CHAPTER 175

Tristan's eyes fluttered open, followed by the most satisfying morning yawn he's ever had, before pulling himself off the otherwise empty bed.

"She's still at it?" He groaned irritably. What a way to ruin the morning. 'This has to be the record for the fastest ruined morning.'

He draped a robe over his body but left it open as he went outside to the backyard of their house where he found a blood-mouthed Malia and three dead animals by her feet.

"You've got to make this stop at some point, y'know." He closed the distance between them and wiped off the blood on her mouth, but not before tasting it. "Hmm, fresh deer… along with something else. Fox?"

There were no foxes on the ground so maybe she threw it away after killing the poor animal.

He could still feel the feral air around her, telling him that she wasn't in a stable emotional state. He ran his hand through her hair for a while and that managed to sooth her enough that she wasn't as tight-lipped as before.

"It feels as if I'm stuffed full that sometimes it feels like I have to force myself to breathe. It's annoying." She grumbled her indignation into his chest while silently enjoying his finger running through her hair. "It happened again this morning so I tried to vent by hunting, but you can probably tell how much success I had from it."

Tristan let out a wry smile as he felt Malia's annoyance bubbling up the more she spoke, making him double his efforts in soothing her.

The issue of her needing to vent only arose after she killed one of the twin Alphas, Ethan, in her feral state; which was only one of the complications that came from her supposedly Alpha status. 'Supposedly' because they weren't even sure if she was a complete Alpha.

The first issue came from two fronts; her supernatural heritage and the way the twins became Alphas.

Werecoyotes were rare enough already that most supernaturals never saw one, or have even heard about it, so there was little they could do on that front. The second one too was just as tricky, if not more, as the first one and Scott McCall being the one who told them what little he knew about the twins during his time with the Alphas; mostly what they told him about their reasons and motivations for joining Deucalion.

What they hypothesized as a probable cause for Malia's Alpha status came from the fact that the twins' ability to merge together was something they've had ever since they were bitten by their former Alpha.

Long story short, to join Deucalion's pack with the requisite Alpha status, they killed off their pack along with its Alpha in their merged state, which was the loophole that granted them both their Alpha status.

So one of the questions concerning Malia was whether she inherited the whole thing, or was it simply half part of a whole.

"I can try to help." Tristan offered, to which Malia wiggled in an attempt to shrug.

"Sex definitely helps, but it's not like it's a usable solution at any time or place."

Tristan hummed in agreement while internally sighing in relief that he managed to get her out of her funk. Finally out of the danger zone, he could now safely address the three dead animals in their backyard.

"We can't finish all these, you know that right?" He told her but only got a complaining groan in response. "Obviously you'll be the one preparing them, better yet since you need the exercise to vent."

A guttural groan that showed just how much she appreciated his patronizing comment escaped her lips before she pushed him away and stomped her way inside the house.

Tristan looked at the dead animals and frowned slightly upon remembering a specific memory of a few mornings ago.

...

[Flashback]

Tristan dragged himself towards Brett and Malia after killing Jennifer and assessed how injured they were – which was quite critical – and drew out a fist-sized glob of blood, divided it into two, and sent it into their body through their wounds.

He was too lazy to get up so he just laid down near the blood and gore, and controlled three smaller globs of blood towards McCall, Lori and Chris, who was just standing there watching him the entire time.

"It'll help with your wounds." He said and practically stabbed the blood needle into the man, causing him to hiss in pain. "That's for trying to kill me."

He didn't go back to Satomi because he wasn't sensing any fight happening, and the air of intense emotion in that area started dissipating, confirming that the fighting was over.

He remained there until it was time to leave and get the others to a safe place to heal.

It wasn't until a few hours later that Chris Argent called and said that someone had taken away the bodies of the dead twins by the time his men arrived to take them to be cremated and deposited in their morgue, except that they left Jennifer's behind.

They figured it might be Deucalion but the man didn't seem the type for any deep emotions for his pack.

Even when Tristan went there to see if he could pick up a trail scent, all he could tell was that someone did take them away but nothing else from that. Not a scent or any lingering emotion; something he knew Deucalion was capable of doing yet still doubted that it was the man who took the bodies.

[Flashback ends]

…..

"One thing at a time." Tristan shook his head and went inside.

He had barely taken off the bloodied robe when he heard someone entering the house and didn't even need any of his senses to tell him that the criminally early visitor was none other than Boyd because the dark teen announced his presence as soon as he stepped through the door.

"Ayo, Tristan, what's up with dead animals in the back?"

Tristan sighed as he threw the robe into the laundry basket before going down to the living room to meet Boyd. "Malia went hunting this morning."

"Oh, yeah." Boyd mentally bonked himself for not thinking that. "I think it's weird that I feel like something like that should be obvious."

Tristan snorted at the gross understatement of what Boyd just said.

He no longer ignored Boyd when it came to talking about the supernatural world after that night. It also seemed like Boyd enjoyed the small adventure he went on with Stiles and Tierney to look for Allison and Scott's mothers. Hopefully someone will soon tell him that this wasn't some live action Scooby Doo reenactment or some bestseller detective thriller.

As for the Sheriff that escaped with Allison, he had held her back and tried getting some answers from her since what he saw that night was something straight out of a fantasy book.

Allison didn't have to tell him anything as his son basically spilled out everything he knew, so yeah, now the Sheriff of Beacon Hills is aware of the supernatural.

No one has seen Deucalion since that night, and honestly, Tristan was more than happy if it could remain that way.

As for Lydia, she was back to being alright after the mothers were saved so that was a huge relief for her.

Among the circle of his closest friends, Malia was the only one currently with some type of complications.

Yes, she had gained the Alpha spark upon killing Ethan, but for some reason her eyes kept flickering between red and blue. One minute she has the red eyes of Alpha and at another time are her luminescent blue beta eyes.

It caused a headache and two any time Tristan thought about it, but unfortunately for him this wasn't one of those things he'd ignore and couldn't be bothered by.

"Eagle One to Leech, do you copy?"

"Uh, what was that?" Tristan asked confusedly as Boyd brought him back from the maze that was his head.

"I was asking if you want anything from the fridge." Boyd said while surveying the fridge for his options on things he could chow on.

"I think there's a bottle of blood in the last compartment." Tristan said, before rolling his eyes the next second away from Boyd's view and caught the bottle Boyd threw at him.

"Nice reflexes." Boyd praised dryly. "Remind me again why you still sometimes lose the ball in lacrosse when you can do that?"

"One being for the obvious reasons. As for the second, I'd rather not have Coach tell the whole team to pass me every ball to score. And we both know he isn't above doing something so shameless if it means he'll be decorating his office with another state championship trophy."

Boyd nodded with a semi-serious frown on his face upon realizing that Tristan was mostly right. "Yeah, good thinking there."

"Chop chop boys. Go get changed and get your ass out back." Malia announced as she came out of their room.

"… Should I even ask why?" Boyd asked.

Malia smiled harmlessly while waving her hand at him not to worry. "Well those animals aren't going to butcher themselves, you know."

And just like that the holidays quickly rolled by and out as quickly as it came.

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