold a notebook, in the other a pen. The pages were still empty, waiting for the woman to write down her observations. From time to time the woman would click the ball pen, the noise disrupting the silence that penetrated the room.
While the woman was calm and composed the same could not be said from the person right opposite of her. The teenage boy – for he still looked like one even though he was already nineteen according to his file – was nervously fidgeting with his fingers. His dark brown hair was tousled, probably because every now and then the boy would run his finger through it. His whiskey-golden eyes never focused on anything, his gaze constantly roaming through the room. The only area the boy avoided to look at was where the woman was sitting. Deep shadows surrounded his eyes, caused by nightmares and the following sleep deprivation. His sickly-pale skin was littered with moles that looked like star constellations. The boy was rather lanky and his legs and arms looked to be too long for his body. He wore a black shirt, the font on it commanding the Avengers to assemble. There seemed to be always tension in his body, like he was ready to flee every moment.
"Stiles," the woman said and for the first time the boy looked at her.
"That is what you want to be called, isn´t it?" the woman continued. The boy – Stiles – remained silent.
"Tell me," the woman probed, "why are you here?" Stiles smiled. It was mirthless and lacking any warmth. As if he couldn't remember what to feel anymore and this was just a bodily reaction.
"Haven´t you read the file about me?" he asked mockingly. He looked her in the eyes. Dead, cold, ruthless. His gaze appraised her like she was some kind of animal led to its slaughter. Broken. Despaired. She wrote it down.
"I have," the woman replied evenly. "But I like to hear it from you. Those reports…often they only show us one side of the story. But I´d like to hear yours." She smiled at him. He didn't react. "After all that´s why I´m here. To hear your side of the story."
"You aren't the first one," Stiles said. "And you won´t be the last. They all want to 'hear my story'." He snorted in disbelief. "And then they look at me full of pity. Like I´m a broken, little thing. I don´t need pity. Never needed it." He paused for a moment. "Have you ever seen a bird with broken wings? They never stop trying to fly. They don't understand that their wings are clipped and continue flapping their wings, trying to escape. But there is none." As he stopped talking so did the woman stop writing.
"Are your wings broken?" the woman asked. Stiles didn't answer. Silence stretched between the woman and the boy. Eternity could have passed by or only a few seconds.
"Let me hear your story, Stiles," the woman implored. "And I won´t give you pity." The boy seemed to think about it. He looked her straight in the eyes. Then his gaze broke and he looked down on the ground.
"I don't know where to begin," he whispered and only the silence of the room allowed the woman to hear it. "I don´t know what to tell."
"Then maybe you shouldn't start with the 'what', but the 'why'," the woman said. She put the pen and the notebook aside and folded her hands in her lap. "Tell me why you killed Scott McCall."
Stiles starred at Allison.
She stood there, in front of the wall, holding her bow in one hand and an arrow in the other. She wore black leather – like always when the Pack had to fight – and her hair was tousled by the constant fighting motions she went through since the attack had started. Her gaze was fierce and full of determination. She looked like the Artemis incarnate.
Stiles looked around. He could see the other fighting against the Oni. Scott, Derek, Isaac; their eyes glowing bright in gold, red and blue in the dark surroundings. Their claws were extended, ripping through the Oni like a hot knife through butter. But it was to no avail. The Oni dissolved into black smoke only to reappear a few meters away. Their onslaught never lessened while the attacks of the Pack became more sluggish and slower.
Stiles turned around. He could see Aiden lying in a pool of his blood. The flickering lights of the underbridge made his skin look so white, a stark contrast to the dark red of the blood.
Stiles turned back to the main fighting. It had stopped. Everything was frozen in mid-action. He could see every particle of dust swirling through the air, every drop of blood and every crack in the wall. Mist gathered, its tendrils slowly creeping forward until it covered everything but Allison and Stiles. The world was white and nothing was left.
Lights flashed and suddenly he stood in front of Allison, a sword in his hand.
'Please, no, please, please, not again, please, don´t.'
His hand shot forth. The sword ripped through Allison. Stiles could feel bones breaking, tissue being ripped apart, blood flowing over his hands. Allison looked at him, her eyes wide in shock and her mouth opened in a silent scream, blood colouring her lips deep red.
Lights flashed again and Stiles was kneeling on the ground, Allison´s head lying in his lap. She tried to speak, but only blood poured out of her mouth. Stiles bend forward, bringing his head near Allisons to hear what she was saying.
"Murderer," Allison wheezed. Coldness spread throughout Stiles' body. He straightened up only to see that Allison´s body had evaporated into nothing but ash.
"Murderer." He looked up, still kneeling on the ground. Allison stood before him. Her black ensemble had vanished and was replaced by a white nightgown. She looked like an Angel of Death. Blood soaked through the thin fabric, turning it from white to deep red.
"Murderer." She took a step forward.
'I´m sorry,' Stiles wanted to scream but no sound would make it past his lips. Tears were filling his eyes, blurring everything around him.
"Murderer." Another Allison appeared.
"Murderer." Another. "Murderer." Another. "Murderer." All around him Allison was standing, gazing upon his kneeling form with accusatory glances. Their voices united into one giant chant.
"Murderer. Murderer. Murderer. Murderer."
Stiles woke with a deep gasp.
He felt like he was suffocating and he just couldn't stop shaking. His vision blurred and he could hear his blood pounding in his ears. The walls seemed to come closer and the shadows wanted to devour him. The room was to tiny. He couldn't breathe. Everything was moving, turning around and he just wanted everything to stop. It was too much, too fast.
He could still hear Allison in his mind. Her accusation repeated over and over again, like a broken record. Stiles was sure that if he looked down on his hands they would be stained with her blood. Every time he closed his eyes he saw her standing in that white blood-soaked nightgown, her gaze devoid of life.
Stiles barely noticed when the door opened and the light was turned on. He barely heard his father´s voice; barely felt his hand running soothingly over his back.
"Breath, son," he could her his father through the haze he was in. "Breath in and out. In and out." Stiles latched onto his father's words like they were a life-line that prevented him from drowning in his guilt. He could breath. Breathing was easy. He did it every day. Just breathing. That wasn't difficult. In and out. In and out.
The panic receded. Allison´s voice grew quiet until he could no longer hear her and his body stopped shaking. The weight on his chest lifted and he was able to breathe again.
Stiles looked at his dad. The lines on his faces had deepened over the last few weeks and his gaze held a constant sorrow. Instantly guilt welled up within Stiles and the only thing he could do was to avert his gaze.
It was his fault.
His fault that his father came home every night late, because he couldn't stand being in the house that held nothing but a son who had brought nothing but destruction on the town he had sworn to protect and the memories of a long lost love that taunted him wherever he went.
His fault that his father´s only companion at night was a bottle of cheap whiskey wherein he tried to drown his sorrows. Every night Stiles could hear his father staggering up the stairs, his helpless fumbling when he tried to open the door to his bedroom. And now his nightmares deprived his father of the sleep he so desperately needed to escape the hell that was their house just a little bit.
"Everything alright?" Stile´s dad asked. And Stiles nearly broke.
He wanted to tell his father of the guilt that consumed him every second he was awake and that threatened to overtake him completely every time he saw Scott or Lydia, the persons that had been closest to Allison.
He wanted to tell his dad of the nightmares that made every second he was asleep like living hell. Of the tortures that his subconscious dreamed up the moment he closed his eyes.
He wanted to tell his dad that he was a murderer and that Allison´s death was his fault alone. The nogitsune may have possessed him, but it was his plans it acted on. How could a thousand-years old fox-spirit know how to cut the power lines in a hospital? How did a demon that had been imprisoned for the last decades know how to best hurt his friends? That was him; all him.
But Stiles couldn't tell his dad that. He didn't want the only person that still held a tiny bit of affection – of love – for him to turn away from him with disgust, leaving him alone with his guilt in the dark. He just wanted his dad to hold him forever and make the world go away like he had when he was still a little child.
However Stiles knew that he didn't deserve that. He needed the pain to remind him what kind of monster he was. He couldn't forget what he had done – what he was guilty of – because everyone else was willing to forget and forgive. Stiles didn't deserve forgiveness.
"I´m fine," Stiles lied. He didn't look in his father´s face. One look and he would know that Stiles lied. His father huffed in disappointment and new guilt was instantly added to the load Stiles was already carrying. It seems that even with everything out in the open Stiles couldn't stop lying to his own father.
"If you need something…" his dad started only for his voice to fade out. He had already said it so much, but Stiles never took him up on his offer. The pain was his alone to carry.
"I love you, son," his father whispered and closed the door behind him. Stiles waited for a few moments. Then he holed himself up on his bed and began to cry until there was no tear left anymore. He cried until he was so exhausted that he fell asleep.
Allison was already waiting for him.
Stiles haunted the hallways of the school like a ghost.
People everywhere tried to avoid him. That wasn't something new – after all he had been that spastic kid that couldn't keep his mouth shut for his whole life – but the fervour with which they did was something new. Everyone knew that he had been in Eichenhouse. People whispered behind his back that they had always known that he would end up there someday. When he looked at them they scuttled away as if he would explode and murder them if they dared to look at him any longer.
The worst, though, was seeing the Pack.
Kira didn't know how to react to him. She hadn't known Allison very well, but she saw how her death affected everyone around her. She tried to make up the gloom of the others by being extra cheerful, but Stiles could see how her smile would fall off her face whenever she thought nobody was looking. She was always extra careful around Stiles, as if she feared that she would break him.
As if she feared that you´d murder her as well, a voice in his head so gracefully supplied.
Isaac walked through the school like a ghost as well. His skin was unhealthy pale – Stiles didn't knew that it was possible for werewolves – and everything of colour seemed to have been banned from his wardrobe. He didn't speak much with Stiles and had taken to avoid him whenever he could. He seemed to be the only one that blamed Stiles for Allison´s death. Correctly so. Stiles wondered how long he would keep staying in Beacon Hills. There was nothing left in this town for Isaac, but the spectres of the people he had lost. Brother, father, friends and lover.
Lydia had devolved back to the uncaring bitch she had been before the supernatural had taken over their life. She had grabbed the first good-looking athlete she could get her hands on and declared him her new boyfriend. Sometimes when Lydia entered the cafeteria and she saw them sitting at their table, Stiles saw a longing gleam she directed at them in her eyes before she straightened her back, put back her mask and walked over to the popular table.
She tried so hard to be uncaring – to be the perfect little doll she had been before – but when she left the girls restroom one day Stiles saw that her eyes were wet and her eye-liner and make-up newly applied. She looked at him, saw him standing there and dragged him into an empty classroom where she buried her head into his chest and began to cry.
Stiles could do nothing but hold her as she bemoaned the death of her best friend. He felt terrible. How could he even try to help Lydia with her grief when he was the cause of it? So he didn't say anything and kept holding her.
When Lydia had finished, she straightened up, rearranged her hair and dried away her tears. One last look at Stiles and then she left the room. They hadn't spoken since then.
Scott – Scott he couldn't even bear looking at. Every time Stiles saw his best friend – his brother in all but blood – he assured Stiles that it wasn't his fault that. Allison had died.
It was the nogitsune´s fault, he would say, you couldn't have done anything to prevent it.
Stiles wanted to scream that this was a lie. The nogitsune had possessed him, because he had been the weakest in the Pack; the weakest in a chain made of the strongest links.
Scott tried so hard to act as if nothing had happened. As if there was no gaping hole in his heart that had once been filled by Allison. But Stiles could find no humour in the jokes they traded and no comfort in their usual rituals. They just reminded him of a time when everything had been fine and the supernatural hadn't fucked up their lives this much.
Stiles couldn't look Scott in the eyes and not think how much Scott must blame him.
Your fault, they seemed to scream. Your weakness has taken the love of my life from me.
Stiles would never deny it.
Stiles was alone in his room when he suddenly felt as if someone was observing him.
It was that tickling feeling at the back of your neck that you got when you were sure that somebody was looking at you. But there was no one but Stiles in his room. Yet the feeling wouldn't abate.
"Who is there?" Stiles asked into the emptiness. For a while nothing happened. Then – in the shadows in the corner of his room – something seemed to move. Stiles couldn't discern what it was but every second its form became clearer.
When the figure stepped out of the shadow, Stiles heart seemed to stop.
"Hi, Stiles," Allison said.
The woman stopped writing when Stiles stopped with his tale. She looked up at the boy who seemed to be lost in his own thoughts, his head tilting towards the windows. She shut her notebook and laid it aside.
The noise seemed to tear Stiles out of his reverie. His head snapped back towards her and his posture stiffened.
"Do I have it?" he asked.
"What do you have?" the woman asked as she leaned back, still observing the boy.
"Your pity," he answered and looked her straight in the eyes.
"How can I pity you, when I don´t know the whole story?" the woman answered back. "I´m not here to judge you – that has already been done – I´m here to listen to you."
"Do you even want to?" the youth asked and for the first time there was some emotion in his voice. Curiosity.
"Yes," the woman replied instantly. "I want to listen to your story. Everyone deserves to be heard, even if it´s only my ears that will hear the story." Both remained silent after this; the woman completely calm and collected while Stiles started to fidget again.
It couldn't be denied: Hearing the story and telling it; that had created a bond between them. A delicate strand of fate that tied them together until the whole story was heard. Maybe they knew it – or could feel it – or maybe they were both completely unaware. It didn't matter.
"I think we had enough for today," the woman finally disrupted the silence. "We have both things to contemplate. Maybe you even more than I. We´ll continue tomorrow."
"Do you believe me?" Stiles asked, as if he hadn't heard what the woman had said. The woman stilled in her movements, her complete attention focused back on the boy sitting on the couch. Stiles averted his gaze. The whole world seemed to hold its breath. Time had stopped and there was nothing but two people sitting in the room.
"Does it matter?" the woman asked. The world continued spinning.
"No," Stiles replied after a while. "No, it really doesn't."
So, I had this undeniable desire to write some angsty and dark Teen Wolf stuff and that is what happened. Hope that you liked it :)
There will be two chapters (three in case I write too much) and I try to write and publish the rest within the next week.