(Thank you all for the well wishes while I was sick! It took longer than I thought to get better, but I am better, thankfully. I also had some family stuff come up that took some extra time to come back, but I think that's all resolved now ☺️)

...

When Y/n woke up the next morning she was completely healed, her magic and a good nights rest doing wonders. She now stands with Stiles, Scott, Malia, and Kira in a line waiting to go into their PSAT's. "Where's Lydia?" Kira wondered as she glanced up and down the hall.

"She took it her freshman year." Y/n answered.

Malia gaped at her. "Does that mean I could have taken it some other time?"

"You'll do fine, Mal. You studied your ass off for this."

"Doesn't mean I'm gonna do good."

"Well." Stiles corrected, but Malia didn't get it.

"Well, what?"

"It's do well, not good."

"God!"

"Okay, okay."

"You're doing this, because while we're trying not to die, we still need to live." Scott said. "If I survive high school, I'd like to go to college. A good college."

"It's only three hours." Kira pointed out. "We can survive three hours."

Stiles gave her a look, silently begging her not to jinx it. "A lot can happen in three hours." Y/n mentioned. Soon they were let into the classroom where the test would take place. They pressed their thumbs into the black ink and stamped their print onto the provided piece of paper, placed their phones in small envelopes and dropped them into a basket, and recieved their packets before taking their respective seats.

"Please do not open the test booklet until you are instructed to do so." The visiting PSAT proctor, Simon, says to the students. Stiles quickly, but neatly, closes the booklet making Y/n smile in amusement from beside him. "This test is two hours and ten minutes. There will be two 25-minute critical reading sections, two 25-minute maths sections and an essay writing portion that will last 30 minutes." He turns to Natalie who was standing nearby. "There are supposed to be two teachers monitoring this exam."

"I know. It's Coach. He's not exactly punctual. Um, let me just try him again." She grabbed her phone and stepped out of the classroom. After a couple minutes she returned with an apologetic smile. "I can't find him, but Mr. Yukimura is upstairs grading papers. Do you want me to try him?"

"We have to start. We can ask for his assistance during the first break." She nods. He leans over his desk and presses a button on a watch he had sitting there, starting the timer. "You may now open your test booklets and begin." There was a rustle of paper as the teens did as told. The room was filled with the scratch of pencils and the rubbing of erasers when something needed correcting. Stiles held a pencil in each hand and one in his mouth which all promptly fell to the desktop when he blinked at the paper, already lost on some questions. Malia frowned at her test, taking off her jacket and glancing at the others who were all marking their answers. Y/n could feel her anxiety and muttered assurances under her breath to the coyote, knowing she would hear and hoped that it would help ease her stresses.

Only a few minutes had passed when Sydney, one of their fellow classmates, fell out of her chair. "Sydney!" Natalie called as she rushed over and helped the girl up. "Are you alright?"

"I'm okay. I just got kind of dizzy."

Natalie frowned as she looked at the girl's wrist. "Sydney, how long have you had this?" There was a strange red rash on the inside of her wrist.

"I don't know."

"Ms. Martin, do I need to stop the test?" Simon asked.

"No, um, it's fine." She helped Sydney back into her chair and went back to the front of the room. "Everybody stay in your seat. I'll, um, be back in a minute." She gave everyone an assuring smile, trying to make sure everyone didn't start worrying, but Y/n could feel her sudden rush of worry. Natalie grabbed her phone again and looked at Simon. "Nobody leaves the room." She spoke quietly, yet those with better hearing than average could hear her. And then she left the room again. Y/n and Scott looked at each other before he glanced back at Sydney. It was only a few moments later when everyone heard her yelling at someone to go back outside and to not come in. Curious everyone exited to classroom to see what was going on, finding her having just locked the doors to the school. "Back to your seats. Now. Please." She firmly instructed, and everyone did as told albeit very confused. After the door was closed again Y/n couldn't help but listen to Natalie make a call, and when she asked for the number to the CDC she looked to Scott. The look on his face told her he heard it too.

The school was swiftly blocked off from outside access and people wearing hazmat suits came in. They set up plastic tents to isolate the sick, put plastic over the doors and windows, and set up equipment to do tests. The students not showing any signs of sickness were kept in the classroom. Y/n, Malia, Stiles, and Kira sat together while Scott went to ask Natalie about what they were to expect. "Bet they're thinking smallpox." Stiles says, only for Simon to chime in from nearby.

"Not likely. Smallpox was eradicated worldwide in 1979. We've only managed to completely eradicate two viruses in history. The other was rinderpest. It killed cows."

"So we should be comforted by that, right?"

"Unless it's something worse."

"That's a lovely thought." Y/n muttered. She tried not to pay attention to the man too much, something about him giving her the creeps.

"Whatever it is, they're taking it pretty seriously." Malia said. "There are a lot of cars and trucks out there."

Y/n listened outside for a moment, recognizing one voice in particular. "Your dad is out there too." She said to Stiles.

"I should probably call him." He went over to the basket of phones and started to rifle through them to find his when Simon spoke up once again.

"Don't bother. They would have shut off any access to all outside communication by now." He shrugs. "No cell service, no WiFi. No one starting a panic. Looks like we're all just going to have to wait here and see what happens." He licked his finger and turned the page of the book he was reading as Stiles went back over to the girls.

"I didn't tell Alan where I'd be today." Y/n realized. "With everything going on I forgot about the PSAT's until today, and he was gone by the time I got home this morning." She frowned and shook her head. "He's gonna be worried if he finds out what's going on."

"I'm sure everything will be fine." Kira smiled, trying to comfort her friend, even if only a little bit.

The students had been led to the hall and lined up to get some blood drawn for tests. Stiles had gone off to find Scott and Malia took this chance to ask something without either of the boys around. "Kira, do you ever get the feeling that Scott and Stiles aren't telling you everything?"

"What do you mean?" Kira asked.

"Like they hide stuff." Malia smiles, trying to do this nicely like Y/n had taught her.

"I think if they did, they probably have a pretty good reason."

Malia sighed as her smile fell, her patience for being nice running short very quickly. "Do you know what they're hiding in the bag under Scott's bed?"

"What? No, I've never been under Scott's bed. Or in it. Just on it... Wearing clothes." She awkwardly trailed off. Thankfully for Kira her name was called as the next one to get some blood drawn and she hurriedly turned away.

"What are you talking about, Mal?" Y/n asked. Stiles apparently knows about it, yet she hasn't heard anything about it. Usually the three told each other everything and anything, especially after the supernatural was revealed to the two boys.

"There's a weird duffle bag under Scott's bed. I noticed it last night when I went to tell him about Satomi's pack. He and Stiles acted all weird, trying to keep it out of view. I didn't ask you about it because you weren't there, so I figured you didn't know."

"I didn't." Her lips drew together as she thought about it. There's nothing to be upset about, she was passed out and healing, and there was the test and the sudden disease scare. It makes sense they haven't told her about it yet. But, if she was honest with herself, there was something nagging at her. Sometimes Stiles looks at her like he's holding something back, not telling her something important. And when she started paying attention, she noticed Scott and Lydia look at her the same way.

She couldn't dwell on it anymore when there was the quiet zap of electricity and Kira jumped back. The woman in the hazmat suit dropped the needle she had been using and looked at her sleeve where there was a fresh burn mark. She gave Kira a worried look before she was rushed off by her collegues. "Kira. Kira!" Malia quietly coaxed the fox who was stuck to her spot, stunned. The three girls managed to get away in the sudden commotion.

"Are you okay, Kira?" Y/n asked, but Kira's response wasn't what she was expecting.

"Are you okay?"

"What? What do you mean?"

"Y/n, you're bleeding." Malia answered.

Y/n frowned as she then noticed the wetness on her lip and she reached up to her nose where it was coming from. When she pulled her hand back she found blood. Black blood. Soon after Malia developed a fever and her claws came out. Stiles found the three and led them to the locker rooms where Scott and Kira's dad were at.

Scott had a fine sheen of sweat on his skin, and he looked up at Ken, his eyes flickering between his natural brown and Alpha red. "It's still happening." Ken confirmed.

Scott looked to Malia, who didn't look any better than him, and she held up her clawed hands. "I can't make them go back."

Y/n huffed as she tossed aside yet another black-stained tissue, the blood slowly trickling down from her nose again. "Can't smell anything now and the bleeding is slow, but consistant."

"Obviously the virus is affecting the three of you in a way it won't hit any human being." Ken said.

"You guys gave to stay out of sight. We have to quarantine you... From the quarantine." Stiles finished lamely.

"Yeah, but where?" Kira asked. "I mean, what if Scott and Malia get violent? Like on a full moon."

"We shouldn't stay in here. Not in the locker room." Scott commented.

"A classroom is not going to hold you guys if that happens." Y/n pointed out.

"What about the basement?" Malia questioned.

"Too many ways out." Scott denied. "We need something secure. Somewhere nobody can find us."

"The vault." Stiles said. "The Hales always have an escape route. Like their house. There has to be another way in."

They all gathered in an empty office and Stiles rolled out a blueprint of the school. "This is where the school sign is, so the vault's got to be right about here."

"I suppose if there's a second entrance, it would probably be accessible from the basement." Ken said.

"It's probably somewhere in this hallway. Or this corridor." Stiles suddenly wobbled and Ken and Y/n steadied him. "Whoa." Ken moved Stiles' sleave and revealed Stiles has now gotten the same red rash.

"It's happening to you too. You're getting sick. You all are."

"I don't feel sick." Kira denied.

"I think it's affecting you differently, like Y/n. But unlike her, it's affecting you neurologically. I found your test answers here in a pile with the others." He took the folded piece of paper from his pocket and laid it flat on the table. Kira's pencil marks were nowhere near the answer bubbles, instead in the empty spaces between the lines.

The five teens made their way down into the basement where they then started to look for anything that would resemble a secret entrance to the vault. Y/n had glanced at a shelf to her left, not seeing much and was just about to pass it, but something stopped her. A pull in her gut telling her to look closer, and when she did, she found the same marking on the wall that was on the school sign. "Over here." She called as she started to move the shelf away from the wall, Stiles and Scott coming over to help.

"Look at the cracks in the wall." Stiles pointed out. The markings form a triskele, the Hale pack symbol.

"It's like the entrance outside. Maybe I can try something." She put her hand on the wall, her eyes starting to glow as she tried to use her magic. But instead of coaxing the mechanisms to move like she wanted, everything on the shelf next to her flew off making everyone jump. "I'm sorry! That's not what I was trying to do." She frowned at her hands and Stiles gently took them in his own.

"It's okay. It's probably just because you're sick and your magic is more focused on trying to heal you." She nodded and let him move her to stand next to Malia. "So if it's like the one outside, then it opens with claws. Anyone's claws, right?" Scott and Stiles shared a look before glancing at Y/n and Malia. And there it was again, the sense Y/n had that there was something they weren't telling her. Even Kira looked tense.

"Um, Malia, can you try?" Scott asked.

"Why me?"

"Y/n's magic isn't working and I don't have control."

She was quiet for a moment before she nodded. "Okay. I'll do it. But first tell me what you've been hiding from me." Stiles stammered a bit, not knowing how to answer. "I know you think you're trying to protect me, but I can handle it." Stiles and Scott looked away, almost like they were steeling themselves to admit to something. "I know I'm on the list." And just like that they relaxed in surprised shock.

"Yes..." Stiles agreed.

"So how much?"

"How much what?"

"How much am I worth?"

"Four million." Scott answered.

"Are you okay?" Stiles asked at her silence.

"Yeah. Scott's worth 20, Kira, five. They'll take you guys out way before me. What about Y/n?"

"She's 17 million."

Malia frowned. "Well, they'll still go for Scott first." And with that she walked up to the wall to open it.

"It's progress." Y/n muttered. Malia used her claws on the lock and the wall slid open, giving them access to hide in the vault. As soon as they entered, the wall closed behind them, and they were safe for now.

Malia's and Scott's fevers were getting worse, Y/n even starting to get warm. Y/n's eyes started to get blurry, but the most concerning thing was when she started to bleed black blood from her eyes as well. It was slow, just like her nose bleed, and she realized this thing was slowly attacking her senses. How far it would go, she didn't know, or why it was affecting her at all, and all of that made it all the more frightning. Stiles held her as she and Malia fell asleep, wiping the blood from her face occasionally despite it only being replaced with more.

"You know, this is where it all started." He said making Scott and Kira look at him. "That's where the money was." He gestured to the large safe. "117 million in bearer bonds."

"How do you even change bearer bonds into cash?" Kira wondered as her eyes idly scanned the shelves around them.

"Bank, I guess. They just let it sit here the whole time collecting dust. You know bearer bonds are basically extinct?"

"Why does it matter?"

"You know how many problems that money could solve?"

"For you?"

"Me. My dad... The Eichen House and MRI bills are crushing him."

"Mom does this thing," Scott started, "she writes down all the items in our budget, and how much they cost, then she adds it all up and figures how long we have until... We'd lose the house." Stiles looked down at Y/n again.

A few hours later Scott and Stiles stood by the vault door, Scott listening for anything important. "Anything?"

"They're looking for us. Someone's gonna have to go out there." Stiles looked over at Y/n and Malia, the former now sitting up next to Kira while Malia laid in the witch's lap. Y/n was staring blankly at nothing, her eyesight barely more than formless blobs at this point. "We need to tell her the truth about Peter. Both of them." Scott lowered his voice to make sure neither of the girls could hear him. Stiles gave him a look. "She's going to see the rest of the dead pool eventually."

Stiles stepped closer to Scott. "Try to remember that Peter is the one name missing on that list. Which either makes him really lucky or the Benefactor. She finds out about him she's going to go to him, you know she is. And then he's going to twist his way into her head like he did before, like he does with everyone. Including us. We let him walk around like nothing ever happened, like he's one of the good guys. Scott, he's not one of the good guys. If she finds out about him, she's gone. They both are. That's probably what he's waiting for and if he wins, we lose."

"We're already losing." Scott looks down at his hand where black blood has started leaking from his finger nails.

Y/n wiped at her face yet again, having half a mind to just quit and let it stain her skin, but she couldn't stand the feeling. She felt someone grab her hand, cleaning her face for her, and she leaned into his touch. She tried opening her eyes, but quickly realized they were open, everything was just dark. She couldn't see anything now. "Y/n, I gotta leave for a few, okay?"

She put her hand over his to hold it to her face. "Where are you going?"

"Whatever's happening, it's worse for you guys. That means it's not just people getting sick, it's another assassin."

"Ah, and here I was thinking it was just a head cold." She smiled when he huffed a laugh. She felt Malia shiver from chills and then heard the rustle of Stiles' jacket as he laid it on her. Y/n reached out for him and he readily grabbed her hand. "Be careful out there."

"Of course. I've got something too important to come back for." Her lips turned up into a watery smile. With everything happening right now, it was comforting hearing his nice words. "I love you."

"I love you." She felt him press a kiss to her forehead. And then he was moving away and she let her hands fall back down as soon as she couldn't feel him anymore. Stiles went to the door and looked back as it closed, watching her as she wiped at her eyes again, but not just for blood this time.

...

Alan and Melissa have just finished an autopsy on a recently deceased member of Satomi's pack, the vet now knowing what killed the werewolves in the woods, and what's now affecting the teens in the school. "It's a varient of canine distemper." Alan says to the three people in the room with him. Melissa, Derek, and Satomi herself. "A few years ago, an outbreak in Yellowstone killed 40% of the wolf population."

"What's it going to do to our wolf population?" Melissa asked.

"Well, it's been altered to infect quite a bit faster."

"You mean, it's been weaponized?" Derek questioned.

"It infected my whole pack." Satomi frowned.

"Everyone except you." Alan pointed out. "That's the real question. Did you not get infected? Or are you immune?"

"If your pack was infected, then who was doing all the shooting at the entrance to the woods?" Derek wondered.

"Apparently another assassin. Personally, I'd rather face a gun than a varient of smallpox."

"Sounds like you're going to get plenty of chances." Melissa commented.

Alan's brow was furrowed, and Derek could see there was something bothering him. Or, more accurately, scaring him. "There's something else, isn't there? Something you're not sharing."

Alan looked up at Derek and nodded a bit. "I'm afraid that the virus isn't just affecting the werewolves. I think there's a very good chance it's affecting Y/n as well. I'm just not sure how bad."

"Why would it affect her at all? She's not a werewolf." Melissa pointed out, confused.

"Witches are interesting creatures. Sometimes a witch can get extra abilities, naturally enhanced senses, if their paternal parent is also supernatural."

"You're saying Y/n's father is, what, a werewolf?" After a moment of hesitation the man nodded. "Do you know who?" While Alan didn't say yes or no, his silence was answer enough.

"Who is it?" Derek asked. For some reason, he had to know. Maybe it would explain some of the things that have happened between them. "Who is her father?"

Alan knew Derek wouldn't stop asking. If he was honest, he knew he wouldn't be able to keep the secret forever, yet his need to keep his promise still made him hesitate before he finally admitted it. "Peter."

Derek and Melissa were stunned into silence at the admission. Derek stared at the tiled floor as he thought about it. While it was shocking, it wasn't hard to believe. M/n and Peter were practically inseparable up until she suddenly broke things off and left. And he could guess that Y/n was born not long after M/n had went away.

Derek felt eyes on him and looked over to see Satomi staring. She realized what she had been doing and looked away. "Sorry." She apologized. "I just noticed how much you remind me of Talia." Derek smiled a little. "I used to visit her a lot, you know. Do you remember me?"

He nodded a bit. "I remember the tea. You always brought that tea that smelled terrible."

"I brought that tea as a gift. Your mother loved it."

"What kind of tea?" Alan asked suddenly.

"What?"

"The tea with the smell, what kind was it?"

"Reishi. Wild purple reishi. It's very rare."

"It's also a very powerful remedy for sickness. Satomi, you didn't get inftected because you've been inoculated." He realized.

"Okay, okay. How rare is it? Can we find it?" Melissa asked, which Derek was able to answer.

"We don't have to. My mother kept some of it. It's in our vault."

...

Y/n feels Malia shift in her lap, pulling the jacket closer around herself. Malia tucked her hands into the pocket and felt something there. She pulled out the folded piece of paper and sat up to lay it flat on the ground. Scott saw the paper, and tried to stand up to stop her despite his weakening legs. "Malia..." Her eyes scanned the paper, yet she had no reaction. "Malia?"

Malia's breathing picked up as she started to panic. She looked up at Scott, or at least where she thought Scott would be. "I can't see. I can't see anything."

"Scott," Y/n called, "everything sounds like I'm underwater." She admitted. Scott looked to his best friend and saw black blood now trickling from her ears. Although he didn't see it for long as his own vision started to blur.

Malia and Y/n clung together, both frightened and disoriented. Malia jumped anytime she heard a loud sound from Scott and Kira moving. "What's happening to us?"

"Scott?" Kira ran her hands over the ground where she sat, finding and holding onto a pillar next to her. "I can't- I can't see." She panicked.

Scott held onto a shelf, trying to keep himself standing. He needed to help them. But it was getting exceedingly more difficult. He stumbled over to the door when he heard rushed footsteps and Stiles' voice. "Hey, Scott! Scott? In the vault, it's in there with you. Reishi mushrooms. Scott?" Unable to get into the vault himself, all Stiles could do was slam his hand against the wall and yell for his friend. "Scott, open the door! It's in there with you! It's in a jar, it's on one of the shelves! Scott!" He continued to hit the wall to no avail. "Scott, can you hear me?" He yells in frustration as his attempts get more desperate. Yet his energy is soon drained and he slides down the wall in defeat.

"Reishi..." Kira muttered. "Scott, I saw it. In a jar on one of the shelves. Reishi..."

Scott used the wall to push himself to his feet once again. He couldn't give up. Not when the cure is so close. His eyes have already stopped working, but he closed them as he decided to try a trick he learned from someone a while ago. When he opened them, they blazed Alpha red and he was able to see. See Malia and Kira fading, Y/n losing her senses, and see the jar of reishi on the shelf. He stumbled his way over, falling to the ground and crawling to the metal shelving and using it to pull himself up and reach for the jar. His fingers grazed it enough for the jar to fall off of the shelf and shatter, allowing the reishi powder to escaped and float in the air.

Stiles was scared. Was he too late? Could they not hear him? The door started to slide open behind him and he moved back. Scott fell to the ground in front of him and he panted as he looked up, finally able to meet his friend's gaze and actually see him. Stiles put a hand on Scott's shoulder and shook his head in relief. They were okay.

The two got up and went in to check on the girls. Scott went and helped Kira up while Stiles went to Y/n and Malia. "Hey, you alright?" He asked as he knelt in front of Y/n, happy to see that the blood has stopped and been wiped off. She didn't answer him, wouldn't even look at him. "Y/n? Malia?" Neither of them acknowleged him or looked at him. Malia stood up and walked away from him. He watched her in confusion before looking at Y/n again. "Y/n?" He reached up to touch her face, but she caught his wrist before he could. She finally met his gaze and he saw hurt and anger in the e/c depths. She moved his hand away from her as she shook her head and got up, a crumpled piece of paper falling from her hand as she moved away. He watched her walk away, hurt and confused.

Y/n grabbed Malia's hand as she passed and the girls walked out of the vault together, not saying a word to anyone. Scott and Kira looked to Stiles with sad expressions. Stiles licked his lips, a sinking feeling in his gut making him look down to the paper on the ground. He picked it up and looked at the dead pool that told Y/n what he couldn't bring himself to. He clenched it in his fist and pressed his hand to his lips, realizing he may have just lost one of the most important things in his life.

He should have told her the truth.

~~~
Published: 2/9/22
Edited: 4/12/22

And that is when Stiles knew, he fucked up 😔

☽︎𝑱𝒆𝒏𝒏𝒊𝒇𝒆𝒓 𝒅𝒐𝒆𝒔𝒏𝒕 𝒍𝒊𝒌𝒆 𝒕𝒆𝒆𝒏𝒂𝒈𝒆𝒓𝒔☾︎

☽︎𝑷𝒓𝒆𝒕𝒕𝒚 𝒃𝒆𝒔𝒕 𝒇𝒓𝒊𝒆𝒏𝒅𝒔☾︎