Lydia was crying again. And she'd been crying since the moment she'd snapped herself out of whatever stupor she'd fallen into in the middle of their annual gift exchange. But the crying was totally valid. She had led them, once again, directly to a dead body that was currently cooling a few yards in front of Stiles. Honestly, at this rate, she was going to go into full-blown Victorian-style hysterics at any minute. But Stiles had no idea how to help her besides hold her. And he was already doing that.

It just didn't feel like enough. Nothing did anymore.

She wanted answers. And more than that, she needed them. Fuck. They all did. And this situation hadn't provided that. Just another dead body. More problems for them to clean up. Okay, more problems for Derek and Scott to clean up because no way in hell Stiles was touching a dead body, and they were the two who had volunteered to check it out with their werewolf Spidey senses and do an impromptu autopsy without actually touching anything.

Actually, that wasn't entirely true, now that Stiles thought about it a second. They had some answers.

First, Lydia Martin was not a werewolf. They had discovered at least that much when Stiles had locked her up during the last full moon and nothing had happened. Well, nothing werewolf-y had happened. Other things had happened. Namely that she had yelled and cussed and pouted to try and get him to let her out, but nothing bad had happened. And that was important. Granted, they were no closer to discovering what she was, but they had managed to cross off one possibility on what felt like a never-ending list.

It wasn't fair, though. None of this was, damnit.

"It's not Peter," Derek declared after another silent moment, only interrupted by Lydia's sniffles. "But a werewolf killed him."

"And he's a werewolf too," Scott tacked on.

"The rogue?" Jackson asked.

Derek shook his head sadly. Ugh. More questions.

"A pack fight?" Isaac offered.

Derek sighed, shaking his head again, hands on his hips now. "Other packs can't come this close. We can't have two Alphas in the same area for too long. They'll kill each other. We all have our own territories for a reason. The nearest one to here is, like, 85 miles away or something."

"Why does this keep happening to me?" Lydia interjected next, her voice muffled by Stiles' shirt. "I just wanna be normal again."

Stiles snorted derisively. "Girl, we're about four werewolves past normal."

She wiped her eyes on her sleeve, turning to peer up at him, never fully leaving the warmth of his arms. "Yeah, but I'm not a werewolf. And it's bullshit that no one knows what's going on with me."

She hiccupped between every other word, only breaking his heart further. Stiles wanted desperately to give her what she deserved. But as he'd suspected in the beginning, he had uncovered absolutely nothing new. And most of that had to do with the fact that they had no direction to point him, causing him to come up empty at every turn.

Just like Deaton had.

Just like Derek had.

Everyone else remained quiet as they continued to peer down at the motionless body in front of them, lost in their own thoughts. After another second, Derek and Scott forced their claws out and began to dig a hole, and when they were finished, they unceremoniously dumped the body inside without a word.

Once he dusted himself off, Derek stood and pulled his phone from his pocket, placing it on speakerphone as it started to ring. He'd made a habit of this lately, likely tired of having to repeat himself after every conversation.

"Hello?"

"Hey, Sheriff," Derek said with a heavy sigh, running a hand through his hair. "Sorry to bother you."

"Derek? Is everything okay? Is Stiles..."

"Stiles is fine," Derek interrupted, a small smile breaking out on his face.

And on Stiles' face too. Leave it to his dad to unintentionally inject some humor into the completely dire situation by first making sure that the town is still standing before checking in on his son that he probably believes caused whatever they're currently experiencing.

"But, uh, no, everything's not okay. We handled it, though."

"Handled it? Handled what, Derek?"

"Lydia found another dead body," Derek admitted. "A werewolf. It's not Peter and he didn't do it."

"Jesus," Noah muttered. "But that's good, Derek. Really good about the Peter thing."

Whatever soft background noise had been playing when his dad had first picked up suddenly stopped, letting Stiles know that his attention was fully on them now.

"I know we're interrupting your date. I'm sorry," Derek insisted again.

"Date?" Scott whispered harshly in Stiles' ear as he leaned over. "What date?"

Stiles smirked. Well, that answered that question. He had been wondering if Scott was aware of the budding relationship between their parents, but per his usual, Scott was clueless if it didn't involve Allison. And no, it probably shouldn't give Stiles immense joy to ruin Scott's night further with this information later, but it did. It totally did.

"Derek, listen, it's fine," Noah clarified. "I know I said earlier that I didn't want to be interrupted, but Mel and I made it through dinner and almost a whole movie. That's progress." He chuckled low and then let out a dejected sigh of his own. "If your lives are being interrupted, we want to be interrupted too. We're incredibly thankful you've trusted us with this and we're in the loop now."

"Thanks, Sheriff."

"Mel?" Scott whisper-shouted again. "As in my mom?"

Stiles shushed him as he refocused on Derek's phone and his dad's voice again. "How many times do I have to tell you, Hale? Call me Noah."

"I... can't do that, sir."

Noah laughed heartily as a beep sounded, letting them all know he had an incoming call. "Right, well, have a good night. I'll talk to you soon. Deaton's calling."

"Let us know if you need us, son."

"I will," Derek returned distractedly before switching over. "Hey, Deaton. What's up?"

"I need you to get over to the clinic. Bring everyone. Especially Lydia. I figured it out."

Derek looked up, the confusion they all likely felt etched on his face as well. "Lydia?"

"Yeah, I know what she is."

Derek nodded, though Deaton couldn't see him. "We're on our way."

"She's a banshee, Derek," Deaton blurted out, slightly breathless. "Lydia's a banshee."

"Okay," Derek said slowly.

"And if we play our cards right, we might be able to start finding people before they're dead for a change."

"Be there in a second," Derek announced, hanging up and then turning to Stiles. "What do you know about banshees?"

"Not much," he admitted. "They're really powerful, though."

Derek pocketed his phone again, nodding as he looked back at the freshly packed pile of dirt, checking his work probably to verify nothing was out of place that could point back to any of them.

"Damn right she is," Jackson retorted. "This is Lydia we're talking about."

She giggled quietly in return, still wiping her eyes before moving from Stiles to Jackson as they all began to walk out of the forest together. And it wasn't ten more minutes and the library was cleaned out too, everything and everyone packed away in their respective cars in order to head to the clinic as a unit.

Even Kate, unfortunately.

Stiles and Derek were the last two left to leave, though, so they could lock up, and when he moved to head toward the Jeep, Derek grabbed his arm. He grabbed his arm just like he had the night they'd learned Lydia was in the hospital and might not make it. And exactly as he had that night, Stiles peered down to where they were connected.

"We'll finish this another time," Derek promised.

"It's okay," Stiles asserted. "This is more important."

"Human things are important too, Stiles," Derek said gently.

"They are," Stiles agreed, "but this is our life now, Derek. I get that. I do. And Lydia needs some answers way more than I need hot chocolate."

Derek dropped his hand and the coldness that enveloped Stiles' skin next very nearly made him shiver. But he managed to keep it at bay. He didn't want Derek to know just how badly he craved his touch. Or how dazed and disoriented it made him when it did happen.

"Besides," Stiles continued, "it looks like I'm the only human left anyway. We don't need to go to all that trouble for one person."

"Nah, you still got Jackson," Derek said with a laugh.

"You're a butthole," Stiles said with a half-hearted sneer.

"You love it."

He'd said that once already tonight. And just like the first time, he gave Stiles a wink too, making his insides catch fire.

Damn this man and his ability to confuse, infuriate, and excite Stiles with one look. No, correction. Damn this werewolf. Yeah, damn this werewolf for his propensity to confuse, infuriate, and excite Stiles with one look, all while simultaneously helping to expand his little found family more than he ever thought possible.

Damn him, indeed.