Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/659016.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Choose_Not_To_Use_Archive_Warnings, Graphic_Depictions_Of_Violence,
      Underage
  Category:
      F/M, M/M
  Fandom:
      Teen_Wolf_(TV)
  Relationship:
      Derek_Hale/Stiles_Stilinski
  Character:
      Derek_Hale, Stiles_Stilinski, Scott_McCall_(Teen_Wolf), Allison_Argent,
      Lydia_Martin, Sheriff_Stilinski, Jackson_Whittemore, Alpha_Pack_-
      Character, Isaac_Lahey
  Additional Tags:
      Demon!Stiles, sterek, Hurt/Comfort, Angst, Torture, dubcon, noncon?
  Stats:
      Published: 2013-01-28 Updated: 2013-06-08 Chapters: 11/? Words: 23460
****** Inside-Out ******
by LadyLazarus
Summary
     Stiles only wanted to protect them, everyone, to make sure they were
     safe.
     But making deals with demons never goes right.
Notes
See the end of the work for notes
***** Chapter 1 *****
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
Running. Heavy breathing. Snapping twigs and crunching leaves. Stiles ran as
fast as he could, tearing through the trees and dodging wayward branches. Fear
clutched him tightly and he knew the scent was leaving a trail as much as he
tried to create a haphazard path away from the alphas. His chest was beginning
to tighten up and the panic was edging in, ready to seize him should he take a
precious moment to consider himself. Stiles wasn’t supposed to be in danger on
this one. Derek said, oddly, that he had had enough of Stiles being the bait.
That damn werewolf was probably just angry he had to keep jumping in to save
Stiles. It’s not as if he hadn’t saved Derek once or twice himself. Sometimes
Derek could be really selfish despite his pretense for ‘saving’ Erica, Isaac
and Boyd. Where were Erica and Boyd now that the alphas left them to rot in the
woods, missing limbs and heads?
Three footfalls too close. Stiles was hoping and praying that he could get to
his jeep before they captured him. Or killed him. Or that maybe Scott would
intervene or Derek would have to get over himself and come save him. When did
Stiles become the damsel?
A howl rent the air above him and with a huff of relief as he scurried over a
rotten log, Stiles ran faster, but with less of a desperate air. In his sight:
the jeep, salvation. His heart beat faster with elation and he reached the
door, only to spot glowing red eyes in the reflection of the window. Ducking,
Stiles avoided the fist that broke his window. With no room to wriggle away,
Stiles was pressed, crouched, against the door of his Jeep as the largest of
the Alphas kneed him in the side of his head, which slammed into the door.
Darkness. Then bright spots and he was back. In the interim, Scott had reached
the Alpha and they were lunging at each other before Derek came from nowhere
and pulled out the Alpha’s still-beating heart. Scott decapitated him without
hesitation. The moon was full, tempers high, and animal instinct potent.
Darkness again, albeit with blood dripping into lashes.
---
“Stop trying to save the day.”
“Stop needing me to.” He hadn’t even opened his eyes yet and already Derek was
growling at him. Stiles was surprised enough that Derek was in the hospital
with him instead of Scott. Unless Scott was being quiet, but that would be too
weird for him. Where was his dad?
“Your dad is getting coffee. He’s about to come back, so I’m leaving. Don’t
tell him I was here. And don’t do anything stupid.”
“I hate you.” Maybe he imagined it, but Derek’s huff might have sounded more
amused than annoyed this time.
At least there was one less shitty Alpha around Beacon Hills. Stiles could
sleep a little more soundly knowing there was only the female and the twins
left to deal with. Maybe without their leader they would leave? Maybe they
would submit? In the meantime, Stiles thought it was best to just sleep.
---
He woke to his father shaking him, telling him that they could leave now. His
head was hurt less than they thought and he would be in pain, but not anything
he couldn’t manage on his own.
The drive was an angry silence perpetuated by the Sherriff and a repentant one
by Stiles. Wordlessly Stiles went up the stairs to his bedroom and closed the
door. He needed to do some research and he wanted to sleep some more.
Turns out Stiles didn’t need to sleep as much as he thought. He needed a way to
stop hurting himself and to help his friends. He needed a way to stop hurting
his father. He needed a way to stop caring too much about what Derek did. What
he said. How he looked at Stiles. He needed a way to stop hurting himself
beyond the physical plane.
Always nearly dying had sort of become normal for Stiles, and the fact that
that was normal for him was enough of a wakeup call.
Which is why when his search turned to crossroads deals, Stiles wasn’t even
hesitant.
---
It was easy to sneak out that night. It was easy to untangle his bike from
inside the garage, walk it out and pedal out to the nearest dirt road
intersection he could find. It was easy to assemble the bits of demonic
paraphernalia for the ritual. It was easy to bury them. It was not easy to
wait.
For a few minutes. For an hour. For two hours.
Apparently demons don’t have a thing for punctuality. Or Stiles got the recipe
wrong. He turned and left. He’d been talking out loud to himself, reciting his
reasons and his desires once the demon hadn’t shown up right away. Two hours of
whispering to the wind how much he couldn’t stand hearing Scott’s bones break
or seeing Derek school his face into anger to hide the pain of having more
people he cared about senselessly murdered. He couldn’t stand being beaten and
having to see his father’s eyes sag into tearful alcoholism.
When he got home, Stiles slipped into his bed and went to sleep. He had school
the next day and he hadn’t even written that two-pager he was supposed to have
done. He could cram it really quickly or he could just use the hospitalization
as an excuse. He’d get out of it. It was history and not Mr. Harris.
---
School was the disgusting kind of normal it usually is. Everybody walked by
without knowing their lives were in danger, that there were werewolves that
only wanted to rip them to ribbons. Threads.
Sometimes it was too much Stiles to handle. Sometimes it was too exhausting
knowing so much and being unable to share it with someone. It wasn’t as if he
could tell Scott he was a werewolf. Heading to the restroom, Stiles threw up
his hood. It didn’t sound as if anyone was in the restroom so Stiles headed
over to the sinks, wet his hands and ran them over his eyes and down his
cheeks, washing away some of that tiredness that clung to his steps.
And then the door opened, the mirrors shook and the stall doors all clattered
open like shutters in a tornado. In stepped a man, all hard edges and clean
lines in a dark suit with a vibrant red tie.
He was sexy, but the tie was nauseating for some reason.
“You called?” he said, picking at a nail not sparing a glance for Stiles.
“Excuse me?” Stiles replied, pulling back his hood again, bracing himself to
push past the man and run into the halls to disappear.
“At the crossroads. You want to make a deal, Stiles. I’ll give you a deal.” He
looked up and his eyes opened up into pools are dark miasma. Definitely not
human, clearly a demon. Stiles opened his mouth to reply but the demon
continued, “I’ll give you what you want. Everything you talked about for two
hours last night.”
“I have a few questions first.”
“Shoot.”
“What’s your name?”
He laughed and smiled at Stiles as if he were a pet that had just done a trick.
“Back when I was human, you mean? Morris. Cooper Morris.”
“Why didn’t you show up right away?”
No laugh, but a more focused expression. “I wanted to watch you. See who you
were. I like to know who I’m crawling around in.”
“Oh. That answers the last question.”
“Yes.” The man sidled up to Stiles, backing him up towards the sinks and
sliding a knee between his legs, the slick suitpants sliding between denim so
softly. “To give you everything you want, to save daddy the pain, save your
pals from being hurt, save yourself the injury, save the broody one from hating
your fucking guts every time you leak adoration and arousal near him, I’m going
to get you for my meatsuit. This one was dead when I slipped in, and it’s time
for a new one. I’ll take care of your body bag. It’s in the deal. I get you for
a year. That’s a good deal. I’m sentimental like that. Most get what they want
and in ten years they go down into the pit. But I’m not like the others, and… I
like the color red on you. Be it cotton… or blood.”
Stiles couldn’t breathe. His vision was getting heavier and he couldn’t look at
the demon’s face as it spoke, as it listed each painful barb in Stiles’ heart.
But the deal was never a question. If anything, the pain made it easier to
agree. “Ok. What do I do?”
“You scream.” He smiled and without a pause for any sounds from him, the demon
kissed Stiles, thrusting his tongue into him before his throat was opened up by
something else.
Smoke. The demon. It was in him.
The man slumped forward, dead and empty now. Stiles’ hands shoved him off
unceremoniously and his feet forced him to turn without his control until he
was facing the mirror. His eyes slid into place, two voids.
“Hello Stiles. I’m Morris.”
And together they walked out of the restroom, leaving a dead man in their wake
and pursuing a new life.
It was time for Stiles to sleep.
Chapter End Notes
     Hey Guys! This my first fic on AO3, Teen Wolf, and the first I've
     written in a LONG time. Let's see how it goes! Warnings, tags,
     rating, etc may change as I go. I have no clue what I'm doing. ;)
     I'll probably update on Sundays. If I have a schedule, I'll be better
     about it! I'm on tumblr as FoolProofPoem
***** Chapter 2 *****
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
Except he couldn’t sleep. Stiles thought he’d be put down into a slumber, like
a coma, while a year flashed by before his eyes. Not so apparently. It was a
strange experience, being trapped inside your own skin, aware, and being unable
to control anything. Stiles was locked away in his own head.
Morris, can you hear me? It’s uh… Stiles here. Doin’ ok?
Stiles, I hardly need you to shout to hear you. Stop flailing.
Oh, well, I’m right here if you need me to fill you in on something.
I have all of your memories already. I just need you to be quiet. Try thinking
in your own head so you can stop thinking in mine.
With that, Stiles became quiet, seeing his body move without the same jerky
movements he was known for. His walk seemed more confident and weighty, as if
instead of tripping over air, his feet were leaden and solid. It wasn’t Stiles,
but then Morris must know that and must be doing it on purpose. It would be
terrible if anyone found out, but then, Morris must know that too.
Stiles wasn’t going to trust him, but the deal was good. Or at least Stiles
thought it was good.
The day passed uneventfully, the correct answers stolen from his head when he
was called on. No distractions from his ADHD. No looks toward Lydia in class.
At lunch, he was quieter, joked less easily, and was snappish, blaming it on
his head. Scott and Isaac were blissfully unaware, though a comment about
smelling sulfur near them was not unnoticed.
School bled into the afternoon and soon Stiles and Morris were driving the jeep
back home. There was no pack meeting that night, wouldn’t be until the weekend,
so they had time to themselves to think. To adjust. Stiles wasn’t the captain
of this ship anymore.
I’m not usually that much of an asshole.
You want them safer, don’t you? Maybe they need distance from you. You’re a
weak, little human Stiles, they need to stop thinking of you as their teddy
bear. They need to leave you out.
But I’m pack…
You’re not pack, Stiles. You’re a pet. Once this Alpha business is over, I’ll
make sure they leave us alone and then you won’t have to deal with Derek. It’s
really for the better. In a year, you won’t even hurt.
And that was that. No more talking. Despite the inability to move, Stiles was
oddly calmed. His nervous energy was gone it seemed, sapped by the demon
possessing him. They shifted on the mattress before getting up to grab his
laptop and bring it back to the bed.
My pass-
Shut up, Stiles.
Flawlessly, as if his muscle-memory had stayed, Morris moved Stiles’ fingers
over the keyboard to enter the password.
Pulling up Chrome, Morris examined all kinds of things, reading too quickly,
moving his eyes too quickly for Stiles to catch onto anything besides the
occasional word – Werewolves, alphas, wolfsbane, sulfuric acid, snare traps,
heavy duty chains. None of it made sense, but it all seemed very… dangerous.
---
The week scraped by for Stiles. Nothing happened, no one was dying, no one was
being attacked and his homework was still being designed for subpar
intelligences. Curiously what Stiles was annoyed about the most was the fact
that he couldn’t taste anything. Morris had to feed him to keep up appareances
and to preserve his body, but every time he’d take a swig of milk from the jug,
nothing happened for Stiles. No quenching, no creamy feel, nothing. It wasn’t
as if he were hungry either, just that if it was happening, he’d rather have
some sensation.
Tonight was the pack meeting. Stiles wasn’t too sure what they’d discuss. Derek
would probably growl at Stiles again for taking the beating from the Alpha.
Stiles couldn’t care less. And if Stiles couldn’t care less, who knows how much
Morris could absolutely not care less what Derek thought about that.
Stiles caught a few stray thoughts from Morris once in a while. Hatred for
Derek was probably the most common, though Stiles hadn’t a clue why. Although,
the thoughts he heard seemed like rehearsed rejection lines rather than any
substantial ire.
Throwing the jeep into gear, he tore out of the drive with abandon, leaving
streaks of hot rubber on the suburban street as he headed to the Hale house.
Even though Derek had gotten a small apartment earlier in the month, everyone
still met at the house. It would only be Derek, Scott, Isaac, Jackson, Lydia
and Stiles, but it was everyone they had.
Hopping out of the jeep, Stiles walked the rest of the way up the walkway. It
looked like everyone was there waiting for him. As he walked into the living
room, all of the werewolves looked up and then back down at the map spread
between all of them on some upturned crates.
“No ‘Hello, Stiles!’? Come on guys!” Jackson huffed and Scott smiled. Derek
didn’t do anything. “What are we looking at?” He asked, trying to get some
dialogue going.
“Where we think the Alpha pack might be hiding. They lost their biggest guy.
They’ll all be weaker for it, so we’re trying to pick out a place they could be
hiding to flush them out,” Lydia answered, adding, “But without you. Too many
concussions in a row.”
“Oh, ha ha. I can help guys.” Derek looked up from the topography of the Beacon
Hills Preserve to growl at him angrily.
“Don’t even think about it,” he bit out, “Stop trying to get yourself killed.”
“Stop bossing me around like you own me!” Morris was pissed. Stiles could feel
it. This wasn’t anger on his behalf. Morris was angry because it was another
person trying to control him, make him do as they please. It was really enough
after so many years carving wicked curses into the souls in the pit. He was
expert. He was precise, and when he crawled out, craven and empty, he vowed
never to let another force control him. He was in control. He was the one that
decided what happened. He was the one to call the shots. Not Derek, whose eyes
had flashed red and was coming around to face Stiles head on.
“Don’t,” he began, prodding Stiles in the chest with a blunt, but just as
piercing finger, “Yell at me.”
“Then don’t,” began Morris, grabbing hold of Derek’s finger before he could
pull it away, too fast for a human to grab, but not inconceivably so, and bent
it back with a quick shake of his wrist till they all heard the sharp pop of
dislocated finger. “Fucking touch me again,” Morris finished.
Morris!
Morris’ glare was dark in the face of Derek’s shock. Isaac’s eyes were wide
open and the rest were hopelessly aghast. Derek was cradling his finger to his
chest as he snapped it back into place with only a small flinch of pain.
“Don’t come near me. Don’t try to protect me. I am tired of your shit.”
MORRIS!
“I don’t need you touching me. I fucking hate you. Don’t you even understand
personal space? Stay the FUCK away from me, asshole.”
Morris…
Shut up, Stiles. It’s for your benefit. You told me to take care of Derek. I’m
taking care of Derek. If he keeps having to worry about this body, then he’s
weak. He doesn’t love you like you love him. No loss.
I don’t need him to love me.
That’s not what you said last week, now is it?
“Get out.” Derek’s eyes were flashing red constantly, his rage barely in check.
With the finger that was injured, he pointed Stiles’ way out the door. The
others still silent, pained.
“My pleasure, fucker.” And Stiles was out the door, walking to the jeep, a sick
smile painted on his face by Morris.
Be careful what you wish for, Stiles.
They took a detour on the way home, near a nursery where Morris collected
samples of wolfsbane.
I’ve always loved kicking dogs when they’re down, Stiles.
But Stiles was unsure which dogs Morris was talking about.
Chapter End Notes
     Lol. I said I'd update in a week and... it's been a day. oh well!
     Leave comments! I'll answer 'em! :) (also feel free to tell me what
     you don't like, or directions you'd like to see this go. I like
     hearing input!)
***** Chapter 3 *****
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
When Stiles arrived home, he sensed a werewolf’s presence inside his house. The
demon could hear better than the average human, and he picked up the clumsy and
impatient nature of Scott fiddling with something in his bedroom. The Sherriff
shouldn’t be home at the moment as he was still trying to piece together the
mystery man found dead in the men’s bathroom at Beacon Hills High. Right now,
the Sherriff was even too distracted to really be angry at Stiles showing up
with inexplicable injuries again.
Stiles left the wolfsbane clippings in his jeep and locked it as he entered the
house in case Scott decided to snoop around as he left. Morris wasn’t planning
on having Scott around for much longer tonight. There were things to do after
all. He shucked off his shoes and padded down the hallway past the kitchen to
the stairs, ascending them doggedly and tiredly so Scott would think he were
exhausted. He trained his face into a sour grimace as he opened the door and
offered some fake surprise at seeing Scott. His heart didn’t jump.
“Oh. Hey Scott, what’re you doing here?” Morris moved Stiles over to his desk
to grab his laptop and then to the bed to back himself up to the headboard as
Scott turned from the door to face him, sitting at the foot of the bed. He was
holding Stiles’ lacrosse stick, twisting the strings between fingers.
“Are you ok, Stiles? You’ve been acting really weird. It’s like you’re totally
different. Did you hit your head that hard last week?” Scott looked up with his
asymmetrical jaw and his soft puppy eyes.
“What? Naw, I’m ok. I’m just pissed at Derek. He doesn’t respect any of us and
he gets really into my personal space. I just had enough of it.” Scott shifted
more, crossing his legs up as he sat fully on the bed.
“No, I mean… Well I mean that too, but I can sorta see that. I mean at school.
You don’t ever ask me to come over and he don’t joke very much.”
“Nobody laughs anymore.” Morris’ words were a shock to Stiles. They were
ringing so frighteningly true. Stiles must have realized it at some level –
that Scott just threw little smirks and half-smiles his away after a quip
instead of his raucous belly laugh. Lydia never rolled her eyes anymore either,
which was kind of her version of a laugh at Stiles’ humor. It was certainly a
dart in Stiles’ side hearing the truth slip so easily out of Morris’ mouth.
“And besides, every time I’ve asked you to come over and play COD or something
you make up an excuse. Or you’re at Allison’s. Or you talk about her the whole
time you ARE here. You’re not fun anymore.”
Ouch. In his mind, Stiles was fidgeting something fierce. Could
subconsciousnesses get panic attacks? Scott’s face fell  faster than an anvil
in a Looney Toons cartoon.
Could you stop squirming? I’m trying to guilt this pup.
I think he’s had enough. Scott is my best friend!
But is he though? Has he really been there for you? Haven’t you pretty much
saved everyone’s lives? And how did they repay you? Treating you like a burden.
These aren’t your friends Stiles. You don’t have friends.
“But… I don’t mean to. I miss you Stiles.” Scott looked truly repentant.
“Not enough apparently.” Morris wasn’t a sap. He didn’t care for Scott’s mopey
face. “I really need to sleep Scott. Can you just go?” With the dismissal,
Stiles refocused on the screen of his laptop.
“Um yeah. Sure.” Numbly, Scott walked past Stiles to the window, reaching out
to brush his fingertips across Stiles’ arm or shoulder. Stiles shifted the
moment before he could. Stiles was so grateful Morris didn’t look up to see the
tear forming in Scott’s eyes or the trembling left in his fingers or the shakey
breath exhaled into the cooling night air as he jumped to the ground and biked
home, fighting back the heartache.
Scott lost his best friend and Stiles was alone.
After an hour, searching quickly through amazon for a few things and browsing
the internet, Stiles went outside to retrieve the wolfsbane clippings. He went
back up to his room and lined up all the flowers and leaves on paper towels and
sandwiched them between pages in his dictionary. Soon they’d be dry and able to
be crushed into a powder.
---
At school, Stiles drifted through the hallways without any care in the world.
At least he appeared that way, even though he, and even Morris, felt a bit out
of place without Scott tagging along with him, pulling and pushing at him as he
joked about lacrosse or Greenberg or Coach Finstock. In AP Calc, Lydia started
throwing him odd looks every once in a while that he ignored. Mr. Harris had
nothing really to say to him considering Stiles was quiet, not fidgety and
answered all the questions correctly. It was starting to grate on the man’s
nerves. It was as if Stiles was giving blue balls for his massive sadist
erection. Morris smiled at the thought.
At lunch, Stiles picked a new table to eat at alone. On Wednesday, Lydia
suddenly appeared and set her tray down with a measured amount of grace –
enough to clatter, but not enough to jostle her glass of orange juice.
“What’s up Stiles?” she asked as she tipped her body forward, getting into the
seat, exposing her cleavage. Morris sighed in his head and maintained eye
contact with Lydia.
“Nothing. Why?” Lydia pursed her lips and picked up her fork to push around the
pilaf on her plate.
“I just flashed my cleavage and you didn’t even look. You’re not talking to
Scott. You’re answering every question in classes and you aren’t distracted or
spazzing out. What the fuck has gotten up your ass? Are you depressed?”
Morris laughed, “Hardly, Lydia. I’m just tired of some stuff. I’m done. Over
it. Finished. Finito.”
“Well you need an attitude adjustment and you need to get laid. Clearly by a
guy.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Morris frowned as Lydia smirked like she won
the top prize at one of those rigged carnival games.
“Just that you clearly aren’t swinging my way, and you blew up at Derek. Super
over-dramatic. You are soooo GAY. ”
“You don’t have to be gay to like guys. You could be bi. Or pan. Or demi. Why
should you care?” Morris stabbed at the carrots on his plate, over boiled and
somehow dry.
“Because it looks bad on me to not have at least one dopey puppy fawning over
me that I ignore. It’s a status thing. I’m on top here and I like to maintain
that. I don’t do losers, but losers are helpful. You ignoring us makes for a
bad rep. So get over yourself, sneak into a bar and get some ass.”
“God you’re so selfish.”
“No. I’m calculating and I don’t do anything but win. You should know that.”
Morris did know that. All of Stiles’ memories of Lydia was her being brilliant
and beautiful and fierce, even at her lowest.
“I’ll get back to you on that one.”
“You do that.” She left, picking up her tray again, though nothing had been
touched, Morris could have sworn that she had eaten. It was certainly one of
Lydia’s tricks, but she was eating when she got back to her own table with
Jackson, so maybe she just had one of those eating styles that is a mirage of
sustenance.
The afternoons were much the same as the mornings and soon Friday rolled round
and Stiles was free to go home. When he got to the parking lot. Scott was
waiting for him.
“Um, Hey Stiles!” He looked sheepish. Stiles’ heart twinged. Morris didn’t have
a heart.
“What’s up.” Not even really a question. Morris could care less.
“I was just wondering if you could drive me home? Mom dropped me off before a
shift, but she couldn’t be here to pick me up and she has the car.”
You could do that at least Morris.
Fine.
“Fine.” If Scott had been a puppy (a potato-puppy probably) his ears would have
shot up and he would have started one of those wiggle dances where his tail
would have moved his whole body.
“Cool!” They clambered into the jeep and Stiles put it into gear and headed to
the McCall residence.
“You know… I’m not doing anything right now. We could go back to your place an-
”
“No.” Scott looked down into his lap. Sighing slowly, raggedly. “Sorry, I mean,
I have a few things I need to put together for a project and Dad is being kind
of a hardass. They still haven’t found that dead guy on any of the missing
persons lists. Maybe next week.”
“Oh. Ok. Next week I guess.”
The rest of the ride was filled with a semi awkward silence until Scott climbed
out of the jeep and offered a wan smile and a stilted wave good bye as Stiles
backed out of the McCall drive and headed home.
---
As he hopped up the steps, he retrieved a package from amazon and headed down
into the basement. All of his mother’s belongings were hidden in the darkened,
dusty corners. The sheets that were covering them seemed soaked in his father’s
pain and loneliness. Morris tore them off unceremoniously. Digging through,
looking for the flat lacquered pine box he knew to be among the piles. Having
found it, Morris flicked the latches and dug around, pulling out of the silver
chest a wickedly sharp and beautiful silver knife. It had been the knife with
which the newly married Stilinskis had cut their wedding cake.
Stiles hadn’t seen it in years. He’d almost forgotten about it.
Morris put everything back approximately the way it had been. It wasn’t as if
the Sherriff would be coming down there anyway. They headed up to Stiles’
bedroom, box in one hand, knife in the other. It was the last ingredient.
Morris grabbed everything together he’d need: a box cutter, the knife, the now
dried and flattened wolfsbane, a bowl of hot water, a tall cup, the package. He
opened up the amazon box and pulled out the plastic tub of liver of sulfur
(‘for jewelry-making and patina purposes only’ it read). He stacked the
wolfsbane up into a pile and then chopped them up with the blade of the box
cutter as if he were going to snort a line of cocaine. The purple-fuchsia
powder was mesmerizing. Morris scooped it up into the bowl of hot water and
then scooped out a few caked pieces of liver of sulfur. It smelled awful and
had a weirdly yellow-green-black color that mixed with the purple-pink of the
wolfsbane. Morris stirred it all together and let it sit for a minute before he
placed the knife into the tall cup and submerged the knife in the sulfuric
mixture.
After about five minutes, Morris put on gloves and pulled out the knife,
blackened and tarnished with iridescent patterns shining through the black like
oily puddles in parking lots. He smiled. What better way to cut down an Alpha
than with a silver blade infused with wolfsbane tarnish? If it could, the blade
looked even more eerie and wicked, shining like crow’s feathers.
Time to have fun.
Chapter End Notes
     Hey guys! I'm still trying to figure out when I'll update. I know
     I've been really inconsistent. I don't have classes on fridays so I
     may be updating then AND on sundays. Saturdays i don't have anything
     either, but it's a toss up. Anyway, I wanted to call attention to the
     updated tags and ratings! Demon!Stiles is going to get pretty dark in
     the next chapter, especially before it gets better. THERE WILL BE A
     HAPPY ENDING, DON'T WORRY. I'm not really one for tragic endings
     unless it's a one shot. Also I finished outlining the whole fic, so
     it'll have about 21 chapters. Unless of course I go over that. But
     that's why I outlined it all!
***** Chapter 4 *****
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
A day later it was Saturday and a new moon was in the sky. The night seemed
darker with no light coming from the heavens and Morris grinned manically,
feeling his demonic power increase slightly. Tonight was perfect to hunt down
one of the Alphas. Morris wrapped the blade he had made the day before in a
square of linen he had cut from the thick sheets in the basement that covered
Stiles’ mother’s possessions.
Ready to have some fun Stiles? There was little Stiles actually enjoyed in the
way Morris was handling his life, but the one thing he did appreciate was
Morris upholding his end of the deal to help kill the Alphas.  Cuts from this
blade wouldn’t heal. The Alphas would be stuck without one of their greatest
strengths. Plus the blade would really hurt, being both silver and wolfsbane.
If Morris could corner one of them, he could easily deal with them and weaken
their pack even more significantly. Stiles wasn’t quite sure what a demon could
really do as far as physical strength against the werewolves, but hopefully it
would be enough to not die.
I don’t if FUN is the right word, but I’m ready for some BAMF action, man!
Well, I think you’ll find the show quite entertaining.
They slipped outside quietly, though again the Sherriff was working late and
hopped into the jeep. Driving out to the east end of the preserve, opposite
Derek’s side, Stiles hummed in his head along with Morris to Queen and
Supertramp. Somebody to Love was an odd favorite of theirs. The mood was so
juxtaposed Stile couldn’t even handle it and his inner grin manifested on
Morris’ face.
It felt good to agree, to work together, to finally do something to help the
pack.
They parked the jeep off a trail and Stiles slid off his seat and onto the cold
ground, crunching the leaves and twigs beneath him.  Stiles takes a deep
breath, breathing out through his mouth. He rolls his neck on his shoulders and
hears a few pops.  He stars walking into the forest, mindful of the shadows and
the starlight breaking through the leaves, little shards of mirror reflecting
the glint in his eye. His steps become more confident and quieter as Morris
wraps himself up into the shadows of the night, reaching out to feel the
presence of the lives around him. All woodland creatures and sturdy oaks and
pines.
Then, as if he were struck in the face, Morris stops, jerking his neck back and
swiveling to the northeast. There – a trail of bloody brown smoke, slowly
percolating into the earth – the scent of a werewolf. Now it was only a matter
of time following this trail even they couldn’t hide from a demon to find an
Alpha. It seemed as if there was only one on this trail however.
Morris cloaked himself again in the darkness, flight of foot, running between
shadow and tree, seemingly teleporting from one place to another, only slowing
as a patch of starlight became unavoidable, though his footsteps remained
silent.
It wasn’t long before Stiles came up on a shack-like cabin. At first glance no
one would have thought anything could live in there, but here he was smelling
the stench of a wet dog, sweaty, just back from a run through the woods.
Expertly, Morris approached the door. Just before he opened it, he noticed the
open window. Silly werewolves. No salt, no problem. As Morris inspected the
window, glancing in to see the female werewolf lying on a mattress, he started
to climb in, waving his hand to throw open the door as he slipped into a corner
of the room, the darkest where the light of the fire inside the hearth couldn’t
reach. It danced at his feet, threatening to reveal him even as the werewolf
sat bolt upright, shifted and facing the door.
After a heated moment of tense shoulders and lengthened claws, she relaxed,
shrugged, and went outside to see if there was something waiting outside for
her. She closed the door and turned around to go to her bed just as Stiles
glanced up from picking at his nails, the blade unwrapped from its cloth on his
lap, all together resting in a wooden chair by the fire. He smirked.
She laughed, “Cute trick. You’re the little human one, aren’t you?” She sidled
up a couple of steps closing the distance between them, but she stopped a
distance away from him. She was smug and irritating. Her smile was saccharine
and morbid. She was a killer.
Morris was the nightmare she never knew she had.
“Cute? Yes. Little? I suppose I am only 147 pounds of sarcasm. Human…? Well, on
the outside.”
On the inside too asshole! I’m still here.
Shut up Stiles, I’m being dramatic. You’re ruining the scene.
The werewolf’s smile faltered a little, eyes squinting, questioning. “Well,
you’ll die just the same anyway!” She unsheathed her claws and advanced
quickly. Morris threw up a hand and the werewolf couldn’t come any closer.
“Ah, ah, dear! We were having a conversation! I don’t even know your name!” The
wolf snarled, fighting against the force, scratching at the air vainly as if
she could pull apart whatever was stopping her. “Now, now, calm down! I just
want to chat!”
“What are you?! I’ll rip your fucking throat out--”
“With your teeth. Yes, yes. I’ve heard that one before. You werewolves
seriously ought to pick up some better phrases to use or we’ll all get used to
them. It bores me. I don’t like to be bored. Now, what. Is. Your. Name?” Morris
grit out the last bit in a growl as he flicked his wrist and sent the werewolf
flying back into the door.
She growled, and lunged toward Stiles again, but he just threw her into another
wall. No need to beat up the door. “We can do this all day, or you can just
tell me what your name is.” Morris’ voice had an air of humor in it. He was
beginning to really enjoy himself.
“Kali,” she spat out, eyes flashing a dangerous red.
“Oh put away your little tricks. I’m in control here. I tell YOU what to do. I
call the shots. Dearest Kali, you’re going to be my precious messenger.” Morris
stood up, closing in on Kali as she snarled fiercely from her corner, ready to
slash out his trachea at the first chance he gave her.
Message?
Yes, Stiles. We’re going to make sure these mutts stay out of Beacon Hills.
Thank you.
There was a table and what looked to be some heavy duty chains hanging in
another corner of the room. With blade in hand, he snatched Kali’s wrist, while
making sure she couldn’t move and dragged her body up onto the table. He kept
her immobile as he chained her arms back under the table so that her elbows
were bent uncomfortably hugging the table from behind as if his father had
handcuffed her with a board on her back. Morris wrapped her legs at the ankles
around the table as well as her neck in the same fashion. She wriggled and
growled, gnashing her teeth, hair a blizzard across her face.
“Oh Kali… Such beautiful skin.” Morris tenderly stroked her cheek and pulled
her hair from her face and tucked it behind her ears. “My, what big teeth you
have!” Morris laughed. Kali looked truly afraid for the first time.
“Do you know what this is?” he asked, holding up the black blade, catching the
starlight that streamed through the windows. “It’s silver! Which might really
be nothing, a little more tingly than a normal knife against your skin, but the
black tarnish? That’s wolfsbane. I’ve only heard your growls, why don’t we hear
some pretty screams?” Before she could brace herself against the bite of the
cool metal, Morris had deftly slid the sharp blade from rib to rib across the
front of her bare midriff where the tank top stopped, just lightly enough to
draw blood, but not enough to cut very deep.
And oh how she screamed so beautifully.
“It’s not going to heal so quickly either, so don’t get your hopes up. You’ll
be hurting for a while.” Her breath began to become ragged and she sucked in a
sharp breath to begin howling for the twins’ help. “Ah, ah! None of that!”
chastised Morris as he slipped a fresh blossom of wolfsbane into her open
mouth. Sadly, her instinct was to close her mouth against more intrusion and
she tensed against the flower in her mouth, screaming even louder than before,
sparkling tears dripping from her eyes.
“So pretty.” Morris pulled the tip of the knife up to the corner of her eye as
she froze so still in fear and he flicked away a tear without cutting her. “No
crying though. Whatever God you have cannot save you now. This is the world.
This is Karma. Your hatred, your blind punishment, your sense of righteousness
is unfounded here. We were fine. We were safe. Then you came to hurt us and I
cannot let anything else happen. You think Derek owns this hamlet? I am God
here, and you are a pestilence.” He gripped the crown of her head suddenly like
a vice and began to etch into her face with the tip of the blade as she coughed
and sputtered, trying to rid her mouth of the wolfsbane even as she choked on
her own sobs, dropping fat wanton tears onto the wood beneath her. Her voice
climbed octaves as she tried desperately to control herself, undecided between
screaming, howling and wracking sobs.
“This is my mother’s silver. Was, I guess. From her wedding day.”
“You’re sick.” Kali spat out, still crying and squirming against Morris’ tight
hold around her head.
“We’re all sick in some place, honey.” Morris paused to press a kiss to Kali’s
forehead. If anything pained her before, the gentleness of that kiss was as if
a thousand of Stiles’ blades were dancing underneath her skin. Her screams
subsided into desperate whimpers as each cut into her skin burned like fuchsia
fire on her body.
Morris worked across one cheek, to her forehead and down the other cheek before
going down her neck and across her breast bone. When he was finished, he let go
of Kali’s head and wiped the bloody blade on her tank. He glanced around the
room, ignoring her exhausted whimpers and found a hand mirror tucked aside her
mattress. Crossing the room, he picked it up and brought it over to Kali.
“Let’s take a look now.” He said, brandishing the mirror so that Kali could see
what he had etched into her skin. Across each of her cheeks was ‘ERICA’ and
‘BOYD’ while ‘MUDERER’ was spelt across her forehead. Surrounding these largest
words were other names, all smaller, but numerous trailing across every inch of
her upper body that Morris attended to.
“How--” She shuddered, new drops bursting from her spent tearducts as she
hyperventilated trying to close her eyes against her own reflection. Stiles
kept them open for her. It had taken so long for Morris because each name had
to be carved into her backwards to show up in the mirror.
“How did I know each soul you stole from this earth? How did I know each name
you massacred? Because I can see every inch of you Kali. All I needed was your
name.”
“Please. Kill me. Please.” Morris frowned, throwing the mirror into the
mattress, as a flash of the blade caught her eye and sunk into the thick flesh
of her bicep.
“NO! You don’t GET to die! I told you already, you’re my little messenger.
You’re going to go back and make sure no one bothers us again.”
“The twins… They’ll kill you all. And I’ll help. I’ll tell your pack what you
did, you fucking human piece of shit.” Her anger was back, anger not only for
her indecent rage but for This petty human dominating her on her won ground.
“No you won’t you mongrel, because,” Stiles’ eyes shifted into the blackest
voids as he blinked. Kali’s face was ridden with shock. Somehow, even as the
world was more tinted, Stiles could see clearer, sharper, and he could see the
red smoke that dripped from his body like heavy fog from dry ice into the
earth. “Because I’ll swallow your fucking soul.”
“I’ll see myself out. Good night, princess.”
Chapter End Notes
     So.... I had extra time and I wrote another chapter. I'm sorry it's
     so creepy! I don't think things are going to really get better until
     chapter 7 or 8, just so you know. I still love you!
***** Chapter 5 *****
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
Sweaty and still breathing heartily, Stiles entered his house, key twisting in
the lock loudly like a death sentence. As if to play the part, there his father
sat in at the kitchen table, arms crossed, expectant and the closing of the
door slammed into their ears like a gavel coming down in a courthouse.
“And why are you so late coming home?” The Sheriff looked at Stiles accusingly.
There wasn’t much compassion in that gaze and no wiggle-room in those crossed
arms. Guilt seeped into both Morris and Stiles. The demon had taken a small
liking to the warm but stern man as he commanded Stiles into perfect chivalry.
“I was, eh… out.  I had to take Danny home from a bar. That’s all.” It was a
bold faced lie, but probably believable enough for the Sheriff.
“Are you two…?” The Sheriff wasn’t looking directly at Stiles, eyes downcast
toward Stiles fidgety hands.
“What? No! I was just taking him home. He was drunk. That’s all. I’m the only
one that has a car it seems like.” His father relaxed to a degree, though he
didn’t seem convinced. It was enough for one night though.
“That’s good. Take care of your friends. You’re a good guy Stiles. Just, just
give me a note or something. I don’t like coming home and not knowing where you
are.”
“Sure.” There was a lull and Stiles turned to head down the hall, dragging his
tired feet up the carpeted steps and over the threshold into his bedroom. He
collapsed onto his bed, his body too exhausted to stand another moment, even
though Morris could have forced him to stand for hours more without any
apparent injury.
---
For days there had been no mention of Alphas or werewolves around Stiles. It’d
been a couple of weeks. The boredom had taken its toll on Stiles. Morris was
becoming antsy. It was mid-October and only a month into the deal. They were a
twelfth of the way through their time together, but Stiles felt as if he still
knew little of who Morris actually was. Stiles’ old friends, the pack, had
become more distant. Lydia still gave him the occasional odd look, more a self-
satisfied smirk at figuring out his sexuality than anything else, though if he
looked long enough, it seemed as if she were concerned.
No dangers had made themselves apparent in the absence of the Alphas either. It
seemed like for so long they were being hunted or harassed by some evil or
another. This downtime was so odd and… unwelcome almost. No one knew what to
do. It was like being given a cake and being told not to eat it yet. Just all
nerves and twitchiness. No one really knew what to do with their hands.
For Stiles, it was a little different. He didn’t have the twitchy anxiety,
especially with the state of safety in Beacon Hills. It was more that he didn’t
really know Morris. Most of the time his thoughts and Stiles’ thoughts just
flowed around each other in their head comfortable, but then often there would
just be emptiness. Morris’ side was empty or blocked off – Stiles couldn’t
tell. It was so odd for him that there was this presence he could feel around,
but didn’t know, like he suddenly woke up with a third arm, but he didn’t
control it, but he could see it and touch it and he knew its boundaries.
This afternoon they weren’t really doing much. Morris was obliging Stiles by
scrolling through tumblr for some semblance of entertainment. This was one of
the moments when Morris was on autopilot, his mind elsewhere, but closed off to
Stiles.
Morris? Do you miss this?
What? The scrolling faltered and then stopped.
Do you miss being a boring human, not doing anything?
Yes.
Is that why you do the deals? So you can pretend to be human again?
No. This is the first time I’ve possessed someone as a deal. Usually I give
them what they want and then drag them down in ten years’ time. You’re the
first one I’ve taken as a meatsuit.
I really hate that term. It goes against all of my social justice tendencies.
Yes, I know what tags you track on tumblr, Stiles.
I’m just wondering what made you decide to possess me.
You reminded me of myself.
How so? I mean, you’re kinda crazy, but you seem like you would’ve been the
popular guy in school.
Ha. School. Stiles… how old do you think I am?
Like, a hundred or something?
Stiles, I was born in 1620. Springfield, Massachusetts.
Oh shit. I thought you were younger. You adapted very easily.
I wasn’t under a fucking rock. I didn’t fuck around in Hell very long. They
barely had to break me before I was begging to torture souls. I was… handy.
Why did you go to Hell?Morris closed the laptop and pushed it away. He unzipped
the hoodie he was wearing and threw it on the floor before shuffling under the
covers. He rolled onto his side and bent his knees up a bit as if he were cold.
I made a deal, much like yourself.
What for?
Honestly? I wanted to protect people I loved. There was trouble back in
England. I was 22 and our country was becoming a new nation. There was a call
to arms by the King and men were being sent off. It was a little different for
the colonials like myself. If we had a good enough reason, it was no bother for
us to be struck from the roster. My mother was alone after my father died early
and I had to tend the farm.
Bright images and memories of smells came into Stiles’ mind. He saw an
untouched, virgin Massachusetts countryside, dotted with farms and small wooden
buildings. He saw quaint streets and horses whinnying as their bridles were
pulled against their tongues. He saw sunsets and sunrises over a treetops and
hills and the bubbly rush of clear creek water over smooth stones. It was
beautiful. Just before Morris quit showing things to Stiles, there was a man.
It was a man’s face, bearded, but trimmed. Rustic. His long hair pulled pack
and tied with a small strip of leather. He had an aquiline nose and full lips
with the most piercing blue eyes. His loose shirt was dirtied with labor and
his cheeks flush with it too. A hand came to swat at a twig in his hair, and
clap him manly on the shoulder before withdrawing, sliding a bit over the
fabric and skin underneath that wasn’t covered by the linen. Stiles thought it
might be better to not mention the man just yet, in case Morris hadn’t meant to
show him.
So you made a deal for what?
I made a deal so that I could kill the King’s man with the enlistee rosters.
And how’d that go?
I’ll show you.
---
“Cooper Morris, it is?” said a lithe man in a Parliamentarian uniform. His eyes
were a deep brown, beautiful to behold until they became raven-black and empty.
He smiled as Morris gaped. Stiles knew he was gaping, but only through an odd
feeling. This was all a memory from Morris perspective. He couldn’t see his
face at all.
“Yes sir.” Morris took off his cap and wrung it between his hands a bit. If
anyone saw him writing in the Devil’s Book, he was sure to be strung up and
hung.
“Oh please, boy, don’t call me sir. Sir was the first man’s heart I ate.” His
smile became a toothy grin, his teeth all sharpened points as if he had sat
down one day and filed them all to wicked sharpness.
“’Um, s-so I wanted to make a deal.” The man snorted.
“I gathered that, peasant. The question is WHAT you want.”
“I need a way to stop the enlistee roster from getting back to Boston.”
“You could always kill the King’s man. There would be much investigation about
his death and little care about his paperworks. If one were to be amiss… What
man would be the wiser?”
“Does he really have to die?”
“Does he really have to be a Royalist?” The man laughed heartily and doubled
over, overcome with his own humor. It was all a sick joke to him, even though
it wasn’t even that funny.
“Sir…” The man’s laughter snapped, and his eyes flared into black slits again
as he threw his hand up and Morris was flying backwards into a tree.
“I told you not to call me ‘sir!’ I asked you nicely. I made it a joke. I
smiled. Don’t make me kill you before you get your deal, boy!” There was such
anger and fury inside the man. It had become very simple to realize that this
was indeed a demon that Morris was conversing with.
“I’m sorry! I’m sorry! Forgive me!” Morris picked himself up off the ground and
walked cautiously back to where he had stood before, though he kept his gaze
lower and tried not to appear as if the tree had hurt as much as it did.
“I’ll give you what you want, Morris. I’m going to help you. In ten years
though, I’m going to come back up here and I’m going to tear the skin off your
bones and pull out your soul and take you down to Hell. How does that sound?”
Morris’ face drained of blood and his fingers trembled. His breath hitched and
he nodded shakily.
“I’ll keep them all safe? Everyone here?”
“Everyone? Morris, you are more blind than I thought. Yes. Yes they’ll be
safe.”
“Where do I sign your book?” The demon gave Morris a confused look for a second
before bursting out in cackling laughter. His whole body shook with it again as
if he were some sort of wind-up machine like the kind his father brought back
once from Denmark. It had been his most favorite possession, so expensive and
amazing, but his mother gave a withering look and it had become less fun. This
was like that, the jittering action and the lack of joy at being laughed at.
“Oh Morris… We don’t keep black books. We seal this deal with more intimate
means. Come closer.”
“Intimate… how?” Morris began to step closer, confusion pinching his eyebrows
together as the demon motioned him closer with his hand until he could grab at
Morris’ wrist. He pulled Morris to him, flush to his front and wrapped an arm
around his waist with a hand cupping his ass as another arms pressed against
his back and a hand held the nape of his neck. The demon was aroused and hot
and his breath smelled like a roast.
“Don’t you know it’s a sin to love this Morris?” Morris’ eyes shut against the
grin, but he felt the demon roll his hips into him, relishing the gasp Morris
produced, himself becoming aroused.
“I would never act upon this sin.” He kept his eyes shut.
“Oh, but wouldn’t you like to?” another gyration of the hips had Morris very
hard and very wanton, whimpering a bit at the demon’s words.
“Yes,” he hissed out, opening his eyes to the black-stained eyes. The hand on
his ass slid between them to disappear into Morris’ trousers. Warm fingers
encircled his cock and Morris shuddered, instinctively bucking his hips into
the hand and gasping out, arching his back.
“Such an eager, precious boy. Kiss me.” Morris didn’t hesitate, pulling the
demon’s face down onto his, biting at his lip before soothing it with a wet
tongue that entered the demon’s mouth with ecstasy. The kiss lasted for a short
time before his throat felt like it was being torn asunder by knives. He choked
and tried to pull back from the pain, but he was frozen in place until he was
just standing in the middle of the crossroads with a man slumped against his
body. His hands moved up to push the demon off him, but it wasn’t Morris that
pushed, it was something else and it wasn’t the demon that was in the body,
because as soon as his hands touched it, he knew it was dead. His body was not
his own.
Hello, Morris. Want to touch yourself some more?
Chapter End Notes
     Thanks for the awesome response guys! I'm really glad you like what
     I've written! For now, I have a 21 chapter outline, but it may be
     more. I seem to be writing more than I had thought, but that's all
     very good for you! I'll be at my brother's wedding next weekend and I
     might not update because I have to make the wedding cakes, but I may
     have some random time late at night to bust out a couple thousand
     words. We'll see, darlings! Find me on Tumblr at FoolProofPoem.
***** Chapter 6 *****
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
The time passes slowly. It goes day by day and each day is another slow drag of
a hypothetical cigarette. Morris and Stiles suffocate from the boredom. Each
action they perform is fluid, but as if through molasses. The fire in Morris’
tongue still burns against all the other pack members as he makes more distance
between them. Stiles’ can’t tell whether it’s for the better or not. It just
seems like each time the pack tries to understand Stiles’ new distance, Morris
becomes more perplexing and ousts the pack from their domain. Stiles is an
island, a drifting island that repels fruited shores.
But the Milky Way is still flowing and Andromeda is still spinning and the
universe is still on its axis, ever tilted and dreaming of new stars to be born
and old stars to send their souls to a new cosmos. Each leaf that falls from
the trees fall from green branches to golden air to rust red earth and litter a
carpet of down under their feet. The birds begin to sing later and sing softer
and the bite of cold starts to gnaw on their skin. The world ages.
They all go in stages. Each pack member is a slow leaf to fall. Jackson gets
fed up so easily with Morris’s judgment, the jokes about his adoption, the
jokes that should never be made, the ridicule and mean-spirited laughs. Morris
is merciless and cruel and Stiles cries. Just as Morris became human in his
memory, Stiles eyes open to meet the ebony pools that penetrate the mirror in
his bathroom. Jackson stops coming to pack meetings. His loss isn’t so much an
impact though. He never was very involved in the first place.
Lydia glares with an even flame. She neither sparks nor gutters.
Scott quickly becomes just as distant. Morris had belittled Scott so well and
so quickly before. It was so easy to minimize Scott before everyone else. There
were easy critiques and sarcastically condescending remarks. Stiles cries.
Scott still attends meetings out of duty, but he doesn’t speak to Stiles and he
doesn’t smile or chuckle or show any response to him when there is an
opportunity for interaction. Allison went with him.
Lydia glowers darkly. There is no heat. Her hair becomes less maintained.
Then goes Isaac. He was so resistant to Morris’ destruction. The boy, so
innocent underneath a bravado to match anyone else’s, was devastated in turn.
He wanted to believe so fiercely in goodness, but what goodness existed in the
heart of a demon? When Stiles begins to cry, Morris lets loose a terrible,
crippling pain to Stiles’ psyche. The world is consumed with red lightning and
sharp, cold cuts to his mind. There is no escape, but Stiles weeps anyway for
the golden-curled boy who only sought acceptance and love. A family.
Lydia has nothing. She is empty.
Then Derek, who plays witness to each of these ruined relationships and becomes
weaker himself. Morris saves the best for him, when only the two are alone. It
isn’t often, but by the time everyone hates him, Stiles is left with more time
alone with Derek. Each instance is mockery and shame. Stiles can’t bring
himself to cry this time. He is spent and weak and Morris turns then to flay
Stiles with all of the reasons why this is necessary, tormenting him with the
absence of Derek’s love.
“You’re alone.” He says.
“I know.” They say.
Stiles and Derek, infuriatingly written in stone and leaf and star and moon and
sun and breath.
They are twined around the roots of some cosmic tree and forever locked in a
spiral. Heavenward or otherwise is unknown to all but God.
And this time, Lydia smiles.
After a month, Stiles never goes back to the Hale house.
---
“It’s not true!” Lydia screams. She picks up a charred piece of pottery and
throws it at the wall next to Derek’s head. It shatters and reveals its blue
painted china underneath as the soot and ash is shocked from its surface. Who
owned it before it became mosaic? Derek whips around and his eyes flash red.
His lips are a tight line and he growls a warning in his gut. Lydia is
unaffected.
“He told me never to speak to him again! I told you the truth! You can’t just
deny it and make it untrue. What was said was said. FACT!” yells Derek back. He
takes a few steps to crowd Lydia into the wall behind her.
“Don’t you dare-” She says, pushing against Derek’s chest until he’s against
the wall behind him and she is pinning him in, “use your patriarchic, archaic,
physical, misogynistic actions to exert your masculine privilege and will over
me. You will respect me as your EQUAL. Don’t you dare ever try to think that
because you’re an alpha wolf means you’re above a female human. I will end you
in the most precise demise you cannot imagine. I will tear you down to the dirt
you’ll be in forever!” Derek’s features shifted to his human state, stunned and
battered. He supposed that after Peter, Lydia would be sensitive to anything
similar. Hell, any woman should be. Was he really perpetuating rape culture?
Yes. He was.
Not acceptable.
“I’m sorry.”
“I was speaking. ” She kept him trapped against the wall. Derek shifted
uncomfortably, unused to being dominated so efficiently by a woman. It was
healthy. “Anyway, it isn’t true. Look at what he did! Stiles eliminated every
single person. He didn’t bother with me because I kept my distance after
Jackson to observe. It was predictable, but algorithmic. He did it all in
order. Jackson wasn’t friends already, Scott was losing his friendship, Isaac
didn’t want to believe that Stiles was being an asshole. Then you, and you were
a whole different animal. No pun intended. He got rid of you so fast compared
to the others. Even faster than Jackson!”
“But why would he do that?” Derek was pleading now. He couldn’t fathom why
Stiles would act so cruelly so that he could eat lunch alone and have no
friends. Why would he make everyone he had mothered for so long hate him? Derek
was just thinking of him as his first friend.
“Because he’s trying to protect us! The alphas have been quiet too long. He
knows we’ll find them and we’ll kill them or make them leave and he’s the weak
spot. I’m immune and secondary. Stiles is practically your sidekick. He knows
everything and he’s the best at research. His humanity is a liability and he
doesn’t want the bite. He’s saving you the trouble of looking after him. If you
don’t care about him, then when they’re looking for the weak link to threaten
us, Stiles won’t be it and you won’t kill yourself trying to save him.”
“He’s just saving himself then.” Derek turned away from Lydia’s gaze. Her eyes
narrowed and pierced him a little too deeply. He was already uncomfortable
enough.
“Hardly! It’s because he gave up on YOU! He’s had a crush on you the moment you
stepped into the picture. I used to be every fantasy that boy had since
puberty. Maybe since before. Then Peter pulled Scott into this garbage and
Stiles followed and he got wrapped up in you. I’m not his fantasy anymore. You
are! And you care about him too! You too have been eye-fucking for months. So
quit it. Just. Stop.” She punctuated the last bit with a few prods of a
perfectly French-manicured finger. She stepped back to survey the results.
Derek still wasn’t looking at her. In fact he just wasn’t looking at anything.
His eyes were closed tightly and he was holding his breath. He sighed overly
dramatically and slumped to the floor.
“I don’t like him.”
“You’re right.”
“What?”
“It’s not love, but it’s a hell of a lot more than just liking him. Get your
ass of that floor and do something about it. Stop being such a dick.” Lydia
spun and headed toward the door and paused at the threshold, turning back to
Derek who was still slumped by the wall. “And clean up this pigsty.” And she
left.
---
Morris undresses and climbs into bed in his boxers. If it weren’t for being a
demon, he would be having a headache. He crosses his room to the bed and climbs
in.
Care to have a little fun tonight?
Morris. I’m angry at you and I don’t feel like skinning bunnies.
I was talking about jacking off.
I wouldn’t feel it. Stop being an asshole.
I’m sorry, okay? And I was gonna let you drive. I don’t get anything out of
jacking off really. Why do you think we haven’t been? I’m not a prude, Stiles.
Oh.
Don’t try anything funny though. I mean, It’s a contract and I can stop you any
time I want.
Yeah. Ok.
It wasn’t that Stiles actually wanted to masturbate, thought that’s an awesome
bonus. It was more that he would be able to feel things for a second and it
would be great to be in control again. Even if it’s just for some self-love.
It wasn’t actually that Morris was being compassionate to Stiles. Morris knew
Derek was watching the house. No one had watched the house in a while. Since he
last went to a pack meeting. It was odd that Derek was watching, but jacking
off might scare him off and Stiles shouldn’t be the wiser for it.
Morris shifted inside of Stiles and like a breath after being held underwater,
Stiles came to the surface. He breathed in sharply and touched his arms, moving
his hands over his bare torso. Just touching, Just amazing feeling.
He settled into his sheets a bit more and moved his fingertips under his
waistband, teasing at the trail of hair that lead down to his hardening cock.
Stiles was always sort of horny and this was no different, except maybe that it
was the first time in too long and it felt amazing.
His whole body was electric as he slid the cotton down to his ankles and off
one leg. Fully hard, he wrapped one hand of long fingers around his cock and
slowly dragged up to the head, moaning quietly at the ecstatic feeling. It was
so much in such a slow, soft move, but it was phenomenal. He moved his other
hand down to his balls, rolling them between his fingers, pulling a bit as the
dragged the other hand down his cock.
He squeezed tighter, moaned louder and moved more desperately, getting
impossibly harder, until he started to leak precum. He swiped his fingers
across the tip of his wet cock and lubed his dick between his fingers and his
palm, gliding over the soft skin, worrying his balls and raising his hips as he
imagined Derkek’s cool lips turn into hot tongue, laving at his cock. Stiles
breath hitched at the thought of dark stubble pricking the skin between the
base of his cock and his inner thigh as Derek sucked a sweet bruise into his
delicate skin.
Savage red eyes connecting with his own earthy brown ones, invigorating him as
Derek slid his mouth completely over Stiles’ cock and began to swallow him into
his throat. Derek never looked away from him as his spit dribbled out the side
of his mouth and he licked at it before it met the base of his cock. Derek was
sloppy and hungry and sexy. It was delicious in every way.
Except it wasn’t real of course. But then, Stiles was a virgin and it was just
a given.
“Derek!” he cried out suddenly, enveloped in the fantasy. Derek had
deepthroated him and it was too much to bear in that instant. Thick short
streams of cum arced in the air and landed on Stiles’ stomach, cooling quickly
under the ceiling fan. He breathed heavily and reached over to the box of
tissues on the nightstand. After Stiles was cleaned up, he felt his arms
slacken and he was pushed back into the back of his own body.
It felt like shit. All the elation he had just built up vanished instantly.
This was probably the cruelest thing Morris had done yet.
I know it feels worse. I’ll let you drive once in a while. Sorry. A contract is
a contract. And I’m a demon.
Yeah…. Yeah.
Stiles whispered the second dejectedly, sad and diminished again.
Morris noted the wolf was long gone.
---
Derek tore through the suburban streets until he hit the treeline, where he
exploded into his wolf form, unable to keep himself at bay any longer. His
emotions were at an all-time high. He was conflicted and screaming internally.
He hoped to stave off this energy with running, but it was becoming
frighteningly difficult to concentrate. His blood pumped and his vision
reddened and he lost himself, howling a song of woe and diving into the thrush
and the oaks before him. Too much. All of it.
But then, as he started to calm down and as he approached the edge of the Hale
house, he smelled them. The alphas. They had been near recently. He slowed and
quietly padded through the forest the rest of the way to his home.
There, one his door was the alpha pack mark above a spiral for revenge.  They
were coming to exact a price for Deucalion’s end, and Derek was too unfairly
pay for it.
---
A month passed since Derek had found the mark.  A month since he heard and
smelled and just barely stopped himself from seeing Stiles touch himself to the
thought of Derek. It was mid-January now. Christmas had gone by unmarked again.
Derek was alone. Stiles was right.
But Stiles wanted Derek?
Derek didn’t understand boys.
They were all at a pack meeting, minus Stiles. They had only started coming
back together at the Hale house with the promise of Stiles being absent. This
was the first one Jackson had attended.
And despite all of their efforts, the whereabouts of the alphas still eluded
all of them. Nobody could figure out where they were hiding, holed up away from
the pack finding them. Lydia was brilliant. Scarily so, but she didn’t have the
knack Stiles had for these sorts of things. She wasn’t confused, she simply
didn’t have Stiles’ ability. The alphas were definitely not staying in one
space, but every pattern Lydia saw was anticipated by the alphas and they
changed course. The area was too large to sweep effectively or close in to a
centerpoint. The going was rough.
They needed Stiles and Lydia was the only one that would admit it.
“He left us. We didn’t abandon him!” Scott argued exasperated. He wanted so
desperately to forgive Stiles, but even after months, the pain of what he had
said to Scott was still razors in his veins. Right to the heart.
“We need him. You can forgive him in your own time, but the Pack needs him
before we get ambushed and fucked. I’m not about to deal with that. All I have
is wolfsbane nail polish, lipstick and pepperspray. That’s no good if they pick
me off the street. We need to go in first. They tried to kill us before when
they had that Deucalion guy. It’s just the girl and the twins now. They’re
weaker and outnumbered.” Lydia reasoned calmly. She hadn’t spoken about Stiles
at all since she had yelled at Derek. “Fine. If none of you are willing, I’ll
speak to him myself. Fuck you all.”
Derek had the decency to look ashamed.
---
“Coming!” Morris swung open the door to reveal Lydia. He feigned surprise at
seeing her. Humans were supposed to look surprised in situations like these. He
frowned. “What do you want?” It almost came out as a statement rather than a
sentence.
“I need your help. The pack needs you. They don’t want to admit and I was the
only one with my head out of my ass. So you better fucking help us, because I’m
done with their moping. Especially Derek’s.”
“Derek’s?”
“Yes. Are you going to invite me in?” Lydia wasn’t going to give Morris
anything about that. He hadn’t felt Derek near the house since he let Stiles
have a go at himself, so it was weird to hear about him. He thought that was
done for. Derek shouldn’t like Stiles and Stiles should have ruined their
budding relationship already. It wasn’t going right.
“Sure.” He left the door open and walked to the kitchen, pouring a glass of
milk. Lydia pulled out a topographical map with scads of pen marks all over it
and threw it on the table.
“Let’s play ‘Find the Alphas.’ I’m done. Your turn.” Morris gulped down the
milk and glanced at the map. Despite the clutter, it was all very neat and
color-coded, just packed in tightly and dense with information – dates, times,
weather, moon phases, everything possibly important. There were arrows and
circles and x’s everywhere.
And it only took a second for Morris to see what they were doing.
“I know where they were.”
“Oh fuck you.” She didn’t look like she disbelieved him. She just looked like
she couldn’t figure out it all.
“They’re not running around leaving clues and patterns. They’re avoiding rainy
days.”
“So?”
“So rain washes things away. They’re fucking with you. They start patterns and
then they break them. They know you’re a math wiz, so they’re toying with
that.”
“And how does that have to do with rain?”
“Because if there’s rain to wash things away, then they can’t use whatever it
is they’re using to cover up their scent. They’re being careful.”
“Great! Let’s go!” Stiles laughed as Lydia scooped the map up and stuffed it
into her purse. She glared at him.
“I’m not going over there.” She sauntered over to Stiles and reached up to his
face, stroking it until her nails cover his neck. She grabbed his trachea and
dug in sharply.
“If you don’t go deal with that house of fucking wolves, I won’t rip your
throat out with my teeth, I’ll do it with claws and then I’ll dance in your
blood.”
Since when was Lydia taking lessons in threats from a demon? Morris didn’t
know, and he knew she was all human, but it was impressive. He swatted her hand
away and grimaced.
“Fine. Let me grab a hoodie.”
---
Climbing the steps, Stiles felt out of place. He felt so alien, walking into
this house again. Morris plowed on without care. Everyone was glaring at him as
he stepped into the room the pack was gathered in. It looked cleaner.
“Hey.” They all frowned. The welcome committee must have died.
“Stiles knows where they are.” On the way to the house, he had explained how he
somehow came across a cabin in the preserve, hidden in a far copse that the
werewolves must still be operating from. Of course, if the alphas weren’t
playing nice, Morris was obligated to set them straight and this time the
result would be blood. That bitch Kali would be dry by the end of this.
“We don’t need him. You already know. You wouldn’t have dragged him here
otherwise.” Ouch Scott.
“I wouldn’t tell you, just to make a fucking point. And plus, I don’t actually
know. Stiles has to take us because he only found it by accident. We have to
retrace his footsteps.” It was a lie on Morris’ part, but that way we could
pick up the trail the werewolves left behind, voodoo track covering regardless.
Morris was a demon after all.
“We’re going in two days and Stiles is coming. That’s that.” Derek’s voice came
down like a gavel in a courtroom. Done. Finished. Finito. No one protested.
“Good. Let’s go Jackson.”
“Wait! How am I supposed to get home?” asked Stiles as Lydia spun around and
headed to the front door in a carefree stride. She whipped back around, curls
bouncing perfectly and smiled a saccharine grin.
“Derek will take you home, won’t you, Derek?” Her smile twisted a bit. It was
darker now as she turned to Derek.
“Sure.” And that was that.
Stiles was fucked.
Chapter End Notes
     Hey Guys! Hope you liked a little dark!Lydia. I think she's fun. ;)
     anyway, sorry for disappearing. I overestimated the time I would have
     flying home for my brother's wedding. I made this chapter longer to
     make up for it though! I hope? anyway, I should be back to updating
     on fridays and sundays (and saturdays if I have time). I'm working on
     an ad hoc major proposal right now though, so my time is a little bit
     consumed. wish me luck on that!!!! as always, find me on tumblr as
     Foolproofpoem.
***** Chapter 7 *****
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
The ride home was awkward to say the very least. Both Stiles were on the same
pissy page. Stiles was frowning grumpily in his seat while Derek drove. His
face was focused on the road, but he didn’t seem angry. Stiles had no idea what
was going on in his head, but then, he often never did.
“I don’t want you hurt again.”
“I can take care of myself asshole. And you need me. You can’t scent them
obviously, otherwise they’d be dead or gone already.” Stiles smirked. Derek had
frowned even harder, his eyebrows smushing together into a mountainous
unattractive unibrow.
“You… break too easily.”
“I’m capable, thank you very much. Don’t condescend to me.” Derek glared at the
road outside even more if it was possible. He didn’t know what to do with
Stiles. He kept trying to insert himself into the drama of pack life and he
kept getting hurt. It was a ridiculous and futile process to try and extract
him from the action. He would slip in uninvited somehow and worse this time was
that he HAD to be included.
They continued to perpetuate the silence that had fallen after their brief
spat. Stiles was fuming silently, pressed up against the passenger side door as
far away from Derek as possible in such a cramped space. Derek seemed to be
trying to expand. It was as if his arm edged further over the lip of the
armrest into Stiles’ space. It was aggravating. All he wanted was to get out of
the car as soon as possible so he could prepare something for when they met the
Alphas. Morris had no idea what he was really planning on doing, probably just
repurposing the blade he had used on Kali.
“Um… We should stop by that nursery in town that has wolfsbane to get you some
clippings. They don’t have any cameras, so we can just sneak in there quickly.”
“I have some already. I went by the other day.” A lie and a truth, but Morris
wasn’t letting his heart give it away. Yeah he’d been by, but he didn’t have
any extra flowers or leaves. He didn’t really need any when it came down to it.
He had all the powers of his demonic prowess at his dispoal. Poor little pups
were nothing in the face of angry hellspawn. But Derek had unnecessarily
offered to get Stiles more protection.
It earned him a side-eye and a twitch in his jaw.
“Oh. Ok. What are you doing with them?”
“Making pepperspray and cologne. I don’t know yet.”
“Those ideas sound… Good.” Derek had turned to face him, surveying the boy in
his passenger seat. When had Derek really noticed Stiles? It seemed so recent
and new. If Lydia hadn’t… Would he…?
---
“Derek! Get your ass together!” A few days ago, Lydia had stormed into the Hale
house with fire in her breath and electricity in her red mane. Her stilettos
clicked on the wooden floor as she crossed the living room where they planned
everything. Derek, scowling, was still frustratedly glaring at the topographic
map of the Beacon Hills Preserve that lay before him.
“What do you need Lydia?” he deadpanned. He wasn’t really in the mood for
whatever hair-brained lecture Lydia had rolling around in her head.
“I need you to save Stiles. Duh.” If Derek were an actual wolf at the time, his
ears would have flipped up and turned toward Lydia. He looked up from the map,
jaw a little slack before he realized it and snapped together.
“What?”
“He’s been such an asshole lately and it’s because of you!” She pointed an
accusing, ring-adorned finger at the man as she stalked forward, swatting the
map off the table. It rolled into a wide-mouthed tube as it fell under the
table and toward the back wall. Derek groaned at it. Now it’d be all sooty.
“What? What did I do? He yelled at me! He broke my finger!”
“Because he likes you!” No. Hell. No. Was Lydia really trying to insinuate the
old sandbox ‘He hates you because he loves you’ bullshit? That’s what it was –
bullshit. Derek squinted at her, trying to see if she was swaying like she was
drugged up somehow. She wasn’t. She was iron and steel and fire and he
definitely didn’t smell anything besides her wolfsbane nail polish and lip
gloss. It was absurd. So absurd really, that he burst out a loud “HA!” before
her glare silenced him.
“No! I mean, that doesn’t make sense.”
“Or it makes complete sense. He likes you too much and you’re an asshole and
you never ever show your feelings. He has been systematically removing everyone
from his life. And he started with you. You were the easiest to get rid of.
God, you’re so bitter! All you care about is your own whiny story. Other people
are fucked up too, Derek. You know Stiles has lost people. He removed himself
so he wouldn’t have to deal with it and so everyone else could be happy without
him in the way, but we need him. I’m going over and I’m getting him for the
pack meeting and you aren’t going to be an asshole. Just look at him and tell
me you don’t care.”
He promptly told her to get out. She sashayed like a queen .
---
Derek supposed it was about then that he noticed Stiles. It was like that
gnawing feeling you were forgetting something for days and then suddenly you
remembered, or when you were reading a book and skipped a sentence that wasn’t
important but you knew you skipped it so you desperately had to scour the page
before to find it again. It was relief. Somehow he had suppressed his desire to
look hard at Stiles, to memorize the channel from his hips to his waistband,
the gingersnap-brown eyes that glared at him, that tongue that slipped out to
moisten his lips. Stiles was… something else.
“Derek!” He was just staring. And now he’d been caught.
“What?”
“Nothing. I just said thanks. And you missed the turn. You sort of zoned out
for a bit.” Stiles was both trying to glare at him and appraise him with a
critical glance. He turned away back to the road, unsure what to think.
The drive continued without words until they pulled up near Stiles’ house,
though not right in front in case the Sherriff was keeping an eye out. Stiles
hadn’t left a note for him. He’d just left with Lydia. He could just say he
went walking for a while. He moved to clamber out of the vehicle but Derek
slipped his hand up Stiles’ upper arm and onto his shoulder, squeezing almost
imperceptibly before dropping off and into his lap as Stiles turned a
questioning glance his way.
“Um, be careful?” Derek said, though it sounded more like a question. Stiles
rolled his eyes and huffed.
“You too I guess.” Stiles replied stiltedly before turning back to the house up
the street and shutting the car door. He walked self-consciously as Derek’s
lowbeams seemed to bore into him, the light feeling like a spotlight.
Ghastly.
He got upstairs to his bedroom without incident and Morris fell into the bed
exhausted. He knew Derek was watching from the roof of the neighbor’s house.
Why.
---
A couple days passed and finally it was the day to hunt down the remaining
alphas. Morris couldn’t lie, he was excited. He had spent their free time re-
tarnishing the blade so that it was at full strength. Some of Kali’s blood had
wiped away the wolfsbane from the blade so he needed to replenish it. He had
also gone to the nursery during the day and legitimately bought a couple of
wolfsbane plants which were now growing on his sill. It was a small insurance
no one would come through his window. Or at least it would make them hesitate a
bit.
He harvested a few flowers when he purchased it and dried them in a cool oven
before pulverizing them into a powder. He wasn’t sure what he’d do with the
bulk of it yet. It was just sitting in a small pouch on his desk, mixed with
some mountain ash, ready to be tied onto a beltloop. Some though, he packed
into a quik-dissolve gel pill. That the very least if he needed to, he could
stuff it down an alpha’s throat and let it wreak havoc on their digestive
system.
After a while of scrolling through tumblr, getting no new ideas, Morris loaded
the pouch and slipped the blade into a hunting knife holster he’d found in his
father’s old outdoors-stuff-and-things trunk. It didn’t really fit, but it
stayed secure and that was all that really mattered.
At the honk from outside, Morris leapt down his steps and bolted out the door.
He had already written a note saying he was staying at Scott’s for the night in
case he wasn’t back before the Sherriff was due home at 5 in the morning. He’d
been working so much lately, but Morris was thankful. It kept him out of the
way of his business.
He was greeted with Derek’s Camaro oddly. It unnerved him to be honest. Peeved
him too. He hadn’t sensed Derek nearby for the entire weekend, but it was weird
to see him catering to Stiles again. He was being attentive and that was
freaky. Hadn’t he successfully pushed him away?
“I’m gonna drive myself. I don’t need you to take me.” It was stupid. The less
cars they had rumbling up to the edge of the Preserve, the better. But really,
he just didn’t want to be stuck in another awkward car ride with the werewolf.
“Just get in Stiles.” He groaned at his inability to counter Derek opened up
the door to slip into the seat as Derek rolled the window back up.
“Fine, but don’t talk to me. You’re so fucking annoying.”
Derek smiled. He actually smiled. Morris was freaking out internally. Why was
Derek smiling? Hadn’t he just insulted him directly? Derek didn’t take insults.
Even a shady glance would earn you a growl and poopy look. Derek was the King
of poopy looks.
They drove to the starting point Stiles had described to Lydia where they were
supposed to rendezvous with the others.
Stiles quickly slithered out of the car and stalked toward the others.
“Kay. Let’s get this show on the road!” Stiles proclaimed, clapping his hands
and rubbing them together. They all turned ad trudged through the forest,
following Stiles. As he ventured, wandered really since he was just trying to
pick up a trail any of the werewolves might have left behind, he stepped over a
line of wolfsbane. It was too late as his foot connected with the leaves and
twigs that covered the forest floor. A spiral of red fluorescence lit up ahead
of them as a line shot from the center straight out into the woods somewhere.
“Shit!” cursed Morris as whooping howls rent the air. Kali had been clever
enough to curse the ground around these parts in case he came back. Before too
long, before they could strategize much beyond Scott’s clever “Split up!” three
shifted werewolves burst into the foray from different directions. One of them
– Kali actually- had come from the canopy above, leaping down in front of
Scott. A spike of fear shot through all of them, but it was quickly eliminated
by the fury of battle and surprise.
Morris had unclipped the knife from its holster and loosened the cinch on pouch
of powder he had at his side. Out of the corner of his eye, Stiles saw a flash
of red – one of the alphas- coming toward him. He threw out the powder with one
hand, willing it to fly in a sparkling stream to the alpha’s nostrils. He
barked wildly, stopping suddenly and tossing his muzzle back and forth,
sneezing and trying desperately to get rid of the poison. He was starting to
bleed from his snout, the mountain ash and the wolfsbane dissolving the flesh
in side of his nasal passages and his throat. He turned suddenly, angered and
determined to flay Stiles alive with his claws and brilliant teeth. However, in
the time he was shaking, he had missed Morris running by his side, stabbing the
point of the knife into his flank behind the should blade and with a twist,
running the vicious metal across his whole side. His determination faded with a
crying yelp as he twisted into a heap of spasms. His tongue stretched out to
the side, lolling helplessly as his eyes blinked a few times and rolled up to
reveal black undersides. Not black like he was a demon, but as if the powder
had started to consume him relentlessly. He was bleeding tar profusely. He was
as good as dead.
Stiles left it to die, turning toward the rest of the fray. Everyone was
consumed in battle, though he lost track of Jackson and the other male Alpha.
Just as he was going to throw his knife across the clearing into Kali’s spine,
as she was only shifted in her beta form, the clack of claws on bones exploded
in his ears. Claws on his ribs that is. The pain was bright and numb. Funny
that such incredible destruction would breed a lack of feeling. The swipe had
come up from his waist, through the pouch on his right side up to his armpit
and he fell feebly to the ground. Leaves crunched beneath him, some sticking
already to his tattered skin. Morris could power through it, healing even, but
the process would ensure that Stiles would die as soon as he left the body.
Demonic healing was a lie, like anything else, just a façade and an illusion.
Morris concentrated on keeping his healing under control to protect the terms
of the deal – and Stiles- but quickly he was losing consciousness, weakened and
unable to keep everything together. Something had to give and the deal made
sure it was his wakened state. Struggling to keep his eyes open, he saw Jackson
bolt from behind a tree to attack the alpha from behind as it prepared to snap
Stiles’ neck. Morris saw the alpha take notice of the attack though and try to
turn. With an outstretched hand, Morris pushed the wolf backwards and onto its
hind legs. It whimpered in fearfully shocked amazement as it lost control of
its own limbs, only to have Jackson’s claws enter its back at the neck and tear
through its back. Jackson came away with blood and fur covered hands as he
lifted one clawed hand back up and decapitated the wolf while ripping through
the vital organs from the front with his other hand.
Nothing would heal from that.
In the next instant he heard Kali’s scream and saw derek’s human features
before him, scared and concerned, whispering something. The words sounded
distant and nonsensical. He never heard the death moan of the other alpha, but
there was little it could have done to save itself.
Then together, Morris and Stiles retired to the bliss that was unconsciousness.
For the first time in hundreds of years, Morris dreamt. There was blood and
there was terror, but in all of it there stood Stiles and Derek with black and
red wings. Black wings covered in blood, dripping onto the clouds around heaven
as they opened the gates for Morris to step through.
“It was enough,” Stiles said, “to love.”
Chapter End Notes
     Hey guys! i'm sorry I didn't get two chapters out last week! I had a
     very drama-filled day on Sunday and it was just not something I could
     manage to do. Hopefully this weekend will not be like that. I should
     be able to get out another chapter! :D Anyway, this is the conclusion
     of arc 1 of this story! WHOOOOO!!!! So yay! all fun and games! As
     always, you can find me on Tumblr as Foolproofpoem. Leave a comment!
     I really enjoy hearing from you guys and hearing what you liked/
     didn't like! I always reply!
***** Chapter 8 *****
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
Morris and Stiles wake up again briefly to notice they’d been moved to a gurney
and were rolling through the hospital. Stiles tried to move his arm, moan in
pain, wiggle his fingers, and he managed all of them with great surprise.
I have to let the wound heal naturally so the contract isn’t void.
Does that mean you’re weaker?
For the time being. It’s uncomfortable. Try not to make it too obvious that
you’re possessed.
It hurts so much.
No shit, Stiles, your whole side is ripped up and you have a couple of cracked
ribs. I’m only just keeping the blood in you. You’d be soup if I weren’t here.
Thanks, I guess.
You guess.
Stiles could only see the bright foggy lights and feel his throat vibrate with
his moans. So much pain. Was he crying? Slowly, tendrils of sound started to
wiggle their way into Stiles’ consciousness.
“Stiles!” His head jerked violently and he caught Derek’s eyes with his – red
and puffy. Not red like an angry alpha, just worried and watery. His neck was
screaming at him and he grabbed his thigh in pain as his side throbbed so
painfully that he fell back into darkness.
---
The fields again. Soft countryside and plain houses. Clapboards on the windows
to shut out the hot sun and the moonlight at night. There were birds tittering
in the branches of a large crabapple tree above. Spring. The fluffy fuchsia
blooms were open and full. It seemed like the birds were playing tag in their
lofts, high and distant from the ground below them.
Their laughs mocked him. His body was not his own. For weeks, Morris was only
an empty case, a puppet, a glove on the hand that moved him. The demon had
offered no name. He called Morris “Sweetie” and “Boy” and “Faggot.” By now,
Morris wouldn’t have responded to his own name even if it was his mother
calling to him for supper.
Not that he had many suppers to go to nowadays. The demon inside him pushed
everyone away from him, turned cruel inside and grated his soul against Morris’
so that every movement felt like rasps against his skin, even though he
couldn’t actually feel his skin. At night, the demon sent images of death and
destruction and blood into his consciousness. Each moment was filled with small
children eating their parents, little five year-old fingers clawing away skin
to get to juicy flesh underneath. Cannibals and monsters, their ears stretched
to points and their faces wrinkled, contorted into nasty ridges. They were some
kind of horror with no name, but they began as human.
Morris couldn’t shut his eyes to it – to each squelch of an eyeball between
dull molars, each living scream as the babe they birthed began to tunnel back
through their abdomen with an intent to consume their bodies. It was disgusting
and horrible. What sort of evil in this world possessed him? Even if the demon
were to be exorcised, would his mind be the same?
With each day growing crueler and gaunter in its prospects, it was no wonder
the town started to take notice of the Morris kid. He was almost a man, not
able to enlist, no, but still able to support the men that would be leaving.
Henry was leaving.
Henry was everything wonderful that was in Morris’ world. Even as the demon
shrouded his world in agony, Henry was a luminary. It was his eyes – blue,
bright, cleverly dancing everywhere. He wasn’t the type to play about, but
everything he did was with a carefree ease. Labor was nothing in his company
and resting under the shade of the oaks with him was the most pleasure Morris
had ever had.
The birds were laughing at him surely.
There were days when Henry’s eyes glanced over at Morris and they lingered for
the briefest moment. Like a breath – quivering, excited, nervous. Morris’ chest
always stopped for an instant. It was the hope that was feeding him. What did
Henry think of him? Did Henry lie awake at night ask himself what Morris was
doing at that moment? Did Henry want to kiss him like Morris did?
It happened then one day. Henry was alone and the demon thought it time to play
with his heart.
But his eyes! Don’t you love their quaint twinkle?!
They do not twinkle. And I don’t like his eyes.
Oh Morris, you DO love lying to yourself, don’t you?
Please stop this.
No, no. Morris, this is my playtime, Henry my plaything, and you my precious
audience.
The demon sauntered Morris’ body over to Henry, secluded in the hay barn. Henry
was there, pitching the loose straw into piles to be baled later on. His sweat
glinted in the streaks of light that came from the gaps in the wooden slats
that made the walls. His face was flushed, his beard trimmed neatly despite his
labored appearance. Taut muscles contracted when he lifted the fork with piles
of hay. His shirt was dirtied and unbuttoned, his trousers and suspenders
loosened.
To say that any woman – or even man – would be flustered in Henry’s presence
would be stating the obvious. The demon snuck behind Henry, giggling tritely,
making the whole thing a joke as he launched at Henry from behind, wrapping his
arms around Henry’s middle and flinging them both together into the haystack to
the side.
Henry laughed. The birds laughed. Morris laughed. To outsiders, it was just
friends rollicking and fooling around. Morris knew better. This was the final
barrier Morris had before he broke completely. It had been months since he was
possessed. The deal was kept: no one had been enlisted. The King’s man simply
stayed over in the town and left on. The town was relieved, and then they saw
how Morris acted and became suspicious of him.
“Coop! What a change! Yesterday you were all doom and gloom!”
“Still am!” the demon chirped, “Just feeling better today. Being with you!”
“With me? I’m worried about you, but I’m glad you’re feeling better.” Morris’
arms were still tight around Henry who hadn’t made any effort to change
position. The demon shifted Morris’ body around so that Henry was beneath him,
his head between Morris’ hands on the haystack, his waist straddled by Morris’
thighs.
“Yes, you,” Morris’ right hand moved to cup Henry’s cheek, the pad of his thumb
stroking against his beard there. Henry’s eyes changed – darker and more
intense, unquestioning, “Henry…”
And then suddenly Henry’s lips were on Morris’, crashing violently into him.
The hand that had been on his cheek was now sliding onto his chest, gripping
the muscles underneath savagely, hungrily. The demon could almost taste the
meat of him there.
Please, stop!
Manic laughter in his head. No mercy, no stopping.
As Henry’s beard scratched against Morris’ mouth, hungrily devouring each
other’s tongues, Morris’ hand crept further down until he cupped Henry’s
growing erection.
My, this boy is stiff! He DOES want to fuck you, doesn’t he? You were right
about this one, Sweetie.
Please! Stop it! This isn’t right!
“I want you to fuck me, Henry. I want this,” he squeezed, “inside of me. I need
you in me.”
“Coop! Yes!” Henry growled out the last word, flipping them over and unclasping
his waistband and drawing out his cock, before the demon swatted his hand away
to get a grasp on the hot flesh. Henry groaned and Morris cried.
No! Don’t do this! Stop it! Please!
Morris’ hands flew to his own trousers, yanking them down to his knees before
Henry pulled them off completely, and settled his cock on Morris’ ass, rubbing
against him, just rutting and moaning. The demon was laughing in his head.
What a little faggot! Just like yourself, Sweetie!
Stop it! For the love of God, please stop!
God doesn’t listen to faggots, Morris.
The demon flipped them again, so that Henry was on his back, and Morris was
pantsless, grinding himself against Henry beneath wantonly, kneading Henry’s
muscled chest, tangling his fingers in the light curls of chest hair.
Suddenly there was a dull thud, like someone falling over and Morris’ and
Henry’s heads whipped to the doors of the barn. There, standing with eyes wide
was Henry’s fiancé, Maria. Her basket of radishes had fallen from her hands and
rolled in every direction, the same as the thoughts that now rolled across
Henry’s eyes.
They settled on outrage.
“Get off of me, Demon!” Henry clasped his pants as feigned struggling to get
out from under Morris, tucking his hard cock back into his hands, before
reaching up and throwing Morris off of him. “Maria, fetch the Reverend! Cooper
is possessed!”
Oh God!
God doesn’t listen to faggots, Morris.
“Maria, Maria! MARIA!” Morris sang, stripping off his shirt, so that he was
completely naked. “Join us if you want to, Maria!” Transfixed, she could only
stare in horror as the demon revealed himself so expertly to Henry and Maria.
“Fuck me once Henry! Fuck me twice Maria! FUCK JESUS TOO!”
STOP! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?
Playing into their expectations of demons, Morris. I told you I’d rip off your
skin one day.
But I have ten years!
Now, who said that? You’re going to burn, Cooper Morris.
The birds were certainly laughing at him now. That’s how it happened. It wasn’t
long before the reverend tried to exorcise him and failed, always
mispronouncing one line. Now, as a spring zephyr rattled down crabapple
blossoms from the trees and fluffy clouds ambled by on their azure carpet sky,
Morris, silent, was tied to mast, with logs and kindling piled around him. The
demon wouldn’t let him cry or speak. As soon as the exorcism was deemed a
failure, the Demon kept silent.
No one doubted dear Henry, and he was filled with righteous anger for the demon
inside Morris seducing him. He stood under an awning now, to the side, just
within Morris’ periphery, stoic, arms crossed. Henry’s eyes weren’t shining.
The reverend said some last prayers and gestured for a few of the council
elders to throw lit bundles of sticks onto the pyre. At first there wasn’t much
of anything, but a creeping sensation of more heat, but then it grew
exponentially. The flames grew higher, they stretched and they danced and the
licked at his skin, which blistered and popped. The smell of his own burning
skin amidst the smoke was nauseating and heady, filled with absolute
annihilation. An explosion in his gut – the demon roared out of his mouth,
shrouded by the black smoke of the pyre. Morris was free, finally! How cruel
that his final moments spent on earth would be burning, when he would spend
eternity in Hell, burning there forever.
The demon-smoke, arched down from above the flames and shot through the crowd,
who recoiled and screamed. Some women fainted. Some men too. The dogs yapped at
it, but then ran away. The heat was unbearable now, the smoke almost completely
filling his lungs. Breathing was impossible and he began to suffocate.
Suddenly, Morris felt vibrations underneath him and heard squealing and whining
from the edge of town.
All of the pigs, with shining beetle-black eyes came stampeding through the
street to the square, trampling children and adults alike in their course to
the inferno with Morris at the center. They leapt onto the pyre and rolled in
the flames, not to put themselves out, but to burn with Morris. The town was
screaming with madness. No one could do anything for the pigs that squealed and
grunted with manic glee.
One hog seemed to be unburnt, stepping up above the rest to Morris.
“I told you I’d come for your skin and bones.” Was Morris hallucinating?
No. The hog reached out with a ferocious maw and gripped Morris’ exposed,
blistered skin. It pulled off like the flaky layers of his mother’s biscuits.
Morris died screaming.
Chapter End Notes
     Hey guys! I know i disappeared for AGES. I have all the excuses in
     the book, but it was basically just a combo of school, work, and
     spring break volunteering in TN. I DIDN'T EVEN GO ON TUMBLR GUYS.
     anyway, this is a short chapter, but I should be updating on Friday.
     this was a toughie to write. haha. (also sorry i'm so mean to these
     characters! I'm a nice person, really!)
***** Chapter 9 *****
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
Morris opened his eyes to darkness. Electric blue-white light streamed through
the gaps in the blinds and lit of lines across his lap in the hospital bed. He
pressed a hand to his side, feeling the wound tenderly. Though he couldn’t just
heal the gash immediately because Stiles’ body would never heal, he could help
accelerate the natural process. Of course, doing that caused him to sleep for
so long – dreaming.
He wanted to forget.
Sometimes, when Stiles was quiet and not listening to him think, he heard the
squeals of those pigs, the betrayal of his town, his screams. He dreamed of
angels. It had taken centuries to accomplish this – to crawl out of hell and
still be able to be a coherent demon. So many others transfigured themselves
into monsters in order to dig their way up, clawing at the dirt, eating the
bones of the dead in their course, screaming their own laments. It had been
some kind of miracle that Morris had been able to cheat himself up the layers
of hell. He was a lackey, clever enough to betray a higher up when they were
about to be exorcised or killed, obedient enough to remain under the cover,
ambitious to climb up, up, up. How had he done it for so long? Well, no matter,
he’d done it at last: surmounted everything and ascended to earth, to the land
of the living to deal the deals and dole out sins. All in the name of Satan,
but also for something else.
For himself. He’d been cheated once before, by love, by demons, by the angels
he prayed to to protect him. Where was his guardian when he kissed the dead?
But he’d save one soul. One soul would be left pure even with him inside of it.
He needed consent.
And Stiles gave it to him.
Out of the side of his eye, there was the breath of movement. He turned his
head toward the body, moaning as the stretch of his skin burned and tore at his
nerves. Slumped in the hospital visitors chair was Derek. He puffy red eyes,
dried tear tracks that that lightened his skin, the miniscule crystals of salt
glistening barely in the light that fell on his cheeks. His head was cramped to
one side, and his arms were crossed over his waist. He looked like shit.
At Morris’ moan though, Derek woke up instantly, blinking away the crust from
his eyes and shaking himself into rigidity, ready for whatever was going on.
Apparently anything meant worrying over Morris, because Derek was suddenly
hovering there with his hands wanting to touch him, but knowing they’d only
cause pain.
“Stiles, Stiles!” he said excitedly.
“Yeah, I’m pretty sure I can hear you. No need to shout man, just almost died
here. How long was I out?”
“Two weeks. We thought you’d stay down for another week at least. You lost so
much blood.” Morris rolled his eyes. Amateurs.
“I am a professional. Ok, you’ve seen me. You can go now.” It took all of
Morris’ willpower to roll over without whimpering, but soon he was facing the
other side of the room and waiting with clenched eyes until Derek left. The
door opened and the door closed, but suddenly he felt a hand on his chin and
one on the wound as a calming sensation filled him with warmth.
Morris’ eyes shot open to see a grimace on Derek’s face. The veins in his arms
swelled the black of pain and Derek’s thumb swept over Morris’ cheek softly.
Someone gasped and then Derek’s chin was pressed to Morris’ head for the
briefest moment before Derek was swiftly out of the room and the door was
closing with a click that reverberated in Morris skull for the rest of the
night.
---
Utah_Gazette
BIGFOOT SIGHTING: HIGH-DEF PHOTOGRAPHS BAFFLE ZOOLOGISTS
“Maybe not a legend after all,” asserts Dr. Timothy Langerfeld, top ecologist
and zoologist of Utah State’s…
---
“I think he hates me.”
“I think he’s protecting himself and trying to protect you. That’s what Stiles
always does.”
Derek paced in Lydia’s bedroom. At first their rendezvous had been because of
Derek’s inability to cope with Stiles being in a medical coma. Now it was
because only Lydia knew about Derek’s newfound feelings for Stiles. At this
very moment, it was because with the amount of times Lydia has seen The
Notebook, she was about as close as a love guru as Derek could get.
“Just tell me how I can get him to talk to me!” he growled, finally slumping
into Lydia’s pile of oversized plush animals.
“Well why don’t you tell me how you’d… I dunno, woo him,” she said with an airy
twirl of her emery board without a glance to the exasperated werewolf. Derek
picked up Mr. Snuffles (his favorite, but dare anyone to mention it), and
started to pick at the pills of lint on his plush. He sighed, settling Mr.
Snuffles in his lap as he looked at the Cheshire moon outside. What was
romance? Especially when it was between an underage teenager and a werewolf?
Who’d fall for that gimmick of a love story?
Derek obviously. “I don’t know… read him poetry? What are some good love poems?
Shakespeare?”
Lydia actually took the time to glare at him this round. “Are you serious? Do
you want him to laugh at you or kiss you? Because it’s not gonna be both. And
for the record, all Shakespeare wrote about were penises. Well I guess that
would be fitting…” she mused, tapping the emery board to her chin, gazing
thoughtfully at the ceiling. “You know, Derek, I might just stick with the
dinner date thing, or movies. Stay safe and see how he responds. Don’t play
with him.”
Derek nodded, seemingly taking notes in his head. “Ok. Thanks.” He got up from
the pile of stuffed animals and placed Mr. Snuffles at the top, where he could
rule his subjects with his plush fist.
As he slipped a leg out of the window, Lydia spoke: “And for god’s sake, try
dressing outside of the bad boy wardrobe. Look at a tie for once in your life.”
Lydia was still Lydia.
---
Corpus_Christi_Times
CHAIN OF ANIMAL MAULINGS HEADS EASTERLY
“A frightening trend of animal attacks have been noted by authorities across
Texas. The attacks seem to be moving in a straight line toward…”
---
No one really came to visit Stiles in the hospital. It was the first week of
February he found out. It was four and a half months since he made the deal
with Morris. At this point, Stiles didn’t know how he felt about the whole
thing. It was good. It was bad. It was sort of all of the things at once.
Morris had helped him get rid of the alpha pack at no real harm to Derek and
Scott’s packs. But at the same time, those packs had abandoned him.
Except Derek. No, Derek was being weirdly attached to his bed the entire time.
It was February 4th. Ten days until Valentine’s day. Stiles was always alone.
It was the one day he didn’t fawn over Lydia. Now it was the one day he
desperately wanted to fawn over Derek and couldn’t. Morris was keeping a tight
hold of that sort of emotion. He’d worked so hard to get rid of it at the
beginning, why let it crop up again?
And he was right. Better that Derek and the rest of them stay away from him
while a demon was occupying his body than have them accidentally out him or
became too attached to this persona. Morris was still dangerous. He was still a
demon and at the core, untrustworthy.
Yes, Stiles had seen the memories flashing into his consciousness as Morris
slept, seen his story overlaid with Morris’. He’d seen himself as an angel,
bloody and pained, barring filth from heaven, but welcoming Morris. He’d seen
the workings of a demon’s mind – the inexplicable self-torture that sustained
their cruel desire for the infliction of pain across the world. He’d seen the
good and the bad and been left feeling ugly. Who was Stiles to see those most
private parts of Morris? He might have been able to see them had he asked, but
they were instead exposed to him by weakness. Morris had no say in any of that.
At least Stiles gave Morris consent to take his body. Speaking of which, this
shirt wasn’t his? This Henley was way too baggy and smelt like leather and
spicy cologne. It smelled like Derek.
---
Louisiana_Mirror
LOCAL DEER POPULATION DWINDLES, RURAL FAMILIES WORRY ABOUT REMAINING WINTER
“While most of us buy meat at the supermarket, many families in rural parishes
depend on hunting for their food. Reports have come in over-hunting and
accusations of hording…”
---
The Sherriff had of course been in to see him, grilled him, insinuated that it
was Derek’s fault plenty of times and then cried, while yelling about him being
careful. It was an animal attack of course. Didn’t you watch the news? They
were happening all the time around the country.
The Sherriff had too much work to do though. He’d spent what little vacation he
had at the beginning when Stiles was asleep. Now that he seemed to be on the
mend though, he had to go back to work. In his place, though without his
knowledge, Derek settled into a habit of occupying Stiles’ hospital chair. It
was guaranteed to be uncomfortable but Derek never showed any signs of caring
about that.
He passed the time reading different books – some supernatural, some not, some
new, some old. He tried to play cards with Morris once or twice, but quit when
Morris used a bit of demonic trickery and won every game. He played solitaire
instead. They silently browsed tumblr and refused to follow each other even if
Morris kept checking Derek’s URL to see if he EVER reblogged anything. He
didn’t.
Also, tomorrow was Valentine’s day.
---
The_Daily_Virginian
MIGRATION OF LOCAL ANIMALS WREAKS HAVOC IN SUBURBS
“For the Johnson family, living in Shady Oaks Villages was always a matter of
comfort. Recently though, their lawn has become home to herds of deer and…”
---
You’d think that after years of expectation and disappointment, Stiles would
expect that nothing would happen on the 14th. He just showed up like usual, no
words exchanged for the most part. Morris hadn’t facilitated any conversation
at all.
It was a weird experience, falling in love all over again with Derek, but
through the filter that was Morris. It made everything so difficult, so easy to
over-analyze. He had the strange position of being both the third-person
perspective and also the addressee. Every time Derek looked at Morris, it was
as if Derek was looking at both of them. He didn’t know what to expect from
Derek, except that either he’d do something with all of the tangled strings of
affections he’d wrapped Morris in – the extra time spent in his room, the
shared clothes, the closeness of their bodies that night, but instead he’d just
left them all untied and Stiles was tripping over them.
Now it was February 15th and nothing had happened. They were playing card and
Morris was cheating again. It was the usual.
---
The_Boston_Chronicler
MISSING PERSONS COUNT CONTINUES TO RISE
“Over the past weeks, officials have noticed a dramatic increase in missing
persons reports being filed to the police department. Countless amber alerts
have…”
---
“Get out.” Derek turned to Stiles. He had been writing in his journal in the
chair as Stiles napped. Or at least Derek thought he was napping. He could hear
his heartbeat now though. It was beating like a hummingbird, frantic and hard.
“What? Ok. I mean, did you need me to get you something while I’m out?”
“No!” Morris screamed, fed up finally with Derek’s antics. He grabbed the
nearest vase of flowers and lobbed it Derek, who dodged it as easily as if
someone had tried to throw a feather at him. Stiles had been moaning for days
about how Derek didn’t love him and Morris was fed up with it all. He didn’t
need the drama going on in his head.
And if Morris was honest with himself, it was also because he had been hoping
Derek would confess. That for the briefest moment, Derek would become Henry.
That someone in this godforsaken universe would love him too.
Morris and Stiles were together and they were lost.
 
Chapter End Notes
     I have had Born Whole by Doe Paoro on repeat for hourssssssss.
     Anyway, expect these sort of random updates. I took on an extra class
     and an extra job so I have very little time for writing :( I won't
     abandon you though!!!! Plus I love these boys too much! Also PSA: I
     AM DOING THE AO3 AUCTION! Check me out! I'm offering two fics to the
     top two bidders and I'm super cheap right now! So yeah, suppport AO3
     and the OTW and get fic from me!!! I'M_RIGHT_HERE
***** Chapter 10 *****
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
The Mainer
GRAVEROBBER CONTINUES MORBID DESECRATION
“More reports of exhumations and bodily desecrations fill the inboxes of
several Sherriff’s offices around…”
---
Stiles was released from the hospital a week later. His wound seemed to close
up pretty well and the pain had dulled immensely. Morris had aided in the
healing process, but not enough that when he left Stiles’ body, the wound
reappear again. If he left soon there’d be a considerable amount of pain, but
nothing that would kill Stiles. Derek continued to hover around him though. It
was beginning to feel suffocating. No amount of angry vase-throwing had
deterred the werewolf.
Tonight however, Derek wasn’t there. He’d been strangely absent today. If
Morris was being honest, he was starting to miss the (silent) brooding presence
around him. In fact, it was getting difficult to sleep without the scratch of
Derek’s pen on the rough pages of his journal and the slide of his calloused
fingers as he turned the pages, which flapped like wings as they fell over on
another.
He was beginning to think he’d peruse tumblr again or check out that online
gaming community so he could battle some mythical creatures. As he rolled
around in his covers and fidgeted with the bandage under his pyjama shirt,
Derek appeared in his window, lifting up the pane, but not stepping in. Stiles
turned to the sound to meet Derek’s eyes – soft, but flitting around the room
as if he were nervous.
“What are you doing here?” questioned Stiles. Derek looked like he was
expecting the question.
“I know you think I’ve been hovering, but I thought you’d be having trouble
getting to sleep first night back in your bed. I… did. When I moved back here.
I thought I might just read to you.” Derek shifted on the sill tweaking his
zipper between his fingers anxiously. As Stiles rolled over to look at him
better, Derek pulled out a small journal – a different one from the dark red
one he had before. This one was green and worn around the edges, more so even
than the first journal. Was it Derek’s old one? Before he filled it up and
moved to this one? Derek turned it over in his hands, looking at the back where
it was black, like it’d been burned.
Like he dug it out of the ashes of his home. Stiles wanted nothing more than to
comfort Derek, and Morris wanted nothing more than to forget the connection he
just made.
“Read to me? Really? I’m not five, Derek.” Morris glared at Derek, wishing he’d
had his dad bring one of the flower vases home so he could throw it at the
stupid alpha. Derek just sat there on the sill, looking at the journal. He
looked up at Morris and climbed into the room and sat down by the head of the
bed, his back against the mattress. His head was right next to Morris’
shoulder. He could move his hand to run through Derek’s hair if he wanted to.
He didn’t want to, he told himself.
“I know. But it does help, I think. This book was a wedding present from my
parents to each other. It was one of the few things that ended up surviving the
fire. They collected poems each of them liked that reminded them of each other
and then wrote them onto the pages. I was always jealous of Laura because her
handwriting looked like our mom’s. Mine doesn’t look anything like either of
theirs. I tried copying it for hours in New York, but I couldn’t do it. It was
the ‘g.’ I just couldn’t get my mom’s loop right. See?” He lifted the book up
to Morris’ line of sight. The bright moonlight skated across the page and
illuminated the script. The loop was thin, but held up the rest of the letter
well. It was odd to think that handwriting could say so much about a person.
Derek’s mom seemed strong, but so feminine… queenly. Derek pulled the book back
down. “Anyway, there’s a lot in here. I might just read a couple to you.”
“Love poems? For me?” Derek stiffened. His fingers hesitated as they flipped
through the pages.
“Some of them aren’t about being in love so much as loving someone as a
companion. Like being together is so important to them – without them it hurts.
Sometimes being with someone hurts just as much. Some of them are about losing
love.”
“You sound like an English nerd.” Derek laughed. He actually barked a laugh and
turned to give Morris a cheeky smirk.
“I was! I was an English major at NYU. I concentrated in American and British
poetry.” Derek turned back away from Morris, looking at his lap and the journal
that rested there. “I used to read this to myself every night when I couldn’t
sleep.”
“Well, read away then, youthful suitor.” Morris flourished his hand in the air
loftily. He let his hands collapse heavily onto the bed. If his arm seemed
closer to Derek, it was only a design of gravity.
“I’ll only read a couple. Just my favorites.” He wiggled upright a little more
and spread out the page, thumbing the handwriting of the title before he began:
I saw in Louisiana a live-oak growing,
All alone stood it, and the moss hung down from the branches;
Without any companion it grew there, uttering joyous leaves of dark green,
And its look, rude, unbending, lusty, made me think of myself;
But I wonder'd how it could utter joyous leaves, standing alone there, without
its friend, its lover near--for I knew I could not;
And broke off a twig with a certain number of leaves upon it, and twined around
it a little moss,
And brought it away--and I have placed it in sight in my room;
It is not needed to remind me as of my own dear friends,
(For I believe lately I think of little else than them)
Yet it remains to me a curious token--it makes me think of manly love;
For all that, and though the live-oak glistens there in Louisiana, solitary, in
a wide flat space,
Uttering joyous leaves all its life, without a friend, a lover, near,
I know very well I could not.
 
                                      My life is waiting just beyond the douane
                                           Maybe, while I’m waiting for valises
                                     To roll out of the rain. This story teases
                                        Unmercifully. I guess it’s in the plan.
                               Well, I’m in one piece, both feet on the ground,
                                         Intestines churning with anticipation.
                              Who’d wait for me past midnight? Are you patient?
                                         The same wet suitcases trolley around.
                                      I’ve always been stoic toward such delays
                               –lunch hour for luggage handlers, one’s bag last
                                              Inevitably. I’ve put off for days
                                        Waiting to wait. I want to get out fast
                                  And find you out there, if out there you are,
                                      Star of my long night, with a rented car.
The art of losing isn't hard to master;  
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster,

Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.

I lost my mother's watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.

- Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident
the art of losing's not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like a disaster.  
 
Much as Morris was loathe to admit it, he was sincerely touched at the gesture
Derek was making to him. He might call poetry outdated, even for an old demon
like himself, but that didn’t make any of these poems less thoughtful and less
amazing. Derek closed the journal and hummed to himself a little. No tune –
just a single note, like a contented sigh but more musical even in its solitary
tone. Morris moved his hand to the nape of Derek’s neck, stroking his thumb
along the hairline, feeling the short, soft, bristly hair.
They were silent for several minutes. Morris was starting to get tired despite
himself. He didn’t feel uncomfortable anymore in the sheets and Stiles was
quiet. While they were calmed, Morris felt an acute sadness. Derek was doing
what Morris had always wanted from Henry. Morris had tried so hard to get Derek
to leave, to protect Stiles from the same sort of torture he’d gone through
himself with the other demon. Poor Stiles was going to wake up one day, in
control of his own body and he wouldn’t know how to touch Derek, how to walk
with him, how to hold his hand if Morris allowed this to go further. If Morris
took Derek’s place, where would Stiles be?
Even for a demon, Morris had to admit it was unfair. Even now, he could feel
the presence of Stiles, swooning over Derek’s gestures, delighting in the
attention Morris was giving Derek. The whole thing was a trap and there was no
way out but to concede to Derek’s pursuit.
“Thank you Derek.” Morris said, breaking the silence first. He pulled his hand
away and closed his eyes against the werewolf’s olive skin sliding underneath
the leather jacket. He could hear Derek shifting, trying not to bump the bed as
he stood to leave. There was a pause and then the covers were being pulled up
to cover him more and a puff of warmth against the shell of his ear.
“Goodnight, Stiles. Sweet dreams.” Sweet dreams? Not now, Derek! Anguish
overtook Morris as he troubled himself with the treacherous course his life in
Stiles’ body had taken. The rough slip of the windowpane and the soft slump as
it hit the sill signaled Derek’s departure. He was so torn now, between the
beginnings of love for Derek and the beginnings of resentment. They grew in two
vines from a single seed, it seemed.
---
The week was filled during the day with begrudgingly catching up on schoolwork
Morris had missed. Lydia was bringing him all the necessary textbooks and
handouts and he had to make up almost a month’s worth of work before he got
back to school next week. Derek showed up most nights, though he missed the
full moon of course. Sometimes he’d read a poem form the journal or he’d simply
rest next to Stiles’ bed. He seemed content to just exist in Morris’ space. It
drove both Stiles and him nuts. They both wanted Derek to do something –
anything really.
Lydia was dropping off the latest haul of schoolwork and picking up what he’d
finished that day. The Sherriff was very grateful Lydia had taken on this
enterprise, but seemed worried when it wasn’t Scott doing these chores.
“So, how’s Derek doing?” Lydia picked at some post-it note tabs Morris had
stuck on the edges of his American History text, marking all the important
passages about the Civil War, despite his immense knowledge of how that war
really went down. God, he can still remember what a bunch of pricks the
Southern demons were. He looked up to the strawberry-blonde and piqued an
eyebrow.
“What do you mean?” He turned back to his calculus.
“Oh don’t play coy with me Stiles. He’s been over like, every night. Are you
guys making out yet or what?” Morris jerked back in his chair almost hard
enough to tip himself over, grabbing the edge of the kitchen table at the last
moment to steady himself.
“What?! No! He’s just hanging out! Sometimes he reads poetry to me?” She sighed
and rolled her eyes, supremely underwhelmed with the news.
“Oh God. I told him that poetry was stupid. He’s so backwards with this whole
flirting thing. I swear the next thing he’s gonna want to do is a picnic on
your roof with a bottle of rosé. He just needs to man up and ask you out on a
proper date. You know what, I need to give him a makeover too. I am SO sick of
seeing the same clothes over and over again!” She was pacing the room now,
books abandoned on the corner of the table. She was tossing her hands around in
the air, her bracelets clinking against each other, mirroring her angst, “You
know, if he can afford to drive that gas-guzzling Camaro everywhere, he can
damn well afford a new wardrobe! God and he needs to quite with the renaissance
love drama! He is SUCH a poor pick, Stiles. I liked it better when you were
always hanging off of me.”
“Are you done now? One, I like the poetry. It makes it easier to go to sleep –
no, stop that, not because it’s boring – it’s nice. Really. Two, yeah he needs
to change up his style a bit, but I don’t think he’s going to take well to you
telling him what to do. He just does what he wants, you know? Three, I need
help with this differential.” Morris hoped he’d saved Derek from the gauntlet
that was a shopping trip with Lydia, but he really doubted it.
Morris…
I know, Stiles.
“…And Lydia?”
“Yeah?” she prompted, engrossed in the Stiles’ chicken-scratch handwriting that
was his formula.
“Can you tell Scott that I miss him?”
“I’ll tell him, but I think that’s something you need to fix.” She gave him a
pointed look and Morris had to turn away, back to the pencil and graph paper
before him. Suddenly math looked much easier than before.
Thanks, Morris.
Shut up, Stiles.
---
The Toronto Voyager
ANIMAL ATTACKS WREAK METRO TORONTO
“Gruesome animal attacks abound, baffling Fish and Wildlife officials. Half
mauled, beheaded corpses litter…”
Chapter End Notes
     Hey guys! I made this a tiny bit longer to account for the poems'
     length. I didn't want to cheat you out of the story!!! Also, yes, I'm
     a HUGE poetry nerd. I actually write some and put up on my tumblr if
     you're curious (under the 'creative' link on the sidebar). In order,
     the poems are "I saw in Louisiana a Live Oak growing" by Walt Whitman
     (from his calamus poems), "Dark Night of the 747 IV" by Marilyn
     Hacker, and "One Art" by Elizabeth Bishop. Oddly, and without meaning
     to, all of these poems are about same-sex relationships. WHAT HAPPY
     PROVIDENCE. Also I may be taking a small break from this story to
     write up commissions from the AO3 auction. I'll still be writing Just
     maybe not on Inside-Out. So go check those out when I put them up!
***** Chapter 11 *****
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes
This wasn’t Scott’s house.
It was supposed to be. Morris was supposed to go over to Scott’s and sleep
over, though neither Scott knew he was expecting a guest nor did the Sherriff
know that Scott had no plans with Scott that night.
This wasn’t Scott’s house. This was release.
This was a club. Probably not a safe one either. It was too dark and there were
too many questionable men in faux leather jackets wearing sun glasses even
though it was 11 at night. The bouncer looked like he actually had to do his
job frequently. Morris reveled in it. The thump of the bassline and flash of
the lights inside signaled relief from the weeks he’d had to endure in Derek
and the pack’s safekeeping.
Just the other day when he’d had to do homework with Lydia, he’d felt so
trapped. He defended Derek when all he was supposed to do was ignore him. It
wasn’t part of the deal. It was so NOT part of the deal it was the opposite of
the deal because Morris had promised to keep everyone safe and that meant
getting rid of all of Stiles’ friends. Somehow Lydia survived. Derek was too
stubborn. Scott… Morris bent.
Stiles was getting to him.
But not tonight. Tonight Morris was going to get wasted, end up in some other
guy’s bed, and maybe he’d kill someone for fun. Whatever it was, it wasn’t
listening to poetry and sleeping soundly and wasting the night away day
dreaming (night day dreaming?) about a guy with nice stubble in a real leather
jacket.
He was in line for one of the sketchiest clubs in Beacon Hills and just fucking
happy for once that he wasn’t being hounded about his safety or werewolf drama.
The bouncer stopped him. Morris looked up, smiled at the man, shifted his eyes,
forcefully peeled the man’s hand off his chest and walked right in. The bouncer
didn’t even attempt to stop him and forgot to check the next four people’s IDs.
Being a demon certainly has its benefits.
If only you knew Stiles.
If only he knew how much it hurt. Why did Stiles think demons worked so hard to
climb out of Hell? It wasn’t so they could get a good tan. Morris bumped into
too many people on his way to the bar. The place was packed, bodies grinding
against each other. Tall men hunched over women they’d seduced and others
writhed against each other like eels in a shallow dish.
Morris needed alcohol.
He sidled up to the bar and draped an arm on the wood, waiting until the
bartender saw him. As he bumped into people, he’d snagged a few wallets. He
plucked out all of the bills and dropped the wallets on the ground and kicked
them away back into the dancing crowd. Turns out they were going to have a
terrible weekend.
“Two double Whiskeys,” Morris ordered once the bartender got close enough. He
eyed Stiles, disbelieving his age, but he was in the bar, so the bouncer should
have been doing his job. Morris grabbed the drinks and paid, tipping the
bartender. If you tip your bartender, they’ll pay more attention to you for
sure. Morris was going to need a lot more of that alcoholic attention to start
touching humans tonight.
After downing both doubles, Morris ordered another round and swallowed them as
well. Eight drinks in and it was time to dance. The beginnings of a buzz was
just setting in, but soon he’d be completely drunk, and dancing would get his
blood pumping and get the alcohol working faster. Whiskey was a good choice
tonight.
There was a blond man dancing with a girl a little off from the center of the
throng of people. They were dancing like they were friends so Morris figured he
was a safe bet to dance with.  The man was tall, built, toned, fresh looking. A
night with him wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world and it was certainly
what the doctor was ordering.
Morris sauntered over to him, grabbed him by his V-neck and turned him to face
Morris. The man’s face was angry and confused until he gave Stiles a once over
and his frown turned into a grin. Morris smoothed his hand out on his chest and
slid it down to his waist, his other hand coming to mirror it on the other side
of the man’s waist. Morris brought the man closer has he rolled his hips to the
beat and crashed his body into the other man’s. He grinned, his hands sliding
to his waist and ass, squeezing Stiles and dancing with him, rocking into him,
sharing in the heat of the moment and the hungry, lusty mood of the club.
The other guy, his name started with a B or something, Morris forgot
immediately, he started to kiss at Stiles’ neck. Morris bent, accepting the
ministrations and tasting the pleasure coming off the man’s body as Morris
closed his eyes.
Another person came up behind him, hands on his hips and stubble at his neck as
well. He smelled familiar – salty, spicy, warm. Morris, eyes closed still,
sighed in comfort and moved his hand to cup the neck of the new guy and slide
another over his hands. They gyrated together, the three of them, grinding
their bodies together, Morris pressed between. The new guy nipped at his neck
playfully and Morris felt his cock twitch in his pants. He was already sem-hard
from all the dancing, and this new guy was playing him in all the right ways.
Morris opened his mouth to breathe, but a moan escaped instead. It wasn’t loud,
but the guys he was dancing with probably heard it. The blond one shuddered
against him, breath hitching at Morris’ noises.
Then he was gone. Morris opened his eyes to see him being dragged away by his
female friend as they both stumbled over themselves. He turned to his friend,
angrily brushing her off before the pushed further out of the crowd. She was
yelling at him about something. Who knows what was going on. Morris didn’t
care. Plus, he had a very attentive man behind him that was snaking his hands
over to the front of Morris’ thighs, pressing him flush to the man behind him,
who felt particularly defined. He was a solid mass for sure.
Hopefully he didn’t have an ugly face.
Morris closed his eyes against the next nip at his neck and turned to grab the
man’s neck and crash his lips into Morris’. Fuck, he thought. This guy was an
awesome kisser. His stubble scraped against Morris’ chin and they bit at each
other’s lips as their tongues fought over skin and each other and teeth. Morris
wouldn’t be able to say he’s had any memorable kisses, but this one might be
the first contender for the top spot.
It seemed like forever before they separated. Morris breathed out unevenly
before he opened his eyes to see the stud that was kissing him like this.
Derek. That’s who. Morris was completely shocked. He stopped dancing and just
stared at Derek. Derek held him close still, not losing his gaze.
“Stiles. You shouldn’t go off alone at night.” Of all the things that could be
said, that was it? That was what Derek was opening with? Well, he wasn’t really
opening with it. He’d sort of opened with grinding, necking and then a full on
tongue-down-throat kiss. Why was Derek kissing him now? He hadn’t really made
any moves before now. Yeah, he’d stayed up and read poetry to him and there was
the way he always said sweet dreams and pulled the covers up, but nothing that
said ‘Hey I wanna fuck you.’
Was that even what he was saying now? His arms had a grip on Morris, but the
quirky up-tilt on the corner of his lips definitely said he was proud of the
state he was putting Morris in. It was honestly unfair. Morris turned his head
to the side. Anonymous bodies were crashing in waves over each other next to
him.
Of all the people to be here right now, it had to be Derek. “Why are you even
here?”
“I could ask you the same question, Stiles.” They were shouting over the music
and the cheers of college kids doing shots. It felt private in the way that no
one was paying attention to them and nobody could hear them, but it also felt
so public. Morris shifted uncomfortably and shook Derek’s hands off himself,
but grabbed his jacket and pulled him to the side of the room toward the
couches where it was quieter.
“I needed a break from stuff. I just wanted to get away from everything. And
you. Were. Not. Supposed. To. Be. Here. And especially not kissing me! What the
fuck man?!” whined Morris, prodding Derek in the chest pointedly.
“I didn’t want anyone else kissing you.”
“Excuse me? That was NOT an answer, and I have no fucking clue how you want me
to interpret that!”
“You like me.”
“I barely fucking tolerate you.” Derek looked hurt at first, before he shook
himself up and glared at him in the way that said he knew something more than
Morris.
“Lydia said you would be thick.” What?
“What the fuck is Lydia talking about?” On the inside, Stiles was preening.
Even with everything that Morris was doing, Derek was still chasing after him.
Even after trying to eliminate the pack as his friends, Morris was beginning to
like them. Stiles was absolutely beside himself. If Stiles had any concerns now
about how Derek might be feeling toward Stiles, it was pretty much erased with
tonight’s happenings.
Morris, don’t push him away. Please.
Stiles, you’re going to hurt him.
I wouldn’t do that!
No, you wouldn’t, but someone is going to hurt him using you. You’re so fucking
weak compared to them. You have nothing on werewolves that would paint the
forest with your blood.
I’m NOT weak! I’m-
Then why am I here, Stiles, if you’re so strong? The deal was to keep you safe
in exchange for your body. I’m not about to break this contract because you
have a crush.
…I’m not weak anymore.
You’re not strong either.
“Don’t kiss me ever again, Derek.” The joking glare disappeared completely from
his face. Derek’s face was slack, his lips parted and his eyes sunken. It was a
terrible picture of sadness. “I didn’t ask for this from you. I don’t want
you.” His eyes darted from Morris’ lips to his eyes, begging for the twinkle of
a lie, as he listened for an errant heartbeat.
Morris, wiped his hands on his jeans, stood up and left the club. He didn’t
look back to see if Derek followed. His hands kept sweating, he couldn’t
breathe, his legs were locking up, he was puking.
It felt good to empty his stomach honestly. The purge was shocking and he kept
sweating, like his body was trying to evacuate itself of every single touch
Derek had made to his skin.
Why am I sweating like this? Why can’t I get a breath in?
Morris threw a hand out to catch himself as he leant into the brick façade of
the alley. His forehead and a knee followed, as he crumpled against the wall
completely. His fingers dug into the stone as if it could catch him from
falling apart.
Why does my chest hurt?
The same way I hurt? You’re right, Morris, I was weak when I made our deal. But
it wasn’t because of the pack and danger. I was weak because I was running away
from this feeling. I hurtsomuch.
Walking home after collecting himself, Morris didn’t even feel the tears, but
the grass caught each drop like dew.
Chapter End Notes
     omggggg guyssss. it's been FOREVER. I AM SO SORRY. I had a
     combination of writer's block and like... actual schoolwork/work/
     anxiety. SO. that's why this chapter is so short (thought not SUPER
     short either). Finals are coming up and then I'll be home for a few
     days in Florida before coming back and then I should have a tiny bit
     more spare time than usual, but I'm taking a summer class and have a
     job so there's that too. BUT! I wanna be done with this fic before
     school starts. Also I'll have a oneshot/2-3 chapter fic that will pop
     up sometime maybe before this is done because I have a commission
     from the AO3 auction I need to do, and I feel awful for taking so
     long to do that. so here's a super long winded update on my life. if
     you wanna know more about me, check out my tumblarghhhhh as
     Foolproofpoem
End Notes
     "I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead; I lift my eyes and all
     is born again." -- My main lady, Sylvia Plath. You can find me on
     Tumblr as Foolproofpoem
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