Chapter Text
Alan Deaton is a man who’s always known what he wanted: power. He understood from a very young age that it’s those with power that make the rules (or break them without consequence). He even knew exactly how to get that power. That hasn’t stopped him from failing in his plans. Each and every time. It’s almost like the harder he tries, the harder he fails… But he will find a way to succeed, he will, and no Stilinskis will get in the way this time!
As Alan Deaton kneels on the cold, hard tiles of the backroom of his veterinary practice, hands on the shoulders of young Scott McCall as he pushes the teen-aged werewolf down into the ice-bath, the druid cannot help but think of how they’ve come to this. How he’s come to this…
Born to a rather poor family in the slums of Chicago, his mother remarrying when he was still a child brought him some new opportunities. He gained, aside from a step-father, a step-sister: Marin, and eventually a little half-sister: Serena.
Alan always had some power, a bit of a ‘spark’. Things tended to happen, when he focused really hard. Not a lot, no, but when he really needed them to. His step-father was a druid, and he was the one who told Alan that his little spark? It was magic. Alan didn’t think much of it, not until he saw his baby sister create tiny little glowing butterflies, laughing gleefully as they flew around her head. Alan had never seen something like that. It was so beautiful…
Days later they got a strange visitor: Rolland Weber, the second of Alpha Müller (and Alan had known that the supernatural existed, knew it even before he learned about magic… the things one got to see living in the slums… but he could have never imagined something like the Müller pack existing). He was there on behalf of his alpha, with an offer, they wanted Serena to one day be emissary of their pack. And they were prepared to offer a lot if she agreed.
So his little sister got to have all new clothes, pretty toys, she attended private school, and people came to see her from other cities and other countries. She had everything she ever asked for, and a lot of things she didn’t even have to. All to help her prepare so she could one day take the position of emissary for the Müller pack. That was the first time Alan Deaton felt jealousy…
At Alan’s insistence, his step-father trained him in the ways of the druids. Though the man warned him that as good as Alan was in the theory, his magical potential was limited, it was why none of Serena’s trainers ever showed interest in him, no matter what he tried to do to call their attention. Even Marin had had more luck, though only a druidess, and a lesser witch took interest in her. Alan decided he needed to find a way to become more powerful. Because he knew what he wanted in life. He wanted to be an emissary, just like his little sister. Wanted people to be interested in him, to give him gifts, to be willing to give it all for him to be willing to be with them. And if what he needed to get that was more power, he’d find the way to gain it.
On the mundane side of things, Alan was a fairly good student. Not extraordinary, but his grades were still good enough to get him into pre-med. However, by the time he finished that, he’d gotten so deeply into his magical studies, into finding a way to get more power… he realized med-school would bite into his time, time he needed to achieve his true goals, so he opted for veterinary medicine instead. After all, if he was going to one day be working with wolves… Well, that should be a good enough career path for him, right?
He eventually met Sebastian Galanis, a dark druid (darach, he’d eventually learn the right name for his kind to be) who taught him all about the… less known druidic practices. It was he who taught Alan that things like light and dark, good and evil, were children’s tales. Power is what truly matters. The one who has it makes the rules, they’re the ones who control everything. Alan also learned a few tricks to avoid staining his aura, his magic, the way Galanis had. It wasn’t that hard, really. It was all about intent. If he did something that hurt another, or pushed them into doing something that hurt them, intentionally, that gained him a stain on his aura; but if he could convince the individual in question, that their actions were their own choice… he was in the clear.
Something else he learned from Galanis was about siphons. It was a way to gain power, but a tricky one. After all, siphoning power from someone could be good, but it ran out eventually. It gave him a temporary boost, but that was it. And it wasn’t easy to control a siphon on another person. One could easily end up drawing too much, killing the individual which, while it wouldn’t bother him, strictly speaking, it was something that would leave a mark on his aura, his magic. The ideal therefore would be siphoning magic from a thing, like a nemeton. Galanis laughed at him when Alan brought it up:
“You’re a fool if you think it’d be that easy, boy!” the man exclaimed.
“Not easy but… one could siphon a lot more power from a nemeton,” Alan pointed out. “No risk of death, which means no stain on the aura…”
“You’re the only one worried about the aura,” Galanis scoffed. “With your obsession to appear so pure, when you’re anything but!”
He was obsessed, but he knew that if he became a darach the chances of a pack picking him as emissary were pretty much nil. So he held onto that.
“Besides,” Galanis continued. “Do you think nemeta have no protections? They do! There are always shifters, vampires, witches, religious orders, or any other supernaturals who are devoted to guarding the magical nods. Come on boy, if it were so easy to steal power, everyone would do it!”
Galanis eventually tried to kill him of course. Alan had been expecting it from the start (the man was a darach, of course it’d happen eventually!). He didn’t try to use a siphon, claiming Alan did not have enough power to make it worth it. So the younger man took great pleasure in turning the ritual on the older one, killing him. This had… unexpected consequences. Alan gained Galanis’ power, not just as a temporary charge, but his well of power (small as it was) grew some to be able to hold it all. Because the kill was, technically, in self-defense, Alan’s aura wasn’t permanently stained. There was barely a hint of a shadow, which he could easily explain by having survived such a dark ritual (which also served to give him a better reputation all around).
The next big moment in Alan’s life came when he was recommended to become the Hale Pack’s next emissary. Their previous one, a witch, was getting on in years, and often sick, so it was decided she should retire; but before that, she had to pick her successor, and have Alpha Hale approve.
By that point Alan knew that being a pack emissary wasn’t quite the way it had seemed to him, when he was a kid. While the Müllers were willing to give a lot for his sister, that wasn't the case with most of the packs. And even those that might be interested, and might have the money to throw around, most knew better than to do things like that. Still, being chosen as an emissary, especially by the larger packs, with the best reputation, remained a good thing. Something that would show to the Shadow World at large that the magic-user was talented, was… desirable.
Alan still wasn’t particularly powerful, even for a druid. But he had other things going for him. In the years following his time with Galanis, Alan made a point to learn everything there was to know about nemeta. He even visited the places where some of those nexus could be found: like Lyons-la-Foret in the Normandy region in France, Sado Island in Japan, Fell’s Church, West Virginia in the US. Galanis had been right in that the nemeta had guardians, and none of them allowed Alan to get too close. Even the ones that were willing to talk to him, the information they were willing to share was limited. Always excusing it as their duty to protect the nemeton…
In any case, by the time the Hale Pack found itself in need of a new emissary, Alan Deaton had become well known as a scholar, and for his interest in researching nemeta. It was why he was proposed as a candidate, despite not being particularly powerful.
Alan worked hard at showing himself as the best possible candidate. At the same time he sought to ‘persuade’ his competition that they should walk away. In the end he managed to get rid of most of the competition, all but one candidate, a young woman, an enchantress, brunette, with honey eyes and pale skin with beauty marks, of Polish descent; married to a local deputy sheriff and working part-time at the library. Her name was Claudia Gajos-Stilinski. There were whispers that she might be a descendant of the fae. She had great power, though at the same time was very humble and unassuming. Alan couldn’t help but feel annoyed by her. For someone with such power, to be married to a human, and leading such a simple, boring life… he believed it was such a waste.
Three days before the new Hale Emissary was to be announced, Alan decided that the only way to ensure that would be him, was to get rid of the remaining competition. And since Claudia didn’t seem to give in to veiled suggestions, and surreptitious threats, he’d have to be more direct. Thanks to all his travels, and the various individuals he’d learned from throughout the years, Alan had many resources available to him, even rare (technically banned) substances, like cold iron and dimeritium. To help him choose the best way of handling Claudia, he put himself under a trance.
Usually that kind of trance was used to revisit memories, to learn from the past. Those gifted the right ways could use them to astralwalk. And in some cases, it could also be used to peek into the future… The trance was Alan’s best spell. Didn’t require a lot of power, just specific ingredients and following the ritual step by step. He’d found it useful before, and he did again.
It’s a variation of that same ritual which he finds himself using as background for the surrogate sacrifices he’s managed to convince the three teenagers to undergo (for both their benefit, and his… the latter more than the former).
Technically he never lied to them. He told them that the ritual would allow them to die temporary deaths, finishing the five-fold knot; doing it themselves, without three-fold deaths, and with said deaths being non-permanent means that Jennifer Blake won’t be able to get the kind of power she hoped to get from the killings (even if she were to manage to kill her chosen guardians). He also told them that the ice-bath would allow them to find the nemeton. Which is also true. Alan knows that each of the three teenagers has touched the nexus at least once before, he can sense the trace of its power on them. So they’ll be able to walk through their own memories and recall where the tree-stump is. What he did not tell them was that they did not need to do the sacrifice to be able to find the tree (he does believe that most of them would have done it anyway, if only in the hopes that doing so might somehow help save their parents). Or that, all that power Blake would have gotten from finishing the sacrifices herself? Alan doesn’t plan on letting it go to waste, he’s ready to siphon it into a number of crystals for later use (waste not, want not and all that).
Alan deserves to have the nemeton’s power. He’s owed that power! After everything he’s done! From poisoning emissary candidate Claudia Gajos-Stilinski so she’d have to give up, leaving him as the sole remaining candidate to be the next Hale Emissary. This also led to her almost miscarrying her baby, which Alan believed would further ensure she’d want nothing to do with the supernatural, if only to protect her baby.
He even managed, in the months he worked under her, learning how to be an emissary, to convince Witch Irena Novak that the nemeton was damaged (which was true enough) that it was rotting from the inside and there was no way to heal it, that all they could do was cut the tree down before it became a danger to others, and to the territory itself (which wasn’t). This led to Emissary Novak talking about the matter with the Hales, and Alpha Hale ordering the cutting down of the huge oak tree not two months later. It was probably not entirely coincidental that, despite having been in fairly decent health, Irena Novak got very sick and died months after the cutting down of the tree.
Alan took his position as the new Hale Emissary shortly after the cutting down of the tree. And his first task as both the emissary, and the local druid, was to ensure that whatever damage the nemeton might have, would not extend to the rest of the preserve. To ensure this Alan warded the tree so only he and Alpha Hale would be able to find it, he also made a few careful suggestions which led Alpha Hale to decide to take the memories of what members of the pack had ever come across the tree (which was only really her brother and young son).
“Welcome, Emissary Deaton,” Alpha Hale welcomed him officially. “Now, I know we haven’t talked about this before, but I was wondering, if you wished to join the pack. Be a full member of it, rather than just serve as our emissary, from the outside.”
“I believe I’d better serve the Hale pack as an outsider, Alpha Hale,” Alan stated stoically. “I am a druid, we are guardians of balance. It’s also well known that we work better from a distance, to keep us neutral, and objective.”
It was a load of bullshit, really. Well, technically not all of it. Druids were meant to focus on the balance, the Earth’s balance, technically. Though Alan himself had never fully believed in such things. Or rather, he just wasn’t interested in any kind of balance unless it benefited him somehow. In any case, emissaries weren’t obligated to be fully part of the packs, and it was well known that most druids tended to be solitary people, so it wouldn’t have been much of a surprise for Alpha Hale, his decision not to fully join the pack. The most important part, at least to him, was that keeping his distance meant he had more time to dedicate to his own pursuits, and there were less people who might discover his true plans before he managed to make things work.
Being one of only two people who could even find the nemeton, and with Alpha Hale often busy with other matters, Alan had more than enough time to work on creating a siphon with which to take power from the tree and for himself. And yet, no matter how many times, and in how many ways he attempted it, he always failed. Always.
It was then that he remembered Galanis, and his remark about Alan being a fool if he thought it’d be that easy to siphon power from a nemeton. The man had also talked about guardians… He’d suspected already that the Hales were the guardians of that particular nemeton, though whether they knew it or not was anyone’s guess (he suspected they didn’t… that if they did, if they truly did, they would have never fallen for that lie about the rotting and the tree needing to be cut down).
It was around that time that Alan decided that if the Hales were what stood in the way of him gaining the power he deserved (the power he was owed!) then they’d just have to go…
Of course, he probably should have known better than to trust someone else to handle such an important matter. Especially someone whom, aside from pretty much pointing her at the target, and helping provide her with the right tools for the job, he had no control over! Kate Argent managed to set the Hale house on fire, with most of the pack inside. And that, right there, was the issue. Because it was only most of the pack, and not the whole of it. Laura, Derek and Peter survived. And granted, Talia’s brother was so badly off that he was next to no risk at all, but still. Laura and Derek left town so quickly there was nothing Deaton could do to stop them (or to finish the job).
At first he thought that might be enough. That maybe the new Hale Alpha summarily abandoning the territory would be enough for the nemeton to be more open to his work. It wasn’t to be. Whether it was the fact that there was still technically one Hale in the territory (even if Peter was pretty much useless in his current condition) or that there was a Hale alpha at all, Alan did not know. The fact remained that he could not get the siphon to work.
One thing Alan had contemplated at one point, but never pursued, was the possibility of him not needing to get rid of the pack entirely, but rather get the pack to work with him. If they had some kind of connection to the nemeton, that ought to work, right? Of course, Talia Hale would have never aided him in his plans, and he never got the chance to persuade Laura. In any case, he’d always believed her to be too much like her mother. So perhaps instead of trying to persuade a Hale, it might be a better plan to put someone else, someone he could control, in the position. He even had someone in mind already that suited perfectly!
Scott McCall was the only son of nurse Melissa McCall, nee Delgado. He was a good boy, son of a good woman. His asthma was bad enough that there were quite a few things he couldn’t do, things Alan was sure other boys his age did, something he clearly resented. Alan had no doubt that, if he timed it right, he could make it so Scott would be delighted to become a werewolf, and of course he’d be more than willing to pay back to the person who helped him get there. Also, with his father walking out on him and his mom, wanting to pursue his own career, the boy was very much in need of a new male role model, a father figure, so-to-speak. And who better than Alan to fit the part?
He did not count on the Stilinskis (and why is it that whenever someone gets in the way of his plans, it just happens that their last name is Stilinski? First Claudia, then the Sheriff… and eventually, their son too!).
Still, even with the good sheriff having an unexpected amount of influence on young Scott, Alan managed to be an important figure in the boy’s life at first. And how could he not when he offered the boy a part-time job as his assistant? It was easy enough to convince his mom: her son doing something he liked (spending time with animals), while at the same time earning some money (so he could buy himself things he liked every so often), and having a respected member of the community watching over him, what was not to like?
Peter was feral enough, at least at first, that a simple luring spell was enough to ensure he bit Scott, turning him into a wolf. It would have never worked if he were fully in control of his actions, but then again, he obviously wouldn’t be, though clearly no one else realized it, blaming Peter for all the things he did while half-feral and insane. In any case, that part of the plan worked. After that all Alan had to do was wait for Scott to go to him, desperate, needing someone to help him…
Which didn’t happen.
That was when the Stilinski-effect reared its ugly head yet again. Really, as if the parents hadn’t been enough of an issue in the past (and Alan had so hoped that Claudia’s death would put an end to that, but apparently he wasn’t that lucky). If Enchantress Gajos-Stilinski had been an oddity… Alan really had no words with which to even try and define Stiles. Really, what kind of boy, with absolutely no prior knowledge of the supernatural, heard that his best friend got bitten by some kind of wild animal, and his mind immediately (and accurately) guessed werewolf?! There’s no logic to that!
Alan did not plan on Derek surviving the confrontation against feral-Peter and Kate (really, could the Argent huntress do nothing right?!), he especially did not plan on Derek becoming the alpha, or creating a pack of his own. Alan did his best to show himself cooperative, at least until he could find a way to get through the latest hurdle.
At least Scott coming to him when his mother’s life was threatened by Argent Sr. showed Alan that he still had the boy’s trust. The plan he made was perfect! The mix of mountain ash and mistletoe would ensure that Gerard started transitioning, but didn’t finish. The hunter would probably expect his killing of Derek to complete the transformation, making him an alpha at the same time, instead it would worsen the effects of the mixture, eventually killing him. And because Scott was the one to switch his pills, magic would see him as the one responsible for the kill, and thus he’d be the one to inherit the alpha spark.
It was a perfect plan. Which of course means that something had to go wrong.
Alan didn’t even know what it was that went wrong, exactly. Everything was going just according to plan: Gerard had been consuming the pills, they were all at the warehouse. The hunter even thought to get Stiles out of the way! Derek was immobilized with kanima venom and forced to bite the hunter, who started the transition but couldn’t complete it and then… and then Stilinski came out of nowhere!
What is it with people called Stilinski finding a way to ruin his plans every single time?!
The alpha pack arriving to town was not ideal, especially not when they ended up bringing Cora Hale with them (another Hale?! Just how many Hales survived the fire?!), but still, not the worst that could have happened either. Blake on the other hand… Her connection to the nemeton was unexpected, but her murders were… convenient, in a way. Magic dark enough to weaken the nemeton’s protections, and the Hales’ hold on it, and the territory. Also, Alan knew that if he intervened at just the right moment, he might be able to steal a good amount of that power…
That was when he began concocting a new plan, a way to steal all that power Blake was trying to get for herself (was trying to steal from him, the only one who deserved it!), and if in the process he could get rid of those trying to influence Scott more than him? All the better!
Poisoning Cora with mistletoe was something opportunistic. Something he did when the chance presented itself. He was hoping he might get rid of her, though he wasn’t entirely certain she was a threat at all. Even after being in Beacon Hills for weeks, she still wasn’t part of Derek’s pack… but still, she was a Hale, so she had to go. He did not expect for things to go the way they did. And for once, that meant they ended up going much better than Alan expected.
There’s only one person who could have told Derek about the ritual to save a beta, using the power of the alpha spark. He wonders if Peter though that his nephew undergoing the ritual would allow him to gain the alpha spark himself… of course, he couldn’t have known that Alan had spells in place to ‘capture’ the alpha spark, necessary if he wanted to make Scott into the next territory alpha (he considered using another spark, he had quite a few with the alpha pack in town, and with Deucalion killing Ennis right in his practice… but in the end Alan didn’t want to risk the specific spark being important for the nemeton, so he waited, and the wait paid off).
He’s been preparing Scott for his rise to alpha for months. Pushing him into taking the lead, into getting the other wolves to follow him. It was easier than he expected it to be, but then again, Derek was never that good an alpha, was he? He’s also been spinning stories, ensuring that when the time comes Scott will believe that he’s that special, becoming alpha without having to fight for it. That was especially easy; of course someone who believed that killing one’s alpha could lead to being cured when there was no proof and no logic to it, would easily believe that they could ascend to alpha without any effort on their part.
In the end it was easy enough to add things to his planned ritual to help push his plans along. All three tubs have various herbs in them. Scott’s will help prepare him for the power that’s in store for him. The next time Scott starts seriously pulling on his power as a werewolf, he’ll rise to alpha. As for the other two… Alan plans on weakening their mental and spiritual defenses. With Beacon Hills being what it is, sooner or later they will either lose the fight against an enemy… or against themselves.
“Okay,” Alan told the teenagers as preparations were finished. “The three of you will get in. Each of us will hold you under until you're essentially… well, dead.”
Regretfully he cannot have any of them ‘accidentally’ dying just yet. Otherwise it’d have been the perfect opportunity.
“But, it’s not just someone to hold you under,” he continued explaining. “It needs to be someone who can pull you back, someone with a strong connection to you. A kind of emotional tether.”
There was some hesitation when he paired up Lydia Martin with Stiles. It was clear they expected the young banshee to be paired with Allison Argent. The two were best friends after all. It’d have certainly been a good partnership… if Alan’s intentions were as benign as he claimed. Also, it’s not like there was any good prospective partner for Stiles anyway. He would have had even less of a connection with the Lahey boy than he did with the Martin girl. Alan supposes that, if he were doing things right, if he were trying to do right by the teenagers, truly, he’d have insisted on Derek being Stiles’s anchor, it’s likely even Peter or Cora would have worked in a pinch. But then again, Alan might pretend to be all about the good… but he’s never been one to lie to himself about such things.
After some parting words from Stiles (and what was that about Scott’s father being in town? Will that end up being yet another complication to his plans?) the three teenagers finally settle into place, and at his signal, they go under.
Which is how he ends up on his knees, on the cold, hard tiles of the backroom of his veterinary practice, hands on the shoulders of young Scott McCall. He lets the ice-bath do its thing, sending the teen-aged werewolf into a trance that might allow him to revisit old memories, find the nemeton; at the same time he starts chanting under his breath, completing the ritual necessary for his own plan to come into fruition; being careful enough not to call the attention of the other two anchors (which is actually harder than it should be, what with one of them being a werewolf, and the other a girl much too intelligent for her own good…).
For some unknown reason the trance ends up taking longer than expected (a lot longer) enough that Alan decides to risk it and take a look, to find out what’s going on. And that’s when things take a completely unexpected turn… and while, to be fair, it wouldn’t be the first time, this time no Stilinskis are to blame! No, this time it’s all Scott…
One moment Scott’s standing in the shadows watching his younger-self walking around, trying to use the light from his cellphone to search the underbrush for his inhaler when unexpectedly he comes face to face with none other than Laura Hale! Or well, her body (the upper half, at least).
The presence of a dead body right in front of young-Scott startles him badly enough that he flails backwards, stepping wrong and suddenly he finds himself tumbling down a hill. Present-Scott then witnesses his younger-self be attacked, and bit by alpha-Peter. His reaction is instinctive, as he takes a few steps backwards, stopping only when the back of his legs hit something. Turning around, he sees it, the stump of a huge tree… the nemeton.
Scott seems to contemplate the tree-stump for several seconds, hand hovering in the air. He knows he must touch it (even if he has no idea how he knows that, exactly) but he just…
Watching all that from the outside, Alan is seriously considering telling Scott to hurry up, when the teenager turns to look over his shoulder, in the direction his younger-self fell down the hill and then… It’s like the blink of an eye, and suddenly there’s young-Scott once again, cellphone in hand. Searching for his inhaler.
“Is this a dream… or a memory…?” Older Scott murmurs as he watches himself go through the whole thing all over again, and then again. “Is it real?”
Alan doesn’t realize what Scott’s saying, doesn’t understand why the scene keeps repeating over and over again. Just what is Scott doing? The druid doesn’t understand! And then the scene starts all over again, except older-Scott is no longer standing in the shadows, watching it all happen. No, instead present-Scott has somehow managed to… to join in, to become one with his younger self and… what the hell is he doing?!
“Stiles!” The kid leaves the search for his inhaler completely, instead rushing the opposite way from the edge of the hill, and the nemeton. “Sheriff! I’m here!”
The druid thinks he can vaguely hear Sheriff Stilinski in the distance muttering something about how he knew that if one ‘young delinquent’ was in the woods, the other couldn’t be far away. He barely pays that any mind, just watching the two teenagers go, trying to understand what just happened. It’s…
It shouldn’t be possible!
Alan’s eyes go very wide as his surroundings seem to vibrate and go misty and he realizes that somehow (it shouldn’t be possible!) somehow Scott just changed history…