CHAPTER 195

"Want to talk about it?" Stiles and Scott were both sitting on his bed in his room but the latter had his pillows covering his face.

Scott grumbled a no, a response that made Stiles stare stolidly at him. He yanked the pillows from Scott's face and started pulling him off the bed and towards the bathroom.

"Stiles stop." Scott's voice sounded extremely frustrated but Stiles paid no mind to it and just pushed him into the bathroom.

"Seriously, I don't get why you're so down. You were possessed so I don't think anyone actually blames you."

Scott stared expressionlessly at him and only muttered one word. "Malia."

Stiles did a double take and chuckled sheepishly. "She did leave you half dead, but hey… half dead, not fully dead right?" It was meant as a joke but Scott failed to see the humor in it because it sounded too much like a grim truth… which it probably was.

But still that wasn't it.

"Just let me be for a moment, Stiles. Please?"

Stiles looked at Scott and scoffed derisively, having known what was really bothering Scott since the beginning. "You're not the only one jealous of Tristan Hayes, Scott. The entire team is jealous of him. Heck, even Coach too."

They both sat on the bathroom floor, one in shame while the other in comical disbelief.

"Okay, so what if you have a crush on Allison? Half the guys on the lacrosse and the swim teams do. The other half have tried asking her out but no dice. But you already know that, don't you?"

Scott sighed tiredly and sat up against the wall. They both sat in silence for a few minutes before Scott finally decided to speak.

"… She has a crush on Tristan."

"Oh…"

Stiles' speechless comical face made Scott chuckle. "Yeah. And I'm pretty sure he knows. No, there's no way he doesn't know."

Scott watched as Stiles' face degraded from a humorous speechlessness to a contorted visage of worry and horror.

"Stiles, what is it?" Scott asked in alarm as Stiles' heartbeat was beating in genuine worry.

"Malia, Scott! Malia! What do you think she'll do to Allison if she finds out, or worse if Allison actually confesses to Tristan?"

Scott jumped up from being startled by Stiles' panicked scream. He wanted to say she wouldn't, given that she and Allison were practically best friends, but stayed his tongue as a reminder of his own recent situation.

Malia wouldn't do it… right? RIGHT?

...

On the other side of town, Tristan and Malia were over at Allison's house to consult her father on whether he knew how to kill the Nogitsune.

"And what makes you so sure that it's you it really wants rather than Kira?" Chris asked while slowly rubbing his temples.

"Maybe the fact that I decapitated the body it resurrected by expending most of its power? I don't know, you tell me."

They had come unannounced and Allison's mom had been the one to greet them at the door, with a very frosted look at that. Unlike her husband and her daughter, Victoria wasn't exactly sold on this 'truce' her family had with some of the werewolf packs in Beacon Hills. But even with her dissatisfaction, she wasn't too strong headed with or against it, choosing to spectate instead of directly interfering.

"Or maybe you want to consider the fact that it is not exactly fond of vampires… just like everyone else."

"Right." Chris nodded. They were the only ones in the garage since Malia and Allison were helping his wife with breakfast. Chris briefly wondered how that was going but shook his head after realizing that he wasn't that curious.

"And you know I know because…"

"Derek told me before he hiked it out of town." Tristan replied easily.

Chris made no comment on Derek skipping town last night because he knew. There was nothing else Derek could help him with so the Alpha quickly bade him a goodbye and see you never before booking his long overdue flight.

"Well, I might have a clue but getting it is kind of strenuous." Chris finally relented. There was very little he could do on his own at this point and his only saving grace was that the helping prospect, in the form of Tristan, was a very capable and mature young man.

Tristan leaned forward with a bottle of beer lightly held between his fingers.

"And what exactly is it?"

"During my youth, I came across the Onis during a yakuza trade and that was when I managed to break off one of their masks, which was why I thought they were back for me." Chris started but Tristan immediately held up a finger to rudely cut him off – a very bad habit of his.

"You've told the story before." Tristan remarked plainly.

Chris grunted in vivid irritation. "Yes, but did I ever mention why they came in the first place?"

The two of them stared blankly at each other making Tristan blink in confusion. "That was a rhetoric, right?"

Chris wearily took a swing of his bottle and curiously looked at Tristan. "Is this how you normally converse with other people?"

Tristan gave a 'more or less' shrug which Chris accepted and moved on.

"I want to ask him about why the Onis came to them and if it really was because of a Nogitsune, if there are other ways to kill it." What followed was a tired sigh as Chris reclined lazily into a wooden chair. "The problem here is that being yakuza, he's very cautious about who he meets and those he has business with."

"Just that?" Tristan questioned confusedly.

"I don't understand."

"If it's just for questioning then let me do it. I can be very persuasive at times." Tristan said as he stood up. "As long as it's not blindly killing them, and they don't have two really strong Alphas on their side, then let me take care of it."

Chris wanted to say something but held himself at how efficient having Tristan with him would be. The only thing that made him hesitate a little was his natural aversion to putting teenagers in a crossfire.

"Then let's go." He stood up and they both left without telling anybody. "I was trying to secure a trade of antique arms with him but that doesn't matter anymore."

They drove to the edge of town where Chris knew was a hanging spot for some of the high level yakuza members.

"You said you were quite good, right? How about 'persuading' them to tell you where a Mr. Katashi is?"

Tristan calmly walked into the upscale bar and knew upon first glance that this was an exclusive establishment with the look the reception gave him.

"I was never here."

She dumbly nodded to his words and just let him pass through into the main hall.

"Perfect." Seeing the dim lights in the bar made him smile as this made his work much easier. Using his speed, he snuck around the darker parts of the bar and made his way to the VIP section.

"Who is it?" Tristan's entrance caused the inhabitants of the room to glance angrily at the idiot subordinate who dared interrupt them without prior notice.

Seeing the foreign face, the first thing they did was pull out their guns on Tristan.

"Who are you?!"

"Shh." Tristan shushed them, an action which caused panic to grow as the yakuza members slowly started closing their mouths one by one until the whole room fell silent.

"You." He pointed at one man that appeared to be higher ranked since he remained seated when everyone pulled out their guns. "Where's Katashi?"

…..

Chris waited by his car while anxiously tapping his feet as he kept a keen ear on any gunshot he might hear from the bar, but it never came. Instead, it was Tristan who calmly walked out barely two minutes after he went in.

"Well, he's not at his compound and that's because he's meeting up with a few business partners/family heads."

Chris nodded with no trace of his previous anxiety to be seen.

Following Tristan's directions, Chris drove to a rather luxurious mansion where Katashi and his business partners were, evident from the number of guards on patrol.

"Let's wait until they get out, unless you want to break in and face a battalion of lethally armed security." It was meant as a sarcastic statement but Tristan took it literally.

"That's easy enough." Tristan remarked. It wasn't meant as an act of bragging on his part but that was all it sounded like to Chris.

Tristan stepped out of the car and in two quick motions, vaulted over the fence and arrived to intruder alarms going off and the security rushing to his location.

"I just want to speak to Mr. Katashi."

"Get down, now!"

"I ju–"

BANG! BANG! BANG!

Maybe his method of entrance came off as threatening – Tristan couldn't help but think as six gun men fell down paralyzed.

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