Chapter 20: Ouroboros
A small caravan pulled up to an old nuclear plant that had walls plastered with dirtied warning signs on the rusted fences surrounding the place. From the look of it, the plant hadn't seen any real activity for decades. The caravan drove to the front entrance and a small group of men came out. One of them was Alan Deaton and he stared at the area with a determined look on his face.
It had been almost two weeks since he had left Beacon Hills to try to find any answer for what the Dread Doctors were doing and why. He reached out to some old contacts and sources for any information about them. It hadn't been easy as some knew next to nothing, and those that did, it seemed they were a somewhat taboo subject to even discuss out loud. His big break came when Maggie's druid mentor told him of a place where the Dread Doctors had last been rumored to have been. An old defunct nuclear plant, in Russia. The local news was that this plant's reactor had broken down and started leaking out nuclear radiation and made it too toxic and lethal to be there. Not as serious and damaging as the Chernobyl incident, at least, from what the official stories say. Yet, the Geiger counter he had with him was barely picking up more radiation than you would find around a microwave oven. As he started to venture inside the structure, Deaton was starting to wonder what the unofficial story was.
Deaton whipped out a flashlight as they started to head down into the plant's maintenance tunnel with one of the men, who seemed to be getting more nervous and anxious the deeper they went. He had a flashlight out to, along with an automatic rifle.
"You're quite tense. I take it you don't believe the official story about nuclear radiation."
"This is not a nuclear plant," the man said, getting more fidgety.
"Do you know what it is? Or what it was used for?"
"I know the rumors. Superstition."
They stopped when Deaton spotted a sign. It had a message spray painted over it but Deaton couldn't read it as it was in Russian. "What's it say?" he asked.
"They come, they come for all of us," the man translated.
"The men in the masks?"
"Yes." The man then moved to pull out a leather mask. "Like this."
They started walking on.
"What was the story?"
"They say they never took off the mask. Some people believed they had no faces underneath. But, they had a symbol. The snake that eats itself."
Deaton narrowed his eyes. That sounded eerily familiar. "The Ouroboros." He stopped and shone his flashlight up ahead when they came to a metal door. "Like that one."
On the door was a carved image of the serpent coiled around itself and devouring itself from its own tail. They then pulled the door open and found what seemed to be some kind of science lab. There were jars and instruments scattered around on a work table that were covered up in cob webs. On the opposite side were shelves that were crawling with bones and skulls, just as covered in cob webs. As Deaton stepped deeper into the lab, he found some more jars on a shelf that seemed to contain bodies of premature…infants swimming in green liquid. Deaton's companion started to shake a bit at the sight of them. Even Deaton, with everything he saw, felt a chill traveling up his spine.
"Failed experiments," Deaton gasped.
"On children?"
"Fetuses," he corrected. "These were done in the womb."
It seemed that an attempt had been made to develop chimeras back when their experimental subjects were still in development before birth. Though, it was safe to guess that none had succeeded. From this, Deaton could see that the Dread Doctors' experiments had gone far deeper than he realized, and were far more horrendous.
Further down the room, they spotted a small operating table where there was a skeleton of a small child, barely a year old or so. Next to it was a jar that contained something. Deaton took it and held it up to the light.
"Is that a claw?" his companion squeaked.
"No, it's a tooth. I think I found what I'm looking for."
"What is that?"
"An answer," Deaton said, starting to feel anxiety building up inside him. "We should leave here. We should leave now."
But, as his friend turned to do just that, a bullet went and found its way right into his chest and he collapsed onto the floor in a dead heap. Quickly, Deaton brought out his metal nightstick to get ready and defend himself.
"Easy Doctor, I know you have skills but I'm pretty sure I can shoot faster than you could hit."
Stepping into the light, carrying an automatic rifle, was a face he had only seen a few times but hadn't seen for roughly 16 years.
"You," he mumbled.
She smiled. "Hello, it's Alan, right? We never got to meet in person but I believe we have a mutual young acquaintance in common, one that likes probing into other people's business." That made him narrow his eyes at her. "You do know who I am, do you?"
"I know what you're called. The Desert Wolf. And, I know your name…Corrine."
That made her break into a smile.
Scott was running out through the trees as fast as he could, his eyes and ears peeled out for any sign. He ran deep into the woods, trying to find them, he had to. Yet, there was nothing in the woods to be seen or heard. No trace of Hayden, or Liam. Scott soon found himself on his familiar spot that outlooked down towards the town. He looked off at be beautiful view with a pained look on his face.
After Scott's asthma attack ran its course, he shot up to his feet when he quickly detected a heavy scent of blood flooding the air. He ran down the halls around and gasped as he caught the sight of Satomi pinned up to the wall by a small blade stuck through her shoulder. He quickly went up to her and yanked it out. Helping her move down the halls to the locker room. Once there, they found the place a mess with the jammers thrown callously to the floor. Scott heard groaning and quickly spotted Brett and Lori sitting up on the floor with pained looks on their faces. He then took a look around and saw that not only was Hayden missing, but Liam too.
"They took them."
That was what all Brett said when Satomi asked the siblings what had happened.
Scott started to stressfully yank at the back of his hair. Suddenly he started remembering everything his friends said about this plan. He heard Stiles doubts of keeping the Dread Doctors from getting into the school and his worries about everyone else when they did, Kira asking if the plan even worked then would they just keep hiding Hayden every night and Liam yelling at him about using Hayden as bait and then asking Scott to promise that he would do what he could to save her. He had tried to counter each one of them but they all had been right. The Dread Doctors had come into the school and gotten to Hayden with barely any trouble at all. Everyone had gotten hurt and Liam was gone too. He hadn't even been there to even try to catch one of them.
A buck load of emotion began rushing at him all at once and Scott fell to his knees. Liam had put his faith in him, was counting on him and he failed him. He then went and let out a hard howl for his lost beta.
Malia was searching the woods too. It felt like she had been suffering under the grip of that claw trap for hours when she felt some slaps to her cheeks and began to hear her dad's voice, cracking in grief and worry. She then came out of it to see her dad's fearful face staring down at her. When she woke up, he quickly moved hug her in relief. She then saw that her leg was fine and realized that she had been hallucinating the whole thing. She quickly shook herself out of it and she and her dad went to try to find the others when they found Lydia on the floor. It seemed that she had been having her own hallucinating episode. Soon after, they learned that the doctors had taken not only Hayden, but Liam too. Lydia and her father had offered to stay behind to try and help Satomi and her pack while she and Scott went off to try and find Liam. Scott had quickly taken off for the woods and Malia went right in after him, following him for a while before he told them to split up. She couldn't find anything that told her that Liam or Hayden had been anywhere around this way though. Then, she suddenly heard Scott's howl and ran for it. She then came upon Scott, kneeling down and breathing hard.
"There's no scent, no tracks…no way to find them."
"But, Liam can howl back, right?" she asked. Liam had to have heard that. She was sure that Scott and Theo had heard the howl just now and known it came from Scott so Liam must've too.
He let his eyes fall back on the lights of the town. "Only if he heard me."
When Melissa had found the body in her dining room, she quickly went and called for the Sheriff to come over. She knew that the kids were all off with keeping Hayden safe so the Sheriff was the only one left who she could go to with this.
Noah got to the McCall house and saw that Melissa was standing outside the door, waiting for him. "Hey, I can't reach Scott and Stiles isn't picking up either," he said about to make his way into the house but Melissa stepped in his way. "I thought you said you uh, you had a situation?"
"Yes, but complicated," she said, completely anxious and tense. "If you come in, I need you to leave your badge at the door."
"Uh, literally or figuratively," he tried to joke.
"Both would be preferable," she said, not cracking a smile or relaxing a bit.
Noah's grin quickly flattened. It was clear that she was serious and could only guess something was really wrong.. "Melissa, uh, I've had to set my badge aside a few too many times in the last couple of weeks. Even a couple of times today."
"Well, you may need to do it a few more considering what our kids get into during their free time. So, do you want to come in or not?"
It was clear that she wasn't going to proceed unless he did what she asked so he went and took his badge off and pocketed it. With that, she fully opened the door and showed him in. Quickly, he spotted the body laid out on the table just ahead. One of a young girl with needle like claws on her fingers and a samurai sword stuck in her chest.
"Has anybody seen Kira tonight?" he asked as he began circling the table, his eyes locked on the sword.
"You don't think she did this, do you? Couldn't this have something to do with Scott? Some kind of message being sent?"
Noah gave Melissa a look. From the sound of it, she didn't even believe what she was saying. They both knew who had done this. He looked away from her and Melissa let herself turn away to avoid staring more at the body.
Knowing what he had to do, Noah went for his radio. "Dispatch, this is Sheriff Stilinski. I got a 1-8-7 at 821 Williamson Road. Notify Beacon Hills Memorial."
As soon as his message was done, he was given a hard slap to the face from Melissa. She looked at him with a pissed off gleam in her eye. The man had promised her that he would leave his badge at the door and he went right on ahead and pulled it back out right in front of her not even a minute later.
Noah just let himself reel back from that and moved to stare, calmly, back at her. He would let her have that because he understood where she was coming from but he had to make her understand where he was coming form, so he started speaking calmly back to her. "There's a dead girl in your kitchen with a sword sticking out of her chest. What did you think I was going to do?"
"You know it wasn't Kira's fault."
Not her fault? At that, Noah lost his cool and was through trying to be calm. "This is murder!" he spat out, pointing at the girl's corpse. "This kid, this child, has a family. What, am I supposed to just cover that up?! This is a crime and it's my responsibility to handle that, within the parameters of the law."
Melissa knew that whatever the truth was of what happened here, it was far from simple. Especially considering that the child he was trying to throw at her, had claws on her fingers that were almost as long as their forearms. "What about our kids? They constantly deal with things outside the law."
His jaw hardened a bit but he remained resolute. "But not above the law."
"It's not that simple," she argued. "You know that."
The sounds of sirens could soon be heard and the Sheriff moved to stick his badge back on. He gave her one last look before he moved to go outside to explain everything and show them in. Melissa watched after him for a moment before she moved to her purse and pulled out her phone.
Stiles blinked as he tried to push down the pain from what had happened. He looked over and saw that Theo had a bloody gash on the side of his head and was staring at him. Stiles then started wiping at his face trying to clean the blood that still was splattered there. It was Theo's blood so he was eager to try and not have it on him.
"You alright?" Theo asked him.
Stiles didn't answer. He turned and looked around to see that there were small pockets of fire spread about as some weeds and stray pieces of trash were still burning about.
"Did you get a look at them?" he gasped out at him.
Theo shook his head. "No. All I saw was a bright flash before everything went dark." He then moved to wipe some blood dripping down to his cheek. "What about you? See anything?"
Stiles let his mind go back to what had happened. The smell of burning smoke, his face getting splattered with blood, his jeep flipping with him in it. And…after that everything seemed like a blur. "No," he muttered, giving his head a shake.
Stiles then dived down to the floor and began reaching into the capsized jeep for the monitor. As he pulled it out, his face dropped when he saw that it had been smashed. He then ran into the clinic, and quickly caught the odor of burnt ash and smoke drifting through the air. On the floor, there were dark ashen footprints and they led right to the table where Josh's body had been taken off from.
'Who or what did this?' Stiles thought to himself.
Theo had come in after him. His own senses took note of the room and he more than ever wanted to wring the Surgeon for not giving him any clue or warning about who or what was taking the bodies.
"I already told you, the body is gone," he said.
"Yes, I can see that. Thank you," Stiles slurred out as he directed his eyes off to the shelf. He then stomped over to it and let off a sigh of relief when he saw that his phone was still there, and looked untouched.
"What are you doing?" Theo asked.
Stiles decided to ignore him as he checked and saw that his phone was still recording what was happening. He quickly started to roll back the footage to get back to the time of the break-in. He had to know who did this. They were able to flip his jeep and leave a trail of fire in their wake. Stiles got to the right time and began to play the footage. Theo moved to watch it over his shoulder and their eyes widened as they saw a bright, red orange colored blur come in and cover the screen. It stayed there for a moment before it moved away and as the picture dimmed, they saw that the body was gone from the table.
Theo was aggravated. "Well, that was a help," he huffed as he started to pace a bit.
Again, Stiles ignored him. He rewound and played the footage again but paused it when the blur came in. He squinted his eyes as he thought he could make out what looked like an outline in the center. A bright outline, of a man. His mind then flashed to after the jeep had been flipped. Something was coming back to him. A bright fiery blur, and two eyes glowing brightly down at him and feeling a rush of scorching heat coming at him before everything went dark.
It had to be the body snatcher. But who was it? And what was it? It couldn't be another kitsune. The eyes seemed different than Kira's and even when her aura flared, and at her worst she didn't make things burn around her. Shock definitely, but not burn. And whoever it was that was doing this, why were they doing it?
"So, what now?" Theo asked, breaking up Stiles' thoughts.
He pocketed his phone and stressfully rubbed at his face. "C'mon," he grunted before he stomped out of the clinic.
Stiles limbered himself up a bit before he stood at the side of his flipped jeep with Theo three feet from him.
"Okay, lift on the count of three" Stiles grunted out as he bent down to get a grip.
"Ugh, why are we doing this?" Theo asked still standing firm. "Why not just call a tow and let them handle it?"
"Because I don't want to have to spend an hour trying to explain why my car was flipped upside down in an empty lot." 'Not to mention risk the garage trying to hustle me again,' he thought bitterly as he remembered the last time his jeep was left to a mechanic. "Now shut up and help me lift," Stiles grunted out at him.
"Okay, okay," Theo surrendered, as he moved to bend down and get a good grip on the jeep's bottom.
"And be careful." His jeep had been through more than enough. "Alright, one, two, three."
At three, both of them went to lift and the jeep creaked as it slowly began to rise up from the ground. The two werewolves grunted before the jeep's metal body creaked when it started to slowly lift up off the ground. As it rose up higher it started groaning under the strain. Stiles' blue eyes and Theo's gold eyes were in full glow as they got it up to their kneecaps. Theo groaned along with the car, even stressfully revealing his fangs but Stiles was calm as he tried to carefully set his jeep right. When the car was lifted high enough, they then began to tip it until it's two left wheels hit the ground and then pushed until the jeep got upright with a slightly hard thump.
As soon as the wheels were firmly on the ground, Theo let his back lean onto the jeep and slide down to the floor in a tired huff. As for Stiles, he let his eyes scan the jeep to see how much damage had been done. He saw that there were a few dents and small scratchers scattered all around. Stiles let his forehead fall and rest against the back door window. His jeep was coming more and more apart at the seams. Like everything else was around here. He let out a heated sigh as heat rose up in his forehead. He had just spent the night, barely tolerating being in the same air space with Theo for hours, and it had gotten them nowhere. And he couldn't reach Scott, Malia or any of the others at the school to let them know what happened or even check up on how things were going with them. As his thoughts went to them a pit seemed to form in his stomach. He couldn't help but feel that they weren't fairing any better…or were worse than him right now. His breathing intensified as the stress of the night and everything else was rushing at him. A vicious heat and pounding started rising up in his head. Stiles crunched his face as he pushed his head harder into the glass and moved his hand to apply pressure to his temple. It rose so high that he went and even put some wolf strength behind it and his claws started coming out and scratching into his scalp. Stiles hissed in pain and backed away to look at the tips of claws in his right hand stained with some blood. He sighed but then gasped when his eyes rose back up to the window.
Theo had heard the gasp and shot up to his feet to see Stiles moving back a few steps, staring out in shock. "What is it?"
Stiles blinked over at Theo's direction before he looked back at the glass. He saw nothing there but his reflection staring back. "Nothing," he said, clearing his throat. "Just a headache."
He then started to pace as he tried to settle himself and gather his thoughts. After a few seconds, his breathing began to ease and the heat and pounding in his head slowly settled down. As he calmed down, Stiles moved and looked back at the window to stare at his still normal reflection. He then wiped some sweat, and blood, from the side of his head. What he had just saw, in the window, it couldn't be. Could it?
Hearing the uptick in his heart, and smelling a small dose of fear and anxiety coming off him, Theo knew that Stiles had lied to him. But, he couldn't see about what. He watched Stiles as he started to pace off a bit, seeming to try and calm and settle himself down. Something was clearly heavy on his mind. Something intense. He then moved to pull out his phone and look at the photo of the strange spiral scratches he found. The one that matched what Stiles had been scratching in his jeep. He bet whatever seemed up with him had something to do with this symbol.
"So…what now?" he sighed after he felt was long enough.
Stiles shook his head to try and shake himself back into focus. "No, he won't call. He can't, not with those jammers they have set up to try and protect Hayden. We've gotta get to the school, right now."
Theo blinked. The school, where not only were Scott and his pack where but Satomi and her pack. He couldn't risk that. Earlier today, Scott had called him to go over what he and his friends planned to do with Satomi's pack. During that he mentioned to Theo about Stiles telling him that Satomi and her betas had felt something when Wilson Grant was killed. Add in the fact that Courtney was discovered and Satomi told Stiles that she sensed she was involved. Theo had heard many things about different kinds of bonds had in werewolf packs and Wilson had been that pack's Second. He heard some things about Seconds and their impact on pack members, things which seemed to hold real weight considering what happened when Courtney's cover was blown. Yet she was indirectly responsible. As the one that actually made the death blow, he had to avoid Satomi and any member of her pack, at least until he could finish what he had to do. But, how was he supposed to get out of heading there without arousing even more suspicion from Stiles?
Stiles threw himself into his jeep and went for his keys. He sent out a silent prayer and his jeep squeaked out a bit before softly coming to life after three tries.
"Yes," he sighed out in relief.
The police radio in the jeep fired up and Stiles recognized his dad's voice speaking. His eyes widened when he heard code was spoken, and the address.
Seeing Stiles' reaction, Theo quickly asked, "What's a 1-8-7?"
"Homicide," he answered. Before anything else could be done or said, Stiles felt his phone vibrate on him and he pulled it out to see that it was Scott's mom. Knowing that it had something to do with what he just heard, he quickly answered her call. "Melissa?" he quickly answered.
Theo stared at Stiles as his eyes started to widen as he listened to Scott's mom start to talk to him. "What's going on?" he asked after a moment.
It wasn't Stiles who answered him then. But the echo of a howl.
"Scott," they both muttered together as they stared off.
Stiles kept staring off for a moment before blinking and going back to listen to Scott's mom and his eyes soon widened.
Theo let a small smirk loose behind his back. It seems as if things might still play out well for him yet.
Thankfully, it hadn't been a busy night tonight so Virgil's boss wasn't asking him to pull an extended late night shift. Currently, the garage was empty of vehicles needing repairs or maintenance and there had been no road or car accidents reported in that night so the boss was closing up. Unluckily, for Virgil at least, his boss told him to stay and close up the but let his fellow night mechanic before he too left. So now, Virgil was handling it all by himself. As he did, Virgil couldn't help but think he saw some kind of spiteful twinkle in his boss' eye as he left him there.
It took him a little over half an hour before Virgil took care of everything on the closing checklist before he started getting ready to go himself. As he opened his locker, his eyes flew to his pouch where he kept his grandmother's deck. He stared at it for a few ticks before he shrugged.
"What the hell?" he sighed.
Virgil decided it was time for a reading. A special kind that his grandmother showed it to him once. Drastic perhaps, and maybe a little paranoid, but not for the first time he felt that his boss had an axe to grind with him. A personal one. He went out to the halls and yanked out a small self portrait of his boss that was hanging by his office. He then took his deck and moved to kneel in the center of the locker room. He placed his boss' picture flat and then started shuffling the deck. He then moved and placed a card directly below it, face down. He then put one directly in front of him.
"Soul cards," he mumbled to himself.
The cards that identify who people are at their core.
Then went and drew two more cards and put them directly below his boss' soul card, both face down as well. Then drew two more cards and put them above his. The layout was set.
"Alright, here goes." He then moved to flip his boss' soul card first. "Four of Pentacles. Big surprise," he sarcastically muttered, rolling his eyes. "Stubborn, greedy and an obsessive bastard. Yeah, that's him alright."
Virgil then moved to flip his soul card. He sighed as it came up. The Knight of Pentacles. Reversed.
"Sorry gran," he muttered to himself. He dwelled on it for a moment before moving on.
The two cards below his boss' soul card were what he was truly driven to see. The one to the left would tell him what his boss felt towards him and the one to the right would tell him where it could potentially lead him. Same as the two cards above Virgil's own soul card for him but he had no interest in flipping them. As silly and kind of crazy a part of him still kind of thought when it came to his grandma and her cards, what really did his life have left but craziness?
He then shook his head and flipped the left card to reveal what it was. "The Five of Swords," he muttered.
He gasped because as soon as he finished reading the card's name aloud, he suddenly heard what sounded like an echo of a woman screaming as well as the bang from a gun. And saw them, for a split second. It was so sudden and unexpected that he dropped the cards and quickly rose up to his feet, slightly panting but relaxed as there was nothing wrong around him. He then shook his head and started gathering the cards up without another thought. He was starting to scare and freak himself out. It was a long night, he was tired, he should just go home.
He left from the garage's front door before locking it and headed off for his parked bike. The area was so empty and silent that every step he took on the concrete was louder than usual. The rustling of the trees against the wind from the woods across the street also seemed louder and seemed to make Virgil uncomfortable so he sped his pace. He hopped right onto his bike and quickly threw his helmet on. But before he could start his engine, he froze when he heard a distant but clear howl in the air. It sounded like a…wolf. He shook his head and started his engine before he revved it on up and sped on down the road to get out of there.
Melissa was standing out on her porch, fuming at everything that had happened. She still couldn't believe that Noah had gone on and just called for Kira's arrest the way he did. They knew what was happening around here was far from simple. Scott was going to be so devastated when he found out, as well as the rest of their friends, on top of everything else they were dealing with right now. Before she could keep dwelling on it, a pair of headlights were shining on her. She lifted her gaze to see a familiar jeep pulling into the driveway, and a familiar teen climbing out of it.
"Stiles," she sighed out as she headed for him. "Thank you for coming so fast." She froze when she took in his appearance. There was still a bit of dried blood on him and some parts of his shirt had tears in it. She also looked over to see that Stiles' jeep had dents spread "What happened?"
"Things got a little…complicated at the clinic."
Stiles then quickly gave a short recap of what had happened.
"Where's Theo?" she asked him.
He rolled his eyes. "Said that he had to go home and check with his parents. Where's my dad?" he quickly asked.
She shook her head. "He left almost ten minutes ago. He didn't want to wait. And he had the body taken away."
Stiles didn't need his super senses to see that Scott's mom was upset with his dad. Melissa quickly took him inside and brought him to look at where the body had been found. He quickly found traces of mercury mixed with blood. He also noticed that there were some things knocked over here and there and saw that there were some deep claw marks on a few places in the floor and walls.
"Must've been some fight," he mumbled before he went to run his fingers over one he saw on a wall in the living room.
Suddenly, Stiles' eyes widened when he saw the image of a crazed girl with a vicious look on her face dive for Kira. She had her sword out and jumped away just a moment before she swiped with her claws and hit the wall instead. The chimera then turned to try and go for Kira again but she was charging at her as well.
He then gasped as he felt himself brought out of it and started stumbling back two or three steps. "Yeah, it sure was," he choked out as he quickly nodded.
"Stiles?"
"I…I saw it." He just had tapped into a memory scar. Left behind by this chimera's intense rage, bloodlust and…desperation? Not strong enough to see the whole event, but strong enough to leave something for him to see.
"You saw it? What do you mean saw it?"
"I mean I saw what happened, well just a glimpse. A moment before and after that was left there. Kira was here and she had her sword out, but she jumped out of the way as that chimera tried to claw her face off. Then they went for each other."
"So, you're saying that Kira definitely had no choice, right?" she asked, almost eagerly.
Stiles sighed. "I'm saying that if this chimera is the one Satomi told me about, then she didn't come here hoping to have a friendly chat with you or Scott. Kira must've came by and found her lying in wait here and…she did what she felt she had to do," he said calmly, after taking a deep breath.
Melissa nodded and moved her hand to stressfully hold up her forehead. "Well, you should tell that to your father."
"It's been a long day for him," Stiles said, quickly moving to defend his father. After all, he knew that he was still reeling from when he told him about Josh and what they did with his body. "For all of us."
She let both her gaze and head drop a bit. "I know," she said, at the floor.
Melissa saw Stiles seemed to be getting quite upset and she moved up to him and pulled him into a hard hug. One that he found himself returning in full barely a second in. Neither were sure how long they had hugged, a moment or an hour, but it still felt too soon when they separated. Melissa took note of how there was still some dried blood and dirt on him and she moved to get a damp paper towel and help clean him up.
Stiles let her do it for a moment before he cleared his throat. "Uh okay, call Scott and tell him what happened. I'll head to the station and try do what I can to help Kira," he told her.
She nodded. "Thank you, Stiles."
He then narrowed his eyes as a thought came to him. "And, I hate to ask this now, but I'm wondering if there's something you could do to help me, maybe when you get the chance."
"Uh, yeah, anything," she nodded as she looked at him curiously.
Jordan came to suddenly and found himself sitting in his bathroom, underneath a running shower, apparently just staring off into space. He blinked as he tried to remember how he had got there. The last thing he remembered…he had been in his car outside of the school, waiting and keeping watch for the Dread Doctors. How did he get back home? He stood up to turn the shower off, oblivious to the small traces of black soot on random parts of his body. He stepped out and grabbed for his towel as he looked at the small clock he had hanging on his wall to see that it was quite late. He realized that he had to call Lydia.
But before he could, his phone started ringing. Thinking it was Lydia, he moved over for it but saw that it was Clark instead. He answered it and was quickly bombarded with Clark's bossy tone.
"Where the hell are you?" she asked.
"Home. It's 4:00 in the morning," he said, in a tone that suggested that it should be obvious.
"Stilinski's calling everyone in. There's another body."
Jordan's eyes widened. If Stilinski was doing that there could only be one reason behind it. "You mean another murder." 'Another chimera,' he added, mentally.
The forest was silent and lightly misty as Liam trekked blindly through it. He had no idea where he was going as he made his way through the trees. He let his eyes go up to the night sky where a bright full moon was shining overhead. To Liam it seemed brighter, and bigger than usual. His ears twitched when he heard some growling echoing through the trees. He moved, carefully, for where it was coming from and came upon a clearing that had quite a sight.
Two wolves, one black and the other a deep brown, were looking at each other, and they seemed kind of stand-offish. The black wolf's fur was shaggy, and its eyes shown bright red as it was lowly growling at the smaller brown wolf. This wolf had blue eyes and its hair was a bit more spiked in a few places. Yet, Liam could see that while it wasn't as big as the other one, the claws and fangs on this wolf were bigger and sharper than the ones on the black one, making it somewhat scarier. They both were glaring and lowly growling as they looked at one another. Liam was thankful he wasn't between them as it seemed that they were just one hair away from going at each other. His eyes then looked off to the side to see the Nemeton and they widened when they saw what was standing on it. It was the wolf he had dreamed of before. The one that seemed to have been made by sowing parts of other wolves together and it was staring at the two other wolves with a hungry look in its golden eyes. Eyes that then moved to stare at him.
The next moment, Liam gasped and found that he was now lying on the floor. He was feeling groggy and he opened his eyes to see that everything around him was blurry. He blinked through his daze and moved tried to rub at his eyes but found that his wrists were restrained. He shook at his head and blinked his eyes harder until his sight was clear enough to see that there were some kind of manacles binding his wrists. He then let himself remember everything that had happened. He, his friends and Satomi's pack had tried to protect Hayden but couldn't stop them from taking her and him with them. He suddenly sobered up and tried to search for Hayden and quickly spotted an operating table just up ahead, at the opposite side of the room. Liam could make out a body restrained onto it with two of the Dread Doctors nearby. He lifted himself slightly, afraid what they were doing to Hayden and tried to scream for her but found that he couldn't. He felt too weak. In fact, the adrenaline he had just gotten from this moment of fear ran its course and he felt himself shrinking back to the ground. He felt so helpless there, only able to watch what they were about to do to Hayden.
But then, there was a slam as a body was dropped down right next to him. It was Hayden. The third Dread Doctor that was carrying her then stomped off to join the others at the operating table, leaving the two teens there. Liam moved to pull himself closer to her.
"Hayden, you okay?" he whispered desperately to her.
As he pulled himself to her, he noticed that her whole body was covered in sweat and there was a pained look on her face as she was breathing hard and quick.
"It hurts," she hissed out.
They then looked down to see that there was a deep cut at her side. There was dried blood all around it, dried black blood. Hayden moved to touch it and she gasped out as a fresh wave on intense pain hit her.
Liam reached out to her. "Give me your hand." Hayden moved to put her hand over to him and Liam quickly got a firm grip on it. "There's more to being a werewolf than having teeth and claws. We can also take away the pain. I've seen Scott do it once. I've never done it before but I can try. Stiles told me all about how it works."
"Okay," she said, with a pained nod.
Liam began to focus. Focus on wanting to take the pain that Hayden was feeling and draw it away from her and into himself. Stiles told him that he would begin to feel a sting coming up from his fingers that became a tight pain when it went up his hand but it would only be for a moment. His hold on her hand tightened but Liam couldn't feel any difference at all. No stings or sharp pains that told him he was taking anything from Hayden. After a moment he huffed and let her hand go.
"I'm sorry," he muttered.
Why hadn't it worked? Was it because he was too weak right now to even sit up?
"It's okay," she cried out to him. "Why are they doing this to us?"
"I don't know."
Liam then let his head roll off and he began to stare off at the ceiling. He started breathing harder as he felt that he had just run a marathon. What were they doing to them? But before he could wonder about that, another quick thought came to him. If Hayden was here with him, then who was on the table?
The Pathologist had come back from dumping Hayden's body down to start preparing the syringe device while the Geneticist working at a vector chemistry station nearby. The Surgeon moved to be right over the face of their latest subject. A 19 year old boy named Zach, that was completely restrained, but the opposite way. The front of his body was against the table with his back facing outward. His face turned to the right and there was a strap of leather tied at the back of his neck to keep him from moving. Yet, his eyes were wide open and were staring out with great fear. They widened when he made out the Surgeon standing over him.
The Surgeon moved his gloved hand over his back. "Zach, your condition worsens," he told down to the boy in his distorted voice. He then reached for his belt and removed the tiny vial that had the blood he collected from the school. He held it up to look at it. "Yet, may be treatable."
He then handed it to the Geneticist who poured it into a bigger vial and then inserted it at the final spot of the chemistry set before moving to begin the experiment. Opening the first valve red drops from an upside flask started flowing into a beaker filled with a yellow solution, blending together under a hot flame. The contents of the beaker quickly began turning orange before they started flowing up into tubes for another beaker that had a flask with a green solution and turning it black before the new solution started flowing down another tube. This process kept going for three more compounds until, eventually, it all ended up in a final vial where the blood waiting. Instantly the vial became filled to the top, making the final result a metallic gray solution. The Geneticist then took the final vial and handed it to the Pathologist who then loaded it into the syringe device he had ready. After it snapped in place, he then handed it over to the Surgeon and he moved for Zach. He then moved to slowly stick the needle of it into the boy's back and pull on the pump trigger. Zach let out a faint whimper and swiftly shut his eyes as he felt pain burning all through him. Sweat was oozing from his pores and he then opened his eyes to reveal a faint golden glow passing through them before he fell unconscious.
Noah had gone with the body to the hospital where he made sure that it was placed in the morgue. The coroner informed him that he would start working right away for an identification though was quite puzzled with the appearance of the long claws on the girl's fingers. He pulled the man aside and asked that he not spread that fact around until they were sure what it was they were dealing with. Well, it was a form of asking, leaning towards threat. The coroner seemed to get the message and quickly promised that he wouldn't say anything. He then ordered that there be a guard posted near the morgue around the clock. He didn't want to take the chance that this body was taken away like the others.
At that, he wondered how Stiles was doing. If he knew his son as well as he thought, then he knew that Stiles would've heard him calling in dispatch from the radio in his jeep. He better prepare for the impending confrontation he was sure to have about this. But, before he could leave the hospital, he got a call from Deputy Clark. She had found Kira wandering around Route 115 and had brought her in. When he got to the station, he found Clark at her desk, with Kira's sword out in front of her, staring off at Kira who was handcuffed to the bench nearby.
"Is it really necessary for this girl to be cuffed here? If she was actually involved then it was self-defense."
"That correct Sheriff." Everyone turned to see that Mr. Yukimura was stepping in the room with his wife behind him.
"Dad, don't say anything," said Kira as her mother moved over for her.
Her dad didn't listen and kept his gaze on the Sheriff. "The sword is mine," he told him.
"Really?"
"No," Kira spoke out. "It's mine."
Her dad kept talking like she had said nothing. "I was attacked in my home. I grabbed a replica sword from my collection and defended myself."
Noah moved to fold his arms and firmly face the man. He knew what Mr. Yukimura was trying to do and he couldn't have it. Not now. "And how exactly did the body end up at the McCall's house?"
"Apparently she wasn't quite dead," Noshiko threw in.
"Sheriff, I have a call to my lawyer. If you need to take me into custody, I'm happy to surrender myself."
Noah moved over to him and stared the man down. "Is that really what you're going to go with? This is your story?"
"Are you prepared to tell a different one?" Noshiko said, almost threateningly.
He moved to stare directly at her for a moment before some noise made them look over to see Stiles was making his way for the room. He looked a bit flushed but determined as he locked eyes with his dad.
A few moments later, Stiles and his dad along with Kira and her parents were in the Sheriff's office listening to what Stiles learned about the attack at the McCall home.
"So, I really did this?" Kira said after he was done. "I killed her."
"Kira," Noshiko said sternly. "You didn't do this. The fox in you must've taken control, to protect both itself and you."
Stiles nodded. "Your mom's right. Kira."
"Wait," his dad cut in. "You're telling me that you saw this girl attacking Kira by a touching a scratch in the wall?" he asked skeptically.
"It's more complicated than that dad. Look the point is, I felt how much that chimera was trying to kill Kira. I saw and felt how much she wanted to."
"A young girl is still dead Stiles."
"Dad, this isn't some young girl. It's a chimera. And if she's who I think it is then she has already killed at least one person already."
"Yeah, well unfortunately I can't just let Kira go because my son had a…vision," he snapped.
"Dad-" Stiles started.
"No, but her father already gave a statement about what happened," Mr. Yukimura cut in, calmly staring at the Sheriff.
There was then a knock on the door and everyone looked to see that it was Clark, and Parrish was with her.
"Everything ok Sheriff?" Parrish asked as he opened the door.
Noah stared at them for a moment before looking over at Kira for a second and then turned his gaze to his son, who was staring blankly at him. He sighed to himself before looking back over to his deputies. "It's fine. Please take Kira and my son to wait outside. Mr. Yukimura has agreed to make an official confession."
Stiles and Kira were taken out to the bench by Clark while Parrish went off to grab the witness statements for Kira's parents to fill out. They moved to sit there while Clark watched them from her desk. After a while, Stiles let his gaze go out towards the windows and saw that the skies were starting to brighten a bit. The sun was starting to come up. His nose then crinkled as he felt a growing bit of guilt well up and looked over at Kira who was tensely watching their parents.
"Don't blame yourself," Stiles said, making her look away.
"I'm not," she said, shaking her head. That made Stiles raise an eyebrow at her. She sighed. Of course, he knew she was lying. "Right. Sorry."
"It's okay. I saw what happened. Look, there's still some things about the whole fox thing that I still don't get. But, if this is the same girl that helped kill Satomi's Second Wilson, then you could've been the body Scott's mom found last night instead. Or Scott could've come home and found her," he said, getting a little angry at the thought. But he shook himself out of it. "You don't have to feel guilty."
"I can't help it," Kira sighed out.
"Yeah, I know what you mean," he said, looking over at his father through the glass.
She then got up when her mother stepped out of the office. Kira went over to go and give her mother a hug while Stiles stayed seated and watched them. He understood what Kira was feeling all too well. He knew what it was like to be driven to this because of a chimera trying to kill them and those around or important to them. And he was also starting to get a little scared. If his dad was being like this with Kira, then, what would happen if he were to learn about what happened with him and Donovan? He then sniffed the air and looked over at the door in time to see Scott coming in.
Scott and Stiles quickly filled the other in on everything that had happened that night. Needless to say, they both felt emotionally stretched by the end of all of it. Stiles went off to call Malia while Scott went off to talk with Kira.
"You don't think that he'll really arrest your dad, do you?" asked Scott, looking towards the Sheriff's office.
Kira shook her head morosely. "He has to. My dad basically confessed."
"And, you don't remember anything?"
"Nothing. It was like sleepwalking. Suddenly, I'm just standing out in the middle of the road."
To Scott, it sounded like whatever happened to Kira at the station and the club happened to her at his house.
"Okay, we'll figure it out."
"What about Liam and Hayden?"
"We're all meeting at my place. We'll come up with something." His mood then fell more. "I don't want to leave you, but, I've got to find them."
Kira nodded. "I know."
"I wouldn't leave," he quickly said.
But Kira shook her head. She understood. Liam and Hayden were in trouble and they needed Scott and the others right now more than she did. Scott didn't have to try so hard to explain it to her. "It's okay. My mom's taking me home anyway. We have to talk to a lawyer. There's nothing anyone can do right now. You should go."
"Yeah, right," he mumbled.
Yet before he could begin to leave, he felt Kira hand go for his, stopping him.
"Scott, you don't think that I really wanted to kill her, do you?"
Scott stared at her for a moment and he shook his head. "No, of course not."
Scott moved to give Kira a soft kiss on her forehead before he turned to head on out. Yet, he barely got a step when he saw that Stiles was standing in the path, giving Scott a bit of a look and froze. They just stood there, staring right at each other. Scott knew what was wrong. Stiles had just heard him and Kira talking, and knew that he had just lied to her. For a moment, he thought Stiles would do or say something, especially with Kira still watching them, but he just turned and walked away. Scott stared after him for a moment before he moved to leave too, throwing one last look Kira's way.
From his office, the Sheriff watched them leave too.
A/N: I'm sorry for the late update but I have a lot of new ideas and changes to throw around starting around this 'episode'. Already, some of them had been thrown into this chapter. I can't wait to hear what you guys think of them and will think of what is still to come.
