Chapter Text
The halls below Echo House wailed with the tears of a story long passed. Pain and agony were still lingering through the halls and she could hear it all, sending a shiver down her spine and a tingle through her skin. The halls were frigid and dark and as she ran her hands across the pipes lining the halls she could feel the grime that had built up over the years of misuse, slimy to the touch and consistently dripping down the walls. Though she didn’t have time to care about the grime, bigger things were happening that were more important.
A lot of people had died down here and the suffering from it was heavy and was clouding her head with a guilt that was never hers to begin with. The history of oak creek may have passed and gone, but as the saying goes:
History always repeats itself.
“You can feel it, can’t you? All the death that happened down here.” He wondered, a coldness in his throat escaping into his voice and sly smirk. Her throat was cold too, but with fear locking it still, his with hate. He knew she wouldn’t reply so he continued, “I can feel the confusion, the malevolence… the Chaos. It tastes so sour, yet so sweet. I’m not a fan myself, but it has to do for now.” He approached closer as he said this like a cat stalking a bird.
She made like a baby deer, trying to get as far away from him as she could. Stumbling over her own shaky legs. Her voice was trembling and watery as she asked, “Why are you doing this? I know only those who offend you receive your ire. We didn’t do anything to offend you, so why? Why us?” She took a breath and begged for an answer, “Why me?”
He stopped walking, heartless smirk slipping off his face, he was going too far. His silver tongue was too convincing and she believed his actions were wholeheartedly not his own, but the actions of a dark entity. His face softened and his posture relaxed into something more his own.
“Lydia, I’m so sorry.” He reached out to her, but she jerked away. He sighed and continued, “I- I didn’t mean to scare you.” He was frantic, with his words rushed and hands gripped in his hair. “Lydia, it’s me, it’s actually me. I’m Stiles. It’s always been me.” Her shock was evident as he said this, she believed him, so he continued, “I’m not possessed. I’m a trickster fae and trickster fae need to eat chaos, mischief and confusion to live. We need to come into our powers slowly so the hunger doesn’t consume us and make us mindless killers.” He took a deep shallow breath and continued as she stared at him intently. “When Allison, Scott and I sacrificed ourselves my powers started to emerge. They were slow, like they should be, but something kickstarted them to come in all at once.”
“What was it?” She asked
“A Nogitsune.” He moved to sit next to her on the damp ground, barely any energy to stand, and he put his arm around her and she rested her knotted head on his shoulder. With a tired voice, no longer cold he told her his story, “For those few weeks after the sacrifice it had made its home in my body, but it was weak. I was weak too so it couldn’t feed off of my energy, so it made a plan to get some more and with Kira’s arrival to the school he had a way to get more.”
“Using her fox fire.” Lydia gasped
“Yeah,” he sighed, “He was right too, it gave my body more power, but instead of jumpstarting his own power it supercharged mine. Instead of filling my hunger slowly over years I needed to eat immediately. Lydia, I was so HUNGRY.” His voice rumbled with something other she had never heard before, not even in the whispers only she heard. His voice which had slowly grown to a crescendo had suddenly quieted down to a whisper, the sudden change a whiplash, “I ended up consuming his power and his memories. He was so angry Lydia. It was so disorientating honestly. Anyway, I ended up back home to get my dads help, we went down to our basement and he gave me some of his food to help keep me away from starvation.” He looked into her eyes before he said the next part, so he could drive home how serious he was, “Starvation to our kind is dangerous, it strips all of our conscious and morals and makes us mindless. All we can think about is trying to find a food source and if it were that bad, we would kill, just to stave off the all-consuming hunger growing within us.” He leaned in close to her ear and whispered like it was a secret only she needed to know, “we would be insatiable.”
“Oh god.” She gasped, tears running down her freckled cheeks.
She was trembling with fear again, but this time instead of scared of her own safety it was for one of her closest friends. She wasn’t scared of him, but for him. How close he would’ve come to losing himself to his hunger. How close her friend had come to being a monster, just like the Nogitsune they thought he was right now.
He held her close and tight until her breaths evened and her tears stopped leaking like a faucet. They stayed there sharing each other’s warmth despite the corridor’s cold sorrowful walls
Stiles had always seen Lydia, actually looked at her and just saw her. He knew how smart she truly was, he knew how upset she was and he knew how in need for a real human connection she truly was. Despite he masks made of stone, despite her misdirecting comment and despite her harsh words. She hadn’t cared about him not nearly even half the amount he did, but now she felt like she did. Her chest was hollow and her limbs heavy. A pressure around her throat was threating to force out a sob, but she swallowed it down, just like she swallowed down her guilt. She didn’t have time to be guilty right now, she only had time to show him that she now cared for him too as much as he did for her. She stared into his amber eyes and truly looked. She got sucked into his all and finally understood who he was. She could always see through him, through his goof and humour, but now instead of through she could truly see who he was. Could see how he cared with his heart and soul and hid it behind a mask of sarcasm. She could read how smart he was and how his attention kept him from truly unlocking it. She could now read his soul as clearly as he could read hers.
She understood his fears, his hopes and his dreams.
Is this what having a soulmate is like?
She stared at him and saw a glowing beauty she had never seen before, she memorized every mole and every brushstroke of colour in his eyes. Although his eyes were sunken and bruised, his cheeks hollow and sullen, and his skin pale and clammy she fell for him. Whole hearted and fully and all at once, right into the ground heart first.
Some of her hair had fallen into her face and with a hand so gentle he could’ve brushed glass shards and kept his skin intact he brushed it out of her sight and behind her ear.
She needed to pull him closer, to feel him closer than just the fleeting skin she currently had, so she did. She cradled his face and sunk her lips into his with such a passion she had never, could never, for anyone else. He had frozen. Scared, she started to pull away before his hand nestled in her hair and he reciprocated her kiss just as, if not more, passionate than her. They were locked together as one for what felt like a lifetime. They slowly pulled away and stared at each other with the goofiest most lovestruck smiles on their faces either of them could ever remember owning. A silent understanding passing between them.
Stiles broke the silence with a hushed, “Not that I’m not happy, but where did that come from?”
Lydia blushed, with smudged lipstick and bashfully said, “I just… saw you.” And he understood exactly what she meant.
They would’ve stayed together forever if they could, held as one in each other’s warmth, however the sun started to go down and Stiles tensed. He knew what had to happen next.
“Lydia, the sun is going down, there’s some stuff I need to do, I’ll be back in a few minutes, ok?” He rushed and at her nod he stood up and started to walk away from her. Just as he was about to turn the corner he looked back and told her, “Its going to be alright, nothing bad is going to happen. no one is going to get severely hurt. I just need to feed a little more and it can all end.”
“What will?” she called out. At his raised eyebrow she reiterated, “What will end?”
“This Chaos.” He grinned and left.