It took them four hours to get a hold of their "zmutowany wilk", having to dance around the pack of them for hours before getting a hold of one on its own and then finding somewhere, which was eventually the basement of the still existent Hale house, to drag it to and then chaining the beast up.
It was strange being surrounded by werewolves again, but also comforting; most of the people he had known in Stanford had been human, but there had been one vampire and the guy was so creepy it made it hard for Stiles to fall asleep (which was another reason for the single dorm – which he had finally emptied out a day after they had figured out what they'd needed to know about the terrible monsters in Beacon Hills which were killing so many people).
"They're really creepy up close" Scott noted quietly, wrinkling his nose in a grimace when the beast snapped at him.
"Tell me about it" Stiles agreed, folding his arms and leaning against Derek, who glanced at him before turning back to Scott.
"Strong too" Cora added, this being the first time she'd spoken since they'd employed her help: her stance reading impatient yet stoic – she was definitely Derek's sister "Should we call the pack?"
"Isaac's on his way, but everyone else seems to be unreachable" Scott answered with a hint of frustration in his tone "We won't be much better for numbers"
"Okay!" Stiles began, jumping at the loudness of his voice and stepping forward "So, what we know, is that while not necessarily a trademark monster, this thing has been named in several cultures what roughly translates to mutated wolf, so we can safely assume that they possess no magic power whatsoever…" looking around the same group, Stiles nodded to himself and continued "The true power is with whatever created the mutants, which we've assumed is something with some kind of magical prowess a witch, warlock, fae, trickster… we don't know yet. The beast itself however, we can describe"
He paused then and looked over to Scott, who nodded, urging him on silently.
"Speed, strength, strong jaws, large form… savage and also a little mindless" Stiles summarised, looking to the beast for a brief moment and pulling a hunting knife – not his supernatural multi-tool – from its sheath at his hip and pressing the blade into the beast's right forearm "Susceptible to sharp objects with no magical properties, but with a tough hide"
"So, we're dealing with, in their most basic description, a killing machine" Peter added, smiling toothlessly at Stiles when the younger male scowled at the interruption.
"Basically: yes" Stiles finished "I was getting there"
"Too slowly" Cora argued, folding her arms a little tighter "How do we find the source?"
"We haven't figured that out yet" Scott answered, moving over to where Stiles was standing, cleaning his chosen knife with a black cloth, removing the dark blood there with precision.
The small group stood together in silence for a long moment, the only sounds being those above ground of the old house creaking and settling irregularly. Then, almost all at once, the werewolves all looked to the roof of the basement and Stiles sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose and once again wishing for their hearing.
"What?" he asked softly.
"More of them" Cora whispered "Must have followed our scent" she explained as she crept up the stairs and inched the door open without so much as a noise being caused and then holding up four fingers to the rest of the group: four beasts.
Stiles shared a look with Scott as he pulled the knife he'd just cleaned from its sheathe, hearing the faint hiss it gave as it scraped on the leather it was settled in and the group all tensed at the sound of a growl above them. Slowly, carefully, they moved up and out of the basement, checking for the beasts before slowly moving out of the house one by one.
Stiles stayed back with Scott, and the silent argument he had had with Derek had seemed to last a lifetime before the older male finally relented and carefully moved off. Their escape would have gone smoothly if not for a mistimed step and then Scott's foot was through the floorboards with a loud, resounding crack. It split the tense silence in two, and then the beasts were on them all at once. It took only a moment for the werewolves to collect themselves and then there was fighting everywhere. Stiles flipped the knife in his hand once, planning on causing a general nuisance to the beasts that got the advantage over the werewolves before he felt the heavy vibration of footsteps from behind him: the beast in the basement.
Its arm was still oozing blood, and Stiles could have sworn the thing grinned before it leapt at him, only missing him thanks to an evasive dive. Almost instantly, Stiles was fighting back, only blocking and dodging until an opening in the beast's attacks allowed for one of his own which drove his knife deep in leathery skin. Not bothering to remove the weapon as the beast roared, Stiles took a weary step back, picking at the lighter set of knives strapped to the upper part of his leg, taking two into the spaces between his fingers and pulling them from their sheathes, throwing both over his own beast's body and into the neck of the beast bearing down on Scott, who glanced at him with a look of first thanks, then fear. Stiles shook his head, pointing at the beast Scott was fighting, and then going back to his own, which was shakily standing. A badly timed dodge sent Stiles through one of the already weak walls after another few minutes of dodging and countering. He coughed harshly and ignored the twinge he felt in his back as he picked himself back up. Slowly, the sound of fighting was dying down, roars dwindling into a heavy, muffled sort of noise that might have signalled dying moments.
The beast shoved through the hole Stiles had created, roaring at him once more, and Stiles wished for the knife protruding out of the beast's shoulder as it advanced on him. Thankfully, the beast was halted by a wolf that was almost - if not for the grey tinges and the greyer marks on its paws – white that leapt onto its back and latched onto the back of its neck. Stiles took the distraction for what it was and pulled his knife free, ducking the cruel jaws of the beasts and plunging his weapon into its neck, stepping back to avoid the crushing weight of it as it fell to the floor. Stiles shared a look with the wolf, before it seemingly nodded and sprinted off in the other direction, where the remaining beast was cornered by a group of almost wolves: if not for Cora. Quickly and efficiently the pack took down the beast and shifted back to a human appearance.
Stiles forced a smile at Derek when he caught his gaze, and the werewolf strode over to him with obvious purpose, touching two fingers to his side carefully, manipulating Stiles to turn around.
"I'm fine" he forced, trying but failing not to wince at the gentle prod of fingers to his back.
"Quit getting hurt, its scaring me" Derek uttered softly before turning to Scott "We need to be quicker than this: we'll lose control of the situation soon enough"
Scott nodded "We'll work harder then, we've got an idea of what they're like and who could be creating them: we'll just expand on it"
"I'll get out the ol' 'supernatural contacts' book and see who our mystery creator is" Stiles announced, cracking his knuckles purely for dramatics, and then sighing at the concerned look Scott gave him "I'm not high school Stiles anymore Scott… I'm injured: not bedridden"
"Well…" Peter began lewdly, smirking when Derek growled in his general direction.
Cora shook her head at her uncle and turned to Stiles "See what you can dig up, I'll keep my phone on and see if it doesn't have anything to do with the new estates or if we can somehow track these things back to something useful"
"Thank you Cora" Stiles beamed, a brighter tone to his voice "That's incredibly helpful of you"
Cora smirked and as she walked past Stiles she shoved him gently "I know: keep me posted Red"
"I wear it one time!" Stiles exclaimed at her retreating back, throwing his arms out to his sides and almost knocking Derek, who caught the arm before it ran into his face "Sorry"
"Come on" Peter said to the other three people in the room "I'm sick of this house"
/
He was back in his room, only an hour after his father making him sit down and eat before handing him an ice pack for his back and letting him be free, researching everything and anything he could think of that related to the beasts they were currently dealing with: anything he could find that was related to wolves and Polish folk lore and rituals. Nothing jumped out at his already tired mind, and his eyes grew sore as the night wore on, a mug of coffee joining the bestiary, knives and papers on the desk he was sitting at.
He got a text at about twelve at night and it woke him up instantly, the loud ping jolting him out of the fogginess of the between world of sleep and awareness.
It was from Cora: You said Polish didn't you?
Yes, why, did you find something?
I'm not sure.
With the message came a photograph of a road, engraved with thin lines which were brought together to make circles, along with dust particles in the cracks.
Looks like ritual work: Come by and I'll try and dig something up
It only took Cora about four minutes to turn up at his window, and Stiles sighed and lifted the lower half up for the werewolf.
"What is with Hales and not using doorways?" Stiles asked rhetorically, sitting back down at the desk and watching Cora pick apart his room with sharp eyes before she sat down on his bed.
"When we were kids we'd crawl across the roof of our house to each other's rooms and have secret sleepovers: I broke my leg once and our mom went nuts in the morning, we didn't know how she knew but we didn't try to do it again for at least a month" she replied, not realising it was rhetorical until after she spoke, when she pursed her lips tightly.
"Once I jumped from my roof because I thought I could fly" Stiles mentioned without prompting "I broke my leg, Scott thought I was awesome for the next week until I told him why I tried it"
"Why?" Cora asked softly, bringing her knees up to her chest.
"I thought I could control the Matrix and wanted to try to make myself fly" Stiles admitted, grinning at the laugh he elicited from the werewolf.
As Stiles turned back to his research, Cora started talking to him, her voice soft and tentative in the still silence in his room.
"I miss those days, now more than ever… it was all so simple back then, you know? I had a family: everyone was happy and while we weren't perfect we were all together…"
Stiles swivelled around and watched the youngest Hale cautiously; Derek he knew, knew how to comfort him and the right things to say, but Cora… Cora he didn't know. "You've got the pack now" he said slowly, watching as she looked to him with a gentle smile and he knew he'd said the right thing.
"I do" she replied, grinning at Stiles as she stood from his bed and swivelled him back around "What have you got?"
"Circles are both Celtic and Polish when it comes to magic and spells; this might have been ritual work: which is more than likely the case and could be where our mutant wolves came from… but we don't know that yet so… let's just assume we have a Celtic or Polish witch or warlock on our hands for now…"
"Should we tell Scott?" Cora asked, gaze falling on Stiles slowly.
"Maybe in the morning: I'd rather look over it with a rested mind before ramming down his door and making accusations and then maybe getting hit over the head with a baseball bat" Stiles answered, rubbing his eyes tiredly, feeling the burn of lack of blinking instantly.
Cora hummed in agreement, and then patted Stiles on the shoulder before leaving out the window, alighting from the roof with grace and silence, but not before closing the window behind her.
Stiles sighed loudly and got up from the chair he was in, flopping backwards onto his bed, almost missing it but saving himself by gripping the sheets tightly and pulling himself up properly and closing his eyes, listening to the dull pounding in his head from lack of sleep and the soft sound of wind being redirected by the solid strength of the house. The moon was waning, but still bright in the sky as it filtered through his window, cold air seeping through the small cracks between the pane and the frame.
A long yawn left him and he turned to his side, facing the wall and kicking his shoes off laboriously, hearing the dull thunks against the carpeting, after that, Stiles settled in and breathed out slowly, allowing the sweet siren call of sleep carry him away.
/
"We should go and interrogate those teenagers" Derek said as soon as Stiles was in the Camaro.
"Interrogate? That's a bit extreme… don't you think?" Stiles asked "Besides… Scott wants us… me… to look at that circle- thing Cora found last night" he added with a little bitterness
"He's trying to keep you out of trouble… don't be so melodramatic" Derek retorted, flexing his grip on the steering wheel "I'm coming with you: think about that instead"
"If I weren't so frustrated or tired I'd call out that innuendo… but as it is… no" Stiles responded, stifling a yawn and groaning at the stab behind his eyes.
He hadn't slept well the night before, both the cold weather of Beacon Hills and the lack of sleep were bearing down on him in colds and insomnia, and was feeling the weariness now more than ever in the heated Camaro, the wind rushing around them with a hissing sound.
"I know it won't help now but, maybe you should try to just sleep tonight, instead of staying up for hours?" Derek suggested, pulling the car up at one of the crossroads in the new estate: where Cora had followed the beasts until she'd lost them.
"That's a good idea, both ideas that were yours are good ones" Stiles assented, jumping out of the car as it came to a stop and gravitated toward the circles on the road, pulling a piece of string from the satchel at his hip and kneeling down beside the circles. "But this thing here is slightly more important"
"More important than sleep? Who are you and what have you done with Stiles?" Derek replied in a teasing tone, kneeling down next to him and scratching at the asphalt gently, nails catching a deep red pigment beneath them "Dried blood" he noted quietly.
Stiles glanced at the werewolf for a moment and then stopped measuring the circles to join his side "Blood magic?"
"Maybe" Derek answered "You'd know better than me"
Stiles nodded and took stock of the dried blood and dust particles that were stuck within the circles "Why Polish?" he asked rhetorically, tracing the circles as he spoke "Are you from Poland? Is Polish magic stronger than most? Why mutant wolves? Do you have a vendetta?"
"I don't think the road will answer you, no matter how much you talk to it" Derek noted, grinning at the scowl Stiles sent his way "Okay, sorry, it's not helpful I know… Here" the werewolf continued, shuffling to Stiles' side and examining the blood under his fingers "What do you know about Polish magic?"
"Okay… a lot of it is done quite easily, the use of dust and plants that are easily gathered are common… there's not a lot of incantation involved in most spells but there's a lot of help from deities and whatnot… that's about it" Stiles answered, looking between the circles and Derek at even intervals.
"So is the blood relevant?" Derek prompted gently, smiling softly when Stiles shook his head and a smile graced his features.
"That means that the blood may be completely unrelated to the spell" Stiles announced quietly "And then that means that the likelihood of this whole thing being Polish is increased, which narrows the possible spells, which means that it was either a transformation or an animation spell"
"And he's done it again" Derek stated with a grin, gently pushing Stiles to the right "Knew you could do it"
"And it only took me what? Twenty minutes? I'm getting pretty good at this" Stiles added with a smirk, using his hands to support him when Derek shoved him roughly and Stiles laughed "I'm getting good, but I still need help from grumpy Sourwolves… okay?"
Derek grinned as he stood; pulling Stiles up with him by the arm "It'll do… now what?"
"I'd say research but I think it's outgrown its usefulness, wanna mess around?" Stiles answered, linking his left hand with Derek's right and swinging their arms gently.
"Do you think that's a good idea? People are dying" Derek asked, concern reaching his gaze.
"They're only killing at night: and don't forget the others are unavailable until we get the 'ok'… I think it's a reasonable good idea" Stiles argued, stopping mid stride and pulling Derek's arm to have the werewolf stop as well.
Derek raised an eyebrow first, and then he grinned "Alright"
/
"My head hurts" Stiles announced, reaching up a hand to touch at the offending thumping, and rolling to lie on his back.
"Probably because you managed to ram it into about five walls on the way up here" Derek murmured softly, throwing an arm around Stiles' midriff and chuckling.
Stiles laughed too, rubbing the back of his neck "Oh yeah… I feel like an idiot" he then rolled back onto the side.
"Feel like a loved idiot then" the werewolf responded, chuckling again "I still don't understand how you hit your head though"
"Let's face it: how I do anything without getting injured is a complete mystery" Stiles said with a laugh "Me hitting my head was bound to happen"
"Your phone is ringing" Derek said softly, pressing a kiss to his neck.
"Why tell me? I'm just going to ignore it" Stiles asked with a grin
"It could be Scott: they might have found something… hang on" Stiles felt the bed dip behind him, and then Derek was answering his phone for him "What?"
Stiles grinned and chocked back a laugh at the harsh tone of the werewolf's voice "Jeez Derek be nice"
"Shut up, listening" Derek responded with a grin "Okay… good: we'll be there" after hanging up, the werewolf pulled Stiles so that his back was on the bed instead of his side "Scott thinks they have a lead on our warlock and Isaac is here now: they want us to regroup at Scott's house" he informed matter-of-factly.
Stiles groaned and then laughed "Of course he finds something now: Scott's always had impeccable timing" then, after sitting up and watching Derek dress for a moment, he added "Hey, where do you live?"
"You're asking this now?" the werewolf responded, almost tripping over as he pulled on a boot one handed, using the other to run through his hair, ridding it of its static appearance from Stiles' pillow.
"I only just considered it now" Stiles explained as he stuck his arms through the sleeves of a red hoodie, knocking the hood off of his brow gently and ruffling his own hair: knowing how it looked but not having the energy to care.
"I have an apartment about ten minutes out of Beacon Hills, near the university… have you seen my shirt?" Derek answered, scratching at his collarbone absently as his eyes searched the room.
Stiles launched himself off of his bed and scrambled beneath it, dragging the blue Henley out and tossing it at Derek, moving over to the werewolf and kissing him once the shirt was over his head "I still can't believe I get to do that now without receiving bodily harm"
"I could still throw you around" Derek argued, playfully wrapping a hand over the material of his hoodie "Slam you into a few walls and what-not"
Stiles chuckled and wrapped his hand around Derek's "Isn't that what you just did?"
The blush Stiles managed to achieve had him grinning as he led the way down the stairs, making a beeline for the leather jacket on the coat hanger and freezing at the sound of a throat clearing.
It was his dad, and Stiles finally understood what mortified felt like: how long had he been home? Why did he care?
Before he could say a word, Derek smiled and shook his father's hand "Good to see you again sir"
"You too Derek" his dad said in response "And I keep telling you it's John"
Stiles found himself almost bouncing on his toes: not only were his two favourite people he loved getting along – but there was a super important thing happening here: Meet the Parent was going well.
While he had been musing, an entire conversation had happened and Derek was gently guiding Stiles out of the house, grabbing his jacket on the way and promising to come over for dinner; once they were out of the house, Stiles almost exploded.
"My dad wants you on first name basis?" He asked, excitement causing his voice to squeak slightly.
Derek chuckled as he slid into his car "He insists: I refuse"
Stiles just shook his head and grinned "I'm glad"
/
His good mood seemed to be rubbing off on Derek, who had a small smile on his face and had entwined their hands as they had made their way to the front door of Scott's house. They had been talking softly on the way over, and Stiles had completely forgotten what the topic was by the time they had stepped into the house, and the second Scott spoke to them - the days events seemed to pinpoint on those very words.
"You're not going to believe this"
