In The Name Of A Team I'm Not Apart Of

by BottleDemon

Summary:

Stiles gets involved with magic before werewolves. The latter is almost immediately after the former.

Notes:

I haven't watched Teen Wolf in years, and I refuse to start it right now. If it's not accurate that's too damn bad.

Chapter 1: Not My Fault

Notes:

One day i’ll follow my updates schedule. Sorry for being so late.

It was a series of events that led Stiles down this path. He was planning on enjoying his summer with Scott. He’d just gotten his licence and they were sixteen mobile. Scott was using his jeep to practice and prepare for his own driver's test, and everything was good. 

Until one bright and sunny day, when his mom called and asked them to drop off the lunch she’d forgotten. They were only playing video games, and both Stiles and Scott would do anything for Melissa. So they drove to the hospital, and as Scott delivered his mom her meal, Stiles wandered aimlessly through the halls. The nursing staff thought Scott was adorable, and Stiles didn’t want to stick around as they pinched his cheeks and squeezed him in tight hugs for thirty minutes. 

Stiles had a sadly good knowledge of where everything was in the hospital, he’d been everywhere because of Scott, Ms. McCall, and his mother. So when he stumbled across an unfamiliar and creepily dim hallway, he assumed it was either where they kept an ancient hidden tomb with a cursed mummy inside… or the coma patients, as the sign said. He wasn’t sure if he was allowed to be down here, but it wasn’t like he was bothering anyone– it’s not like he could. 

A shred of panic hit him when he saw the security camera, but he relaxed when he realized it wasn’t blinking red. In hindsight, it was strange that this area of all places didn’t have a working camera. None of the patients could even defend themselves. 

He’d resumed his walking only to stop a second later when he heard footsteps headed in his direction. Panic not being his friend, he opened the nearest door and entered, ducking under its window, praying no one entered. After what felt like hours, whoever entered the hallway left he was excited for approximately two milliseconds before the hall was flooded with bodies. “Fuck,” He muttered. 

He didn’t recognize the man, why would he, but nevertheless, once he caught sight of the scars, he had an idea. It was confirmed when he picked up the chart on the side of the bed and read, “Peter Hale.” 

He let out a huff of air; “I’m going to hell– Sorry for intruding, man, but I don’t know if I’m even allowed on this floor, and if I get in trouble again, my dad's going to kill me.” He took a seat next to the bed–the only seat in the room. 

“Hey, while I’m here, I read somewhere that talking to coma patients can help them wake up!” He sat up straight at the opportunity to rant to someone uninterrupted. Usually, Scott had to cut him off at school so Stiles didn’t make a fool out of himself, and he truly appreciated his best friend for that.

“I’m not sure what to talk about– I mean, have you seen Star Wars?” Stiles waited an embarrassingly long time for an answer before saying, “I kind of hope you can’t hear, cause I just forgot you couldn’t answer.” He sighed and thought. He’s never been out of a subject to talk about. He snapped his fingers, “Oh! My dad still has the Hale fire case!” Stiles thought back to the last time he looked through his father's things. 

“It’s technically considered an accident, but he’d also thought something was off about it. Whenever he drinks, he picks the files back up. I’ve never read through it, but he’s usually really thorough with investigations. I think he feels guilty because he couldn’t investigate that one himself. I- mean– my mom died around the same time, and he’d taken leave.” Stiles didn’t know why he’d started spilling family secrets–well, kind of secrets. Maybe he’s been wanting someone to tell. His father's drinking is substantially better than it was, and he’d never in a million years hurt his son–Stiles knows that. But sometimes he had a feeling his father was trying to hurt himself. And that, more than anything, scared Stiles.

He wished he could get rid of the sadness and guilt that burrowed into him every morning.

He snapped out of his daze when his phone pinged–it was Scott asking where he was. 

“I gotta go. Again, sorry for bothering you, man– and thanks for not jumping out at me like in the movies!” Stiles did his superspy/sleuth impersonation as he ducked out of the door.

 

---

 

The second thing happens several days later. He’d been grounded for something that was entirely not his fault and was forced into cleaning out the attic. It was so gross and dusty that he was beginning to think he was allergic to everything in it. He’d called his father, and when sent to voicemail, gave him a long and detailed explanation of his actions and why he believes he should be released from his imprisonment. After twenty minutes, he sent his father a text message telling him that he was probably going to suffocate on dust mites and Ms. McCall would be in charge of his diet moving forward.

He wasn’t even a third of the way through when he’d stepped on a loose floorboard and slammed his face into the wall. “Ah! Fuck! Son of a bi–Agh!” He was holding his dripping nose in one hand and his scratched-up leg in the other. Writhing in pain for several painful minutes. Calming down, not because the pain had subsided–it didn’t, but because he saw a bunch of books in the hole he’d just made with his foot. The nosebleed was still going strong, and his shirt (It was Scott's, he stole it) was already a goner, so he was keeping it in check while he struggled up and fixed himself up.

There was an energy in the attic that Stiles didn’t notice until he was out of it. The electrical hum quickly became silent as soon as he was down the ladder. 

His father came home while he was distractedly throwing his shirt away, still thinking about the books upstairs. Books in his house weren’t unusual. He was part of a family that used to relax in the living room together on Saturday nights, reading their books in the company of each other. Those books were different. They were his mothers. He knew that for a fact, unless his father randomly learned how to read Polish. Stiles had a generic understanding of how to read Polish. He could speak it fluently enough — he hasn’t since his mother died, but sometimes he’d realize he’d been thinking in the other language. Reading it might be more difficult, however. He’d been a shit student when his mother was teaching him. Assumed he’d never need to read it, and speaking it was enough. 

“What the hell is that?” His father asked, alarmed. Stiles snapped out of his daze and looked over to see his father staring at his hands.

He moved his eyes to the shirt and snorted, “Tripped in the attic, slammed my face into the wall, and cried for a couple of minutes while my nose bled onto Scott's sixth favorite shirt.” He smiled, and his father looked at him like he was insane. “There’s still blood on the wall if you don’t believe me,” Stiles added, trying not to sound offended.

“No, I believe you managed that. I just don’t know how.” His father's exasperation drew a laugh from him.

“What do you want for dinner?” He asked, and his father went suspiciously still. “I was thinking I could cook tonight.” He said. Stiles was immediately tense. 

His father was a good cook– they both were, but the Sheriff only cooked when he didn’t have work or a special occasion. 

“What?” Stiles asked.

“And you don’t have to finish the attic style, I think you’ve put enough blood and tears into it.” He tried and failed not to chuckle at the last part. Stiles would’ve joined him if he weren’t already certain of the reason for his father's sudden change of tune.

“You’re going back to work?” He made it a question, but by the cringe his father gave him, he didn’t need an answer. 

“Dad, this is the third double this week.”

“There’s a bug going around the station–”

“And you wanna stay there and catch it?” 

“Stiles,” His father let out a tired sigh. “You know I don’t want to.” God, how Stiles wanted to get that resigned look in his eyes out. He was aware that this probably wasn’t his dad trying to overwork himself to death, but he couldn’t help the anxiety that wrecked him. His dad could take care of himself–logically, he knew that. 

Illogically, he wanted his dad to retire and become something safe like a florist or professional bird-watcher. His dad was his entire family, and he needed to protect him. So he’d do it in any little way he could. 

Nodding, Stiles deflated. “I’ll cook, you should get a nap before you go back,” He said. It was just a fraction, but he saw a bit of the guilt leave the Sheriff’s eyes. He could still try and get him into bird-watching later.

It was several hours later when the thoughts about the books got Stiles out of bed and his pitiful attempt to fall asleep. So he grabbed his empty (for once) laundry basket and went back up there. As if waiting, the low buzz made itself known. It was only bizarre for long enough for Stiles’ brain to come up with an explanation. Maybe the air conditioning was connected to something up here, it was cold enough. Much colder than the kind of cool they kept the rest of the house. 

He didn’t want to stay up here longer than necessary. Especially since the buzzing was getting louder, like it was coming from the inside of his head rather than whatever vent he’d first assumed. There were eight books in total. Most of them looked like they were older than America, but when he touched them, they felt firm and sturdy. Not like they were going to fall apart. “Jesus, Mom.” He muttered. Because of the heft of the book, it took him three trips to get them all into his room. 

He felt like giggling as he read some of the titles. ‘Znak i Dusza: Wiedza Przodków,’ a book that might be about invocation, spirit work, and traditional magic. ‘Obrzędy Krwi i Księżyca’.  This one seemed more occult-like, something about rituals and the moon. Stiles was partially using the Polish dictionary he had to translate. He could barely understand it. Some of the words he’d simply never seen or heard before.

He looked at the books around him and considered whether he should just put them back and move on. That’s when he spotted it. A grayish-blue leather-bound book. He was shocked he didn’t realize earlier, but he knew that book. Sat on his mother's lap as she wrote on it. 

His mother’s diary. He nearly died as he dove for it. His hands were shaking as he struggled to unlatch it– he needed to be sure to see her beautiful handwriting himself. 

The strangled sob he let out when he tried to read her pretty Polish words on the page. He let out an amused breath as he recognized the heart she put over the ‘i when she wrote “Mischief”; it always made him feel special whenever he saw her write it. The pages all had dates on them, and he was flipping through them to see his nickname in her scrawl. He felt warmer and warmer the more he did it. 

His motions all completely halted when he saw a name he wasn’t expecting to see in his mother’s diary. “Talia.” His brain rebooted for a couple of seconds as he slowly went back to see if she’d ever been mentioned before. 

She had.

He’d tried to use Google to translate his mother's words, but it gave him a confusing garble of words. From what he could glean, his mother was having nightmares and told Talia something awful was going to happen to her pack. Stiles hates translating. Things never fit in a way that made sense. Talia was kind and told her everything was going to be okay, but his mother knew she didn’t believe her. That she was being kind to the ‘unstable lady’ as she called herself. It wasn’t surprising. She was at the worst point of her diagnosis. Random fits of rage, not recognizing him, sometimes not even recognizing his father. As he thought it over, all of the blood pumping through his veins slowed down. Because he’d researched his mother's illness obsessively. 

One thing that was true for every single patient was the loss of fine motor skills and tremors. 

But his mother's beautiful handwriting stayed forever

consistent till the very last page.

Chapter 2: Concerning Continuations

The third event happened that same night as he booked it into his father's closet and began digging through his things to get to the Hale case file. There could’ve been a chance that his mother overheard something, and the fire was premeditated. How she knew Talia Hale was anybody’s guess.  Stiles took it back into his room with him and moved all of the books, aside from his mother's, to the side. He read through everything first. All statements, reports, and the insurance investigator's final decision were. 

He kept his eyes off of anything his father added, wanting to come to conclusions on his own first before reading what the more experienced Stiliski had to add. Stiles didn’t puke at any of the crime scene pictures, even if he did have to take a twenty-minute break after seeing burned bodies that were too small to be older than him. He had yellow sticky notes where he had assumptions and green sticky notes for things he knew as facts. (They’d yet to be used) and red for questions he had no idea about. (There was mostly red)

He wasn’t a genius, but the Investigator and Forensic Analyst shouldn’t have different points of origin. The Analyst also noted that the fire accelerated at an alarmingly fast rate, “Too fast to be natural?” Stiles muttered. The Investigator said the speed varies, and Deputy Dickwaffle (Dixon) took his word over the lady, making the most sense. No wonder his father kept the case.

It was insanely shady and wreaked a shitty cover up. Stiles flipped to a clean page in his notebook and titled it suspects. The file had the names of everyone who worked the case, and he put Garrison Mayers at the top of his list. It didn’t escape his notice that as soon as his father was back to work, both Garrison and Dickwaffle were fired. Ex-Deputy Dixon now works at a video store, and Garrison is a bus driver.

That makes two top suspects. 

Stiles looked at his father's notes, and they were in his list too, along with two names he didn’t recognize. He smiled with pride. It took him way too long to notice the sun was up, “Shit!” Stiles stood and immediately stubbed his toe on one of his mother's heavier books.

“Agh!” He yelped as he hopped on one foot, still trying to get to the door and away from the tripping hazard that was his room. He was only now starting to realize the reason his laundry bin was empty was that everything was on the floor.

 

---

 

Stiles felt like a fucking creep. Sneaking into the coma ward of a hospital to use an unconscious man as a sounding board. Scott had begun to train for lacrosse, and as much as he wanted to join his best friend in his unattainable dream, Stiles was too much of a realist. 

Which is exactly why he was investigating the writings of his dementia ridden mother. 

He had to. 

If she was going through another delusion and the fire was a coincidence, fine. He’d move on, but from what he read, Talia was her friend, and she didn’t believe her. Stiles doesn't blame the women, but he’s her son. He has to trust her. Even if she’s not around anymore. 

It was evening. Two days after he started looking into everything, he’d looked up the hospital's terms of care for comatose patients and waited for the creepy red-headed nurse to finish checking on him. He’d run into her while walking back to Scott the first time he’d seen Peter almost bump into her, and she’d dead-eyed him. 

He got chills just thinking about it. 

His chills immediately faded into a warm, fuzzy feeling when the thought of red hair shifted to strawberry blonde, Lydia. She was ethereal. He was so glad he’d been blessed with the image of her. Shifting gears, he walked on the edges of his feet–he got that from a ninja manual– and it was surprisingly quiet. He had his mother's journal and his own notes along with a few copies of the case he deemed important enough to bring, and entered the man's room. 

“Yo, Pete.”

“Stiles here.” He added, and winced. “Just realizing I never told you my name, it’s Stiles.” He repeated. He took several steps closer and put the papers on the end table at the man's feet. “So, first I want to promise I'm not a serial killer and I have a reason for being here.” He started and kept talking as he organized the papers in the best way to help him think. 

“So, do you remember last time I was here, I told you my dad still had the fire’s case file?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “Well, originally I wasn’t going to look into it–it felt disrespectful. That was until I found my mom's old diary. She’s dead–I might’ve mentioned that.” He cleared his throat as carefully and quietly as he could. He wasn’t even talking over a whisper, doubting Peter could even hear him if he could hear. 

“Anyways, so I was trying to read it–it's in Polish and my reading level in that language is as good as a dyslexic 5th grader, so it was slow going, especially with how informal it was. There was one name that caught my attention–Talia.” The heart monitor spiked for a beat, and Stiles felt his mouth gape.

“Holy shit!” He hissed, “You can hear me!” He hopped up and down for a beat before realizing there was a kinda of sorta conscious person around. He cleared his throat again, a little louder than intended. “Lemme calm down.”

He took a second and continued, “Everything I'm about to say, please take with a pound of salt. My mother died from frontotemporal dementia, and she really could have just been having delusions. But she told your sister something bad was going to happen– that her ‘pack’ was in danger.” Another spike in his monitor. “The direct translation is ‘pack’, but I assume she means family. Sorry for your loss.” He added sheepishly. Now that he knew the man could hear him, it felt like that should’ve been the first thing out of his mouth. 

“By dreams, I'm assuming some creeps were talking in or near her room when she was asleep.” Stiles paused. “Yes, I know what I just said.” The monitor beeped again, and now Stile thought the guy was laughing at him. “Anyways, there are two that I'm certain about. The deputy and investigator were both fired after it was deemed an accident, even though the forensic analyst was certain there was foul play involved. Funny enough, the analyst died a few weeks later.” Stiles let out an unamused sigh, “Gas leak. Their apartment was the only one affected.” 

Stiles flipped the picture over, “I mean, look at this. The wiring was state of the art if those two aren’t involved in fucking over the investigation i’ll eat my jeep.”

He was quiet as he reread a report. “There was also mountain ash scattered around the house. I have no idea why that was added or what that has to do with anything, but I looked it up, and it's hard to get. From my dad's notes, there are two other people he suspects, usually since arsonists of that size have a buildup. Chances are, some people involved had a record.” He’d begun muttering to himself when he heard the unmistakable click-clacks of heels coming this way. 

“Shit!” He hissed, quickly clearing away all of his papers. The steps are getting too close for him to make a run for it. “Thank god this is the first floor.” He muttered as he unhooked the door and leaped for his freedom. 

“I’ll see ya, man!” He whispers-shouts as he closes the window. 

Jennifer enters several seconds later, and he can hear Stiles’s footsteps quickly re-treating. “I’m off soon. Is there anything else you need?” She asks. 

Peter’s eyes open with langered amusement; “Nothing at all.” He answered. If the boy keeps it up, Peter might not need her at all.

 

Chapter 3: Potions Project

Notes:

I update on Wednesdays!!!

Stiles wasn’t crazy. 

Yes, dementia was technically hereditary, but the kind Claudia had was rare. 

If he wasn’t crazy, then he was apparently magical. There are things in his mother's diary from before her diagnosis–before she’d even shown a hint of being sick. The pages after she’d deteriorated were too disjointed and difficult for Stiles to read. 

He could get the gist of the earlier pages, but once she starts mentioning Talia and the Hales, nothing is easy to understand. 

The later pages are what’s going to help him understand what happened in that fire, but the earlier ones… those will help him understand his mother. 

She’d constantly bring up recipes with ingredients he’d never heard of. She’d add things to his father's coffee in the morning if he didn’t sleep well, or give him special teas that would calm him down and help him work. He remembered that one of the books was about herbs and remedies. He cracked it open and blamed his disappointment at not having a glossary. The book was clear (if you knew Polish) but unorganized. He’d been over halfway through the book when he stumbled upon a recipe that looked familiar. 

He relaxed– it was just tea that caused relaxation. “1 tsp melisa, 1 tsp rumianek, 1/2 tsp lawenda.” He read aloud. Those were just Lemon balm, Chamomile, and Lavender. He chuckled at his overreaction when he stopped at a different page. 

It said 'Eliksir Leśnych Szeptów’. According to the book, he’d be able to see nature spirits.

“Yeah…okay,” Stiles still hadn’t told Scott his grounding ended early, and the other boy thought he had two days left on his sentence. They’ve been video chatting and playing video games together every night since his dad was always nicer to Scott. 

If he did have weird magic blood or whatever, he should at least get something cool out of it. And the recipe said it only lasted a couple of hours. Stiles wrote out the list and looked at the time– it was pretty early in the day, and his dad wouldn’t be back till late. 

There’s this apothecary that his mother mentioned in her diary. He’d have to find it and get everything on the list.

 

---

 

He’d finally found the place after getting its name and a very unspecific location. He’d been wandering around an unfamiliar town when he looked up and there it was. 

“You’ve got to be shitting me,” He huffed. He was certain he’d passed this exact spot maybe four or five times. But there it was, ‘Siri’s Apothecary.’

He entered, and instead of the Hippie aesthetic with magic rocks and astrology signs everywhere, it was modern, sleek, and everything was clearly labeled with short explanations of what they do. “Can I help you?” A woman asked. She was tall, dark, and beautiful–buzzed hair with sharp features that made her impossible to forget. She was definitely older than he, but not by much. Her hair and how well she wore it heavily contradicted his own clumsy and random swipes he’d used with his razor. He’s definitely growing his hair out. 

“I uh.” He closed his mouth, pathetically aware of the lack of sense he was making. He fumbled for his pocket, trying not to pay attention to how the woman was pressing her lips together in an attempt not to laugh at his inarticulate manner. 

He was tomato red when he’d finally managed to get his ingredients out of his pocket; “Do you have any of these?” He asked quietly. 

She was still suppressing a smile when she opened the page, read it, and blinked. 

“You want… all of this?” She asked. Stiles nodded, and she looked him up and down, assessing. “And you know how to use them?” Stiles nodded. He’d read the instructions front to back over and over again until he’d had it memorized. 

She let out a sigh, then put on a pair of gloves. He watched as she grabbed them, measured them, and packaged them separately. She was mostly done when the silence became too much, and he opened his big mouth. “So, how long have you worked here?” He asked. She gave him a quick glance before focusing on shredding the birch leaf; “It’s my mom's shop. I grew up working here.” Stiles smiled at that.

“That’s really cool. Do you like it?” He asked, and in addition to a look, he caught a glimpse of a tiny smile. “Yeah, she always knew how to make it fun.” She said, packing up the last of his order. He didn’t ask about the past tense, it wasn’t any of his business. 

“$64.79,” She totaled. Stile was insanely proud that he didn’t cry as he handed her his well-earned plagiarism money. It was less than he was expecting. He looked in the bag–it seemed too heavy to be his order. 

There was a packaged mortar and pestle at the bottom. “You seem new, that’s on the house.” She explained. “Wow, thank you.” She waved a hand, “Good luck with that. It’s really hard to mess up.”  With that, she walked into the back of the store.  

It was only then he’d realized he watched her put everything in the bags, and those weren’t a part of it.

 

---

 

Stiles got home around nine– his father was already there, and while not angry, he did want an explanation. “I swung by the house over eight hours ago. Where’ve you been all day? And why didn’t you call?” His father asked. Maybe Stiles was too quick to jump on the ‘not angry’ assumption. His phone dying wasn’t the smartest thing he’d let happen.

“Hear me out.” He started, and the Sheriff groaned. “Dad! It’s nothing bad.” He pulled out a ‘Polish for Dummies’ book along with a practice writing book to improve his writing. He’d ended up sitting at a cafe and using it for a while.

“What’s this?” His father asked. “Mom wanted me to read and write in it too, so I wanted to learn.” He explained. Not telling his father the entire truth made something in his chest ache. Something deep and throbbing. Like a broken bone setting wrong.

His father didn’t say anything for a long time, only nodding and looking at the book. His father understood Polish, but he couldn’t read it, and his pronunciation was always terrible. Stile and his mother used to cheer whenever he’d get over the embarrassment and say something in Polish. His dad would turn red and try to turn before they saw him smile. “I’m uh– Going to head to bed.” He said in a hushed tone. He looked at Stiles for several seconds, and Stiles knew a second before he did that he was getting a bone-crushing hug. 

He enjoyed every second of it. There was never a place he’d felt safer than in his dad's arms. Because if he was holding him, if he was being held… then he couldn’t be taken away from him.

 

Notes:

I just read a book called "Among the crows" it's pretty short and has Polish mythology and folklore plus the characters are great. I recommend it!!

Chapter 4: Ghostly Endeavors

Notes:

Sorry i forgot to post yesterday!!!!

His father was still asleep when Stiles made breakfast and left a note telling him that he was being forced into exercise by Scott. It didn’t escape his notice that the lies were piling up. 

It was four in the morning, and he had an hour before sunrise to prepare everything. He had to drink it at the exact time ‘first light’ hit him or whatever the fuck it means. 

Stiles did everything in the order it told him. He’d even pricked his finger to get the drops of blood it wanted. He was confused why he’d need to drink his own blood, but it wasn't like it was going to kill him. The book told him that he needed to assign a tonic ‘words of power’ and not to speak them aloud. 

He found focusing himself easy for once, all of his usual excess energy not coming out in uncontrollable sprouts for once in his life. He cleared his head and repeated, ‘Ukaż mi to, co ukazane być musi’ in his mind.

 

‘Ukaż mi to, co ukazane być musi’

 

‘Ukaż mi to, co ukazane być musi’

 

‘Ukaż mi to, co ukazane być musi’ 

 

Only when he felt the warmth of the morning sun on his skin. Then he lifted the cup to his mouth and chugged it. He tried to keep his mind off how disgusting it was and onto the words. 

His words, ‘Ukaż mi to, co ukazane być musi’. 

The light breeze that was flowing through the trees just a moment ago went stagnant. The fresh air surrounding him smelled like copper and electricity. He felt that the same humming that was in his attic was apparent here. Stiles didn’t know what to do. So he did what any moderately intelligent teenager would do in this scenario. He left. 

Collected his things and went the fuck home. He wasn’t sure what it was, but he didn’t think he had done the potion correctly. All he could hope for was no long-term side effects. Maybe he was overreacting, and none of this was even real. 

 

---

 

He spent the rest of the day with Scott. The younger boy somehow managed to get Stiles to actually work out with him. 

He had to admit Scott was kind of impressive. He’d been practicing breathing techniques so he could go longer without needing his inhaler. Stiles has no health issues and was barely keeping up with him. He started to join in Scott's hope of being off the bench. Maybe not the first line, but he was good enough to be on the field. Stiles was considering becoming a cheerleader, getting signs and things. It seemed like his friend didn’t need the assurance, but maybe it’d be nice to boost his friend's little self-esteem. 

They were planning to grab lunch at a burger place nearby. Scott went to the bathroom while Stiles looked for a good place to sit. He spotted an empty table when an older woman nearly walked into him. He took a quick step back; “I’m sorry.” He said reflexively and moved out of her way. She blinked several times, looked at him, and the spot in the walk he just opened for her.

“Are you speaking to me, hun?” She asked. She sounded ancient, the original grandma voice. “Yes, ma’am.” He said. 

“You can see me?” 

“Yes… ma’am?” This time it was more of a question. She clapped her fingers in delight, “Really! Oh well, isn’t this just perfect!” She exclaimed. “Ma’am?”

“My name is Elizabeth Howard, and I have a favor to ask of you.” 

Stiles was a little shit at the best of times but she looked so relieved that he was there and he really wanted to help her. There was a prickle of something in the back of his head telling him something, but he couldn’t fully grasp it.

He motioned for her to join him at the booth he’d picked. “How can I help?” He asked, and she somehow managed to brighten further. 

She pointed at the woman and the front register. “That’s Eliza, she’s my granddaughter. The only family I have left. She got everything in my will, including a small family heirloom. It’s a diamond pendant my mother gave me before my wedding.” She explained, and Stiles was getting more confused the longer she went on. “She’s getting married to Hannah in two weeks. I need you to tell her that the necklace box is in the false back of her office drawer.”

Just as he was about to ask why she couldn’t, Scott slid into the seat. Stiles nearly screamed before he was shocked and silent.

The part of Elizabeth’s body that touched Scott was translucent. He took a long, slow blink, and she was suddenly standing to the side of them. “Thanks so much, hun,” she chirped and walked back towards her granddaughter. 

He replayed the words in his head again; ‘Ukaż mi to, co ukazane być musi’ (Show me that which must be revealed.) 

He definitely fucked up the brew.

–

 

She’d specifically told him that it was a difficult one to mess up. How the fuck did he mess up? He’d dropped off Scott and rushed home to read through it again–while replaying whatever the fuck he did. It was all perfect, he’d done everything according to the–

 

“Fuck me.” He groaned. It said “krwi” not “krew.” The former is used in phrases like ‘of blood’ and ‘from blood’, not actual blood, which is what “krew” is. How much longer could he see ghosts? He’d kept getting prickles of awareness as he and Scott walked to his Jeep. He’d been more than a little disappointed in discovering his mother wasn’t home. He was glad she’d passed and was living peacefully, but seeing her would’ve been amazing.

He’d been sitting when he had the beginnings of an idea. In some studies, coma patients are considered to be in the astropheric middle between death and life. Walking a thin line between the two. Maybe he could get some answers out of Peter.

 

---

 

He was more than a little smug when he entered the coma ward, for it was flooded with ghosts. He kept his eyes down, doing what he could to not meeting anyone's eyes. Not letting them know he could see them. After a while of not ignoring his senses, he could tell who was human and who wasn’t. He did his sneaking spy thing and ignored the fifty-something-year-old man who called him a pansy loser.

Entering Peter's room, he was surprised not to see him anywhere. The rest of the ghosts clearly had a distance limit to their bodies that only extended up to the hallway. Stiles stared at Peter's body, getting a prickle in the back of his neck that nearly stopped him in his tracks. 

It might be a new sensation, but Stiles would know it anywhere, and this feeling wasn't it. It was heavier and more intense. 

Peter wasn’t a ghost.

So far, every coma patient had one, even the ones deemed unresponsive, and Stile knew he could hear him.

Peter wasn’t a ghost, but he still wasn’t human.

Stiles felt panic rise inside him. He stopped walking in front of Peter's bed. He needed to calm himself down, and there was only one thing to do.

“Was your family like a badass crime family?” He asked in a tone that sounded more like Scott impersonating him than his own voice. “Did you have an evil crime family enemy? Because I seriously cannot figure out who would do this.”

His mind was still racing– what could Peter be? A vampire, a wizard…awake?

That would explain him not have a ghost. Then the familiar clickity-clack of his freaky savior. “Sorry, man. I have to–”

Peter was up and pinning him to the wall faster than Stiles could fight. One hand covered Stiles' mouth while the other shushed him with a finger of his own. Stiles was going to piss himself– he should’ve learned attack magic before anything else. His eyes were glowing a vibrant blue that looked deeply into his soul.

The door opened partway; “Close it, go home.” He ordered in a chilling calm. The woman hesitated–she couldn’t see who he was holding at her angle. Luckily (not for Stiles), she obliged and left the two of them alone.  

“Hello, Stiles,” The scared man smiled. “I think it’s high time we officially met, don’t you?”

Chapter 5: Intimidation Game

"If this is how you introduce yourself, I’ll pass.” He grunted out, and Peter tightened his grip; “Y'know you have great motor skills for the guy who's supposed to be drooling on his pillow.” 

“Says the one trespassing,”

“I didn’t hear you complaining,” he snaps, “Or your creepy nurse.”

Peter blinks; “I thought that was just me.” 

“She has dead fish eyes,” Stiles states. Peter hummed in quiet agreement. Then, just as suddenly, he released him. Stiles dropped to the ground in a gangly heap, barely catching himself on his elbow before he could completely faceplant and deal with another nosebleed this month. He glared up at the man above him. 

Peter rolled his eyes heavenward like Stiles was the issue. “For the record, I was going to keep up the coma shtick. Then you came into this room smelling like you were hit by a lightning bolt.” Peter chuckled.

“And you knew I knew.”

Peter smiled faintly. The tension in his jaw suggested that even that small smirk hurt. He shifted to lean back against the bed, the momentary display of strength clearly fading.

“You’re a lot smarter than you look,” he muttered.

“That’s not a compliment,” Stiles said. “From me it is.” Peter's smirk remained, and he looked way too tired to have that expression on his face.

“Are you going to kill me?”

“Do I look like I could?” Peter asked. Amusement giving way to an underlying frustration, Stiles has seen before. He took a deep breath, steadying his mind– he’d never been good at it before, but he’d been less jumpy since he drank the potion. 

Peter looked wrecked. Drawn and gaunt like he’d used all of his strength in a temporary display of power that didn’t even do him enough to keep Stiles afraid for long. He was leaning on the edge of the bed, and his burn scars looked like they hurt to move. Stiles was up and leading him back to his bed before he knew what he was doing. 

Stiles inhaled slowly. He felt… weird. Clearer than he had in weeks. Focused. Not calm, exactly, but steady. The potion, maybe. Or adrenaline. Or just the fact that Peter looked more wrecked than rabid.

Without thinking, Stiles moved toward him. Not to fight — not even to run. Just… to help.

He slipped one arm under Peter’s, bracing him as he half-lowered, half-guided him back to the hospital bed. “Was scaring me really worth doing this to yourself?” he asked, not really expecting an answer.

Peter snorted, sinking onto the mattress. “I’m nothing if not a thespian.” His smile didn’t reach both sides of his face.

“You’re a drama queen and a werewolf. Good to know,” Stiles muttered.

Peter exhaled through his nose, slowly. Watching him.

“And you,” he said softly, “have magic.”

Stiles froze mid-step. His eyes narrowed. “I… guess?”

Peter’s head tilted. Just a little. “You… guess .”

“It’s new, okay?” Stiles snapped. “Last time I did something magical, I ended up seeing ghosts all day. I’m still figuring it out.”

Peter was quiet again. This time, he wasn’t watching him like prey — more like a puzzle. His eyes flicked to the IV, the machines, the false stillness of the room.

“You’ve been looking into the fire,” he said. Not a question. He heard every thought Stiles had about it since he first came to bother the man. Stiles nodded. “Nothing adds up.”

“What did you say again? No accelerant found.” Peter’s voice was flat. “No origin point. No one charged.”

“The files were sloppy,” Stiles said. “Even my dad doesn’t know why.”

Peter let that settle. His fingers flexed slightly against the blanket, stiff.

“Have you ever heard of the Argent family?”

Stiles frowned. “No. Should I have?”

“Old name. Old money. Moved out of town just before the fire. Not hunters in any legal sense, but… they keep old traditions.”

“What kind of traditions?”

Peter looked at him. “The kind that ends with houses full of werewolves and human children burning to the ground.”

Stiles blinked. Once. “…Subtle.”

Peter almost smiled. “I didn’t say it was them. But if someone were organizing a purge, they’d have the means. The cover. The reputation. And last I heard they were already leaving town as it happened.”

“You’re not asking for help,” Stiles said, staring at him.

“No.”

“But you’re sure as hell laying out the path like you want me to walk it.”

Peter didn’t deny it.

“Look into them,” he said simply. “Just look. The names of the other man—I think you're right about those four, but there has to be at least one link to that family.”

Stiles didn’t say yes. But he didn’t say no either.

He left the room in silence, mind already spinning. Peter didn’t watch him go—just leaned back into his pillow, a faint, unreadable expression tugging at his scarred mouth. It was the scars and the fact that this was a real-life werewolf that got him saying what he said what he did. 

“I can help with the burns.” He regretted it the moment he said it.

Peter looked dubious and unconvinced at best. “And how would you manage that?” He asked.

Stiles—being already too far in—thought it over. “I can make something, it’ll relieve the pain and you’ll sleep for a really long time, but it could help speed run the healing process.” Peter, somehow, looked even more dubious than before.

“Maybe next time.” He muttered.

Stiles was more than a little relieved than he wanted to admit. He’d confirmed everything he’d read in those books was true; he was going to absorb everything he possibly could. Werewolves were real, and apparently so were hunters. Once comfortable with murdering children. 

Peter might be an asshole but he was a victim nonetheless. “Does your creepy nurse have a phone?” He asked. 

“She does, but so do I,” Peter almost mumbled. He looked like he was going to pass out. Stiles grabbed the notepad he’d been carrying around like a noir investigator and slipped his number under the man's pillow.

“Do me a favor and keep fish eyes away from me,” Stiles muttered, leaving out of the window anyway.

 

Chapter 6: Lessons In Everything

He didn’t get a call, but he learned Peter was a prolific texter.

It was kinda bizarre when he thought too long about it. He was certain Peter wanted the people responsible dealt with, and it was what Stiles wanted, too. People like that shouldn’t be allowed to interact with the rest of society. 

Immediately after the last visit with Peter Stiles started reading every one of his mother's books from front to back and vice versa. That, along with the little-to-no progress on figuring out anything on the Argents, took the rest of his summer away from him in a flash. Scott was still nonstop practicing for lacrosse as if they didn’t have until after winter break to get ready. 

Stiles was two weeks away from school starting all over again and as the Mccall’s went to Texas to meet up with Melissa’s side of the family he wasn’t being constantly plagued with the desire to leave the magical shit behind and hang out with Scott like he was when his friend was around—Skype calls not withstanding.

Stiles made a list of everything the books told him he could do.

 

• Protective amulet and talismans

• Spoken incantations or Power words

• Rituals and summonings

• Protective symbols and sigils

• Enhancement runes

• Elemental Invocation

 

There were more things, but these seemed like the easiest to learn without having someone else teach him. He’d been meditating like every book suggested, and the stillness and calm he experienced after making that first potion were gone. He’d been overly twitchy–more than before–ever since it wore off. The day he’d told Eliza about the necklace, he’d been a jumpy, fidgety mess, and the Adderall was barely helping anymore. 

So here he was trying to wrangle up all of that excess energy into lighting the candle he placed in front of him. The buzzing had become a constant around Stiles. Ever Present and always buzzing–it was quiet after that first tonic. He’d learn it was because potions like that needed to be imbued with magic to work. 

He’d sat in the middle of his room, legs crossed, eyes closed, for over thirty minutes when the buzzing got the smallest bit quieter. Stiles felt the smile on his face before he opened his eyes, and it dropped completely. 

The candle wasn’t lit. Or standing anymore. It was a melted pile of wax that he was wondering how he was going to get out of his carpet. “That's tomorrow's Stiles problem.” He mutters, immediately moving on to ‘Enhancement runes’.

He’d practiced writing them when he worked on his Polish writing. There were several symbols that he wanted to work on, but three mainly stuck out to him. Realistically, he couldn’t get a tattoo, his father would actually kill him. Good news was he’d found something called henna. Its origins lay in Egyptian and Indian cultures, so he wasn’t entirely sure it would work. He’d not been entirely sure if to access his magic he’d be allowed to use things of various historical backgrounds or if it didn’t matter.

He didn’t want his dad to see it and start asking questions, so he wrote out the first symbol on his thigh and colored it in. He had to wait for it to draw and peel off the outer layer to see the surprisingly intact black design underneath. 

He knows he has to imbue magic into it and winces at the sitting and focusing he’s going to have to do. It isn’t like in the movies when the character is suddenly channeling power through themselves. It's the energy already inside him. The energy he’s always had that made him spastic, and fidgety. The energy that made his brain run at a thousand miles an hour, unable to stay on a single topic for too long when it came to school, and hyper-focused on things other people thought were weird.  

And ever since he found the books and became aware of the energies swirling around him, and the consistent and incessant buzzing. It only goes away if he uses a lot of his abilities. That’s the only thing that makes sense. He was calm and concentrated the rest of the day–he didn’t even need to take his Adderall. 

“This is some Percy Jackson ADHD equals magic bullshit.” He muttered as he got back into the position he was in before. Trying to be self-taught while also only having the training sequences from Star Wars and that one time he watched Karate Kid as reference, wasn’t the most confidence building endeavor he’d thought it would be.

The boring process of letting magic out the way he wanted took another hour before the buzzing got quieter and the Uruz symbol worked.

According to the books, once a symbol of power can sustain itself when attached to a living vessel. Like a magical parasite. Stiles snorted before it dawned on him how creepy it was. The symbol should increase strength, stamina, and speed. If it worked, maybe he and Scott might actually make the first line. He’d have to figure out how long it would last. The henna fades after two weeks but maybe the abnormality of this would keep it around longer.

Maybe he could use magic help Scott get rid of his asthma… and he had the perfect Ginny Pig. 

 

---

 

“No.” 

“Why not?” Stiles asked.

Peter just gave him his own personal amalgamation of Nurse Jennifer’s dead fish eyes. “I have my own plans to heal faster,” He didn’t elaborate.

“Ah, yes. Your secret kinda suspicious plan that you won’t tell me about.” Stiles mocked. “I can help.”

“Please, in the short time I've known you, you’ve botched a potion and told me you hear voices.” 

“Buzzing,” Stiles corrected. “I said, buzzing. It’s not really hearing—it's more feeling it. Also, I have a new theory about that.” He started and went into a detailed explanation on how he thinks it’s a way for his magic manifests itself. “I think the buzzing is electricity,” He admitted. Peter looked at him for a good long while. Searching, for any hit of Stiles bluffing for messing with him. After several seconds of silence Peter closed his eye content to ignore the sheriffs son until he left.

Stiles is suspicious of most people at the best of times and still hadn’t told Peter about his books. The man had to guess he was using something to learn, but Stiles never mentioned them, and he never asked. Peter was the closest link he had to the supernatural, and even the unsubtle threats and less than vague mentions of past actions couldn’t deter him.

Stiles thought it was the scars.

They humanized Peter in a way that kept reminding Stiles of what the man had lost. It also reminded Stiles that Peter wasn’t entirely sane. It was obvious he was struggling, and he’d recognized the violent outburst Peter displayed when they first spoke wasn’t entirely voluntary. He’d usually been calm, but every so often, he’d grab Stiles' wrist too hard or show his eyes and teeth to get the boy to shut up. 

Stiles didn’t think Peter wouldn't hurt him, but if he wanted his help, the chances were much lower. 

‘I wanna preface what I’m about to say–”

“Oh, here we go,” Peter mumbled, eyes still shut.

Stiles ignored him; “– I'm not calling you crazy.”

“I think it's an apt description,”

Stiles ignored him even harder, “But the full moon is coming out tomorrow, and that’ll be the best time for me to help you at least move around without enduring excruciating pain.” Stiles shrugged, “And hey, maybe being out and about doing your werewolf thing will calm you down.”

Peter had told about the times he’d run with his family on full moons. He hadn’t meant to, but it was one of those rare fuses stated the boy had caught him in. 

Peter sighed long-sufferingly, like Stiles was a child who wouldn’t let their relative leave the tea party until they drank the probably dishwater tea. 

“What did you have in mind?” He asked, finally opening his eyes. Stiles fell out of his seat and hopped up so he stood over Peter, accidentally giving the man the creepiest smile he’d seen on a face not his own.

 

Chapter 7: Lunar Enhancements

Notes:

Posting Early this week! Still going to add another chapter for this wednesday!

Stiles wasn’t stupid. He’d picked up on Werewolf lore as soon as Peter told him what he was. He’d also made sure he warded the shit out for both his and Scott’s homes before willingly fixing the man in front of him. 

A stupid person wouldn’t do those very intelligent things. 

They would, however, go into the woods after helping sneak and a slightly unstable (both mentally and figuratively) man-wolf on the full moon. 

“Are you sure this is going to work?” Peter asked. Stiles stared as Stiles laid out everything he was planning to use. It was a lot in comparison to the whole ghost whisperer incident. 

“...Yeah,” Stiles said as he checked his watch. He needed to start now if he was going to make it before it was too late. “You don’t sound certain,” Peter chided.

“I’m never certain. Have you met me?” The other man rolled his eyes, and Stiles began brewing. He was extra careful when translating this time around in fear of repeating such a dumb mistake. He was midway through the brew when he asked, 

“I need your name.”

“You know my name.” Peter huffed.

“No. I need you to tell me your full name. I need to hear it from you,” Stiles clarified. 

“What are you, the Fea?” Peter chuckled.

“They’re real!?” He asked. Nearly sloshing the mixture over the rim. Peter sighed, “Yes, Stiles. The fea is real.” 

Stiles spluttered. “You gotta tell me about them.”

“Tell me why you need me to say my name.”

“I’m using it to tie you to the spell. It’s either that or blood, and better not to include blood in healing practices unless unavoidable or desperate.” He explained.

“What about another guy named Peter Hale? Won’t he hear it?”

“Peter Hale,” Stiles repeated. Peter felt a charge begin to build as a chill ran down his spine. Stiles noticed and smiled, “Apparently, names are all said in a unique way and the only way to say them correctly is to respect the named.” Stiles finished and stood. He helped Peter to where he drew the symbols with spray paint. 

He laid the older man down and moved into his position. “It’s not long now, tell me when you feel the pull of the moon.”

Peter hummed in agreement, and Stiles began to pool in energy. He begins the chanting in his head until Peter says he feels it. 

Stiles gets the ink and smears it on the man's forehead. The kolovrat symbol is there as he focuses on lighting the candles around him. It’s slow as they light one at a time.

He’s killing two birds with one stone, seeing how much power is his limit. So far, so good. 

“W ciemności kiełkuje światło. W bólu rośnie siła.”

“W ciemności kiełkuje światło. W bólu rośnie siła.”

“W ciemności kiełkuje światło. W bólu rośnie siła.” Stiles embuses power into each and every word.

He hears Peter inhale as the charging energy reaches a boiling point. He grabs the brew and begins putting the paste directly on any burns the man has. He watches as his body jump-starts as it makes contact with the paste.

His hands are slowly but surely shifting into claws, and hair is growing where it wasn’t before. As much as Stiles wants to scream and make a run for it the calm already has him. It’s like his soul needs him to finish. He begins;

  “Siły stare, słuchajcie mnie —
Peter Hale ma się uleczyć. W to, co prawdziwe. W to, co zostało utracone.

Złe duchy — precz, ale nie złoszczę się.
Ból i cierpienie precz, ale nie powracajcie nocą.

Niech zostanie tylko życie…
i niech nie będzie nic więcej.”

 

Peter hasn’t made a sound up til that point. Like the energy flowing into him, the energy that Stiles was enchanted by before his roar refocused him. The power he’d been pulling wasn’t his, he noted. He was sure he’d channeled it from somewhere, given his own wasn’t tapped much.

The buzzing was low but still there.

Peter was writhing, like he was being electrocuted. His hands were bigger than the night he’d scared Stiles. Large and the skin under deep brown– nearly black fur was leathery in how it looked. Peter’s alarmingly blue eyes were unsettling. What was more unsettling was the partially humanoid, monstrous look the other man was sporting.

Stiles guessed this was how all werewolves were supposed to look, and a part of him was surprised Hugh Jackman's portrayal was the closest. “Wanna watch Van Helsing after this?” He asked, and those terrifying eyes focused on him. 

Stiles mentally cursed himself for being so slow on the uptake. 

The roar tore through the trees. Peter was no longer human. His body twisted, muscles bulging under thick, dark fur. His claws shredded bark, his eyes glowed blue fire—pure, uncontrollable rage.

Stiles froze for a heartbeat, then sprinted.

Paying the rune on his side worked. He was relieved as he began to make good time back to his jeep without being as tired as he would’ve been. The short-lived relief was quickly dropped for good-old-fashioned terror as Peter got so close so fast he felt his hot breath on his neck. Stiles assumed the man was going to bite his head off and vaulted his entire body to the side just as Peter’s giant fanged mouth closed over where his head used to be.

Stiles isn’t one to work well under pressure, so sue him for not remembering any of the really scary innovations. “ Wichr, zerwij więzy, zmiażdż słabość w pył.”

Sharp and harsh winds whipped Peter’s large body into a clump of trees not twenty feet away, giving Stiles another few seconds to think, while running like a bat out of hell. Apparently the rune isn’t entirely functional as he trips on whatever bullshit was on the ground.

Scrambling up as fast as he can Stiles feels something wet sliding down his hand; “Fuck,” He groaned seeing the deep gash and trying to not let the exhaustion take over him as whatever the rune was doing wans’t enough to keep hin running. 

Until it hit him.

His scared, slightly manic brain handed him a solution on a silver platter, and not too late if the roar behind him was any indication. 

He cupped his hand and picked four trees pretty decently spaced away from each other. Using the blood and trying not to cry out in pain as he rubbed all four of them with his blood. He stood in the middle of all four of them.

He practiced the words under his breath as the rabid beast charged at him. Only when he was close enough did Stiles step away. “ Korzenie wstają, krew wiąże mocno, —” He finished as Peter was fully in between the four trees . “ — Zatrzymaj cień, niech nie ucieknie nocą.”

Peter’s body slammed against an invisible force keeping him inside. He writhed and slammed to no avail. Stiles was breathing heavily. The buzzing was gone, and the calm was setting back in without adrenaline there to keep it away. 

“This better fucking work.” He muttered, walking back to pack their belongings away.

 

Notes:

Translations if Google is correct: In darkness sprouts light. In pain grows strength. (W ciemności kiełkuje światło. W bólu rośnie siła.)

"Old forces, hear me! Peter Hale is to be healed. Into what is true. Into what was lost. Evil spirits be gone, but do not grow angry. Pain and suffering be gone, but do not return by night. Let only life remain… and let there be nothing more." (This is the other invocation.)

Gale, tear the bonds, crush weakness to dust (Wichr, zerwij więzy, zmiażdż słabość w pył.)

Roots rise, blood binds tight, hold the shadow, let it not escape by night. (Korzenie wstają, krew wiąże mocno, Zatrzymaj cień, niech nie ucieknie nocą.)

Chapter 8: Intense Information

Notes:

Peter’s wolf form is just how he looked in season one.

Stiles was going insane.

 

Well no. Scratch that Peter was going to make Stiles go insane. 

 

He was sitting in Stiles' car with nothing on aside from a blanket and monopolizing the rear-view mirror.

“God. I am beautiful,” He said for what felt like the millionth time. 

“And humble.” Stiles huffed. “Who needs humility when they look like this?” 

“People whose first words when they shift back isn’t ‘Thank you, Stiles.’” He nagged. “Or, ‘i’m so sorry for not telling you all werewolves look like goddamn Fenrir’–

“You know Fenrir?” Peter inquired

Stiles pretended he never spoke; “ — Not a single, ‘Thank god you're alive!’”

“I’m very glad you’re alive. I hear blood-magic is near impossible to undo if the user is dead.” He snarked. 

“You glib mother-fucker,” 

“Good lord.” Peter groaned. “Good job on doing what you said you would Stiles. You set a goal and accomplished it. Congratulations.”

“Wow– just anything aside from actually saying the words.” 

“You get what you get,” He hummed. They sat in silence for several seconds; “We don’t all look like that,” Peter said.

“What?” Stiles asked.

“We don’t all look like that,” He repeated. “That form was new… whatever was in that spell of yours didn’t just heal me— it supercharged me. Sometimes werewolves take on a form that reflects them as a person.” He said, his voice tinged with a slight awe. “This does change a lot of my plans though.”

“Like which plans?” Stiles asked, trying to ignore Peter’s form being a Vanhelsing wannabe. He was also hoping to finally get some look inside this man's head.

“Well I was going to lure my niece and kill her for her power.” Peter said, like it was fucking normal.

Stiles took a deep breath and counted to three; “Don’t tell me shit like that.”

“I thought you’d appreciate the honesty.”

“I’d appreciate it more if we weren’t in a moving vehicle that I can’t escape.” Stiles complained.

“I should be the one scared for my safety— the things you can do… frightening.” He chuckled and the younger only rolled his eyes in response.

“While I have you— have you ever heard of Micheal Unger and Jacob Reddick?” Nothing changed on Peter’s face from what Stiles could gather. “No. Are they important?” 

Stiles nodded his head toward the backseat and Peter reached for the files. Opening it and flipping through the pages. He looked up and he motioned for Stiles to turn left. “Why?” He asked. 

“Jessica was maintaining a property for me. I have clothes, and other essentials there.” He explained and gave the rest of the directions. He went quiet when he finally took a look at the mug shots, “Suspects?” He asked, so quietly Stiles almost couldn’t hear him. 

“Yeah. You recognize em’?” 

“I watched as they added fuel to an already burning fire— as my family died around me.” He said. Louder than before but still barely over a whisper. “We’ll find them. See who hired them— which of the Argents were responsible and get them all locked up.” That was the best he could do for comfort.

They parked and entered a nice— really nice holy shit— apartment that seemed too big to belong to just one person. “Christ— how much is the rent?” 

“I own it,” The man answered. It was modern and neatly decorated. He entered his room and by the gods above he found muffins. They were the crappy unhealthy store bought ones he’d never let his father touch with a ten foot pole but they worked. Peter exited his room dressed and with an absurd amount of hair product in his hair. He gave both the box and Stiles a look of contempt and sat across from him.

“I have no intention of having them arrested,” He stated. 

Stiles managed to cough and splutter at the same time. He sped up the chewing and swallowed down the larger than average lumps.

“Then why have I been investigating this?” He asked. 

“Because, we’re going to kill them.” Peter’s nonchalance was really starting to bug him.

“I feel like this shoulda been orientation material.” Stiles quipped. “Because then you would have realized I’m not willing to kill anyone.” He finished.

“Eight people died in the fire.” He started, which visibly confused Stiles because outside of peter only seven other people were there. “Talia; my sister, Ben; her husband, Maria; our mother, and Oliva; my fiance. They were the adults that died that night. Only two of the four were werewolves.”

Stiles’ father always told him that when he investigated he tried to maintain an empathetic distance. Because he knew himself well enough that if he got attached to every case he would’ve quit early on in his career. Stiles had seen the times his father had gotten too close to a case. Usually when a child was involved he'd always hug Stiles just that much together when he left for work. 

This was the first time anyone put names to the people that died in that fire. He’d alway heard ‘the victims’ or the ‘hale family’ but never all of their names. 

“Oliva was my fiance… we were set to get married in july. She was only there because of me. I dragged her along to the Hale house because I found out she was pregnant and didn’t want her too far out of my sight. She wasn’t even aware yet.” His voice was struggling to stay steady. One hand was clenched, the other was shaking. Stiles felt his stomach bottom out, bile creeping up and the buzzing he thought he wouldn’t have for a while spreading through his body. 

“Out of Nick, Aaron, and Cora; the only one that was even showing signs of being a werewolf was Aaron. Cora was too young and Nick was human.” 

Peter finally stopped focusing on the wall behind Stiles and looked him in the eyes. The buzzing intensified. Like it could feel Peter’s anger and it wanted to use it to grow. Stiles could feel a similar anger coursing through him— like they were connected.

If it were his mother— or god forbid something like that happened to his father, or Scott or Melissa. He’d be more than willing to kill the ones responsible. If it’s just them— just those four, he’ll help. “Just the people that are responsible?” He asked.

As small tension in Peter’s should relax just the slightest bit. “And any hunters that might try and kill us after we start.”

“We’ll deal with that when he gets to that. Answer the question.” 

“Yes, only those responsible.”

Stiles stared into the man's eyes for a good long while. He wasn’t sure what else the spell had done to the man but he seemed more stable than before. Stiles nodded and motioned to the door; “It’s almost six. We need to get you back.”

Peter shook his head; “No need— that’s already been dealt with.” 

“What do you mean?” Stiles asked. 

“I mean my nurse has already facilitated my ‘transfer’ to a different state at the request of a fictional family member.” 

“Why?” 

“Well after getting the possibility of getting completely healed I thought it was best to let people assume I was still—” He did his blank coma stare and Stiles couldn't hold back a snort. “Right. Won’t someone realize your accounts are active?”

“My legal ones won’t be active and the others—” He chuckled, “No one’s connecting those to me.” 

“So I was right with the crime family guess. Holy shit! Werewolf crime family!” Stiles ignored the eye roll the man shot his way and thought through the logistics. 

“So the alphas like the Don or the Mob boss—”

“Jesus christ.” Peter groaned.

“Then I'm assuming she had like a right and left hand—?” Stiles was going over the power structures in his head. “You seem more left hand— y'know. Ruthless, intimidating… but you also seem like you’d be the leader of a cult with that scary psychopathic charisma!”

“I would have made a wonderful cult leader.” He sighed. Stiles glanced at the time and hopped up. “My dad’s getting home soon I gotta go. Try not to kill anyone.”

Stiles was halfway out the door when the older man grumbled “No promises.”

Notes:

At this point, I'd say it's around Early November. If that doesn't make sense... opps

Chapter 9: Temporary Avoidance

School wasn’t great for two goofy idiots that had less than stellar social skills. The first month went by at a snail's pace and Stiles was sitting behind Lydia fucking Martian. Well— behind adjacent. She sat in front of Scott and when they tried to switch seats Mr. Latch said all seating was permanent for the entire semester. 

Scott gave him the equivalence of a puppy’s ‘i’m sorry’ eyes and all was fine not five seconds later. The magic was the only good thing going in his life as the practice he’s been putting in is starting to catch up. The issue with the rune he discovered was how much power he put in it in the first place. It’s supposed to charge up gradually and instead he’d done it all at once after he finished drawing it, not as he was going. 

That specific peace of lore pissed him off for a solid two days. 

He wasn’t bringing any of his mothers books to class– contrary to popular belief he wasn’t a complete idiot but he did have a small journal with the more complicated invocations in it. 

So whenever he wasn’t doing anything important or paying attention in class (which was often) he was looking for a reason why those spells weren’t working for him. The bell rang and he was saved from ripping his hair out.

“Mr. Stilinski!” Mr. Latch called out. He and Scott made eye contact in startled confusion. “Since whatever you were reading looked more important than the lecture, maybe wiping down the chalkboard will help you soak up some of the formulas.” Stiles didn’t roll his eyes, he just really wanted to. 

Scott stepped up to help but the teacher waved him off, “Mr. McCall, get to your next class. This is his job.” 

Scott gave him an apologetic shrug and Stiles threw him a thumbs up. His teacher left the classroom with instructions for Stiles to be gone and done by the time he got back. 

So Stiles did what he was told and started erasing— it wasn’t a hard job, just tedious. Which led to a voice in his head reminding him he had fucking magic and didn’t need to lift a goddamn finger if he was smart about it. 

Levitation seemed like a basic skill for someone with the abilities but either what he tried to do didn’t budge or he lost control of it immediately. Stiles looked at the empty classroom and the mostly empty hallway and muttered, “What the hell?”

He took several steps back and focused on the eraser and rather than using the long and flashy words he’d read on the pages he just said what felt natural; “Odrzuć grawitację i ugnij się pod moją wolą”

Nothing happened for a beat before it shot up onto the board and started frantically wiping the board down. “Yes! I’m a fucking genius!” He cheered. His victory dance was halted before it even began. 

“What the hell?” Shit.

The eraser fell instantly and Stiles moved forward to finish wiping everything down. Maybe ignoring the problem would make it go away. “What the hell was that?” The voice— Jackson’s voice, asked a little louder.

Stiles turned a quizzical look to the other boy, “What was what?” He asked, in the feigned nonchalance Peter could usually get away with. Apparently it didn’t work as well for him. Jackson looked at him like he’d grown three heads. Stiles, finally done, put the eraser down and picked up his bag. 

“You know exactly what I'm talking about!” He was loud again, but unsure and Stiles capitalized on that immediately. “I really don’t, man. Are you feeling okay?” 

“I just saw—”

“Jackson, did you get my phone?” Lydia asked and looked between the two of them. Stiles spied her phone on her chair and moved to the door. “Maybe you should see the nurse man.” He added and prayed Coach didn’t throttle him for being so late. 

—

Stiles could and would avoid Jackson until the end of time. It wasn’t that difficult, in fact he wasn’t even trying for the last week and he was doing awesomely. The issue was now the guy stared at him— like a creepy amount. 

“What did you do to him?” Scott asked, moving his body to sit directly between the other man's eyesight. Stiles had been lamenting on telling his best friend everything but the whole ‘i’m helping a guy get revenge for his murdered family, so he doesn’t go off the deep end and kill everybody’ line might mess up the coolness that is magic. 

“Wish I knew,” Stiles muttered. Once he and Peter were done, he’d tell Scott everything and he was going to help his friend if it’s the last thing he did. He and Scott tried to keep up normal conversation and Jackson eyed them like they were the parents he’d never met, when Peter sent him a message; 

ComaWolf: One down, lol. 

“Good lord,” Stiles muttered as the meaning of what he’d probably done sinking in. “What?” Scott asked. Stiles looked up, “Oh, ugh. My dad. He said I can’t sleep over. I didn’t finish my chores.”

Scott chuckled, “Oh course you did,” the boy stretched and began packing away his eaten lunch. “It’s fine. I was kind of hoping Deaton would let me stay late tonight and help with stitches.”

“Oh! Big man with a big needle.” Stiles huffed. “Shut up, you fainted the last time you got vaccinated.” 

Stiles nodded in a pathetic agreement. The bell rang and he joined his friend in a hurried shuffle to get to class. 

—-

“What did you do?” His father asked.

“What!?” Stiles flailed. “What makes you think I’ve done anything?”

His father looks between the bag Stiles brought him and his son. He raises an eyebrow without saying anything. Stiles rolls his eyes and plops the food down onto his fathers desk, “Calm down it’s not like I got you curly fries.” The Sheriff let out a disappointed grunt. 

“Anyways you were supposed to have tonight off,” His voice isn’t accusatory but clipped. His father knew the best way to distract his son and did resort to vague gossip to avoid nagging and lectures on mental burnout from his son.

“I did, but there was an animal attack in the backroads off of Sigmount.” His voice was hushed as he explained. Stiles truly wished his face wasn’t as open as it was, “What’s wrong?” The Sheriff asked.

“Nothing—just. Was anyone hurt?” He asked. His father nodded somberly, “A man changing his tire on the side of the road.” 

Stiles really had to work at not letting his face give anything away this time. The knock at the door had his father waving him off. “Drive safe, and actually get some studying in tonight, you and Scott need to cut back on the hours you play those games.” Stiles nodded and left his dad to speak with one of the Deputies. 

Stiles made his way out wrapping his head around Peter killing a guy— and how that wasn’t even the part that irritated him the most. It was the fact that he’d agreed to wait until they worked on a foul-proof plan. Maybe he had a plan and just wasn’t telling Stiles. 

“Stiles!” Brenda called. He turned to look at the newest deputy, she waved him over and gave him a relieved smile. “I really need the restroom, can you watch the desk for me?” She was already moving away, correctly assuming Stiles wouldn't say no. He’d been around so often they all knew him. 

Not even a second later one of the most gorgeous women Stiles had even seen in his life walked in. She had long dark brown hair and a smile that nearly blinded him. “Hi.” She said, 

Stiles was certain he’d swallowed his tongue, his mouth opened and closed several times before she took amused pity on him and asked, “Is Sheriff Stilinski in?” Stiles, his brain finally adjusting to reality, “Yeah!” He answered a little too excitedly. “He’s talking with one of the Deputies if you wanna wait.” She nodded and Stiles got ready to let his dad know someone was waiting for him. “Who should I say is waiting?”

“Laura Hale.” 

Stiles is amazing with how he didn’t freeze, only hit his head against the phone a little too hard. Thank god that’s when his dad answered. “Yeah.”

“Yo, pops there's Laura Hale wanting to talk to you.” 

She shivered and Stiles wondered if anyone in the Hale clan had a middle name. 

“Stiles why are you at the front desk?” 

“Brenda asked me to watch it. Are you busy or not?” 

“Send her in and go,” He gave his father a noncommittal ‘mhm’ and smiled an admittedly goofy smile at the werewolf in the room. “Go ahead, it's the door with ‘Sheriff’ on it.” 

“Huh, wouldn’t have guessed.” she said walking past him. 

Once Brenda was back Stiles B-lined it out of here to have words with a shapeshifting manic.

Chapter 10: Old friends, New friends, Dead friends.

From what he’s read, good and evil is considered a philosophical delusion that has nothing to do with real magic. The only thing that matters is nature, and apparently Mother Nature’s a bitch. Things like Karma isn’t as a kin to justice as Stiles assumed.

Karma is about natural consequences– not moral or emotional but neutral. Karma isn’t a living thing; it's the rippling consequences of past actions. It's basically the saying that ‘you’ll receive what you put out to the world’. If it won’t get you it’ll get your bloodline or a subjected afterlife. Stiles has never been religious so he’d scoffed at that part. Justice can be human or divine. When karma’s wheels are going too slow it’s common among supernatural creatures— especially lycanthropes— to take revenge so seriously. Usually the ripples won’t get you if you’re the one counteracting a karmic effect. That’s how you stay in the grey, but again, that’s only what the books say.

None of the books held much about supernatural creatures, most of the information being just vague notes between the margins in scribbled polish. ‘Jan killed a Zmora with this!’ and ‘Halina burned six ghouls!’ under a fire spell.

They always made him smile, learning new things about his ancestors.

What he’d mostly learned was that they were ruthless. Nor did they discriminate. Human, Werewolves, Vampires— anything. If they became a threat they were dealt with swiftly. He’d even found a record of a family of hunters that his ancestors publicly executed. There was a mention of a respected vampire being their victim. One of his relatives going as far as writing out a bunch of nearly unreadable chicken scratch ranting about how the vampire owed him a cow. Maybe? The guy had awful handwriting. All this to say he understood where Peter was coming from but killing every suspect even with the proof they had only hurts their case in figuring out who led the charge.

Stiles shook his head trying to get his brain to focus on what was important.

‘Porządek.’

His mothers maiden name. The last name of almost everyone mentioned in the book. ‘Peacekeepers,’ is the closest direct translation.

That was always how they referred to themselves. It took Stiles longer than he liked to realize they were speaking in the first person but grammar was hard. Especially when the person writing is shit at it. He was sitting in Peter’s apartment after letting himself in. He had no idea where the man was given he’d just gotten out of the hospital. He was memorizing a shield spell he’d written on in his hand in case his confrontation turned into an argument.

“Why are you mumbling to yourself in the dark?” Peter asked. Stiles, not having heard the man in the slightly jerked so hard he flopped onto the floor. “Christ, Sparky! Do I have to put a bell on you?”

The man only rolled his eyes, “Dog jokes are so last year. Like your clothes.” He looks at Stiles up and down in the same disinterested mildly disgusted fashion Lydia did when she deemed to look at him. “Are you color blind?” This question sounds genuine and that somehow hurt his feelings worse.

“No?” Stiles said, looking down at his outfit.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes!” He huffed, both arms flailing upwards in exasperation. Peter eyed his outfit in the same way a parent would look at their child covered in peanut butter and a light came into his eye. A light that Stiles had come to recognize as the ‘batshit crazy’ lightbulb in his head.

“Come with me.” Peter announced.

“What? No!” Stiles exclaimed while following behind the quickly retreating back of a murder werewolf.

“I have an idea and it’ll kill two birds with one stone.” Peter said.

“Is that your non subtle way of telling me you're going to bash me in the head with a brick?” Stiles asked as they were getting into an elevator. So far he’d not seen any neighbors on Peter’s floor. He’d seen people in passing on the ground level and the parking garage but so far Peter was the only renter for the fourth level.

“Surprisingly enough, no.” Peter chirped. Stiles was mentally going over the rolodex of defensive spells he’d been slowly but surely been memorizing in case he needed to use them against Peter. But the issue with that was they weren’t consistently reliable. Sometimes it would take too long to focus and get his magic to behave, other times the magic would collapse on itself if he didn’t put in the right amount of power or blow up if he used too much. He found himself being best with ritual magic or anything he could prepare ahead of time. 

Really learning and understanding Polish was the only thing really helping with oral spell casting. Apparently his use of his mother’s language when first learning was his way of picking a magical tongue. Those were the languages a magic user chose to speak their magic into existence. It was usually a second language because the art of familiarizing yourself with a new tongue opened your mind to learning new magic.

Spells that were solely vocal or mental were harder to manage, but times where he was allowed to slowly build up the power he needed and focus his will were usually more successful. Even the whole mostly ghostly situation was technically a success. The spell was altered but it worked how it should have just not how he wanted. So far the only time he’d been successful is when he’d changed the wording of a spell to suit his will.

He hesitated as Peter’s car and began to focus his magic in case the man really was planning to kill him. Peter rolled his eyes at Stiles' hesitation, “I assume that if you go missing there would be enough clues that will lead your father to me.” Peter asked, Stiles could hear the amusement in the man's voice. 

Stiles nodded, “That and I've been studying death curses. If I go down you're coming down with me,” He has been studying death curses. Not sure if he could even manage it but he’d most certainly die trying. “Hmm.” was all the other man said before sliding into the driver's seat. Stiles finished weighing his option and hopped into the seat next to him.

—-

“The mall?” Stiles asked, somehow even more suspicious than before.

“What do you think I'm going to do Stiles, kill you in front of a crowd?”

“More like kill me and the crowd.”

“I’m starting to think you're more paranoid than me,” Peter snorted.

“Says the guy regularly dosing himself with wolfsbane to build tolerance.” Peter tilted his head in a silent inquiry. “I was looking for my Twinkies when I found it in your spice cabinet.”

“Where are my twinkles, by the way?”

Peter shrugged and his sly self-satisfied grin appeared on his face, “I was peckish.”

Peter wasn’t even pretending to listen to Stiles opinion on the clothes he’d apparently be wearing. They were walking— well Peter was gliding from store to store, grabbing things making Stiles try them on. Stiles was too tired by the filth store to maintain a straight line for too long, especially with the weight he was carrying. Peter with werewolf super strength being absolutely no help whatsoever.

“Why are you doing this?” Stiles asked. The man had even gone so far as to pay for everything. It made Stiles' skin crawl to think he’d be indented to someone he didn’t fully trust.

“Think of me as your fairy godfather. Or! Stepfather! Your dad is single right?” Peter’s smile widened at the flash of annoyance that gleamed in Stiles eyes.

“I curse all of that hair of yours off your head. Hell you’ll look like a giant naked mole rat in your werewolf form.” With a roll of the eyes and still not a finger lifted to help Stiles carry the copious amount of bags burdening him Peter walked to the parking lot. Not so much as slowing down as the child behind him was panting.

“You should really take up running.” Peter said over his shoulder. He watched as the sunlight slowly but surely faded away into the horizon. He’d always made a spot out of shopping and it was a good way to keep Stiles preoccupied while also not having to see him dress in the worst possible way.

Peter stopped as a thought occurred to him. “Don’t you have increased stamina and strength with the temporary tattoo of yours?”

“The magic… and power… makes it… fade… faster.” He was taking in breaths as explained. “Would it do that to a real tattoo?” Peter asked genuinely interested. Stiles finally reached him and leaned on his car, Peter would give him until he could breath to push him off.

“Real tats are embedded into the skin, usually mixing blood with the magic and becoming a part of a person. So, no.”

Peter nods in understanding and motions for Stile to get off his car. “Put the clothes away,” He says and motions for Stiles to stop when the boy moves to open the trunk. “That’s full, put your things in the back seat.” He was giving Stiles yet another patronizing look and the boy promises to find a spell to torment the older man with.

“One more stop and we’ll be done for today.” Peter announces. Stiles rolls his eyes, “I do have school tomorrow, ya’know.”

“Whatever will become of you.” Peter mused, not taking anything Stiles says seriously.

Notes:

If anything seems familiar, yes I’ m re-reading the Dresden Files. If it doesn’t then please read the Dresden Files.

Chapter 11: In Relation To The Walking Dead

The car came to a halt when it became obvious they couldn’t keep driving through the unpaved road. There were too many trees way too close together for any car to get through. Stiles stared out the window trying to figure out why Peter brought him so deep into the forest. He was only coming up with one reasonable answer. 

 

“I’m not going to kill you.” Peter said without prompting. 

 

“How’d you know I was thinking that?” Stiles asked and cursed whichever god was around for the crack in his voice.

 

“You have no poker face.” He deadpanned, then in one sleek motion exited the car. Stiles fumbled with his door handle for a second or too before nearly falling out of the car. Peter was already at the open trunk. “This is what I wanted to show you.” He said and Stiles hurried to join him.

 

“What is— Ahhh!” Stiles’ eyes moved to the open trunk and met truly dead fish eyes.

 

“My nurse and I had a bit of a disagreement.” Peter pouted like her lifeless pale corpse was a minor inconvenience. “Why did—” Stiles started. “When did—” He took another breath. 

 

“What the fuck!?” He shouted. “You killed Jennifer!” He exclaimed.

 

Peter blinked, “I didn’t even know you knew her name.” 

 

“Of course I know her name!”

“You always called her dead eyes. I just made it literal.” He shrugged. 

 

Stiles paced for several seconds trying to get his breathing under control. “Please don’t have a breakdown in front of me, I wouldn’t know what to do with that.” 

 

A bark of slightly manic laughter bubbled up out of Stiles. It snapped him back to reality. He stopped pacing and spun back to Peter. 

 

“Explain.” Stiles demanded. 

 

Peter, clearly waiting for Stiles to regain his composure, obliged; “Before you healed me and did whatever you did to enhance my shifted form I had a plan to heal myself.” Stiles made a ‘hurry the fuck up’ motion because he already knew that part. 

 

“Remember how my plan was going to involve bringing my niece, Laura back to Beacon hill and killing her to become an alpha.” 

 

“She’s your family.” Stiles groaned, still weirded out by the plan.

 

“I wasn’t thinking straight.” Peter sighed. “All I wanted was power, revenge and to stop the constant agony I felt whenever I breathed too heavily.” 

 

“You don’t want those things now?” 

 

Peter put up three fingers and started checking things off, “Pain's gone,” — one finger down— “Have the power,” He motioned to both himself and Stiles, causing the younger man to raise his eyebrows in surprise. Peter had one finger left. 

 

“All there is, is revenge.” Stiles nodded in acknowledgement. 

 

“There’s also more than a little resentment of her leaving me in a hospital and moving across the country.” Peter added. 

 

“She was what? Eighteen?” Stiles replied.

 

“She was my alpha,” Peter answered coolly. “She was trained to take over for Talia since before she could walk. She knew what her leaving would’ve— did do to me.” Peter's temper slips had been few and far between after Stiles had healed him. But they still occasionally popped up.

 

 He pointed to Jennifer in a rush to keep the story moving, “When does her dying play into this?” He asked. Hearing his own voice made him want to recoil. He’d said it in such a flippant way like someone's death meant nothing. 

 

“The only reason she agreed to help me in the first place was with the promise I’d eventually turn her. When you healed me, I no longer had the need or want to kill Laura thus not becoming an alpha.”

 

“If you're not an alpha you can’t turn her into a wolf,” Stiles surmised. Peter laid out the basics of his wolfy nature. 

 

“Exactly.”

 

“But Laura’s in town,” Stiles said. Peter nodded, “That's why she’s dead. She sent over the evidence of the fire we were going to use to lure her here early to force us against each other. Not sure why she thought I’d change her after that.”

“You couldn’t have just scared her away?” Stiles asked.

 

“She threatened me.” Peter pouted again. Stiles rolled his eyes so hard he had to blink several times to get them back into focus. 

 

“Dude—” 

 

“I’m serious. She said if she wasn’t turned she was going to give me up to hunters.” He explained. 

 

Stiles scrunched up his face in a grimace. Not all the pieces were fitting in together– or they were fitting together too well. It might just be his paranoia talking but trusting Peter was never in the cards for him, “Oh.” Stiles grumbled.

 

“Yup.” Peter and Stiles stared down at the dead lady. “Still don’t know why you brought me here— with the body.” Stiles shivered. “Holy shit she was in the trunk the whole time!” He was aware somewhere in the back of his head he sounded like a toddler that just ate broccoli for the first time. But the whine in his voice couldn’t be helped.

 

“I wanted to turn this into a teaching moment.” Peter smiled.

 

“What, Body Disposal 101?” Stiles asked, he couldn’t keep the incredulity out of his voice.

 

“No— well kind of.” He lifted Jennifer with an ease Stiles would’ve liked to see when he was struggling to carry the shopping bags— “Wait did you take me shopping as a bribe?!” He accuses.

 

“More to soften the blow. Also I don’t like the idea of working with someone wearing a shirt with a stripper on it.” Stiles looked down at his shirt and rolled his eyes, closing the trunk he raced up to the man who was already pretty far away. 

 

“How do you even have money?” Stiles asked. He’d never gone over the logistics of Peter’s life. “Savings.”

“How do you have access?” Stiles asked.

“Not all my activities were legal before the fire.” 

 

“Weren't you a lawyer?”

 

“Exactly.” Peter put his nurse's body in the middle of two elaborate circles of etched runes Stiles recognized. Peter ignores the boys' repeated and constant guffaws at the sight. 

 

“Is this a—” Stiles started taking a step back. He shook his head in an attempt to speak. “This isn’t—” He tried again.

 

“Can you do magic?” Stiles asked. Peter scoffed. “Werewolves can only do certain kinds of magic,” He started. “But those talents usually lie with transmodification, or alchemy. The structures of magic within us won’t allow for anything too fluid.” 

 

“How’d you know how to set up a necromantic circle then!” Stiles shouted more than asked. There was not much in his books that forbad necromancy. Nothing aside from warning to only use that kind of magic while being watched over by several teachers or colleagues. That necromancy while useful at times was highly volatile because there was another side of the veil you needed to look out for. A side that wanted the caster— their power— their lifeforce, everything and that would take it by dragging the castor there by any means necessary.

 

“Calm down, it’s not deep necromancy, it's the little stuff.” Stiles scoffed at that, “Says the guy that's not doing the spell!”

“So you agree!” Peter grinned. Stiles was. Necromancy while terrifying looked like the most interesting thing all across his books. He wasn’t planning on killing anything to start experimenting but Dead ey— Jennifer was already dead. 

 

“Depends on the spell,” He lied. Judging from how Peter's grin sharpened he caught the leap in Stiles heartbeat. He was going to have to figure out a way around that. 

 

“I only need a bit of information. You see during our… confrontation I lost my temper. Luckily! I only snapped her neck so no bloodshed.”

 

“I’ll buy you a cookie.”

Peter kept talking like Stiles never spoke; “So the spell is in very old-english and it’ll let us get the truth from her. It’ll compel her to obey you.” He motioned to the home-bounded book laid next to a tree. “What would you have done if it rained?” Stiles asked, picking up the book and flipping through it. “Move all this stuff to my underground lair.”

“Do you have one?” 

 

“No you idiot, I would’ve set up again another night.”

 

“Where did you even get this book from?” Stiles asked, taking his time to read it over and understand the base of the language thinking of ways to imbue power in the words he plans to say as he translated everything from English to Polish. Midway through he noticed how similar the steps were for these rituals to nature rituals. “I have loads of books, Stiles. Maybe one day I’ll let you breathe near them.” Peter hummed. 

 

Peter was still setting up the rest of the supplies. Stiles caught a glimpse of salt as he laid it on the outside of the circle, there was also iron fillings and what Stiles could only assume was graveyard dirt. “You're going to need to break open her–” Stiles gags, Peter lifts an eyebrow. “Expose her heart. I– ‘the castor’ has to bleed on her heart.”

 

“Where does it say that?”

“Spille the lifedraught ‘pon yon hushed hert, where breath be still’d.” Stiles read aloud in his least impressed voice. 

 

“Huh,” Peter looked genuinely surprised. “Must’ve glanced over that part.” 

 

“I hate you so much it physically hurts.” Stiles replied.

Chapter 12: Zombieland Central

Notes:

Double posting bc I didn’t last week. My bad 🙂‍↕️

The woods were too quiet. Even the bugs seemed to know better than to linger where a necromantic circle had been carved into the earth.

Stiles adjusted the collar of his hoodie, tugging it tighter around his throat like that would do anything against the sudden cold. The runes around the body shimmered faintly—just enough to make his skin crawl.

"You sure about this?" he muttered, not looking up from the book he now held like a fragile bomb. It’d taken little over an hour but he was fairly sure he’d translated everything well enough to make the magic bend to his will.

"Of course not," Peter said, far too pleased for someone standing next to a corpse. "But I’m committed to the bit."

Stiles shot him a look, then returned his eyes to the pages. He was trying to ignore Jennifer’s body that lay at the center of the circle. No visible wounds. Just wrongness. Still. Unblinking. Her dead eyes reflected the silver moonlight in a way that made Stiles want to retch.

He exhaled slowly and stepped forward.

"Don’t screw this up," Peter said lightly. "If we get a demon instead of Jennifer, I’m blaming you."

"If we get a demon," Stiles muttered, "I'm letting her eat you first."

He knelt, his fingers tracing the last last sigil Peter craved with a trembling touch. The ground beneath him pulsed—like something deep in the soil had woken up to watch. He whispered the incantation, the syllables like gravel in his throat. Half the words didn’t want to be said. The other half were too eager to escape his mouth.

“Przez ziemię, przez krew, przez oddech cofnięty,
 Przez ciszę pod kością zapieczętowaną,
 Wzywam cię ze snu nieprzerwanego, lecz związanego,
 Wróć z prawdą na języku.
 Niech martwe serce napije się żywej czerwieni,
 I wypowiedz imię, które cię wiąże.
 Wyjdź z cienia. Niech imię twe znów zabrzmi.
 Wyjdź. Wyjdź.”

Stiles lifted his hand and Peter quickly used a claw to slice open a wound onto Stiles hand. He tried to not show the other man any weakness but the tremble in his hand shook too much to hide. There was still a warning alarm in the very back of his head telling him to not trust the man as he took his steps back and out of the circle. Stiles wants to join him, the aura of decay already filling his nostrils and it’ll only get worse from here.

Clenching his hands into fists he waited for the several drops of his blood to land before continuing; 

“Nie wstawaj w gniewie, ni w zemście,
 Nie wstawaj w głodzie, ni w ogniu—
 Ale wstań, by mówić, by nazwać, by odkryć.

Niech twój język niesie nieskrępowaną prawdę.
 Niech twoje oczy zobaczą to, co ukryte.
 Niech twoja dusza wspomni chwilę zdrady.

Stiles let his voice get louder as the wind begins to howl around him, the quiet surrounding him moments ago gone in exchange for nature rebelling against his actions. The sky showed no signs of raining anytime soon but thunder clapped regardless. Stiles felt the buzzing receding at first slowly but as he continued it was to near silence.

 Wyjdź, duchu niespokojny.
 Wyjdź, dziecko ciszy.
 Wyjdź i daj się nazwać.

Mów teraz, nim ciemność cię ponownie pochłonie.
 Mów, nim Ten który czeka w cieniu usłyszy twój głos.
 Mów—nim Gavrel pozna twoje imię.

The final word hit the air along with another crack of thunder. Wind tore through the trees harsher than before. The trees groaned. The circle ignited with dull, reddish light, casting monstrous shadows over Jennifer’s body.

Stiles made it out of the circle as her chest jerked upward. He’s not sure how her heart didn’t fall out of her opened chest.

Peter straightened, face suddenly still.

Jennifer gasped. The sound wasn’t breath—it was air being pulled into lungs that had stopped working days ago. Her eyes snapped open.

And she screamed.

It wasn’t a human scream. It was wrong. Like glass scraping metal. Like the noise light might make if it could scream. The sound hit the back of Stiles' skull like a hammer. His knees buckled.

Peter didn’t move. Just stared. Stiles did move– slightly behind Peter.

Jennifer’s body collapsed back onto the forest floor, and for several agonizing seconds, she didn’t move.

Then she sat up.

Not like a person. Not like someone waking up.

She rose, fluidly, like a puppet pulled upward by strings that hadn’t been there a moment ago.

Her head lolled to one side, eyes staring through Stiles before slowly settling on Peter.

"You," she rasped. Her voice echoed wrong, like it came from a hallway too far behind her.

Stiles wiped the cold sweat from his lip. "Holy shit."

"Language," Peter said absently.

Jennifer's mouth twitched—half a sneer, half a memory of one.

"You killed me."

Peter rolled his eyes. "Yes, and now I’ve resurrected you. Let's not pretend we didn’t both make poor choices."

"You promised me," she hissed. Her voice sounded more solid now, but there was something frayed at the edges. A shadow behind the words.

"I promised you something when I thought I needed you," Peter said coolly. "Plans changed. You know how it is."

Jennifer’s head turned sharply toward Stiles. "You shouldn’t have brought me back."

Stiles took an involuntary step back. “Trust me, it wasn’t on my vision board.”

"Enough," Peter said, stepping nearly into the circle like it didn’t crackle and groan in front of his feet. "You’re here for one reason: I want the information you were planning to use against me. Where is it?”

Jennifer’s body twitched. Her jaw clenched like she had to fight through something to speak.

"You don’t control me anymore."

"You’re dead." Peter said it like it was a punchline. "And I raised you. I do control you."

Stiles flinched. "Dude, maybe don’t antagonize the undead. Just a tip."

Peter glared at him and shockingly enough he took the hint. “Oh! Answer his questions.” He commanded and she gave them everything they were looking for.

Jennifer’s hands curled into claws at her sides. Her lips peeled back from her teeth. She’d ripped them off in an attempt to make herself more difficult to understand but Peter’s ears were keen and she couldn’t stop herself from repeating the information until she was understood.

Peter blinked. A slow, thoughtful nod; “I don’t think I have anything else to add.” 

“Alright. I guess we let you go.” Stiles said. He was glad the reversal incantation was much shorter and less draining.

"Let me go?" she asked, voice mocking. "You don’t get it, do you? There’s something on the other side now. Something watching. It’s angry."

Peter’s smile faltered.

Stiles swallowed hard. “What do you mean something?”

"It wants you,” she said to him, voice full of dark joy. “It saw you when you opened the circle. It knows your name now.”

The green fire flickered.

Peter turned to Stiles. “End the spell.”

“What? I didn’t—”

“Now.”

Stiles scrambled to recite the incantation. The wind rose again. Jennifer’s body started convulsing.

"You think this ends when I go?" she rasped. "You called it when I rose."

"What?" Stiles shouted, almost choking on the words.

Jennifer grinned, blood bubbling from her mouth. “It wants both of you.”

And then she collapsed, dead again.

The flames winked out.

Silence. Heavy. Suffocating.

Peter exhaled. “Well. That was fun.”

Stiles stared down at the corpse, then up at Peter. “Who the fuck is she talking about?”

Peter was already walking back toward the car. “Probably the reason we’ll both be screaming in our sleep soon. Help me clean up.”

Stiles looked at the circle, the body, the now-chilled air that hadn’t been there before.

“Yeah, okay.” He grumbled, before pointedly walking back to the car and letting the werewolf clean alone.

Series this work belongs to:

• Part 1 of TW changes