Scott McCall ruins everything
He didn't sleep. Not really.
He just laid on the overstuffed couch in Tony’s lab with his back turned and his eyes closed to keep the worried crowd from talking to him.
He had been having such a great time with Tony. It was the first time in a long time that he had been relaxed enough to just lose himself in his company.
So of course Scott had to call.
He had known this was coming. Eventually even Scott would notice his absence, he just hadn’t counted on just how bad it’d make him feel.
He doesn’t feel guilty about leaving with a warning. No, he’s more upset that it took Scott this long to even realize he was gone, especially considering that they hadn’t even talked since that day Stiles decided to leave.
He snuck a glance at his phone when the worried crowd had cleared a bit. He’d been at the lab for three days. That means that Scott hadn’t checked in in thirteen.
This piece of information – while it’s the emotional equivalent of someone stabbing him in the gut and twisting the knife – only solidifies the belief that he was right to leave Scott and Beacon Hills behind him. But…he can’t help but miss a few of them.
Isaac.
Erica.
Boyd.
Lydia.
They’re probably so angry with him for leaving without warning them first. After all, in Derek’s absence, Stiles had become friends with the abandoned betas that had been left behind. And Lydia considered herself to be his best friend no matter how annoyed with him or busy she was.
Stiles can’t help but feel a heaviness in his chest when he thinks about how he left them behind. Just like Derek.
Yeah. Okay.
That hurts.
He isn’t really sure how long he lays like that, but eventually, Jarvis speaks. “Stiles, you have an incoming call from someone named Boyd.”
“Jarvis, let him sleep.” Pepper scolds, but Stiles is already sitting up and dragging a hand over his face.
“I’ll take it.” He says quietly, a heavy weight having settled on his shoulders.
He’s surprised that it’s Boyd calling. He figured it’d be Isaac in tears or Lydia to yell at him, not Boyd – quiet, calm Boyd that was much more content to simply be there, and Stiles had always appreciated his tranquil presence.
“Hello?”
“Stiles?” Boyd asks with a slightly sad tone to his voice.
“Yeah.” He says quietly, knowing Boyd will pick it up.
“Are you okay?” He doesn’t ask it like he thinks something horrible has happened to Stiles. It’s really more like he’s asking if he needs a hug.
“Yeah.” Stiles says back, just as somber.
“Okay.” He can practically see Boyd nodding, and even though it’s just a phone call, he can sort of feel that tranquility that radiates from him. “Call every now and then, for the others. Okay?”
“Okay.” There are tears building in his eyes, turning the worried figures at the edges of his vision into colorful blurs. “I will.”
“Oh, and Stiles? It’s okay. We get it.”
“Thank you.” It comes out a broken, warbling whisper so quiet that he’s sure that even Boyd’s ears won’t have picked it up, but Boyd doesn’t seem to need it, because he ends the call then and Stiles finally breaks down in tears.
He slides all the way to the floor with his head between his knees and sobs quietly. Pepper comes to rub a soothing hand through his hair, but neither her nor Tony say anything or interrupt him.
Once he’s cried all his tears and Pepper has coaxed some food into him, he heads home for the day.
His dad is very alarmed to see him return home with splotchy cheeks and a hoarse voice.
“Son, are you okay?”
“Not really.” He admits, not seeing any point in denying it. “Sorry for staying at the lab so long.”
“It’s okay, son.” The sheriff assures him. “Ms. Potts assured me that you were okay. Do you want to talk about it?”
“Not right now.” He shakes his head. “I think I’m just going to go get some sleep.”
“Okay.”
In his room he takes out his phone and finally answers Scott’s next call.
“What the hell, Stiles!” Scott yells so loud that Stiles has to put the phone down on the bed next to him to avoid having his ear drums shattered.
“Hi Scott.” He says tiredly. An exhaustion has set in so bone deep that Stiles barely has the energy to even take his shoes off before he crawls under the covers fully clothed.
“That’s all you have to say???” Scott snarls. “I went by your house to check on you only to find some chick living in it who said that you moved ACROSS THE FREAKING COUNRTY!!!!! Then you spend all day dodging my calls and all you have to say is ‘hi Scott’?”
“What do you want me to say?” Stiles sighs.
“How about an explanation?”
On any other day, a comment like that would have Stiles putting Scott in his place, but today, he can’t be bothered. “I was tired of your crap.” He shrugs even though Scott can’t see it. “I moved. What more is there to say?”
“ARE YOU KIDDING ME STILES?”
“Nope.”
“How could you just leave?” He demands, and Stiles thinks he might actually detect some pain under all that Alpha Rage. “We were your Pack! I’m your best friend and you didn’t even bother to tell me.”
“Can you really blame me, Scott? I mean, with the way you treat me, it’s a wonder I even lasted that long.”
Scott starts to protest, but Stiles really just wants this over, so he continues.
“I don’t even understand why you’re yelling. You’re the one that didn’t notice I was gone until it was too late. What was it that tipped you off? Did you finally notice the pack bond break? It was so faint in the first place, you probably didn’t even feel it, did you? Or did you just need something? You probably tried to climb through my window in the middle of the night to demand that I help you sort out whatever problem that you no doubt created for yourself. How far did you get before you noticed I wasn’t there?”
“You know what this means then?” Scott asks in a shaky voice, completely ignoring everything he had just said.
Bull's-eye.
“That I’m not Pack?” Stiles guesses. “I don’t think I’m really going to lose that much sleep over it, Scotty. We both know I never was in the first place.”
The silence that follows that is deafening. At least Scott has the common sense not to argue that fact.
“I’m going to bed now. You can stop calling.”
“You were my brother, Stiles.” Scott whines low, finally having burned off all the anger.
“Then maybe you should have paid more attention to your family, Scott.”
If Stiles had anymore energy, he’d be screaming or maybe hitting the walls, instead the exhaustion finally overtakes him, and he slips into a troubled sleep.
*****
Nightmare, of course. Because he hasn’t been through enough emotional torture today.
Run. Faster! FASTER! HURRY! Too late.
Stiles can’t see a thing as he tries his best to run from his assailant. He knows it’s useless, the Demon Fox will always find him, but he runs anyways.
The very forest seems to be putting up a fight. The thick leaves blot out all traces of sunlight, the thin branches snag on his clothes and cut at his skin, the roots stick out of the ground at every possible foothold, sending him sprawling to the ground.
He’s more crawling than running at this point, but the tell-tale sounds of his pursuer propel him forwards.
He runs in what must be circles until he’s bleeding and exhausted. His legs are made of lead. His lungs are filled with sand. His whole body aches with pain.
Finally, the darkness relents. The forest pulls back to reveal a beautiful clearing filled with buttery sunlight and vibrant wildflowers.
The shockingly beautiful scene before him instills more fear in him than the dark, dangerous woods ever could. He’s had this dream before. He knows what happens here.
Still, he tries to run, tries to escape what’s coming.
“You can’t outrun me.” A chillingly familiar voice says, and Stiles knows he’s defeated. He turns to face the figure with dread filling his veins like ice-water. “I’m in your head, remember?”
“NO.” He shakes his head, clamping his hands over his ears to protect himself from the poisonous words that leave him shaking in fear for hours after he finally manages to drag himself back to consciousness. “No, you can’t be. You’re gone. You’re gone. You’re gone.”
“No, Stiles.” The nogitsune’s words find him anyways. “I’m a part of you now. Surely, you’ve noticed the gift I left behind.”
As if on cue a fire ignites on Stiles’ skin that spreads until it engulfs the entire clearing. He doesn’t need to watch to know what’s happening.
The flowers burn. The smoke forms thick, dark clouds that blot out the sun. And now, screams.
He can’t help but hear them, but he’s trying so hard to wake.
“Stiles!”
“Stiles, help us!”
“Stiles, don’t let us burn!”
“Stiles!”
“Well, go on.” The Nogitsune says calmly as he watches the scene before him. Invisible hands force Stiles to his feet and his hands by his side to watch the horrifying scene unfold before him. “Save them. If this really is just a dream, surely you can’t take control. Wake yourself up, Stiles. Make their suffering end.”
He watches his friends burn with tears streaming down his face. “Why won’t you just leave me alone? Haven’t you taken enough from me?!”
“Oh, Stiles.” The Demon Fox chuckles. “I never took anything from you. You did that. Remember? It was your hands that killed Allison. Aiden. You blew those people up. And now, you’re burning your friends. I wonder who you’ll kill after that? Maybe Mrs. McCall? Your father? Or what about the new ones? Tony? Pepper? Clearly they care about you. If only that knew how dangerous that really was.”
Broken pleas fall from his lips as he is forced to watch his friends drop one by one, tortured by the flames he’s creating. “Stop it. Please. Stopitstopitstopit. I didn’t kill them. I didn’t hurt them. It wasn’t me. I didn’t mean to.”
“Stiles!” Scott pleads, the last one standing. He reaches for his best friend, but Stiles can’t move to him.
“Wake up.” He digs his hands into his sides, but to no avail. “Wake up, Stiles. Please. Wake up.”
“Stiles, wake up.”
“You can’t wake up, Stiles.” The Nogitsune whispers in his ear as the ground starts to shake violently. “You can never wake up.”
“Stiles. Wake. Up.” His eyes fly open with a gasp and he immediately attacks the figure leaning over him.
“Why won’t you just die?” He cries and lashes out until strong, rough hands catch his carefully.
“Stiles, it’s me.” Stiles stops to see a familiar blonde figure looking at him with apprehension in his eyes. He sags in relief as he shrinks away from his touch. Clint flips on the lamp next to him and Stiles gasps.
“Did I hurt you?” Clint’s face and shirt are covered in blood.
“No.” He shakes his head. “It’s your blood, Stiles.”
He looks down and nearly screams out his next sob. His hands are covered in dark blood. He yank at the nearest piece of fabric – his shirt – until it rips in half to scrub the blood off his hands, but it doesn’t really do anything. “I need to get it off. I won’t come off.”
“Stiles. Stiles. Calm down. We can wash your hands.”
“I need to get it off, Clint.” He pleads.
The next thing he knows he’s sitting in the bottom of his shower with icy water running over him. He just sits there, crying, as he scrubs at his hands until long after the blood has been washed down the drain.
“Stiles, what was that?”
“You never have nightmares?” Clint is sitting on the edge of the tub, getting soaked from the showerhead, but he doesn’t seem to care much.
“Of course I do. But mine don’t usually leave me clawing holes into my skin.”
He looks down and for the first time actually registers where the blood was coming from. He had dug his fingers into the sides of his stomach while he was trying to wake himself up. He vaguely notes the sting of the water hitting the ugly marks but is too numb to really care.
He just shrugs.
When he finally get out of the tub, the water has gotten hot and then ran cold all over again and he’s shivering in his soaked jeans and blood-stained remnants of his shirt. He changes, not really caring if Clint sees him naked right now and lets himself get pulled back into the bathroom to get bandaged up.
“How often does this happen?” Spy Dude has thankfully wiped the blood of his face so that Stiles can look at him without cringing away now.
“The nightmares? Only when I sleep.” That one earns him a very unimpressed look. “I’ve only hurt myself twice before. Both were accidents. Look, I don’t need your pity. This isn’t a new thing and meeting you hasn’t suddenly turned me into some helpless child.”
“I didn’t say I pitied you.” That draws him up short. “Empathetic? Yes. Worried? Yes. But pitying? No.”
“Empathetic.” Stiles scoffs. “Big word there, Spy Dude.”
Clint just rolls his eyes as he smoothes the last bandage down. “There you go. Do you, um…do…do you need anything?”
“No.” He sighs. “It’s not like I’m going back to sleep any time soon. You can stay if you want. Surveillance on a teenager must be boring. The most interesting thing we do is jack off.”
Clint scoffs but sits in Stiles’ computer chair while he replaces the sheets on his bed. “Sure, I’ll stay. Wait a second, did you just call me ‘Spy Dude’?”
“Yes, yes, I did.” He huffs, ignoring the heat in his face at being called out on that. He had hoped he wouldn’t notice. “What?” He asks at the incredulous look he gets. “You fell through my window and the first though that popped into my head was ‘aren’t spy dudes supposed to be graceful?’ so, Spy Dude. If it makes you feel better there is also Eye Patch Guy, Dude in the Suit, and Dude in the Suit 2. No need for applause, I know I’m a creative genius.”
Clint mutters something under his breath that makes Stiles grin as he plops down on his fresh sheets. “You might as well get some sleep or something.” He tells him as he pulls out his phone, ignoring the texts and missed calls from Scott. “At least one of us should be able to function like an actual human being in the morning.”
“Who said I was human?” Clint asks as he cautiously lays down next to where he’s sitting. “I happen to be a cyborg from the future that’s here to destroy you so that you never become the leader of the human resistance.”
“Okay, Terminator.” Stiles rolls his eyes. “Go to sleep.”