Work Text:
Teen Wolf || Stetopher || Drown Your Demons in Despair || Stetopher || Teen Wolf
Title: Drown Your Demons in Despair – Mischief Mondays Series
TW Disclaimer: All rights reserved to Jeff Davis and MTV. This fanfiction on the other hand is entirely mine. No money is made with this, though reviews are more than welcomed.
Tags: m/m/m, polyamory, alternate season 3 (no Alpha Pack), Spark Stiles, hurt/comfort, Pack Feels
Main Pairing: Chris/Peter/Stiles
Teen Wolf Characters: Mieczysław 'Stiles' Stilinski, Chris Argent, Peter Hale, Derek Hale, Erica Reyes, Vernon Boyd, Isaac Lahey, Jackson Whittemore, Lydia Martin, Scott McCall, Allison Argent
Summary: There was a demon loose in Beacon Hills and it took the faces of the dead to inflict grief and guilt in its victims, feeding on these emotions. The pack didn’t expect Stiles to be a target.
Drown Your Demons in Despair
Mischief Mondays Series
There was a new threat in Beacon Hills. Stiles was wondering if there was like a waiting line where bad guys had to take a number and wait their turn. It really was just one thing after the other in this damn town. Though this one was new. A demon. Sure, why not. Feral Alphas, werewolf hunters, killer lizards – why not an actual literal demon! How was this his life.
People who were attacked were left in kind of a funk, in lack of a better term. It took a couple weeks for them to figure out what exactly the threat even was – and then what exactly the demon was doing. They only figured it out after it attacked Boyd and they had a first person account.
The demon had taken Alicia’s face, pretending to be Boyd’s dead little sister, making him relive her death and feeding on his grief and guilt. So Boyd ended up at the bottom of a puppy-pile after that, including a lot of reassurances that it hadn’t been his fault, that he had only been a child himself.
“Okay. How do we like lock the Hales and the Argents away for safekeeping?”
Everyone turned to look at Stiles at that. Well, everyone who was in a position to look at him – an eleven person puppy-pile on the mattresses laid out on the loft’s living room floor was a bit tricky.
“I’m the Alpha,” Derek glared at Stiles. “This is my territory to protect.”
“Yeah, because you are totally not haunted by the ghosts of your dead family and you definitely harbor no Kate-shaped guilt in regards of that,” Stiles nodded sarcastically.
Derek gave a low growl but Stiles opted to ignore him, instead shooting Peter a look. The other Hale had the decency to not try and argue. Peter knew the ghosts that haunted him. Most recently Laura. Chris reached out to take Peter’s hand and Stiles couldn’t help but watch the motion. The main reason why the Argents were part of the Hale Pack now. Chris and Peter had spent the summer ‘reconciling’, because there was apparently a juicy past that Stiles would love to get all the dirty details on. Instead, he got to watch from the sidelines how Beacon Hills’ hottest DILFs fell back in love and were now being all hot but even worse so all gentle. At first Stiles didn’t even know who he was jealous of until he realized that it was both.
“But Allison will be fine,” Scott argued with furrowed brows.
“Right,” Stiles raised both his eyebrows at his best friend. “Because I’m sure that she doesn’t feel any lingering, misplaced guilt about how her mother took her own life after getting bitten by a werewolf Alpha with whose pack Allison got involved. Emphasis on misplaced, Ally.”
He shot Allison a more gentle look to lessen the impact of his sarcasm. She bit her lip and nodded.
“I’m guilt-free,” Erica offered, not moving from her spot sprawled-out over Stiles, Boyd and Isaac. “Nobody I know has ever died. Well. Not counting the bad guys we faced so far, but… guilt-free.”
“I don’t know,” Isaac admitted softly. “I have… complicated feelings toward my father’s death.”
Well, that was putting it lightly. Stiles reached out to pat Isaac’s curls, knowing that Isaac chose his abusive father as his anchor. Anchoring himself to the love and the good, as far in the past as it laid.
“The only person I ever knew who died was my abuelita, but I was like five when she died and I don’t have any guilt about that, she was just… old,” Scott said thoughtfully. “Grief… I mean, I barely knew her. I was four. I grieved more for mom’s loss than anything.”
“Mh, yes,” Lydia nodded. “For me, it’s my grandmother too, but I don’t have any guilt.”
Jackson was glaring out the window. That guy really needed to connect more to his emotions. Much like their Alpha, really. This whole pack needed therapy, if Stiles thought about it.
“It would probably be my birth parents,” Jackson admitted reluctantly. “I already saw them when Lydia poisoned us with wolfsbane on her birthday.”
“That was Peter’s fault,” Lydia huffed defensively.
Peter sighed and rolled his eyes dramatically. Hey, Stiles counted it as a win that they were in the same room! The mediating that Stiles had done there was ridiculous. Honestly, it was so annoying that Stiles had accidentally gotten attached to Peter. But ever since the kanima take-down, since Peter’s resurrection and Jackson turning into a real wolf, Stiles had spent a lot of time with Peter. Most of it, in the beginning, very unwillingly so. Doing the research that his ‘punch first, ask later’ puppies weren’t big fans of, so Stiles as the pack-human who did decidedly less punching, got to do all the research and Peter claimed to still be weakened from his resurrection (Stiles called bullshit), plus the older wolf had a lot of knowledge to tap into and had proved to be useful. The unwilling team-ups turned more willing and before he knew it, he developed feelings for Peter.
“Okay, so lot of prime targets all around,” Stiles summed up to stop a potential Lydia-Peter fight before it could blow up. “So… Scott and Erica lock everyone else in the Hale Vault for safety?”
“The kind of brilliant plans that we keep you around for, Stilinski,” Jackson snorted.
The words lacked the bite they would have had half a year ago though. Stiles was reluctant to call them friends, but they definitely were pack and that meant enough on its own. Stiles still flipped Jackson off for it though and rolled his eyes. It wasn’t a plan, it was Stiles’ anxious brain afraid to lose more people he loved. The first two victims had died by now. It started with an apathy, just blankly staring at the wall. The next stage was a catatonic state. Like the victims slowly lost their will to live and then just kind of… stopped and faded away.
Boyd had already been attacked and that meant they were on a maximum two weeks time limit to kill the demon to save Boyd. That pressure alone made anxiety rise in Stiles and the thought that anyone else from his pack could get hurt? Could even die? He found it hard to breathe at that.
“Darling,” Peter’s voice was very gentle and so were his fingers as they curled around the nape of his neck. “Easy there. You need to breathe. So far, we’re all safe and alright.”
“Only that we’re not all alright,” Erica pointed out and pointed at Boyd.
He was still quietly laying on the mattress, staring at the ceiling. Over the course of this puppy-pile, he had given less and less responses to the things that were being said to him. It was concerning.
“Yeah, and we’re not all safe,” Stiles added, glaring at Peter and motioning all around. “This whole damn pack is like an all-you-can-eat-buffet for the de…”
Stiles trailed off and his eyes widened in realization. Scott gave a worried noise of protest.
“Oh, I don’t like that,” Scott complained with a frown.
“What? What are we missing?” Isaac asked. “Also, it’s weird when he’s so still.”
“That’s the face Stiles makes whenever he comes up with a horrible idea that usually gets us both grounded,” Scott supplied, very unhelpful.
“What’s the plan, Stiles?” Chris asked, in that nice, rough voice of his.
Stiles blinked, only now noticing that when Peter had stepped up to him to calm him down, the couple had apparently moved as one because Chris stood on Stiles’ other side. Also, Peter’s hand was still in Stiles’ neck, rubbing soothing circles. It was nice and warm and grounding, so Stiles didn’t protest. He liked the comfort, soaked it up whenever it was willingly given.
“Well, we seem to have a whole host of trauma to offer here, so… What if we use the pack as bait? Part of the problem is finding the demon. Maybe if we actually offer up the pack as an all-you-can-eat buffet, we’ll draw the demon out and then I can try to trap it?” Stiles offered.
He got more unsure toward the end and motioned at the open books on the table. Ever since the rave, he’d been working hard to hone his magic skills. Growing fond of Peter had helped a lot there, because once he allowed himself to spend time with Peter and opened up about said magic, Peter opened up the doors to his private library, including magic books.
“You’ll do fine, Stiles,” Chris promised, resting a firm hand on Stiles’ biceps to give a squeeze.
Stiles blinked doe-eyed at the hunter, acutely aware of both Chris’ and Peter’s hands on him. For a moment, he got kind of lost in the sensation, in their warmth and closeness.
“You’re the one who found out that there is a banishment ritual,” Derek spoke up, drawing Stiles’ attention away from the hot couple. “I trust you, Stiles. We’ll try it.”
“Can you not volunteer everyone to play bait?” Jackson requested disgruntled.
“You’re gonna be a target either way,” Peter pointed out with a scalding look. “This way, there’ll be safety in numbers and in the Spark who’ll have all our backs.”
Derek’s trust made him feel warm but it wasn’t exactly a surprise. They’d saved each other’s life so often now, the trust came natural between them. But Peter’s vote of confidence had his heart racing and he couldn’t help but shoot Peter a mildly surprised and a little flustered look. Peter met his gaze with that self-assured, annoying smile of his.
“Okay,” Stiles nodded, feeling more sure in himself. “We’ll do some more research, to figure out if there is a way to lure it. And then we’ll set the trap.”
His eyes dropped to Boyd and his stomach dropped too. This had to work.
/break\
The problem with Stiles leading a discussion was that he tended to slip through the cracks. When the trap snapped shut, the members of the pack deemed bait were gathered together, while Stiles, Erica and Scott stood by the side, so Erica and Scott could protect Stiles in case something went wrong. Something did go wrong. The demon went straight for Stiles. In all their planning, nobody had considered whether or not Stiles would appeal to the demon.
The demon appeared in their midst and shimmered into the shape of a woman. A brunette woman with moles and bright eyes. Chris frowned at first and warily held onto Peter’s hand, wondering if she was a lost Hale. But neither Peter nor Derek reacted to her. And then there was a gasp and all wolves turned toward Stiles. Wide, tearful eyes, staring unblinkingly at the woman.
“Mischief,” the demon smiled sweetly and tilted her head.
“M… Mom…” Stiles’ voice cracked.
Stiles took an instinctive step back but even as the pack grew vocal around him, trying to break the spell the demon had on Stiles, but Stiles seemed unable to hear any of them. Peter growled, a deep and angry sound rumbling in his chest, his eyes flashing supernaturally blue. Both Peter and Chris moved as one, trying to put themselves between the demon and their boy.
It was ironic. They’d been at odds for so long, had let so much pain come between them, and in the end, it had been their shared need to protect Stiles that had brought them together again, had made them sit down and talk so they would be on the same page, so they could work together to keep Stiles safe. That agreement had opened the door and not long after, they fell back into the familiar comfort of each other and learned to love each other again.
“Why would Stiles have guilt over his mother’s death?” Jackson asked. “Wasn’t she sick?”
“Yeah, I remember something like that from second grade,” Erica agreed. “That he used to visit her in the hospital all the time. And then he missed class, when she… when she died.”
“Demon,” the demon snarled, to everyone’s surprise, and lunged forward at Stiles. “You took my son, you hurt me, I know you’re hurting me, you’re dangerous. If I get rid of you, I’ll save my son. Noah will understand, he’ll see that I was right. You’re wrong. You are something wrong and twisted and I’ll make sure you’ll never hurt me again.”
Chris watched with horrified eyes, frozen to the spot by his shock, how the demon wearing the face of Stiles’ mother grabbed him by the neck. The shimmer of the demon extended, the same way Erica had described seeing Alicia’s death when Boyd had been attacked. How the demon had dragged Boyd back in his memories, made him look like a child. Before their eyes, Stiles changed, suddenly, there was this big-eyed little kid. Second grade, was what Erica had said. Stiles was, what, seven or eight. He was so small, so… fragile. Looking even more fragile as the demon pushed him… under water. They were in a bathroom and Stiles was struggling against his mother as she tried to drown him. Chris couldn’t even comprehend what he was seeing.
“W… What do we do?” Allison asked next to him, sounding horrified.
Whatever they tried, it didn’t work. Peter had tried to sink his claws into the demon repeatedly, but they went right through. Derek and Chris were desperately trying to pull Stiles out of the water, but they couldn’t grasp him. They were powerless to watch how the demon pretending to be Stiles’ mother tried to drown Stiles. Chris felt his heart break because this was real. It wasn’t real in the now, but it had happened in the past. They knew the demon reenacted, drew from the memories of its victims. Another horrible thought followed, because Stiles was their solution to the problem. He was their magic user. If he got affected by the demon now – how would they banish it?
“I am not losing you, sweetheart,” Peter snarled, trying to attack the demon again. “Come on, you bastard, I have so many deaths that you can choose from. Eat your fill, but leave him alone.”
It was only when the splashing water calmed down and Stiles’ struggles grew weaker that Chris had a horrible realization that made him feel sick to his stomach. This wasn’t about his mother’s death. This was about Stiles’ death. She hadn’t tried to drown Stiles, she must have succeeded, for however short it lasted. The suspicion was confirmed when Lydia’s banshee scream made his ears ring. The memories were brought to the forefront so strongly that it affected the banshee. However, the banshee’s scream also had a piercing effect on the demon in return. The shimmer shattered like a mirror, the face of Stiles’ mother falling away and leaving a twisted, vaguely humanoid red shape behind. It still had its hands around Stiles’ throat, Stiles unconscious in its grip. Lydia was still screaming and the cracks she had caused in the mask now spread to the demon itself. It gave a hissing, screeching sound as it broke apart and dissolved, leaving only the unconscious boy behind, who would have fallen to the floor if not for Peter catching him.
“Darling,” Peter sounded desperate, looking up. “Christopher, help. I can’t…”
The wolf with super-strength couldn’t give CPR to a breakable human, not in his current state of distress. Peter lowered Stiles to the ground and Chris quickly got to work reviving their boy. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw Jackson, Scott and Allison tending to Lydia, who had collapsed onto the floor too. With a breathless gasp did Stiles jolt upright after the third attempt.
“Easy, baby,” Chris whispered gently, pulling Stiles into a hug. “It’s okay. We got you. It’s okay.”
The gasp turned into a sob and then he was fully crying, clinging onto Chris as he curled together so small and breakable. Peter joined them, running his fingers through Stiles’ hair. There was a groan from the couch and Chris spared a glance to Boyd sitting up with heavy limbs, Isaac and Erica with them. Derek exchanged a look with Peter and once he knew Stiles would be taken care of by Chris and Peter, Derek went to check on his other Betas and see how Boyd and Lydia were doing.
/break\
Once Lydia and Boyd were more aware and had been able to see for themselves that Stiles was alive, the pack piled on around Stiles, trying not just to comfort him but also themselves after just having seen him die. However, Stiles still seemed very raw and on edge. He kept flinching away, his eyes wide and alert, panic making his heart race. Knowing Stiles, the boy probably mistook their attempt at comfort for pity. Still, the pack needed the reassurance, at least some.
“I think you’ve had an eventful day and need some quiet,” Peter declared when it became apparent that Stiles wasn’t being calmed down by the puppy-pile. “How about you stay at the loft today?”
“That’s a good idea,” Derek agreed, looking at his Left Hand and then reaching out to scent-mark Stiles one last time. “We’ll be right down here when you need us, okay? Peter?”
“I got him,” Peter agreed with a smile, gently picking Stiles up.
The boy gave barely any protest as he was carried up the spiral-staircase by Peter. Chris was the only one to follow and after they entered Peter’s room, Chris closed the door behind them.
“You can stay here, sweetheart,” Peter offered while going through his closet.
“Okay,” Stiles’ voice was croaky from the choking, the near drowning.
Peter’s fingers curled tightly into a shirt, his claws ripping it as the memory of what they had just witnessed overwhelmed him once more. Chris gentled Peter’s fingers out of the shirt and took over looking for comfortable clothes to wear. Peter got a water-bottle for Stiles and carefully helped the boy drink some sips. He ran his fingers through the boy’s hair like he was trying to reassure himself that he could touch Stiles again. The despair of trying to pull Stiles away from the demon but being unable to intervene in the magic was one that would cling onto Peter for a long time, he knew that.
“W… What happened to the… the demon?” Stiles asked near fearful.
“Banshee scream, works like a charm on demons, it seems,” Peter replied with a small smile.
Stiles sighed relieved and sagged back onto the bed like a puppet whose strings got cut. Chris handed him a shirt and sweatpants and couldn’t help but touch Stiles to reassure himself too.
“We’ll leave you to it,” Chris offered an unconvincing smile. “Rest some.”
“Stay,” Stiles’ voice was so soft, Peter nearly didn’t catch that. “Please?”
Both Peter and Chris turned around in surprise and Stiles visibly curled together tighter. “That was weird. Sorry. I didn’t… Thank you, for letting me stay. I’ll be fine. I’m fine.”
“We’ll stay,” Chris assured him, quickly sitting down next to Stiles. “You don’t… You don’t have to talk about what happened, but if you want or need to talk about it, we’d both listen, okay?”
The three of them got changed for bed and not even Peter felt up to making teasing comments or chancing a glance. Even though he’d wanted Stiles in his bed for months now, this wasn’t how. This was a moment of genuine vulnerability and Peter was honored to be allowed to share it with Stiles.
“She didn’t mean to,” Stiles whispered as he climbed back into bed and curled together once more. “She was sick. She wouldn’t have done it if… if she was still herself. But the dementia… It...”
A boy with such long limbs had no right to look this small and fragile. Both Peter and Chris slipped into their respective side of the bed, safely sandwiching their boy between them. Peter pressed against Stiles’ back, his arms tight around Stiles’ waist, holding him close, making sure he could hold the boy again, while Stiles rested his head on Chris’ chest, Chris’ arms around Stiles too.
“We got you, baby,” Chris said. “We want to comfort you. Just tell us what you need.”
“I…” Stiles trailed off. “I like when you call me that? Can you… keep calling me that?”
He hid his face in Chris’ chest, missing the smile on Chris’ lips. “Of course, baby.”
Chris pressed a kiss to Stiles’ temple, pulling the boy closer. Peter exchanged a look with Chris before pressing a kiss of his own against Stiles’ neck. A gentle, chaste brush of his lips, nothing more. A reassurance, that this was something Stiles could have, was allowed to ask for.
“We love you, sweetheart,” Peter whispered. “We love you and we got you.”
Stiles took a shaky, relieved breath and relaxed between them before he drifted off to sleep.
~*~ The End ~*~