Morningstar

19

Luci rested her back against Scott's bed as she, Scott and Stiles listened to the tape. Stiles pressed play, and they hear a male voice. "After entering the IP address, you will be connected through a Darknet portal to an untraceable bank. Once logged in, enter your account number to receive wire transfers. The IP address will deactivate with each transfer. You will be assigned a new IP address if you choose to continue down the list. Remember, visual confirmation is always required for payment."

"Either of you ever made a wire transfer?" Stiles questioned.

Scott shook his head. "Never had enough money."

"No reason to," Luci replied. "Maze handles all that."

Stiles asked, "So you didn't understand a word of that either? Who's Maze?"

Luci smiled. "Mazikeen. One of my most loyal."

Scott frowned. "I don't understand any of this. Why would someone use all this money just to kill us?"

"Someone wants you two dead, dude. Badly. But apparently killing Luci will be hard." Scott slid the bag of money under the bed. "Whoa, whoa, what are you doing?"

"It's late," Scott replied. "We've got PSATs in the morning."

Stiles shook his head. "No, I meant the money. $500,000. You know how much money that is?"

"It's $500,000..."

Luci raised a brow. "Which is also half a million. What are you going to do with it? Hide it under your bed and hope your mom doesn't find it?"

He turned to her. "I have to talk to Derek. The money's his."

"You mean his and Peter's," Stiles corrected.

"What does that mean?"

"Just be careful."

"You don't think we should tell Derek?"

Stiles stood and looked out the window. "No. No." He sighed. "No, of course we have to tell him. I'm just... I'm just saying, some of that money's Peter's, right?" He turned away from them.

"Yeah."

"Right? Peter. Homicidal killer? Remember? You want to give $500,000 to him."

Scott frowned. "So we should give Derek his money back. But not Peter?"

"I didn't say that," Stiles said.

"Stiles, we don't all speak your language," Luci said.

They heard something and the boys panicked. Scott stood, trying to look like he wasn't doing anything. The door opened and Malia entered. "We found Satomi's pack. Derek and I. But they're dead."

"All of them?" Scott asked with a frown.

"All the ones we found."

"Then where's Derek?" Stiles wondered.

---

The teens met up with Kira and Malia and the former of the newcomers asked, "Where's Lydia?"

"She took it freshman year," Stiles replied.

Malia spoke in a hopeful tone. "Does that mean I could have taken it some other time?"

Scott gave her a smile. "Malia, you studied harder for this than any of us."

"Doesn't mean I'm gonna do good."

"Well..." Stiles corrected.

"Well, what?"

"It's do well. Not good."

Malia frowned. "Oh, God. Okay, okay."

"You're doing this because while we're trying not to die, we still need to live. If I survive high school, I'd like to go to college. A good college," Scott told them.