A/N
Hey guys! Thanks so much for reading! Ok, here's the deal: this is a sequel, so if you want a better idea of what's going on in this story, I suggest you read 'Blood on my Name,' in which Stiles' connections to the Winchesters is explained. The Winchesters themselves won't be a focus in this story, but there will be a lot of other Supernatural characters. It takes place at the tail end on SPN season eight and is an alternate of TW season 5 episode 9, from which it branches out. Here's another deal: I've continued this story with a couple of Vampire Diaries crossovers featuring Stiles and the gang, and the events in those stories will be heavily referenced here. If you haven't read them, fret not, just try to gloss over the references. Basically lots of bad things happen in Mystic Falls and New Orleans, and I called the whole 'wanting void Stiles' thing about four months before episode 9. So yeah. This will eventually be canon divergent, but I'll try to work in 5b once that airs. Alright, that is all. Make sure to check out the other stories in this series (and my Supernatural story 'One Way Ticket', review, and enjoy!
Ch. 1
We Need To Talk About Donovan
Let's start with Donovan. Stiles didn't mean to kill him, it's just kind of one of those things that happens. Just like when he killed Alexander, or Katherine, or anything he's hunted with his brothers. He was a hunter, after all, and that meant sometimes things ended up dead. Sometimes, those things could be him if he wasn't careful. So let me repeat myself. Stiles didn't mean to kill Donovan. But as he watched the blood and mercury mix together on Donovan's corpse, he felt something gnawing and twisting in his gut that he hadn't felt since February his junior year: guilt.
Oh god, Scott's going to kill me.
That shouldn't have been his first thought. He was a hunter. He knew better. Sam and Dean had taught him that the worse thing to lose on a case was not your phone or your gun, it was your mind. He should have been thinking of the shovels in his backseat and places he could hide the body instead of shaking like he was suddenly in the arctic. Even as he reached into his phone to call 911 he could hear his brothers in his head, screaming at him not to. But what would they know? He hadn't talked to them, not since Dean called him to say that he and Cas were back from purgatory, and that something was weird with Cas so they had to stay vigilant.
So as Stiles hid in his jeep as the patrol car swept the area, all he could think about was how disappointed Scott would be. As a hunter, Stiles was supposed to protect the innocent, and now Donovan was dead thanks to some bad luck and worse morals. Scott's trust in Stiles was thinning, had been thinning since New Orleans, (not that Stiles would ever forgive himself for that. If he looked closely, Scott's knee still had the slightest phantom limp.) But now, with Donovan's blood on his hands? Scott would only see the cruel hunter that struck first and asked questions later. He wouldn't see the scared teenage boy that had clutched on to scaffolding as if his life depended on it, all training and skills erased from his mind in blind fear. He would see the boy who held a gun to a demon's head and shot without mercy, with cold, cruel eyes that could easily be turned on his friends. No, Stiles couldn't tell Scott, not yet anyway. Scott would only see a potential deadly hunter, not the boy who probably wouldn't have survived the night if not for his training.
When he checked the library again, the body was gone, and Stiles took that as a blessing and a curse. Somehow, he managed to get home in one piece, and his fingers splayed and twitched with nerves as he dialed one of several numbers seared into his brain.
Ring...Ring...Ring...
"Hello?" An unfamiliar voice said.
Stiles' brow furrowed in confusion. "Kevin?" he asked tentatively.
"Stiles?" Kevin asked with equal trepidation. There was a pause that sounded suspiciously like chewing and then Kevin spoke again, slightly muffled. "They told me you might call."
"Yeah, where are Sam and Dean?" Stiles asked. "I can't believe they trusted you with their cellphones."
"Yeah, well, they're still a little hesitant about the bunker." Kevin said. "So they left me one of their phones."
Stiles flopped down on his bed, processing the information. "Well where are they now?" he asked. "Could I call Dean?"
"Unlikely." Kevin mumbled through his meal. "They just left to go complete the second trial. Something tells me they're a little out of their coverage zone."
"You mean Hell." Stiles mused.
"I mean Hell!" Kevin said. "But you can talk to me if you want to. I am a prophet of the lord, after all."
"You are a 19 year old with an ego problem." Stiles grumbled. But he actually considered it. "I don't want any of this repeated to Sam and Dean..." Stiles began hesitantly.
"Cross my heart." Kevin said. "So spill."
"Okay," Stiles said, "let's say I did something bad. Unforgivable bad. Death penalty bad. But it was self defense. And it wasn't on purpose. And it was a him-or-me situation. And 'him' being a chimera-wendigo hell bent on eating my legs and killing my dad. Ame 'me' being a scared 17-year-old clutching onto scaffolding and pulling out a screw that resulted in falling steel beams and a hypothetical body And then said hypothetical body disappeared. Should I tell my strictly-no-murder best friend about it, even if it shatters my relationship with him?"
Kevin was silent for a moment.
"Kevin?" Stiles prompted.
"I'm thinking." Kevin said. "Sam and Dean told me all about your pack. It's Scott, right? The alpha? Stiles, I think you should tell him. Even if it wrecks your friendship now, keeping it a secret will definitely be worse."
"I have a history with this sort of behavior." Stiles said, panic from the earlier night beginning to resurface. "Scott's not going to believe it was an accident."
"He will if you tell him." Kevin said sincerely. "And if you mean it. Stiles, something like this, it's going to come out. Would you rather Scott heard it from you, now, or from someone else farther down the road?"
"Now." Stiles said. "Definitely now. Thanks Kevin."
"Don't mention it." Kevin said. "You're a welcome distraction from my 'required reading.'"
"Good luck on the tablets." Stiles said, relief flooding into his system. "And tell Sam and Dean to hightail it to Beacon Hills the moment they get back. This Dread Doctors situation is only getting worse."
Kevin murmured his assent and then the two said their goodbyes. Stiles was about to call Scott, his fingers poised over the numbers, when he looked up and saw a scrawled name on his whiteboard.
Theo Raeken.
Stiles' blood boiled. Theo. It always came back to Theo. Stiles wasn't fooled, not for a minute. There was something wrong, off, untrustworthy about Beacon Hills' newest werewolf. He could spot a liar from a mile away. But instinct told him to bid his time, so he did. If Theo wanted to move in on Stiles' ex-girlfriend, fine. Malia could more than look after herself. If Theo wanted to try to twist Scott around his finger, fine. Scott wasn't an idiot. But now the bodies were piling up, now people were less and less safe, and now Stiles had a sneaking suspicion about his old friend. Theo said he had wanted a pack, just how far was he willing to go?
Stiles flashed back to a fight he and Scott had had upon Theo's return.
"I let Malia in!" Scott yelled, walking frustratedly into the forest as Stiles trailed behind, the aftermath of his fight with the giant werewolf still leaving adrenaline in his system. "I let Kira and Liam and Mason into our pack. Why can't I do the same for Theo?"
"Because I don't trust him!" Stiles shouted just as loudly, flailing his limbs as if to make a point. "And Scott? I'm usually right about these things!"
"Why? Cause Sam and Dean taught you?" Scott asked with only a little bitterness.
"YES!" Stiles exclaimed. "Because I know what to look for! Because you trust people too quickly, and too often. And look where that's gotten us!"
"Stiles..." Scott said, softer, and Stiles felt bad immediately. Thier problems weren't Scott's fault. New Orleans wasn't Scott's fault.
"Do what you want, Scott." Stiles said, beginning to back away from him into the woods. "I can't stop you from connecting to an omega. But don't tell him about me, ok? Don't tell him who I really am."
Scott shook his head. "It isn't my secret to tell."
So Stiles had one advantage over Theo. But now Donovan was dead, and Stiles was more and more sure he was playing into Theo's- someone's-hands. That this was all a sick game. Well he had learned the hard way not to try to out trick a trickster.
Stiles took a deep breath, lied down, and went to sleep, dreaming of blood, mercury, and purgatory.
So he didn't call Scott that night. He went to Eichen house and tested his friend's morality, of which he was disappointed to find contained no remorse from anything Stiles had done to Donovan. And Theo continued to be in the dark about Stiles. Fast forward a few weeks, and Stiles got to watch as he continued to warp his way into the pack. He read the book, and, okay, the vision about his mom had sucked, but Stiles had been through so much worse. Satan worse. But then Theo killed Josh, and Stiles acted out. The key being acted. He wanted to find out how much Theo knew about Stiles, and what his cover story would be for witnessing Stiles' death, and Stiles wasn't disappointed. He always knew Theo was a lying son of a bitch, he just didn't expect him to be that smart. So, when he and Theo offered to watch the body several hours later, Stiles took the opportunity to study the wolf. And that's how he came to the conclusion that Theo was a total and utter sociopath. And guess what? He knew from experience.
But then Theo had saved Hayden and Liam, and Stiles knew that he was running out of time to make his move. Theo obviously had a huge endgame in mind, and Stiles needed to figure it out before it could happen. Meanwhile, Kevin had nothing on the Dread Doctors and Sam and Dean were busy with Cas and Naomi.
Stiles had made a mistake. He had made a huge mistake. Because he had told his dad about Donovan, and his dad had completely understood. But he was investigating the school for chimeras and something awfully suspicious had happened.
"Stiles..." Sheriff Stilinski said on the phone, "I just asked Theo what had happened at the library that night. And he told me completely the wrong thing."
Stiles had made a mistake.
He should have told Scott.
Because apparently Theo was backing down on the deal of silence they had reluctantly made.
He was smart, he was manipulative, he was a liar, he had Scott under his thumb, and now he was unpredictable.
Theo was going to tell Scott about Donovan. It made sense, really, to go after the only person in the pack who trusted Stiles completely (only Theo didn't know why) and rip that trust out of his chest.
Malia was missing. Lydia wasn't answering her phone. And, oh look, was that thunder?
Oh, and apparently Haden was dying. Lovely.
Stiles had made a mistake.
He had underestimated Theo Raeken.
Because Theo was obviously working for the doctors. Stiles could see that now. As he was driving over to the animal clinic with dread festering in his heart, Stiles' head swam with facts and conversations that were now beginning to make sense. First of all, the timing. That should have been the biggest clue, Theo came back into town just as the doctors did. Then there were the different signatures, conveniently covered up after the fact. Then Donovan disappears and makes a beeline for Stiles? Theo turned him into a chimera, and then sent him to Stiles. And how did the Dread Doctors know that Kira would be at Eichen House? Theo! Why did he give little qualms about killing Josh? The bastard had probably watched the doctors stick needles into him in the first place. Also, he was a sociopath using the death of his sister as some kind of get-out-of-jail free card. Not to mention, he had found Hayden and Liam rather quickly. The whole thing with the electric fence was most likely a show to gain their trust.
And then there was Scott. Stiles was observant, he could see the signs. Everywhere Scott looked, there was Theo with a comforting glance and words of wisdom. Theo was there every time Stiles should have been. Theo was trying to replace Stiles. Well tonight, tonight would be a chance to see if it had worked. Because there was no doubt in Stiles' mind that he was driving to a psychologically engineered trap set up by the wolf. What his endgame was, Stiles wasn't sure, but he was going to find out, and then he would chain the S.O.B. in Eichen House for good. Or maybe hand him over to Crowley. Whatever works.
Now it all made sense, and Stiles kicked himself for not seeing it sooner. Because while he knew Theo was bad news, he had assumed the wolf was too prideful to work with anyone else. Now, was he on par with the doctors? No. Stiles had seen those scary things. No way were they telling him everything. Most likely they were using him instead of the other way around. But that still made Theo dangerous. Because he obviously had an endgame- other than his 'pack' B.S. -that Stiles still needed to figure out. Which reminded him...
Even though Stiles was running late and Lydia and Malia were missing and Hayden was dying at the animal clinic, Stiles still pulled over to make a phone call. Because if he was walking into a trap, it was stupid to not tell anyone.
Kevin picked up on the first ring.
"Stiles?" he asked a little sleepily, and Stiles realized that if it was 10 pm in California it was midnight at the bunker. Poor Kevin.
"Yeah, it's me." Stiles said, his nervousness bleeding though his voice. "What's up?"
"You mean where are Sam and Dean?" Kevin asked. "They left to go hunt down Metatron and close the gates of hell. They told me to stay safe."
"Yeah I figured they'd be busy." Stiles said, though he did feel a twinge of disappointment. "That's why I called you."
"What do you need?" Kevin asked through a yawn, and Stiles' heart broke for how exhausted this kid sounded.
"Nothing, nothing." Stiles assured. "I don't need anything because I was going about this all wrong, and I've figured it out."
"You figured out how to kill the Doctors?" Kevin asked excitedly, tiredness momentarily forgotten.
"No." Stiles said solemnly. "I figured out how they know things. I figured out why my life and my pack are falling apart, and I figured out my mistake."
"What do you mean, Stiles?" Kevin asked through another yawn.
"There was this one question you asked me the moment we started researching these things. I batted it aside. Do you remember what it was?"
"'Do they have any allies?'" Kevin recollected. "Because Sam and Dean have been boned because of it."
"Yeah, well, they do, and it's Theo." Stiles said.
"Oh. Oh. Stiles, I'm sorry!" Kevin said sadly, as it all started to make sense to him, too.
"No, it's my fault. I didn't listen to you. And I didn't take your advice about Donovan." Stiles said reassuringly. "But I'm walking into a trap and Theo holds all of the cards. I'm not sure what's going to happen tonight. So if Sam and Dean come home, tell them that."
"I will." Kevin said. "Stiles, be careful." Stiles could tell that Kevin meant it. "But you're wrong."
"What?" Stiles asked, momentarily thrown. "Why?"
"Because you're going to win." Kevin said, barely containing his glee. "Even if it won't seem like it at first. Because Theo doesn't have all of the cards. He doesn't know you have me, or Sam, or Dean, ready to back you up. He doesn't know how much determination you truly have. And he doesn't know that you're a badass hunter who can eat bastards like him for breakfast. That's your Joker. Use it."
Stiles was speechless at Kevin's faith in him. "Thanks." was all he could say.
"Don't mention it." Kevin said. "And not just because I'm a fugitive."
Then the line went dead, and Stiles was left alone to drive to the animal clinic with nothing but his slowly returning confidence. Kevin was right. He was an awesome hunter. This was Scott. What could possibly go wrong?
