Agent McCall didn't quite know what the hell to expect as he and the Deputy piled out of the car.
"Do you think we should call for back-up? Or animal control?" he asked the Agent.
McCall was eyeing the debilitated warehouse. He was about to speak when an ear-bleeding, skin-rending shriek ripped through the air, followed quickly by the rapidly approaching roar of a vehicle. The Deputy and McCall were driven to their knees by the first sound, and then a frantic shout that could have been human had McCall on his feet again. Something smashed into the wall of the warehouse and piled out in shattering chaos.
"Hey!" McCall shouted instinctively as a body emerged from beneath the rubble.
His gun nearly dropped out of his suddenly numb fingers as the figure whirled around; it's eyes were glowing pale blue, it's almost human body hunched over, claws and fangs-
That was all McCall had time to see before something huge plunged out of the gaping, jagged hole in the side of the building, as the terrible shrieks came again. He covered his ears with effort, trying to keep his gun in his hand as he stumbled back against his SUV. The Deputy bunched in at his side, shouting something incomprehensible. The animal-man-thing spun around to face...
"What the fuck is that?!" shouted McCall, eyes blown wide.
No answer came as the thing—all leather and wings and bones, a dripping, needle-toothed maw and slitted eyes—took suddenly to the air. The creature roared, the sound so load and awful and animal it drove McCall and the Deputy to their knees. Squealing brakes tore their attention away from it as more bodies piled out of a familiar blue Jeep.
"Cora, help Derek! Stiles, check if they're alive!"
Was that...? No...how...it couldn't be...
There was more roaring and he twisted to watch as something like the blue-eyed beast leapt up the side of the building, a blur almost too fast to see, with the sound of metal tearing under keratin.
"Hey, you guys-oh shit!"
McCall turned aside again and found himself face-to-face with none other than Stiles Stilinski. He had a bleeding cut from the corner of his nose to his ear, blood splattered on his filthy shirt, carrying a metal baseball bat, dented and splattered in something black and thick like tar.
"You've got to be kidding me! I had a date! I had a date with a hot, single, relatively sane-" he cried, waving his arms and glaring at McCall. The Agent's head was spinning too much to reply, when Stiles' rant was cut off at the pass.
"Stiles hit the deck!" a female screamed, commanding and absolute.
The teenager rushed McCall, driving him into the ground just as something screamed down from above them, a blast of hot air and the reek of death, the whoosh of leathery wings. The Deputy screamed as he was lifted off the ground, metal scored in high-pitched protest as claws ran along the edge of the vehicle.
"Stiles, go!"
McCall identified the girl from the brief flash he saw of her from between the ground and Stiles' lean arm. The Argent girl, sporting one of those heavy-draw combat crossbows. Suddenly he was being hauled up and off his feet, shoved stumbled towards the warehouse.
"Wait, Ryan-"
"He's dead, move!"
It chilled him briefly into absolute stillness, the cold fury of the teenager's words. He'd recall that moment with a grimace for the rest of his life, because suddenly the winged monster was coming at them again, and there was a boy standing between him and it, swinging out with the baseball bat like a knight with a mighty sword; it connected with a sickeningly thick crunch, and the thing spun out like a race car on a wet corner. He didn't remember what movement took him from standing in the open to being crouched by the side of the warehouse, but he realised that Stiles was hurt a second later. The boy held a hand against his wet, red side and coughed, splattering blood against his hand. The bat lay by his side, a prominent bend in the thickest part of it.
"Jesus Chr-I'm calling 911"
Stiles gave him a completely incredulous look.
"Are you serious-give me that!-" he snatched the phone out of his shaking hands and pitched it against the wall. Outside of their hideout, somebody shouted Stiles' name.
"I'm fine, go help Scott!" he shouted over her shoulder, around the edge of the wall.
"Scott's here?!" McCall yelped, far less masculine and in control as he would have liked.
"I'm blaming this whole damn on Scott" Stiles muttered darkly, more to himself than in reply.
McCall gave a loud sound of protest, which was cut off by the sound of a round hitting the chamber. Stiles had just shucked his service weapon with practised ease.
"What the hell are you doing with-"
Stiles was already speaking over the top of him, moving into a crouch and picking up his bat as he shoved the gun into McCall's gesturing hands.
"Shut up, shut up, just shut up! I don't have time to explain anything to you-" from across the expanse of the warehouse, there was a roar that shook the tin. Stiles swore.
"Stay here! Stay quiet! And shoot anything that's not furry!"
He was scrambling to his feet even as he gave his orders in a zero-argument tone, the aluminium of the bat scraping on the asphalt in his scramble.
"What?! Furry?!" McCall shouted, pushing himself to his feet with one hand and tensing on the familiar butt of his gun. Stiles walked backwards a few steps, gesturing wildly.
"If it's got wings, put a bullet in it!"
There was a shriek, another crash of metal and body and the earth-shattering roar of the beast and Stiles whirled around just in time to see a tangled, messy rolling dog pile of supernatural pile off the roof of the neighbouring building and crash spectacularly to the ground. Then, quite suddenly, it was absolutely silent.
Stiles sat down hard in the middle of the asphalt and stared at Derek and Isaac, staggering away from the corpse, covered from forehead to thigh in the creature's tar-like blood, chucky splatters of unmentionable gore, and brief, brilliant smears of their own blood. Derek shook, unmistakeably dog-like though Stiles disinclined to comment, and his face became human once more. Isaac bent over, catching his breath, and when he looked up again, his face had also returned to normal.
"You know, in a long, varied career of really, really gross, that-that is just...that's, just... gross"
Derek approached, frowning.
"You're hurt"
"Yeaaa"
Stiles stuck his right hand out, curling his left around the bloody claw marks that had torn through his shirt. Derek gripped his palm and hauled him to his feet.
"We got bigger problems" he said as he jerked his head over his shoulder, where McCall was walking towards them, eyes glued on the mangled, leathery corpse, face white in the gloom.
"Great" Derek bit out sarcastically. Stiles clicked his fingers into a 'you-got-it' gun shape and spat out a mouthful of exertion-sticky spit and blood.
"We gotta get you to Melissa" said Isaac, looking concerned as he picked up Stiles' bat and offered his shoulder. Stiles leaned into the support gratefully.
"What...what is that?" stammered McCall.
"Harpy. Maybe. Not actually too sure. It's all...gooey now anyways" replied Stiles in his knowing, offhand manner, waving a perfunctory hand in the general direction of the monster.
"So...then...wh...what the hell...?"
"Hey! You guys okay?!"
Stiles kind of wished he had a camera for the look on McCall's face when Scott came limping through the ripped gap in the warehouse wall, followed by Cora and Allison. He paused briefly when he saw his father standing there, eyes narrowing.
"What the hell is he doing here?" he demanded when he got closer. McCall started forward, angrily, trying to gain back some control for himself.
"Scott Graham McCall, what the hell is going on here?!"
Scott held up a silencing hand with a quick, distracted frown—he looked like a parent with an annoying child—only to have it swatted away. The three werewolves growled and snarled in unison; McCall of course he'd just struck an Alpha in front of his pack and leaned into the teen's face.
"Don't put a hand up at me, young man-"
Isaac snarled again, louder this time, and flashed enough fang and beta-gold that McCall went green and stumbled back a few steps. Scott shot a reprimanding look at his beta, but otherwise didn't react. He was looking at Stiles, who was trying not to look too impressed. Stiles straightened a little as he met Scott's gaze: a soldier to a general now.
"He was here with...-" he trailed off and stilled, like some of the constant vibrating energy under his skin was switched off. Scott cocked his head questioningly. Stiles cleared his throat and tried again;
"-He was here with Deputy Ryan"
"Where-?"
Stiles jerked his chin to the side, over McCall's shoulder. Scott followed his line of sight to the crumpled, mutilated remains and sucked in a breathe. Stiles unwound his arm from Isaac's shoulders and moved past him towards the body.
"Stiles, you're hurt..." Scott reached for his friend, only to have him shake him off.
"Yeah, so everyone keeps, telling me. I can feel it. It's bleeding"
Scott let his hand drop and glanced at Cora, who nodded and moved slowly after the human. For a moment he rubbed the back of his neck and sighed. Then he straightened and turned to McCall.
"Agent McCall, you know nobody is going to believe you about anything tonight-"
The man gathered himself, fluffing up like an affronted bird and eyed Scott.
"Scott, whether you like it or not, I can prove what I have seen tonight, and if you don't explain to me just what exactly you've gotten yourself into here, I will do something about that. Just what-who...what is your friend here? How about you start there" he folded his arms as if this somehow made him the authority figure.
Scott blinked and his eyes were Alpha-red, crimson as fresh blood and glowing softly like embers in the murky night. McCall gasped and took a step back.
"He's what I am. Besides, you took a pretty hard knock to the head. I wouldn't believe...anything you had to say. As a matter of fact, I don't think you even remember what happened here"
"Nice try, Scott, but I didn't get hit in the-"
Scott's fist shot out and crunched into his father's temple, sending him crashing spectacularly to the ground. Allison let out a surprised sound somewhere between a laugh and a gasp and Isaac tried to smother a breathy chuckle into his fist. Derek cocked an eyebrow, but the corner of his lip ticked.
"That probably felt a lot better than it should've" Scott admitted, a little guiltily, but his voice broke into a small laugh when he glanced sideways at Allison's smiling face. He looked across at Stiles and Cora; she was tucked into his side, arms wrapped around his middle and if he squinted he could see black lines on her arm where she was sucking away at his pain. He let his shoulders relax slightly in relief; it had taken Stiles months to work up the courage to finally ask Derek's fierce little sister out, and it was just their luck to have a rabid whatever-the-hell-that-thing-was show up the night of their second date.
He wiped his hands on his mud encrusted jeans and fished his phone out, putting it to his ear. The extent to which he was ignoring the unconscious figure at his feet made Isaac smile.
"Let's clean this mess up and home" he said, his voice dropping into something like a tired, frustrated whine at the end. He acknowledged it with a smile as Derek rolled his eyes and moved off with Isaac towards the corpse.
"Hey, Mom...I'm fine, we're all...well, actually Stiles is kind of beat up, and I think he might need stitches...?...it was a harpy, or something. It's dead, anyway...yeah...no, Allison's here...yeah, tell Chris I'll drop her off...oh, okay...yeah, I'll call the Sheriff...hey, Mom?...-" he glanced back at Agent McCall.
"-I might've, sort've, kind've...I punched Dad. And knocked him out...?...Yeah, okay, love you too"
"What'd she say?" asked Isaac, helping Allison with the container of gasoline from the back of the Jeep. If it was one thing they'd learned; if ripping a thing apart didn't kill it, burning it to a crisp sure as hell made sure it wasn't coming back.
Except for that one time with the phoenix...
"Good job" commented Scott with a grin.