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RAEGAN MCCALL

"Why didn't you tell us before?" Scott demanded as the three of us walked through the hospital entrance.

Mom had explained to us on the way here that Isaac had been admitted to the hospital this morning from an attack. We were here to rescue him before anyone noticed he had miraculously healed.

"Honestly, I was hoping I didn't have to," Mom replied.

"What do you mean?"

"Everything that you've been doing... the extra reading, the summer school, saving up for the bike, even though it scares me half to death... Honey, I just didn't wanna disrupt a good rhythm."

"It's not gonna stop. I-I'm gonna be better this year. A better student, a better son, a better friend, a better everything. I promise."

"Ditto," I agreed, smiling.

"Okay," Mom looked towards the elevator. "He's in room 315 if he isn't already in surgery."

"Thank you," Scott said as he and I hurried for the elevator.

I pressed the button for the third floor and the doors were about to close when a stick poked through, opening the doors back up.

It was the walking stick of a blind guy. He was about thirty-ish and was wearing glasses with red lenses. I tried not to stare. Even though he was blind, I still felt it was rude.

"Would you hit the button for the second floor, please?" he asked in a British accent.

"Yeah," I said, and hit the button.

"Thank you," he said. And when we reached his floor, he asked, "You wouldn't mind helping me out for a second, would you?"

"Um... sure," Scott said, reluctantly. We really didn't have time for this. But, of course, Scott was ever polite. He gave me a look and I nodded. While Scott helped the blind guy out of the elevator, I stayed and went to the third floor.

I was running down the hallways, looking for 315, when Scott joined me. When we saw that 315 was empty, we kept looking around the floor.

We had circled back to the elevator, when we saw Isaac in it. He was unconscious, in a wheelchair, with a buff, nearly bald nurse behind him.

Scott and I noticed the nurse's claws at the same time.

Scott got his werewolf face on and growled. Both of us lunged towards the elevator doors, but Scott was much faster and got into the elevator at the last second. I almost ran into the closed doors. Frustrated, I cursed and hit the elevator door. Then I found the stairs and went down them two at a time. When I reached the elevator on the second floor, I ran smack into Derek. He quickly righted me, so I wouldn't fall.

We both turned when the elevator doors opened and saw that the "nurse" was holding Scott up by his throat. He said, "Don't you realize what you're dealing with? I'm an Alpha."

"So am I," Derek said, jamming his claws into the the Alpha's back and tossing him out of the elevator. Derek turned to look at us and said, "Aren't you supposed to be in school?"

SAMANTHA STILINSKI

Once everything calmed down, I slowly stood up and observed the mess of a classroom. There were black feathers and paper all cluttered around the disheveled desks. Lydia and Stiles got up a few seconds after me. I winced at Lydia's knotted up hair that she probably spent hours on perfecting this morning. In front of me, I saw Allie run her hand through her hair.

"You're bleeding!" Stiles exclaimed, pointing to my arm.

"It's fine," I said. "I can wait for it to get fixed once help comes."

I knew all of the supernatural drama was going to start again, but I didn't think it was going to start this early. I just wanted to enjoy the first day of school like any other teenager on the planet. However, Beacon Hills was always an exception to that rule.

"What the hell just happened?!" Lydia exclaimed.

"I have no idea, but I have this feel like something big is coming," Allison said.

"You mean this wasn't big?!" I exclaimed, starting my rant.

"Here we go again…" Stiles rolled his eyes.

"Birds literally attacked us and the other day a deer attacked us!" I said. "I don't know if this is the Lorax's revenge on us for screwing up the environment, but what just happened was not okay!"

"Sams," Lydia tried for a smile. "We'll get through this like we always do. Don't worry."

"She's right, Sammy," Allison sighed. "We somehow always survive."

"Yeah, after all the mental breakdowns and death!" Stiles commented. "Would you like me to remind you guys what happened last year?"

"At least we all survived last year with hair that didn't make us look like we were twelve!" I smiled sweetly at him.

Allison and Lydia laughed while Stiles gave me the stink eye.

"I grew my hair out!" Stiles defended himself. "I don't look like that anymore!"

"And thank God for that," I snorted.

Stiles was about to fight back when Dad interrupted him.

"You two can't even stop fighting after an attack like this?!" Dad exclaimed.

"Hey, she started it!" Stiles defended.

Dad just rolled his eyes. "Whatever. Sammy, come with me so you can get your cut fixed up."

"Fine," I groaned.

ADELINE LAHEY

"Woohoo! We just finished our first day as highschoolers!" Mason cheered.

I couldn't help but giggle at how excited he was. "Yep."

"But we already have a whole bunch of homework," he grumbled, now sulking.

"And don't forget about that test we have next week," I couldn't help but remind him.

"Middle school did a terrible job at preparing us for high school," Mason said, "It's only been the first day, and I'm already stressed."

"Agreed." It was then that I recognized one of my classmates. "Corey!"

The said boy looked up in surprise, but then waved back when he saw me-and Mason-walking over to him.

"You forgot this is History," I told him, handing him his notes, "It would be pretty bad if you came to class unprepared for the quiz."

"Thanks," Corey said, but I noticed his eyes flicker to Mason.

I bit my lip to contain my grin as I felt my shipping senses tingle. "Oh, I almost forgot. Corey, this is my friend Mason Hewitt. Mason, this is Corey Bryant. We have History together, and we're all in the same Biology class," I said, introducing the two boys to each other, "Well...I gotta go meet up with some other people. Talk to each other, get to know each other. See you guys later." And with that, I walked away, leaving a blushing Corey and an oblivious Mason.

I went to Stiles' Jeep-where we usually meet up after school-but only Stiles and Sammy were there.

"Where's Scott and Rae?" I asked Sammy, since Stiles was on the phone.

Did Scott and Rae not show up to the first day of school?

"They got called out for early dismissal," Sammy answered.

"We got a serious problem at school," Stiles said into the phone. "Ms. Blake's class-"

Scott, who was on speaker, interrupted him, "Hey, can you tell me about it later?"

"Well, no, pretty sure this qualifies for immediate discussion."

"Okay then meet me at Derek's."

"Derek's house? What the hell are you doing at-"

Scott interrupted Stiles once again, "Just meet us here, okay?"

He hung up.

"What happened in your class?" I frowned, climbing into the Jeep with the others.

"Well, birds attacked our class," Sammy said, nonchalantly, and I noticed the bandage wrapped around her arm.

My eyes widened. "What, like the deer?"

"Exactly," Stiles started driving.

|| Teen Wolf ||

"Yeah, I see it," Derek said, looking at Scott's arm with his red Alpha eyes. "It's two bands, right? What does it mean?"

"I don't know. It's just something I traced with my fingers." Scott reached over and created a circle with another circle around it in the dust on a table in Derek's old house.

After we had arrived at the house, Scott and Rae had explained what had happened to Isaac and Sammy and Stiles had explained what had happened with the birds. Then Scott had said Derek owed him. And now Scott was about to get a tattoo.

Such a strange turn of events.

"Why is this so important to you?" Derek asked Scott.

"Do you know what the word "tattoo" means?" Scott asked in return.

"To mark something," Stiles answered for Derek.

"Well, that's in tahitian. In samoan, it means "open wound." I knew I wanted to get a tattoo when I turned eighteen. I always wanted one. I just decided to get it now, to make it kind of a reward," Scott explained.

"For what?" Rae asked.

"For not calling or texting Allison all summer. Even when I really wanted to, even when it was so hard not to sometimes. I was trying to give her the space she wants. Goin' four months later, it still hurts. It still feels like a, uh…"

"Like an open wound," Sammy offered.

"Yeah," he smiled at her.

Derek nodded and said, "The pain's gonna be worse than anything you've ever felt."

"Ah, that's great," Stiles muttered, sarcastically.

"Do it," Scott nodded, propping his arm up on the table.

Before Derek could start, I put my contrasting small, pale hand on Derek's huge, tan arm. "Please don't hurt him, Derek."

"I won't." Derek grinned, "Not permanently, at least."

Derek started the blowtorch and Stiles' eyes bugged out of his head. "Oh, wow. That's a... that's a lot for me. So I'm gonna take that as my cue. I'm just gonna wait outside."

As Stiles moved to leave, Derek pulled him back by his shirt. "Nope. You can help hold him down."

Stiles groaned and went to go hold down Scott.

Before the torch could touch Scott, I turned and hid my face into Rae's arm, not wanting to watch. She held me, rubbing soothing patterns into my back.

Scott's screams outweighed her attempts, though.

|| Teen Wolf ||

Towards the end, Scott's screams had stopped. He had apparently passed out from the pain.

When he woke up with a start ten minutes later, he looked down to see his new tattoo. "It worked."

"Well, it looks pretty damn permanent now," Stiles said, helping Scott down from the table.

"Yeah. I kind of needed something permanent," Scott said, pulling his shirt back on. "Everything that's happened to us... everything just changes so fast. Everything's so, uh... Ephemeral."

"Studying for the PSATS?" Stiles laughed.

"Yep," Scott grinned. "Sammy's been helping Rae and I."

Sammy's eyes widened.

"Oh, god," Rae groaned. "You reminded her! I was hoping she'd forget after the whole fiasco today."

We all laughed as Sammy began scolding Rae about not being responsible.

After Scott thanked Derek, we turned to leave, but Scott paused when he swung open the front door.

"You painted the door," he frowned. "Why'd you paint the door?"

"Go home, Scott," Derek simply said.

"And why only one side…?" Scott continued. He flicked out a claw and scratched the paint off the door.

"Scott, what the hell are you doing?" Rae frowned.

"Scott!" Derek's voice boomed.

When Scott saw a hint of black lines underneath, he brought out all his claws and began scratching paint off the door ferociously.

When he was done, we stood back and looked at the fancy-looking triangle symbol that was carved into the wood.

Scott turned to Derek, who was crossing his arms. "The birds at school and the deer last night... just like the night I got trampled by the deer when I got bit by the Alpha." He paused as he realized something. "How many are there?"

Derek sighed. "A pack of 'em. An Alpha pack."

"All of them? How does that even work?" Stiles said what we were all thinking.

"I hear there's some kind of a leader," Derek said. "He's called Deucalion. We know they have Boyd and Erica. Peter, Isaac, and I have been looking for him for the last four months."

So that's what Isaac's been doing all this time.

"Let's say you find them. How do you deal with an Alpha pack?" Scott asked.

"With all the help I can get," Derek told him.

"Where is she? Where's the girl?"

We all turned to Isaac, who had previously been unconscious, lying on a table. He was sitting up now, and had a peculiar look on his face.

"What girl?" Rae frowned.