We followed Deputy into the loft to see Stiles standing in the middle of the loft with the evil gleam from Nogitsune glistening in his eyes. Allison held up her taser and shot him with it but before it could hit him, the Nogitsune grabbed the line in mid-air and yanked the taser from Allison's hands. Derek growled and charged at him but the Nogitsune wrapped his arm around Derek's should and popped it making Derek groan as his head got slammed into the metal table before getting thrown into a pillar. Derek coughed from the lack of air in his lungs as Chris cocked his gun and pointed it at Stiles' head.
"Argent, listen to me." Deputy tried to reason with him. "Don't do this."
"Why not?" Chris snapped, never taking his eyes off the Nogitsune. "I've done it before. Werewolves, berserkers. I can easily add a nogitsune to the list." The deputy pulled out his gun and cocked it, aiming it at Chris. The nogitsune's eyes got wide with surprise.
"You're not going to shoot my son."
"You said it yourself, Deputy. That's not your son."
"Put it down." Chris ignored him. "Put it down." The nogitsune's face changed to a worried and scared expression, the same expression that Stiles would get.
"Dad, he's gonna shoot me." The nogitsune said in the small scared voice like Stiles. "He's gonna kill me, Dad." He turned to look at me, giving me the soft brown eyes that Stiles would give me when he wanted something. "Calla, please." I grinded my teeth and ignored the plea for help.
"Don't listen." Chris said.
"Put it down." Deputy ordered again. "Put it down. Now! Do it!" The nogitsune's face hardened its epxression as it looked back at Chris.
"Pull the trigger." Nogitsune offered. "Come on."
"Listen to me, you put the gun down now!"
"Shoot me."
"Put the gun down now!"
"Dad." Allison tried to reason with her father but he ignored her too.
"Shoot me!" Nogitsune yelled. "Shoot me!"
"Argent, you put the gun down now!" Deputy continued to shout at the hunter.
"Strife." I heard Allison whispered and it all started to fit together. He wanted us to fight. I looked at the window to see the sun in the horizon. He was stalling. But why? He knew the Oni would be after him at night and kill him? Why was he stalling?
"Put it down! Put it down!" The loft got dark and the air got still and cold.
"Stop!" I yelled. "Stop. This is what he wants. This is exactly what he wants." The nogitsune looked at me again.
"Not exactly." He said. "I was kind of hoping Scott would be here. But I'm glad you all have your guns out. Because you're not here to kill me." He turned to the big window and stepped back to where he was behind the deputy and Chris. Four clouds of black smoke formed in front of the glass and the oni appeared swords drawn and ready to fight. "You're here to protect me." Chris and Deputy began to fire at them and Derek and I unsheathed our claws and charged forward, canines bared and surrounded by smoke.
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I burst through the door of Scott's house and into the living room where Scott and Deaton were carrying an unconscience Stiles to the couch. I inhaled deeply and stood beside Lydia and Aiden. He disappears into thin air in the middle of the night with the oni and then turns up out of no where in the middle of the day.
"What happened?" I asked hastily. "Where did you find him?"
"In the middle of a parking lot." Lydia answered.
"If we're not going to kill him then why aren't we at least tying him down with really heavy chains?" Aiden questioned Deaton.
"I might have something more effective." Deaton said opening a leather handbag and pulling out a flask of golden thick syrup. Deaton looked to me and Scott and we walked over to Stiles and held his shoulders into the couch. I squeezed his cheeks to open his mouth and Deaton pulled a whole syringe full of the liquid into his mouth. As soon as the substance touched his tongue, the nogitsune's eyes snapped open and his hand shot out to grab me by the throat. His fingers enclosed around my windpipe and I gasped for air but kept my left on his chest to hold him to the couch while my right hand try to pry his enclosing fingers off of me. I grunted with frustration as my head pounded with the lack of oxygen but the nogitsune's grip just kept getting stronger and stronger. The nogitsune just sat there and laughed at my pain and struggle.
"Get him off me!" I spat as Aiden and Scott both tried to get him to let go off. "Get him off me!" I was to the point where I was about to black out with his grip suddenly left me and I coughed and gagged on the rushing air into my lungs. I looked at the nogitsune and saw his body laying motionless on the couch but he was still able to move his head around.
"Kanima venom." The nogitsune grunted. "Nice touch." Aiden roared at him and the nogitsune just laughed. "You know how they say that twins get a feeling when the other one is in pain? You didn't lose that talent too, did you? Oh, I hope not. You're gonna need it. Okay, I'll give a little hint. Ethan's at the school." Aiden looked to Scott for guidance.
"Go." Scott ordered and Aiden ran out of the house to find his twin brother. The nogitsune rolled his head and laughed.
"Oh, I hope he gets there in time. I like the twins. Short tempers. Homicidal compulsions. They're a lot more fun than you bakemono trying to save the world every day."
"Doc, you brought something to paralyze his body." Melissa stated. "But do you have something for his mouth?"
"Yes, I do." Deaton answered and he pulled out some duct tape and tore a piece off to place it over the nogitsune's mouth. He yelled through the black tape before he started giggling like a maniac.
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"How much longer do you think we have?" Scott questioned Deaton as Lydia, me, him and Scott stood in the kitchen trying to figure out our next move.
"I wish I knew." Deaton said. "But if we don't figure something out soon, we're going to need to find a better place to keep him. I think we're grossly underestimating the danger here. He might be paralyzed, but it still feels like he has us right in the palm of his hand." We looked back at the nogitsune who was watching us closely as Melissa was tending to the nasty cut on his stomach.
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"But the scroll said to change his body." Lydia reminded us.
"That's if I translated it correctly." Deaton objected. "We're looking for a cure in something that might actually be nothing more than a proverb or a metaphor."
"And what if he doesn't want?" Scott said. "He's never asked to be a werewolf."
"What if it saves his life?" I inquired.
"What if it kills him?" Deaton retorted.
"I've never done this before." Scott said. "I mean what if I bite him and I hit an artery or something."
"That venom is not going to last long. Something needs to be done sooner than later."
"I can try calling Derek again." I offered, pulling out my phone but Lydia stopped me.
"Maybe we should try calling someone else." She said and by the look in her eyes, I knew exactly who she meant. I groaned but dialed the number and stated my request. We waited in silence in the kitchen when the doorbell rang and I slowly made my way to the door and opened to let Peter in.
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Peter stood in front of the nogitsune and examined him as the evil fox spirit glared right back at him.
"He doesn't look like he would survive a slap across the face, much less the bite of a werewolf." Peter muttered.
"You don't think it would work?" Scott challenged him.
"This is more a war of the mind than the body. There are better methods to winning this battle."
"What kind of methods?" Deaton asked. Peter grabbed my hand and held it out as my claws extended and the nogitsune looked in shock at them.
"We're gonna get into his head."
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"So, do we have a plan?" Deaton asked Peter.
"Calla is gonna try to dig through pale and sickly evil Stiles' mind to unearth pale and sickly real Stiles." Peter said. "Then guide him back from the depths of his own subconscious. But she's not going to do it alone."
"What do you mean?" I questioned him.
"Somebody needs to go in with you." He turned to look at Scott.
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I stood behind the couch where the nogitsune and Scott sat as Peter positioned my claws in the right place behind their necks.
"So what do we do if we find him?" I asked.
"You're gonna have to guide him out somewhere." Peter answered as he positioned my claws on Scott's neck. "Try to give him back control of his mind, his body?"
"Could you elaborate on the somehow?" Scott inquired. "It's not feeling very specific at the moment."
"Improvise."
"What if this is just another trick?" I thought glancing cautiously at the nogitsune who was still staring straight ahead.
"When are you people gonna start trusting me?"
"I meant him."
"Oh."
"Calla, we're running out of time." Deaton reminded me for the hundredth time. I nodded and closed my eyes to try to focus. My eyes opened to my red wolf sight and I breathed heavily as I plunged my claws into the nogitsune and Scott's necks, causing us to spiral into the memories and thoughts of Stiles. I closed my eyes to stop myself from getting dizzy but when I opened them, Scott and I were standing in a tiny room with two beds that had restraints on them. It was dark and there was no light what so ever.
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"What now?" Scott's voice echoed throughout the room.
"I don't know." I said. "This is the first time I've been in someone else's head."
"Just stay behind me." Scott headed to the door of the room and walked through it but before I could follow him, the door slammed shut in my face. I turned the doorknob and pushed on it but it wouldn't budge. I started banging on the door freaking out that I was in this alone.
"Scott? Scott!" There was no answer and I turned my back to the door and inhaled sharply when I wasn't in the room anymore. Instead, I was in the dark hallway of the high school at night. A distinctive howl sounded on the other side of the building near the gym followed by the roar of a beta. I recognized that howl. It was Scott's howl when he was a beta. My blood ran cold as I remembered this night. This was the night where we got locked in the school by Peter when he was an alpha. Peter's howl came again and I turned around and ran down the hallway towards the double doors. The sound of chalk on the board sounded and I stopped to look in the classroom where the noise was coming from. There was a tall figure with bandages wrapped all around his body. From his head to his feet he was in bandages despite that he had on a t-shirt and a leather jacket with jeans. There were no holes in the bandages for the eyes. Just a slithered were silver sharp jagged teeth poked out. The figure turned to me and I took a step back in shock. I started up my run back down the hallway again but when I got to the double doors and pushed on them to open, they wouldn't budge. My hairs stood up and my breathing labored as a locker door slammed behind and I pivoted to see the figure slamming the locker doors shut as he slowly made his way to me. The sound of the slamming doors echoed through my head and my thoughts and rattled me senseless. I dropped down to the floor and cowered by the door, my knees to my chest and my hands over my ears as the doors kept slamming. "Go away. Go away. Go away!" I yelled in fear as I didn't know what else to do. I was in someone else's head and I had no control. I was an alpha and I had no control. "Please. Leave me alone!" I was letting my pack down. My best friends, Scott and Stiles. The figure roared and I roared back to counteract it but it was helpless. From a far away place, I heard something calling out.
"Calla! Concentrate!" My head shot up from my knees at the word. Concentrate. Concentration. I have a job at hand and I'm here cowering like a lost pup. Concentrate. Find Stiles. Find the real Stiles. Find my best friend. Help him. Save him. Concentrate. I stood up with more strength than I had coming in here and I slammed myself into the double doors causing them to break open into a large white room. The room was large with several white pillars. Sneakers squeaking against the tile floor and I turned to see Scott running towards me. I sighed in relief.
"Are you ok?" He asked. I nodded relieved to be with someone besides my own thoughts. We looked to the other side of the room to see the bandaged figure and Stiles playing the game of Go on a large tree stump. The nemeton.
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We started to the root but it seemed like the more we ran the farther they got. We were making no progress by running in place. We stopped and I groaned in frustration.
"Stiles!" Scott yelled.
"Stiles!" I echoed. "Stiles! Stiles, over here!" Stiles ignored us and continued to play his game of Go with the bandaged figure. We tried the running again but ended up with the same results. We panted with exhuastion and then an idea came to mind. "Stiles is part of our packs. A part of your pack and a part of mine."
"What? What do you mean?"
"He's human. But he's still part of our packs, right?"
"Yeah. Yeah, of course."
"So, how do wolves signal their location to the rest of the pack?"
"They howl." The bandaged figure looked down the room at us as Scott and I wolfed out. I summoned as much air as I could possible get and let out the biggest roar that I could muster. Scott's and my howls were strong enough to break every window in a building. The sound was deafening of the two of us howling together but yet comforting to have another wolf by my side to share the same intentions as me. The pieces on the Go board rattled and Stiles seemed to snap out of whatever hypnotic thing he was in. He looked over at Scott and me, his eyes full of understanding before looking at the Nogitsune. Stiles wiped the board clean of the pieces and the Nogitsune roared in his face. The room around me began to swirl and I closed my eyes and opened them again to be back in Scott's living room. I gasped for air as I took my claws out of Scott's and Stiles' neck. I looked down at Stiles to see him hanging his head.
"Did it work? Did it work?" I rushed back around the couch and knelt down before Stiles.
"What happened?" Lydia asked. Stiles wasn't moving at all. "Why didn't it work?" Stiles then jolted awake and started gagging and coughing through the duct tape that was still on his mouth. He peeled it off his mouth and dropped to the floor as he began to vomit yards after yards of gauz bandage. It fell to a pile before him and when he moved away from it a cloud of black smoke formed on top of the pile and it began to move. First, a bandage hand popped through the pile and then another followed by arms and a head. I gasped in shock as I recognized the bandaged figure from when I was inside Stiles' head. It just kept coming up out of the floor until the whole body was on two feet. He looked around before lunging at us. Lydia screamed but before he could touch any of us, Peter and Scott grabbed him and wrestled him back to the couch.
"Hold him." Peter ordered.
"I'm trying." Scott said. "Wait, wait, wait!" Scott pushed Peter away and started to unwrap the bandage from the figure. I stepped forward cautiously to see what he was doing. He unwrapped the head to reveal Stiles. Stiles looked around the room with frantic eyes.
"Scott?" He called out in a shaky voice. "Calla?"
"Hey," Deaton said. We turned to see that the front door was wide open and the other Stiles was no where to be found. Same with Lydia.
"Where are they?" Scott asked. "Lydia!" He rushed out the door with me close to his heels. "Lydia! Lydia!"