"This is weird and I hate it."
Jackson sat heavily on the riser beside Scott, knocking their shoulders together. He had his shin guards in one hand and threw the rest of his stuff on the ground with a huff so that he could set about pulling them on.
"What's weird and why?" Scott asked, hunched over and lacing up his own cleats. He almost took one of Jackson's elbows to the face and when he jerked back out of the way, he ran right into Isaac on his other side. Isaac just rolled his eyes, too used to Jackson's douchebaggery to bother commenting, and went back to talking shop with Boyd. Liam and Kira were already warming up on the field, Malia and Erica pretending to do homework on the riser above them.
"This whole situation," Jackson said. "With the Ghostriders and the missing dude you're so obsessed with."
"And why do you hate that?"
"Because now I can't stop thinking about it!" Jackson bit out, and he really did sound supremely irritated by that.
Malia leaned forward between them to say, "Doesn't that make you obsessed with it too?"
Jackson shoved her back, knocking her into Erica, who flipped him the bird.
"I keep thinking," Jackson said, pointedly to Scott and only Scott, "that if even Danny's forgetting shit because of this guy, then I must be forgetting shit too, and that is so not cool. So now I'm running over everything that's ever happened in my entire freaking life looking for moments when the Ghostriders could've fucked with my head."
"You say that like you haven't always been fucked in the head," Erica put in helpfully. Isaac groaned and, sensing an all-out bitchfest in the making, escaped to the field with Boyd in tow.
As much as Scott would've liked to jump ship too, he had to admit that Jackson had a point. He'd been doing the same thing ever since that nap he'd taken on Deaton's advice, that first memory with obvious pieces missing. Honestly, it was hard for him to find a memory that did feel whole. Even sitting on the bench alone didn't feel right.
"Did you think of anything specific?" Scott asked before Jackson could decide he was in the mood to actually claw Erica's face off.
For a minute Jackson just chewed on his tongue, glaring vaguely in the direction of the net, uncharacteristically fidgety and restless. Then:
"Remember the winter formal sophomore year?" he said.
"The dance where you took Allison because I had academic suspension?" Scott did remember that, and it wasn't a particularly pleasant memory.
Jackson rolled his eyes. "More like where Lydia got mauled and almost died, dumbass," he snapped. "She only didn't die because I carried her from the field back into the gym to get help. But…"
"But what?" Malia asked when he hesitated too long.
"But how did I know Lydia had been attacked in the first place?" Jackson asked. "I wasn't there. I wasn't out looking for her or anything, I was sloppy drunk and getting menaced by Argent in the woods. How did I know to find her on the field?"
"Our mystery guy told you, you think?" Erica asked.
"Makes sense," Malia said. "This is really bugging you though, isn't it?"
Jackson didn't even shove her back again or say anything rude, which was pretty definitive proof that she was right. His jaw was clenched tight, fingers twisting together in his lap. He smelled more anxious than Scott could ever remember him being.
"Dude, are you okay?" he asked.
Jackson gave him a dirty look. "Fuck off, McCall," he said. "Maybe I have a problem with people screwing around in my head. So sue me."
People like Matt Daehler and Gerard Argent, Scott realized. When he had been the kanima, Jackson hadn't realized until weeks later because he'd always blacked out when he shifted, hours and hours of empty space in his timeline that he couldn't account for. He could never remember where he had been or what he had done. No wonder this was bothering him so much.
Scott put a hand on Jackson's shoulder, half expecting to have it shoved off. Surprisingly, Jackson allowed it for once.
"We're gonna fix this," Scott told him bracingly. "We're gonna get him back and all the blanks will be filled in again."
Jackson made a disbelieving noise. He snatched up his crosse, dislodging Scott's hand in the same gesture, and followed Isaac and Boyd onto the field. Scott let his hand fall with a sigh. Almost in the same instant, he saw Allison coming around the far side of the bleachers from the direction of the parking lot. He waved to her and she set off toward him at a jog.
"Hey," he said when she was within human hearing range. "You went with Lydia to look for relics, right? Did you find anything?"
"We found a lot of things," Allison said. "His entire bedroom, for one."
"Wait, seriously?" Erica asked incredulously. "Jeez, you guys work fast."
Allison nodded. "Our missing person is Sheriff Stilinski's son," she said. "And his name is Stiles."
The name felt like a gong had been struck in Scott's chest. It fell into place like it had always been there, like it had never been taken away. It didn't bring anything else with it, and there was nothing explicitly remembered, but the name itself felt so right. There was no doubt in Scott's mind that this was who was missing from his life.
"Stiles," he said, breathless with how familiar it felt.
A smile spread on Allison's face, and Scott could see the relief in her too. "Yeah. Stiles," she said. "There's more, though. Lydia and Derek are in the parking lot. You should go meet up with them. And Derek says you should bring Malia with you."
"Me? Why?" Malia asked, but she was standing up anyway.
Allison took her vacated seat beside Erica and said, "You'll see. Go, I'll fill everyone else in."
Scott gestured for the rest of the pack to stay on the field and continue with practice, and led the way toward the parking lot. Malia was quieter than usual at his side, a half step behind when normally she was speeding past him, too impatient to follow his lead if she already knew where they were going. She didn't look like she wanted to talk though, and asking before she was ready to answer didn't always end well, so Scott kept quiet too. She would talk if she needed to.
Derek and Lydia were indeed in the parking lot like Allison had said, but they weren't by either one of their cars. Instead they stood together by a powder blue Jeep Scott couldn't recall ever having seen before. There was a tow truck there too, but it looked like it was leaving empty-handed.
"What's up with the hunk of junk?" Malia asked. Then, before they even drew up alongside it, she stopped in her tracks. She sniffed the air and her eyes went wide.
Scott sniffed too, confused by the strong reaction. There was nothing out of the ordinary. He could smell all the usual scents of the packmates that were present, the stink of asphalt in the sun, the waft of generally unpleasant chemosignals from the direction of the school. Nothing unfamiliar.
"I saw it from across the lot," Lydia said, both hands flat on the hood. "They were about to impound it, but I knew… I don't know how, of course, but I knew I couldn't let them take it."
"Which means I had to put up $150 for the drop fee," Derek said, arms crossed but not sounding as annoyed as he could've been. "It was worth it though."
"Why?" Scott asked. Derek and Malia both looked at him funny. "What? Am I missing something?"
"Don't you smell it?" Derek asked.
"Smell what?"
"Stiles," Malia said, like the answer was obvious, like they hadn't just learned that name for the first time two minutes ago. "This is Stiles' car. That scent, it… I know that scent."
Scott stared at her, then at the Jeep. He sniffed again. Nothing new stuck out to him. He clamped down on a wave of strange jealousy. Malia was leaning against the Jeep now, taking deep breaths with her eyes closed, and it wasn't fair that Scott wasn't sensing the same thing. He missed Stiles too! He should be able to catch his scent just like the others.
"You really don't smell that?" Derek asked. "What do you smell?"
With an impatient flick of his claws, Scott broke the lock on the door. He climbed into the cab and settled himself down on the stained pleather of the passenger seat. He breathed.
"I smell...me," he said, frowning. "I've definitely been in here before." He breathed in again, following his nose over his shoulder toward the backseat. "And Malia. Liam. It sort of smells a little like the whole pack in here, really, but mostly it just smells like me."
Derek was still looking at him weird, like that wasn't what he was smelling. And Derek's nose was pretty damn reliable after a lifetime of practice with it, so Scott sniffed one more time, eyes closed and really thinking about it this time. Two years and an alpha upgrade and he could admit that scenting still wasn't his biggest strength, but he could usually pick things apart pretty well if he really, really tried…
His eyes flew open. "Oh my god."
"What?" Malia asked, leaning in through the open door.
"It is Stiles!" Scott said, marveling.
"That's what we literally just told you," Malia said.
"No, I know, that's not—" Scott had to laugh, mostly in relief. "I didn't even notice it, really," he said. "I thought it was me because...well, because it's everywhere I am! This scent is all over my bedroom, my house, even most of my clothes. Jeez, we must have lived in each other's pockets."
"No wonder you couldn't fully forget about him," Derek said. "If he was that deeply embedded in your life. The Sheriff couldn't either. There are just too many holes left behind to fill in."
"He's my best friend," Scott said, without a shadow of a doubt.
"And he's definitely my something," Malia said. She hauled herself into the Jeep, crawling over Scott until she could fit herself into the backseat. She collapsed there with a sigh, in a boneless sprawl. "Just his scent and I'm already feeling better than I have in days."
"Me too," Derek admitted. "Being in the Stilinski house, I was almost completely back to normal. The scent was everywhere."
"Allison said Stiles is his son?" Scott asked, and Derek nodded. "That makes so much sense. Man, I can't even imagine. Like if they took my mom, I don't even know what I would do."
"It wasn't easy to convince him," Derek said. "Wasn't pretty either. But he believes it now. He wants Stiles back more than any of us."
"At least that explains our personal connection to him," Scott said. "Like, as more than just the local Sheriff, or even a friend of my mom's. The gaps in my memories go back years. Stiles and I have been friends for a really long time. If Stiles is the one who dragged me into the woods that night, then it's no wonder the Sheriff assumed I would be there too."
Derek nodded. "And look at this." He reached through the open driver's side door to point to the contraption on the dashboard that Scott hadn't noticed, too caught up in scent to focus on any other sense. "Stiles has a police band radio, probably to keep track of his father. Which is no doubt how you two heard about Laura's body in the first place."
"What's up with Lydia?" Malia interrupted them, leaning forward between the seats to peer through the windshield.
Scott followed her line of sight. Lydia was still braced on the hood, but now her eyes were closed, head tilted to the side like she was listening intently. She was very still and didn't seem to have been hearing their conversation at all.
"Lydia?" Derek asked, rounding the car toward her and speaking softly like he didn't want to startle her. He stopped moving when she shushed him.
"Do you hear that?" she asked.
Scott almost said no. But then there was something. It sort of felt like a dog whistle—as much as he hated making the comparison—just a buzzing, squealing sound that was almost too high-pitched to hear.
"What is that?" Malia asked, wincing and rubbing at her ears.
The sound grew by the second, building into something like static or white noise. It got so loud that Scott had to cover his ears, but that didn't do anything to block it out because it wasn't coming from an external source. It felt like it was being broadcast directly into his skull.
"I think it's—" Derek started, barely audible.
"The radio." Lydia's voice, on the other hand, cut through the buzz with no problem. She was in the driver's seat in a second, pulling the police scanner's handheld receiver from its plastic hook.
As soon as she touched it, the noise cut out. Nothing else happened. They all looked around at each other, sure that all that had to have been a lead-up to something. But the car wasn't on, so neither was the radio, no lights, no signal, no nothing.
"We need to get this radio on," Lydia said.
"We don't have the keys," Scott reminded her. "How are we supposed to—"
"I got it." Derek leaned in alongside Lydia, nudging her legs to the side so he could access the steering block. With a few deft tugs and some neat claw work, he had wires in his hand, and then the wires were sparking. The engine roared to life.
"Dude," Scott said, torn between impressed and scandalized, "why do you know how to hotwire a car?"
Derek gave him a flat look, the kind that made it really hard to tell if he was joking or not, and said, "Believe it or not, I was kind of a troubled teen."
He stayed where he was, halfway in the cab with one foot propped on the wheelwell and his arm on the back of the driver's seat, as Lydia flipped the radio on and began fiddling with the dials. It made the same squealing, crackling sound, though thankfully not nearly as loud. Bits of words and sounds popped in occasionally as she surfed past frequencies in use locally but Lydia scanned past them all, head tilted again, listening for…
"—lo, is anyone there? Can anyone hear me?"
"Stiles," Lydia said, fumbling with the receiver until she found the right switch. "Stiles, we're here!"
"Lydia?"
The sound of that voice sent a chain reaction through Scott's entire body, a visceral kind of relief flooding through him and unlocking every too-tense muscle until he felt like he might collapse from it. He knew that voice better than he knew his own. How could he have ever forgotten what it sounded like?
"It's me," Lydia said, her voice shaking. "Stiles—"
"What was the last thing I said to you?" Stiles asked, urgent, desperate.
Lydia had to swallow twice before she could answer. "You said, 'remember I love you.' You begged me not to forget you."
Stiles' sigh of relief was audible even over the staticky connection. It was so familiar, something Scott had heard a million times before. He remembered at least that much now.
"We didn't forget you," he said, leaning across the gearshift to speak into the receiver himself. It felt absolutely critical that Stiles know this, that he was too important to be erased.
"Scott?"
Fuck, hearing his name in that voice was something else. It seemed to shift everything in Scott's world a centimeter to the left, or shift it back to where it was always supposed to be.
"Hey, buddy," Scott said through a throat suddenly tight with emotion. "We didn't forget! Well, we did. But not completely! And I think it's coming back."
"We've been looking for you," Malia said, her face appearing over Scott's shoulder so she could be heard. "Like, non-stop."
"Stiles, where are you?" Derek asked, practical as always. "What can you tell us about where you are now?"
"Is that Malia too? And Derek?" Stiles asked with a shaky laugh. "Jesus, it's good to hear all your voices again."
"Stiles, tell us where are you," Lydia reiterated. "We need to know where you are so we can find a way to bring you back."
"I don't know how—last, it's not a—thing," came Stiles' voice again, interrupted with bursts of harsh static. A chill ran through Scott, dread dumping his heart into his stomach.
"No, no, no, no," Lydia muttered, examining the dials as if they might somehow make the signal stronger, but she didn't dare actually touch any of them in case it messed up the connection instead and they lost him completely.
"Stiles, you're breaking up," Derek said. His jaw was clenched and the steering wheel was squeaking under the force of the grip he had on it, but his voice was steady and calm. With Stiles' scent all around him, he was in control.
"Shit," Stiles said. "I don't know where the hell I—kind of train station, everyone says they're waiting to board but—never—all like zombies, man, it's freaky weird."
"Is there a way out?" Scott asked.
"All the doors lead right back here," Stiles said, frustration obvious. "Following the tracks is a no-go too. There's—stical portal thing that the Ghostrid—ne guy tried but he—very dead, so I don—"
"We're gonna find a way to get you out of there," Malia said. "You hear me, Stiles? We need you here."
There was an extra loud blast of static, making all of them flinch. Then Stiles: "Shit, they're com—gotta—they can—"
"Wait, Stiles!" Derek called, but the connection had already gone dead, just a flat buzzing again. They all stared at the radio, lost for words.
"Now what?" Malia asked. She turned to Lydia, then to Scott, eyes wide and lips pressed tight together. She was upset, that much was obvious, but over that was determination, the stubborn drive to get the job done no matter the odds. Derek's face was carefully blank and shuttered, but he was watching Scott too, ready to follow whatever directive he gave.
Scott looked at Lydia, but she was still staring at the dead receiver in her hands, mouth open around words she hadn't gotten the chance to say. He swallowed hard, breathing in the scent of Stiles all around him.
"We'll all meet at the loft," he said. "We have research we need to do."
