Chapter 30. Anchors

"Stiles…"

Stiles had heard the voice from the train station, but it wasn't Daria's. He followed it through a tunnel until he saw the rift. The closer he drew toward it, the louder her voice became. Lydia's voice. The woman he loved.

"STILES! Don't stop! Keep Going!"

He pushed his weight against the rift, and its green glow shifted to a blinding white.

"I can see you, Stiles! Don't stop!"

Forcing his way through the rift, he found himself back in Beacon Hills. Not with Lydia, but awkwardly crammed across the front seat of his jeep. Flipping on the lights, he grabbed a screwdriver, jimmied it into the ignition tumbler and started the car. All there was left to do was find his friends.

Peeling out of the parking lot, Stiles sped to Scott's house, but there was no one there. Next he tried the sheriff's station, and then his house. His next guess was the hospital, but there was no one. It was like all of Beacon Hills had become… a ghost town. The morbid irony did not escape his notice, but he pushed it aside. He had to find Lydia. He had to find Scott.

Pulling into the hospital Stiles immediately heard the roars of supernatural creatures. Wagering a guess that Scott was among the roars, he booked it into the hospital with no more than a bat and a head full of ideas.

Stiles jogged a few feet and then stopped short. Train tracks lined the hospital corridor, and the same Arrivals and Departures platform from the train station was now firmly fixed on the wall behind the front desk.

"Höllenhunde!" Stiles heard the shout from down the hall and crept through a staff entrance to get closer.

"Parrish. Parrish! You don't want to do this! Stop!" He heard Scott's voice, and his heart took courage.

Liam's voice rang out in equal desperation. "Daria! It's Scott and Liam! We're your friends. Don't you remember?"

Liam's words nearly stopped Stiles in his tracks. Whatever the Wild Hunt had done to Parrish, the same thing was happening to his sister. When had Daria come home?

"The train is coming, boys." said a firm, male voice that Stiles didn't recognize. "There's no stopping the Wild Hunt."

Stiles crept closer to the open door leading to the hallway. Since when could Ghost Rider's speak English?

"You'll make a fine Ghost Rider, Scott. And I'll have a true Alpha by my side–"

"PARRISH! STOP!" Scott shouted.

Stiles edged past a cluster of files scattered in an office and peeked past the door frame. More tracks lined the floor. A man strode past him, and Stiles tightened the hold on his bat.

"–And then a banshee, a were-coyote…"

"A Stiles?"

"A what?"

Stiles jumped out of the alcove and smashed the bat against the man's neck. "Bad Guy, right? I didn't misread that?" The man on the ground began to stir, and Stiles leapt out of the way as he rose from the ground.

Scott grabbed Parrish - who for some reason had green glowing eyes and had green flames emitting from his body instead of the typical orange - and he threw him into the man Stiles had hit with the bat. They went flying backward down the hall, and Stiles dropped the bat, running to Scott and giving him a hug.

"It's so good to see you," Scott's voice was thick with emotion.

"GUYS!" Liam screeched, and they turned to see him still trying to fight off Daria.

She roared with green flaming skin of her own, gaining the upper hand against the beta as she pushed him slowly into the wall.

"DARIA!" Stiles shouted, and she paused, hesitating as she stared at her brother.

Liam took advantage of the distraction to get up and hurl her body into Parrish's.

"RUN!" The three took off down the hall, and Stiles scrambled to come up with a plan.

He raced up the stairs, checking for something cold enough to neutralize hellfire. Maybe liquid nitrogen?

"I can't believe I'm gone a couple days, and the whole place falls apart." He dashed into a room, but there was nothing useful.

"No, you were gone for three months!" Scott shot back.

That made Stiles pause. Three months? "What? Okay, if they don't let me graduate, I swear–" He darted across the hall into the next room. "And do I even want to know what's going on with Daria? Since when can an empath be controlled by a Ghost Rider? When did she even get here?"

Liam shrugged. "We saw her for the first time tonight. She was channeling Parrish; maybe that's why? And what are you looking for up here anyway?"

Stiles picked up a large canister of liquid nitrogen. "Ah! This!" He carried it into the hall triumphantly, just as Parrish came treading down the hall in a fiery blaze. "And him. Grab him. Grab him now!"

Scott and Liam forced Parrish into a wall, and Stiles sprayed the liquid nitrogen copiously over the flames until they completely died out and Parrish sank to the floor.

"Stiles?" Parrish blinked several times. "What are you doing here?"

"Buddy, love ya, but we're way past that, okay? You gotta fill us in. What's going on?"

Parrish revealed that Mr. Douglas, the highschool teacher-turned-Ghost Rider was merging the worlds between the Ghost Rider's domain and Beacon Hills so the Ghost riders could permanently cross over.

In a word, terrifying.

But he also revealed that the train's tracks could be diverted away from Beacon Hills.

"Okay, do we need to be worried about Daria showing up in the hallway?" Liam looked over his shoulder nervously.

"Mr. Douglas left with her." The hellhound looked physically pained by the admission. "This is my fault. I told her to channel my powers so she wouldn't be taken. But now–"

"We'll get her back," Scott reassured. "We'll get everyone back."

Scott and Stiles followed the tracks into the woods in an attempt to divert the train, but Mr. Douglas was there with Daria still by his side, and they were immediately erased. But instead of being taken to the train station where Stiles had been imprisoned for three months, they were transported to the school.

Scott knew it meant that Mr. Douglas' scheme of merging the Ghost Rider dimension with their own was all going according to plan, but it didn't mean Scott would give up. He raced out of the school building and back into the woods toward the spot where the rails could be switched.

As he drew closer Scott saw them - Mr. Douglas and Daria, the latter of whom cleaved to his arm like they were on a romantic outing instead of trying to destroy an entire town. It made Scott's insides burn to see her being used in such a way, and he slowed his gait to a careful stride.

"I'd almost say you enjoy this, Scott." Mr. Douglas quipped. "The pursuit of utterly futile endeavors."

"Step back from the diverter, or I'll make you step back," Scott threatened.

A low laugh rumbled through the lowenmensch's throat. "Now that's the German way of doing things." Daria growled beside him, and he laughed again, "Komm mal runter, kleines höllenhündin." He turned toward her, inhaling the scent of her hair, and this time Scott was the one who growled.

"Let Daria go, and step back from the diverter." Scott was nearly shaking.

Mr. Douglas let go of Daria's arm and roared. "I don't think so."

Scott's own roar matched the lowenmensch's ferocity as he prepared to fight, when lightning struck the ground and Ghost Rider's appeared around him in every direction. Letting out another deafening roar, the true Alpha stood his ground. If he was going to go down, he would go down fighting.

"Unbelievable." Douglas shook his head. "Even in the face of insurmountable odds. I don't know if it's suicide or stupidity."

"Maybe both," Scott shrugged. "Either way, I'm getting to that diverter."

"You of all people, Scott, should know what happens to a lone wolf."

"He's not alone."

Peter, alongside his daughter Malia and some chimera he'd never met before named Theo, arrived just in time to help Scott take on an army of Ghost Riders and the arrogant Nazi trying to lead them.

Like lions they fought, trying to save a town Peter was certain didn't deserve it. He reached Daria, in a blur of green, orange, and black, and couldn't help but chuckle as he dodged her attacks.

"Well, aren't you adorable all dressed up in your fireproof clothes, fighting with the bad guys."

Her immediate response of fury shook the trees. He'd enraged the little pseudo-hellhound, and he laughed again. He wondered if the Nazi lowenmensch even knew she was an empath, or if he just assumed she was a female hellhound - an anomaly of mythological tales.

She cut off his pondering with a punch to the jaw, and Peter went flying into a tree. The wolf met wood with a sickening crack, and he swore. Daria was a lot stronger than she let on.

All four of them fighting against the Ghost Riders had fallen, and the lowenmensch stood tall.

"Your little friends are no match for the Wild Hunt." He threw out his arms, and Peter rolled his eyes. It's something he would have done for the dramatic flair, but no one liked a Nazi. "There are too many of us, and too few of you."

Scott rose bravely, trying to strike at the man, but he dodged easily and landed two blows. This gave Scott time to round for another attack and send the lowenmensch into the trunk of a large tree.

Daria came at Peter again just as the whistle of a train sounded through the air.

"C'mon, Daria. We… have a history." He struggled as her hand closed around his throat. "You can't say it meant nothing," he said through gritted teeth. "Even… Derek was jealous."

She loosened her grip for less than a second, but it was long enough for Peter to send her sailing in the opposite direction.

His eyes fell to his daughter, who had managed to take a whip from a Ghost Rider. Malia tossed it to Scott, and before the lowenmensch could reach, the true Alpha was able to hit the diverter with the cord and wrench it backward, successfully switching the track.

The train followed its new course, and Peter could feel the relief in the air.

The lowenmensch yelled out in dismay, and Malia jogged toward him with a smirk. No sense of self-preservation! How were they father and daughter?

"You missed your train."

Scott let out a thundering roar, signaling to the rest of his pack that the plan had worked. Peter had to hand it to the boy; his track record when it came to defying the odds was incredible.

The ground began to tremble, and the Ghost Riders drew closer, circling around each of them. Then lightning began to strike, and even the lowenmensch glanced around in shock. By some miracle each Ghost Rider lowered their guns, and once they holstered their weapons completely, they slowly walked to the tracks toward the diverted path.

"Where are you going?" the lowenmensch snarled. "Stop. Zurückkommen!" He stepped onto the track and shouted furiously, "Come back and kill them! Töte sie!"

The Ghost Riders continued to walk away, but Daria was still under the man's control. She rounded on Scott, grabbing him by the throat.

"Daria stop!" Scott gasped for air under her grip.

Malia and Theo wrenched the empath off of him, but Daria still struggled forward as if in a trance.

"Who is this girl?" Theo grunted.

"Stiles's sister," Malia screeched, trying to keep the girl from attacking Scott again.

The lowenmensch shouted at the Ghost Riders in German, but they didn't listen.

"Obey me!"

The Riders stopped then, and Peter hesitated.

"Kill them. Kill them all. Töte sie. Töte sie!" He wore a triumphant expression, but to Peter's delight, they circled the lowenmensch instead.

"Riders don't bow. They have no leader." That much was obvious to Peter. If the Alpha Ghost Rider had had any sense he would have settled with the hellhounds and moved on, but clearly there were a few too many loose screws for a Nazi to have much sense in the first place.

Daria wrenched herself out of Malia and Theo's grasp, and Peter and Scott had to step in help.

And all the while the Ghost Riders closed in on the lowenmensch until lightning struck where he stood. His eyes turned black. His face became a taut, leathery white, and he now wore the garb of a true Ghost Rider. Letting out a sickening shriek, even Peter cringed, but only for a moment. Ah well, he deserved it.

All of the Ghost Riders disappeared in a thick blast of green lightning, but Daria still thrashed beneath their grip.

"I don't get it. Shouldn't she be fine now?" Malia pinned down a fiery arm and winced from the pain.

"You would… think so," Theo grunted in discomfort as he tried to hold her in place.

Scott's mind was scrambling for an answer. "We have to get her to snap out of it somehow." Then the boy's eyes widened. "That's it."

"What's it?" Theo yelled.

"Daria. She's not in her right mind. Maybe it's like a panic attack. She and Stiles used to get them all the time."

"Well, how do we get her to snap out of it?" Malia tried not to let her pain show as she continued to hold Daria.

Peter also held in his pain. Pinning down an empath-channeling-hellhound felt reminiscent of sticking a hand on a hot stove and leaving it there. Of course their skin would heal, but it still hurt like hell.

"She has to focus on something," Scott strained. "Something that will calm her down."

"Okay," Malia nodded. "Daria, think of Stiles. Your brother, Stiles! He's alive! Isn't that great?"

Daria roared violently in reply.

"Got any other brilliant ideas?" Peter gritted through his teeth.

"Maybe her dad?" Scott said hopefully.

"No." Peter shook his head. "It's gotta be someone Daria is attuned to. Someone she connects with on a level neither her father nor brother can reach. The way Lydia reached Stiles."

Scott paused. "Like Parrish?"

Peter could have laughed. "You've got to be kidding me. The deputy?"

"Well, who did you have in mind?" Scott spat.

"Daria look at me," Peter faced the empath fully. He knew who the empath needed. "This is not you. You need to find your anchor. Find Derek, do you hear me?"

When Daria had loosened her grip on Peter's neck just minutes earlier, he connected the dots. He had only mentioned Derek's name, and it couldn't have been coincidence.

Daria's thrashing lessened, and her eyes fell to Peter's.

"It's working," Scott exhaled in awe. "Daria, think of Derek. Derek Hale. Focus on him however you can. Derek. Hale."

The empath stopped resisting completely, and the green in her eyes shimmered into a blue glow.

Daria blinked several times. "Scott?" She looked around in horror. "Oh no." She sank to the ground and began to sob. "I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to."

Peter patted her back sympathetically, and Scott drew her into a hug. "It's okay, Daria. We know. It's going to be okay."

Her sobs rang out into the trees, and Peter could feel the chemosignals of guilt, sadness, and loss as they poured out of her body.

"There, there," he offered. "It'll be all right."

After everything they had survived so far, how could it not be?

Derek awoke to the sound of sobbing. He wasn't in the woods anymore, as he had been when he had fallen asleep. He wasn't even in South America. This was someplace else entirely.

Taking in his surroundings, he realized it looked familiar. There was a futon he'd seen before, and a dining room table, but where? The sobbing sound grew, and he followed it into a bedroom where he felt his heart rate accelerate.

"Daria?" His own voice echoed, and he realized this was a dream or empathic illusion.

"It hurts, Derek," she sobbed into her pillow, oblivious to his presence.

He knelt beside her. Daria's eyes were red and puffy as tears streamed onto the bed, and his heart ached.

"Where does it hurt?" he murmured tenderly. Derek tried to touch her hand, but his skin ghosted through it. Daria couldn't see him at all.

The sobbing lessened into a soft cry. "I guess I'm being metaphorical," she sniffed. "I helped someone bad, really bad. I didn't even know what I was doing. I tried to hurt Scott."

"Is Scott okay?" he pressed.

"Yeah," Daria's face crinkled into a small smile. "Scott always wins, doesn't he?"

"Every time," Derek smiled softly. He longed to sweep a lock of hair behind Daria's ear, to comfort her in more ways than with his voice, but his voice did seem to be helping at least. Thinking on his feet, he brought up something he thought might comfort the empath. "You know, I helped someone really bad once too. I didn't know what she was doing, and she killed a lot of people."

"The darach," Daria whispered and shook her head. "You have such bad luck with women."

He smiled in spite of himself, knowing that it wasn't entirely luck, but also poor choices. "My point is, I didn't let what happened keep me from doing what needed to be done. And eventually I moved on."

"I don't know what needs to be done now." She wiped her eyes with a tissue and stared at the ceiling. "I could go back and keep training with Deucalion, or I could go see Scott's Dad."

"Scott's Dad?" Derek puzzled.

"Yeah, he knows all about the supernatural now. He was giving me some FBI training tips and stuff before I came back to Beacon Hills." A slight grin formed on her lips. It was good to see Daria smile.

"So what you're saying is, you don't know what to do next."

She let out a humorless laugh. "I've done all this training, but I still screwed up. I need to make up for it somehow.

Derek hesitated before speaking. "You could come with me."

Daria's eyes widened. "What? Isn't… you know, Braeden there?"

He bit down a grin when he saw the blush creeping up her cheeks. "I haven't been with Braeden for a while."

"Really," she squeaked and then clapped her hands to her cheeks. It was adorable to see. "I'm sorry to hear that."

"We parted on good terms. She had her own path, and I had mine."

She nodded with wide eyes. "Well, okay, then. What do you need help with?"

He told her about the string of werewolf murders in Brazil. He had been trying to track the killer and coming up short each time.

Daria's lips parted, truly mourning the deaths of those he had recounted. "And you trust me to help with something like that?"

He knew what she was really asking. Concern and insecurity creased between her brows, and Derek took a deep breath. "I was wrong before." The admission cut him more deeply once he said it out loud. "You're one of the strongest people I know. And I could use your help."

Tears brimmed her bottom lashes. "How do I find you?"

"You might not have to. I can see you right now."

Daria gasped and glanced around the room in a panic. "What?! You can see me? Right now?!"

Derek chuckled. "It must have been your empath abilities. You connected to me while I was asleep."

"You're sleeping?" Her mouth made an o-shape. "Will you remember any of this when you wake up?"

"I hope so."

She glanced at an empty wall and pressed her thumbs together nervously. "Stay with me until I fall asleep?"

"I'll stay as long as I can."

She grinned widely and scooted over to make a spot for his invisible form. Derek sat on the bed, imagining for a moment that he was really beside her, and it made his blood flow faster.

"I miss you, Derek."

He ghosted a hand over her outstretched one and inhaled deeply. "I've missed you too."

Gradually she drifted off to sleep, and Derek was grateful for whatever empathic force that allowed him to be there for her again.

Komm mal runter - calm down

Kleines höllenhündin - little hellhound (female)

Zurückkommen - come back

Töte sie - kill them

Taking a few days off to fully get over being sick and to regain some motivation to write the next few chapters. Thank you for reading, reviewing, favoriting, following, and just being here. I appreciate you. -V