SONG OF THE CHAPTER: Blue by Troye Sivan ft. Alex Hope

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SIXTY ONE;

PRACTICALITY OF THE PRACTICES

The sound of footsteps had three heads lifting in time to see Sage walk through the door, entering the kitchen with Melissa slowly trailing behind her. The look on her face was grim, Melissa's eyes immediately meeting with her son to give him a small shake of the head. Scott was sure that his heart deflated a little bit at the gesture, knowing that another person he was supposed to protect was suffering while he was left with no idea how to fix it; maybe not the same way as Stiles, but just as critically. Having someone in the medical field confirm it left Scott stumped on what to do with the information. Sage, seeming to notice that there was an exchange between the McCall's, had straightened her posture in a hopeless attempt to somehow diminish the worry. Considering the circumstances, the teenage girl showed absolutely no signs of distress that would suggest her pain. In fact, she looked like the small altercation in the bathroom never happened, a thick sheet of glass covering her coldly.

"You good?" Scott asked, his face softening in her direction. While it would do nothing to help the situation since he knew the exact answer that would come from her mouth, he had to ask.

It struck a nerve inside of Sage instantly, enough for her to freeze momentarily to register the fact that it was Scott who said it, not Derek Hale. She was sure that Scott didn't even realize what he had done, his attempt to figure out her condition phrased the same way that her surrogate brother had been doing for the longest of times — comfort, from the moment she was eleven and the nightmares began. Unsurprisingly, the sound of the two words consoled Sage in the largest of ways; after having spent so long being asked the question by Derek, she had grown to understand that every time it pushed through the man's mouth, he already knew how she felt. Utterly defenseless. He always knew. His words were the ammunition she needed to remind herself that she had strength, and even though they weren't coming from the same person, a feeling of relief even in the darkest of times washed through her. Now seventeen, she still carried that sentiment with her.

Not bearing to look in the direction of Scott as she nodded, she focused on the tile of his kitchen floor. Deaton had been watching the interaction closely, his eyes wandering from Scott's furrowed brow in concern to the subtle deflection on Sage's part. His absence over the last week had clearly caused him to miss out on a lot, especially as he stared at the relationship between Sage and Scott. He knew that the recent events were clearly taking a toll on the teenage girl when he heard her over the phone. She, above anyone else, had the most understandable reason for falling apart after what happened with the Nogitsune, Eichen House, and even more her own mind. Deaton just didn't expect for her to think that she had to fall apart alone. Although, it was the worst time for anyone to do so. She didn't even look in the direction of the werewolf as she gave him hope, almost as though she was trying to distance herself from him. The friends that always seemed to lean on each other like a pair of fallen dominoes had been pushed in the opposite direction, Lydia getting nothing better than Scott from a girl bound to her breaking heart.

It was satirical above anything else that, even though Sage was no longer being compelled to do things by the Nogitsune firsthand, the supernatural creature still had a hold on her that was even stronger than when he was inhabiting her actions and darkest secrets. The Nogitsune could have gone for Allison or Scott and the reaction would have been just as strong, but there was something about the meticulous play that was made involving the couple. Two bodies, one mind. Deaton already had his beliefs that that was what the thing thought while it was making decisions. Go for one, and the other suffers just as much. Go for the two that people would consider last and tear them apart from the inside out. Break the humanity that Stiles' held tightly onto by killing innocent people, and crush the sanity that Sage played with by letting her loyalty be her end. It was the perfect plan, and sadly one that they realized too late.

Scott turned to look over at Deaton, shifting his weight on his feet as he diverted to a new conversation. Pointing his thumb back in the direction of Stiles' body, which was currently being tended to by a silent Melissa, he asked the question that everyone was afraid to know the answer to. "How much longer do you think we have?"

"I wish I knew, but if we don't figure something out soon, we're going to need to find a better place to keep him," Deaton admitted wistfully, not holding back his fears of the predicament that they had just landed themselves in. If anyone had been anticipating a positive response from him that could get them out of the mess, they were shot down very quickly by the simple fact that the man they assumed had all the answers was left without one for once. That did nothing to improve their faltering confidence of the situation, Lydia and Scott meeting eyes to share their concern.

Sage could practically feel the doubt flooding through the room, crossing her arms over her chest as she moved closer to the other three in the kitchen. An idea was filtering through her brain, a suggestion that she knew her friends would shoot down before they even heard just how much it might help, even if it was quite possibly one of the stupidest plans she had to date. However, their options were dwindling down to nothing the longer that they kept the Nogitsune in both Scott's living room and Stiles' body. If doing this would give them time or information in any sort of way, she wasn't going to back away just because of the past problems that occurred when she was in the same scenario. Preparing to defend her claim, the green-eyed girl looked directly at Scott. "I'll talk to him."

Like clockwork, Lydia and Scott were both sending her expressions that had her reconsidering the departure from Eichen House. Before she could explain anything or Scott could interrupt with a selective choice of words on how stupid her idea was, someone had beaten her to it. Deaton's hand raised, halting the werewolf to his right before he could open his mouth. "Scott, wait. Maybe she's right."

"What? She's not going in there. We can find another way," Scott stated pointblank, baffled at Deaton as he looked at the man with wide eyes. If he ever had to disagree with the veterinarian on something, it would be this. Nothing good would come from a conversation between Sage and the Nogitsune. It never had; not when she was in the living room a few minutes ago, definitely not when she was in the clinic or Derek's loft. He might not know all of the ways to help her right now, but he was plenty aware that sticking her in the face of the problem — both problems — would only make her state worse. "You know what happened the last time she was near him."

"I get that I haven't been making the best decisions lately, and you can put me on whatever kind of medicine that Morrell prescribes after all of this is over, but we have no idea what the hell the thing wants to do besides play a stupid game of 'Chicken' with Stiles. Who kills who first, Scott? Us or him?" Sage maneuvered around the counter, taking a few more steps so that she was closer to the boy. Her shoulders were back to their steel state, false solidarity with her emotions in every movement she made. The gap had returned, the small one that Deaton noticed before. The words from her hurt, Scott feeling like she had just stuck a needle into a gaping hole without the intent of stitching it up. Not quite finished yet, the blonde continued to speak the only truth she knew. "Right now, Stiles is stuck somewhere deep down in this small corner putting up a fight with the one thing that is literally ripping him apart from the inside out, and you know what the worst part of this whole thing is? Because I, sure as hell, do. I've spent enough time hiding in my bed and on the bathroom floor to know."

With the close proximity between him and Sage, he could see the frustration hidden under her eyes. Not with him, not with herself, but possibly because the words from the first night Stiles went missing still stuck deep in everyone's skin. If anyone was going to find Stiles, it would be the person that knew him best. It would be the person who related the most to him, and the one who felt all of his pain in every which way as though it was her own. Scott was only just starting to realize that knowing Stiles best was what was driving Sage to be her worst because she knew. She knew what he was thinking. She knew what he was doing. She considered everything, the emotions, that the others overlooked in the chaos of getting him back physically and mentally. "What?"

"I know that he doesn't want to win."

It came small, unnecessary for her to use her full voice given his distance to her. Sage Connelly understood the one thing that Scott McCall couldn't, wouldn't, be able to possibly accept about his best friend. There was something screaming inside of Stiles in that very moment, clawing at every edge of his conscience to try and tear apart the places that were darker, ruled in anger, spite, jealousy, vengeance. All of the secrets that he had been hiding beneath the exterior of sarcasm and self-assurance; the pieces of his personality that he had long-since locked away from the moment they were discovered, and the fragments of his being that the Nogitsune only just exposed the world to. She knew Stiles had already realized that, if he were to win the fight, the flaws in his morality that Nogitsune showed him would never go away. They had been let out, released and contorted until he had succumbed to the darkness, and he would never be able to forget the fact that there was a time when he thrived in the anger. A time when he enjoyed the pressure of another's pain. She understood and she knew better than Scott could try to in a lifetime.

Before Scott had the chance to ask her what she meant, Sage was grabbing a hold of her friend's upper arm, tighter than she had anticipated but all the same. His tattoo was covered from his shirt, but that didn't stop her from gripping the skin that was permanently stained. The two circles were plain, bland even to the point that Stiles still continued to state his dislike towards it, but that didn't change the symbolism of it all. Scott's tattoo represented an open wound, the reminder that they carried a multitude of things, from growth to pain. Sometimes, though, Sage wondered if Scott forgot not everyone could brand themselves so explicitly to the point of it becoming strength. "We can't all wear our pain on our sleeve, Scott. Some of us suffer silently, and I get that you want to save us all... but, please. Just let me do this. I need to do this."

She had to assume that everyone thought she was losing her mind, or that she already had, but in that moment Sage had never been more sure about a decision in her entire life. The decision to get answers as to why the Nogitsune felt such a compelling desire to ruin the lives of an entire community, to why he took everything from the people that she loved without a single ounce of remorse — as if it could actually feel any emotion other than the void. No, she didn't need a debate to settle that part of the discussion, and she could see that Scott realized that as his worn eyes stared into her green ones. He could see that she had built that thick sheet of glass around herself because she was no longer made of paper, but of cement, because she would not let him lose his best friend. She would not let Sheriff Stilinski lose the only person that he had left to hold onto. She would not give the Nogitsune any more opportunities to tear apart her friends — her family — when she had the capability of stopping it; and that doubt that he had earlier about the blonde, the feeling where his pack's anchor was slowly starting to let them drown, it had been lifted only slightly. In that moment, the teenage girl had made one step out of the confining, black hole within the abyss of her charred mind.

"Scott." The sound of Deaton's voice pulled the werewolf out of the limitless exchanging of expressions happening between him and Sage. Turning back around and failing to see that Sage had taken a few steps away from him after raising her voice earlier, Scott noticed how solemn the man looked. "I think we are grossly underestimating the danger here. He might be paralyzed, but it still feels like he's got us right in the palm of his hand. If she can speak to him... if he'll listen, he might slip up. This could give us an opportunity to explore other options."

Lydia had kept herself out of the differing opinions on Sage's decision, knowing very well that with the hardheadedness of her personality, she wasn't going to be asking for any of their permission to speak with the Nogitsune. However, there was one word that Deaton had said in his attempt to get them to rationalize. One word that had her thinking differently. "Might? What if he doesn't?"

"There are some possibilities, but that is all they are. Possibilities." Deaton turned to look at the three in the room to make sure that they understood that anything that he was about to say would not ensure a positive outcome, or even one that worked. "Like Sage said, right now, Stiles is stuck in between a conscious and subconscious state. His very own bardo, if you will. Whatever control he has over his physical and mental form is being beaten every time the Nogitsune pulls more from Stiles. It's, for lack of a better term, literally feeding off of Stiles. An internal tug of war. If we can somehow find a way to pull him out of that place he's stuck in, or reboot Stiles' mind so that the connection between the two is broken, there's a chance that he could tear apart the Nogitsune from the inside out."

"Reboot," Sage deadpanned, her face falling slack of hope as she looked at Deaton. What he sent back in return only told her that his definition of 'reboot' was clearly taking the word lightly. Hell, if they had been talking about any person that wasn't Stiles, she would probably find the term amusing. Now, she was just perplexed and skeptical beyond belief. "Like a computer. You want us to reboot his mind like he's a machine."

Scott didn't give Sage any more opportunities to send Deaton into reevaluating his possibilities. Instead, he opted on asking how exactly the man thought they would be able to carry out the act of making Stiles' mind the hardware to technology. "How would we do that?"

The question shot the veterinarian down almost instantly, Deaton hunching his shoulders and curling his fingers tighter on the kitchen counter. The solution that he wanted to proceed with could only be described as a loose example of what a solution really was, and he knew that the second it escaped his mouth, he was going to release the elephant in the room that everyone had been trying to ignore... and, just before he could, the human resource of emotional distress had already caught on. The indifference on Sage's face softened slightly when Deaton nodded once in her direction, telling her that her thought was true— and that thought? That thought completely changed the game. "You want to turn him into a werewolf."

"But the scroll said to change his body," Lydia interjected almost immediately, leaning in closer so that she was joining in on the conversation more than before.

The transition of him becoming a werewolf was more than just a transformation of the body. It was a transformation of every thing that Stiles represented, from the hyperactive movements that would be turned into hyperactive reflexes all the way to the substantial fact that Stiles was the human. He was the one who didn't deserve to become like the supernatural creatures that he loved and protected. It was a transition of heart, of mind, and of the simple matter that no one could possibly imagine the boy fifteen feet away from them having a pair of lethal claws. The card of turning Stiles into a werewolf had only ever come once between the group of friends, and that was when they were all entirely convinced that he was going to die of dementia just like his mother. Now that Deaton had resolved it to be their only solution, their best solution, it changed things. It changed everything.

"That's if I translated it correctly," Deaton reminded the strawberry blonde. He tried to ignore the different emotions that were showing in their faces; Scott's immediate panic, Lydia's immediate protest, and Sage's haltered participation in feeling anything. "We're looking for a cure in something that might actually be nothing more than a proverb or a metaphor."

Scott's uneven jaw tightened slightly, ready to disagree with his mentor once more for the sake of his best friend. While he had been there since the beginning, and while he had heard every single small reflection from Stiles that suggested he wanted to be supernatural, he also knew that being a werewolf was a burden that he wouldn't willingly place upon his brother. "And what if he doesn't want it? He's never asked to be a werewolf."

"What if it saves his life?" Lydia asked, her decision about Stiles having been made the moment that she considered the chances that he would survive. As she glanced over at Scott, she could tell that he was anything but on board with the idea.

"What if it kills him? I've never done this before," Scott dismissed, shaking his head as the panic slowly started to rise into his throat. He knew what it meant to change Stiles, and he knew just as well that he was the only alpha around that had the capability of doing it. Knowing that they were not only making a decision that could affect Stiles for his entire life, but that he had to be the one to do it put too much poison on his plate."I mean, what if I bite him and accidentally hit an artery or something?"

"Stop saying 'what if.'" The four words changed the atmosphere of the room once again as three heads turned to look at Sage. She wasn't glaring down like expected, but let her eyes flicker between them as she shook her head slightly. "What if I kill him, what if he doesn't want it, what if it saves his life—regardless of whether or not he gets turned into a werewolf, he's never going to be the same. He's not, and giving him some claws or a pair of golden eyes isn't going to change what the Nogitsune took from him. Regardless of whether or not we try to do everything we possibly can, he's always going to remember. He knows how to adjust to tragedy. We've all had to get pretty damn good at it. Him becoming a werewolf may not be what he wants, but I'm sure as hell not going to sit here and watch that thing torture him with his humanity anymore. I won't."

Sage was silent after that, her chest moving a bit quicker than everyone else's as she let her hands wrap around the sides of the counter, hoping to God that the pain in her palms would distract her from the alarms going off all around her. As she watched, watching for one of them to speak up to agree, disagree, yell, or do anything but stare at her like was insane, she started to feel the tight box around her head return. The reflective, little box that managed to suck all of the air from her lungs and fill her with dread instead. Swallowing the breathlessness that was covering her whole, Sage released her hands and opened her mouth once again. "This is all we've got."

"I can try calling Derek again," Scott muttered after a few moments, inhaling deeply as he kept Sage's attention. A small shadow of relief fell through the green irises of the blonde, knowing that the sentence was Scott's way of accepting the decision. It might be flawed, and it might involve too many problems after everything ends, but it was the only thing that they have left to hang onto. Their only possibility.

Lydia's contemplation involved interchanging her gaze from Scott to Sage, her lips pursing slightly in consideration as she slowly nodded her head. They might not be in the most rational minds, but that didn't mean they weren't going to try all of their options. So, with her thoughts remaining solely on the safety of her friends, the strawberry blonde laid down her agreement alongside her best friends with her own suggestion. "Maybe we should call someone else."

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"Melissa, I'll watch him."

The curly-haired mother shot up straight when she heard the sound of someone's voice, having blocked out every bit of the conversation happening in the kitchen from the moment it began. The attempt to have her weak, worn complexion go unnoticed hadn't worked because Sage's eyes were trailing from the woman's face over to the Nogitsune on the couch within a matter of seconds. The flash of humor that she saw in them reintroduced her to the anger that she felt before, and her hands moved back into fists at her sides as she looked back at Melissa. It was clear to see that whatever the hell he had said shook something in her, struck her down to the bone and set a parasite that was evading her brain in that very second. The doubt that had appeared in the fifteen steps it took to make it over to the living room disappeared, and Sage saw that it was just as much her job to get Melissa away from the poison as it had been Melissa's earlier with her.

Knowing that she would get nowhere with trying to steer the blonde away from answers, Melissa nodded and pulled herself up from the couch. Just as Sage had moved to take her place, the woman had reached out to grab a hold of the teenager's hand, stopping her from making any more movements. Giving Sage a hard expression, Melissa guided her eyes over to the Nogitsune. "Don't listen to anything he says."

"Already made that mistake," Sage whispered in return, squeezing Melissa's hand in reassurance before she pulled away. After a second of considering whether or not to stay, the mother finally left to go talk quietly with her son.

The Nogitsune had traveled the path that Melissa took, watching with Stiles' brown eyes full of excitement before she had disappeared behind the kitchen wall. Just like that, the room turned into a hazardous place when the Nogitsune tilted his head back around to look at Sage. Much to her surprise, the shades that she saw when she gazed at him weren't full of an attempt to torture her with his own amusement. No, this time, he stared at her completely void; the indifference to her appearance bubbled an unwelcoming amount of fear in her stomach, an understanding that the Nogitsune already knew why she was here and that the false thrill would not work. He, as he continuously loved proving, knew her every move—and because he knew, she could see that he was doing everything possible to make sure that she didn't find out the same information.

With a quick movement, Sage had leaned forward and ripped the black tape from his mouth. The Nogitsune didn't react, only raised his eyebrow in temptation at the blonde in front of him. Of all the things that had happened today, it was most surprising to see that she had decided to try and speak to him. He was astounded at the resilience she had, and while it was most often directed with the usage of hostile language and idiotic manners, that didn't change that she had impressed him again. He still felt that small ripple of anger at Stiles for figuring out that the young woman was not herself, and he knew that that anger caused him to lash out in the dramatic way of going after Stiles, but there was so much promise there. There was so much that he had the opportunity to manipulate, so much he could dig and destroy, so much he could have fun playing with. He just didn't have enough time.

"Why?" Simple question. Complex answer. It came from Sage so hastily that she would have had to repeat it if it were anyone else, but considering that a small twitch came from Stiles' mouth when she started speaking, she knew that wouldn't be the case there. So, instead, she just leaned forward a bit with her elbows on her knees and her hands clasped tightly together. Instead, she restrained from twisting her rings and showing the Nogitsune any sign that she was currently trying so desperately hard to keep her breathing steady. Instead, all she could do was clench her jaw and keep the nausea from invading her interrogation with something that was slowly destroying everything good in her home.

"Did you know that altors originated from Roman mythology?" the Nogitsune asked lowly, never once breaking his eyes away from the green ones before him. His voice was rough, worn from all the screaming, and so unnatural for Stiles' persona that it sent a chill down her spine. With just the single word of 'altor', he saw that she was itching to walk away. "No, I'm sure you didn't. They used the word to describe those that stood in front of the Roman Gods during battle—the warriors who never received recognition for being the armor to those that were meant to be indestructible. The transfer of pain — you used to be rather familiar with this one — onto an altor from a God was a way of punishment for their absence. To feel the pain of a practically indestructible creature, and know that it was all their fault for not being there to protect them... I commend it. Those people couldn't get rid of the pain. Their mistakes lived inside of them, consumed them, until the moment that they died from it all. That was when the Gods knew that their altor was unfit to protect them, and they got a new piece of armor. It's a bit like our situation. The only difference is that Stiles is my armor."

As the Nogitsune watched her, he had to give her respect for not moving a muscle at the revelation. He was all too aware of the search that the blonde had been on ever since he took away what she was, and he was even more aware that it was eating her alive. The blank expression could only hide so much; the need to know more, to ache to receive anything more about who she was, became enough for him to distract her from the important matters. To still have a hold on her that was so strong and so prominent, it gave the Nogitsune as many opportunities as he could fit in before she gave into the information and walked away from him. Considering the way that she was acting at the first round of torture, he had high hopes that she would last longer than Melissa did, and that just made his excitement to have the altor in front of him all the more intoxicating.

Determined to be stronger than the Nogitsune, Sage clenched her jaw to refrain from saying anything anything about the topic he strayed to, and instead focused on her own single, one-worded question. "Why?"

"It's a harsh way to die, though, don't you think? Slowly drowning in your own mistakes. To feel your throat close up, and all of that pressure just build and build around your heart. To have the people you were supposed to protect watch as you disappear because of their own idiocy. As you are punished for simply existing to care about another... and then all of that suffering not even matter because a couple of useless bakemono didn't know how to hold a sword properly. I find it rather insulting. Don't you, Sage?" The Nogitsune challenged, the questions slipping easily off of Stiles' tongue as he started to let his smug smirk lift even higher. The subtle hints back to the night that he had wrapped himself around her until her heart stopped were caught, from the reminder of the suffocation she felt all the way to Scott's screaming at her immobility by his stab wound. It was all there. "Or do you find it more insulting that people treat you like you are a paper doll? I'd imagine it's infuriating to feel inferior."

Sage went stiff then, her shoulders tightening as she put the shield tighter around herself when she realized that the Nogitsune had heard every word of her conversation with Melissa in the bathroom. When she saw that a grin had formed, she sat up straighter with her eyes more hostile than ever. There was no way she was going to accept defeat. Not now, and especially not when she had enough to say that didn't have one syllable.

"You know what I think? I think that all of this deflecting from the subject of why exactly you did any of this is because you can't give an answer. I think that everyone is hoping that there has to be some other reason you're doing it besides having fun in killing people because that is who they are. They have this irrational idea of giving everything, including monsters, the benefit of the doubt. That's what they do, but not me. No, I just think you're absolutely terrified of being nothing again. And you know what I find insulting? I find it insulting that you think you're going to win—that you think for even one moment that we're not going to do everything supernaturally possible to send you back to the sad, little place you were stuck in before all of this. I find it insulting that you think I actually care about a few words about altors and paper dolls because right now? Right now, I only care about killing you."

"There she is," the Nogitsune taunted, rumbling that the stoic Sage had eventually dug back into his prime example from earlier involving the twins. Short tempers. Homicidal compulsions. He wasn't even moved in the slightest by her words, only motivated to do more damage. As much as she may try to deny it, he saw the bad parts in her as much as he saw them in Stiles. Their loyalty could only extend to the length of their pinky fingers if they were ever to challenge it with their bitterness towards the world. "Does it make you feel better to let it out? I know Stiles feels better when he can finally release all of that anger. You did too at one point."

That had been where she was going to draw the line. It was easy to see that there was absolutely no way that he was going to slip up, not when Morrell had already stated that the Nogitsune wouldn't make room for any more error after she had been his first embodiment of one. If she at least got Scott and Deaton enough time to figure out a better plan then the whole thing wasn't a total waste of her time. Before she could move a muscle, though, the Nogitsune seemed to realize that she was done with the conversation. He, however, wasn't. With one last stab in the direction of her identity, having already covered her loyalty, her ability, her darkness, and her Stiles, he was left with only one more weakness.

"If I drink, I die. If I eat, I am fine. What am I?" he challenged, arching his eyebrows in her direction. The riddle was old, one that he had never been excited to use until now. By the way that Sage's eyes narrowed, and even more by the way she had dug her nails into the palms of her hands, he realized that he had successfully accomplished belittling the blonde in as many ways as he possibly could so quickly. She knew the answer, and the fact that she couldn't bring herself to say it reinforced the realization that the answer would always halt her. With exhilaration showing in every flicker of his brown eyes, he decided to hurt her even more. "A fire."

And that was that. The restraint that the blonde had been showing disappeared, the color of green casting back at him ten shades darker than before. A plug had been pulled, where whatever ounce of recovery she might had been on her way to making after the events with the clinic and Eichen House suddenly disappeared by two words learned in kindergarten; where the thought of the Nogitsune making untimely jabs at the deaths of the people she and Derek lost that day churned the anger all over again; where, in that moment, the Nogitsune challenged the former altor, just as it had been challenging her from the moment it made her ex-boyfriend a snug, little host of his destruction. A switch had been turned on, and the Nogitsune felt his — Stiles' — gut rip a bit more inside at watching the teenage girl try to pick up the pieces fast enough to walk away. Just before she did, the Nogitsune was given yet another example of the enigmatic personality of Sage Connelly and just how complex her emotions truly were.

"What's so delicate that saying it's name breaks it?" Sage asked, her eyebrows raising as she leaned on the edge of the seat. The Nogitsune's grin slowly began to fall as he noticed the tone she used in the question, hollowed out and thinned to the point where she had perfected his own play on void; she had detached herself from him. Before he even had the opportunity to answer the riddle that he had used often before, the tape that was sitting on the table was picked up, ripped up, and placed over his mouth. In turn, it left the blonde to answer her own challenge before she walked out of the room. "Silence."

Now, that was that.

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Peter Hale was the most unreliable and insufferable person that Sage had the dishonor of knowing, and just the fact that he was standing in front of her then, circling around the couch as though he actually gave any shits about the person on it only made her more aggravated. The smug look that was gracing across his face every time he made eye contact with her didn't help calm her down either, especially knowing that he could release the awaiting bomb of telling her friends that Mallory was still alive or, at the very least, had been. With Morrell's inability to answer her phone, Sage still had absolutely no idea if Brunski's unsubtle remarks about her mother were just a way to piss her off or actually true. She also had absolutely no idea if Peter had an ulterior motive with helping them, or if he was even going to help them or just stick his claws into the necks of her best friends. It wouldn't be the first time he had stabbed them in the back.

One look at Stiles' deteriorating body had Peter announcing that turning him into a werewolf wouldn't work; another look at Stiles' deteriorating body had Peter telling them that it was an internal war more than an external one — that one, of course, had been paused with a look from Sage that clearly stated they were very well aware it was happening internally; one paused exchange between Sage and Scott kept the friends at odds, the problems with Stiles causing more tension for the two of them than it ever had before; and one off-to-the-side conversation from Peter and Lydia left more questions rising in the air about what the strawberry blonde had over him that would convince him to come. Surely, she could play the lacrosse field card. It would work, but it had to be something more. It had to be. Peter Hale was looking too frustrated with the banshee to have come here out of guilt.

"Do you have a plan?" Sage finally interrupted the silent inspection, peeling her eyes away from Stiles' squinted ones, still unable to move from the paralysis. Peter stopped pacing, standing directly behind the teenage boy's body to leave the Nogitsune with no way of seeing him. "We're running out of time, Peter."

Peter's lips turned in annoyance at the pestering blonde, and instead of turning to Sage to answer her, he looked across the room in the direction of Deaton. "Scott is going to try and dig through pale and sickly Evil Stiles' mind to unearth pale and sickly Real Stiles. Then, guide him back from the depths of his own subconscious. But he's not going to do it alone."

"What do you mean?" Scott asked, taking a step closer to Peter as he spoke. While he was plenty sure that he couldn't successfully save Stiles on his own, he assumed that the invasion of Stiles' mind would be left up to what he was able to do as a werewolf. Considering the only other werewolf in the room was the same person that had nearly killed them sophomore year, the list was rather short and consisting of only his name.

"Someone needs to go in with you," Peter explained, watching as the crowd of eyes in the room flickered over Sage. Her shoulders had gone back at the revelation, almost like she had just been shot by an invisible bullet. It was natural to assume her to be the first option; she was closest to Stiles and Scott, she knew Stiles' mind about as well as she could without actually entering it, and yet she was probably the worst person to do so. Before anyone had the chance to slip out her name, Peter interjected, getting their attention again. "I advise against one unstable mind going into another. Logically speaking. No offense, sweetheart."

Sage snorted at his attempt to wipe away the insult to her mental health, not completely sure what part of the sentence was worse than the other. She could have easily said that it takes one to know one, and that his mind was even more unstable than hers given his past, but the scary part wasn't that it was true. The scary part was that, looking back on Peter's past, she had started to see justification of his actions — and maybe that was because she wasn't thinking properly, or maybe it was because if something ever happened to her friends the way it happened to her family, she would not stop until everyone responsible was dead. Maybe it was because she truly had snapped in the midst of the nightmares and hallucinations, and her image of death was not as wrong as it used to be. Whatever the reason, Sage's resemblance to Peter was growing so close that it gave her another reason to despise him.

"So, Lydia does it," Sage resolved, glancing over at Lydia from the corner of her eye to make sure that she was comfortable doing so. She wasn't going to send her best friend into an explosive mind without making sure she didn't mind doing it. Lydia only nodded her head, moving from her standing position to sit down on the couch next to the Nogitsune. Even with the venom inside of him and the inches between them, everyone could still see her discomfort. "What happens when they get into his head?"

Peter moved his attention from Lydia to Scott, confirming first that they were listening closely. "You two are going to have to guide him out somehow. Try to give him back control of his mind, his body."

"Could you elaborate on the "somehow"? It's not feeling very specific at the moment," Lydia admitted, her nerves showing through her words as she watched the Nogitsune next to her. Before they got any further into their plan, the strawberry blonde turned back to the others. "Maybe you're wrong. Maybe Sage should do this. I mean, the three of you know everything about each other. Shouldn't she be the one going in, not me?"

It did make more sense. If they were speaking as logically as Peter was, Sage going into Stiles' subconscious would probably be quicker and easier. Not only had it been the three of them in this mess from the very beginning, but Sage and Scott were quite possibly the only two people aside from Stiles' father that had the chance of guiding him out of his hell. However, if they were speaking incredibly logically from the realistic point of view, Peter was right for once. Shoving one ticking, time bomb into the mind of another could be catastrophic for all of them. The Nogitsune could play too many cards if he had access to both of them, and if they were going to give Stiles the best chance possible, Sage couldn't involve herself in the plan any further than where she was standing.

"Even if she could, we don't know how her body would react after everything that's happened," Deaton included, almost as though he knew that Sage was already listing reasons inside of her head of why she couldn't go in even if she wanted to.

Sage knew that was the polite way of saying that she had lost her supernatural abilities, and she wasn't going to sugarcoat her reasoning to Lydia as much as he was. "The last time Scott decided to have a field day in my mind, it was when the four of us died and I was still an altor. Deaton's trying to say he has no idea if shoving a pair of claws in my neck will kill me again. So, putting me in the mind of the thing that took away those abilities might not be the best idea for me right now. Improvise, Lydia. It's Stiles, not a stranger. You know him better than you think you do."

"What if this is just another trick?" Scott interrupted from behind the Nogitsune, putting the discuss on pause long enough for everyone to grow quiet. Of course that was their biggest fear; they had no idea what was going to happen regardless of the plan that they used, simply because the Nogitsune seemed to have the ability to pull out a wildcard in any scenario. Not assuming the possibility of a trick was just naive.

Peter, however, seemed to believe another culprit was hanging in their minds. "When are you people going to start trusting me?"

"I meant him," Scott corrected, nodding in the direction of the Nogitsune sitting below him.

"Oh."

"Scott," Deaton cut in before another conversation could come up that prevented them from starting already. Much like Sage had said earlier to Peter, the veterinarian realized that the clock they were counting down on was getting closer and closer to the end of their chances. It was now or never to get Stiles back, and they couldn't waste any more time perfecting a plan that would never truly be perfect. "We're running out of time."

Scott's face noticeably paled, tilting his head only once into a nod to confirm that he understood the timer they had just placed on such an exceedingly calculating procedure. Before he had the opportunity to think through what he was doing anymore, the alpha lined his extracted claws at the base of his friends' necks, and without a single glance at anyone else, he pushed his way through the skin. Deaton, Sage, and Melissa each kept a close watch on their facial expressions, noticing how the Nogitsune's eyes widened moments before and Lydia's whole body went rigid beside him. They noticed that the room enveloped into complete silence as they watched the teenagers, hoping to God that nothing went wrong. They had no other possibilities after that. It was all they had left, and it had to work.

"I don't like this," Melissa muttered over to Deaton. Her words came from the maternal instinct that took over her entire body, wanting nothing more than to pull her son and his friends from the state they were in. She didn't, though; swallowing her urges, the curly-haired woman stuck to inspecting the three for any signs of immediate harm. "We have no idea what's going on right now—"

"There was a white room when we were there before." The statement that stopped Melissa mid-sentence came from Sage, who had never once let her narrowed gaze move from the people in front of her. She only looked away to glance at Melissa for a second, not even acknowledging Peter and Deaton's curious eyes. The dark tint was back in her green eyes from the concern that she was trying to control, and quite possibly even from the information she was about to reveal. "That's where this whole thing started; where we left the doors open. It was a white room. Sterile white. I didn't think I remembered it, not until I started showing up there in my nightmares. I'd imagine if they're anywhere right now, it's there."

Melissa went silent after that, the pestering frustration that seemed to radiate off her body any time she spoke with any one of Scott's friends returning once again. She knew about the supernatural, she knew that her son was the supernatural, and yet she found herself hitting limitations and barriers when it came to protecting the teenagers from the very things that they were themselves. The same feeling from earlier returned, and even knowing what they go through, there were still pieces that she didn't have the story to. There were still vivid reminiscences of terrible things that she didn't have the power to stop, and she hated it. More than anything, she abhorred hearing the reminders that came from the children's lips, permanently stuck to their memory like glue. Yet, while she let her thoughts twist and turn about the thought of the white room they were stuck in, Sage barely acknowledged it and instead returned to twisting her rings around.

That is until she noticed the blood. Standing up straight, Sage's hand reached out instinctively, grabbing tightly onto Peter's arm. The werewolf let out a small snarl under his breath, going to ask what the hell her problem was, only to be stopped when he noticed the same crimson falling from Lydia's nose. Sage's jaw tightened, her fingers digging into Peter's skin to attract her own wound as she felt her eyes furiously glare at the distracted man. "She's bleeding, Peter."

Melissa had the exact same idea as Sage, taking a step forward to make sure that the young girl was okay. Before she had even gotten two centimeters closer, Deaton had ushered his arm out to prevent her from touching the banshee. "I'm not sure that's a good idea."

"What the hell is happening to her?" Sage all but snapped in Peter's direction, watching as he ripped himself from her death grip to move towards Lydia. Instead of being stopped like Melissa, the teenage girl followed after Peter. "Peter, I swear to God, if she gets hurt because I couldn't—"

"Shut up," Peter snarled without pause, turning his head to glare at the blonde. Sage could have very easily raved back at him, she very well had the frustration to do it, but she did as told and kept her mouth shut. Peter's voice had gone down an octave, darker as he pressed all of his nerves into growling at her. He knew it would do no good in the long run, but it did give him enough silence to put all of his attention back on Lydia. Reaching for her head, the werewolf held the strawberry blonde's neck to stable her weighted head. "Lydia, can you hear me? Lydia, you're stronger than this, okay? You need to concentrate. Lydia. Lydia!"

The scream that came next echoed through the halls of the McCall house, Lydia's name burning the throats of the three that watched Peter try to pull the girl out of the distraction that had been placed inside of Stiles' head. They went three minutes without another reaction from any of them. No more blood. No flicker of a finger, or even a movement of their eyelids. Three long, brutal minutes where Sage had never felt so much anticipation build up in her chest, ready to smother her if it became necessary. There were just three still, silent bodies before them, each of which jerked forward on command as the third minute was almost at its fourth. Almost has if having adapted it into her muscle memory, the blonde was reaching forward to grab Lydia the second that the girl stumbled off the couch, holding her neck the moment she was disconnected from the link between Stiles and Scott.

"Did it work?" Scott gasped out first, his breaths uneven as he stuttered his way around words. Moving from his place around the couch, he went to stand beside Sage and Lydia with his legs getting caught between each other in the midst of the rush. His irises were wide, feverish and unstable as he looked in between the witnesses standing before him. "Did it work?"

"What happened?" Lydia, just as confused about the circumstances as Scott, glanced around as well. Upon seeing three views, she knew exactly what happened: the first, the look on Sage's face that could very easily resemble someone who just had a hand twisted in their heart. A look of defeat, as though all of the energy that she had been fueling from the back of her head shut down, a willing surrender; the second, Scott hovering over the body of Stiles, hands moving in a desire to shake him but never truly reaching further; the third, the lack of mobility coming from Stiles Stilinski. That was when she knew, and felt her disbelieving eyes trail up to look at Peter. "Why didn't it work?"

Sage only blinked. It didn't work. It didn't work. It didn't work. It didn't work. The teenage girl dug her heels deep into the carpet, her eyes refusing to accept the unmoving figure in front of her. The statue, resembling everything that she loved and lost in an unwavering fight against an internal darkness, had turned her capacity to comprehend to a mere zero. Melissa might have reached for her. Deaton might have said her name, but all she knew was that the conversations dulled around her, the movement of Peter's lips unnoticed, Lydia's deal with the werewolf lost in the chaos of her attempt at understanding something. Just through the seclusion of her surroundings, Sage made out one thing. One word.

"Malia."

And just like that, the world had returned back to its loud and visceral place. The statue broke from its frame, Stiles' body lurching forward at an attempt to rip the black tape from his mouth that Sage had previously set there. Scott, having been in the crossfire of the Nogitsune's struggling, staggered back to get out of the way. In doing so, the werewolf's body crashed directly into that of the blonde, who had been staring at the scene unfold with no thought in her mind on how she was supposed to react to the altercation. She just stared, watching in absolute confusion alongside Scott as Stiles collapsed onto the floor, his fingers reaching frantically into his mouth to grab something. Before any of them had the opportunity to intervene or restrain him again, gauze was being pulled out, no end to the strain in his throat.

Just like that, the situation turned into a living, breathing, traumatic nightmare for everyone that loved Stiles because all they could do was watch. All they could do was stare as the teenage boy continued to pull the bandages piece after piece from the inside out, choking on the substance while the idea of breathing went completely out the window. It was just gags and groans filing from his wavering lips, attempting to rid his body of the fabric. The pile of the gauze was growing, turning into the evidence needed that only confirmed the connection between what had a hold on Stiles and what they had found that night in Eichen House. It was the same material, and it was the same hands finding their way out of the finally-ended pile, billowing with the same smoke that materialized around the Oni. It was the same expression of fear that cast over the faces of those in the room, each unaware of what to do about the Nogitsune emerging from a shadow of ashes right before them in the same bomber jacket as before.

"Scott," Sage muttered under her breath, cautious that speaking loudly would alert the thing that they were only a few centimeters from being murdered by it. He didn't say anything in return, only extended his arm so that she was behind him and pushed closer to Melissa. In fact, they all seemed to crowd together in an attempt to get as far away as possible without making a run for it. Sage's hands had moved to grab onto Melissa and Lydia's arms, hoping that if the Nogitsune did jump for them that they would have the opportunity to run along with Deaton. If worse came to worse, Scott and Peter would have the upper hand without them getting in the way.

Then, that exact thing happened. The Nogitsune had reeled its body forward, seeming to go for the group that was huddled closely together for a final move in the long-awaited end of the game. Before it had the chance to touch any of them, though, Scott and Peter had taken the open opportunity to grab a hold of the supernatural creature, pushing it back until it landed on the chair in the corner of the room. Sage inched forward before Melissa or Deaton, focusing fully on the fact that the thing wrapped in bandages seemed to be struggling against the two werewolves. More than it should be. More than a Nogitsune that had successfully thrown the body of Derek Hale around like a doll. It was with that realization that Sage felt her protest get caught between her teeth and tongue, rushing forward without being able to say anything to grab at the gauze covering the outline of the person's face.

"Get back!" Scott shouted, his head shaking rapidly as he gave the blonde next to him a wide-eyed assertion. Rather than listening, Sage just pushed Scott's hand away from the person's shoulder, grabbing a hold of the pieces that were covering the face underneath. While Peter and Scott argued to restrain him better, the mouth of the identity underneath was revealed, and it was a pair of lips that Sage had gotten too familiar with in the past year. It was the moles on his cheeks that gave him away, and her green irises had grown in size just as quickly as Scott's hands moved off the body when he caught on as well. "Wait! Wait, wait, wait!"

Scott and Sage worked to string apart everything that was suffocating Stiles, unaware of how much their hands were shaking together as they did so. All they cared about was getting their best friend out, and when they had finally pulled at the final piece hiding his forehead, they were met with a warm pair of brown eyes. A color that had gotten lost in the Nogitsune's amusement over the past few weeks, and a color that they never believed they would see again. That contrasting shade met with another pair of brown, and then a pair of green as Stiles Stilinski let his eyebrows furrow in an infinite level of confusion. "Scott?"

"Scott."

Turning around at the sound of Deaton's voice, Scott raised his eyebrows at the man. Before he had the opportunity to ask why he had called out his name, he scanned the room to see the growing look of panic on his mother's face. That was when he noticed that, as opposed to having four people standing behind them, away from harm of what they thought was the Nogitsune, there was only two. There was only two, and the third and fourth in that equation meant that the game was not done yet. The body that they had crashed into was not the villain, and that said villain had just made his final move before checkmate. A final move than consisted of taking one of the most important people in Scott's life. Whipping his head back around to his mentor, he stepped away from his best friend to ask: "Where are they? Where are they?"

Sage ended her full-body inspection of Stiles early when she heard Scott's shouting, knowing the second that she turned around that she was going to see something that would only further confirm just how little luck they had. When she did, she followed Scott's movements of checking off everyone on a list until she got to two people. The thing that created the whole mess and the person that collectively kept all of them sane in the midst of that mess. It was then that Sage realized the relief she had felt when she saw Stiles simply wasn't allowed to exist — not for her. Not when they lived in the practicality of practicing with tragedy. It was then that Sage understood that the universe had just given her back one person she loved in exchange for someone else. Leaving Stiles to sit there confused, Sage and Scott pressed play on the familiar action of screaming out the name of those they loved most.

"Lydia!"

And, through all of that, the only thing that repeated over and over again in Sage's mind were three words. It didn't work. It didn't work. It didn't work. It didn't work.

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HELLO. You would be surprised at how long this chapter was just sitting in my drafts, half finished and all lonesome. I apologize for my procrastination. Before I get into the chapter, I want to first off just ask everyone to give Dylan O'Brien well wishes and a quick recovery. For those of you that don't know, he was in an accident while filming for Death Cure and had to be rushed to the hospital. While they've already confirmed he is okay, he still deserves support for all the amazing things about him that make watching these shows and movies worthwhile, and for just being an overall incredible human and actor. I hate that this happened to him, and I just hope that he gets the deserved time to recover before he is forcing himself back into any productions.

Onto the chapter: my favorite part was definitely the conversation with Sage and the Nogitsune. Not only is the history of altors slowly piecing together chapter by chapter, but there is a lot of subtle taunting used in those lines of dialogue that I wanted to make perfect. He hints at all of the weaknesses and tragedies that have formed Sage's deteriorating mental health, and that was a significant part that I didn't want to screw up. I decided to use the Roman Mythology because of how I adapted the altor from the Latin word of one who sustains or protects. Overall, I'm pretty pleased with that portion of the chapter. I hope you guys enjoyed finding out more information on Sage's history, and small things like that will continue to show up throughout the series.

I know that some of you are probably wondering where the climatic scene is where Sage and Stiles reunite, and I'm sure that the final scene was where a lot of other fanfics included that, but I tried writing it and didn't think it connected as well in this story as it might in others. With Lydia's absence, it made more sense for all of Sage's attention to be diverted onto her as opposed to ignoring the fact that her best friend was just taken by the thing that almost killed Stiles. So, while there wasn't a huge scene between them in this chapter, there definitely will be in the next one. More than likely, the first thousand words of it. Hope you guys are looking forward to it, and I hope all of you are well. Much love.