CHAPTER THIRTEEN
A MERMAIDS FURY
"can't fight the sad days and bad nights"
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When all you wanted to do was lie in bed cuddling with your pillow and your cat, it was hard not to be a slight bit pessimistic when you were being forced to be at the police station late at night. Scott, Stiles and Shivani peered over Noah Stilinski's shoulder, eyes locked on the evidence file lying on the desk infront of him.

Shivani didn't really get why they even needed her there. And she defines didn't get how Stiles had just convinced her to come. Just like that. She really needed to gain some self control and the power to say no when someone asked for her help. It was like the word 'no' just wasn't in her vocabulary lately. The same went for both Scott and Noah. How the hell did Stiles manage to drag any of them down here? His power of convincing was not to be underestimated, Shivani noted.

"We look at the hospital stuff first, okay?" Stiles decided quickly when his father exited the room for a short moment to handle something.

Scott furrowed his brows in confusion. "Why?" Shivani had now resided to the other side of the room. She was comfortably slumped down in a chair, eyes slipping close. After everything with the party and Allison, she needed a break. The punch from earlier that night was making her head hurt, and the blaring lights inside of the damned office was blinding her.

"Because all the murders were committed by Jackson, except for one, you remember?" Stiles explained to the clueless McCall boy. His eyes fell on Shivani. Though she looked ever so peaceful and cute where she was curled up, she needed to stay awake. "Shivani, over here."

"The pregnant girl, Jessica." Scott realized at the same time as Shivani groaned in irritation. Reluctantly, she got to her feet and made her way over to stand along side the two doofuses.

"Yeah. Since Matt had to kill her himself, somebody from the hospital could've seen him." Stiles continued. It made sense.

Shivani shuddered at the thought. Matt had literally killed a pregnant woman, with his own two hands. It was disgusting. What reasoning could he possibly have for that?

"So, what are we looking at?" Stiles' dad asked as he reentered the room. Shivani stepped aside, letting the former sheriff get closer to the desk.

His face twisted up in hesitation when he realized they were looking at the hospital files. "I don't know, guys. I mean, look at this. There was a six - car pileup that night, the hospital was jammed." He was obviously still in doubt about it all. Which was understandable. What were the chances of some high school boy going off on a murderous spree just like that anyways?

"Alright, just keep going. Look, he had to have passed one of the cameras on that floor to get to Jessica, okay? He's gotta be on the footage somewhere." Stiles pressed. There was no way Matt could have possibly dodged the cameras. He was on there somewhere, they just needed to find it. Shivani narrowed her eyes as she desperately tried to spot the boy.

"Oh, hold on, stop! Did you see that? Scroll back." Scott suddenly said, pointing to the screen. Stiles' father obliged, scrolling back on the tape.

"That's him! That's Matt!" Stiles shouted, pointing to the screen. The former sheriff and Shivani shared a skeptical look. Sure, it could've been Matt, but all they really was seeing was the back of someone's head.

"All I see is the back of someone's head." Noah blankly said, unamused. Shivani folded her arms over her chest, shooting Stiles a look.

"Matt's head, yeah. I sit behind him in history. He's got a very distinct cranium, it's weird." Stiles' comment made Shivani groan loudly.

"My god Stiles. It's late, I want to go home and sleep. Can you please be serious." Shivani plead. Her desperate tone made Stiles frown slightly.

"Alright, fine, then look at his jacket, huh? How many people do you know who wear black leather jackets?" Stiles continued. Shivani shot him a dumb look. Oh, let's see, Derek, Erica, Isaac. . . literally every werewolf out there and so on, Shivani thought. She kept her mouth shut. Whatever came out of it when she was this level of tired was usually not that nice.

"Millions, literally." The former sheriff spoke.

Scott decided to dip in. "Okay, can we scroll forward? There's gotta be a shot of him coming at one of the cameras." Shivani nodded in agreement, thankful for the McCall boy's voice of reason.

So, Noah continued going through the tape. "Right there! Stop, stop!" Stiles exclaimed. "See, there he is again." Shivani facepalmed at the footage.

"You mean there's the back of his head again." They really weren't getting anywhere with this.

"Okay, but look. He's talking to someone." Stiles pointed out. All four leaned closer to the screen to check out who it was exactly.

"My mom." Scott realized. "He's talking to my mom."

"Well? What are you waiting for? Call her!" Shivani ushered. Scott fumbled with his phone before quickly dialing Melissa McCall's number, impatiently waiting for her to answer.

Fortunately for them, she answered rather quickly.

"Scott, you know how many people I deal with in a day?" Scott's mom sighed through the phone upon hearing his question.

"This one's 16. He's got dark hair, looks like a normal teenager." Scott tried explaining.

Stiles pulled Scott's phone to his mouth. "Yeah, he looks evil." Shivani rolled his eyes at Stiles.

"Scott, I already talked to the police about this." The McCall woman sounded exasperated, which she probably was too. After all, being a nurse wasn't always sunshine and rainbows. Shivani knew so far from listening to her mother's endless rants about her job.

"Just send her a picture or something." Shivani suggested in annoyance. Scott quickly took her advice, snapping a picture of the computer screen. Did any of them have any sense of efficiency? Apparently not.

"Okay, mom, I'm gonna take a picture and send it to you. Did you get it?" Scott asked. A moment of silence passed before his mother responded.

"Yeah."

"Do you recognize him? Do you remember him?" Scott asked in desperation.

"Yeah, I did. I mean, I remember I stopped him because he was tracking mud in the hall." Melissa explained. "Scott, what's going on?"

"It's - it's nothing, mom." Scott stuttered back. "I'll explain later. I gotta go." With that, he hung up. Now, they had at least gotten enough to confirm that it was infact Matt at the hospital that night. Shivani was hoping this meant the tail end of their investigation for now, but unfortunately it wasn't.

"We've got shoe prints alongside the tire tracks at the trailer site." The Stilinski man said. Stiles nodded his head frantically.

"And if they match, that puts Matt at the scene of three murders. The trailer, the hospital, and the rave." Stiles continued.

"Actually, four." Noah Stilinski said when something popped up on the computer screen. "A credit card receipt for an oil change was signed by Matt at the garage where the mechanic was killed."

"When?"

"A couple hours before you got there." They were finally getting somewhere.

"Alright, dad, if one's an incident, two's a coincidence, and three's a pattern, what's four?" Stiles asked, voice full of hope.

A grin glazed his dad's face. "Four's enough for a warrant. Scott, call your mom back, see how quick she can get here. If I can get an official ID, I can get a search warrant. Stiles, go to the front desk. Tell them to let Scott's mom in when she gets here." The man instructed. "Shivani, help me get this stuff sorted."

The girl nodded her head, more than willing to help if it meant they'd get things done faster.

Shivani was officially one step closer to the comforts of her bed.

˚✧₊⁎*⁎⁺˳✧༚

Shivani was nowhere near close to the comforts of her bed.

Instead, she was being held at gunpoint, along with Scott. Matt was there along with Jackson, who had taken it upon himself to either kill off or paralyze the entire sheriff's station. Stiles was paralyzed aswell, ontop of Derek. His dad was cuffed inside of a holding cell, as well as Scott's mom who was locked up. This night just kept getting worse.

Matt had forced them to delete everything they had on him, including the hospital tapes. But apparently that wasn't enough for Matt. He had fired a shot in Scott's stomach, right before of his mom's eyes. Of course it had healed almost instantly, but she didn't know that. Shivani's heart broke at the sounds of her cries, begging Matt to let her help her son.

"The evidence is gone." Scott growled. "Why don't you just go?" Shivani let her hand slowly clench, her powers slowly starting to heat up Matt's blood. She had never tried this on an actual person before, but now was as good time as ever to start. So she out all of her concentration into fueling her powers, hoping to knock him unconscious before he had the chance to react.

"You- you think the evidence mattered that much, huh? No, no, I - I want the book." Matt stuttered, sweat already starting to trickle down his forehead. Scott quickly picked up on what Shivani was doing.

"What - what book?" Scott asked, trying to distract him. Matt had so far only revealed he knew what Shivani was. He hadn't mentioned anything about her powers though, which gave them an advantage. Usually, she stopped herself from using them, but this was an emergency after all. Hopefully this would give them the element of suprise.

"The bestiary." Matt barked, wiping the sweat of his forehead. "Not just a few pages, I want the entire thing." He was starting to feel light headed, tugging on his shirt to cool down.

"I don't have it. It's Gerard's. What do you want it for, anyway?" Scott questioned.

At this point, the boy clenching the gun was starting to pant. "I need answers."

Scott and Shivani shared a look of confusion. "Answers to what?"

"To this."

Shivani almost gaged at the sight. Matt pulled up his grey tshirt, revealing the reptilian scales covering parts of his upper body. Her eyes went wide at the sight. He looked just like Jackson.

Matt grabbed Scott's phone, which he had confiscated from Scott earlier on. He quickly shot a text before putting it back down in his pockets. "Why the hell is it so hot in here?" Matt exclaimed, grabbing a water bottle standing on a shelf, chugging it quickly.

"What the hell are you doing?" Matt yelled out when his gaze fell on Shivani's hand. "You're the one doing all of this? Stop that right now!"

Shivani cocked her head to the left. "You're aware that I can literally make your blood boil, right? Before you even get to think about pulling that trigger, you'll be passed out from overheating." Shivani said, clenching her hand further.

"Oh yeah? Well how about this." Matt pulled the gun to Scott's head. "The next bullet I fire will be going through his brains, how'd you think he'll be healing from that?"

Shivani pressed her lips into a thin line. Reluctantly she was forced to put down her hand. Matt nodded, a cocky smirk on his face. "Yeah, that's what I thought. Don't think about doing anything like that again." Matt quickly clamped a pair of hand cuffs on her wrists, pulling her arms behind her back to stop her from using her powers. Matt glanced over at Scott who's hand was still covering his wound. "You know, I - I feel sorry for you, McCall, 'cause right now, you're thinking, "how am I gonna explain this when it heals?". And the sad part is, you don't even realize how incredible it is that you actually are healing. 'Cause you know what happens to everyone else when they get shot? They die." Matt then looked over at Shivani. "And you. You have literal powers. No one stands a chance against a gun, yet here you are, with these incredible powers and ability to protect yourself, and you barely even use it? If you touch water, you literally become this creature who's able to swim perfectly and hold your breath for ages. You don't drown."

"Is that what happened to you?" Scott suddenly realizez. "You drowned, didn't you?"

"He shouldn't have let them drink." Matt suddenly mumbled.

"What - who - Matt, what do you mean?" Shivani queried, brows quirked up in confusion.

"Lahey!" The boy yelled back in anger. "He shouldn't have let them drink."

"What, who was drinking?" Scott questioned further, hoping Matt would reveal something they could use.

"The swim team, you idiot! I didn't know what was happening. I didn't know they had just won state, and Lahey, he's letting his favorites come over to have a couple drinks to celebrate. Who cares if they're 17, right?" Matt started. Shivani had a feeling they were in for the origin story of the villain.

"Were you at Isaac's?" She asked. Matt nodded.

"He had this first edition Spiderman, or was it Batman? And we were gonna make a trade. But then I'm over there and I hear music. And everyone's having a good time, and I see Sean. He throws Jessica in the pool. And then - and then Bennett goes in and-"

"Bennett? What - the hunter?"

"And then Camden, Isaac's jarhead brother, he grabs me. He thinks it's funny." Matt continued.

"They threw you in." Scott and Shivani realized, eyes wide.

"I - I yelled that I can't swim, but nobody listens. I go under and I swallow water, and no one cares. And I see these bodies underwater. I - I see Jessica's got her hands down Sean's board shorts. Tucker's grabbing Kara. And I'm drowning. I'm dying, and they're laughing. All of a sudden, I was just - I'm lying by the pool. And Lahey is right there, right above me, and he says "you tell no one! This, this is your fault! What little bastard doesn't know how to swim?" And I didn't. I didn't tell anyone. And I would see them at school, and they wouldn't even look at me. I'd wake up in the middle of the night. I'd gasp for breath. And my parents, they thought I was an asthmatic. They even gave me an inhaler." Shivani almost felt bad for the boy. "They didn't know that every time I closed my eyes, I - I was drowning. You know about that little white light that they talk about, you see when you die? Well, I didn't see anything. Just darkness. Everything was dark. But then- then came the Argent's funeral, and everything changed."

"How so?" Shivani questioned, pushing him to continue. And so he did. . .

word count; 2586
a/n

i'm having very mixed feelings with this book to be completely honest. it had been slightly rushed and not too planned, and i can only hope it's not to sloppy. eventually i will probably be editing it, but in the meantime i greatly appreciate all and every comment pointing out stuff, it really does help me out a lot. hope u guys enjoyed this chapter, it was definitely very fun to write. stay tuned for more my loves!

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