The bathroom light flickers above Scott as he stares at his reflection in the mirror. He leans in, studying his eyes. Closer and closer until he can see the tiny striations of color within the iris.
A glimmer of red ripples within the brown. Scott jerks back from the mirror and his phone rings. Shaking off the strange moment, Scott steps out of the bathroom and picks up his cell from the night table.
"Hey, Mom, what's up?"
The only reply is a subtle yet disturbing static. "Mom?"
"Scott..." Hearing the tremor in her voice, Scott presses the phone tighter to his ear. "Mom, what's wrong? Mom?"
"I'm sorry--he just came into the house. I tried to stop him. I'm sorry--"
"Where are you? Mom, where are you?"
"Outside. Look outside." Scott pulls the window blinds up. His mother, Melissa, stands in the parking lot, holding the phone to her ear. Deucalion stands next to her, clawed hand wrapped around the back of her neck like he was grabbing a dog by its scruff.
"Scott, can you hear me?"
"What are you doing? What do you want?"
"Isn't it obvious? You're an Alpha now, Scott."
"No, no I'm not. Derek could still be alive. He could be--"
"He's dead. You know he is. So now I'm coming for you. You and everyone you love. I'm coming for all of them."
Eyes glowing red, Deucalion rips his hand back, sending droplets of blood flying into the air as Melissa's knees buckle.
"Scott?", He spins to find Stiles in the doorway of the bathroom, a toothbrush in his mouth. Scott turns back to the view of the parking lot, but there's no one there. "You okay?" Stiles asks.
Scott nods, still focused on the window. A vibrating makes him jump. Stiles pulls out his cell phone.
A message from Lydia appears: Need to talk. Just you.
Stiles slowly glances up from the odd request, noticing Scott still at the window, still staring out.
-ᴅᴀɴɴʏ ᴀɴᴅ ᴇᴛʜᴀɴ's ʀᴏᴏᴍ-
Two pairs of bare feet slip across the bed spread, one accidentally kicking a backpack to the floor. Making use of only one of the beds, Ethan and Danny look up.
"Sorry."
"It's just school books."
"You brought homework? Should I let you get back to it?"
"Hell no.", Smiling, Ethan pulls Danny's shirt off. They kiss, bodies pressing close as Ethan's hands move from Danny's shoulder's to his torso where his fingers brush against a small scar. "What's that"
"Oh, I've got two of them"
He pushes up, twisting his body to show a matching scar on the other side.
"It was surgery to correct misshapen cartilage I was born with. I had a metal bar put in when I was fourteen. It stayed there for two years to support my sternum so my lungs and heart wouldn't be crushed"
Ethan gently touches one of the scars.
"What if there was a way they could disappear?"
"I don't really want them to. I like them. They make me feel like a survivor."
Ethan nods, looking into his eyes with genuine affection.
"I hope you are."
Danny peers back at him quizzically. But then Ethan kisses him again, pulling him closer, hands moving up his back, turning him turn over on the bed.
As Danny's fingers wrap around his neck, the vertebrae in Ethan's back ripples up, splitting into two separate spines beneath the skin. Ethan pulls back, a gasp in this throat.
"What? What's wrong."
"Nothing."
He looks at his hands, fingers trembling. Danny watches him, confused, as he steps off the bed.
"Just give me a second."
Ethan shuts the door of the bathroom, locking it. Breathing hard, he turns to the mirror, twisting around to view his back when something presses against the skin of his chest.
Ethan sucks in a pained gasp, looking down at his rib cage which begins to distend impossibly. And then he sees something more horrifying the face of his brother, Aiden, pushing through the skin. His mouth opening as if screaming his way out of Ethan's body.
The bathroom door bursts open and Ethan rushes out with his arms around his torso. He quickly grabs his shirt and pulls it on, moving for the door. "Ethan? You okay?"
"Yeah, fine. I'll be right back." He slams through the door and out past the first floor rooms, Ethan hurries with his arms wrapped tightly around him. When he sees a group of students, he diverts past them to the stairs, heading up to the second floor.
-ʀᴏᴏᴍ 217-
Allison turns from the window to face Stiles and Lydia. "Last time I saw Scott act like that was on the full moon."
"He was definitely off with me too. But actually, Boyd was really off. I watched him put his fist through the vending machine"
"See? It's the motel. We either need to get out of here right now..." Yanking open the night table drawer, she pulls out the room's copy of the Bible. "Or someone needs to learn how to do an exorcism A-SAP before all the werewolves go crazy and kill us"
"Hold on. What if it's not just the motel? The number in the office went up by three, right?"
"You mean like three sacrifices?"
"What if this time it's three werewolves?"
"Scott, Isaac and Boyd."
"Maybe we were meant to come here."
"Exactly. So can we get the hell out of here now?"
Stiles doesn't respond, eyes caught by the Bible.
"Let me see that."
He takes the book from her hands. With Allison and Lydia watching, he carefully pulls a newspaper clipping out from between the pages.
"What is that?"
"28 Year-Old Man Hangs Self at Infamous Glen Capri." Stiles reads out loud. He turns a few pages in the Bible and finds another clipping. Then another. Pulling them out one-by-one, he discovers seven in all and places each on the room's small cafe table.
"Look at these two. They both mention room 217. These are probably all the suicides that happened in this room."
"So if there's a Bible in every room..."
"There could be articles in all of the rooms."
"That's just beautiful. Most places leave a mint on the pillow. This one leaves a record of all of the horrible deaths that occurred."
"What if the room next door has the one about the couple?"
Without another word, the three of them go for the door.
With Allison and Lydia behind him, Stiles twists the knob on Room 216 but the door won't budge.
"It wasn't locked before."
"Forget it. We need to get Scott, Isaac and Boyd and get them out of here."
Stiles nods, starting away. Lydia, however, holds still when she hears a surge of electricity and the odd sound of buzzing coming from behind the door.
"I'm not the only one who heard that, am I?"
"It sounds like someone turned the hand saw on."
"Hand saw?" The door bursts open, its flimsy lock snapping apart. Stiles stumbles in and looks up to find Ethan raising the buzzing hand saw to his abdomen.
"Ethan, don't-"
Stiles starts forward to stop him, but it's Lydia who thinks the fastest. She grabs the power cord and yanks it from the wall.
Stiles seizes Ethan by the arms and manages to wrestle the still spinning saw out of his hands. Slamming to the floor, however, Stiles comes face-to-face with the blade, mere millimeters from its razor sharp teeth as it jerks to a stop.
Undeterred, Ethan opens his hands, claws unsheathed. But Allison latches onto one hand while Stiles grabs the other, both trying to keep Ethan from literally gutting himself.
The twin yanks them back, all three tumbling to the floor. Ethan slams into the wall heater and instantly snaps his hands away as if touching a burning pot. He whirls on Stiles.
"What the hell? What are you doing?"
Stiles, Allison and Lydia, all breathless and frightened, look back at him, noticing the immediate change in his demeanor.
"What happened?"
He glances about in utter confusion.
"What just happened?"
-ᴅᴇʀᴇᴋs ʟᴏꜰᴛ-
Bruised and blood-crusted hands pushing against his bed, Derek struggles to rise. But Jennifer hurries over to ease him back. "You sure you want to do that?"
"I need to find the others. They think I'm dead. Especially Maya... she needs to know."
"Maybe that's a good thing.", "I'm an English teacher, remember? You know how many characters in literature use a false death to their advantage? Ever read Les Mis? Tale of Two Cities? Romeo and Juliet?" Jennifer says off Derek's look.
"They need to know."
"You have any idea how bad you look? You're like one giant open wound. I'm not entirely sure you aren't really dead. You also don't have any bandages or any kind of first aid anywhere. I looked."
"I usually don't need them."
"Then how do we fix you up?"
"Time." Finally, weariness seems to press him back down. "You shouldn't be here."
"Why's that?"
"You don't know me. You don't know anything about me."
"Maybe I've got a feeling about you." Derek huffs.
"Then it shouldn't be a good one. Everyone around me... everyone gets hurt."
"I've been hurt before."
"Not like this."
She doesn't retreat from his stare, however. Instead, she comes closer. Timid--even a little frightened--she softly and cautiously presses her lips to his.
Derek barely responds at first. As if he doesn't even remember how to kiss someone. But then--despite his injuries, the bruises, the cuts on his body--he pulls Jennifer to him and begins to kiss her back.
ᴀ'ᴍᴀʏᴀ, ɪsᴀᴀᴄ ᴀɴᴅ ʙᴏʏᴅs ʀᴏᴏᴍ
Room key gripped in his hand, Boyd sits on the edge of the bed, a strangely far-off look in his eyes. The clock radio clicks on and he snaps his head around to it. Light static surges from the small speaker. Boyd presses the power button, turning it off.
It clicks back on by itself. No static this time. Just an airy silence. Boyd reaches to turn it off again, "Do you remember what time it was when you last saw her?"
"I don't know. I can't remember." The young Boyd said.
"Sometimes it helps to put yourself right back in the moment. Try to see yourself there. Imagine you're seeing Alicia skating on the ice rink. Plenty of other people around. And then what?"
"And then she was just... she was just gone." Young Boyd struggled to say.
Boyd hits the power button. But the moment he pulls his trembling hand away from the clock radio, it turns back on. "And what were you doing?"
"I told you. I was watching her. I didn't want to skate anymore. I was tired. And I swear I was watching her."
"It's all right, Vernon. We're just trying to piece together what happened--" Boyd grabs the clock radio and yanks it up. The cord snaps away from the wall. Even unplugged, it turns back on yet again with an electric crackle.
"Is she dead? Is it my fault? Is she dead--" Boyd slams the radio to the floor, smashing it to pieces.
Ethan hurries down the stairs to the first floor with Stiles, Lydia and Allison trying to keep up. "Didn't you hear what I just said? I don't remember how I got there or what I was doing."
"Hey, you could be a little more helpful, you know? We did just save your life."
"And you probably shouldn't have." They watch him step into his room, door slamming shut.
"What now?"
"I'll find Scott. You guys grab Isaac and Boyd, while you're at it can one of you try to get ahold of Maya? She's not answering the phone. The best we can do is get them out of this place." She quickly hurries back up the stairs while Lydia notices Stiles's eyes on her.
"What? Why are you looking at me like that?"
"I wasn't looking--"
"Stiles."
"Okay, I didn't want to say it. But we've kind of been through something like this before. A lot like this."
"What do you mean? When?"
"Your birthday party. The night you poisoned everyone with wolfsbane."
A shadow appears on the floor of the motel's office. Slowly approaching the bullet-proof glass Boyd looks in past the front desk, searching for something...
Next to a cabinet and shelves sits a large and quite heavy-looking safe.
Stepping quickly down the balcony, Allison reaches Scott and Stiles's room. When she knocks on the door, it drifts open.
"Scott? Are you in here? Scott? "
"Stiles."
Stiles follows Lydia, trying to catch up with her. "Lydia, I didn't mean you're trying to kill people. I meant that maybe you're somehow involved in getting people to kill themselves. Which now that I've said it aloud sounds just as bad and yes, I will stop talking now."
No longer listening to him, Lydia pauses at a sewer grate near her feet. A strange sound emanating from beneath it. A baby crying.
"Stiles? Do you hear that?"
Fearful, Stiles shakes his head. "Stop. Please, just stop.", The baby's cries turn to insistent shrieks. "What do you want? I don't know what you want?"
Stiles watches Lydia slowly kneel at the grate, eyes locked on it. "Lydia? What do you hear?"
"A baby crying. Its mother--she can't get it to stop crying. And I hear... I hear water running." Eyes widening as she listens intently, Lydia's breath catches in her throat.
"Lydia?"
"Oh my God, she's drowning it. The baby. She's drowning the baby." Lydia shoots back to her feet, whirling to face Stiles. "Someone's drowning."
ᴀ'ᴍᴀʏᴀ, ɪsᴀᴀᴄ ᴀɴᴅ ʙᴏʏᴅs ʙᴀᴛʜʀᴏᴏᴍ
Water plunges from the faucet of an almost full bathtub. Boyd's reflection comes into view. He reaches down, twisting the knob to stop the flow. Bare feet stepping into the water, Boyd calmly lifts the motel safe up, carrying it into the tub with him. Carefully, he lies back, letting the weight of the safe push down on his chest. Lips and nose sinking beneath the surface, Boyd stares blankly up at the ceiling. And begins to drown...
ᴀʙᴀɴᴅᴏɴ ᴍᴀʟʟ
Argent steps out of the shadows of the abandoned mall with his phone to his ear.
"You want me to come pick you up? I don't mind a late-night drive."
"No, it's okay, Dad. We're at a motel."
"The school paid for that?"
"Yeah. It's not great but it's just for a night."
"What's it called?" Chris asks
"Ah... The Glen Capri." Argent holds still, the name of the motel giving him pause. "Do you know it?"
"It sounds familiar. Listen, I'm going to jump in the car and come get you guys."
"No, Dad, it's seriously okay."
"Allison, if there's something you feel like you can't tell me..."
"You don't think I'm lying, do you?"
"No. Not at all. I just want you to know that you can talk to me." Chris states trying to sound truthful.
"We don't have to keep anything from each other."
"I know," Allison said softly
"Okay." Clicking off, Argent lowers the phone and looks out from the exact same vantage point where Allison fired the flash bolt arrows. Standing in the very same place she stood.
ᴀ'ᴍᴀʏᴀ, ɪsᴀᴀᴄ ᴀɴᴅ ʙᴏʏᴅs ʀᴏᴏᴍ
Through the open bathroom, Stiles and Lydia can be seen rushing into the motel room, racing to Boyd's rescue. The safe half covers his body, keeping him completely submerged. Stiles dives his hand into the water, searching about for the drain. "He blocked it--he blocked the drain with something. I can't get to it."
"What do we do?"
"Help me." Stiles reaches around the safe. Lydia grabs a side, struggling to help.
"It's too heavy--it's too heavy!"
"Is he dead? How long can a werewolf stay underwater?"
"You think I know?" Unable to even budge the safe an inch, they let go. Stiles steps back and his hand hits the hot radiator behind him. He yanks it away and then does a doubletake.
"The heater--Ethan came out of it when he touched the heater."
"What?"
"Heat--heat does it. We gotta' burn him. We need fire, heat, something--"
"He's underwater."
"I'm aware of that!"
"Wait--the bus--on the bus, there'll be emergency road flares. They've got their own oxidizers. They can burn underwater."
"Are you serious?"
"Yes. Go!" Spinning around, Stiles hurtles out of the bathroom and out of the motel room while--
Allison hurries around a corner, nearly running into two students. "Either of you seen Scott McCall? "
Slow response of head shakes and shrugs sends her to the next door, while below Stiles runs to the bus in the lot. Yanking open the rear door, he finds a roadside emergency bag containing four road flares. He grabs two of them and slams the door shut again.
ᴀ'ᴍᴀʏᴀ, ɪsᴀᴀᴄ ᴀɴᴅ ʙᴏʏᴅs ʀᴏᴏᴍ
Lydia backs out of the bathroom, glancing to the open door. "Come on, come on."
She quiets, hand coming to her mouth to cover the sound of her own breathing. Hearing someone else breathing.
Ever-so-slowly, Lydia kneels to look under the bed and gasps when she sees isaac. Curled up in a fetal position, he stares right back at her with wide terror-stricken eyes.
Lydia staggers back to her feet and spins around just as Stiles hurtles into the room.
"I got one."
Charging into the bathroom, he yanks the cap off and--nothing happens. Frantic, he spins back to Lydia.
"What do I--how do I do this?"
"The cap. It's like a match--the cap lights it!" Stiles twists the flare around and sees the coarse burgundy surface of the cap is indeed just like a match. He rubs it against the end of the flare, trying to light it.
"Stiles--"
"I'm TRYING."
The flare ignites and Stiles shoves it into the bathtub, burning Boyd.
The safe tilts up as Boyd lurches out of the water, gasping for air. Eyes darting about as if just now realizing where he is, he grabs hold of the safe and lifts it up.
With a metallic thud, the safe drops back onto the floor of the bathroom in front of Lydia and Stiles. Breathless, they look up from the safe to Boyd now standing in the bathtub, dripping wet and pulling in deep breaths.
"She's gone..." Boyd whispered softly.
"What?"
"My sister. She's gone..."
His back gently presses to the tile wall behind him and he slumps down.
In the main room, underneath the bed, a terrified Isaac watches Stiles kneel down to peer in at him.
"Hey, Isaac. Got something here for ya'."
Stiles uncaps the second flare, lights it, and whips it right toward him.
Stiles and Lydia rush down to the first floor to meet with Allison. "I can't find him anywhere."
"It's happening to him too, isn't it?"
"It has to be.", "Didn't you say there was two more flares in the bus?"
" Yeah, I'll get it."
Just as he's starting off, however, they all hear the unmistakable sparking of an already lit flare.
"Was that Scott? Or Maya?"
All eyes turn to find Scott standing just past the parked cars and holding the flare in one hand. Strangely, he's dripping wet. Literally soaked all over. But the trail of liquid leading to a tell-tale orange container nearby tells them it's not water.
It's gasoline.
Friends surrounding him as he holds the lit flare, Scott barely seems to notice Allison call his name.
"Scott?"
In an odd trance-like haze, Scott slowly meets her eyes.
"There's no hope." Scott says in a whisper
"What do you mean? Scott? There's always hope."
"Not for me. Not for Derek." Scott raises the sparking flare while Allison, Stiles and Lydia watch, helpless to stop him. "
"But Derek wasn't your fault. You know it wasn't." Staring at the sparks jumping off the edge of the flare, Scott shakes his head.
"Every time I try to fight back, it just gets worse. People keep getting hurt. And the harder I try to protect everyone, the more people get hurt, the more people get killed."
"That's not true."
"It is."
"Scott, this isn't you. This is someone in your head telling you to do this."
"What if it's not? What if it is just me? What if doing this is actually the best thing I could do for everyone else?" With the flare lowering dangerously close to the pool of gasoline, Scott turns to Stiles.
"All of it started that night. The night I was bitten. Remember what it was like before that? You and me? We were nothing. We weren't popular. We weren't good at lacrosse. We weren't important. We were no one." Scott says softly, "Maybe I should be no one again. No one at all."
Stiles takes a step forward, an odd calm replacing the panic.
"But you are someone. You're my best friend. You're my brother."
He looks down at the line of gasoline leading toward the pool in which Scott stands.
"So, I guess you're going to have to take me with you."
And Stiles steps into the line of gasoline.
One careful but deliberate step at a time, Stiles approaches Scott. He reaches out. Scott's fingers tighten around the flare. But Stiles gently grasps it and slowly pulls it from his hand.
As the others breathe in relief, Stiles tosses the sparking flare aside.
Lydia watches it tumble across the pavement. Until a strange gust of wind sends it rolling back, right toward the pool of gasoline.
"NO!"
Darting forward, she pushes Scott and Stiles to the ground as a fireball erupts behind them.
Flames flickering toward the sky, Lydia spots something within the black smoke. Something appearing out of the darkness, almost right out of hell a face with severe lacerations scarring the ashen skin, as if it had been slashed over and over by claws. Its round eyes focused on Lydia, the creature bares rotted teeth at her with a hate-filled shriek.
And then vanishes into the shadows.
ᴍᴏᴍᴇɴᴛs ʟᴀᴛᴇʀ
As everyone repacks they're bags in Scott and Stiles room they all remember the one person they forgot.
The run outside knocking on door to door until they hear muttering coming from the last room they haven't checked.
Isaac kicks the door down to see Maya, in a bubble muttering, "it's all my fault" over and over to herself.
"Maya?" Isaac said calmly but nothing. "Maya!" he said louder and her head snaps up.
"Go away... You'll only get hurt..."
"No" He stated, staring straight at her as the other stood behind him silently. Knowing he is the only one that can help her.
"I said go away!" she shouted bursting her bubble as her eyes glowed a bright neon green.
"Why are you pushing me away? I want to be here with you, I want to help you"
"Everyone I love dies, my mother, my father, Derek, my entire family!" Maya said as the wind in the room starts to pick up.
"Their deaths weren't your fault. I swear" Isaac said as he slowly started moving forward.
"STAY AWAY!"
She shouted sending everyone flying into a wall.
Everyone groaning in pain as Maya realized what she did. "It's all my fault..."
"No it's not. I thought the same thing but Stiles helped me realize it wasn't my fault and trust me it wasn't yours either." Scott softly said as Stiles rushed off to the bus to get the last flare.
"I'm alone... all alone once again..." Maya cried.
"You're not alone, I'm right here" Isaac said as Stiles rushed back in with the flare. He hands to Isaac as Isaac makes his way to Maya.
"I'll show you, you're not alone" He kisses Maya as he opens the flare and taps her on the arm with it. She jumps a bit, biting his lip on accident.
They pull apart and Maya's eyes widen greatly.
ɴᴇxᴛ ᴍᴏʀɴɪɴɢ: ʙᴜs
With the bright sunlight streaming in through its windows, the door of the bus yanks open, and Coach steps inside followed by the Cross Country Team.
Everyone pauses, however, to notice something odd...
Scott, Stiles, Lydia, Allison, Isaac, Maya, and Boyd, all begin to wake up in their seats, clearly having spent the rest of the night on the bus.
"I don't want to know. I really don't. But, in case you missed the announcement, the Meet's canceled. We're headed home. Pack it in."
While the team quickly fills the bus, Scott looks up to see Ethan approach.
"I don't know what happened last night, but I know you probably saved my life."
"Actually, I saved your life. But doesn't matter really. Minor detail"
"So, I'm going to give you something... We're pretty sure Derek's still alive."
Scott and Stiles share a look of surprise. As Maya, who was sitting a few seats behind them eyes begin to water. "He's alive..." She said to herself.
Letting out a sigh of relief.
"But he killed one of ours. That means one of two things can happen. Either he joins our pack-"
"And kills his own."
"Or Kali goes after him. And we kill him. That's the way it works." Those words didn't make Maya feel better or worse all she knew was her brother was probably alive, waiting for her at home.
Maya excuses herself past Isaac and makes her way to the others. Ethan gives a final nod to the group and steps past Allison and Lydia's seat. Noticing something, Lydia stands.
"Coach, can I see your whistle for a second?"
Before he can respond, Lydia reaches for the whistle just below his neck. When she lifts it a stain of purple dust is revealed on his shirt.
"I want that back."
"Why'd you take his whistle?" Maya questioned.
As he turns, Lydia puts her hand over the whistle's air vent and gives it a short breath. With Stiles and the others watching, she turns her palm up to show a bit of purple dust.
"Wolfsbane."
"Every time Coach blew the whistle in the bus--Scott, Isaac, Maya, Boyd--"
"And Ethan."
"We all inhaled it." Scott commented
"You were all poisoned by it."
"That's how the Darach got into their heads. That's how he did it."
Grabbing the whistle out of Lydia's hand, he tosses it right out the open window.
"HEY, HEY, HEY, STILINSKI"
(ok this chapter is rushed but so were the others so idrc:) but I hope you enjoyed this mess of a chapter ☺️)