Things got a little blurry for Stiles after that. The adrenaline was wearing off, leaving fear and exhaustion in its place, and he actually ended up going back to his knees again after being ignored for about eight minutes while Talia started barking orders. Hugging himself tightly, he tried not to shiver, tried not to give any more sign that he was practically falling apart at the seams than the fact that he physically couldn't stand, but there wasn't a doubt in his mind that they already knew exactly what kind of a state he was in.

Melting into a puddle had kind of given him away.

"Get him off the floor," Talia muttered as she crossed to the large oak desk positioned beneath the library windows, and her husband, David - because it had to be David Hale from the way he'd trailed his hands affectionately over her shoulders - crossed to his side, lifting him by the elbow far more gently than Stiles had expected him to and guiding him to a straight-backed wooden chair in a corner.

He thought the werewolf might've also given him what could pass for an encouraging smile, but chalked it up to wishful thinking and his imagination.

"Derek, get your sister on video call," Talia said harshly, and the younger man nodded before slipping silently out of the room. Meanwhile the Alpha was smashing at the keys of an old-fashioned landline, tapping in four numbers at a time, giving brief commands to come to the library, and hanging up to dial again.

'Closed circuit, local line,' his brain provided.

Must connect the main house with all the other buildings - apartments maybe, or offices.

Mayday, mayday, report to headquarters...

Luckily for Stiles, Derek chose that moment to slink back in behind him, causing him to jump an inch out of his seat with surprise but killing the hysterical giggles before they could fight their way out of his chest. The werewolf scowled at his startle response but Stiles was already beginning to suspect that that was his default face so he ignored it, instead taking interest in watching him set up a battered, sticker-covered laptop on the desk next to his mother's hip. He could see one for The Violent Femmes, and was hit with the sudden recognition that, wow, the guy listened to one of Stiles' favorite bands.

That shouldn't be so weird.

But then he was booting the thing up and Stiles could hear the familiar jangle of a Skype call going through, and then there was a pretty, green-eyed brunette - clearly another Hale - smiling and waving furiously at him through the camera.

"Hey baby bro!" she cheered, resting her chin on her fist. "What's up? It's not Satur… woah, hey, who's the cutie?"

Umm… Pretty girl say what?

Blinking dumbly through the webcam at the werewolf who was staring him down like he was Friday's prime rib special, Stiles quickly schooled his face into an innocent 'who me?' when Derek turned back over his shoulder with a snarl and a flash of blue eyes. The girl in the computer squawked with protest when he grabbed the corner of the laptop and turned it away from him, angling it back towards his mother.

"Oh come on Derek!" Stiles heard her yelp with indignation. "You're not gonna introduce me to your new boyfriend? I get it, you're trying to make P…"

"He's not my boyfriend!" Derek snarled indignantly, whipping the computer back around again so he could level her with what was no doubt an impressive glare.

"Laura that's enough," Talia growled, grabbing her son's wrist and pushing him gently back so that she could angle the computer upward, and there was enough gravity in her tone that all teasing from the other end of the line was immediately cut off. "Derek, go sit with Cora please, she's getting upset."

Frowning, Derek none the less nodded, returned his sister's melancholy wave, and ducked out once again.

'Talia,' Stiles listed off silently, trying to focus his attention with the list scrolling at the back of his mind. 'David and Derek and Laura and Cora.'

He remembered some of the names. He'd been young when the wars broke out, young when they'd ended, but he remembered the nights his dad would come home, weary and worn beyond the physical, the nights when he would scoop Stiles up in a hug and hold on so tight it hurt. He remembered the names - Talia, David, the kids Laura and Derek. He didn't remember a Cora, and he thought there'd been a Seth back then, but he wasn't sure.

"So what?" Laura said as he tuned back in to the conversation. "He just came walking right up to the front door?"

"Didn't make it that far," Stiles huffed bitterly, and all three wolves turned to look at him, a range of emotions from impressed to amused to angry.

"Brave kid," Laura murmured and Stiles felt his cheeks burn as he turned away to stare at the wall.

He didn't feel brave, he felt stupid. Trapped.

"That remains to be seen." The Alpha sighed heavily, pinched the bridge of her nose. "This is going to be a disaster," she muttered to herself, but even Stiles heard it, and that wasn't reassuring at all because what was she talking about that he had missed? "You need to be here for this Laura," she continued, lifting her head. "Your father will pick you up in the morning. You should make it back by late afternoon - I think I can buy us that long."

"Ok," Laura agreed, nodding along. "I'll email my professors, tell them there was a family emergency. But keep dad at home," she added, and Stiles saw Talia's eyes flash. "You'll need him too. Send Nicky - he drives faster anyway."

"All right then. If he leaves now he'll be there around three - be ready."

"I will."

With one last lingering look at Stiles over her mother's shoulder, Laura signed off and the screen went black. Closing the laptop, Talia turned around to sit on the edge of the desk, folding her arms tightly around her middle, and David was quick to move behind her and place comforting hands on her shoulders.

"Mom?"

Oh for god's sake, how many kids did these people have?

A tall, slender young man, older than Derek, stood anxiously in the doorway, only coming in when Talia motioned him forward. He looked about twenty four or twenty five, had long, tousled hair, which, coupled with his family's coloring and his neat, dark facial hair, suggested to Stiles that there was more than a little bottle in his blonde. He was followed in by two older wolves; one a little old lady draped in half a dozen colorful knit-shawls that oddly reminded Stiles of his grandmother, and the other a stocky, middle-aged man with tawny hair just starting to go grey at the temples and the air of a soldier, scarred and clearly blind in one eye, which had gone pale and milky.

Stiles almost choked on the clichés.

"Nicholas, I need you to go pick up your sister from school," Talia commanded firmly, straightening up again and brushing her husband off. "If you leave now you'll be there before sunup, and you can be back by early afternoon."

The blonde didn't protest, didn't question the way Stiles would've, but then he suspected that with werewolf hearing, he'd probably caught everything he needed to know from the hallway. Still, it was a harsh order given without explanation, a little cold, a little callous, and even though she wasn't his mom, wasn't human, the way that Talia spoke to her sons made Stiles bristle.

"Take Laura's Camaro," David said, and yeah, that was better, calm, smooth, soothing. Quiet, trying not to squirm on the hard, wooden chair he'd been dropped onto, Stiles watched as the man stepped up and grabbed his son by the neck, pulling him down to press their foreheads together. "Make her drive on the way back so you don't fall asleep at the wheel."

"Yes sir."

Giving his father a brief, tight hug, the young man nodded to his mother and then he was gone, bounding off through the house, and Stiles thought he might've whimpered if the glance spared him by the Alpha's husband was anything to go by. What he wouldn't give to hug his dad right now, to feel safe in the man's arms the way he had when he was a kid. There was no guarantee he was getting out of here, no guarantee he'd ever even see his father again, and if he didn't…

"Breathe kid," David said, clamping a hand down tightly on Stiles' shoulder, and he could feel the heat burning through the fabric of his hoody - liar, liar, liar - "Your heart's going a hundred miles a minute."

Stiles flinched and made some strange noise of protest because he wasn't helping and the werewolf backed off, frowning as he withdrew his hand, but Stiles couldn't care, he didn't want to be touched, didn't want to be sitting there…

Pulling Scott's inhaler from his pocket, he took another dose, hoping it would calm his breathing, but the reminder that his friend was still hidden away somewhere in who knows what kind of condition…

"Where's Scott?" he asked in a strangled sort of tone, his courage creeping back to him with its tail still tucked.

Talia turned to glare from where she leaned over the desk, a thick volume of what looked like case law cracked in front of her. The two other wolves were bent over the book as well, their gazes snapping over to him filled with annoyance, but also a little bit of surprise, a little bit of reluctant awe.

Oh right.

Alpha.

Angry Alpha, capable of turning you into sliced bologna with a couple of swipes if she wanted to…

Stupidity, not bravery.

"Sorry," he mumbled, dropping his eyes again. "Um. Ms. Alpha, ma'am? Could you please tell me…"

"Where the hell is Peter?" Talia sighed with exasperation, cutting Stiles off.

Unsure what he'd done wrong that time, or who Peter was and why the hell he was relevant, Stiles raised his head just in time to see the other werewolves shrugging unconcernedly.

"We're none of us Peter's keeper, my love," David said quietly, reassuringly, and Stiles had to give the guy credit because the look Talia was leveling him was enough to make his insides go to jelly. "He's probably with Luca."

"Damn it," the woman hissed, pressing her fingers to her temples, and then she was turning to the scarred beta, pointing a clawed finger dead at Stiles' heart.

"Calvin, get him out of my sight," she growled, and that didn't sound good. "Take him down to the barn and leave him with the other one until I can figure this out. God knows this is just what we need - the whole town thinking we kidnapped the Sheriff's son!"

"They won't…" Stiles began to protest, but he couldn't finish the sentence.

Shit.

He hadn't thought of that.

His dad might be smart enough to realize that Scott had trundled off on his own and that Stiles had followed in blatant disregard of his orders, but the rest of Beacon Hills likely wasn't. There were still people in town who hated and feared the werewolves that lived on the other side of the boundary line, and would likely jump at the opportunity to accuse them of kidnapping, and that was to say nothing of the hunters.

Shit.

The soldier beta was watching Stiles with great interest as this realization played out, no doubt written all over his face. He'd crossed to Stiles' side in the meantime, ignoring his reaction when he finally noticed his looming presence and flailed away, trying unsuccessfully to backpedal his chair across the floor, but instead of grabbing his arm and dragging him off like Derek had, he waited patiently until Stiles' pride forced him to his feet without the rough encouragement.

"So we're not gonna talk about this?" he asked with confusion and just a little meekly, looking around the wall of werewolf towards the Alpha, who had bent back over her book and wasn't paying him the slightest attention. "What about the negotiations?"

"Come on kid," the werewolf rumbled calmly, his voice low and hoarse like a smoker's. "You heard what she said. Move it."

Putting a light hand on his shoulder, he guided him firmly into the hallway.

"But…" Stiles protested, waving an arm in the direction of the rapidly disappearing library, but the werewolf didn't let up, propelling him down the hall, past a dining room dominated by a massive, oaken table, and out a screen door into the backyard.

Sighing heavily, resigned to this fate at least by the time they stepped off the patio, he stopped pushing back against the hand between his shoulder blades and started walking properly, surprised when the werewolf immediately let go and fell into step beside him.

"Not worried I'll make a run for it?" he muttered sullenly, mostly just to be bitter as he felt several pairs of eyes following their progress across the grass, a handful of werewolves pausing left and right to watch the strange human trudging through their backyard.

"Not worried I'd catch you?" the wolf asked in reply.

Calvin, he told himself. This one's Calvin.

"Besides," he continued, "From what I heard, you walked in here on your own two feet. Only a squalling little runt would go running back out again."

"Right," Stiles huffed, jamming his hands into his pockets, irked by the derogatory slant of the wolf's statement. "So what, I should just skip merrily on down to the altar?"

"As you like," he replied easily, steering them toward one of the larger outbuildings at the back of the property. "Would you rather squeal and bleat the whole way there like your friend did?"

Stiles steps faltered, a jolt of reality snapping over his nerves, but the werewolf didn't even break stride.

"You seem like you're made of stronger stuff."

Unsure if he'd been complimented or marked as a better quality chew-toy, frightened by what had been implied about Scott, Stiles dragged his feet the rest of the way to the edge of the building, pausing when the werewolf climbed a set of rickety, wooden steps in front of the barn doors and turned the heavy-duty lock barred across them.

"Werewolf reinforced," he said conversationally as his arms bulged with the effort of pushing back the door. "Full moons, this is where the kids stay that can't control their shifts yet."

Ok, that was horrible - and not just because there wouldn't be any chance of sneaking out.

Not that that was really an option anyway - the wolves would be well within their rights to demand restitution or to lay waste to Beacon Hills if Stiles ran off.

No need to make things worse than he already had.

In the face of that fact, and in the face of Calvin's challenge to his dignity, Stiles summoned up his courage, determined to walk into captivity on his own steam rather than be tossed in like a ragdoll. Stepping around the werewolf who gestured grandly - the smartass - he felt his jaw drop. He'd been expecting a basement at best, a dungeon with barred cells at worst, but what he found was nothing more or less than your average college guy's first apartment; a bunch of beat-up furniture and even more empty floor space. Oh sure, there seemed to be some teeth marks on most everything, but all in all it was a lot less horrifying than he'd anticipated.

Which… kind of summed up the trip so far - yeah, he'd been manhandled a bit and given the alpha death stare, a few vague threats, but he hadn't been seriously hurt.

Maybe the stories were all bull.

That would be… yeah, that would be good.

"So this is it?" he asked shakily, a little bit dumbfounded and trying to hide the hope. "I just… hang out?"

Calvin shrugged.

"What about the negotiations?"

"When Alpha Hale feels you're needed she'll send someone for you," he replied. "Don't worry kid. I haven't seen my Alpha that riled in a long time - you'll be hearing from her." Grinning around a mouthful of sharp teeth and shooting Stiles a cheeky wink with his blind eye, he stepped backward out the door and rolled it shut after him with an ominous and final thud.

"Great," Stiles snarled between clenched teeth, his hands fisting. "Just freakin' perfect. Way to go Stiles, great plan!"

"Stiles?"

Hand leaping to his chest to stave off the heart attack, Stiles whipped around just in time to be knocked to the ground by a dirty and bedraggled Scott, who had jumped out from behind a chair that dripped stuffing from several long slashes.

"Scott?"

"Stiles! Oh my god, what are you doing here? Are you ok?"

"I fine, except you're sitting on my lungs," he panted, and then Scott was scrambling off of him and dragging him upright so that they were sitting cross-legged close enough for their knees to touch.

"Dude, what are you doing here?" he asked again, and Stiles frowned, eyes finding the light bruise on Scott's shoulder that peeked out from beneath his shirt sleeve, dried blood on his knuckles.

"What do you think I'm doing here?" he countered, irritation coming back in a flood. "You idiot, I told you not to come here!"

"What was I supposed to do?" Scott yipped indignantly, but then the anger went out of him and he visibly deflated, a terrible sadness dropping over his face. "Isaac's my friend," he said quietly, and Stiles sighed. "He needs help. Your dad can't help him, and we can't help him. What was I supposed to do?"

"Not this," Stiles groaned, scrubbing his hands through his hair.

"He's gonna end up dead Stiles."

And that was it, the undeniable truth that he couldn't argue.

Because if Isaac did stay with his dad, then yeah, he was probably going to get killed, or else hurt so bad he wouldn't pull through it.

"Did you at least get a chance to tell them about it?" he asked.

"No," Scott mumbled, and his voice almost cracked, and all Stiles could do was sigh and pull the guy in for a one-armed hug, try to hang on.

"They wouldn't listen," he said against Stiles shoulder, and yeah, no big surprise there. "They just grabbed me and hauled me into the house and then their Alpha was yelling and her eyes were red and I was pretty sure she was gonna kill me."

"She could have," Stiles scolded, unwilling to overlook that crucial detail. "You broke the law dude; we're in serious trouble here. My dad too probably."

"Well did they listen to you at least?"

"I don't know," he replied. "I think maybe." Pushing Scott off, he stood up and started looking around, taking stock of what was essentially his prison cell for the moment. "I basically named myself an ambassador and invoked the right to renegotiate the treaty just to save my own ass. Honestly I don't have anything to negotiate. But the Alpha was reading the case law when she had me dragged down here, so she can't kill us until my dad's here and has had a chance to talk to her."

"That's good I guess."

"I guess," Stiles muttered. Maybe, maybe not. Might not make any damned difference at all.

"You ok man?" he asked, turning back to his friend once a cursory glance of his surroundings told him that there was nothing around to be used as either weapon or escape route.

"Yeah, I'm ok," he answered, moving to sit down on one of the battered couches. "I mean, they haven't hurt me or anything."

Cocking an eyebrow, Stiles looked pointedly at the guy's shoulder, the backs of his hands before tossing him his inhaler. His voice was scratchy, his breathing uneven, but other than that he did seem ok.

"Oh that," he shrugged, letting the inhaler hit the couch before he even tried to catch it, picking it up and taking a quick shot before shoving it into his jeans. "Yeah, that was me."

"Tell me you didn't try breaking the door down," Stiles frowned, and Scott grinned sheepishly.

"It's not so bad though," he said, ever the optimist as he stretched out and threw his arm over his eyes. "Super boring, which means you've got a lot of time to think."

"Doing much of that?" Stiles asked, his doubt evident in his tone. Clearly he wasn't doing enough - he didn't seem to have any idea how deep they were in.

"Shut up," the other boy muttered. "Really though Stiles, they don't seem so bad. Not like the stories anyway. I mean, they scare the hell out of me, but there's a bathroom in the back and they fed me this morning, so. It's not as bad as I thought it would be."

Right.

Not as bad.

Collapsing into the creaky armchair, Stiles started chewing on the strings of his hoody, toes tapping anxiously on the concrete floor. Images flashed through his brain a hundred miles minute - the manicured lawns with their neatly kept flower beds, the well-stocked library, Derek's computer covered in band stickers. None of it was what he had expected, and while he hesitated to think that he'd been imagining people living like animals, blood and dirt and no technology, it was still well beyond how he'd ever dreamed werewolves to live.

He couldn't decide if that boded well for him or not.

A wolf might've just killed him straight out for invading its territory.

A wolf with the mind of a man might be able to think up something far worse.