THE NIGHT WAS JUST GETTING STARTED in Finn's book, he and Liam were hanging out in Scott's house.

Waiting for the older teen to get there, and judging by the way Liam just let Finn inside, he was slightly questioning how he got inside in the first place.

But here they were, sitting at Scott's dining room table, Finn noticed that Liam was still wearing his lacrosse jersey.

He must've not gone home to change, which is fair, Finn himself hadn't had a proper night sleep in three days? Or was it four? That wasn't the point.

Besides, it's not about him right now, it's about whatever's got Liam so antsy that Finn can hear his thoughts spiraling out of control.

"Hey, you okay?" Finn asked, checking in with his friend.

Liam glanced over, "Not really, this whole situation is so freaky."

Finn hummed in agreement, "No kidding, it was only like, a month ago that I had no idea werewolves, werecyotes, and banshees were real."

Liam chuckled, leaning against the dining table. "I'm surprised none of us have lost our sanity yet."

Finn pinched the bridge between his nose, "I might've. I haven't slept in like three or four days. I lost count, insomnia is a pain in the ass."

Liam's expression softened, "Aw that sucks dude." But before they could continue their conversation, Scott came rushing downstairs and to the back door.

Liam paused, reluctant to leave the house and deal with more assassins. Seeing this, Scott stopped rushing and offered to take both Liam and Finn home.

Liam shifted on his feet, "I'm not like you." He replied nervously.

Scott understood his hesitation, "Not yet."

"I don't mean I'm not strong or I'm never going to learn how to be in control. I mean everything else."

"You and your friends try and protect everyone. Have you been doing this the whole time? I mean, how are you all still alive?" Liam questioned.

"Not all of us are." Liam looked on the verge of tears but Scott offered him a smile and again offered to take them home.

This time, the two of them accepted. Finn didn't think it was a good idea for Liam to be alone. So he texted Eddie, asking if he could stay with a friend.

Eddie responded back saying it was all good. Liam's mom was out of town and his stepdad was working a night shift, the two thought it was an okay idea.

Scott dropped the two off at Liam's and they entered the house, Finn cleared his throat, "Are you sure I can sleepover? I don't want to bother your stepdad."

Liam waved him off, "It's fine, I'll just say we were studying too late and fell asleep. I'm glad you're here."

Finn smiled, "I'm glad too, I've never really done a sleepover at anyone's house before."

"Really, why not?" Liam asked.

Finn fiddled with his hands, "Cause no one's ever invited me to one."

"Well, then this one will be the best you've ever had. We need to have a rematch of Super Smash Bros." Liam said, wriggling his eyebrows with a smirk plastered on his face.

Finn chuckled, "Oh you're on!" The two ran upstairs to Liam's room, the other teen hooked up his console to his tv and turned on the game.

They began playing and spent an hour going back and forth, Liam would win a round, and Finn would win another.

Later, Liam paused the game and turned to Finn, "Do you ever think about what would've happened if we hadn't met Scott and Stiles?"

Finn gave him a pointed look, "I mean, we've known them for about a month? Life would be less complicated."

Liam hummed in agreement, "Yeah, I'd rather be breaking down over calculus than having werewolf fangs and glowing eyes."

"Same, or just people trying to kill you. That guy who chased us to the roof, is the stuff of nightmares." Finn agreed.

"Definitely. But I hope we can stop this soon. I don't want anyone to get hurt." Liam stated somberly.

Finn placed his hand on Liam's shoulder, "As long as we work as a team, I'm sure Scott and the others along with us can stop this."

Liam sighed, leaning his head back against his bed, "Yeah, you're right, but I can't, once again, express how crazy all of it is."

Finn let out a breathy laugh, "You can say that again my friend."

Liam laughed along with him, glancing at the clock, "It's getting late, we should probably go to sleep."

Finn nodded his head, he felt like falling asleep on the floor, Liam turned off the tv, went to his bed, climbing under his covers.

Liam looked at his friend expectantly, "Are you going to get up here?"

Finn's eyes widened, "It's okay Liam. I'm fine on the floor."

Liam ignored him, "You're not a blanket hogger are you?"

"No.. but are you sure? I can sleep on the floor." Finn replied.

Liam noticed his hesitation. "Dude, my bed's big enough for two people. C'mon."

Finn was too tired to argue any further, he went to the left side of the bed, getting under the duvet. "Goodnight Liam." He whispered.

Liam smiled sleepily, "Goodnight Finnie."

'Finnie. That's new.' But he liked it, he really liked it.
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Stiles was at the hospital, suffering from a concussion, after copping Brunski's abuse. Melissa won't allow him to leave until he has a CT scan, another thing Stiles can't pay for.

Melissa told him that Meredith was at the station. Noah was trying to get her to talk and there wasn't anything Stiles could do to speed up the process.

He sat back down on his hospital bed, asking Melissa if she could find him a tape player. While she left to find one that would even still play cassettes.

Stiles pulled out the Lorraine Martin labeled tape out of his pocket. At the station, Noah and Lydia were there waiting for Meredith to talk.

"Is she even competent enough to be charged with something?" Lydia asked.

Noah sighed, "If Meredith is the Benefactor then that means she was competent enough to trick Kate into opening the Hale vault."

"Competent enough to blackmail Brunski into helping her, and competent enough to create a hit list and pay out money for its completion."

"This girl's practically a criminal mastermind." He replied. But Lydia wanted to know why Meredith did this.

Noah was only interested in the why if it got him to the how. Specifically, how to stop it. He thought the payments were automatic at this point.

Lydia later fell asleep outside Noah's office waiting for Meredith to crack. He came out of his office with a few guys, the teen guessed they were psychologists.

He looked over at her sitting on the bench. Speaking in a warning fatherly tone, "I thought I told you to go home."

She retorted, "I thought I told you I wasn't going anywhere." The psychologists had no luck with Meredith.

Parrish then walked up with an update. They'd been through everything in Brunski's office and haven't found anything useful.

He took in Lydia's disheveled appearance and she told him she wasn't going home until Meredith started talking.

Noah reassured that she would be the first person to know when Meredith started talking but she was determined to give it a shot.

Finally, the man agreed. Lydia walked into the room, shutting the door, not wasting time when talking to Meredith. Pacing back and forth.

She began, "He used my grandmother's code for the dead pool. He put it online. He took the money from the Hale vault, then turned the bearer bonds into cash."

"He made the payments. Was it Brunski's idea to fake your death?"

"Did he get nervous because you helped us with one of the cipher keys?" Lydia crossed her arms.

Meredith maintained that she wanted to help. All she ever wanted to do was help. And she wouldn't be there now if she didn't want to talk.

Lydia learned she was talking to Peter, she rushed out to Noah and Parrish, telling them to get Peter. Soon Peter had arrived.

He was finding it hard to believe that Meredith, who looked harmless, is the one who stole all of the money from the vault but agreed to go talk to her.

Inside the interview room, Peter asked Meredith where his money was. She stared at him in confusion and then slowly reached to caress his face.

Peter let it carry on for a second before grabbing Meredith's wrist and putting her hand back down on the table. "Why did you do that?" He asked.

"They're all gone." Meredith replied plainly.

In the observation room, Lydia realized Peter and Meredith had met before. She was talking about Peter's burn scars being completely healed.

Peter was angry, "Meredith, you put everyone, including my nephew and my daughter, on a death list. Don't you think you owe us the slightest explanation of why?"

"You said it had to be kept secret." It wasn't making sense, what did she mean secret? Peter maintained they've never met, at least in his memory.

He got up, shoved the table out of the way, threw Parrish to the ground, and dug his claws into Meredith's neck to get inside her mind.

Lydia and Noah burst into the interview room. Then men had their guns trained on Peter, but Lydia put herself between them.

If they broke the psychic link between them, they could die. Meredith started muttering and Lydia could hear and understand her perfectly.

Meredith was narrating all of her memories, it was right after the fire, the two were in the hospital next to each other.

"Meredith could hear him." Lydia stated.

Noah glanced at her, "Hear what?"

She explained, "Everything. She was hearing every thought in his head like they'd somehow found the same wavelength."

"And now everything going through his mind was also going right into hers."

"This carried on for weeks, maybe even months. For Meredith, it was like having Peter stand right over her bed and talk about the fire and about getting revenge." She continued.

Peter then broke the link and fell backward. Meredith almost toppled out of her chair but was caught by Jordan. Noah immediately trained his gun at Peter again.

Peter pled his innocence, saying there was no way he could've remembered all of that. He was out of his mind.

"She was listening to the ranting and raving of a lunatic. A former lunatic. I'm much healthier now. I had nothing to do with this."

'Healthier my ass.' Noah thought. No one was convinced and arguments ensued. Lydia pointed out that was what Meredith wanted.

There were three people in the room who were still on the dead pool: Lydia, Jordan, and Meredith. A coincidence? Probably not.

Noah was only pointing his gun at Peter, though, and he's willing to bet that a bullet between the eyes doesn't heal very fast, even for werewolves.

Peter still had his hands up, "How are you going to explain this to a judge?"

"Telepathic girl overhears thoughts of comatose werewolf and decides to enact his plans for retribution. They're going to be pointing a gun at your head, asking you to go quietly."

Noah put down his gun and allowed Peter to leave. He called after him, "That's twice, there won't be a third." As Peter walked away, Meredith began screaming that it wasn't finished.
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Stiles, after getting out of the hospital, and listening to the tape with Malia. Both of them rushed to the lake house to search. Behind a wall in the soundproof room, they found a computer system.

He called Lydia to show her the dead pool machines. She didn't know anything about computers from the seventies. The computers didn't even have monitors.

But she noticed something when Stiles was waving the phone around, the wine stain on the carpet disappeared.

The five hundred dollars she had was actually for carpet cleaners, not for bribes to Brunski. "Red wine doesn't just disappear. Unless it wasn't wine."

Sties was confused, "What? What do you mean?"

Lydia ignored the question, "The ashes weren't ashes, the study isn't a study, the record player isn't a record player. So maybe the wine wasn't wine."

She told Stiles to go find the specific bottle. Stiles found the bottle quickly and shook it. There was something rattling inside.

He looked around for a wine opener but Malia just seized the bottle and smashed it on the ground.

It was a key. Stiles took it and put it in the computer. It fit perfectly. He turns it to the right and the dead pool computers powered down.

After the call, Lydia sat down with Meredith. She said she had to do it. She heard Lydia back in screaming in the tunnels of Oak Creek when Allison died.

That's when Meredith knew it was time to start over. "With Peter?" Lydia questioned.

Meredith nodded her head, "He's the Alpha. He's always been the Alpha. He'll make it right. It never was with us."

"Too many people died because of us. We're the monsters. Even banshees. Even me."

Lydia didn't agree, not one bit, "I don't believe that. Not all monsters do monstrous things."

Meredith needed more convincing, "Like who?" She asked.

"Like Scott." Lydia said.

"Like you." She put her hand on Lydia's cheek and then sat back, shocked, as the reality of her actions hit her.
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Morning came, and Finn's eyes fluttered open, it took a second for his eyes to adjust but when they did, he realized he wasn't home. Glancing over at a sleeping Liam.

'That's right, I stayed over at Liam's.' He thought, he checked his phone, the time read seven thirty. He sat up quickly, fully alert.

"Oh shit! Liam wake up! We gotta go!" He exclaimed.

Liam jolted awake dazed and confused, "What! What happened?!"

Finn threw the duvet off of him, almost falling as he got up, "We're gonna be late for school! C'mon!"

Liam got up and bolted to his dresser, Finn got to the doorway. He stopped, looking at him, "Wait! I don't have anything to wear."

Liam, having gathered his outfit, "Look through my stuff and pick something out. Then grab an apple or something from the kitchen. We gotta go dude!"

The raven haired teen maneuvered around him and rushed to get dressed in the bathroom. Liam changed in his room, then both boys went downstairs.

They grabbed an apple each, and ran out the door to school. If Eddie saw him now, he'd think he could be a track star. Though Liam was faster, damn werewolf powers.
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The End of Chapter 10