It feels wrong to walk into the Argents' house. Not that Stiles has ever particularly been comfortable here—he's really only been inside three or four times, and one of those times had been when Gerard had kidnapped him and beat the snot out of him in the basement.
Still, coming here is not something he ever thought he'd do again, since Chris Argent had taken off to… Someplace overseas. He doesn't remember. And as far as Stiles knew, he'd gotten rid of his house after Allison's mom died anyway. Stiles seems to remember his dad saying something about it selling super fast.
He can see why it would. The Argents must have been doing well for themselves with their weapon business, because this place is huge. Way bigger than his house. He finds it interesting that selling guns that kill people makes someone rich while public servants like his dad that help and defend people barely make a liveable wage, but he decides now is not the time to ponder these things.
Anyway, it's good that the house is so big because it seems like every student from Beacon Hills High is here, bouncing and laughing and making out to the deafeningly loud techno music that is literally vibrating the house. He wanders through the entryway and is greeted by a table holding all kinds of alcoholic beverages. Why yes, he could use a drink. He serves himself a healthy portion of punch, realizing only after he pours it that the last time he drank something like this, it didn't turn out so good. Hopefully he didn't have to worry about the punch being laced with wolfsbane in this universe.
"Stiles!"
He startles at the voice right behind him, whipping around and nearly spilling punch all down the front of his shirt. "A-Allison," he sputters.
She's holding her own drink and smiling like she's already a bit tipsy. "Lydia said you weren't going to make it," she shouts over the pounding music.
It's funny how Stiles never noticed before just how pretty she is. Well, obviously he'd noticed that she was attractive, and might have even gone so far to say she was hot if he didn't think Scott would throw him into a wall. But this is a different kind of noticing. Like, the way he can sense her kindness in her sparkling eyes, or the way her dimples make her smile feel so genuine. He would have never considered himself all that close with her, but seeing her now opens the hollow space in his chest a little further.
She raises her eyebrows at him expectantly, and he realizes that he's supposed to respond.
"Umm, yeah," he says with a shrug. "Changed my mind."
"Well, glad you made it. I think Lydia's out back." She motions with her cup and then takes a long drag from it.
Stiles follows her eyeline through the open hallway and, sure enough, he spots Lydia's strawberry blonde hair bobbing in the sea of dancing teenagers on the back porch. "Great, thanks." He snaps his fingers, turning back toward her. "Hey, by the way, is your dad around?"
Allison snorts, and yeah, she's definitely tipsy. "Hell, no! You think my parents would let me have a party like this if they were here? They're off on a business trip in France until Tuesday."
Dammit. Oh well, that's probably for the best anyway. Stiles can't imagine how he'd even start a conversation with the man. Hey, you know how your family has secretly hunted werewolves for hundreds of years? Well, where I come from, you've kind of teamed up with one who happens to be my best friend, except somehow I woke up in an alternate reality where he isn't a werewolf or my friend. Want to help?
Allison wanders off, ostensibly to find Isaac, who was not hanging off of her as Lydia had predicted.
That's Stiles' cue to poke around. Even if Argent isn't here, there's gotta be something in this house. Some shred of evidence that the supernatural exists. Something that might spark an idea of what's going on and how to fix it.
If he even wants to fix it.
No, of course he wants to fix it. He doesn't want to be stuck forever in the Darkest Timeline, where he's a douchebag with dubious tastes in friends and lives a boring, werewolf-free existence.
…And Allison is alive and his dad is happy and he still has his mom.
He shoots back his drink as fast as he can, slamming his cup down on the table. This isn't the time to overthink things. He has a problem, he needs to solve it. That's what he does.
Picking his way to the stairs is challenging—there are a lot of sweaty teenagers here, dancing and grinding on each other. And he's trying to be inconspicuous, but he forgot he's popular here, which means people keep slapping him on the back and shouting his name out across the room. He figures it's only a matter of time before Lydia or Jackson find him and drag him off to dance or play beer pong or whatever the hell kids these days do at parties.
The only person he's happy to see is Scott, who's doing his best impression of an uncoordinated white guy as he dances with Kira. Scott breaks into a huge, goofy grin when he spots Stiles, jerking his head toward Kira and giving a thumbs up.
"Good for you, buddy," Stiles says to himself, waving back.
The stairs have a length of painter's tape across them with a sign that reads, "Off limits." Stiles glances around, but no one is paying any attention, so he hops over the tape and heads on up.
He slinks down the darkened hallway toward the bedrooms. The sounds of the party downstairs are a much more reasonable volume up here, though the bass is still buzzing through the floor and walls. It's enough that he doesn't hear the couple in the first bedroom until he opens the door on them.
"Oh, hey, sorry," he apologizes, averting his eyes. This must be Allison's room. He's never been up here before, but the decorations look like her. A music box on the dresser, a flowery scarf hanging from the mirror, framed pictures of her posing with her family and friends.
"Can we help you?" The girl has pulled up a blanket to cover herself and is now eyeing him with pure disdain.
Allison's room probably isn't going to have anything he's looking for, but he feels protective over it for some reason. He bites his lip, narrowing his eyes at her. "Does Allison know you're in here?"
"Dude, get the fuck out!" the guy yells emphatically, and not only does he look pissed, but with his shirt off it's very obvious he's more than capable of pounding Stiles into a senseless pulp. He must be enrolled in weightlifting.
"Yep," Stiles says with a little wave, backing out of the room and closing the door behind him. "Don't forget to use protection!" he yells through the door.
Sighing, he continues down the hall to the next room, making sure to knock before going in this time. No one answers, so he lets himself in and is relieved to find it empty.
This one appears to be a guest room. Stiles rummages through the drawers and closet, but they're mostly empty except for some holiday decorations and off-season clothes. Nothing useful.
The third door is a bathroom, but the fourth door is promising. This must be Argent's room. There's a gun safe in the closet and another one under the bed. The problem is, Stiles doesn't know the combination for the locks, and apparently Argent doesn't keep his passwords on post-it notes under his desk.
"Goddammit," Stiles mutters, kicking the safe and instantly regretting it.
He gives up on the safes, deciding to head back downstairs to check out Argent's office. If there's anything in this house, it would be there, right?
Nope. The office is clean, too, as far as he can tell. He does get a little distracted while he's searching because kids keep wandering in asking what he's doing looking through all the drawers and filing cabinets, so he has to make up a story about how he lost his favorite pen here once and thinks Mister Argent might have stolen it. It's a good thing they're all drunk because that's a bad cover story, even for Stiles.
He narrowly misses Lydia when he goes through the kitchen, dropping behind the counter and hiding like a scared little kid. A couple of kids give him weird looks, but he doesn't care. He doesn't have the bandwidth to deal with Lydia right now.
He searches the garage next, which also turns up empty. Well, not empty, because it has a couple of very nice cars in it, plus another couple making out (thankfully they're all over the clothes action). But nothing useful to him. Nothing that points to Argent having any connection to the supernatural.
Seriously?! In this entire house, there is not one shred of evidence that werewolves exist?
By the time he's finished in the garage, it's a little after two in the morning. He's getting that familiar headache now, the one that says he didn't sleep enough last night and has now stayed up far too long today. He wishes more than anything that he would just find something, anything, to give him a starting place to figuring this all out so he can go home. Because he's more than ready to quit, but he knows he can't. Not until he's checked everywhere.
The only place he hasn't been is the basement.
He'd really been hoping he wouldn't have to go down there. Like, really really hoping. It's irrational, he knows. There's absolutely no reason to freak out about it. Hell, he's run into buildings full of angry werewolves armed with nothing but a baseball bat, and he didn't even hesitate. This isn't like that. It's just a stupid basement where some demented old man threw a few punches at him once.
So why does it feel like he's marching to his own doom as he opens the door?
He doesn't want to draw attention, so he slips in quickly and closes the door behind him, shivering at the cool basement air. He feels for a lightswitch, but doesn't find one, and recalls that it was at the bottom of the stairs. Sliding his phone out of his pocket, he curses when the screen won't turn on. He could have sworn it was charged.
Okay, then. Just head into the dark, creepy basement and hope the moonlight filtering through the half window is enough to see any giant spiders that might be lurking down here.
He sneaks slowly down the creaking stairs, the beat of the music growing softer as the thumping of his heart gets louder. Why is it so cold down here? Like, much colder than a basement should be. And that smell. It smells like shit.
As his foot hits the bottom step, the light through the window sweeps across the room as a car drives by outside. He catches the outline of a shape in the dark, but it disappears too quickly back into shadow to make out what it is. He feels along the wall for the switch, but when he flicks it up, nothing happens.
"Dammit," he murmurs, flipping it on and off a few times. Figures.
He squints into the darkness, willing his eyes to adjust to the dim light. If he doesn't look directly at the shape, he can kind of make it out. It almost looks like…
No. It can't be. His heart stutters, jumping into his throat. Those are bodies, hanging in the exact same place Erica and Boyd had been. But that doesn't make any sense. Why would they be here?
He forces his feet forward despite his fear telling him to run in the opposite direction. The closer he gets, the harder it is to move, to breathe. Goosebumps pimple up his arms, raising the hair on the back of his neck. Something about this is wrong.
He's close enough now to see the pale faces, and it's not Erica and Boyd. It's two men. We'll, a man and a boy that can't be any older than him. They look dead, eyes closed and completely still. Stiles can't place the faces, but for some reason, he feels like he knows them…
A sound behind him has him spinning around, but he barely catches a glimpse of white before he's thrown to the ground. His head smacks into the concrete and the world spins in a dizzying rush of color.
An ungodly screech pierces his ears, and suddenly there's something on top of him. He blinks furiously, trying to make the room stop spinning around him long enough to make out the form holding him down. Flailing, he pushes at the weight on his chest, but whatever it is easily catches his uncoordinated hands and pins them above his head. There's a flash of electric purple, a glint of fangs, and dark hair falling around a pale face. He opens his mouth to scream, but a hand closes around his throat before he can make a sound, claws digging into the side of his neck.
This is it. He just knows it. This is the end.
Colorful spots swirl in from the edges of his vision. It's all happening so fast, it feels like a dream. He can't make sense of it.
Stiles.
The pressure on his chest and throat disappears all at once, and he gasps desperately for air as warm hands touch his face. A silhouette flickers into view, replacing the glowing purple eyes, and he feels like he knows it. But he's too far gone, too dazed to connect who it is. Consciousness is slipping through his clumsy fingers too quickly to catch.
He presses his cheek into the warmth and lets go.
He's surprised when he wakes up with a headache, because he's pretty sure he shouldn't have a headache if he's dead. Which means he might still be alive. But he'd have to open his eyes to be sure, and he doesn't really want to. He mostly just wants to go back to sleep. Except, his head hurts, and it's not letting him fall back into the comfortable darkness.
Eventually, he gives up and pries his eyes open, just enough to get his bearings. Okay, yep, definitely not heaven. He's in a hospital. Only hospitals have beds that are this ironically uncomfortable. He shifts, already feeling achy from the lumpy, thin mattress.
"Hey there, Mischief."
Blinking against the bright white of the room, he looks over to where his mom is sitting next to the bed. "Mom," he rasps, frowning. "What happened?"
She presses her lips together, reaching over to fuss with the blanket he knocked askew. "You were at the Argents' house, remember? For some reason, you went down to the basement. Allison was keeping her family's guard dog down there. No one was supposed to be down there."
"Guard dog… What?" Stiles asks, pushing himself upright. He winces as a spike of pain shoots through his skull. "I didn't know the Argents had a dog."
His mom helps him sit up, propping his pillow behind him. "Well, they do. He jumped on you and you fell. Hit your head. Thank God Allison heard him barking and got him off of you before he did any more damage. Do you remember any of that?"
He tries to recall what happened in the Argents' basement, but it's fuzzy. He remembers walking down the stairs, and having a super weird feeling about the place. And there was something down there… Bodies? And then…
"Kind of," he says. "Not really." He rubs the side of his head and hisses when he finds a tender spot.
"Careful, sweetheart," Claudia warns. "You have a concussion. You're lucky that's all, that dog could have killed you."
Something about it doesn't sit right. He can't remember clearly, but he knows the thing that attacked him wasn't a dog. Or was it? Maybe…
"Was there somebody else down there?" he asks. "I thought…"
His mom is frowning now. "No," she says slowly. "Nobody else until Allison went down and found you. You were the only one."
It doesn't make sense. There were definitely bodies. Two bodies.
He shakes his head in an attempt to clear it, but it just sends stabs of pain through his skull and down his neck. Hissing again, he rubs at the side of his throat, suddenly remembering the feeling of claws digging in. It hurts like hell, but his skin is smooth and undamaged. What the…?
"Honey? You okay? You need me to get the doctor?" His mom is watching him with worry, her hands hovering over him, ready to help.
"I'm okay," he assures her, even though he wouldn't mind something to take the edge off this headache. They would probably give him something that would make him drowsy, and while sleeping sounds nice, he has too many questions that need answered. "Just trying to remember."
Claudia smiles sympathetically. "Your brain got pretty scrambled, sweetie. The doctor said you probably won't remember much."
"Yeah." He sighs, closing his eyes and letting his head fall back on his pillow. He's not even sure where to begin with his questions. He really just needs to go back to that basement.
"What time is it?" he asks.
"Almost six. You've been here for about three hours." She strokes his forehead, brushing his hair to the side with her fingers, and he can't help but melt under the touch. "Probably for the best you were out so long. You just missed your father."
Oh, shit. His dad. He grimaces, peeking at her bashfully.
"Seems you were supposed to be grounded?" she says coyly. "I'm sure you two will be having a nice talk about that once he's off of work.
He groans and puts his arm over his face. Great. Can't stay out of trouble in any reality, apparently. That's probably going to bite him in the ass later.
She chuckles and gently tousles his hair. "For now, why don't you just rest? I'll go tell the doctor you're awake."
He hums his assent and listens as the chair scrapes on the floor and her footsteps move out of the room. As soon as he hears the click of the door, he drops his arm, checking to make sure he's alone.
His cell phone has gotta be here somewhere, right? Rolling out of bed, he hobbles on stiff legs, searching for one of those plastic bags they always put personal stuff in. The room tilts woozily around him, and he has to hold on to the wall so he doesn't faceplant.
He finds the bag in the corner on the floor and digs through his clothes until his fingers curl around the cool plastic of his phone. He fully expects it to be dead, but the screen lights up immediately, showing half a battery left. Huh.
Sliding back into bed, he pulls Google up and squints as his eyes complain about the bright white screen. How would he describe the thing that attacked him? He definitely remembers claws, and fangs. It had dark hair, but that could be just because it was so dark in the basement. There was something about the eyes… Oh, purple! Yes, he remembers purple eyes.
What supernatural creature has purple eyes?
He moans when he gets over 30 million results on his search. Obviously, he's going to need a bit more to go on.
Unfortunately, his mom returns with the doctor before he can figure out how to narrow down his search parameters. He slides his phone under his pillow, deciding he can save it for later.
After a lot of lights in his eyes and cognitive questions that he has to force himself to answer correctly and not sarcastically (he doesn't want them to keep him here longer because he kept insisting Mickey Mouse is president), it's determined he probably only has a minor concussion. The doctor still wants to get him a CT scan and keep him under observation for a while longer, due to him being unconscious for so long. He's ordered to take it easy and limit his screen time for the next few days, and he pretends he'll do exactly that.
"The best thing for you right now is sleep," the doctor tells him kindly as he hands him some pills of the sleepy variety.
Stiles' resolve to figure out what the thing that attacked him was is quickly being trumped by his growing headache. He decides it won't hurt to sleep for a while. There will be plenty of time to figure out his problems when he wakes up.
"You had me worried," Claudia tells him while they wait for the drugs to kick in. "Don't ever scare me like that again, okay?"
"Sorry, Mom." He scoots back down on the bed, lying on his side, and fusses with the pillow. He wishes it was his pillow.
She reaches over to help him, somehow magically arranging it in a more comfortable position like only moms can do, and then pulls the blanket up over his shoulder. He can't help but be reminded of Melissa doing something very similar for him not so long ago.
"Mom?" he says, beginning to feel the hazy pull of the drugs.
"Hmm?"
He bites the inside of his mouth, sneaking a hand out from under the covers and looking up at her hopefully. "Will you stay with me?"
She smiles, her soft hands wrapping around his. "I'm not going anywhere," she tells him, rubbing circles on the inside of his wrist.
He lets his heavy eyelids fall shut, taking a deep breath and letting himself relax. He's not sure if it's the drugs or her touch, but he feels a deep sense of peace, like he's a little kid again. Like his mom's mere presence can keep all his nightmares, all his troubles away. There's nothing to worry about as long as she's here.
Maybe he doesn't need to keep looking for a way out of here. Maybe he should just stay here forever.
"Love you, Mom," he mumbles as he drifts off on the ocean of sleep.
Her response is like an angel's whisper. "Love you, too, Mischief."
The structure of this story is split into thirds, so that's the end of part one! I'm real impatient to get to part two, where we'll get some shifts in POVs and maybe answer a few questions about what's going on. If you've stuck with me this far, I hope you'll continue to enjoy this story going forward!
