CHAPTER SEVENTY-SEVEN:
UNSOLVED CASE

THEY EXPLAINED EVERYTHING TO SCOTT whilst he explained to them everything that happened after they had left. Apparently there were demonic ninjas after them and so far had marked Isaac, the twins, and Lydia. And now Scott was apparently next. When Stiles had went to show Scott proof of what happened, apparently the numbers had been erased and the key to the closet was now missing.

Now, Elaine was headed to the hospital after getting a call from her mother, claiming that Stiles had come in and was now sedated from lack of sleep. She sat in the chair, watching as he slept with a deep frown forming on her face before she too made herself comfortable in the chair and started to close her eyes. Before she knew it, she too had fallen asleep.

It wasn't until later that night that Stiles sat up. He sat there for a moment before turning his head and looking towards Elaine, watching as she stirred before carefully opening her eyes and quickly sitting up when she saw that Stiles was awake. She stood up, moving to sit on the bed as she placed a hand on his cheek, looking at him with a small frown.

"Hey." She softly spoke. "How are you feeling?"

"Better." Stiles admitted, nodding his head. "How about you? I know you've gotten about as much sleep as me if not less." He moved his hand to tuck hair behind her ear. She offered him a small smile as she nodded.

"Best nap I've ever had. Come on. Let's go get something from the vending machine." She stood up, holding out her hand for Stiles to grab. He took it, interlacing their fingers as he pulled open the door and stepped out of the room. That's when they noticed how quiet it was, causing them to share a glance with one another.

"Melissa?" Stiles called out, but there was no answer. They continued down the empty hall, stopping at a set of black double doors before Stiles pushed it open and they continued forward. That's when they stopped again, a presence could be felt behind them. Elaine found her hand slipping from Stiles as her eyes started to glow. They turned around only to find two of the oni standing there, staring at the couple. Stiles went to run only for him to stop when another one appeared.

It walked closer to Stiles whilst Elaine kept her eyes on the creatures in front of her. At the same time, two of the oni lifted their hands up, to check for any dark spirits. But the two were quicker. Elaine grabbed onto the wrist of the oni, whilst Stiles did the same. Stiles plunged his fist into the oni's chest before ripping out it's heart that was replaced by a firefly. Elaine had more fun. She smirked, that darkness that her mother had begged for her to avoid, started to flood her veins. Blue and purple veins turned pitch black, her glowing purple eyes turning charcoal as she brought her other hand up, closing it into a tight fist and watching as the darkness unraveled from the oni and nothing but firefly's replaced it.

The rest of them seemed to attack the two, doing no harm before they were standing there, as if nothing had happened. Like they had almost turned back to normal. The door opened and Scott stood there for a moment, staring at the back's of his best friend and sister with furrowed eyebrows. "Stiles, Elaine, you okay?"

The duo turned to look at him before Stiles was the one to offer him a small smile. "Yeah, fine. What's been going on?" And then, they followed Scott through the double doors and down the hospital halls.

━︎━︎━︎━︎━︎

She had been fast asleep in Stiles' bed when the sound of her phone ringing woke her up. She frowned, grabbing her phone and sitting up to answer it, taking note of the fact that Stiles was nowhere to be found.

     "Hello?"

     "Stiles just called me." Scott sounded panicked. "He doesn't know where he is. He was crying. He said he was going to call me back but he hasn't yet. And he said not to tell his dad."

     "Well, what the hell do we do?" Elaine was starting to become panicked herself. She stood up from the bed, arms crossed over her chest. She bit her lip in worry, glancing around Stiles' room in hopes of finding something that told her where he was, when she noticed the scissors stabbed into the mattress with lines connected to it.

     "I'm getting Isaac to go find him." Scott told her. "If he calls again―︎"

     "Call me." Elaine nodded before hanging up the phone. She stood there in his room for a moment before walking over and turning on the light. Her eyes darted over towards his board that held nothing but red strings, and her eyes landed on the picture of Barrow. She clenched her jaw for a moment, shaking her head. That's when her phone rang again, causing her to quickly pick it up.

     "He said. . ." Scott started. "He said there was someone in there with him. He shut his phone off, because apparently it's about to die. He thinks he's in a basement, that it's freezing, and―︎Elaine we gotta find him."

      "And we will." Elaine nodded her head. "You know that."

     "Listen, Isaac and I are on our way over. Unlock the door for us."

     "Yeah." The girl breathed before pulling her phone away from her to see Lydia calling her. "Hey, Lydia's on the other end, I'll see you in a minute." She hung up the phone before answering Lydia. "Lydia?"

     "Tell me he's there with you." Lydia practically begged. "Tell me that Stiles is laying down, asleep."

     Elaine hesitated before softly sighing. "Scott and Isaac are on their way."

     "Aiden and I are already here." Lydia answered before hanging up the phone. Before she knew it, everyone was in Stiles' room. Elaine sat on Stiles' bed, looking up when Isaac and Scott entered the room. Scott stopped, looking at Aiden and Lydia.

     "How did you know?" Was the first question Scott asked Lydia. "Did he call you too?"

     "I heard it." Lydia answered.

     "Don't ask." Aiden quickly shook his head. "It gets more confusing when you ask."

    "Not as confusing as this." Elaine whispered before standing up revealing scissors that were placed in Stiles' bed with red strings attached to it. "I didn't notice it when I first woke up. I'm surprised I wasn't stabbed, or that I didn't knock any of the strings down." She looked at her brother before saying, "He uses red for unsolved cases."

     "Maybe he thinks he's an unsolved case?" Aiden tried.

     "Or is an unsolved case." Isaac mumbled.

     Lydia furrowed her eyebrow before turning to look at Isaac. "Hold on. Is he still out there? You don't know where he is?"

     "He said he was in an industrial basement somewhere." Scott told her.

     "We came here to get a better scent." Isaac finished.

     "What else did he say?" Lydia asked.

     "Something's wrong with his leg. It's bleeding."

     "You didn't tell me that on the phone." Elaine looked at him with scared eyes.

     "And he's freezing." Isaac added.

     "Tonight's the coldest night of the year." Aiden looked at them in disbelief. "It's going to drop into the 20s."

     "What did his dad say?" Lydia questioned, causing Scott and Elaine to exchange looks with one another.

     "We kind of. . . didn't tell him yet." Scott mumbled.

     "Stiles is bleeding and freezing and you didn't call his dad?" Lydia scoffed.

     "He made me promise not to. We can find him by scent. If he was sleepwalking he couldn't have gotten far, right?"

     "You guys didn't notice his jeep is gone, did you?" Aiden sighed.

     "What?" Elaine looked at Aiden for a moment before walking over to the window and looking outside to see his car was in fact gone. She silently cursed to herself. "I can't believe I didn't hear him get up. Or fucking stab the goddamn scissors into the mattress."

     "El, him missing isn't your fault." Scott shook his head.

     "You promised you wouldn't call his dad." Lydia spoke up, shaking her head. "I didn't."

     "Wait, Lydia, hold on. I can get more help. I can call Derek, Allison―︎"

     "Everyone except for the cops! Great idea."

     "You guys remember she gets these feelings when someone's about to die, right?"

     Elaine snapped her head to look at Aiden. "He's not going to die. Not if I can help it."

     Scott stood there for a moment before shaking his head. "You don't have to call his Dad. It's five minutes to the station." Scott and Isaac moved forward with Elaine following them only for them to stop and look towards Lydia and Aiden.

     "We'll catch up." Lydia assured.

     "What? Why?" Scott frowned

     "There's something here." Lydia told them.

     "Yeah." Isaac scoffed. "Evidence of insanity." This earned a slap on the arm from Elaine, making the wolf wince.

     "Just because I'm letting you sleep in my bed because you're homeless, doesn't mean I won't punch you for saying shit like that." Elaine lightly snapped. He held his hands up in surrender.

     "We can figure out what's wrong with him after we find a way to keep him from freezing to death." Scott told them.

     "Go." Lydia nodded. "We'll be right behind you."

Elaine got out of her car as she pulled up to the police station with Scott and Isaac pulling up beside of her. She stopped, clenching her eyes shut as a pain shot through her head. Scott walked over to her and she waved him off, silently telling him that she was alright. She waited for the pain to pass before shaking her head slightly and opening her eyes, letting out a breath and nodding her head. They made it inside and when they found Noah, they told him everything.

     Noah stood there for a moment to catch his breath before immediately going into sheriff mode. He stood up straight and looked at the three. "If his jeep is gone, that's where we start." He turned to look at one of his deputies. "Parrish, let's get an APB out on a blue 1980 CJ-5 Jeep. Cordova, I want a list of any kind of industrial basement or sub-level of any building that he could've gotten into while sleepwalking. It's the coldest night of the year so far. SO if he's out there barefoot in just a T-shirt, he could already be hypothermic. Let's move fast. Let's think fast. The three of you, come with me."

     They did as Noah asked, following him into his office. Noah closed the door behind him as he turned to look at the two wolves and witch. "Okay. Is there anything you need to tell me that I can't tell anyone out there?"

     "Lydia knew he was missing." Scott answered him.

     "Can she help find him?"

     "Well, she's working on it." Isaac told him.

     "Anything else?"

     "I called Derek and Allison for help." Scott nodded.

     "Alright. Can you two find him by scent?"

     A knock on the door made them turn their heads, watching as Parrish entered. "We got it, sir. We found the jeep."

     They pulled up to the hospital where Stiles' jeep was. They all got out of their vehicle with Noah quickly running towards it and pulling the door open. He tried to turn the car on, but nothing. He sighed before looking at Elaine and Scott. "It's dead. He must have left the lights on."

     "Why would he come here?" Scott quizzed.

     "Let's find out." They all entered the hospital and Melissa came jogging up to Noah, having been informed of the situation by Elaine.

     "Security's doing sweeps of every floor. Nothing yet."

     "What about the basement?"

     "Follow me." Melissa led them down the halls and towards the basement, whilst Elaine, Scott, and Isaac went up to the roof where Derek stood.

     "He's not here." Derek sighed. "Not anymore."

     "You mean the whole building?"

     "Gone."

     "I'll go tell Stilinski." Isaac mumbled.

     Scott turned to look at him. "And see if you can find Allison. She's not answering her phone." Isaac nodded before making his way back inside. Scott made his way towards Derek whilst Elaine stood there. She was having a silent panic attack. She stood up and walked back inside, making her way down the halls before finding an empty room and pulling herself inside, shutting the door and allowing herself to actually panic.

Her hands were shaking, the inability to catch her breath was suffocating, tears fell down her cheeks. She needed to know that he was okay. She needed to know that her boyfriend wasn't dead. She couldn't think, she couldn't breathe, and she just needed everything to stop. Pain started in her head again, causing her to cry out. Her hands shot out and everything went flying. She looked up with wide eyes, the room was completely and utterly destroyed.

     "What's happening to me?" She whispered, her voice shaky. Her eyes then landed on the jacket she was wearing. It was one of Stiles. Realization hit her. "Locator spell." She was quick to pull the jacket from her body, balling it up as she held it close to her chest. She closed her eyes, letting out a deep breath. "Phasmatos Tribum, Nas Ex Veras, Sequitas Sanguinem." A gasp fell from her lips as flashes passed behind her eyelids.

It was dark. She could see Stiles laying there on the basement floor. A man was in there with him, bandages covering his entire body. A white hall. Cells. A creepy looking building with giant black gates at the front. Eichen House. Her eyes flew open, her lips open in surprise.

     "Eichen House." Elaine whispered before her eyebrows furrowed. "Why is he at a mental health care institution?"