APRIL WAS RIDING IN THE CAR WITH THE SHERIFF AND ALLISON. As usual, she was in the back of the car while the other two sat in the front. There was an awkward silence because all of them were thinking about their own problems. Finally, the man spoke up, glancing in the mirror at the blonde girl. "How's Isaac doing?"

"Good. Well, more of the same. I'm on a timeout from seeing him, though," she informed him before turning to glare at Allison who was sitting in the passenger's seat.

"You're not on a timeout," the Argent girl sighed, turning around to face her friend with a pointed look. "I just thought you could use some time away from the hospital after what happened this morning."

After she almost stabbed the scalpel into Elijah's tiny brain that morning, Allison had realized that her friend might have been spending too much time cooped up in that hospital room. She had not slept on an actual bed in forever, and the chairs at the hospital were some of the least comfortable in the world. Pointing out where they were going, the Sharpe girl rolled her eyes and responded, "What a great way to do that — bringing me to the hospital."

"What happened this morning?" Stilinski quizzed curiously because they had yet to mention exactly what had gone down.

Allison answered before the blonde could, and she did not put it as delicately as April would have. "Elijah showed up, and she almost murdered him."

"Could you maybe phrase it better in front of the sheriff? I did not almost murder him," the other girl asked her. She knew that Stiles' dad was not going to arrest her or anything, but they still should not be throwing words like 'murder' around in front of an officer of the law.

"You showed more self control than I would have," he informed her, causing her to smile at him gratefully. After a small pause, he exhaled and looked her in the eye. "You know I'm working on that, right? It's just really hard to prove without explaining the whole supernatural thing and sounding crazy."

She nodded in reply. "I know. I just hate having to see him."

"You know what? I don't know how you guys do it. You're all so strong. You're fearless. Hell, you even manage to keep your grades up," the sheriff ranted to them as the three of them stood in the elevator of the hospital.

Allison glumly responded, "I am... failing Econ." April was almost really close to failing most of her classes as well since she had so much stuff going on. Mr. Yukimura was the only one that was cutting her some slack because he knew what was happening and what she was going through.

"Is that Coach's class?" the man questioned, and they nodded to him. He sighed, "Well, I'll have a talk with him." He and the Sharpe girl noticed that her breathing had started to get a little ragged, and the girl pushed herself off of the elevator wall as the man asked, "Hey, you okay?"

"Allison, what's wrong?" April walked over to her friend and wrapped her arm around her as the sheriff pressed the button that made the elevator stop so that the door did not open while she was crying.

"I'm not fearless. I'm terri—terrified. I'm always terrified," she exhaled tearfully. "I...I act like I know what I'm doing, but I don't. I don't know if Isaac is dying right now. I don't know if I made a mistake with Scott. I don't know what my dad is thinking. I don't know if we should trust Derek. I don't know. I don't know anything..."

Stilinski did not hesitate to pull her into a hug, and April smiled at them. "You know what's funny? You sound just like a cop. Hey... You're gonna be okay."

"Okay," the hunter girl said with a nod, and he pulled away. All of a sudden, a loud buzzing filled the elevator, and he took out his phone to see that some sort of alert was going off. "What's that?"

"Someone's breaking into my house...After Stiles started sleepwalking, I had some safety precautions put in — motion sensors, cameras..." he answered, going into the app as the two girls leaned over his shoulder to see the screen.

He pulled up a camera that showed an all too familiar room as the Argent girl asked, "Is that his room?"

There, sitting on the bed with his legs hanging off the side, was Stiles — or not Stiles — and he was staring right at the camera like he knew they were watching him, which he definitely did. He grinned an evil smile before lifting his hand up to wave at them.

"Damn it."

《❀》

CHRIS, DEREK, APRIL, ALLISON, AND STILINSKI WERE ALL IN Stiles' room, staring down at a chess board that had a bunch of sticky notes with names on the pieces. It had all of the good guys and bad guys on it. Argent ran his hand along the board, "What is all this? What are these sticky notes for?"

"This is what Stiles used to try and explain to me about...all of you," the man explained to them, gesturing to the pieces and the names. April smiled when she saw her name on the rook, wondering what that meant. Her smile quickly turned to a frown when she saw that Isaac's piece was completely off of the board. Did that mean that the Nogitsune thought that he was taken care of?

Allison scanned the board, trying to figure out what it all meant and why he would move the pieces in this configuration. "Well, maybe it's a message from Stiles — the real Stiles."

"Do you think there's any reason my name's on the king?" Derek asked, pointing to where the king was standing with a circle of other pieces around it, guarding it.

"Well, you're heavily guarded..." Stilinski suggested because Aiden and Ethan along with a bunch of other nameless pieces were putting themselves in danger to save the king. "Though, I guess the alarming detail is that you're one move from being in checkmate."

Argent's eyes widened in realization. "It's not a message from Stiles. it's a threat from the Nogitsune."

"He's at the loft. That's what he's trying to tell us. And he wants us to go there," April added, happy that she could finally figure something out.

Realizing that night was just about to fall and that they needed to move fast before the Oni got to Stiles, the hunter man breathed out, "This couldn't sound any more like a trap."

"I don't think it is..." Stilinski sighed, and they all shot him a look, letting him know that none of them were convinced.

Argent responded, "I think your opinion might be slightly biased, Sheriff."

"Hear me out!" Stiles' dad told them, causing all of their attention to fall back on him to hear what he was going to say, wondering what his logic was. "What we're dealing with here is basically someone who lacks motive — no rhyme or reason, right? Our enemy is not a killer. It's a trickster. The killing is just a by-product."

"If you're trying to say it won't kill us, I'm not feeling too confident about that," Derek told him, and a couple of other people nodded in agreement.

Stilinski continued to insist, though, having faith in his son and trying to figure out the Nogitsune's purpose. "It won't. It wants irony. It wants to play a trick — it wants a joke. All we need to do is come up with a new punchline."

"The sun is setting, Sheriff," Argent pointed out. "What do you have in mind?"