#3 I don't think my mother really loves me.

The sky hung like a gray blanket over Beacon Hills. It didn't smell like rain was coming, but it was clear the sun wasn't going to make an appearance this afternoon.

"This is the fourth complaint we've had about them in a month," the Sheriff remarked as the cruiser turned onto Benson Avenue.

Scott shifted in the passenger seat; he was uncomfortable but it wasn't his seat. He was still unsure exactly why he was doing this. Outside the car window, a couple were hanging Halloween decorations in their front yard, including, ironically, a plastic werewolf. When he had been fifteen, Scott would have claimed that it looked pretty life-like, but now he would say that he had never seen an actual werewolf with a snout like the one on that model. He had encountered the raised claws, the torn and bloody clothes, and the look of madness playing in the eyes.

He didn't know what it had to be mad about. The plastic wolf man didn't have to worry about a biology lab report and a paper on Octavio Paz which were both due on Monday. Scott finally turned back to the sheriff.

"What kind of complaints?"

The Sheriff gave him a quick glance. "Domestic disturbances." "People saw them hurt each other?"

"No, nothing that bad. Loud arguments. Someone tossed a sewing machine out the picture window. From the report, there had been lots of shouting going on immediately before. The told the patrol officer it was an accident, which no one really believed."

Scott didn't have to try very hard to imagine how that would have played out. After all, he had witnessed events which sounded very similar to these years ago. "Why'd you call me?"

Noah scrunched up his brow, genuinely confused. "Because you're the alpha."

"I'm not their alpha!"

Even after all these months, the sheriff had never quite managed to wrap his head around how werewolf packs operated. He kept believing that Scott had some form of geographically-based authority, like an alpha would serve as some sort of supernatural law enforcement officer for Beacon Hills.

An alpha's authority only extended to his pack, and Scott seldom found he had reasons or the desire to exert it. His pack was his because he loved them and they loved him. He had met alphas who ruled with an iron hand, who bound others to themselves with bonds of fear, obligation, or both. Scott had never wanted to become anything remotely resembling one of them.

"But you know them."

"Well, yeah. They let me know that they moved into town because it's polite, not because they had to."

"I thought you inherited—"

"Protector of Beacon Hills. The Hales took on that duty voluntarily, but it doesn't mean ... well much of anything in terms of authority, really. Parrish should be the one who talks to them. Or you!"

"Parrish tried, but they weren't cooperative, even after he hinted at what he was. He had to write them a citation."

"And you?"

Noah turned. "What do you think I could do that you couldn't?"

And there it was. Sheriff Stilinski had never gotten past his discomfort with the supernatural. It caused him to veer wildly between the extremes. Sometimes, the Sheriff suspected that all trouble in his town was caused by the supernatural. Sometimes, he simply pretended the supernatural did not exist. It wouldn't bother Scott so much if it hadn't seemed that the way the sheriff approached these troubles always put the burden on those who belonged to the supernatural world even when these people had no greater resources for dealing with their own safety and security than any other citizen.

In other words, if the Sheriff could get away with it, werewolves and things like them were on their own. Scott had experienced that first hand, too.

"Well, you could always call the Border Patrol."

He had timed it so he said it right as Noah was pulling into a driveway of a Craftsman bungalow in one of the less wealthy neighborhoods. Before the Sheriff could reply, Scott quickly got out of the car.

Adam Gibbs appeared at the doorway. He didn't look like any of the abusive husbands Scott had seen on television; he was neither a blue-collar slob nor a frat president gone to seed. As all werewolves tended to be, he was physically fit and alert. He was well-groomed, wearing jeans and a white oxford but no shoes. That wasn't suspicious since this was his home, after all.

"What do you want?"

Scott wanted to be back at Davis doing his homework, but he couldn't really say that. "Hi. I don't know if you remember—"

"I know who you are."

"Okay. Right." Scott took a deep breath. "May we come in? I'd like to talk to you and your wife about some things that have been happening recently."

Adam tried not to look Scott directly in the eye. He must have been ten years older and he stood a few inches taller, but he knew what Scott was and so probably believed that challenging him wouldn't end well. In addition, the Sheriff of Beacon County was standing a little behind Scott, over his left shoulder.

"Sure."

The interior of the bungalow was neat and clean, but not overly so. It wasn't a cage of perfection; it looked lived in. In the background, Adam's wife Claire came out of the kitchen. "What's going on?"

"I don't know," her husband replied, shutting the front door behind them.

"We're here because we're worried."

The couple looked at each other.

The sheriff broke in. "My deputies have had to come out here a lot."

Adam colored. "Uhm. Yeah. I guess they have. I'm ..." He gestures to the couch. "Would you like to sit down?"

Scott looked at Noah who nodded, and they took seats. Adam sat across from both of them. He didn't look angry or hostile. In fact, he looked embarrassed like he had been caught stealing other people's lunches in the work room.

"How long have you lived here, Mr. Gibbs?"

"Uh. You can call me Adam."

"Call me Scott."

Adam gave him a weak smile. "We moved here in April of 2012."

The sheriff squinted at the man. "Right after the ..." He trailed off. Noah might have a hard time imagining someone moving to Beacon Hills in the aftermath of the Dead Pool.

Scott folded his hands in his lap. They hadn't shown up on the list, so it made sense that they had arrived later. Back then, in the midst of the six months of peace before the beginning of his senior year, he hadn't even considered the timing of their arrival.

"A job opened up," Adam explained. "In my field. I'm a data analyst, and well ... there was another reason."

"I get it." The Nemeton. Scott wished he could burn it to the ground, but that would be dangerous. "Where'd you come from, if you don't mind me asking?"

"Ward County, North Dakota. I ... I used to work at the air force base there." Adam seemed absolutely the opposite of what Scott had expected from a possibly violent abuser.

They stared at each other, the awkwardness between them growing with each moment. Scott finally cleared his throat. "Adam, is there something we can do to ... help you ..."

"How dare you!" Claire, who had been standing near the door to the kitchen, took a menacing step forward into the living room.

"Excuse me?"

"You've done enough," the woman gritted out, her eyes going golden-yellow. "Why do you think these 'things' keeps happening? We're scared, and that's your fault."

Scott glanced at the sheriff. "Mine?"

"Claire!" Adam protested.

"No, Adam, I'm not going to let these assholes come here and bully us in our own home."

"No one is bullying anyone, ma'am," Sheriff Stilinski protested.

"You didn't bring an alpha into our home as a warning to shape up? It's bad enough we have to live in this place, with these people." Claire's voice rose in pitch and volume, so it didn't take werewolf senses to tell she was both afraid and furious.

"Which people?" The Sheriff asked.

Scott rolled his eyes. "You're talking about when the Anuk-Ite scared everyone and Monroe armed the citizens."

"Damn right." She pointed at Scott. "Which is your fault. You're the one who revealed us to them."

"Claire!" Adam protested again, looking nervous.

But she wasn't quite finished yet. "You want to know why we shout at each other? You want to know why I threw the sewing machine into the front yard? Because we're scared! We've been scared for nearly two years!"

Standing up, Scott turned to look directly at her. "I know what it's like to be scared."

Claire came right up to his face. "Do you? You seem to be doing pretty okay. Now my husband and I? We can't do anything. We can't move, because we don't have enough money, and even if we did, where would we move to? I remember that woman's people driving slowly by the house on purpose. We had to hide in our basement, but I know they know who we are. Where can we go where we would be safe?"

"I ... I don't know."

"Of course you don't. I've never heard of an alpha so incompetent that he'd let an entire army of humans know about the supernatural."

"That's enough." The sheriff raised his voice. "We're not talking about Scott. We're talking about you and your husband."

Adam stood up when Noah barked at his wife. He growled in the back of his throat.

Scott had to put a stop to this, so he tapped into the power that always seethed within him. Though his eyes went red, he didn't say anything; he didn't even growl. "We're not here to fight. We're here to help."

Claire blanched in the presence of an alpha, but then she shook her head to clear it. When she spoke, it was half venomous and half regretful. "Unless you can go back in time and turn everyone into the people they were before all this happened, you can't."

The conversation grew stilted and short after the confrontation. The sheriff stressed that he was going to have to be more firm if disruptions continued to happen. Scott suggested that they talk to Marin Morrell and gave the couple the psychologist/Emissary's business card.

They had to leave with only thin assurances that the Gibbs would try to be less disruptive in the future. Adam and Claire made the promise to both of them, but all it did was cause Scott to feel something horrible settle in his stomach. Nothing had really been fixed. The source of the problem — the tumult of Scott's high school years — still continued. The town still remembered the monsters who lived within it. The monsters still remember being hunted by most of the town.

The sun had completely set as the cruiser pulled out of the driveway.

"You can't take it personally," Noah began after a few minutes of silence. "When you're dealing with people in difficult situations, they're going to need a target. Usually, that's someone like you."

Scott felt the words slip out of his mouth. "I'm not a cop."

"What?"

"I'm not a cop!" He turned to Noah. "I'm not the law. I'm not the mayor. I'm not their boss."

The words came out, each with a little bit more emotion. He couldn't quite say what that emotion was.

The sheriff drove in silence for a few minutes. From the turns he made, they weren't immediately heading back to the station.

"You said something about the Border Patrol." He finally started the conversation up again. "Scott, I only called you in because I thought it would help. Why do you think I did it?"

"Does it matter?"

The sheriff hummed, unconvinced. "Well, son—"

"Don't do that. I'm not your son, and you're not my father. Don't pretend that you treat me anything like a son. You haven't treated me like a human being since you found out I was bit."

"That's not fair."

"It's absolutely fair. Unless you've asked Stiles to help you track down escaped criminals when I wasn't present. I'm not a kid anymore, and I'm no longer naive. You've made it perfectly clear that you don't think of supernaturals as human beings. You never have. Stop the car. I'll walk ..."

Scott was going to say that he would walk home, but he didn't have a home. The house had been sold.

The sheriff did indeed pull over but he locked the door as he did so. It was simply meant to slow him down; an alpha werewolf could get out if he wanted to. "Scott, what Mrs. Gibbs said isn't true. You're not to blame for surviving. You're not to blame for trying to have a normal life."

"That sounds nice, but no one acts as if that's true, Mr. Stilinski. From Derek trying to force me into giving up lacrosse to Mrs. Finch scolding me about my grades, every single person has acted like me wanting to be treated like everyone else is unreasonable and childish. Especially you. You don't think I can't see that you resent us? I mean the supernatural in your town."

Noah grunted in refutation.

"Bullshit. Did you ever apologize to Kira or the Yukimura's for arresting her?"

"I had a dead body, and I thought I handled it the best way I could. I made a mistake."

"Donovan's body was just as dead, but you didn't mistakenly arrest Stiles! You may have realized your mistake, but you didn't do one fucking thing to make up for it, because why should you? They're not human, so you didn't have any responsibility to them. That's the difference between us, Sheriff. I don't have any responsibilities at all in this. Don't call me again."

Scott went to open the door, and the Sheriff let him. He had been yelling, but the Sheriff had kept his cool. He wasn't satisfied, he was still upset, and so he hesitated to see how the sheriff responded.

"I think maybe you should talk to someone. Does your mother know you feel this way?" "My mother ..."

If Noah had been trying to talk it out with him, he had chosen the worst way to go about it, because, in the end, his mother was even worse than the sheriff in failing to treat him like everyone else. After she had found out he had been Bitten, she had started treating him as if he was a completely different person. She never asked him about his girlfriends, and she never worried about his grades. She worked a lot, and she chose to work a lot of night shifts. On the surface, she was always there when he needed, but in the reality she was always there for the werewolf. He had told Stiles back in junior year that they were closer than ever, but as time went on, he realized that hadn't actually true.

Her attention seemed to be focused entirely on his responsibilities; she was always pushing him to become the best alpha he could be. He still didn't know if she had ever realized that he had been kidnapped to Mexico or that it had taken weeks for the wound Theo had put on him to heal. They had never talked about it; she had never asked.

The worst part was when he discovered that she had married Mr. Argent without even finding out how he had shot Scott when they first met or pulled him through a window and stuck a gun in his face to discourage him from dating Allison. She had thrown his biological father out of the house for tossing him down a set of stairs; because she didn't allow anyone to hurt her son. But that had changed. She obviously didn't care enough to know what Chris Argent had done to him in the past.

Didn't that sort of mean he wasn't really her son anymore?

"I'm sorry, Mr. Stilinski, for getting angry and not being able to help. I just have a lot on my plate right now. I shouldn't have taken it out on you." He shut the door to the police car and started to walk back to his apartment. Neither of them could say anything that could make any difference.