Holding Out for a Hero ▸ Stiles Stilinski (2)

xiii. SWIMMING WITH THE LIZARD

"Stiles," Derek greeted.

"Derek," Stiles sighed, not really happy to see our own neighborhood Alpha.

Derek plucked a basketball off the ground. Why was there was a basketball at the pool? That's weird. "What did you see at the mechanics garage?"

Stiles glanced at me before shrugging. "Uh, several alarming EPA violations that I'm seriously considering reporting."

Erica let out what I'm guessing was supposed to be a laugh. Honestly, it sounded like a cat being choked to death but that was me. Derek grinned sadly and one of his fingernails shifted into a claw. He poked it into the basketball. The once bouncy, normal ball was now deflated in seconds.

"Holy God," Stiles let out. I sighed.

"Let's try that again," Derek announced. "What did you see?"

I groaned. He seriously dragged us all the way here to find out what Godzilla looked like? Couldn't he ask someone else? I have a life that I'd rather be living far away from Derek and Erica at the moment.

"Alright, alright," Stiles muttered. "The thing was...like a lizard, I guess. Its skin was dark; it had scales, like a ton of them. Is that enough?"

Derek just looked at us.

"Ugh, um alright, eyes. They were yellowish and uh, slitted. It has a lot of teeth. And a tail," Stiles added. "We good here?"

The entire time he described it, Erica and Derek began looking up. And the looks on their faces weren't really all that comforting. They looked terrified.

"What?" Stiles asked, thinking we weren't done here. "Wait, have you seen it? You have this look on your faces like you know exactly what we're talking about."

I heard a small clang from up above. I took one last look at Derek's expression before sighing. "It's right behind us, isn't it?"

Stiles and I turned around slowly, only to be met with the sight of the creatures. It was up on the indoor balcony, climbing up the metal fence thing that surrounded it. It let out a sort of shrill cry, just like it had the various other times I had seen it. Stiles and I stumbled back, landing next to Derek. As it roared, it hopped down from the balcony, landing on its hind legs. It fell to all fours and its eyes glanced around.

Derek bent down to its height, letting out a roar of his own. The creature whipped its tail towards us, ultimately knocking Erica into the wall and out cold. Derek turned around, shoving at Stiles's chest. We stumbled back a little more.

"Run!" Derek yelled.

Unfortunately for Mr. Alpha, while his back was turned, the creature took the opportunity to lash at Derek's neck with his tail. Derek spun around, allowing me to see a razor thin gash across the back of his neck.

"Derek, your neck," I cried out, eyes wide.

Derek reached a hand to his neck and began falling backwards. The paralysis was already taking affect. Whatever comes out of that things tail, I knew for certain it had to do with people losing feeling in their bodies. The paralysis was only temporary too. This means that whatever this thing was, it only needed an allotted amount of time to kill something.

"Shit," Stiles cursed lowly, rushing forward to stop Derek from collapsing to the ground.

He put Derek's arm around his neck and began running out of there as fast as he could. I looked around quickly for the creature before wrapping Derek's other arm around my neck. He was really heavy but Stiles and I were managing to get him down the length of the pool.