•

"My dear, you are in the wild now.

There is no such thing as protection.

When the wolves are hunting,

Nobody is safe."

-Sonya Chloé

Stiles bolted from the classroom, almost crashing into a row of lockers as he skid around a corner. Oh, this was not good...

Ms. Smith, their history teacher, lay at the bottom of the stairs, four deep gashes cut across her neck. A girl, a freshman probably, stood over her hyperventilating.

Stiles stepped carefully towards her, setting a gentle hand on her arm. "Hey, it's okay."

She turned her panicked eyes to him, looking too shocked for a moment to even speak, suddenly she was wrapped around him sobbing into his shirt. "Oh, geez, okay, it's okay, you're okay," he stumbled over his words, his eyes searching over the body hoping he'd see something, anything to tip them off as to who did this.

The blood splatter was oddly contained, so the marks were purposeful, probably postmortem though he couldn't see any other fatal injuries.

Actually... there wasn't any substantial amount of blood around her either, it should've been pooling around her head from the cuts... Vampires.

How real the situation was finally hit him. They were dealing with creatures that had to hurt people to survive. Werewolves hurt people for power, vampires did it to survive. How could they help people like that? Scott would insist they try, but the chances of this working out without any more blood shed...

Something glinted in the wound. He looked closer, what the... A bullet was pressed into one of the wounds. Why would someone slit a throat then put a bullet... His eye caught the small symbol on the side and his blood ran cold. This was so not okay.

•••

Scott saw the swarm of police cars as he pulled up to the school. He parked his bike and ran towards the commotion. Before he even reached the door Stiles came flying out of the school, almost running right into him.

"Whoa, what's going on?" Scott asked, reaching out to steady his friend.

"Call Argent," he ordered instead of explaining, he turned to run off again and then spun back around. "Do not text him!" And with that he ran back towards the school.

Scott ran after him, it took a moment, he lost him in the crowd, but eventually he found him talking with Lydia in coach's office.

"Guys, what is this? What's going on?"

Stiles ignored him pacing back and forth and irritably threaded his fingers through his hair. Lydia sighed. "Ms. Smith is dead."

Damn it, Scott actually winced at the words, he should've been here! He was supposed to protect these people.

"There's more," Stiles said. "Her throat was torn out-"

"Was it-?"

"No, this was different than last time, much more werewolfish. But in the cut was something else, a bullet-"

He frowned. "How did nobody hear a gun go off?"

"It wasn't shot," Stiles said, only succeeding in confusing Scott more, his friend must have seen the confusion on his face because he flicked hand around the way he did when he got annoyed that people couldn't keep up with his chaotic thought process. "Someone cut her throat than stuck a bullet into the wound, it was definitely symbolism though I'm not sure what it's supposed to mean."

Scott nodded, that made sense, more sense than he usually made. "But why did you want me to call Argent?"

Stiles paused. "Did you?"

"Well no-"

"Do it," he almost yelled, dragging out each word.

Lydia rolled her eyes, looking back to Scott. "The Argent seal was on the bullet."

"A hunter?" That made no sense, Ms Smith was human. Or at least they thought she was... but what if she had been something horrible hiding in plain sight, the Darach had been hiding right under their noses and all any of them had seen was sweet kinda eccentric Ms. Blake.

"She was human," Stiles argued. "Right? Right, she was human... 'We hunt those that hunt us" that's their little murder chant right? So why would they kill her? It doesn't make sense," Stiles said irritably, Scott knew at this point he was talking more to himself than them.

Lydia apparently wasn't in the mood to deal with Stiles erratic behavior, she marched over to him, and set her hands on his shoulders, effectively halting his pacing and ranting. "Stiles?"

"Mhm?"

"Calm down."

He nodded too quickly, Scott might have laughed if the situation hadn't been so grim, he would never get over her would he?

Lydia turned back towards Scott with a defeated sigh. "There's something else."

Scott didn't think he could take anything else. "What is it?"

"The guy Caroline was with... It's become more probable that he's-"

"He's a freaking vampire!" Stiles cut in. "You're being ridiculous. I have proof!"

Scott raised his brows at Stiles outbursts. "What proof?"

Stiles grabbed his backpack, rifling through it. He paused, looking up at Lydia. "Do you have it?"

Lydia's frowned as she shook her head.

"It's in the classroom, I'll be right back," Stiles dashed out of the room, going to retrieve whatever it was he thought proved him right.

"Does he really have proof?" Scott asked.

Lydia rolled her eyes. "Kind of."

Geez, if even Lydia admitted it... he must have found something serious.

•••

Caroline picked up the piece of paper from the floor under Lydia's desk, her cousin had dropped it when she ran after Stiles. She unfolded it carefully, she probably shouldn't be snooping but Lydia was starting to worry her...

A theatre? Maybe it was for history...

That's when she saw him. It had to be a coincidence. It's not like any sane person would jump to the conclusion that he was immortal. That would be crazy, true but crazy.

Stiles hurried into the room, coming to an abrupt stop when he saw her. "Oh, hey..."

She saw the way his eyes flicked to the paper in her hand, did he know something about vampires? "Hey, Lydia dropped this... What is it?" She smiled hoping he would just see her as the dumb blonde.

"Newspaper article," he said, she would have thought he was being condescending if it weren't for the suspicion in his eyes, like he knew how dangerous she really was.

"Oh? What's it for? I don't remember a history assignment..."

"Curiosity," he replied flatly.

"About a theatre?" She pressed.

"Why else would I have it?" His tone was challenging, like he was daring her to tell him what they both knew.

Because he did know something. "Why do you know him?"

Stiles crossed his arms, a stubborn glint in his eye. "Why do you?"

"I asked first."

"You're also lying to Lydia."

That made her pause. This guy was ridiculously protective of her cousin, that could either be a good thing or a very bad thing. "What do you know?"

"Enough, I think," he said.

"Tell me," she demanded, she could risk compelling him, but if he was on vervain it would only make things worse with Lydia.

"If you tell me what you know and why you don't trust Lydia with it."

She gave a slight nod after a moment, sitting slowly on her desk and watching as he sat on the teachers desk to face her. "Okay, let's talk."