𝕀𝕟𝕤𝕒𝕥𝕚𝕒𝕓𝕝𝕖 || 𝕊𝕥𝕚𝕝𝕖𝕤/𝕍𝕠𝕚𝕕 𝕩 ℝ𝕖𝕒𝕕𝕖𝕣

Chapter 21

"Don't," he said, already knowing what I was going to do.

I listened.

"Move closer," Void said, his voice hoarse.

I complied.

I moved until we were a centimetre apart, until his laboured breathing caressed my lips.

"Kiss me," he breathed.

I hesitated, unsure of what to do. I knew it was wrong. I knew I shouldn't be doing this, but I wanted to. I wanted to so much I could barely breathe. I wanted to kiss him, to get a reprieve from this constant need. I wanted to be able to inhale fresh air without feeling this constant pull, this constant reminder of the one thing I desired more than anything else but couldn't have. I wanted to kiss him.

I leant forward to get rid of the rest of the space between us, cursing myself all the while, when a sudden image entered my mind.

Stiles.

It wasn't a specific memory of him, it was just him, and I was reminded of just how horrible what I was about to do was. I couldn't kiss Void. Stiles was suffering, trapped inside his own body and unable to do anything, and I was not going to kiss Void. I would not.

I pulled back, and Void growled, his eyes blazing. I ignored him and hastily put the duct tape back on his face. I was disgusted with myself and what I had nearly done.

"Y/n? What are you doing so close to him?"

I jumped at the sound of Melissa's voice and spun around guiltily. I swallowed thickly and ignored the deathly glare Void was sending me.

"Nothing," I said. "I'm doing nothing."

I walked away from Void even though it pained some part of me to do so and leant against the wall once more, looking at the ground. I wouldn't give in. I couldn't.

. . .

Peter Hale stared down at Void, who, unsurprisingly, was looking at me.

When I'd first heard that Peter Hale was going to arrive at the house to figure out what to do with Void, I wanted to bolt. After every story, every evil act I'd heard Peter Hale commit, I was not ready to be in the same room as him.

Yet here we were.

"He doesn't look like he could survive a slap across the face, much less the bite of a werewolf," Peter commented as he observed Void.

He stepped in front of him, and finally Void tore his gaze away from me and looked up at Peter Hale.

"You don't think it would work?" Scott asked.

"This is a war on the mind, not the body. There are better methods to win this battle," Peter answered.

I supressed the urge to roll my eyes. I never would have expected Peter Hale to be so dramatic.

"What methods?" I asked, careful to keep my tone neutral. Just because I thought Peter was dramatic did not mean I wasn't afraid of him.

In answer to my question, Peter grabbed Scott's hand and unleashed his claws millimetres away from Void's face. He raised his eyebrows in surprise, and I looked away as I felt the familiar feeling of desire course through me.

"We're going to get into his head," Peter said.

After that, Peter took Lydia aside to have a private conversation. There were many animated hand movements and hushed whispers, making me wonder what they were talking about.

When they came back, Deaton asked, "so, do we have a plan?"

"Preferably one that doesn't involve harming or killing Stiles," I piped up, feeling a moral obligation to say it after everything I'd heard about Peter Hale.

The psychopathic murdering werewolf gave me a look before ignoring me.

"Scott is going to try and dig through pale and sickly evil Stiles' mind to unearth pale and sickly real Stiles, then guide him back from the depths of his own subconsciousness," Peter explained. "But he's not going to do it alone."

"What do you mean?" Scott asked.

Peter looked at Lydia.

"Somebody needs to go in with you."

Void lazily looked up at Lydia as if this all amused him and I could practically see him smirking through the duct tape covering his mouth.

His mouth.

I blocked out the thoughts before they could fully form, looking away from Void and feeling my cheeks heat up. God, what was wrong with me?

I took a glass of water and drank big gulps of it, hoping it would calm me down, when I spotted Void staring right at me. I suddenly found the ceiling very interesting.

"Scott, we're running out of time," Deaton said, and I blinked back in reality. I had missed half of the conversation, but it seemed that Lydia would accompany Scott into Stiles' mind.

I watched as Scott took a deep breath and his eyes turn red. He dug his claws into Void and Lydia's necks, and everything went silent.

We all waited for them to wake up from the strange trance they were in, the only sound in the room our inhales and exhales of breath. I was annoyed to find I could still feel the temptation towards Void even though he was deep in his own subconsciousness.

All of a sudden, I noticed a touch of red stain Lydia's pale face and realised, with no small amount of horror, that she had a nosebleed.

"She's bleeding!" I exclaimed. "Lydia's bleeding!"

Peter walked forward and kneels in front of Lydia, his expression one of complete calm, while I was completely freaking out.

"Lydia?" Peter asked. "Lydia, can you hear me?" There was no answer. "Lydia, you are stronger than this, okay? You need to concentrate, Lydia."

It didn't seem to be working, because Peter took a deep breath and shouted in his werewolf voice, "Lydia!"

I flinched at the sound, my fear for Peter Hale intensifying. Jeez, this man was scary.

We waited in silence for a while more, before suddenly, all three of them opened their eyes, gasping and blinking, and I had to restrain myself from going directly to Void.

"Did it work?" Scott gasped, still trying to catch his breath.

I wondered what happened, and what it felt like to be in someone else's mind. I wondered what my mind would be like.

"What happened?" Lydia asked. "Why didn't it work?"

"Because its not science, its supernatural. I did my part. Now give me the name," Peter said.

I frowned. What did he mean by that?

"What name?" Scott asked, voicing my thoughts. "What are you talking about?"

Peter promptly ignored Scott and dragged Lydia to a different room to have yet another private conversation with her. I narrowed my eyes in suspicion.

Void jerked upright, ripping the duct tape of his mouth, and falling on his knees on the ground. Everyone's eyes widened in shock and horror as we watched Void pull the start of a bandage out of his mouth.

Void kept pulling and pulling the bandage out of his mouth, but more just kept coming, until finally he pulled the end of it out, gasping for breath. There was a heap of bandage on the floor, and I stared at it aghast as black mist began to swirl around it.

It only became worse as a bandaged hand rose out of the ground. It clambered to get some sort of purchase on the ground, and once it did, it started heaving the rest of its body out of the pile of bandages.

Before I knew it, I was staring at a human shaped creature completely wrapped in bandages. It lunged at Scott and I jumped back, right into someone's arms.

I turned around and saw Void smirking at me, but before I could do anything, I felt a pain in my head and then everything went black.