Runaways, we're the long lost children
Running to the edge of the world
Everybody wants to throw us away
Broken boy meets broken girl
You said you tried it all before
And it only makes it worse
Oh, but this time, maybe this time
Two wrongs make it right
We'll safety-pin the pieces of our broken hearts back together
Patching up all the holes until we both feel much better
Safety Pin – 5 Seconds of Summer
Being woken up by Lydia twice in one day really wasn't doing great things for the newfound friendship we were steadily working towards.
I opened Stiles' front door with a scowl, the hem of his old shirt barely covering the blue lace of my panties. Lydia rubbed a hand down her face, looking like she was desperately trying not to groan aloud out of pure exasperation.
"Just once, would pants be too much to ask for?" she asked me wryly.
I growled at her irritably, just barely resisting the urge to flash some fang, but she only rolled her eyes like it were a card I'd played one too many times. "Come on in," I muttered sourly, stepping aside and letting her step inside the house. "What can we do for you today?" I asked in my most prim tone, shutting the door after her and wandering back towards the stairs.
"We need to figure out the code," she was saying before I'd even finished my question.
"Don't you have school?" I asked dryly, running a hand down the length of my face.
"Don't you?"
"Pretty easy to skip out of class when it has literally no impact on your future," I admitted honestly, and she nodded like this was something she hadn't yet considered, though she was largely distracted by the puzzle weighing heavily on our minds. "I'll go wake Stiles," I told her as I smothered a yawn.
Lydia nodded her head, and in the time it took her to blink I was gone, stepping into Stiles' room, my bare feet silent against his soft carpet. Shaking him awake was easy, he grunted and forced his eyes open, peering up at me sleepily. "What's happening?" he asked dopily.
"Lydia's here to get started on cracking her grandmother's mysterious code," I said without preamble, and he blinked slowly, processing my words carefully as he clumsily sat upright.
"Lydia's here?" he asked, struggling to keep up. "What time is it?"
"One."
He blinked, shocked by the late time of day. We'd been up until early morning, however, so I'd decided we deserved somewhat of a day in bed. "No school?" he asked, voice thick with sleep.
"Figured a day off wouldn't kill us."
"You're a terrible influence," he muttered absentmindedly, reluctantly pushing off his duvet and sitting up properly, rubbing wearily at his gritty eyes.
"So they tell me," I muttered, grasping his hand and tugging him gently to his feet. "Put on some pants and go brush your teeth."
He mumbled unintelligibly under his breath, but I paid no attention, pulling on the pants from yesterday before swiping an unused beanie from his drawer, tossing it over my messy hair. I could hear Stiles brushing his teeth in the bathroom down the hall, and knew he was doing as instructed.
Throwing myself casually over the railing and dropping down to the bottom floor directly into the foyer, I smirked when Lydia flinched at my abrupt reappearance. "All the naughty bits are covered," I promised her cheekily. "You're free to head on up."
She shot me an unimpressed sort of frown, but I grinned back, utterly unbothered, and slipped past her out into the day, heading for the Jeep. The blood bags I'd stashed there the night before were still waiting under the seat, and I stuffed them out of sight under my shirt as I strolled back into the house.
I took the time to put two away in the fridge, storing them behind the orange juice and a carton of eggs, where they wouldn't be easily seen. I considered taking the time to heat the remaining one up, but decided it was pointless and simply tore off the top of the bag, wandering back up to Stiles' room, where Lydia was sat at his computer, staring at the screen showing the code like she would be able to will it into revealing it's secrets.
"What's the plan?" I asked flippantly, striding across the room until I came to a stop at the desk, taking a seat on top of it, the straw of the blood bag hovering at my lips. Lydia glanced up at me only to look away with a disgusted grimace when she spotted my morning snack.
"Well, all we really can do is find the cipher key," Stiles murmured, hands steepled in front of his mouth.
"Right," I nodded sharply. "And where are we meant to start with that, exactly?" Neither teenager said anything, and I sighed before downing a mouthful of room-temperature blood, warming at the rush of strength it gave me, even if the taste was less than satisfactory. "Is this just going to be an elaborate game of 'guess the password' until we, by some miracle, maybe get it right?" I asked dryly.
"When you put it like that..." Stiles trailed off.
"What other choice do we have?" Lydia asked, and both the human and I had to admit she had a point.
We were all quiet for a long few moments, each lost in our own whirlwind of thoughts, and I continued to suck on my blood bag, if only for something to keep me occupied.
"Try Maddy," Stiles spoke abruptly, and Lydia spared a moment to blink up at him, unimpressed. "It's gotta be Maddy."
"Doesn't Maddy feel a little obvious as a cipher key?" she asked slowly.
"I guarantee it's Maddy," he continued blithely, but even I knew that wasn't the best guess of the century. Leaning around him, I peered curiously at the screen, watching as Lydia obeyed and typed in the name with careful movements.
ERROR it said stubbornly, rejecting the incorrect guess.
Stiles huffed out a sigh, rubbing at his eyes, mind clearly still just waking up. "Okay, your name – she left the code for you, right?" he suggested with renewed vigour. "So it's gotta be your name." That, too, was incorrect, as was his suggestion of her mother's name. There was a beat. "Do you have any beloved family pets...?"
Neither Lydia nor I felt that deserved a response.
"What's the beeping?" I asked, licking excess blood from my lips. The sound was high-pitched and insistent, irritatingly repetitive.
"Ugh!" Stiles exclaimed, turning and slapping at the device behind him angrily. It stopped for a moment, then started up again, so I assumed it was probably meant to be making the annoying sound.
"Have you tried Meredith?" I suggested, legs swinging back and forth under the table I was perched on.
"Meredith?" Lydia asked in bemusement.
"Yeah," I shrugged. "Granny-Martin was a banshee too, right-"
"Please don't call her that-"
"So what if she knew Meredith was going to die? Just like how we know Derek's gonna die?"
"We don't know for sure that Derek's going to die-" Lydia tried to argue.
"The evidence is pretty damning," I muttered without heat, and Stiles quickly leapt in.
"Just try Meredith," he said, and with a sigh Lydia complied, only for the now-familiar ERROR to blink on the screen, telling us it was, once again, incorrect. Stiles gave a loud sigh, collapsing in the chair beside Lydia, burying his face in his folded arms. He inhaled loudly, drumming his fingers against the tabletop, mind working overtime. "The ashes were left for you," he finally said to Lydia, voice measured and careful. "The code was left for you. You're supposed to be able to figure this out."
"But no one else is..." Lydia murmured defeatedly. "Which is why she made it hard."
"She sounds like a boatload of fun," I added sarcastically, and Lydia rolled her head around to shoot me a narrow-eyed sort of stare that quite clearly said you're not helping, and I raised my eyebrows at her in response.
The beeping from that machine behind us began once again, and Stiles exploded into movement, muttering, "oh my God," in pure frustration as he jammed a stack of paper into the printer, which finally stopped it's annoying, repetitive noise. Continuing to suck down the blood, I peered down at the machine as it began to whir, a different sound than it had been making before. "No one else...but you," Stiles was murmuring to himself, and I looked back up at him curiously.
"What?"
"Our guesses, they're all about Lorraine – we keep trying to guess a word that has something to do with her; maybe we should be trying to guess one that's about you."
"Me?" Lydia asked in bewilderment. "What about me?"
"Well, what do you remember doing with your grandmother?" he asked gently. "What was you guys' special thing? Did you go to the beach? Did you like ice cream?"
I wondered what it might be like to have a family where we had a 'special thing'. I supposed, with the family I did have, we had something of a 'thing'; if you counted near death experiences and reckless power moves a 'thing'.
"We read," Lydia said suddenly, and I cocked an eyebrow as her pulse spiked.
"Okay, what did you read?" Stiles asked. I could practically smell the hope coming off of him.
Lydia hesitated, thinking. "The Little Mermaid," she finally revealed, and I hummed around my straw.
"You read that movie?" Stiles asked in vague disbelief.
"It was a book first. Hans Christian Anderson?" Lydia spoke slowly, and I snorted in obvious amusement, and Stiles sent me a betrayed sort of frown that felt chastising, and I pressed my lips together to smother the sound of my laugh.
"The Little Mermaid," he said, recovering quickly. "Type it in."
Lydia turned back to the code, typing in every variation of 'The Little Mermaid' that she could think of, to no end. Continuously, nothing happened. I sighed, gritting my teeth as I glared at the computer, like I might intimidate it into complying. "We read it every night," the banshee murmured, growing desperate. "I got so obsessed with it. For three months I wouldn't respond to anything but Ariel. I drove my parents crazy, but..." she trailed off, and I looked back at her curiously only to spy a hint of crazed realisation in her hazel eyes, "but grandma thought it was adorable."
Not even thinking, I leapt off the table, my bare feet silently pressing against the carpeted floor. I wandered closer, until I could see the screen perfectly over the banshee's shoulder.
ARIEL she typed in, and we all seemed to hold our breaths as it did nothing for a long moment, until, like magic, the nonsense on the screen began to change, becoming names we could actually read.
Both Stiles and Lydia let out relieved sort of sighs, but I remained silent, knowing this wasn't exactly a win for us, not in the grand scheme of things, at least. The names on the new list were mostly unfamiliar, apart from one in particular that I definitely recognised.
"You recognise anyone?" Stiles was asking quietly.
"Just my grandmother," Lydia responded softly.
Leaning forwards, I once more dragged my eyes down the list. "Nobody I know on here," I murmured. "Which I suppose isn't that surprising, considering I barely even know all of your names," I added dryly, but Stiles wasn't listening, having moved over to the printer behind us, which was making an even louder sort of whirring noise.
"Guys," he said bracingly, "we need to call Scott."
"What's wrong?" I asked, already beside him, staring down at the new list in his hands, eyes narrowed in consternation.
"It's an update of the list," he told me carefully, gaze locked onto the paper. "Derek's name is gone," he added, and I realised he was right.
As I scanned the list again, I noticed another troubling difference. "That's not all," I murmured, reaching out to tap on the familiar name pointedly. "Liam's not worth three million anymore," I said, and Lydia stared up at the pair of us with wide, scared eyes. "He's worth eighteen."
We were silent, processing this information. Who was the mastermind behind all of this? What was their endgame? Kill us all, but lose a couple hundred million doing it? Why was it worth it to them, whoever they were?
"Forget the updated list for a moment," Lydia spoke up suddenly, startling me from my thoughts. I looked away from the printed list in Stiles' hand, glancing over at her curiously. "We need to figure out what all the names on this one have in common," she said, tapping her finger against the screen of Stiles' computer.
"How do we do that?"
"That's obvious," Stiles murmured, and both Lydia and I turned to look at him curiously, "we go to someone who has access to an online database." This didn't enlighten us. "A cop," he explained with an exasperated roll of his eyes. "And since my dad's currently out of commission..."
"Parrish," Lydia finished with an understanding nod. I opened my mouth to speak, only to be interrupted by an annoying buzzing at my thigh.
Wondering who the hell would be calling me, I pulled it free, glancing down at the screen and noting with pleasant surprise that it was Scott. "Speak of the devil..." I murmured mostly to myself, then turned to the others. "I gotta take this," I told them quickly.
"It's fine," Stiles said, distracted as he pulled out his own phone. "We'll arrange to meet with Parrish."
I nodded, sipping down the last of my blood before dropping it into Stiles' wastepaper basket and continuing out into the hall. "Howdy, teen wolf," was my opening line as I answered the call, leaning my weight against the wall and staring curiously at a picture of Stiles as a child.
"Hey Jules," Scott said, sounding somewhat rushed. "Can I ask a favour?"
"For you? Anything," I replied easily, giving a cheeky grin even though he couldn't see it.
"You know this bonfire tonight, the one for the lacrosse team?" he began quickly.
"I know of it," I told him. "Hadn't planned on attending, though."
"Any way I can change your mind?"
I paused, considering. "What's going on?"
"Liam's going to this thing tonight, and who knows who's going to be watching, waiting for an opportunity to strike? Especially now that his value's been more than tripled," he stopped, realising something, "oh yeah, we found an updated copy of the list-"
"We know," I interrupted him thoughtlessly. "We got the same one. Plus more."
"More?"
"How about I meet you at this cesspool the school is holding and we'll go over everything there?" I suggested.
"I wouldn't call it a cesspool..."
"See you in an hour or so – I wanna be there before dark."
"Okay, see you soon," he agreed, and with another nod that went unseen, I ended the call.
Inside Stiles' room, the others were finishing up a call with Parrish, and Stiles moved over to me when I entered. "I'm meeting Scott at that bonfire the school's throwing," I told him as I tugged his beanie further down over my hair. "He's concerned about leaving Liam unprotected, and he could use the backup. Besides, who knows who else is going to be there? It's the perfect opportunity to nab someone on the list."
"Are you sure?" Stiles murmured. "We could use you with Parrish."
"You guys will be fine," I said, tugging his blue flannel on over his shirt until the sleeves dropped just past my fingers. "I need to go shower and change," I added, checking I had everything I needed before stepping closer to my human and reaching up to press my palms to his warm cheeks. "Call me if you learn anything?"
"Of course," he nodded.
I smiled, pushing myself onto my toes so I could press our mouths together, a soft brushing of lips that was more affectionate than anything else. "I love you," I whispered to him, hoping the banshee couldn't overhear.
"Love you too," he whispered back. I smiled again, stepping away and casting Lydia a vague smile.
"Look after him," I ordered her with a smirk, and she nodded, a glint to her eyes telling me she knew I was conveying more than I was saying. "And, do me a favour?" I added, coming to a stop in the doorway. "Don't do anything stupid without calling me first."
Stiles snorted, rolling his eyes in fond exasperation, and I shot them a final smirk before ducking out of the house and making my way back to my own humble abode.
The shower was heavenly, and I made sure to wash my hair and body thoroughly, even going so far as to use the lavender body wash I usually didn't bother with. I took my time – I felt like I'd been going nonstop for days, I'd barely had five minutes to myself. As much as I would never tire of Stiles' presence, it was nice being able to spend time combing through my hair and listening to scratchy old jazz records.
Donning a casual black dress and some thick-soled shoes, I made sure I was fully fed and prepared for a fight before heading outside and breathing in the evening air. It was a little nippy, the air cool against my throat, and I inhaled deeply, enjoying the feeling.
I could have driven, but I really preferred to run; besides, it always got me there faster.
The party wasn't quite in full swing as I arrived. Some students were dancing, but mostly people were only just beginning to show up, wandering in from every direction, carting with them poorly concealed bottles of cheap liquor. There was some kind of God-awful music playing, something that was only bass and had no melody to speak of. It made my head ache something fierce, but I ignored it and I wandered closer to the fire that had just been started, giving light to the quickly-darkening quad.
"Hey baby," a senior was saying in my ear, breath already reeking of booze, "wanna dance?"
I turned to fully face him, my expression one of perfect disgust. "I'd rather throw back a shot of sulphuric acid than touch you with a ten foot pole," I told him in a flare of apathetic honesty. The jock gave a bewildered grimace. He was a stocky bloke wearing a jersey and had so much gel in his hair that I could see the light from the fire dancing off of it's shiny reflection.
"No need to be such a bitch about it," he said, scowling down at me in displeasure. Eyes narrowing, I felt my hands ball into too-tight fists at my side. He was clearly a self-entitled asshole, and I knew it was unlikely anybody would notice if he went missing...
The boy leaned away from me, the pure predatory look in his eyes almost draining into mine, as if by magic. My fangs grew, and I began to struggle to keep my lips sealed.
"Jules!"
Jerking away from the freaked out human, I spun around to spot the boy's saviour, seeing Scott heading towards me, a worried glint to his puppy-dog eyes.
Gritting my teeth, I whirled back around to the human, who was gaping down at my shining red eyes. Thunderously angry and dangerously hungry – in spite of my already full stomach – I opened my mouth, snapping my jaw at him savagely, fangs glinting in the firelight.
With a strangled yelp the boy tripped away, stumbling from view. Satisfied, I turned back to Scott with a haughty sort of smirk, only to find him looking less than impressed. "What?" I asked defensively. "I deserve to have fun too."
"Your idea of fun is terrorising drunk high school students?" he asked dubiously.
"Sometimes it's like you don't even know me at all..." I mused sarcastically, tapping a fingertip against the dimple in my chin.
"I guess I forgot who I was talking to," he said with a hint of amusement, and I found myself feeling embarrassingly affectionate towards the young alpha, wondering how it was possible for someone so pure to be able to stomach talking to me, let alone being my friend. I supposed he was just a supernatural anomaly, a fact for which I was eternally thankful.
"Come on then, teen wolf," I said, chin tilted up and arms crossed tightly over my chest. "Catch me up to speed."
So he told me, in an undertone that only the two of us could hear, about what Liam had told him a few hours beforehand, and then the two of them finding Coach standing amid a sea of automatically printed copies of the updated dead pool. I listened intently, glaring out at the crowd of writhing, intoxicated teenagers, scanning for any hint of trouble, anyone who looked out of place.
"Is it really such a good idea for the Pup to be here?" I asked once Scott had finished recounting his last few hours. "Eighteen million is one hell of an incentive upgrade," I added wryly, glancing suspiciously over my shoulder when I felt eyes on the back of my head, but I saw nothing other than drunk students and a small group of boys smoking something out of an old fashioned pipe.
Fucking hipsters.
"What about you?" Scott asked, his eyes too on the group of self-important stoners. "Did Lydia end up cracking the list?"
I sighed, reaching up to idly crack my knuckles as I began to tell him what the rest of us had been up to while he'd been keeping an eye on Liam at the school. He seemed to agree with Stiles' idea to involve Parrish, and turned to stare at me thoughtfully when I grumbled in response.
"What?" he asked, clearly picking up that I was slightly opposed to the idea.
"We don't even know what he is," I said, eyeing the fire contemplatively, watching as the glowing embers floated up into the inky sky in the most entrancing dance. "And I don't trust what I don't understand," I admitted with another grumble, and Scott nudged me gently with his elbow, the gesture familiar in a comforting sort of way.
"If you see things like that, how do you ever expect to make any friends?" he asked sweetly.
"With any luck, I won't."
Scott chuckled, taking my words with a grain of salt, which was as irritating as it was comforting. I thought he might have a clever, insightful response, but instead he turned away, spotting something on the other side of the bonfire. "There's Malia," he said, and I realised that I'd all but forgotten about the poor girl. I'd been more than a little distracted, considering the new developments on the Stiles-front. "Come on," he prompted me, nudging me in the were-coyote's direction.
My shoes sank gently into the soft earth as we wound our way through the crowd towards the girl, who was standing in a small pocket of space, moving herself in a casual dance along to that atrocious music that made my brain ache.
"Hey!" Scott greeted her cheerfully, and she jerked around to look at us, grip tightening on the silver flask in her hand. "What're you doing here?" he asked in his lightest voice, watching as she never for a moment stopped her dancing.
"Getting drunk!" she yelled over the music unnecessarily, for we would have heard even a whisper. "What're you doing?"
"Trying to make sure no one gets hurt."
"That sounds fun too," she muttered flippantly, taking another sip of liquor.
Stepping forwards, I plucked the flask from her fingers and lifted it to my nose, taking a sniff. "Raspberry vodka?" I asked with a snort. "At least be irresponsible with something that costs more than a bottle of shampoo," I drawled, and she narrowed her eyes at me.
"Then give it back," she snapped, reaching for the flask.
I snatched it back before she could grab it. "Never said I didn't want it," I teased, grinning wolfishly before throwing back a healthy mouthful. I coughed; it tasted like absolute shit, as though someone had mixed cheap alcohol with sewer water and essential oils. "That's fucking awful," I told her in a growl. She continued to dance while levelling me with a rather impressive sort of glare that screamed her irritation with me. She stole the flask back with an irritated humph.
"I don't wanna ruin your night, or anything," Scott yelled, interrupting our standoff, "but we kind of...can't get drunk."
Malia was silent for a beat. "What?" she asked sharply, attention switching to the alpha almost instantly.
"I think it has something to do with our healing," he revealed, and I snorted at the poor shifters' luck. "Trust me, I've tried. You're not gonna feel anything."
I wasn't sure how she would react to the rather depressing news, but she only hummed, continuing to throw herself around to the music as she took another hearty sip. "Maybe you should tell him that!" she told him loudly, jerking her head off to the left, then twirling away to continue partying.
Curious, I moved my gaze past her to spot Liam sat on top of a table, generously pouring something from a covered bottle into his cheap brand soda.
"Would you like to take this one, or shall I?" I asked Scott dryly, eyeing the kid as he tipped back his head, the liquid in his bottle disappearing into his mouth.
"Neither," Scott replied, and I looked away from the Pup to cock an eyebrow at the alpha in bemusement. "I don't want to push him. He can come to us when he's ready. Besides, it's not exactly like he can get drunk and cause any trouble," he added mildly. I stared at him, and it took a moment for him to notice. "What?" he asked self-consciously.
"That was a really mature answer," I admitted with a considering hum. Scott rolled his eyes, but his grin was large. "Maybe you're not so bad at this whole 'mentor' thing, after all," I added lightly, and he nudged me affectionately just as the song changed, this one even worse than the last. "Can they play something that wasn't generated by a machine?" I asked, my voice sour.
"Nobody comes to these things to listen to jazz, Jules," he told me, amused but still kind.
I grumbled back unintelligibly, returning my attention to Malia, who was still close by, dancing unabashedly to the horrendous music, eyes closed as she lost herself in the off-kilter beat. "Well, if we're not giving motivational speeches to the Pup, there's always the Coyote," I offered.
"Why does it sound like you want to give a motivational speech?"
"I'm in a good mood, so sue me."
Scott smiled, the expression wide and unrestrained. "Does this good mood have anything to do with Stiles?" he asked slyly. I gave no indication I'd heard him, continuing to scan the crowd of writhing students like it was more interesting than the conversation at hand. "He called me, you know," he said evenly, also watching the throng of teenagers, for which I was grateful. "Told me you guys were back together."
"Did he now?" I asked cooly, sounding perfectly aloof, like I wasn't completely and entirely invested in his response.
From the corner of my eye I saw Scott smirk and knew I was fooling nobody. "He's finally...happy again," he told me gladly. "I mean, it's not like he wasn't before, but there was just always this hollow, lost sort of air that sort of followed him around. We could all see it, even when he was smiling."
I said nothing, keeping my eyes locked onto the raging bonfire.
"I couldn't be happier that the two of you found each other again."
"We found each other, months ago," I argued weakly, thinking back to when I'd seen Stiles again in Mexico, the feeling of exhilarated delight that had flooded my veins, followed quickly by an ice cold terror, and a knowledge that he was my ending. He always was.
"No," said Scott, an easy, pleased smile on his face. "You didn't."
We fell into silence again, and I pulled out a cigarette, feeling like I needed one more than ever. I stepped closer to the flames, holding the tip in the blaze for a moment before pulling back and breathing in the chemicals, returning to my spot beside Scott.
I thought maybe the time for heart-to-hearts was over, but Scott seemed determined to continue.
"Are you going to turn him?" he asked, voice steady and curious.
I considered my answer carefully. "If he wants me to," I finally said, nodding to myself as I exhaled a cloud of smoke.
"He does," Scott told me with conviction. I shot him a look, though I wasn't entirely sure what my expression conveyed. Scott seemed to know, anyway, smiling in that knowing way. "He wants forever with you, Jules," he said honestly.
"You sound like an infomercial for the undead," I told him dryly, and he huffed out a laugh as I flicked the ash from the tip of my cigarette.
"Are werewolves immortal?" he asked a moment later, sounding pleasantly curious.
I took a moment to answer. "You live about triple what a human would," I admitted quietly, easily heard even over the music. "But no, you do still grow old and die."
Scott nodded, digesting this information quietly. He didn't look distressed by the fact, instead accepting, a thoughtful glint to his puppy-dog eyes.
"So, what's the plan, exactly?" I asked him, eager to move on from the heartfelt, soap-opera type stuff and onto something that didn't make me feel the need to run away and find something to punch. "We're just playing babysitter to these sexually promiscuous teenagers?"
"Sexually promiscuous?" Scott asked, unimpressed. "Have you met you?"
"At least I'm of legal age," I muttered back grumpily, puffing on my smoke and frowning out at the little deviants filling the quad.
"We need to make sure nobody gets hurt," he told me nobly. "It's our duty."
I disagreed, but didn't feel like getting into a debate over it. "There's Malia," I said, pointing a finger over to where Malia was still throwing herself around to the beat. I could count the amount of people I felt bound to protect on one hand, and the were-coyote unfortunately happened to be among them. "Wanna go give her that motivational speech we were talking about? I hear you're good at them – you can give me some pointers."
"Sure," Scott answered around a laugh. "Though I doubt she'll talk to us any more than she already has."
"She'll talk to me."
"And if she won't?"
I sent him a look which clearly told him that wasn't an option. He sighed, but still led the way over to the dancing girl, ready to approach her once again, hopefully with more success than previously.
Malia glanced up as we approached, scowling at us, a clear sign that we were unwelcome. "Hey Coyote," I greeted her once again, attempting lightheartedness and caring little for her sour attitude.
"Not tonight, you walking corpse," she snapped wryly. Sarcastically lifting a hand over my dead heart, I pretended to be hurt by the callous comment, and she rolled her eyes at my dramatics. Uncaring, I darted my hand out to swipe her flask from her again. She let out an irritated huff, but I cared very little, tossing back a mouthful of the God-awful liquor inside before handing it back and returning to my cigarette. It may not have tasted any good, but I for one could get drunk, and I wasn't about to turn down free alcohol, even if it did taste like it was brewed in an old shoe.
"We just wanna talk," Scott told her sincerely, puppy-dog eyes begging her to hear him out.
"Well, I just wanna dance!" she retorted without feeling.
"We had our reasons," he said, ploughing ahead almost clumsily. I'd thought he was better at this sort of thing, so I was surprised by the lack of tact. "We didn't tell you about Peter-"
"To protect me," she finished dryly. "That's what Peter said you would say. And guess what he said next? That you were right." Scott was silent, staring at her wordlessly. "Does that surprise you?"
"No," he denied it immediately, but I knew he was full of shit. "It makes me wonder what he wants," he continued in a rush. "Malia, we need to stay together. You, me, Jules, Stiles-"
"I don't wanna talk about Stiles," she spat his name like a curse, and I felt my proverbial hackles rise, the demon inside me growling, snarling with the urge to protect my mate. I forced down the feeling, inhaling another lungful of smoke and blowing it out through my nose like a dragon, preparing to smite it's enemies. "I just wanna dance!" she insisted blithely, raising her flask up with a sneer. "And get drunk!"
"Sounds like a slippery slope towards alcoholism, if you ask me," I told her through somewhat of a sneer, unable to help myself.
"Shut up, Juliet," she snapped at me, twirling around and almost immediately tripping over her own feet. In the same heartbeat I moved, reappearing by her side and hefting her upright, keeping her from face-planting into the ground, even though I felt like she deserved it.
"You are drunk," Scott murmured from behind me. Spinning around, I cocked an eyebrow at him in bewilderment, because that wasn't possible. Werewolves didn't get drunk.
Malia gave a loud, snorting sort of laugh. "Yep," she giggled, grinning so wide I felt worried her face might split.
"But you can't be."
The bright, intense expression dropped from her face, giving way to something more ill, like she were holding down a mouthful of bile. "Is this what drunk feels like?" she asked, curling in on herself slightly, arms wrapped around her stomach. "It doesn't feel as good as I'd hoped!"
"I don't think it's supposed to..." Scott was murmuring, looking over her shoulder at something in the distance, but I was paying no attention.
"Malia, look at me," I ordered her, and she gave a soft groan, tilting her head up reluctantly to meet my eyes. One hand holding her steady, I used my thumb to hold open her eyelids, watching the way her pupils remained blown, even in the light of the fire. "Something's wrong," I muttered to Scott, though I was sure he'd already gathered as much.
There was an odd sort of feeling in my stomach, but I put it down to concern for the coyote, ignoring the way my insides began to churn and my head throbbed lightly, like it had been days since I'd fed, rather than mere hours.
Scott swiped her flask from her hand, bringing it up to his nose. "What's in this?" he asked sharply, watching in a growing panic as she blinked uncomprehendingly. "What did you have to drink?!" he persisted, raising his voice so even a human would have heard.
"Just vodka!" Malia cried, pulling away from my hands stubbornly.
"She's kind of warm," I said, ignoring her batting hands and instead pressing my palm to her head, "even for a shifter."
"Jules," Scott said, voice low and slightly unsteady.
"Hm?" I hummed distractedly, barely glancing away from a dopey looking Malia. Worry was stirring my stomach like a bad batch of blood, but I kept my focus on Malia, absentmindedly hoping there hadn't actually been anything in that drink.
"One o'clock," Scott told me cryptically, but I understood what he meant immediately. Casually, I tossed a look over in that direction, catching sight of a slightly older kid standing still amongst the writhing teens, a furious stare locked onto Malia's shaking form. His beady eyes flickered over to me, but I was already turning away.
"Fuck," I swore, glancing back at Scott carefully. "What do we do?" I asked him, trying desperately to come up with a game plan but coming up maddeningly short.
"Go get Liam," he ordered me firmly. "I'll meet you there." I nodded, letting go of Malia and stepping back as Scott filled my place. "Don't let him out of your sight," he added quickly, and I nodded, turning and disappearing into the crowd, heading for where I'd last seen the Pup.
He was easy to spot, bent over in his spot on the picnic bench, head held between his legs. There was some black kid hovering over him, but he seemed anxious, and when I thought about it, I remembered seeing them together before; they were friends, so he probably wasn't a threat.
Tapping the kid on the shoulder, he spun around in a rush, blinking at me in surprise. "I'm a friend," I said, though I used the term loosely. The kid stared at me uncomprehendingly. "Move," I added in a growl, pushing him impatiently out of the way and crouching down in front of Liam. "Liam?" I said loudly, in case his hearing was out of order too. "It's Jules. You okay?"
Liam gave a noncommittal groan.
"What's happening?" his friend sounded completely bewildered, unsure what was going on.
"What's he been drinking?" I asked sternly.
"Uh – just this," he said, holding up that covered bottle again. Without hesitation I tipped a mouthful of the contents into my mouth. It didn't taste anything like Malia's had, so it was clearly something else entirely – some kind of cheap whiskey, if my tastebuds were correct – but I wasn't about to risk it, and I spat it out onto the grass to be safe. Liam's friend gave a yelp when some of it got on his shoes, but I couldn't have cared less.
Throwing the offending bottle haphazardly over my shoulder, I noted with satisfaction that it shattered against the ground behind me. "Go get two bottles of water," I ordered the worried, hovering kid. He didn't move for a long moment, and I turned on him with already reddening eyes. "Now!" I snarled, the sound guttural and animalistic. He flinched, giving out a very feminine yelp and scurrying away just as Scott shuffled over with a bleary Malia, her arm thrown over her shoulders as he supported her weight.
"Is he okay?" the alpha asked the moment he had Malia safely deposited onto the table beside a trembling Liam.
"He's conscious," I answered stonily, turning to eye the crowd carefully, looking for any hint of someone who looked suspicious and was paying us too much attention.
"What the hell was in their drinks?" he asked, patting Liam gently on the back as the kid quivered and groaned.
"Nothing good," I mumbled, pressing a hand against my churning stomach, my insides feeling like they'd turned to sludge. It must have been affecting me too. I'd begun to see double, struggling to make my eyes focus, everything was fuzzy and the thudding music was making my head begin to pound, like somebody had taken a sledgehammer to my temples.
Liam's friend reappeared, two bottles of room-temperature water in his hands. I ripped one from his grasp, stepping over to Malia and uncapping it, holding it under her lips and forcing her to take a deep drink.
"Malia?" Scott asked in an undertone. The coyote could only blink back blearily. He glanced up at me, but all I could do was shrug helplessly, just as clueless as him, if only slightly more adept at handling sick people.
Still, supernaturally poisoned was a little above even my pay grade.
He moved over to Liam, but I remained by Malia's side, rubbing my hand across her back in a movement I hoped was soothing. The agony in my head was doubling, but I shelved the pain; I'd experienced worse, and Malia was more important anyway.
"How you feeling, little desert-wolf?" I asked her softly as she continued to tremble, seeming to only get worse. She gave no response other than a vague, sickly sort of stare before dropping her head onto her knees again.
"Something's happening! We need to get them out of here!" Scott shouted to Liam's friend and I over the thudding beat of the atrocious music, but it was so loud I could barely make his words out. The synthesised noise was slamming into my eardrums, and I felt illness clawing at me like souls of the damned, trying to drag me down below.
I moved my hand from Malia's back, dropping my head into my heads to try and quell the unforgiving aching that was slamming against my skull.
"Scott!" I shouted, eyes closed as the light from the fire made them burn. "Something's wrong!"
"I know!" he yelled back, voice trembling. "It's happening to me too!"
Fear began to eat at my insides like a poison, making me feel worse as the seconds dragged on. Scott was murmuring something to himself, but I could barely concentrate on my own thoughts let alone whatever he was trying to say. My headache got worse, the pain only magnifying, like somebody was trying to wrench apart my skull with a crowbar laced with vervain.
My mind flew to Stiles, but for some reason the thought of him didn't comfort me, instead it made me anxious, like something was wrong with him, like he was in danger.I could feel an unfounded sort of panic gripping me, and I grew dizzy with the force of it.
The thought was wiped from my mind as Scott grasped my shoulders, shaking me roughly, forcing me to crack open my eyes and squint up at him blearily. "Jules!" he was saying, though the look in his eye was hazy, like he was struggling to focus himself.
How was that possible? I was so sure he hadn't had anything to drink.
"Jules!" he said again, reaching up to cup my face, his warm hand very gently slapping against my cold skin. "Jules, it's the music!" he shouted, slapping me again, and I squeezed my eyes shut for another beat, trying desperately to scrape together some semblance of coherency.
My head began to rattle, and my ears felt like they were full of water.
There was a long moment where I could only try to keep myself conscious, then Scott was shouting again. "Your ears are bleeding!" he cried, which I supposed explained the wet feeling in them. "Your hearing's – stronger than – than ours!" he added with some difficulty. "I've gotta – turn it off!"
Reaching away from my head, my hands found his, his skin incredibly hot to the touch, almost painfully so. Ignoring it, I clutched at him tightly, squeezing in what I could only hope was reassurance, before letting go and weakly pushing him away.
The next few minutes were sort of a haze. I felt like I was coming off the worst sort of high, and my ears only continued to burn, as though someone was holding blazing matches inside my eardrums. My eyes remained clenched shut, brain turned to sludge and my senses all dulled.
Sometime later hands grasped at me, and assuming they belonged to Scott I allowed them to move me off the bench, trusting him to get me to safety. Hearts were beating wetly all around me, and my failing body was desperately crying out for me to feed, so I could heal myself. The urge was stronger than ever, but with my mind on the Pack, I forced myself to stop breathing and focus on the sound of Scott's pulse. It was faster than usual, beating anxiously, and it had a murmur that he usually didn't have.
The horrible, distressing music was only getting louder, and the pain in my head became white-hot. "Scott," I tried to groan, pulling at his tight grip, trying to drag myself away from the noise. The hands yanked me more firmly, and I gave up.
Consciousness began to slip through my fingers like sand; impossible to hold onto for long.
"Malia!" I tried to yell, but the word was slurred and raspy, nearly unintelligible. "Scott!"
"Shut up!" an unfamiliar voice sneered in my ear just before something slammed into the back of my head, and I knew no more.
I blinked to awareness slowly, the first thing hitting me the pungent scent of gasoline. I coughed, tasting it on my tongue when I licked my lips, like somebody had just poured it onto my face.
I realised with a start that there was, of course, a reason I was covered in gasoline, and also that my life, and the lives of those I cared for, were also in great danger.
The next thing I was made aware of was a terrible, burning thirst that flared in my throat and travelled through my every cell. The need for blood was strong, one I wasn't sure I could quell. It began to override my every sense, my every impulse. All I could think of was blood; the taste, how it would feel sliding down my burning throat, the way my body would throb with power the moment it touched my tongue.
The reasons to gain control were numerous, but in that moment all I could feel, all I could think of, was the insatiable hunger that was the curse of my being.
I barely had to think it before I was on my feet, fingers curled like claws, fangs glinting in the moonlight streaming in through the open windows. The closest human was only a few feet away, a gun in his hand, aimed directly at Derek Hale, who stood still, like he were just waiting to die.
The vague thought of 'idiot' floated through my mind, but I gave it little further focus before I was throwing myself at the man in the uniform. He gave a loud, frightened yelp of surprise that cut off in a wet, helpless gurgle when I bit into his throat without hesitation.
He tried to struggle – and oh how I loved it when they did. My grip was firm, bruising, and I didn't care about manners as I drank deeply, blood spilling down over our clothes, coating my face like some grotesque kind of paint. His pulse was quick, pushing the blood into my mouth faster and faster, and I would have been content to drink until the blood stopped coming, but two arms wrapped around my waist and yanked me back.
A furious snarl tore from my lips, hands clutching at air, trying to claw my way back to my meal.
"Jules!" Scott was yelling in my ear. "It's over, Jules! Jules!"
I came back to myself rather suddenly, realising with a start that I was flailing around like an animal. I froze, and Scott immediately noticed the difference, relaxing his hold on my waist. The blood was hot and rich in my mouth, and I swallowed the lingering traces, licking at my lips as I gently pushed away from Scott, now finding the position rather embarrassing.
After a beat he let me go, and I stepped away, running my hands down over my clothes, straightening them, though that did nothing for the thick, sticky blood coating my front. I glanced over at the collapsed deputy. He was miraculously still alive. I hadn't hit the carotid artery when I'd bit him, and Braeden was there, leant over him with an irritated scowl, very reluctantly holding her hand to the wound.
"Shit," I muttered, feeling guilt and shame swell up in me traitorously.
"He was trying to kill us all," Derek told me dryly, arms crossed over his chest as he cast an apathetic glance down at the bloodied, would-be assassin. "So, I think your conscience can stay clear on this one," he added in a surprisingly kind move, "just this once."
Though I was grateful, I didn't particularly feeling like expressing it. So, I gave a stoic nod before turning to look at Scott, who thankfully didn't look as horrified as I'd expected. "Are you okay?" I asked him, throat dry despite my recent meal.
"Yeah," he nodded, reaching out to squeeze me on the shoulder like he was silently trying to reassure me it was okay. I practically wilted at the gesture, and this time didn't mind expressing as much as I grabbed his hand and squeezed back.
There was a light cough from below us, and I looked down to see both Malia and Liam sitting on the floor. Both looked rather shellshocked by what had just happened, though Malia was significantly more calm than the younger boy. I decided not to approach, stepping back while Scott instead helped them both to their feet.
I was surprised, then, when Malia shifted closer to me, almost like it was an instinct. I looked at her eyes, noting that her pupils had returned to normal. She seemed to be checking that I was okay too, but she looked away when our gazes met.
The offending music had finally stopped playing, which I assumed was the reason for our sudden recovery. I reached up, running my fingers over my ears, pulling them back to see them coated with blood – only now, it was my own.
My ears were still ringing, it was hard to hear everything else happening around me, but I could still pinpoint Liam's racing pulse. Glancing over, I watched as he shifted away from me in fear, which was hurtful, though I couldn't deny I understood.
A cheerful music filled the silent corridor – I realised suddenly that we were in a hallway of the empty school – and even I flinched at the sound, scared the noise would send me into another uncontrollable haze.
But it was just Scott's ringtone, and he pulled it from his pocket with an apologetic grimace. I nodded at him, and he wandered away to answer the call while I turned to Derek, who was just getting off a call with 911 for the assassin missing the majority of his neck.
"You shouldn't be here when the paramedics show up," the wolf told me flatly.
"What?" I asked, struggling to concentrate past the ringing in my ears.
"It's pretty obvious that you were the one to cause that," he said honestly, pointing down at the unconscious officer then looking back at me plainly. "It's gonna be hard to play this off as another freak animal attack when your face is covered in his blood."
Begrudgingly, I had to agree. "Fair enough," I muttered around a sour grimace. "How'd you find us, anyway?" I asked, one finger scratching at my aching ear, fruitlessly trying to make the ringing stop.
"Braeden," he said as though it was an answer, which I supposed it was. That woman was a mystery wrapped in an enigma, as it were. I could already hear the sirens a few streets over, and I sighed, knowing I had to get the hell outta dodge.
"Jules!" Scott reappeared, hanging up his call, a frantic look on his face.
"What?" I asked in alarm, wondering what else could possibly go wrong in the one night.
"It's Stiles," he said, sounding breathless, and my insides froze. The panic was ice cold in my veins, and I stopped breathing, jaw clenched as I fought a hissed snarl of defence. "He's okay!" he assured me when he realised how panicked his opening line had made me. "He's at the hospital – it's only a concussion, but I thought you'd want to-"
I was already heading away from them, no longer listening.
"Stay hydrated!" I shouted at the others, and Malia grumbled at me under her breath. "And for the love of God, stay out of trouble while I'm gone!"
I barely spared a look back as I disappeared around the corner, just in time as the paramedics burst through the doors at the end of the hall, but I'd already taken off into a run.
A/N: I'm watching Sense8 at the moment, and I'm completely enraptured. What an amazing show - 10/10 would recommend. On a more relevant note, I hope you all liked this chapter. I'd be super keen to hear your thoughts. Thanks for reading! :)
