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Thirteen

Allison's POV:

Since the wolfsbane had more of an effect on Scott to the point where he fell unconscious, Olivia and I had to drag him in through one of the stadium's storage rooms.

I will admit, stabbing him before we arrived at the stadium wasn't my smartest decision.

Once we were inside, I moved his arm off of my neck which caused Olivia to stagger backward against the wall and fall to the floor. "Thanks for the warning." She tiredly mutters. "Need to...rest my eyes for a sec."

I stay quiet, ignoring her words and I turn away to place the rest of my weapons on the nearby crates.

I turn back around, my eyes narrow in suspicion at the sight of her unconscious state and I couldn't help but take a few steps toward her.

I crouch down to her eye level in curiosity and tilt my head to the side.

I sew the rest of her wounds and once I finish, I pat her cheek a couple of times.

"Liv, wake up." I shake her a couple of times but her head falls limp. "You're not dying here, not now. Please. I need you, please don't leave me. Please." I plead, cupping her cheek so she could face me.

Instantly her eyes shoot open, gasping for air as she frantically looks around which causes me to pull back a bit.

"I-It's all my fault." She whispers as she looks down in shame. "If I hadn't been so damn stubborn in trying to be the hero, Derek wouldn't have had to save me."

"Liv, look at me." I tilt her chin up and her eyes lock with mine. "It's okay. Everything is going to be okay."

She lifts her hand to tuck in a couple of strands of my hair behind my ear, giving a small smile.

She looks down at her stitched wounds and lets out a soft chuckle. "Did you do that?" I nod. She leans her head back on the wall. "Nice job."

I shake my head, breaking away from the memory as an ache begins to ripple in my head. The hell?

I look back up at Olivia.

That memory... didn't look recent. That version of Olivia—well, both of us seemed younger.

The warmth of her cheek when I cupped the side of her face...it felt so real.

I hesitantly reach to move the strands of her hair, pushing them to tuck behind her ear. "Olivia..."

"Yes, she's charming." The chilling voice of my mother breaks me from my thoughts. "History is replete with charming killers. Especially with Scott, he's still a killer. She's defending a killer."

"What am I even doing here? This..." I mutter as I shake my head in disagreement. "this can't be the right thing to do."

"Don't get lost in useless moral quandaries, Allison." She immediately snapped. "Stick to the plan. Your father is on his way here right now."

I stand up from my spot at the mention of his name, remembering the way his eyes widened as soon as he saw me in the hospital. Almost in pure disbelief.

"I saw him at the hospital." I whisper. "That was him."

"No, he's on his way and he's bringing Peter Hale. You remember what that monster did to Kate?" She emphasized with a distorted growl, circling me. "He ripped her throat out with his claws. He'll do the same to you if he gets the chance. Don't you remember how they burned us? We lost years. Can't you feel that life stolen from you?"

"I don't know what I feel!" I yell in frustration, rubbing the sides of my head as the headache practically pounded against my skull. "I--"

"A few more hours and the sun goes down." She quickly reassured me, but it wasn't the soothing voice I remember. It was mixed with something monstrous. Demonic. "We'll take care of everything then. They come out at night."

I tried to turn to face her but no matter how much I tried, I only saw a sliver of a darkened figure. "Who?"

"The Oni..." She whispers. "And with them comes chaos."

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Scott stirs in his sleep and he weakly blinks a few times until he lifts his shirt, seeing the darkened wound on his side trickled with black veins.

He worriedly looked over to Olivia, seeing that she still lay unconscious but that her blood began to seep through the makeshift bandage she made with her now-torn long sleeve.

"That isn't going to stop the bleeding. We need a medical kit." Scott muttered. "And if we don't come up with a way to get this wolfsbane out soon...I'm going to die."

My expression doesn't waver and despite my silence, he continued. "We need to find Liam."

I raise a brow. "Your beta?"

"My friend." He corrected with annoyance laced in his tone. "Liam, Hikari, Kira."

"They're kitsunes." I bitterly state, remembering when the arrow disintegrated into flames as soon as it lodged into her arm. "That's why that arrow didn't do anything to her."

"Because of the fox. It protects her...like armor."

"It won't protect her from the Oni." I remark.

"Nothing protected Olivia either." He countered. "She saved you."

I furrow my brows. "What do you mean?"

"Fifteen years ago, the Oni were supposed to kill you but instead, she sacrificed herself to save you. She died in your arms." He emphasized. "And if you let me, I could prove it to you."

I slowly shake my head. "You're lying." I whisper.

"Just give me a chance." He pleaded. "If you still don't believe me, fine. Let me die."

"And what if I do?"

"Well, then you're gonna have to save her." Scott nods his head to Olivia. "She's not like me. She's human, she...she has a son."

He moves to pull something from his back pocket and I quickly grab my crossbow, aiming it directly at his chest. "Don't even try it."

"Wait, wait. Just...hold on. Please." He whispers, seeing his bloodied hand before he continues to dig into his pocket and pulls out his wallet. He weakly tosses it with a grunt and it slides near my boot. "It's next to my license."

I slowly pick it up from the ground and open it, seeing a few bills and his license stick out until my eyes landed on the two small pictures.

One was an old group photo with the others from what seemed to be a graduation but I grabbed the smaller photo where it was only us two.

It was a picture of me smiling and holding the peace sign and him smiling with his eyes shut.

"It was at the ice rink. The other pictures didn't come out so I tore that one off for you." He explained. "After you died, your father gave that to me."

I shut my eyes and a flicker of the memory flashes in my thoughts. One of a familiar strawberry-blonde-haired girl skillfully twirling in her ice skates as two other people watched in awe. "Lydia was there."

"Olivia and Stiles." He added. "Remember the winter formal?"

"I went with my friends..." I trail off until I nod. "Jackson and Lydia. I don't remember anybody else.

"I was there, and I found you inside. We danced then we...kissed." He winced. "It was the first time I told you that I loved you...but you didn't say it back."

"Why did you do that?" I hear myself say and the memory flashes in my thoughts, remembering how our heads were pressed against each other as we slow danced in the gymnasium.

"Because I love you."

I put the picture back in his wallet and tossed it to the side. "I don't remember any of that.

"When you broke up with me, I knew we weren't meant to be together but not because I was a werewolf. It was because you were happier with Olivia. I called it fate because you came into each other's lives and made them better for one another. You were meant to be with her. And you told me...there's no such thing as fate. Do you remember what I told you back?"

My eyes slightly widen. "There's no such thing as werewolves." I whisper. "What else?"

"We met again a couple of months later."

I glance over to Olivia, seeing her practically fight to stay awake as she dug into her pocket and held out her wallet for me to grab.

I quickly stand up from my spot to walk closer to them, taking the item from her hand.

In one of the pockets, I pull out a small older photo of us cheekily smiling in a bedroom when we were teenagers.

"It's when you first came over to my house. We weren't anything back then but...you became my friend that day." She grunts, adjusting her posture against the wall. "That memory is something I've always cherished because it was the start of everything. Of us."

I pull out another photo that was tucked in and see a more somewhat recent photo, but this time of us with a young boy. "Who is this?" I question, turning the photo back to her.

Her eyes soften. "Our son." She whispers. "At the adoption center they told us about how his dad was brutally murdered and his mom couldn't handle taking care of him anymore. Since we couldn't have children, we took him in."

I look back at the picture, taking note of his cheesy grin with his arms wrapped around our shoulders as we held him underneath his legs to match our height level.

A brief memory from earlier of hitting a teenage boy with my bow at the auto shop and his pleading eyes meeting mine flashes in my thoughts. Oh no.

"Griffin..." I whisper and she immediately nods with a small smile. I tuck the photos back in and handed her wallet back. "Tell me the rest."

"She can't," Scott spoke up as he moved his hand away to show his wound along with Olivia who gestured to her bleeding side. "because we're going to die if you don't help us."

"What do I have to do?"

Olivia points behind me. "First aid kit for me. Just so I could patch myself up until this is all over where I can go to the hospital." She explains before she points to Scott. "I can help to get rid of the wolfsbane. All we need is something to burn it out."

Griffin's POV:

"A man looks at a photograph of another man." The man dressed in a brown leather jacket with a black t-shirt and khakis but the entirety of his head (except for his razor-sharp teeth) were wrapped in bandages, creepily crawled up the steps towards Derek. "He says, 'Brothers and sisters have I none. But this man's father is my father's son'."

He finally reaches the top and properly gets on his feet, moving closer to Derek's face. "Who is the man in the photograph?" He heavily breathes out, almost hearing the smirk in his tone.

"My son." Derek deadpans with a glare.

"Ah." The Nogitsune sighs before turning to face Eli and walking closer to him.

"Leave him alone!" I yell, trying to yank the binds from my wrists but even if I had made half-progress to rip it completely, it still held firm.

The Nogitsune pauses in its place and turns to me this time, tilting his head to the side in curiosity. "Ah...yes, the son of a Phoenix and my greatest fighter. To think I would have trouble to bring you but all you did was make things easier to lure your mother here by pathetically sacrificing yourself for nothing!" He growled which caused my heart to sink. "You're no hero. You're just a joke."

"Get away from him!" I hear Phoebe grunt from below. "Griffin, don't let him get in your head."

"Here's another one for you. I make you weak at the worst of all times. I keep you safe, I keep you fine. I make your hands sweat," He intimidatingly takes a few steps closer to me. "and your heart grows cold, I visit the weak, but seldom the bold...what am I?"

Collecting all the saliva in my mouth, I spit it in his face, and to my surprise, he didn't even flinch. He simply wiped the saliva off with his sleeve.

"You may not say the answer but..." He inhales a deep breath with a chuckle, cupping under my chin and feel his sharpened claws dig into my face and I let out a groan at the tightened grip. "that familiar delicious smell is radiating off from you. It's what your mother Olivia displayed when I was inside her head and led her to her demise...her fear. The same fear when your biological mother left you behind."

I try to lunge at him but he takes a step back at ease with a chuckle before turning to face Eli.

"Don't be afraid." Derek warned.

"Oh, of this guy? No, no way." Eli tries to brush it off but as the Nogitsune cupped underneath his chin with his claws, his expression churns to discomfort. "Oh, my God, he's touching me! Eugh!"

"The son of Derek Hale. But not a wolf yet, is he?" The Nogitsune taunted, tightly squeezing Eli's chin. "When night falls, he may earn his fangs, his claws, watching the rest of you die!"

Instantly, he slashes Eli's cheek which causes Derek to let out a ferocious roar.

Olivia's POV:

"So...who's the lucky guy?" I look up from tying the wrap's knot around my waist, seeing as Allison continues to search through the boxes. "The ring on your finger....you're married, right?"

I feel my cheeks heat up in embarrassment. "I—uh...yes and no."

She furrows her brows in confusion. "Yes and no?"

"It wasn't a guy but I married...well, you." I awkwardly admit, not wanting to meet her eyes. "I couldn't bring myself to date other people. I sort of...kept your ring and made it into a necklace to wear. To show that you're still with me."

I look up and see that she paused from her search, meeting her solemn expression as she looked down at her ring finger. "How do you have the ring?"

"We had this big fight and I guess you accidentally left your wedding ring when you left the house. You were supposed to only go on a drive but..." I trail off as I finish tying the last knot around my waist before sliding down my shirt.

"I never came back." She whispered in discomfort. "I died."

"It was hard." I look away, tearing a new piece of the wrap so that I can set up to help Scott next. "I pushed everyone away because if I hadn't, it would've made everything clear that you were really gone. Practically buried myself into work to distract myself." I mutter, shaking my head in disbelief. "Ended up hurting myself more and Griffin in the process. Mom of the year, huh?"

"I think...I think I would have done the same. No one has perfect parents." She hesitantly explains and I turn, seeing that she held the flare in her hand. "This good enough?"

She crouches down to my level and as I grab the flare, our hands accidentally graze which causes my eyes to soften in remembrance of the memory.

Motel California.

"It all started that night, that night I stumbled into something I wasn't supposed to see. Before that, I was alone with nothing interesting that had been going on in my life. I was normal." I emphasized, remembering the moment when I followed Allison and she broke into Isaac's house. "I wasn't fighting off werewolves, I wasn't trying so hard to figure out who the kanima was or who had been controlling it, I wasn't constantly worrying about my friends and my mom's safety. I was nothing and it was easier."

"You're not nothing." Stiles shook his head. "You're someone. You're Olivia, our best friend."

"I'm a freak!" I shout, clenching my hand on the flare. "I never asked to be this! It'll be easier for everyone if I left after what I did to them. My mom's financial struggles with me around, becoming stubborn at my actions which led to Derek's and Erica's deaths and Cora hating me for losing the only brother she had," I sadly glance over to Allison. "and I'm the one that caused you to miss your chance at saying goodbye to your mom."

I move my hand that held the flare to the side, preparing to drop it into the gasoline puddle. "The only solution I can think of is becoming nothing again. I don't deserve to be here not after what I've done."

Allison takes another step. "Olivia, you deserve to be here. No matter what you do," She points behind Scott, Stiles, and Lydia who had looks of devastation. "they'll always want you here and I promise you that your mom doesn't regret a single thing about having you here."

"You're lying." I shake my head. "I'm nothing."

"I would never in my life lie to you. Ever." Allison's eyes brimmed with tears. "You've become someone very important to us, you're the light in our lives--my life. Olivia, you're one of my best friends and since then, we've become closer a-and...I need you." She shakily whispered.

My eyebrows furrowed as I blankly stared but she took another step closer.

"I'll always need you and no matter what you go through, I'll always be there for you. Just like how you were with me when I thought I was alone."

"Allison." Scott worriedly looked between us.

"Olivia," Allison takes a step into the puddle of gasoline, getting closer and closer to me. "you're always going to have me in the end. Nothing and I mean nothing is ever going to change that and break us apart. I'll never leave you and I promise that we'll always protect each other." She wraps her hand around the flare as well but I never tore my eyes away from hers.

"Uh..." Scott's voice breaks me from my thoughts, seeing that his eyes widen in surprise at the flare in front of him.

I look back at the flare, seeing that I still had my hand over hers and I quickly move it away. "Sorry." I awkwardly clear my throat. "You're in better condition to do it."

"You couldn't find a lighter?" Scott hesitantly asks, watching as Allison pulls the cap off the flare.

She raises a brow. "Do you want to live or not?"

He sighs. "Burn it out."

She scrapes the cap against the top and it ignites into a bright flame. For a moment, she curiously eyes the fire until she moves it closer to his wound.

As soon as the flames made contact with his skin, his groans soon shifted into a monstrous roar as his eyes brightly glowed red.

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