chapter fifteen.

ARTHUR TWISTS HIS window open when he heard quite taps, a small smile tugged on his lips seeing Scott on his window flashlight in his hand and Stiles laid on the grass nursing an aching butt. They had separate an hour ago after their conversation with Sheriff Stilinski about a case he's reopening: a crash car, no survivors expect the body of an eight year old girl named Malia was never found. He believes it involves the supernatural, Arthur thought it was a fifty fifty percent chance.

"What's going on, Scott?" Arthur questions.

"Wanna find a dead body with us?" Scott retorts, a smile on his lips flashing his torch.

His tongue hit his cheek, more dead bodies in the forest. He's seen enough to last him a lifetime but a potential murdering werewolf on the loose while they're searching for it is trouble, they're going to need more help. "Who needs sleep anyway." Arthur mumbles, snatching his jacket off his desk chair and climbs out the window behind Scott. Spider crawling to the edge of the roof latches onto a thick tree branch swinging him off and onto the ground hands and knees hitting the ground almost painless compared to when he was younger. He'd come home limping with scratches on his palms from sliding down the tree.

The boys of the Scooby Doo gang trudge inside the forest flash lights lighting their path as they pursue the directions on Scott's smartphone. Branches crack under Arthur's shoe, the smell of wet leaves and rosemary does nothing to comfort him surrounded by darkness, the towering anger trees and branches trying to snatch him. He should've stayed inside his comforter reading a book or doing homework.

"You know, if my dad's right," Stiles murmures, kicking every stick and stone out of his path. "That means there's another werewolf in town that we haven't met yet."

"I know." Scott whispers, focused on the trail.

"If it turns out to be something like triplets that form into, like, a three - headed hound of hell, I'm seriously not up for that." The freckles boy rants.

The scar on Arthur's hip tingles and he fights the urge to touch it. "Yeah, a Darach was enough for me."

"Same. Especially if I can't even control my own transformation anymore." Scott mutters, trudging down a small hill. A howl startles Stiles into latching onto Scott, his phone dives into a puddle of water. Scott shoots him a look of annoyance, Arthur snickers.

"Sorry, buddy." Stiles grimaces. "I hate coyotes so much. They always sound like they're mauling some tiny, helpless little animal." The Alpha slides down the steep hill, Arthur uses a fallen branch to help balance him and Stiles dives down stumbling. Arthur tried to pretend not to notice but the small smile gives it away.

Scott picks up his smartphone and rubs away the water with his jacket sleeve, sighing in relief at the light. "It still works." Arthur swings the light in different directions out of boredom.

"Let me see the flashlight." Stiles takes it from Arthur's hand pointing it to the right, eyes squinted. "I think we found it." He leads them to a upside down crushed car with roots growing out of it.

"Why wouldn't they move it? Isn't it evidence?" Scott wonders.

"Probably too much of a pain in the ass to tow out. Look at this." He kneels below the upside door gesturing the light to the three claw marks. Scott's fingers trace them. "See those? Animal claws would be closer together, right? A lot closer."

"Then it was a werewolf." The Alpha breathes out.

"So your dad was right." Scott murmurs, eyes transfixed on the marks around the dark car.

Arthur bits his bottom lip finding no comfort in the new information and wishes. "Hopefully he's wrong about the murderer part." He crab walks to the front Stiles besides him flashes the light around for anything unusual only something pink stuck between the breaks. "What is that?"

Stiles yanks a doll and stands in between them gazing disturbed by the deformed doll. "I'm hungry." Stiles sheriks frozen in his spot, Arthur slaps it out of his hand like it was a hot sausage and Scott runs backwards away from the horror.

With his hand pressed against his electric heart, Stiles reveals. "I think I just had a minor heart attack."

A growl rips through the alarming silence a lot closer this time, Arthur steps back from the damaged vehicle glancing at Scott who looks hiponitized. "Hey, Stiles, Arthur, please tell me you see that."

He comes around his side grimacing at the steel blue irises glowing in the dark peeking through trees. "Yeah, we see it." The bizarre animal sprints away and Scott doesn't hesite to chase it.

Stiles rushes after him, "Wait, hey, Scott! Scott, wait!" Arthur snatches a fistful of his flannel preventing him from trailing Scott and possibly getting lost and injured.

"He can take care of himself." Arthur reassures, tapping the freckles boy's chest lightly. "You can't. Sometimes."

He flashes him a sarcastic smile. "Thanks, Art, really thanks." He squints at the path the Alpha ran by before spinning back to the misty forest debating on which lead. "C'mon, hopefully we won't get lost heading right."

"Well, right is right." Arthur agreed falling in step with him. Silence falls over them like a blanket, Arthur concerned about Scott ambles off alone not knowing the risk he jumped into head first. He shoves his hands in his pockets frowning he tucks a folded note, unfolding it he reads: roses are red, violets are blue, I'll look away from shoes, only for you. A light laugh bubbles up his throat, he doesn't need the signature at the end to know who's it's from. Warmth blossoms around his chest realizing she took the time out of her day to dedicate a cheesy poem to him.

Stiles glances over his shoulder. He presses his lips together once read and nods, "So, you're really with Lydia? You didn't have to pay her or anything?"

Arthur rolls his eyes punching his shoulder playfully. "I'm too broke to pay someone into dating me."

Heartbeats later, Stiles grins. "I'm glad one of us won her heart, you're a way better man than Jackson and your dumbass dad." Arthur glimpses up at him, irises tinted with astonishment and bliss. "I'm getting too soft."

"Fine. I'll save you the speech of how you'll find someone who'll actually appreciate you, and find your obsession with Star Wars adorable." His voice sounds distasteful and mocking but his eyes held affection. Knowing Stiles was alright with him dating Lydia made him feel a lot better and more liberating, their friendship not affected, he folds the note back into his pocket. "No more chick flicks moment, you're making me quesy."

Stiles rolls his eyes. "I'm getting tired of being the single one in our relationship."

His confusion remains only for a split second. "Ooh yeah, Kira from History." He sings glancing up the white moon aiding them in finding their way, but it looks like they were getting deeper inside the forest. He doesn't know what they're looking for. "Whatever Scotty doe eyes wants, Scotty gets."

"I always thought my eyes were prettier thought." Stiles retorts. He sighs stomping his foot higher and higher as they climb a hill.

Arthur shrugs taking a peek at it. "In the sun, yeah, but he has that puppy dog look. Girls love it."

Stiles snaps his fingers in his direction, spinning on heel in boredom and starts walking backwards for a reason Arthur couldn't grasp. "True. True - whoa!" The ocean blue's eyes blink and Stiles body vanished.

"Stiles? Stiles, come out!" Arthur calls, his hands cupped around his mouth spinning on his heel before dropping his hands. "What the hell, man?"

"D - down here!" His voice waivers as he spidercrawls back to the surface. Arthur's eyebrows crease wondering what the hell. "Let's ignore how I nearly died and focus on what I found." Climbing down behind him, his eyes widens at the contemporary den. "We should find Scott."

"Yeah," He nods pointing back from the direction the came from. "We should find Scott."

Letting Stiles be in control of the flashlight while sprinting was probably the dumbest idea Arthur had. Arthur has no clue whether they're going deeper into or away from the forest, his shoulders, knees and forehead aches from the times he tripped and slammed into branches and rocks, Stiles saw them ahead of time narrowly dodging and jumping leaving him to fend for himself. His forehead collides into the back of Stiles' head when he skids to a stop, screams tear into the air from both Scott and Stiles, Arthur continues curses behind them hoping it's smooth his irritation.

"I think we found something." Stiles claims once they stopped screaming.

Scott nods panting, "So did I."

The human duo leads the Alpha back to their findings, climbing up the hill again and knowing to slide down the hill shielding the den. Stiles lights up the path, Arthur bends his back forward nearly touching his knees as they crawl inside the tight space, he says. "It's a coyote den."

"Werecoyote." Scott corrects eyes flickering around the area: a dirty pink blanket laid at the end, thin sticks and dead leaves covers most the ground

Stiles picks up a blue worn out jacket, "You see this? This is Malia's. Remember, it's the same one she was wearing in the photo."

Scott takes a moment to himself glimpses at a teddy bear and picks it, realizing. "We shouldn't be in here."

Arthur's eyebrows pinched together. "What do you mean?"

"She's not going to come back now." Scott explains. "We just invaded her home. Our scent's going to be everywhere."

"If she's not going to come back here, where's she going to go?" Stiles questions.

Scott shrugs. "I don't know."

Arthur's knees begin to cramp so he shifts into a sitting on his butt glancing up at the roof his hand reaches up letting his palm rest again the bumpy roof. It's fit for animal but a human would survive their heads hitting the roof when they wake up or stand. "This is her home, so her scent has to be everywhere. Can you track her?" Arthur quizzes Scott.

"Maybe. But I'm better at this when I'm a full wolf. And I'm still worried that if I do it, I won't be able to turn back."

Stiles sighs heavily. "The door's still open."

"If I can't get to Derek, we're gonna have to find someone else to help." Scott pauses trying to get the ball of ideas rolling.

"Well, This is basically a crime scene, right?" Arthur wonders out loud, both boys glance back at him. "So maybe it's out Scott's boss's league."

"And more in my dad's." Stiles realises.

Thirty minutes later, Arthur overheats indistinct conversation over the radio attached to Sheriff Stilinski's hip as he climbs out of the den and walks towards his son plus son's friends. "You're sure it was her?" He questions once again.

"I looked her right in the eyes. And they glowed just like mine." Scott reassures.

"It makes sense, Dad." Stiles pipes up, Arthur nods.

"But it wasn't a girl. It was a four-legged coyote, right?" Sheriff Stilinski questions skeptical.

"Well, okay. But yeah, see, that's the point that we don't exactly have figured out yet." Arthur presses his lips together noticing the exasperated look on his face. It sounds insane and illogical even in his head, a werecoyote living in the forest: Deaton did say the nemeton would attract many other creatures, maybe next wereunicorns. Luminous blue and red lights flashes in his face snapping out of it, glancing behind him he watches Agent McCall ( he thought he would've been gone by now ) and Mr. Tate walking out of his cruiser.

"Mr. Tate." Sheriff greets but he doesn't acknowledge him. A petit pink ratty blanket is taken from his hands and he gazes with a mixture of adoration and grief. Arthur stares at the ground, his heart clenching at the sight unsure where to look.

Agent Mccall clears his throat, "Mr. Tate?"

His voice cracks. "It's hers."

"All right, wait here." He orders before taking off to speak to the Sheriff then Scott leaving Arthur and Stiles alone.

* * *

EVERYONE NEEDS A toilet break from a class as boring as Art especially when history is involved. It used to be intriguing and boisterous until they received a new teacher who unintentionally made the subject a lullaby. Washing his hands under the cold water, he flickers up meeting his ocean blue eyes and blinks

A streak of golden blonde hair blinds him momentarily. His heart skips a beat recognizing the shade, "Erica?" A giggle makes the temperature drop the water turns to ice, the mirrors gloss and his spine straighten.

"Missed me, pretty boy?" The late Erica wonders, her finger grazing his shoulder. Even in Death she's gorgeous, Arthur had forgotten about his tiny crush on her before Derek turned her but it only amplified but nothing compared to how he felt for Lydia.

"You died." Arthur gulps, his mouth felt like the Sahara desert taking a step back. "You were buried. I saw them lower you!"

"Yes I was." She assures, a smile on her ruby lips. Her heels click strutting to him, her smile blossoming as Arthur does the same backwards until he's trapped again the wall. Her brown eyes haunting staring into his ocean blue, he tries to look away begging to snap out of whatever this is. "You know what I loved most about you?"

His heart pounds against his rib cage making it harder for him to breath, if he moved he'd touch her a warning swarms in his head telling him not. "No, no. Leave me alone. You're dead! Why am I seeing the dead?"

"Your eyes. I could drown in them." She whispers, her hand raises to touch him but his jaw inches away. "And I did. I died, just like the others."

He blinks repeatedly counting his fingers mentally, and pauses. "The others?"

"Open your eyes, Arthur." His name from her lips felt like a forbidden word. Opening his eyes the sky stares down him bawling tossing and turning in a mysterious blue no clouds in sight, the wind tries to collect his soul with it as it blows nearly taking him away. Falling to the ground, his eyebrows furrow at the marble oval stone. His breath knocked out or his lungs as he read.

"Vernon Boyd? Allison Argent?" His fingers dig into his palms shaking his head at the two headstones. "No, she's alive. How can this be her gravestone?"

"She's only one of the others." Erica replies, leaning on one of the many scattered gravestones. "Read this one."

"Isaac Lahey? Lydia Martin? Scott McCall?" He pushes himself up, taking a peek at a few more because this isn't right. His friends aren't dead. They can't be fucking dead if he's still breathing. "Kira Yukimura? Aiden and Ethan? Sage Robinson? Stiles - What is this?"

A dizzy spell nearly knocks him over trying to process what going on, nobody should be dead. After they've survived they're going to continue all of them, no stupid gravestone can take it away from him. Ocean blue eyes land on a bored golden blonde admiring her nails, he demands. "Why are you doing this, Erica? How could you do this? To me?"

"Don't you realize it?" Erica questions, she kneels in front of him a pout on her lips taking in the disheveled man in front of her. "All you do is being chaos, and it's time you realize it."

"You're lying." He stutters, shaking his head. A weigh drops on his chest squeezing an emotion out of him, he wants - needs to snap out of it. "I'm trying to help."

She shakes her head. "Sweetheart, you're a human wreck."

Flames burn his veins snapping him out of his head and into reality, he sucks in a breath ocean blue irises blurred as he tries to recognize where he is. Heart pummeling in his chest, he notices his peers glancing at him and the art room suffocating him.

"Arthur, you're safe." A soft voice cooed besides him, resting a hand on his thigh.

Her hand falls from his thigh as he stands pushing his chair back. "I need to go outside, sir!" He doesn't wait for a response storming outside to find a window and rests his head on the window still trying not to think of his nightmare. It had to be, Erica Reyes is buried six feet under and has been for months. He teases at the familiar sound of heels clicking but relaxed at the Prada heels something Erica couldn't afford to wear.

The cherry red says nothing, giving him enough space to regain his breathing and collect his thoughts, hoping her presence alone brought him comfort.

"I was in a graveyard." Arthur confesses, his curled fists holding his chin up on the window still glancing at Lydia. "Everybody was dead: Scott and Isaac, Stiles and Allison and you. Your gravestones were, were everywhere I looked. And it was all my fault, Erica told me." He inhales deeply before releasing a breathy laugh. "Sounds stupid, doesn't it?"

"No, not at all." Lydia reassures, a small smile on her lips leaning on the wall besides the window rubbing his back. "Well, except the part about you believing what Erica said. When has she ever been right about you?"

"She said I was pretty." Arthur reminds hoping to let the tension to fly out the window. Lydia glances away. "Dead people don't lie."

"Well, this one does." Lydia retorts, her hand falling on his shoulder making him look at her. "Arthur, you didn't kill anybody, okay? You could never." He doesn't reply. "Arthur -"

"Can we please drop it?" He pleads. It looked so realistic, so much it's making him want to go to bed and never leave. "We have like five minutes of class left and they're serving tacos today."

Lydia says nothing her silence making his stomach ache wondering what could be keeping her silent. Her arms wraps around his shoulders holding onto him tightly his eyes widen, knees bent slightly due to her short height taking a moment to circle his arms around her waist breathing in her shampoo eyes closing in bliss standing in the empty school halls. "We'll be fine. You will be fine again, Arthur. I promise."

"I found your note." Arthur recalls, unwillingly releasing the petit cherry red, a smile on his lips remembering the words. She beams too. "I didn't know poetry was your thing."

"It isn't." She replies. "That was my first, and I decided to dedicate it to you."

"Well, I am honored," His fingers lace with her smaller ones stepping forward until his Adidas touches her black heels. "To be your first." He hesitates wondering if this was the right moment: but shrugs it off and presses his lips lightly against her forehead. No words could summarize how cherished he felt in that moment, he wishes this makes up for it. The bell strikes him breaking a spell on him forcing him to pull back as students pile into the halls, the warmth spread in his cheeks watching her eyes flutter open.

* * *

KIRA FROM HISTORY ( he should learn her surname ) was nearly a coyote's meal during lunch but was saved heroically by Scott. Stiles kiddnaped a doll from the wreckage and Mr. Tate brought a gun in school grounds demanding they find the animal ( secretly known as his daughter ) and slaughter it. And that brings them to the vet clinic, discussing how they can bring Malia Tate home as a human before he brings her in s body bag.

"Xylazine. It's a tranquilizer for horses. For a werecoyote, expect it to work within seconds." Deanrin drops three clear petit bottles on the metal table. "I only have three. So whoever's shooting, needs to be a damn good shot."

"Allison's a perfect shot." Scott insists immediately. "She can do it."

"If we manage to find the thing." Isaac counters on the other side of the table, arms crossed. Arthur's mind wonders off to Lydia.

"What's is the point of him? Seriously, I mean, what is his purpose?" Stiles complains. Arthur rolls his eyes. "Aside from the persistent negativity and the scarf? What's up with the scarf anyway? It's 65 degrees out."

"God Stiles, for once can you shut up?" Arthur retorts, eyes narrowed on him. Stiles' jaw ticks.

"Look, maybe I'm asking a question no one here wants to ask: How do we turn a coyote back into a girl, when she hasn't been a girl for eight years?" Issac wonders.

"I can do it." Scott reassures.

"You can?" Arthur and Stiles glance at one another once the words escapes both their lips.

Turning to Stiles, he reminds. "You remember the night that Peter trapped us in the school? In the gym, he was able to make me turn using just his voice. Deucalion did the same thing in the distillery."

"This is a werecoyote, Scott." Deaton interferes. The blue eyed human drifts wondering how Lydia felt when he kissed her forehead, was he good? Does she regret it? God, he hopes not. "Who knows if it'll even work if you can find someone who can teach you."

"That's why you've been calling Derek." Arthur realized, knuckles tapping the metal table lightly trying to push Lydia to the back of his mind.

Scott sighs. "Yeah, I could try it on my own. But right now, I'm too scared to even change into just a werewolf."

"We need a real Alpha." Scott shoots him an offended look. "You know what I mean. An Alpha who can do Alpha things. You know, an Alpha who can get it going. You know, get it.."

"Up?" Isaac finishes.

Scott groans. "Great. I'm an Alpha with performance issues."

"Is there anyone else besides Derek who could help?"

"I wouldn't trust Peter." The blond beta insists immediately.

"Maybe the twins?" Stiles suggests.

"They're not Alphas anymore. after what Jennifer did, almost killing them? It broke that part of them."

"Yeah, but what if they know how to do it?" Arthur wonders.

"Nobody's seen them for weeks." Scott counters.

The smoky eyes grimaces voicing, "Actually, that's not true."