All That Remains
Chapter 3
"Derek, what are you doing here?"
Scott jumped up and quickly left the kitchen, motioning for Stiles to stay put. When he stepped into the living room he saw Derek at the front door, a worried expression on his face. When he saw Scott, he pushed past Isaac and stepped into the foyer.
"Scott, we have a problem." His gaze swept the room, obviously searching for something. Suddenly he froze, staring over Scott's shoulder. Scott turned to see his mother and Stiles peering around the corner, the tension in the faces indicating that the were ready to bolt if necessary. Scott turned back to Derek in time to see a replay of Issac's initial reaction and moved to grab the former alpha as he charged.
"Derek, stop!" Scott was barely able to halt Derek's attack, shoving him as hard as he could through the open door. Derek quickly recovered, his eyes wide with fury.
"Scott, that-"
"Is really Stiles, I swear. Deaton already checked him out. He's alive. He's human."
Derek froze, his gaze on Stiles. He took a deep breath, testing the air, and finally exhaled, his glowing blue eyes returning to their normal hazel hue as he stepped back into the house.
"How?"
"Maybe we should ask your uncle," Isaac remarked as he closed the door and moved as far from the other two werewolves as possible. Derek turned to him, skepticism clear in his expression.
"Peter? How would he…?" He glanced at Stiles again, who had finally moved all the way into the living room to stand behind Scott. "Why, if it was even possible, would he bring Stiles back from the dead? He doesn't even like him."
"Feeling's mutual," muttered Stiles, finally breaking his uncharacteristic silence as Melissa joined them. "And I have no idea why the Prince of Darkness in a V-neck would bring me back, either, but do you know anyone else with that kind of...experience?"
"No, I don't. What about Lydia?"
"She's asleep, but she didn't say anything about this to Allison," Isaac offered.
"OK." He studied Stiles for several moments. "What do you remember?"
"Nothing," he replied with a shrug. "I remember getting in my jeep to drive home, and then I woke up in the cemetery." A horrified look crossed his face. "Oh man, my jeep…"
"The cemetery? And you didn't see anything strange?"
"I was more worried about getting out of there," Stiles snapped. "Because, you know, creepy. But no, not really… Wait. Deaton said my...uh, grave was messed up and someone called the cops. Did you…?"
"Report it? No, but I was driving by and saw what was going on. Managed to get a pretty good look before the police showed up. Too much rain and mud to get a good scent, though."
"Great. Now what?"
"I'll talk to Peter. I'm not saying I think he did this, but he might have an idea of what could." He turned and headed for the door, pausing a moment to turn back and stare a Stiles. "I...I'm glad you're back, Stiles. Your friends… They were unhappy about losing you."
"Aw, if I didn't know better I'd say you missed me, too."
Derek just rolled his eyes and left, shutting the door a little harder than necessary behind him.
"Now what?" Isaac asked, and Scott shook his head.
"No idea. I guess we'll just have to wait and see what Derek gets out of Peter."
"I'm guessing nothing, unless there's something in it for Peter himself," Stiles grumbled. "And we all know how that will work out."
Melissa put a comforting hand on his shoulder. "We'll figure it out, Stiles, with or without Peter Hale's help." He gave her a weak smile in return. "Come on, you dinner's getting cold."
"Kinda lost my appetite. Sorry."
Suddenly headlights swept the yard outside and a few moments later there was a loud, frantic knocking on the door. Isaac rolled his eyes and moved to answer it.
"I'm starting to feel like a doorman."
"You'd look like a dork in the suit," Stiles snarked, earning a dirty look from Isaac as he opened the door to reveal the Sheriff and Deaton. The Sheriff started to speak but stopped dead when he caught sight of Stiles, his mouth hanging open in shock.
"Hey, Dad," Stiles replied, and Scott could hear the tremor in his voice despite his attempt to contain it.
Stilinski's gaze shifted to Scott, fear and confusion plain in his expression.
"It's really him," Scott assured him and Stiles nodded, taking a few tentative steps towards his father. The Sheriff's paralysis vanished and in an instant he had crossed the room to pull Stiles into a hug, a soft sob escaping his throat as he wrapped his his arms around his son. Stiles returned the embrace with shaking arms and a sob of his own.
"Don't you ever do that to me again!"
"Didn't mean to do it," Stiles replied, his voice cracking. "I'm sorry…"
Finally Stilinski released Stiles and stood back to study his face as he cupped a hand to his son's cheek. "How?"
"We don't know yet," Scott replied, barely managing to keep his own voice from cracking. "But we're going to figure it out." The Sheriff glanced at Deaton, who nodded.
"I have several ideas I'd like to explore."
"And he...he's OK?" Deaton nodded again and he returned his attention to Stiles, who also nodded. "OK. I guess we… Damn. How are we going to explain-" A loud knock on the door interrupted the Sheriff, causing Isaac to roll his eyes again.
"Who else are we expecting?" Melissa asked as she went to answer the door. She checked the peephole and groaned. "Great."
"Who is it?"
"Your father."
"Stilinski!I know you're here. Melissa, open up!"
Scott placed himself between the Stilinskis and the door before nodding to his mother. She opened the door and stuck her head out. "Now is not a good time, Rafe."
"I don't care. I need to talk to Stilinski, and he needs to talk to me, if he wants to keep his job."
She sighed and opened the door to let him in. He caught sight of the Sheriff first.
"What are you doing here? You were in the middle of investigating the desecration of your son's grave and you just…" His eyes widened almost comically as Stiles stepped out from behind his father. "What in the hell?"
Stilinski glanced at his son and sighed. "Something came up...obviously."
"How…?" Anger flashed in his eyes. "What was this, some sort of a joke?"
"I'm not laughing."
"So, what you got desperate enough to fake your son's death to get enough sympathy for-" Melissa walked up behind him, spun him around, and slapped his face, hard. The room fell silent.
"You…" It took several moments for McCall to recover. "You just assaulted a federal agent."
"I just smacked an idiot. Wake up, Rafe. Do you really think John could ever do something like that?" She glanced at the Sheriff before returning her angry gaze to her ex-husband. "You were at the funeral. You saw him. You saw all of us. We were devastated. You can't fake that, Rafe. You just can't."
"So none of you…" They all shook their heads as Melissa, Isaac and Deaton joined the rest of the group facing McCall. "Alright. Tell me what happened."
Scott gave him a carefully edited version of how Stiles had woken up in the cemetery and made his way to his friend's house. Scott had been on the phone with Deaton when Stiles arrived, and the vet had volunteered to find the Sheriff and bring him to see his son.
"So you don't remember anything before that?" Stiles shook his head. "You don't remember the accident?" He shook his head again. "Which brings us to the next question: who was in your car when it crashed, and why didn't your father know it wasn't you?"
"That's two questions," Stiles replied, his sarcastic grin fading when he caught McCall's expression. "Uh, well...you know how they say everyone has a twin? Maybe...it was just someone who really looked like me...you know grief plays tricks on your mind, and I've heard of a lot of cases where people have been misidentified by close relatives, so it does happen, and-"
"It doesn't explain what this mysterious 'twin' was doing in your car. Or where you were for the last four days. Or why someone would vandalize your 'grave'."
"Psychological terrorism." They all turned to Isaac, who blushed slightly and shrugged before expanding his theory. "Maybe someone wanted to, uh, screw with the Sheriff's head so he couldn't do his job...and they could get away with stuff."
"He was doing fine with that on his own," McCall muttered, earning him a punch to the shoulder from his ex-wife. "OK, look, one time I'll excuse, but...Fine. Why would someone want to prevent him from doing his job?"
"You'd know that better than the rest of us," Scott replied. "Is there something going on in this town, something to do with crime that we don't know about?"
McCall looked thoughtful. "Maybe, but this is a little extreme. Stilinski really doesn't have enough power, sheriff or not, to stop the type of people that would go to such extremes."
"Well then maybe he was practice. You know, they wanted to see if it would work at all before trying it on the...more powerful people," Isaac suggested.
"That...almost makes sense."
"Knew we kept you around for some reason," Stiles snarked and Isaac flipped him off.
"Hey, none of that."
Isaac ducked his head sheepishly. "Sorry, Melissa."
"There are still a lot of unanswered questions. 'How?' would be the biggest one." He thought for a minute. "Stiles' jeep is still in the impound yard, right?" The Sheriff nodded. "I want forensics to go over it. Maybe there'll be some hint of who's behind this."
"No problem. I'll put in the request. Anything else?"
"Well, obviously, we need to take Stiles to the hospital."
"What?" Stiles backed up so he was hidden behind his father again. "Why?"
"God knows what whoever it was did to you when they kidnapped you...If that's what we're thinking happened. You need to get checked out."
"He's right."
"But Dad, I-"
He turned to face his son. "It will be OK, Stiles. I won't leave you there alone. I promise. OK?" Finally Stiles nodded, and his gently squeezed his shoulder and smiled. "Come on."
"Is that what you were wearing when…?"
"No. I have his clothes. We were thinking they'd contain evidence, it's just…"
"It hadn't sunk in completely yet," Scott finished. Melissa nodded and went to retrieve the bag of muddy clothes from the kitchen.
"I'll call ahead to let them know we're coming." He thought for a moment and let out a wry chuckle. "Keeping a lid on this whole thing is going to be interesting."
"That's one way of putting it," the Sheriff muttered as McCall excused himself and left. Finally Stilinski turned to Deaton.
"Is Stiles...will he be safe at the hospital?"
"As far as I know. I can give you some of the usual wards to make sure he's protected. We'll try to keep it subtle so as not to raise too many questions with the hospital staff."
"I can help with that, too," Melissa offered as she returned from the kitchen. "Just give me a few minutes to get changed."
"Thanks, Melissa."
She smiled and patted Stiles' cheek. "Anything I can do to help. I'm just so glad to have you back." Stiles managed a weak smile of his own and nodded before she headed upstairs.
Deaton left and returned with the wards and explained how they worked. Stilinski listened, making a few notes, an odd expression on his face as the significance of what Deaton was telling him started to sink in. Finally Deaton finished the lesson and excused himself, promising to keep them informed if he found something.
A few minutes later just as Melissa returned, dressed in her work attire, McCall returned to tell them that there would be someone waiting for them at the hospital and that it was time to leave.
"I'm going with you," Scott declared as he watched his friend reluctantly walk through the front door towards the waiting car.
"No, Scott. Stiles...he'll be fine. He's going to feel a bit overwhelmed and...probably the fewer people around him right now, the better. Give him a little bit of space. He'll understand."
"But I should do something. I should be there for him." The this time remained unspoken.
"You will." She kissed his cheek. "But tonight you both need the rest. First thing tomorrow, I promise. OK?"
"OK."
Finally the two werewolves were alone. Scott flopped on the sofa, going over the evening's events in his head and debating what to do next. Isaac watched him for several minutes before breaking his silence.
"So...bedtime?"
"No." Scott looked up and met Isaac's eyes. "I think we need to go check out that grave."
XXX
Stiles sat up with a gasp, heart pounding in his chest, and took in his surroundings as he tried to bring his breathing under control. It took a moment for him to realize that he was not in his own bed as he had hoped, waking up to find the whole thing was some sort of bizarre dream.
The small hospital room was empty except for his father, fast asleep in the chair next to Stiles' bed. Stiles winced when he saw the position his father was in and was tempted to wake him. Finally he decided the krick his father woul'd have in his neck tomorrow from sleeping was less of a concern than getting enough sleep at all, something he had clearly been lacking over the past few days.
Stiles pulled back the blanket and swung his legs over the side of the bed, his bare feet hitting the cool floor with a soft thump. He stood carefully, making sure his legs would support him before he carefully moved to his father's side and gently adjusted his head and neck to a more comfortable position. After making sure that his father had slept through the manipulation, he padded to the bathroom and gently shut the door behind him.
After dealing with his most pressing need, Stiles washed his hands and then splashed cold water on his face as he tried to clear the fuzziness from his mind. He raised his head and looked in the mirror, wondering if he would see something that would explain all of this, some insight into why he of all people had returned from the dead.
He met his own gaze in the mirror, studying every feature of his appearance and finding nothing amiss. If anyone other than Scott had told him what had happened, he wouldn't have believed him. He knew Scott was telling the truth, as much as he knew of it, but he feared both of them were only scratching the surface.
Stiles had spent several hours at the hands of a variety of doctors and nurses who had given him a very thorough-and humiliating-examination. They had pronounced him healthy and unharmed, although they were waiting on the results of the blood work to confirm that assessment. After Melissa had helped to get him settled in his room, McCall had stopped by to tell the Sheriff that he had obtained the autopsy report, but since they hadn't yet recovered the body that had been in Stiles' grave, it wasn't going to be much help.
Stiles' natural, albeit morbid curiosity had taken over and he had asked to see the report, earning him a strange look from the FBI agent, but his father had immediately forbidden him to see it. Stiles figured he'd be able to get a hold of it, eventually, but the expression on his father's face told him he should not push for that any time in the near future. Finally McCall had left, promising to be in touch, and his father had encouraged Stiles to try and get some sleep.
A couple of hours later, the strange, disjointed images of his hollow eyed, grey faced 'twin' yelling at him in an incomprehensible language pulled him from sleep. He suspected Isaac's theory had prompted that particular nightmare, but now he couldn't shake the feeling that something was going on and that memory had more meaning that he originally believed.
Stiles sighed and splashed more water on his face. He knew he'd be getting no more sleep that night. Might as well be awake enough to think this whole thing through and decide where to start to figure it out.
He was reaching for the door when he caught a flash of movement out of the corner of his eye. He quickly turned back to the mirror and froze as he caught a glimpse of a figure in the mirror, standing behind him. His eyes widened as the figure vanished, but not before he recognized the face, one he hadn't seen in years, but knew immediately who it was.
"Mom?"
TBC...
A/N: I was hoping we'd find out what the Sheriff's first name really is, but so far we haven't. The fandom seems to have accepted "John" as his name, so I've used that here.