𝑅𝐸𝑄𝑈𝐼𝐸𝑀 - M.R.

[REBIRTH]

Stiles didn't consider himself a weak man, despite what the pack seemed to believe. He'd go as far as to say he's handled death and trauma pretty well his whole life.

He doesn't mean to brag, but he's sure not everyone would've been able to cope with their best friend becoming a werewolf and trying to kill him, more than once.

Or his mother dying when he was merely a child, not recognising him for months beforehand. That kind of thing takes a toll on a person, and he was good at not showing it.

Yes, he was a lone human in a pack of weres, in a town where it seems normal humans were less likely to come by than druids or even werecoyotes, but he had his smarts, he knew that.

Sure he wasn't the fittest, strictly speaking, and he couldn't run very far or fight very well but he was Stiles, he was the glue, the researcher, the one they all underestimated time and time again.

He was the one with the plans and the stellar intuition, even if no one listened to him.

But being possessed? Not even Stiles Stilinski could recover from that, not completely, how could he?

The nightmares, the blood on his hands that just wouldn't wash off, but mostly the pity. The all-encompassing, heart-wrenching pity from anyone who knew.

Everyone who thought they understood.

As if they had any idea what it was like to be trapped inside your head, not understanding a single thought flowing through it as your own.

Being stuck in your mind while not recognising it at all.

As if they knew what it was like to cause chaos, strife and pain and enjoy every last bit, because it felt so, so good. 

There's this crushing guilt he'd never escape from that washed over him every time he looked at Scott's face, because he's stolen his first love from him - and he'd enjoyed it.

He'd tell himself it wasn't his enjoyment he was feeling, not his pleasure but the nogitsune's, that the ecstasy of the monster inside of him didn't reflect who he was.

But what if it did? Does?

And so Stiles couldn't look at the pack anymore, couldn't bare them looking at him. Every broken glance forcing the black hole in him open wider and wider.

Because when the void inside him was torn out it left an entirely new type of void in its wake.

From that day on Stiles Stilinski knew that he'd never really be Stiles Stilinski again.

And then, Donovan.

He'll never forget the utter betrayal on Scott's face when he looked at him - like he was the monster despite Stiles knowing he was all too human.

Although maybe he was, because as he looked at the thick stings of mercury and blood slipping from the gaping wound in the Chimera's chest, the first thing he felt was satisfaction.

Sure, it was followed almost instantly by a gut-wrenching horror, the kind that had him heaving and retching every time he walked past the library for weeks afterwards.

But killing him had felt good before the panic took over, and he thinks maybe Scott saw that in him way back then.

It doesn't matter, what matters is that his best friend didn't believe him, didn't trust him, chose Theo.

The backstabbing little- well, there's no need to go into detail on all the terrible things he's uttered while cursing out that boy in the silence of his own room.