Don't Make it Personal AA/TW

Crux

CHAPTER 12- Crux

—-Location: Hotel room. Paris, France.—Date: Aug 24th — Time: 2300 hrs—-

Storms have always been an interesting subject. The way the trees whip and the ground shakes. The mountains hidden in slick fog as a torrential downpour rattles the earth with a force mirroring unprecedented rage.

Some things in life come about quickly, almost without warning. The phrase "it happened so fast" repeated again and again like a safety net. It's easier to reconcile with something you didn't see coming rather then admit that you've been feeling the warning signs for days.

Maybe it was a primal instinct thing. A sort of explanation for the absolute trepidation the pack was facing. The way dogs can sense sense the change in barometric pressure that comes with storms, causing them to bark, coddle, or hide in an attempt to seek shelter. That's what Derek would like to believe anyway.

Tik Tok

"Lydia what phrase did you hear again?" Liam rubbed his eyes, dispelling the blue light radiating from his laptop screen.

It had been hours since the pack's encounter with Micheal's dismembered corpse and the smell of blood still clung to their delicate nostrils like a novelty air freshener. Having exacerbated every remaining lead, the disheveled group decided that their best course of action was to retreat back to the hotel.

Tensely spread within its egg shell walls, the pack aimlessly scoured the internet for the faintest hint of a clue.

"'Ana la tatawaqaf lilmawt. Walakun aismi lm yaeud yeysh. Min 'ana?"

Tik Tok

Derek couldn't help but concentrate on the large clock that hung solemnly on the opposite wall. With every passing second the pit in his stomach expanded. The sky began to darken into a misty grey as fallen rain drops chattered off the windows and echoed through the old fashioned space like a hollow drum.

Liam straightened his hunched back and shifted his attention towards the Sheriff. "Noah, Didn't you say it sounded middle eastern?"

"I think so. It sounded a bit like-"

"It's Arabic." Lydia interrupted in her usual sharp but to the point tone.

Derek should be listening to the conversation, trying to find some sort of solution but it all seemed so irrelevant. The only thing that mattered was the little hand on the clock that jerked forward; Almost out of sync with the reality they were facing.

Closing her own laptop Malia let out a huff. "Of course you would know that."

"I know everything."

The sound of the room began to mumble together as the clock's tiny clicks crescendoed off the walls and forcefully propelled into Derek's eardrums. His breathing faltered.

"Then why don't you just translate it for us then?"

"I'm not a machine, Malia."

"Then I guess you don't know everything."

"Ok this is getting ridiculous. What is your problem with me."

"My problem is that you-."

Every event from the past day bombarded him. He looked down to count his fingers. Something that's become a normal occurrence for him in the past 10 years. With an abrupt start, Derek shot from the bed and bolted to the clock on the wall. He roughly grabbed its round edges with both hands and slammed the timepiece onto the floor with a loud SMASH. The glass burrowed its way into the rough carpet as the pack looked up with a collective jump...

"I'm not paying for that." Malia mumbled as she studied Derek's chest as it heaved in and out.

"Derek...?" Noah moved forward like a trained police officer rather than a friend. His hands out in front of him in a non-threatening gesture. "You okay?"

Every eye in the room was boring into him with pitied expressions. It was too much. He was the one who was supposed to be holding it together. Malia's husband was missing, Noah's second son, The pack's alpha. The worst part about his outburst was that it wasn't even about Scott. No, it was about the couple from the apartment. The woman who had enigmatically drawled out his name. Derek. It was the man who sent shivers down his spine. The gun that still hid, tucked behind the waistband of his jeans and smothered in his henley.

The pack had no clue. It was almost deceitful.

Trying to hide the scent of guilt that he knew was making its way around the room, he settled with the most plausible excuse.

"It was loud..."

"I..." Lydia began before noticing that the wolf wasn't too pleased with the sudden attention he was receiving. Hoping to give him the peace of mind Derek knew he didn't deserve, she changed the subject. "Why don't we just use google translate?"

"Uhhh, can you type in Arabic?" Liam contended.

"Am I the only person with a brain here?" She mumbled to herself as she snatched Liam's computer. Quickly bringing up google with an unmatched speed that could rival the best stenographers, she pressed the microphone button and began to speak. "Ana la tatawaqaf lilmawt. Walakun aismi lm yaeud yeysh. Min 'ana."

A look of what only could be described as the blonde's brand of angry confusion lit up her features. "This must be wrong." She repeated the words again.

The pack gathered closer hoping to catch a glimpse of the translation. "What? what does it say?"

"This doesn't make any sense.."

Derek softly took the computer from Lydia's tense hands, letting her fingers brush against his in unsaid reassurance. As he read the elusive text over and over again, thunder began to growl in the distance.

"Derek?" Noah asked hoping for more of a response out of the pseudo-alpha. But as luck goes, he seemed to be stuck in the same confused trance as Lydia. "Jesus Christ you guys are going to give me a heart attack...Lydia! What is it?"

"It's..-"

"I do not stop for death, but my name no longer lives, Who am I?" Derek knew what his words implied. The weight a riddle held for the group. It made the pack regress with a strong internal recoil.

It made him think of Stiles.

"It's a riddle? You've got to be joking..."

"Yes Malia, I just told a bunch of angry ghosts to scream at me in Arabic as a prank." Lydia replied in a condescending tone.

"Ghosts?" Malia scoffed throwing her hands up in annoyance.

"I don't know!.... The voices seemed so violent."

"Lydia.. what else?" Noah whispered.

"They also seemed scared.."

Once again silence filled the room. the lingering dread catching in their throats making their hearts beat one beat too fast.

The tone in which she said her pinched words immediately put the pack on edge. It was as if the banshee was able to transfer her powers onto the group for just long enough for them to understand it's dire implication. It wasn't another nogitsune, or some random apparition playing a cruel joke. It was a warning. One they couldn't quite decipher.

BRIIING

"AHH" Liam screamed like a prepubescent high-school girl discovering a pimple before prom. He looked over to Malia who was hastily pulling her phone out of her back pocket. "Ahem...- He cleared his throat with a slight voice crack - Who is it?"

"It's an unknown number." She replied before pressing the accept button. "What." she huffed with annoyance. At of all the times to get a spam call this would have to be ranked the worst.

The phone crackled as the voice on the other side let out a relieved whisper "Malia..."