Bianca, Isaac, Scott, and Lydia sat in the station. Each all blanked faced and broken. Allison was dead, gone, sacrificed to war she should've never been a part of.
They were called into the sheriff's office, one by one, Isaac, then Bianca, Lydia, and Scott last. They all repeated the same words that Argent had forced into their brains, meaningless words that left nothing but a bitter taste in their mouths. Allison's death, her life, shouldn't have been reduced to a lie.
The four of them had been called into the office one more time, this time all together with only the sheriff present. They moved robotically into the room, sitting down on the couch. Scott was on one end, still in shock, Lydia's hand clutched in his. Because Scott and Lydia loved Allison in only a way they knew. Isaac and Bianca were on the other side, Isaac looking blank faced and empty, while Bianca grasped the hem of his shirt in her hands.
"I'm sorry." The sheriff said to them, leaning against his desk. "But I need to know what actually happened."
"Allison died." Scott whispered, he sounded so blank and empty, never looking away from his feet. "We walked into a trap and Allison died in my arms."
"He was waiting for us." Isaac murmured, his voice catching in his throat. "He needed us there so Lydia could predict his death, and then he used it to his advantage to take the oni."
"Can we go?" Bianca asked, looking out the window, they all knew she was looking for a ghost, whether it was Allison's, or someone else's.
The sheriff nodded. "I'm-I'm just really sorry." He sighed, but opened the door and let them all out. "Will you all be okay getting home? Should I send a police escort?"
"We're not going home." Scott murmured, his hand still firmly in Lydia's. "It's not over yet."
"Here, it'll calm you." Noshiko said, pouring a cup of tea for Stiles. Before the police had even shown up to Oak Creek, Noshiko had taken Kira and Stiles back to her house. It wasn't safe for Stiles to be out and in the open, because deep down Noshiko felt like she owed the pack. After all, it was her mistake they were paying for.
"What is it?" Stiles asked skeptically, looking at the cup.
"Tea." Noshiko answered straightly.
"What? Like magic tea?" Stiles asked, once again his paranoia kicking in. It was working in overdrive, because he knew he was dying. Allison was gone, the nogitsune was still looking for them. He didn't trust anyone at this point.
"No, chamomile tea." Noshiko corrected him. "Drink it." Stiles nodded skeptically and sipped on it anyway.
"He's not safe here." Ken said, walking into the room.
"He's not safe anywhere." Noshiko argued.
"But Allison killed one of them." Kira spoke softly, looking at Stiles' wince at the mention of their lost friend. "Doesn't that mean something? She killed an Oni."
"Is that even possible?" Ken asked his wife.
"I'm not sure how." Noshiko replied honestly.
"But she did it. She killed one of them." Kira insisted.
"Yeah, and then they killed her." Stiles snapped softly. The other three looked down in shame, Allison's death affected Stiles as much as the others and they had slightly disregarded it. "Allison's dead. Now I guess the only good thing is it looks like I'm dying, too."
"He made a powerful move by splitting the two of you." Noshiko moved over to sit by Stiles' side, almost in a motherly comforting way.
"So what's our move?" Kira asked, looking unsure that they could even win.
"At this point, you need a divine move." Ken responded.
"What's that?" Stiles questioned.
"In the game of Go, it's what we call a truly inspired, or out-of-the-box move. The Nogitsune has had sente, the advantage, until this point. What you need is a divine move in order to turn the game around." Noshiko explained.
"Okay, so is anyone feeling divinely inspired?" Stiles asked sarcastically.
"Mom, you said you trapped it in a glass jar, right?" Kira pointed out, because if her mother could do it. Then there had to be a way for them to win.
"It wasn't the jar that trapped it. It was where I buried it." Noshiko reasoned.
"The Nemeton." Stiles muttered.
"A place I don't know too much about." She nodded.
"Who does?" Kira asked.
"Deaton." Stiles said. "Deaton does."
"I appreciate the concern, but you don't have to stay." Argent murmured in an even voice as Bianca and Isaac followed him into his apartment. "I'll be alright. I've dealt with this before. I have a capacity and… an ability to compartmentalize my emotions."
"She hugged me." Bianca whispered, looking up at Argent sadly. "I told her I wasn't ready, but she was." Tears were steadily falling down her cheeks and she curled against the door. Isaac had a few stray tears as well, and he reached out for her, but Bianca flinched back. "I don't have the capacity, because I felt it, when she left. She was right there , and then she faded through my fingers."
Argent pulled her into a tight hug and let the girl cry into his chest, stroking his fingers through her curls. Also reaching a hand out to hold on tight to Isaac's shoulder. "It'll be okay."
"Should be fine in a couple of hours. Unless whoever shot you manages to find you again." Derek told the twins after he finished patching them up from their latest attack. He had finally managed to get them back to his loft without being spotted.
"Lydia's with Scott." Aiden said, throwing Ethan his shirt and marched towards the door. "We need to go."
"Are you gonna try to convince her to go with you?" Derek scoffed. He knew better.
"I'm gonna try and convince her to run and hide." Aiden snapped. "Like any sane person would do."
"And Danny?" Derek asked Ethan.
"Allison's dead. Stiles is dying." Ethan said coldly. "What do you think?"
"I think Danny won't believe you." Derek responded plainly. "And Lydia would never run and hide."
"Because of Stiles?" Aiden demanded, jealousy seeping into his voice. They all knew Lydia and Stiles were different, that they cared for each other in a way that meant more.
"Because of Scott." Derek snapped. "You've been trying to find a way into his pack. Trying to earn his trust, trying to fight for him. You've had it wrong the whole time. You don't fight for a leader. You fight for a leader's cause."
"What cause?" Aiden asked, not seeing Derek's point.
"Scott's always been about one thing. Saving his friends. He will do anything and everything to save the people he cares about." Derek reasoned. "When there's no chance of winning, he keeps fighting. When all hope is lost, he finds another way. And when he's beaten down, he stands up again. You want to earn a place in his pack? You want redemption? Find another way to stand and fight.
"Stiles and Kira said it was the Nemeton that kept it trapped." Scott said, Lydia following close behind him. He had dropped her off to change, spending the whole ride in silence, and then they headed straight for Deaton.
"The problem is this isn't even a person you're fighting. It just looks like one." Deaton emphasized. "It's a spirit that's taken the shape of a human."
"The shape of my best friend." Scott said, because it did matter.
"Someone caught it once. Someone can do it again, right?" Lydia asked.
"I don't know." Deaton replied honestly. "This thing was trapped a long time ago, before the nemeton was cut down. It doesn't have the same power anymore."
"Is there anything that does?" Scott asked hopefully.
"Possibly." Deaton shrugged. "When the tree was whole, its wood was sometimes used to contain powerful objects. But those objects are very rare."
"Wait a second. Powerful objects?" Lydia asked, knowing exactly where she'd seen something like that before. "Like an Alpha's claws?"
"Which Alpha?" Deaton asked worriedly. Some of those boxes were created to keep things trapped inside. It wouldn't be smart to trade one evil for another.
"Talia Hale." Lydia murmured. "Peter had them in this wooden box with a triskele carved on the lid. What if it was made from the nemeton?"
"It was." Deaton confirmed.
"How do you know?" Scott asked.
Deaton grimaced. "Because I made it.
"So all we need is to get the spirit out and trap it." Lydia determined.
"I'll call Derek." Scott said, already pulling out his phone. The conversation barely lasted more than two minutes before Scott came back, looking optimistic. "Derek's got the triskele box. He's gonna meet us-"
Lydia felt the whispers in her mind, they rushed over her simultaneously and she blanked out for just a moment. She didn't catch the end of Scott's sentence, but that was more likely because he had caught her.
"What's wrong?" Deaton asked concernedly, as an emissary, he knew warnings from banshee's were dire.
"Something's happening. I had this sudden rushing feeling, like we're running out of time." Lydia said, holding onto Scott's arm to steady herself.
"Yeah." Stiles said, sliding in the doorframe and garnering their attention, Kira helping to hold up his weight. "Yeah, I kind of got that feeling, too."
Bianca leaned into Isaac, letting her tears soak his shirt as he held her tight. One of the last things Allison had asked her was to take care of her father and make sure her death wasn't for nothing. Allison had killed an oni, and in her death, she had given them a chance to win.
But as the two of them sat in her room, taking in the sight of her half finished English assignment, a book of poems in French, her Chinese ring daggers laid out all pretty. It just seemed too unfair.
Isaac picked up one of her daggers and smiled fondly at the memory of when she'd held it up to his neck for checking up on her.
"Careful." Argent warned. "That one takes some practice." His voice was still hoarse. "When Allison was learning, she had to bandage her fingers because they got so raw. She wouldn't give up on it, though."
Bianca stood up, intending to comfort the man who's just lost his daughter, but instead, she had collapsed back into the bed frame. There were so many of them, too many. Ghost after ghost appeared, all covered in blood and slashed from blade just like the oni. There were some in police uniforms, some in regular clothes, some in hospital scrubs. She didn't recognize any of them, but they were all victims.
"Doll?" Isaac asked, steadying her. "What's wrong."
"People are dying." Bianca said evenly, looking at another ghost who had just reached for her arm. "He's making his move, he's killing people, he's making the oni kill. There's more on the way."
"How do we stop it?" Argent asked, although he wasn't really asking, Bianca had an answer.
"Allison asked me to tell you something." Bianca murmured, holding the side of her head to stop the noise. She knew she should've said something earlier, after all she had made a promise to Allison, but she had also just died, and Bianca just didn't think it was fair, maybe it was selfish, maybe it wasn't.
Argent almost looked hopeful, but destroyed by the statement altogether. "She did? What was it?"
"Allison killed one of the oni." Isaac answered, knowing Bianca knew more.
"She told me how." Bianca said, looking up at Argent. "With a silver arrow. She was making them, wasn't she?"
"It was tradition." Argent nodded.
"The silver bullet." Isaac said, remembering the story Argent had told them.
"Come on." Bianca said motioning for them to follow her down stairs. She paused for a moment and looked at her hands.
"How many?" Isaac asked. Bianca just shook her head and continued down to where Argent kept most of his weapons. Argent had reached over to enter the code, but Bianca got there before he did. Argent looked a little shocked, but knew Allison had probably given it to her earlier.
"She called me to come over." Bianca said, entering into the small gated area. "I think she wanted to show me."
Argent flipped over the cloth on the table and counted the arrow heads. "One's missing."
"She probably made the first one, then she figured it out." Isaac said, holding tight onto Bianca's waist, she was nearly hypothermic to him. Allison may have given Bianca the clue to killing the oni, but Isaac had figured out the rest. "Do you remember when you told us about one of your first gun deals, the Yakuza?"
"That meeting wasn't one of my first deals. It was my first deal." Argent answered him.
"The bullet that you used to shoot the Oni. Was that a silver bullet?" Bianca asked, realizing hitting her as Isaac put the pieces together.
"Yes." Argent said. "But it didn't kill him. It just broke his mask."
"Probably went straight through." Isaac said logically. "What if silver is like a poison to them?"
"It would need to stay in the body." Bianca commented, fingering one of the arrow heads. "She'd figured it out."
"These four would still have been setting when she went off to meet Scott." Argent said.
"We could stop them." Isaac murmured.
"No." Argent held one of the arrows up to his eye. The last thing Allison had left behind in the world. "We can kill them."
"Scott?" Bianca's voice came through the phone. "Where are you guys?"
"The animal clinic, we've figured out how to trap the fox." Scott answered her, putting his phone on speaker so Lydia, Stiles, Kira, and Deaton could listen as well.
"Allison figured it out." Bianca said immediately and they all heard a shuffling noise in the background.
"Figured what out?" Lydia asked shakily.
"How to kill the oni." Isaac answered. "Scott, do you remember the story of Argent's gun deal, when he shattered an oni's mask?"
"Yeah, of course." Scott nodded subconsciously.
"I used a silver bullet I made, a tradition in the Argent family we do when we graduate." Argent explained. "Allison was making silver arrowheads before she went off to fight with you guys."
"So silver kills the oni?" Kira asked.
"It poisons them." Bianca responded. "We're making the rest of the arrows now."
"We're going to the school to meet Derek, he has the box that will trap the nogitsune." Stiles told her. "Meet us there."
"That's not actually the plan is it?" Bianca asked, her voice wavering through the phone call. "We may be able to kill the oni, and trap the spirit, but how are we going to get it out of the Stiles body double?"
"Change the body." Lydia murmured quietly. "That's what the scroll said, we change the body."
"With my bite." Scott nodded, remembering the conversation he had with Deaton and Lydia back in his kitchen.
"That's when I run it through with my sword." Kira added. "My mom said she used it to get the firefly out, and she told me it's how we'll do it again."
"For Stiles." Scott said, looking at his pale best friend. He looked ready to collapse and Scott almost thought he should ask Stiles to stay at the clinic, not that he would listen.
"For Allison." Lydia whispered.
Scott, Stiles, Lydia, and Kira raced to the school in Stiles' jeep to meet Derek. Scott and Kira came out one side, while Lydia and Stiles got out the other. Stiles was so weak he had stumbled against the railing and Lydia had automatically wrapped his arm around her to keep him steady.
"Scott, hold on." Stiles called back, stopping them before they entered the school. "I know what you're all thinking. If this works, it might kill me, too. But even if it does, you have to go through with it. Stick with the plan, okay?"
"The plan is to save you." Scott responded, refusing to accept Stiles' words. "That's the plan I'm going with."
"We're going to save you." Lydia said with conviction, and Stiles looked down at her. She stared back with such a force that he didn't argue with her, no matter how much he didn't agree or believe it. So they followed Scott and Kira through the doors, hoping Derek and the twins would get there soon. What they were not expecting was a snow covered Japanese garden
Stiles stumbled forward. "Oh, this is definitely not part of the plan."
They all reached a hand out to touch the nose, wondering what was real and what was an allusion. The flakes were cold to the touch and melted like real snow, but the etherealness was off putting.
It wasn't until a bandaged covered body started walking around the corner did it occur to them, that they'd just walked into a trap. Kira automatically drew her swords, the natural instinct taking over. Lydia on the other hand manvered herself underneath Stiles' arm again to keep him steady, but he also pushed her slightly behind him.
"Like I promised, Stiles." The former body of the nogitsune said, his voice was thick and grating. "We're going to kill all of them. One by one."
"What the hell is this? Where are we?" Scott asked as multiple oni appeared around them and they were forced to back up into each other.
"Between life and death." The nogitsune answered, his tone so distinctly breathless.
"Bardo." Lydia murmured, remembering when Kira had explained it to them.
"But there are no peaceful deities here, Lydia." The spirit warned her. "You're dying, Stiles. And now everyone you care about is dying, too."
"What? What do you mean?" Stiles demanded. He'd been playing the game with the fix a lot longer than the others. He didn't bluff, ever.
"I've captured almost all of the territories on the board, Stiles." The spirit mocked. "The hospital. The sheriff's station. And now the animal clinic. Do you know the ritual of seppuku, Stiles?"
"No, and I don't want to." Stiles snarked, backing up and making sure Lydia stayed tucked behind him as the nogitsune stepped closer and closer.
"When a samurai disembowels himself with his own sword to maintain his honor, but that's not the cut that kills him." The spirit wasn't looking at Stiles. He was looking at Scott. "The killing stroke is made by his kaishakunin, who beheads the samurai with his own katana." Then he pointed at him with a shaky finger. "Scott, Scott is your kaishakunin. I'm going to make your best friend kill you, Stiles. And you're going to let him. Because just like you, they're all going to die. Everyone touched by an Oni's blade. Unless Scott kills you first."
"Why? Why are you doing this?" Stiles questioned weakly, but so determined. He knew he was going to die himself and he didn't care that he was putting himself in a dangerous position by provoking the fox.
"To win the game." He mocked. As if it was a command, the oni around them drew their swords and were ready to strike. Prompting Scott and Kira to get in position as well. But no one moved and inch until Lydia had screamed.
"Did you bring us a present?" Void Stiles asked, sitting on the steps with two oni flanked behind him. He had gotten to the school long before anyone of the others. Simply waiting for them to walk into another one of his traps.
"I brought two." Derek snapped as he walked up to the trickster, the triskele box in his hands. Aiden and Ethan appeared behind him on either side, this time ready to fight for the cause, not just for Scott.
"I've heard of an Alpha pack, Derek, but not a pack of former Alphas. It's a little sad, isn't it?" The fox taunted.
"I might not be an Alpha anymore, but I can still fight like one." Derek growled. Then he lunged, the twins following close behind. It wasn't exactly a fair fight because the oni would appear, and then disappear, then appear again. Nor could they actually kill them or keep them down.
Ethan was taking on two, but as soon as he managed to beat one down, another was ready to attack. It seemed Aiden was having the same problem on the other side with two of his own oni to beat. Derek was only fighting one, but the oni was stronger and faster than any of the others. It must've been made from one of Noshiko's older kaiken.
"Where the hell are they?" Aiden asked, wondering if anyone had spotted them yet.
"The jeep's here." Ethan screamed, ducking a punch. "They have to be somewhere."
"In the school!" Derek said, nodding his head towards the doors.
"This can't be real." Lydia muttered as she watched Scott and Kira fight off as many oni as they could. She couldn't tell if she was holding up Stiles, or if he was holding her at this point.
"Yeah, tell that to them." Stiles said sarcastically, wincing when Kira almost got sliced in half. But it got worse when her blade was knocked out of her hands and she was cornered by two oni.
Stiles couldn't let this happen. Not again. At the rate they were going, the oni wouldn't tire, but Kira and Scott would. He couldn't sit on the side lines anymore and watched demonic spirits try to kill his friends. The fox had made him a deal, and he knew the fox may play tricks, but was fair. It was playing a game, and it played by the rules, it bent the rules, but never broke them.
So Stiles pushed Lydia behind the structure they were hiding behind and grabbed Kira's sword from the floor, one hand on the hilt, and the other ready to plunge it into his stomach.
"Stiles, no!" Scott screamed, reaching for his best friend, but was grabbed by two oni. "Stiles!"
"What if it saves you? What if it saves all of you?" Stiles said waveringly, the blade shaking in his hands.
"What if it's just another trick?" Lydia asked frantically, ready to lunge herself at him in order to make sure he would be safe.
"No more tricks, Lydia." The nogitsune spat. "End it, Scott. Let your friend fall on his own sword. Do for him what he cannot do for himself. Do it, Scott. Be his kaishakunin. Give up the game. You have no moves left."
Stiles listened to the taunting words and nearly did it himself. He knew Scott would never do it, but Stiles didn't care. He just wanted it to end, and if it had to end with him then he'd believe it was compensation for Allison. The sword was already cutting into his palm, when a glimmer in the sword caught his eye. A glimmer of a high school textbook, then followed by a desk. Lydia's words rang out in his mind, this can't be real. And that's because it wasn't. "I do." Stiles muttered, throwing Kira back her sword. "A divine move."
"We can't do this, we can't beat them." Aiden shouted, blood dripping from his mouth. He had lost count of how many times he'd taken down the same oni, only for it to get back up again.
"Take the box. We'll hold them off!" Ethan reasoned, checking a slash wound on his arm. But that gave the oni the distraction it needed to take down Ethan. The demonic figure threw him to the ground and raised his sword, ready to run Ethan through when an arrow landed in it's chest.
A glow emitted from the oni, a bright firefly glow, and then suddenly, it was gone in a shattered of black light. As soon as it was gone, Isaac had jumped over the ledge, landing just where the oni had stood. Argent coming from one end, and Bianca was on the other, a crossbow ready in her hands.
"What was that? Ethan asked, shocked.
"Silver." Argent responded, holding his own crossbow.
"Isaac, the box." Derek shouted. "Get the triskele box to Scott!"
From then on, they were gaining the advantage. Argent and Bianca were shooting arrows left and right, killing as many of the oni as they could. The wolves managed to gain the up hand, mostly leaving them one on one, until only one oni remained.
Bianca signaled to Argent that she was out of arrows, but he had one left. He had aimed it at the last oni and fired, but the oni was too quick and sliced it in half before it even touched it's body.
"Get the arrow. It's the last one." Argent shouted, motioning towards the floor. Aiden, who'd been the closest, slid underneath the oni's blade and snatched the broken arrow off the floor, plunging it into its chest. But while the oni disappeared, the blade did not.
"Aiden!"
"Stop fighting them." Stiles pleaded with Scott and Kira. Lydia was underneath his arm again and he was clutching to the back of her dress. He could feel her palm pressed up against his neck, and it brought him a small comfort in the chaos.. "It's an illusion. You have to stop fighting them. It looks real and it feels real, but Scott, you gotta trust me, it's an illusion."
Scott turned around, still transformed, but he trusted Stiles. He knew his best friend would never sacrifice him, like he wouldn't do to Stiles. As the alpha of his pack, Scott went first, as all the oni lined up in two rows.
He walked slowly, and the oni slashed his stomach instantly. As he kept moving forward, he gained more and more slashes. He wanted to stop, the pain already making him light headed, but if Stiles believed this was their only out, then this was it.
As he passed the last oni, the slash to his knee nearly made him buckle, but he pressed on, pushing the doors of the Japanese garden hard until they gave out. The four of them stumbled out of the garden and found themselves standing in the school entrance way.
"We're okay." Scott muttered in shocked, checking his body for cuts. "We're-"
But he was cut off by a sharp hit to his head, slamming him into the lockers. Kira was next, landing next to Scott's body.
"This was my game." Void Stiles muttered angrily, stalking towards Stiles and Lydia. "You think you can beat me at my game?"
"Stiles…" Lydia murmured quietly, her body shaking against his as the spirit moved in on them.
"It's okay, Lydia." Stiles whispered, holding tight onto her waist and pushing her slightly behind him again.
"Divine move. Divine move!" The nogitsune shouted, marching towards them with anger radiating from its body. "You think you have any moves at all? You can kill the Oni. But me? Me? I'm a thousand years old. You can't kill me!"
Lydia and Stiles continued to back up, and Lydia had even flinched when the spirit yelled at them, simply because it was Stiles' face. Just behind the fox, Stiles and Lydia could see Kira and Scott beginning to get up, which meant this was the end, they needed to go through with their plan or they might not get another chance. "But we can change you."
"What?" The spirit hissed, halting in its steps.
"You forgot about the scroll." Stiles muttered.
"The Shugendo scroll." Lydia finished for him.
"Change the host." The nogitsune whispered, he looked nervous, and he didn't need Lydia to predict his death this time.
"You can't be a fox and a wolf." Stiles hissed.
The nogitsune looked ready to turn around and run, but Scott was already there. Scott grabbed the arm of the trickster and dug his claws into its shoulder, biting into its forearm. They watched the spirit scream and fall to his knees, only for Kira to run him through with her blade. And instead of a scream this time, a firefly emitted from the body and shattered to dust.
As it looked like the fox was going to get away once again, just to inhabit another body. Isaac came running down the hallway and closed the triskele box around it, clicking the lid shut.
"Isaac." Scott sighed in relief.
"Hey." Isaac said, holding the box tight in his hands.
"Where's Bianca?" Lydia asked, but she had one hand on Stiles' cheek, the other one on his neck, checking for injuries.
"Killing oni." Isaac answered shortly. "Is it really over?"
"Yeah." Scott murmured. "Yeah, it is."
And for just a moment, peace seemed to rush over them, until Stiles' eyes started to blurry. He clutched onto Lydia's arms, and he could vaguely hear her calling his name, but by then. He had already hit the ground.
"Stiles?" Lydia called, falling to the floor with him and kneeling beside his head. Scott was on the other side and checking his breathing.
"He's okay." Scott sighed out. "I think he just fainted."
"But what if killing the other Stiles…" Lydia started frantically.
"He's okay, Lydia." Scott whispered, taking her other hand that wasn't holding Stiles'. "He's okay."
"Oh, God," Stiles had muttered five minutes later, finally waking up. "I fainted, didn't I?"
Lydia laughed lightly and leaned her head down on his chest and sighed when Stiles' fingers made their way into her hair. "Yeah, you did."
"We're alive." Stiles had whispered in disbelief. "Are we all alive?"
Scott's immediate thought was Allison, and how she wasn't there. "Yeah. We're okay."
Lydia's head snapped up a moment later and they all looked at her questioningly. "No, we're not."
Aiden had pulled the sword from his stomach as soon as the oni had vanished. He knew it wouldn't have made a difference, because wounds from an oni's blade were different.
Bianca had rushed forward and he had collapsed back into her arms, and she would've laughed at the irony of it all if the situation wasn't so melancholy. Derek had grabbed Aiden's hand from the one side and Ethan was kneeled before him on the left.
"Does it hurt you as much as it hurts me?" Aiden asked, grasping for his twin brother's fingers.
"Yeah." Ethan whimpered, choking out sobs.
"It's okay." Aiden chuckled between the blood dripping from his lips. "Lydia never believed I was one of the good guys anyway."
"She'll believe me." Bianca promised, brushing back Aiden's hair comfortingly.
In his last moments, Ethan had leaned his forehead down to touch Aiden's and tried to calm Aiden's breathing as it strained. "Shh. Shh."
Bianca slowly removed herself from Aiden's body and stood up, waiting for the moment it would happen. Like it happened with Boyd, and with Allison. "Aiden."
They all heard Ethan crying hard into his brother's shirt, because it meant Aiden really wasn't coming back.
"Who would've thought?" He chuckled lightly, his face still handsome as ever, but like Allison, marred by the blood. "Come a long way since I kidnapped you."
"I'm sorry." Bianca murmured, because it was all she could muster up. Talking to ghosts wasn't something she knew how to do, nor what to say to someone who was dead.
"Will you do something for me?" Aiden asked her.
"I'll make sure I tell Lydia." Bianca promised once again.
"No, not that." Aiden whispered, looking down sadly at his brother. "Please-"
"I promise." Bianca said, cutting him off. She was a twin herself, she understood.
"This is it then?" Aiden murmured, looking around.
Bianca offered up her hand. "Promise me you'll look after Allison?"
"Allison was a much better person than I was." Aiden laughed lightly, but it was broken by a small cry escaping from his lips.
"In the end, you were one of the good guys." Bianca whispered lightly. This time Aiden did take her hand.
"Have you ever heard the term regression to the mean?" Deaton asked Scott. It had been only hours since everything, and Deaton had been surprised to see Scott at the clinic, but he also knew Scott was only there for the distraction.
"No." Scott responded.
"It's a bit of a technical way of saying things will always even out." Deaton explained.
"Like things will always get better?" Scott asked hopefully.
"More like things can't always be bad." Deaton offered.
"So, no matter how bad things get…" Scott trailed off.
"Or how good. They always come back to the middle." Deaton nodded. "Regression to the mean."
"I'm not so sure that applies to a town like this." Scott chuckled lightly.
"Yes." Deaton agreed. "You might be right."
Stiles laid in the bed that night, mulling for what had happened. Allison was gone. Aiden was gone. The nogitsune was gone. He wasn't sure if the price was worth it. Especially not for him.
He was staring at his ceiling for a long time when his door had creaked open and a familiar scent filled his nose. Stiles had looked up to see Lydia padding into his room, still in her dress from that night and her boots in her hand.
Wordlessly, she dropped them by the end of his bed and climbed in beside him. It wasn't such an unusual occurrence. This is what she did when she'd slept over, what she did when she couldn't handle the paranoia in her mind. Stiles also knew she did this for his benefit as well, for his nightmares, but they both pretended they didn't know.
"Hey, Lyds." He murmured into her hair. Usually he was on his back in the middle, and Lydia would lay half on his chest and half on his bed so she could bury her face in his shoulder. This time, he was curled around her, her back pressed up against his chest.
"Hi." She whispered back.
"Do you want to talk about it?" Stiles asked her softly.
"No." Lydia muttered. "I just, I just want to lay here and pretend like my best friend is still gonna be there when I wake up."
"I'm so sorry, Lydia." Stiles said, his heart wrenching because he knew her tears were hitting his favorite pillow.
"Don't." Lydia said, turning around in his arms to look him in the eye. "Don't blame yourself for their deaths. Don't do it."
"I…" Stiles murmured.
"Stiles." Lydia said, tracing his cheek bones, trailing her finger along his jawline. "I know that you were way too willing to sacrifice yourself tonight, for us. And I also know most of that was fueled by guilt."
"Lydia." Stiles said, trying to stop her.
"Do you remember what you said to me the first night I showed up at your door?" Lydia asked, tapping his temple. "I was crying and you had just gotten beaten up. And you told me that if I died, you would literally go out of your freaking mind. At the time I didn't get it, no one had ever cared for me the way you did."
"Of course I did." Stiles said automatically, wondering where she was going with this.
"My point is that I get it now." Lydia whispered. "I watched you hold that sword and I swear my heart stopped." Lydia muttered. "My best friend had just died, and to live without both of you would have driven me insane." Lydia sat up this time and tugged on her curls. "Don't take the blame or responsibility, not for this."
Stiles pulled her back down to his chest and tangled his fingers in her strawberry blond hair. Things weren't perfect, and they would never be. Not in a town like this, but in that moment, it seemed like enough to be alright.