◤ chapter ten: ❛ to be somebody ❜ ◢

✧

THE THOUGHT OF GOING TO HIS OWN HOTEL ROOM WITH AIDEN DIDN'T SOUND APPEALING, AND STAYING WITH SCOTT AND STILES DIDN'T SOUND MUCH BETTER. Dropping off towels for Scott, though he found the room empty when he went in, he followed Lydia to her and Allison's room. Every little movement, howling wind, or thumps caused him to flinch, this faint humming in his ears and song on his lips full of something ashy.

         Lydia didn't question it – wanting the company herself and wrapping her arm around his as they walked. She said she felt some type of dread in her stomach that didn't feel natural, which didn't ease his worries at all. Cooper was a siren; he found himself in tune with all songs, even this violent jazz, and Lydia had driven herself to the sight of a dead body without even realizing. He didn't think that was a good pair at all.

         Allison looked frazzled when they entered, wide-eyed and holding onto herself as if to keep herself from being violated. "I'm rooming with Aiden, and trying to avoid him," Cooper offered as an explanation when Allison turned questioning eyes on him, after which she only nodded.

         Quick to lay down the towels, Lydia turned to Allison and spilled about the creepy receptionist and the sign of suicide numbers. Cooper added in what he felt necessary, not that there was much to add, until Allison frowned and asked for clarification, "One hundred and ninety-eight?"

         "Yes, and we're talking forty years. On average, that's...four-point-nine-five a year, which is...actually expected," Lydia confirmed before sighing, "But who commemorates that with a framed number? Who does that? Who?'

         "Sickos," Cooper commented.

         "...All suicides?" Allison asked.

         "Yes – hanging, throat-cutting, pill-popping, both-barrels-of-a-shotgun-in-the-mouth suicides."

         "I mean, it's not unheard of for people to go to a motel to kill themselves, but so many people? At the same place in the middle of nowhere? It feels...wrong to me," Cooper added, his tongue suddenly feeling coated with a thick taste of jazz.

         Lydia turned away from them, ears searching for something Cooper couldn't hear, eyes almost mystified before whispering, "Did you guys hear that?"

         "Hear what?" Allison frowned.

         "Oh, my God, oh, my God –" the strawberry blonde became ghastly pale, life draining from her face.

         "Lydia?"

         Cooper stood up, standing in front her and placing his hands on her shoulders. "Lydia? You alright?"

         "Did you guys hear that?" Lydia asked again.

         "Hear what?"

         "The two people in the other room –" finally, the girl looked at Cooper, horrified, "They shot each other!"

         She tugged herself free from Cooper, rushing out of the room with the two others following her. "Lydia..."

         "Lydia, what are you doing?"

         "Hello?" Lydia banged on the door before asking again, then twisting the knob anyway and barging in to find – nothing. To find nothing in the room.

         "It had to be right here," Lydia defeatedly whimpered, "It was a girl and a guy, and, I mean, they sounded younger, but...they were here."

         Cooper tugged Lydia out of the room, closing the door and looking around at the motel as Allison comforted her. "I believe you. After everything we've been through, I believe you."

         "Let's get back inside," he suggested. The lyrics on his tongue felt lighter, but the humming in his ears only got stronger, and he felt if he was any weaker, the humming would drown him.

         Allison gently pushed Lydia to sit on her bed, and Cooper stood near the door with his arms crossed. He looked out the window every once and again, though he didn't know what he was searching for, only that he needed to. A song in his ears urged him, feeling akin to the one that Julia feared to teach him.

         There were a few moments of silence before Lydia looked around at them, gaining her bearings back with her eyes now locked in the present. "You know, there is something seriously wrong with this place," she mused before shaking her head and standing up, "Allison, Cooper? We need to leave."

         "But there were suicides, not murders, and it's not like this place is haunted, right?" Allison shook her head.

         "Maybe it is?" Lydia shot back.

         Cooper sighed. "I'm not particularly sold on the idea of ghosts and demons, but right now, there's something going on here and I'm willing to call it haunted. I don't like it here either. It's like – it's like there's a song of something sick and twisted here."

         Lydia frowned at Cooper's metaphor, but Allison's eyes widened in alarm. She at least had some understanding of his abilities, enough to know that he was in tune with something like this.

         "You know, I bet that couple made their suicide pact in that very room!" Lydia shook off Cooper's words after a moment, "Maybe that's why they're renovating – maybe they've been scraping brain matter off the wood paneling."

         Allison's eyes hesitantly met Cooper's. "Maybe we should find out."

         "I really hate that we're the people in the horror film looking for clues, because those people never survive, but sure. Let's be the Scooby-Doo gang and solve the mystery," Cooper rolled his eyes, but followed the two girls out of their room.

         They passed by a vending machine with broken glass, and frowned at the sight. Something broke into it, that was clear, but it wasn't the sight but the song. It was strong, and alluring, and again he felt a connection to it in a way he didn't like.

         Lydia entered the reception office first, going to the counter before sighing. She rang the bell and Cooper leaned against the counter as they waited. Moments passed – too many, and Lydia sighed. "Well, there goes that..."

         "Didn't you say the sign said one-ninety-eight?" Allison voiced.

         Cooper frowned, turning to look at the sign, blinking when the numbers were different from before. "It was one-ninety eight. I swear to God it was one-ninety-eight. Right, Cooper?"

         Her sharp eyes turned to him, and he traded his own confused features to nod. "Yeah," he shakily agreed.

         "Okay, what does that mean? That there's been three more suicides?" Allison asked, looking at the 201 now etched into the sign.

         "Or three more are about to happen..." Lydia muttered.

         "It's been calling out," Cooper murmured, "Singing someone to death."

         "Cooper, what are you talking about?" Lydia reached out and he snapped his head towards them.

         He blinked a few times, noticing the concern laced on Allison's features. "Like – Like another...?"

         She didn't finish the sentence, but he understand the implication. Like another siren. But no – this wasn't right. It was almost right; it was a song, but not one. No one was singing, there was no exact melody, no ringing in the ears, no allure. It was just a presence here, something more, affecting those susceptible, but it couldn't be everyone. He wasn't pulled under, and neither were Allison and Lydia.

         At least, well, he didn't think he was pulled under, even though he could feel it tugging his ears, wanting him to listen. To be pulled under, or to join in...?

         "No," he answered, "No. This is different. It feels...targeted. We should find Scott and Stiles."

✧

         "THE LAST TIME I saw Scott act like that was during a full moon," Allison relayed to the group how Scott visited her in the shower acting strange once they got to Stiles, who was wandering around the motel looking for Scott like the rest of them.

         Cooper frowned. He didn't quite like the thought of Scott going to visiting Allison like that – mostly because that was a complete violation and even he knew that opening the shower curtain on someone was just not right, but also something else. Something warmer in his gut that he couldn't quite place.

         "He said his eyes were red," Cooper voiced, the memory sparking in his mind as he thought of the boy, looking up at the group, "Earlier Scott said his eyes were red, but they weren't, so I told him to get in the shower and I would bring back a towel."

         "Yeah...he was definitely a little off with me, too," Stiles nodded, "But actually, it was Boyd who was really off – I watched him put his fist through the vending machine."

         "The one downstairs? By the receptionist office?" Cooper stared at Stiles, who slowly nodded, opening his mouth before he continued, "It sounded like death right there. It sounded corrupted."

         "See? It is the motel!" Lydia cried, "Either we need to get out of here right now, or...someone needs to learn how to do an exorcism ASAP, before the werewolves go crazy and kill us."

         "Okay, just hold on, alright?" Stile placed a hand up in front of Lydia shaking his head, "What if it's not just the motel? The number in the office went up by three, right?"

         Allison straightened. "You mean, like three sacrifices?"

         "What if this time, it's three werewolves?"

         "Scott, Isaac, and Boyd..."

         "Maybe we were meant to come here."

         "Exactly!" Lydia exclaimed, becoming hysteric, "So, can we get the hell out of here now? Please?"

         "Wait, hang on. Let me see this..." Stiles went to the bedside table of his bed, opening up the drawer and bringing out the bible, flipping through it until he reached the newspaper clippings. "Twenty-eight-year-old man hangs himself at the infamous Glen Capri," he read aloud.

         "Oh, no...look at these two. They both mention room two-seventeen. These are probably all the suicides that happened in this room," Lydia brought up, looking at clippings of her own.

         "So, if everyone room has a bible..."

         "There could be articles in all the rooms."

         Stiles sighed. "That's a beautiful thing. Most places leave a mint under the pillow – this one leaves a record of all the horrible deaths that occurred."

         "What if the room next door has the one about the couple?" Lydia looked between Allison and Cooper. She moved to the door first, getting next door, twisting the knob, only for nothing to happen. "No, that wasn't locked before..."

         "Forget it. We need to get Scott, Isaac, and Boyd out of here," Allison shook her head.

         His ears started to ring before a loud mechanical noise broke through – no, not through, but went along with the chorus. "I'm not the only one who heard that, am I?" Lydia whispered.

         "It sounds like someone turned the handsaw on," Allison said.

         "Handsaw?" Stiles repeated before pushing all of his weight on the door, forcing it to open when they saw Ethan on the other side, bringing a handsaw to his chest.

         Cooper and Stiles rushed forward, wrestling the werewolf. Physically, they were no match, which propelled Cooper to form his lips into a whistle and to stare at Ethan, watching as he staggered, dropping the handsaw right as it turned off. Cooper stopped as soon as blood began to trickle down his ears, stepping away only to start again when Ethan brought out his claws onto his chest.

         Ethan yelled as Cooper focused in, whistling a tune that brought him staggering until he fell, burning his hand and falling to the ground. He groaned at the burn, but somewhere in that fray his eyes became trained on them and he looked around with confused eyes. "What just happened?" he asked, blinking before standing up and walking away.

         Stiles went after him. Asking what had happened but Ethan shook him off aggressively. "Didn't you hear what I just said? I don't know how I got there, or what I was doing."

         "Okay, you could be a little more helpful, you know? We did just save your life."

         "And you probably shouldn't have," Ethan snapped, standing around for a moment before walking away again, this time they let him go.

         "What now?" Lydia was the first to ask once he was gone.

         "I'll find Scott – you guys grab Isaac and Boyd. The best thing we can do is get them out of this place," Allison ordered. She shared a pointed look with Stiles before turning that same gaze to Lydia.

         "What?" the girl asked, "Why are you looking at me like that?"

         "Oh no," Stiles began to stumble.

         Lydia lowered his head and stepped forward, "Stiles..."

         The boy sighed, caving in, "Alright, Lydia. I didn't want to say anything, but this? Everything we're going through? We've been through something like this before."

         "What do you mean? When?" she asked and Cooper found himself looking forward to the answer as well. He had never experienced something like this himself.

         "Your birthday party...the night you poisoned everyone with wolfsbane," Stiles answered.

         As Allison left to find Scott, Stiles went off chasing after Lydia who looked decidedly angry at the implication that she was murdering everyone with Cooper trailing after them.

         "Lydia, I'm sorry, okay? Look, I didn't mean that you're trying to kill people, okay? I just...I just meant that, maybe...maybe you're somehow involved in getting people to kill themselves, you know?" Cooper elbowed him for that justification, he only yelped before continuing, "Which, now that I say that out loud, it just sounds really terrible, so I'm just going to stop talking..."

         She went still then. "Do you hear that?"

         "What?"

         "This happened before. She heard a couple shooting themselves," Cooper told him as his own ears were blasted with an enchanting song, incredibly overpowering as if it was almost complete.

         Stiles looked alarmed at the confession before training his eyes on the girl. "Lydia, what do you hear?"

         "A baby crying..." she whispered, "I hear...I hear water running. She's drowning the baby! Someone's drowning!"

         At the declaration, there was silence in his head. No song – no melody, no chorus, no ending – it was done.

         And then it started back. Slowly, building and building, rising like crashing waves, holding him under, but begging him to come closer. He started to run. His senses attuned to the song, he began to follow it, rushing upstairs of the motel and throwing open the door to a room, seeing through the doorway of the bathroom Boyd's figure in the bathtub drowning.

         He rushed forward, being passed by Stiles – oh, he didn't know Stiles was there – crouching at the end of the tub.

         "He blocked it. He blocked the drain with something, I can't get to it!" Stiles panickily yelled.

         "What do we do?"

         "Help me," Stiles began trying to get the safe that Boyd placed on his chest off. Cooper tugged on it but it didn't budge.

         "Cooper?"

         "What am I supposed to do, Lydia?" he snapped, "I can't do anything if he can't hear me."

         "Is he dead?" she asked, not even registering his words, "How long can a werewolf stay underwater?"

         "You think I know that?"

         "Wait a sec – the heater. Heater," Stiles looked at them, "Ethan came out of it when he touched the heater."

         "What?"

         "It's heat – heat, fire...heat does it, alright? We need something...we need fire," Stiles urged.

         "He's underwater," Cooper pointed out.

         "Yeah, I'm aware of that," Stiles irritably answered.

         "Wait, wait – the bus! On the bus, they'll have emergency road flares. They have their own oxidizers. they can burn underwater," Lydia remembered.

         "Are you serious?"

         "Yes! Go!" she impatiently urged Stiles, who went running out the door to the bus.

         It felt like an eternity had passed before he returned, rushing like a madman holding two flares. "I got 'em. What do I do? How do I do this?"

         "The cap – it's like a match. The cap's a match."

         Stiles tried to light it, taking a few attempts, before it began to spark. He ran to the edge of the tub next, bringing the flare down to Boyd's chest and they watched as his eyes widened in yellow rage, fangs bared as he roared, lifting himself and the safe out of the tub.

         Once he was out and they moved from the bathroom, they heard whimpering under one of the beds. Reaching down, Cooper crouched to see Isaac, which prompted Stiles to take the other flare he brought and burn Isaac with it to wake up.

         With two of the three werewolves free, they moved out of the room, running into Allison who looked less than pleased. "I can't find Scott anywhere."

         "It's happening to him, too, isn't it?"

         "It has to be," Lydia nodded, "Didn't you say there was another flare on the bus."

         Stiles nodded. "Yeah, I'll get it."

         They moved downstairs, only to find Scott near the bus, drenched in gasoline with the last flare in his hand. He looked like he had been crying, so small and defeated.

         "Scott...?" Allison took the first hesitant step forward, but he didn't respond, much less look at her.

         "There's no hope," he finally spoke after another beat of silence.

         Cooper took the next step forward. "Scott, yes there is. There's always hope," he projected his aura onto the wolf, hoping to get through and influence him, but the song of death penetrated his ears, overpowering him. "Scott, let's talk this out, please," he tried again, his voice soft and sweet, and he sang for Scott to slump, but he didn't.

         "Not for me...not for Derek..." he continued.

         "Derek wasn't your fault. You know Derek wasn't your fault," Allison told him.

         "Every time I try to fight back. It just gets worse. People keep getting hurt. People keep getting killed," Scott continued, as if barely processing their words.

         "Scott, listen to me, okay? This isn't you, alright? This is someone inside your heard, telling you to do this. Okay? Now –"

         "What if it isn't? What if it's just me? What if doing this is actually the best thing that I could do for everyone else? It all started that night – the night I got bitten. You remember the way it was before that? You and me, we were...we were...we were nothing. We weren't popular. We weren't good at lacrosse. We weren't important. We were no one. Maybe I should just be no one again – no one at all."

         Stiles began to approach him. "Scott, just listen to me, okay? You're not no one. Okay? You're someone. You're – Scott, you're my best friend. Okay? And I need you. Scott, you're my brother, alright? So...So, if you're gonna do this, then..." he took the flare from Scott's hand, "I think you're just gonna have to take me with you, then. Alright?"

         He threw the flare away from them, it sparked and began a small fire in a pool of the gasoline. Cooper could hear Lydia screaming, but it felt like a distant dream. He watched her rush forward, tackling the two to the ground as Cooper and Allison tumbled with them.

         Eventually, they got up, and Stiles hugged Scott for a long time, unbale to let him go before parting. Eventually, they went back to their rooms, gathering their things and heading to the bus. The Glen Capri was not a motel they wanted to spend the night in, not anymore, not after this. The other wolves joined them, not that Cooper could blame them.

         Cooper took a seat near the window, thinking he'd sit alone while the others paired before the seat dipped and he watched Scott sit down. "I hope you don't mind," the werewolf said.

         "I don't," he said automatically, not taking the time to think through his response. He cursed himself mentally for it, but Scott looked pleased, and after the night they'd been having, he was willing to let the boy have it.

         "Thank you," Scott whispered.

         He shook his head. "I didn't do anything."

         "You tried. I could – I could feel your influence, it almost worked," Scott protested.

         He swallowed. If Stiles hadn't gotten close enough, if Stiles hadn't taken away that flare..."But it didn't."

         There was a beat of silence.

         "I'm glad you're okay," he said after, "You really scared me. You scared everyone."

         Scott didn't say anything, only sucked in a breath and looked forward. Cooper followed suit. He didn't know how to look at Scott right now. The night had frightened him, and while there was no song crescendoing in his head, he still didn't feel at peace.

         "I don't know what it was. I don't think anyone knows, but it felt – it felt like all my fears had come to life, and the best course of action was to...well..." he trailed off for a moment before going on, "I don't think that now."

         "Good," he nodded, "Scott, I don't know exactly what happened after you got bit, but you're right. Everything did change for you. You're also wrong. It wouldn't be better for you to be nothing, because I don't think I could handle becoming a siren without you helping me. You need to be somebody."

         God, where did that even come from? He didn't know, and it felt utterly strange in his throat and brain, like spiders crawling on his skin. He hated that he said it. It felt unnatural and raw, too vulnerable to be shared, but it was already out and Scott's eyes looked so appreciative. His cheeks tinted pink and eyes shining just a little bit more than before, and honestly, his gut felt light and twisting, and he didn't understand the feeling, but he did understand that he liked it.

         "I hope you don't mind if I use you as a pillow again," Cooper said before anything else raw came out of his mouth, or before Scott shared something personal as well. He didn't think he would be able to handle it.

         Scott laughed lightly. "As long as I can do the same."

         Everyone quieted down, and Cooper felt exhaustion creep over him. It had been a long day – too long of a day. First, Scott was slowly bleeding out before he refused to let his boy heal, and then he ended the day trying to kill himself. The air felt light in here, and he felt safer than inside the hotel, so he let himself fall, enjoying the warmth of Scott's shoulder.

         (And in the morning, if Coach Finstock caught them all, it didn't matter. They were safe in the bus, and sleep had been easier to keep than Cooper anticipated.)

         (And if Lydia had figured out where the wolfsbane had come from, it was a small victory, but Cooper still cursed that they hadn't found it sooner. But it didn't matter anymore as the bus reared to life and they started there way back to Beacon Hills.)