Chapter 32: Chaos Rising

"You know, I'm starting not to like this idea. Sounds kinda dangerous." Isaac paced along the tall windows of Derek's loft.

"Dangerous?" Damon eyed him and then the Alpha. "How dangerous? You know what? I definitely don't like this idea."

"Damon." Elena tilted her head to offer a soft, but warning glare.

"She'll be fine," Derek sighed.

"Does it have to be him?" Isaac rolled his neck, missing the way Elena smiled.

Damon definitely wasn't smiling. Some apparently ex-psychotic-murderer-ex-Alpha was on his way to stick his filthy little were-claws into his girlfriend's neck to help find a bunch of teenagers he didn't care all too much about. Sure, he didn't wish Tyler Lockwood dead anymore, but no way was he risking the love of his life to help the kid. Add to that the sweaty way Isaac was hovering and being protective of his girl, well Damon was just mentally telling everyone in the room that they should be thankful there weren't any detached heads rolling around.

"He knows how to do it. I don't. Be more dangerous if I tried doing it myself."

"You know Scott doesn't trust him, right? You know, personally, I'd… well, I'd trust Scott."

"I don't trust any of you," Damon crossed his arms.

"Do you trust me?" Derek ignored the vampire.

"Yeah." Isaac paused. "I still don't like him."

"Nobody likes him."

The door to the loft screeched open and Damon took a single step in front of Elena.

"Boys." The stranger stood in the threshold for a dramatic moment before practically prancing into the loft. "F.Y.I., yes, coming back from the dead has left my abilities somewhat impaired, but the hearing still works. So I hope you're comfortable saying, whatever it is that you're feeling, straight to my face."

Derek stared straight at his uncle. "We don't like you." He emphasized his point by slamming a book closed and Damon couldn't help but smirk. "Now shut up and help us."

The vampires eyed the werewolves, wondering if there was going to be a fight, but, to their surprise, the man just shrugged.

"Fair enough."

They cycled through introductions like reluctant participants in an AA meeting. Peter instructed Elena to sit and she complied, not ignorant of the way her boyfriend was staring down the older werewolf with his usual murder glare. She was shaking as she sat and let out a breath.

"Relax," Peter moved behind her. "I'll get more out of you if you're calm."

"How do you know how to do this, again?" Damon circled around so that he was practically on top of his girlfriend.

"It's an ancient ritual used mostly by Alphas, since it's a skill that requires quite a bit of practice. One slip, and you could paralyze someone." He stroked the vampire's neck and she had to lift her hand to stop Damon's advance. "Or kill them."

"You - You've had a lot of practice, though, right?" Isaac stepped away from the window, joining them.

"Well, I've never paralyzed anyone."

"Wait," Elena tried to turn her head, "does that mean you -"

She never finished as the claws sunk in and the breath was knocked out of her. Her body seized, hips arching and hands absently flailing for the arm around her shoulders. Damon made to attack the former Alpha as Derek and Isaac tensed, unsure if to help or subdue.

"Wait," Peter called out. "I see them."

Elena's body calmed as Peter's head fell back, eyes glowing, but somehow clouded over. The air was thick and Damon felt as though they stayed that way, all standing on the edge of some cliff, for an eternity. Mere seconds later, though, and Peter was pulling back, stumbling and gasping. Damon knelt in front of Elena, taking her head in his hands.

"Are you okay?"

She scrunched her forehead and nodded.

"What'd you see?" Derek advanced on his uncle.

Peter panted, steadying himself on a beam. "Um, im - images. Vague shapes."

"But you saw something ."

"She was with them."

"Erica and Boyd?"

"And Tyler?" Elena looked up.

"I barely saw them. I mean, glimpses."

"But you did see them," Derek confirmed.

"And worse."

"Deucalion."

"He was talking to them. Something about time running out."

"What does it mean?" Isaac glanced from Peter to Derek.

"He's gonna kill them." Derek bit down on his rage.

"No, no, no, no, no, he didn't say that. He did make them a promise that by the full moon that they'd both be dead."

"The next full moon?"

Peter tilted his head with a roll of his eyes. "Tomorrow night."


When Stiles slapped his desk and took the quarter from coach, Scott wanted to laugh at his friend until he remembered that, yeah, they weren't talking. And he was pretty sure Stiles was just doing this little shot to prove something to Scott. He just wished Stiles knew how much he didn't need to prove himself to Scott. How Scott knew his best friend was smarter than any of them, except Lydia, and even then Stiles had her beat when it came to certain topics and figuring things out. How they wouldn't have survived this long in the supernatural world without him. But how Scott literally couldn't survive any world if Stiles was killed because he was running around with werewolves and vampires.

Scott's inner monologuing was cut short as the door opened and the Sheriff called out to his son. Coach kept talking, but Scott's ears were tuned to the conversation.

"Listen son, this is about that party you were at last night."

Party? Stiles had gone to a party? Without him?

"Dad, I didn't drink or -"

"Stiles. This is about Heather." There was a pause and Scott was busy wondering who she was when he almost missed the Sheriff tell Stiles that the girl was missing. "We know the two of you were together."

"Yeah, yeah. She - uh - invited me downstairs to help her with - drinks," Scott heard his friend's heartbeat skip on the lie and apparently the Sheriff sensed something too. "Okay, so there may have been some kissing. Lots of kissing. I went upstairs to - use the bathroom."

"And then what?"

"I couldn't find her. I just figured she'd hooked up with her other friends. Has no one really seen her since last night?:

"No. We put out an A.P.B., but, Stiles, all her friends say you were the last person who saw her."

"Me?"

"We hope that it's just a series of bad decisions based on too much to drink. But if you remember anything else, you call me. All right?

"Yeah, yeah. Of course."

The Sheriff turned and walked away with the deputy, but Stiles never came back into the classroom. Scott listened to the retreating footsteps, resisting the urge to follow his friend.

It was after class, when Scott sniffed out Stiles in the hallway, staring at his phone and slamming his locker. The werewolf's mouth was already open when his friend turned on him.

"I don't care, what you say, okay? I'm done with this. Staying out of everything. I'm done with feeling guilty about my own existence. What if you had been there with me last night, huh? If whatever this is," he waved a hand between their chests, "wasn't going on and you had been there with me, together, like we always used to be. Maybe we could've protected her."

For the first words they had spoken to each other since the fight, this wasn't exactly how Scott had wanted it to go down.

"Protected her from what?"

"The Alphas. Who else do we know in town that's going after teenagers? Maybe whatever it is they're doing, they need five supernatural creatures. So they took her to replace that vampire chic."

"You know about all that?"

"Are you kidding? Of course I know! It's me. I've been having Lydia and Allison tell me everything. Just in case I needed to swoop in and save your ass.Again."

The hostility in Stiles' voice should have made him take a step back. Instead, the comment only made Scott want to smile.

"So you think they kidnapped Heather to turn her?"

"Derek says it's easier to turn teenagers," he waved his phone and Scott couldn't help the pang of hurt that Stiles had turned to the Alpha before his best friend.

"But what would a pack of Alphas need with a Beta?"

"Scott, I don't know. I don't care. All right? This girl... Our moms were best friends before mine died, all right? We used to take frickin' bubble baths together when we were three. I gotta find her.

"Then we need Elena to remember."

"How? According to Derek, one of the other vampires entering her mind didn't work. And Peter couldn't do it. You know any other werewolves with a better trick?

"Maybe not a werewolf. But someone who knows a lot about 'em."