chapter twenty-four

[ season 3a | episode 1 ]
[ tattoo ]

SUMMER CLUNG TO HER LIKE A SECOND SKIN. It made its way into every one of her pores, sneaking into the thin fabric of her shirt and beneath her blanket of curls. Marley was hot. The sun beat down on the four wolves as they marched towards the remains of a charred house, each one sweating as they did.

          She had no idea why they were at the Hale house, or why Peter was still around, but she could tell it was a serious situation. Or perhaps she was just reading Derek wrong. Everything always seemed serious when the sour-wolf, she learned the nickname from Stiles, was around.

          Her head swung between everyone as she walked, staring at each individual and evaluating their moods. Me. Magnificent was just as confused as she, sour-wolf had his regular serious impression, while psychopathic alpha looked amused. She got nothing from the observations, all of them usually supporting those expressions.

          "Is anyone gonna tell us why we're out in the middle of the Preserve?" she asked, annoyance laced into each word. She truly didn't appreciate being dragged anywhere without an explanation.

          Derek glanced at the girl before rolling his eyes. "Be patient, Marley. We're almost to the house."

          She stayed quiet for the minute they were still walking, as the house had come into view quite a while before. When they reached it, she leaned against a tree, shooting daggers at Derek as she did.

          "You haven't told them everything yet, have you?" Peter, standing just behind Isaac, asked. He looked between the two betas, a sense of anxiety rushing through them both. What else could there be? They'd already faced hunters and a giant lizard. And a psychopathic boy hellbent on killing.

          Isaac looked back, meeting eyes with Marley. "What do you mean?"

          Peter leaned against a tree just like her, still acknowledging the two as he spoke, something he needed to work on. "Why do you think Derek was in such a hurry to build his pack? So eager to strengthen his power and his number?" Finally, he looked around and met eyes with Marlowe. "When there's a new Alpha, people take notice."

          Isaac, not caring for the dancing around the point, sighed. "People like who? What is this?" He pointed towards the door, where a new mark stained the wood. "What does this mean?"

          Derek took one step forward, still sporting his blank expression. Even when giving bad news, the man didn't know how to express his emotion. "It's their symbol. And it means they're coming."

          Marley straightened out, walking up the steps to the porch and closer to Isaac, one of the only people to ease the overwhelming anxiety. "Who, Derek? Who is coming?"

          "Alphas."

          Isaac looked back at Marley, eyes squinted against the sun. He wanted nothing more than to hold her close at the news. "More than one?"

          "A pack of 'em," he stated. No fear overtook him, no worry. He said it as if it were a normal Tuesday with new Alphas rolling into town. As if this was a normal life.

          "An Alpha pack. And they're not coming. They're already here."

         MARLEY SPENT HER ENTIRE SUMMER WITH A SECRET. Not even Lydia Martin, whose supernatural ability could have been sniffing out secrets, could pull it from her.

          "Marlowe St. Claire," Marley cringed, "who in the hell has been your summer fling?" The girls grew closer over summer with Allison gone, as Lydia had no other girlfriend to turn to. "I could see it in your eyes the entire summer. That little, itty-bitty spark that made you so much more chipper."

          Marley giggled, something she'd been doing more often now that she'd grown so close with Lydia. "I doubt you'll ever know, Judge Martin. I plead the fifth."

          Lydia groaned, torn over the secretive wolf. "Come on, now that Ally is back, you have to spill. Do we even know this mystery man."

          Caving, she sighed. "Yes. Both of you know him."

          "So," she trailed, "Is it someone in the pack?"

          Because they were stopped at a red, Marley leaned over and booped Lydia's button nose. "You'll never know."

          Allison giggled at the interaction, happy to see Lydia acting this way with someone other than her. Both her and the girl sitting in the backseat knew how pushy the redhead could be. "Onto other things, I still don't know if I'm up for the double date tonight."

          The girls were on their way to drop Marley off after having a big dinner for Allison's first day back from France. Lydia, apparently, had a double date planned for her and Ally, obviously pushing to get the latter back on the dating scene. Marley did not dislike that they left her out of this escapade.

          "It is not a double date. It is a group thing," Lydia said matter-of-factly. She smiled at her bestie, praying her ploy would work. Perhaps it was a double date, but she knew Ally would never go for it.

          She smiled, not the kind lit up with happiness. "Do they know it's a group thing? 'Cause I told you that I am not ready to get back out there. And with Marley's new boy toy, or girl toy, I don't think she wants to attend your double date either."

          "You were in France and didn't do any dating? For four months?" She sounded almost shocked at the fact, rolling her eyes just barely and looking at Allison with a bewildered expression.

          "Did you? I mean, after—"

          Lydia cut her off immediately, the pain still too unbearable for her to manage. Marley could smell the heartbreak from where she sat in the back. "Do not say his name."

          Trying to ease the tension in the car that had come with Jackson's mention, Marley cleared her throat. "Hey, is it really fair if all of us had our dating shit together? The universe is not that kind." Lydia and Ally both hummed in response, silently agreeing. After all they'd been through in just one quarter, it was inevitable for there to be fallout. And trust issues.

          "Is he okay? I mean, did everything work out?"

          "Well, the doctors looked like total idiots when he turned up alive, but everyone got over it." The sentence ended with a lower tone that Lydia usually had. No longer chipper. "And yes, Derek taught him the Werewolf One-oh-One, like how not to randomly kill people during the full moon."

          Allison, with one hand messing with the back of her neck, smiled. "So then you've talked to him?"

          "Uh, not since he left for London," she said, sounding as heartbroken as she smelled.

          "You mean since his dad moved him to London."

          "Whatever, he left. And seriously? An American werewolf in London? Like that's not gonna be a disaster." At the words, Marley chuckled, thinking of the song that was now stuck in her head. It was her dad's favorite song before he died.

          Her head bobbed to one side as she snickered. "Like the song."

          Both Lydia and Allison turned back to her with confusion in their irises and she gasped dramatically. "You guys have never heard Werewolves of London? Oh, I am totally showing it to you when we get to my house. Your little group hang can wait a couple minutes."

          "It better be a good song then. I am not listening to another terrible chorus from you, Marlowe." Lydia shook her head, thinking of all the songs Marley showed her over the summer.

          Allison, feeling the tiniest bit jealous of their new relationship, coughed. "So you're totally over him?"

          "Would I be going on a double date if I wasn't?" Both Ally and Marley chuckled, both girls knowing it was a double date from the start. Lydia Martin wasn't the type of girl to go to a mere group hangout with boys involved, unless it was Stiles Stilinski.

          "And the truth comes out," Marley whispered, loud enough for their human ears to pick up on.

          The strawberry blonde rolled her eyes as she looked at them both, meeting eyes with Marley through the rear view mirror. "Yes, it is a double date. It's not an orgy. You'll live."

          As they pulled up to the red light, another car, specifically a power blue jeep named Roscoe, pulled up beside them. The girls up front didn't notice for a few minutes, Marley chewing on her thumb as they spoke. She knew Allison wasn't ready to see Scott, and the idea of any conflict made her itch with anxiety.

          "—know you don't necessarily like my style but I brought back a couple things for you. I saw them in France and they screamed Lydia," Allison stated. Her new haircut was pulled into a half-up bun atop her head and it bobbed as she spoke.

          Lydia's eyes lit up at the statement, excitement taking over the heartbreak in her pheromones. "Ooh, now I am super excited to sleep at yours. Not only for the clothes, but Mr. Argent has still got it going on." They saw the older man as they picked Allison up earlier that day, him looking as dapper as ever.

          "Ew, Lyds, that's my dad." The raven haired girl made a face, her lips pursing as her eyes squinted.

          Marley giggled, seeing why Lydia could be attracted to Chris Argent. He was a handsome man, that was just a fact. "Being friends with you makes me happy my dad died so I didn't have to hear about your girl crush on him."

          "Oh, you are so showing me pictures when—"

          Suddenly, Allison cut her off, eyes looking straight out the window. "Oh, my god. Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god, I can't see him. Not now."

          Marley followed her eyes, seeing Scott and Stiles in the car beside them. She waved, giving them a soft smile, the whiter of the two waving back.

          "Lydia, go, just go," Ally yelled, holding a hand up to block her face from the two boys. Both cars patiently waited for the light to turn green as a boy and a girl both cried for the driver to move. Finally, Lydia looked over to her panicking best friend and drove just as Stiles rolled his window down.

Allison sighed, her heart beating faster than a rabbits. "You all right?" the two other girls asked, both wondering if the passenger was doing mentally okay after seeing her dreaded ex boyfriend. When she nodded, the other two smiled.

"Lydia, stop, we need to go back and talk to them."

As the brand new Civic pulled to a halt, Marley noticed Roscoe do the same. Both girls up front looked back, confusion laced into all of them. "They stopped too."

Ally turned her head slightly towards Lydia, meeting eyes with Marley as the girl turned her head back to focus on her friends. "Why would they stop too?"

"It's Stiles and Scott. Do you really wanna try applying logic to those two?" Marley looked back again, chuckling at Lydia's words.

Not even a moment later, her ears picked up on something running. It was moving fast, hooves pressing against asphalt as legs pushed to speed up. She looked forward just as the two others screamed, a deer bursting through the windshield. A shard of glass shot out, into Marley's cheek, pain radiating from the cut.

All three girls jumped out, panic moving through their bodies. Marley could smell the stench of terror, clinging to every body inside the car, including the deer. Curls whipped through the air as the girl turned her head, anxiety ripping through her. She pulled the shard of glass from her cheekbone, a gasp following the action.

"Are you all okay?" The boys, both frightened from the screaming, ran up to them, grabbing the human and the banshee as they did. Scott gave Marley a quick look, asking if she was alright. She nodded in response.

Lydia grabbed onto Stiles' arm as he rushed to her. "It came out of nowhere."

The boy did a check over her body, searching for any cuts or scrapes from the glass. It was a miracle the werewolf was the only one to get hurt from the flying shards. "Are you hurt?"

"It ran right into us," she said, words shaking.

"Are you okay?" This time it was Scott,  his hands hovering above Allison, almost too scared to touch the girl he's kept himself from texting all summer.

She nodded, her heartbeat slowing down. "I'm okay."

"Well, I'm not okay!" Lydia screeched, a bewildered look stuck in her eyes. She exhaled, sounding almost out of breath. "I am totally freaking out. How the hell did it just run into us?" While she turned back to the boy full of adoration, Marley followed Scott to where the deer laid in the windshield, blood painting its coat. "I saw it's eyes right before it hit us. It was like it— it was like it was crazy."

"No, it was scared." Scott put a hand to the creatures neck, feeling its emotions through the contact. "Actually... terrified."

word count: 2207

a/n

AN UPDATE, FINALLY.
i got some writing inspo so i thought i'd work on my baby and i'm so glad i did

tell me what you think <3
- andy