Departure
Theo entered the animal clinic, stepping over Steve to help Scott as he struggled to pull himself up using the metal table. "How did you find us?" Scott asked once he was on his feet.
"What, you work here. I heard about Tracy, I've been looking for you," Theo answered.
"No! No." Stiles protested as Theo pulled him off the ground as well.
"We lost her," Scott told them.
"And Malia," Stiles said.
"Alright, I can help," Theo said as he went to pick up Deaton.
"This is Theo?" the vet asked. Scott gave a slight nod in response.
"Let me help," Theo begged, "It doesn't have to mean I'm part of the pack, like you've accepted me or anything like that. It just means I can help catch this girl." Scott, Stiles, and Deaton were looking at each other. "Scott, I can help you."
Scott gave another small nod. "Alright then, let's go," he said steading himself and holding his stomach as he rose from the ground.
"You're not going to ask for permission?" Stiles joked.
Steve flashed his red eyes, "I don't have to." Scott supported Stiles while Theo helped Deaton as they made their way out of the clinic.
Stiles, Scott, and Deaton hopped in the jeep while Theo and Steve got into their own cars. They followed Tracy's scent to the sheriff's station. The alphas ran in first as Stiles and Deaton rushed to keep up.
As soon as they opened the door, a torrent of scents hit Steve's nose. He looked to his right and saw the red headed girl on the ground bleeding while an Asian girl struggled to keep the blood in. Steve tore off his shirt and replaced the girl's hands with it. Stiles stepped into the room freezing at the doorway while Theo pushed past him, removing his belt. Theo tightened his belt around the girl's abdomen as he knelt across from Steve.
Steve glanced up at Theo squinting slightly when Theo calmly nodded at him. He heard movement in the other room from the on-duty officers as they started to recover from the attack.
"Scott," Deaton whispered in the other room. Steve turned and saw them crouching behind a desk, when they stood Deaton held something wrapped in his coat.
"Oh god," a woman said appearing next to Stiles, who remained frozen.
The girl began to breathe heavier trying to speak. "Stiles," Scott shouted from the other room. Stiles turned his head towards him, "Stiles, come on," Scott pleaded. Stiles returned his gaze to the girl.
"It's okay, she's alright," Theo said.
"Tracy," the girl muttered, her face holding back tears, "Stiles, I'm fine, help Tracy," she begged.
"We'll take care of her, Stiles," Steve spoke, keeping even pressure on the wound. He heard sirens wailing not too far away.
"Stiles," Scott said.
"Go!" the girl shouted, pushing out more blood into Steve's shirt.
"Come on, Stiles," the sheriff said reaching out for the support before the pair took off into the basement.
"Lydia, it's going to be okay, it'll be ok," the woman sobbed kissing Lydia's forehead.
"I'm okay, mom," she replied, more blood rushed out into the shirt as she spoke.
"Try to save your strength, Lydia," Steve said smiling down at her. She nodded in response.
The sirens stopped moving and Steve could hear the doors open and the stretcher rolling in as the EMTs made their way to Lydia, taking over.
"Are you okay?" Steve asked the other girl after Lydia and her mother left.
"Um, yeah, thanks for helping out," her voice and hands were shaking.
Steve gently held her hands steady, "You did well before we got here." She looked up at him before pulling away. "Sorry," he said.
"No, it's, I need to go wash my hands," she turned and headed towards the bathroom.
"Careful, that's Scott's girlfriend, Kira," Theo said coming up behind him.
"I was just absorbing some of the shock," Steve turned around, "Nice tourniquet. Where'd you learn that at?"
"I just read it on the internet," he replied.
"Well its lucky for us you knew that."
"What's your problem with me?"
"I don't trust you," Steve answered dryly.
"Join the club," Theo muttered seeing Stiles reach the top of the stair, Malia and the sheriff following. "Did you find her?" Theo asked.
"Yeah, she's dead," Stiles breathed.
"Oh," Theo said. Steve couldn't smell any chemosignals coming from him. He could smell the sadness coming from her. Steve could also sense guilt and fear mixed in. Steve paused for a moment thinking about the previous night. He looked towards Theo as Malia walked out of the sheriff's station.
The Sheriff tossed a cadet t-shirt at Steve as they followed the Malia out. They headed towards the hospital in separate cars.
Scott and Liam were the last ones to join them as they saw in the lobby. "Stiles," a nurse said walking up to the pack.
"How bad is it," he asked.
"It could have been worse," she said quickly, "Theo, nice going on that tourniquet. You probably saved her life." She paused looking around while Stiles shot a look at Theo. "Alright," she continued her voice quieter, "she's about to go into surgery so it's going to be a while. Any other supernatural details that I need to know about or do we just stitch her up and hope for the best?"
"It was the tail," Kira said.
"Tracy cut her with the tail, if that makes a difference," Scott explained.
"Okay," the nurse said before she rushed off.
"But it wasn't just Tracy, there were the others," Malia spoke, most of the pack looked at her confused. "The guys in the mask," she explained.
Scott and Stiles shared a look. "What guys?" Steve asked.
"Malia said there were three men, dressed in black, and one of them was strong enough hold Malia down. They were the ones that killed Tracy by putting something into her neck," Scott stated.
"Okay, how'd they get down there? Where did they go?" Steve continued to ask.
"I don't know, they just appeared and disappeared," Malia answered. She didn't seem to be lying, but her heartbeat was too erratic for him to know for sure.
"Alright, we'll have to keep an eye out for them then," Steve stated before turning to go home.
The next day Steve went school, struggling to stay awake as usual. After math ended, Steve went to track down Stiles. He found him heading to the Jeep.
"I'm with you," Steve said coming up to him
"I'm too busy to even worry about what you mean by that," Stiles responded opening the door.
"About Theo, I don't trust him."
Stiles paused, "Good for you." He slammed the door closed. Steve ran around to the passenger door, opening it. "Out!" Stiles commanded.
"No." Steve plopped down next to Stiles. "Where are we going?"
Stiles stared at him for a minute. "I'm," he emphasized, "going to see Lydia, so get out."
"We can talk while you drive," Steve ignored him, "I'll walk back if it will make you feel better."
Stiles groaned as he started the car and backed out. "So, what about Theo?" he asked after they pulled onto the road.
"He can change his chemosignals. When we saw him in the woods originally, the only scent coming off him was grief,"
"Yeah, he was grieving," Stiles rolled his eyes.
But then when we ran into him a few moments later there wasn't a trace of sadness."
"Well, I would assume his mood changed a bit after he caught us spying on him."
"Even if his mood changes there would still be traces of the previous emotion. If you're sad and someone is talking to you and gets you to relax and laugh, are you completely happy?"
"Well, no."
"Right, the sadness is still there the happiness is just another emotion that occurs. It's the same with chemosignals. It's very rare for only one to occur at a time, it's usually a mix. And it's impossible for them to naturally disappear at a moment's notice."
Stiles looked over at Steve. "So, what? he's able to change them at will?" he asked.
"That and completely mask them. When you told him that Tracy had died, he had no chemosignals at all. It was like he was emotionless."
"Like a psychopath?"
"I think that's a bit of a leap. I was going to suggest that he could fabricate them as well."
"No," Stiles paused, "that makes sense too. He can't feel empathy, the sad emotions, so he wouldn't have any in response to someone dying. And maybe he knew we were watching and fabricated the scent of sadness," Stiles explained. "I have to tell Scott." He started pulling his phone out.
"Why don't you focus on driving?" Steve stated, "Besides, I don't know if that's enough proof for Scott to label him as a psychopath. And I could be wrong, or Theo could get better at creating the chemosignals, and then we are back to having nothing."
"Okay, so what, we just let him run around doing who knows what?"
"We keep an eye on him; catch him in something a little less circumstantial," Steve said as they pulled into the hospital parking lot.
"Okay. Give me your phone."
"Um?" Steve said confused.
"So I can give you my number and you can let me know if you find anything else."
"Right," Steve said handing over his phone, "so this means you trust me now," Steve smiled.
"No," Stiles replied tossing the phone back to Steve, "but I don't think Scott really trusts you either, so I'm less concerned about you."
"That's fair. I'll wait until you get back," Steve said moving for a bench.
"You'll be late for class if you wait to start walking back," Stiles commented walking into the hospital.
"Okay then," Steve muttered as he started to head back to the school. Once the school came into view he heard Stile's jeep coming around the corner. He honked as he drove past, Steve lifted his hand in response.
The rest of the day dragged on. Steve's last class was classical mythology, a class he thought he would enjoy more as some of the stories gave insight into supernatural creatures. However, it seemed more like a blow off class for seniors. The class had a quiz over the assigned reading on Greek monsters and they were allowed to leave as they finished. When he flipped the paper, he saw it was just matching the beast to its description.
Minotaur. Half bull half man. Pegasus. Winged horse. Cerberus. Three headed Hellhound. Chimera. Lion head, goat body, snake tail. Hydra. Nine headed snake. Sphinx. Lion body, eagle wings, snake tail, and woman's head. Cyclops. One-eyed giant.
Steve finished the quiz far before the rest of the class. He waited a few minutes, scribbling on the corner of the page before a girl in the back went to turn her paper in first. He followed suit and headed towards the library to research any possible myths about men in black masks.
He grabbed a handful of books that might have information and headed upstairs to the first empty table he could find. The library began to fill up as the students were getting out of their classes. He heard Scott and Kira enter from downstairs.
"Uh," Kira muttered as she reached the top of the stairs noticing Steve. He waved at the two of them.
Scott looked around for another open table before walking up to Steve. "What's up?" Scott asked.
"Researching men in black masks," Steve held up one of the books, "You?"
"We wanted to research chimeras." Scott answered.
"The monsters that are part lion, part goat, and part snake? Why?"
"We think that Tracy was one," Kira explained
"Well she had the tail of a snake."
"And the claws of a werewolf. And the man who attacked me on the night of senior scribe was a werewolf, but had eagle talons."
"A garuda," Steve muttered. Scott raised an eyebrow at him, "You learn a lot being around the supernatural for eight years."
Stiles and Malia came up the stairs, "How was visiting Lydia?" Steve asked Stiles.
"She was still in ICU when I went to see her during my free period. No one is allowed to see her. Only family is allowed in."
"We got one thing though," Malia said opening a book on the table. Bestiary was written in elegant writing on the first page. "Anything in there about half werewolves half kanimas?" Malia asked.
"Chimera," Scott muttered flipping through the pages.
"Uh, What?" Stiles asked.
"Chimera, it's a creature made of incongruous parts. And if Liam found two burial sites that means that Tracy's not the only one."
"Who's the second chimera?" Kira asked.
"Yeah, and why would they bury them?" Stiles added.
"Deaton thinks it's a part of their process." Scott answered.
"The people in masks," Malia muttered, fear, guilt, and sadness filling Steve's nose.
"We'll find them," Scott said.
After a few hours of searching they had found no results. Stiles had passed out on one of the books. Scott and Kira had left a few minutes ago. Scott's mom had asked him to come by the hospital and check on something that may be supernatural. Malia had begun to click her pen and Steve smelled the guilt return.
"It wasn't your fault," Steve told her.
"I'm taking off," Malia announced. "Stiles, wake up and go home, I'll meet you there in a bit."
Stiles grunted in response.
"I'm going to go catch up with Scott and Kira, you should head home," Steve said, nudging Stiles a bit, but Stiles didn't rouse.
Steve arrived at the hospital a few minutes behind Scott and Kira and caught them as they were waiting for the elevator.
"Oh, hey." Scott said surprised, "I think we got it."
"I know a bit more about the supernatural than you, it'll be faster than waiting for you to try and explain it to me," Steve answered and joined them in the elevator.
"This way," the nurse from yesterday motioned towards the three as they stepped off the elevator, "He came in about forty-five minutes ago."
"Melissa," one of the doctors said running over to her. "I'm going to find an anesthesiologist covering the key pain; see what she can do."
"Okay," she breathed stopping at a door. A kid shrieked from inside causing the group to pause.
"Mom, what's happening?"
"It's the pain, nothing's working. We've already pumped him full of morphine." The screaming continued, growing stronger.
"Can't they do anything to help him?" Kira asked.
"We can put him in a medically induced coma. It's how we help burn victims deal with the pain," Melissa answered shaking her head.
"Let me see if I can help," Scott said opening the door.
A teen boy squirmed in the bed, screaming at the top of his lungs, his arms restrained to the hospital bed. Sweat was pouring from his face, "Please, please make it stop!" he begged, "Please make it stop!"
Steve and Scott each reached for one of his hands. Steve gasped at the intense pain that ran into him, despite both wolves pulling it away. Black veins formed at his wrist and climbed up his arms, he felt them start to crawl up his chest. After they reached his collar bones he let go, looking towards Scott. The black veins started to cover his neck.
"Scott," Steve and Kira said in unison. Kira running over to pull him off. "Let go, come on. Let go of him." She pleaded. Melissa joined the struggle, finally removing Scott from the boy.
Scott was gasping for air, "I'm okay," he breathed out, "Let me see, let me see his arm."
Melissa peeled back the gauze revealing a bloody gash covering the boy's forearm. Steve leaned over him to get a better look. "Holy" Kira gasped
"What is that?" Scott asked.
"The lab says scorpion venom," Melissa answered.
"I know, and that's not the weirdest part. Because a sting this bad means that he should have been dead ten hours ago, and the scorpion that stung him would have been ten feet tall," Melissa said leaving
"Please tell me that doesn't mean there is a giant scorpion running around Beacon Hills," Kira looked between Scott and Steve.
"Could be a manticore," Steve said.
Scott started to ask what that meant, but the boy interrupted him, "Lucas," he whispered, "It was Lucas."
The boy started to become more alert when Scott knelt beside him. "Hey, Corey, what Lucas did to you he's going to do it to someone else and it's going to be much worse," Scott said.
"We need to know what happened," Kira stated.
"I don't really know. He's never been like that before," Corey started
"You mean like what?" Scott asked.
"Aggressive," Corey answered, "we were taking it slow but it wasn't me he was the shy one. We were hanging out today and he seemed like a different person."
"Different how?" Scott asked.
"Like super confident. We were just kissing and then I felt this sharp sting on my arm, and then I looked up at him and I swear his eyes turned black."
"You mean totally black?" Kira asked.
"The whole eye, but it was only for a second. And then he said sorry, that I'll see him at the club tonight and then he just left. And then a few minutes late I'm in the worst pain of my life."
"Wait hang on you said club. What club?" Kira asked.
"Every Friday night, Sinema," Corey answered.
"We need to go," Steve said rushing to the door.
"Right, thanks, Corey," Scot said before he and Kira rushed after Steve.
Scott and Steve sped towards the club ignoring most of the stop signs on the way. Steve pulled in as Scott and Kira were dismounting from their bike. "So, what's a manticore anyway?" Kira asked as the moved around to the back door.
"Persian mythology. They have black eyes and spikes along them filled with scorpion venom, they can sometimes shoot those spikes at their targets," Steve stated, "But usually their whole body turns black, not just their eyes. It's probably another chimera."
"Yeah, I remember reading something about it in the bestiary," Scott said pulling open the door. An alarm immediately went off, filling the room with a flashing red light and loud bell. The three looked around the room panicked before Kira ripped off a part of her belt and threw it at the wire leading to the alarm.
"Nice," Steve commented.
"God, I love you," Scott said smiling at her before turning to head into the club.
Steve moved to follow while Kira stood by the door, "Kira," Steve shouted, "You coming?" Kira shook her head and caught up to them.
"You did it again," She shouted at Scott over the music, "you did something, and it changed everything. You don't even realize you did it, but you did."
"I did?" Scott asked confused. A roar erupted from across the dance floor.
"Come on," Steve shouted pushing his way through the crowd. The three passed through a beaded curtain into a back room. "Mason?" Scott said as they stepped in.
"Brett?" Steve whispered seeing the beta on the ground, with Mason keeping pressure against a wound.
"You're a little late," Liam growled from underneath Lucas.
Scott and Steve ran into action, Kira pulled off her belt snapping it into a sword. Scott swung around the light support, kicking Lucas. Lucas quickly recovered and threw Scott behind him. Liam recovered and charged him but was kicked back to the ground. Steve went to punch Lucas before he was pushed into the wall. Lucas turned towards Kira as she artfully swung her sword in her hand before using the backside to catch the spikes in Lucas' oncoming arms. After a few attempted strikes, Lucas grabbed Kira's wrist, twisting it to disarm her, but Kira stepped into the attack and spun her sword out of his reach before kicking him into the curtain. As Lucas rebounded off the curtain, Steve leapt from the ground and grabbed Lucas, pinning him to the wall.
"Lucas!" Steve growled, shifting. The boy's eyes returned to normal and he stopped struggling. He seemed confused and scared.
Steve's shadow suddenly appeared against the wall as the room filled with an orange light. Kira started shouting something in Japanese behind him. Steve turned and watched her spin towards him before raising her sword. He quickly shoved Lucas on the floor and ducked down as Kira, enveloped in an orange fox shaped aura, brought her sword down.
"Kira!" Scott shouted grabbing her wrists seconds before the sword cut into Steve. Kira turned and glared at him. Scott stared back in confusion. Steve's eyes didn't move from the tip of the sword right above his head. Eventually the aura around Kira began to fade.
"Is everyone okay?" Scott asked. Kira looked down, gasped, and moved her sword away from Steve's face.
"Uh-huh," Steve breathed as Scott helped him up.
They looked at Lucas, who seemed to be unconscious. "Are we gunna get him out of here?" Steve asked.
"Liam, give me a hand," Scott said as the two ran over to pick the boy up. Suddenly a crossbow bolt lodge itself into Lucas' chest before being reeled back to the rafters where three men dressed in black and with black masks stood. The bolt snapped back into the crossbow held by one of the men. "Why did you do that?" Scott asked shocked.
"His condition was terminal," one of the men stated.
"What does that mean? What does that mean?!" Scott shouted.
"Failure," the men answered before a spark shot out from the lights and they were gone.
They all looked down at Lucas. "Scott," Steve said placing a hand on his shoulder, "take him to your mom." He nodded in response and threw the boy on his shoulders. Steve separating from the rest to head to his car.
Steve pulled out his phone. "You're probably going to hear this from Scott, but we found another chimera, the men in black showed up and killed him." He sent the text to Stiles.
"Oh. I'm about to leave the school, I'll check up with Scott in a bit." Stiles replied within a few seconds.
"You're still at the school?"
"Yeah, my jeep isn't starting." His reply came back after another few seconds.
"Do you want a ride?" Steve started his car and headed towards the school. A few minutes went by with no reply. "Stiles?" Steve sent. Still no reply. He pressed the call button, but there was still no answer.
"Theo," Steve thought and pressed his foot to the floor board.