CHPT 45: Vessel of Revenge/Ghost of the Grey Lions

Deaton's heart had never beat so loud in his chest. It was a steady boom that rose and fell with the symphony of war. The Shifters odds looked terrible in the beginning. And then Marco came.... Marco and the Blue-Eyed Beast. As one. Followed by his pack. Everything else afterwards was a blur.

It was all so faced paced. Bullets flew, blood spilled, screams overpowered roars and vice versa.

But that wasn't even the biggest problem.

"Come on!" Deaton pleaded as he tried to rip his duct tape restraints. He didn't have a lot of time, the flames were spreading, ready to swallow the entire school in purple heat.

It seemed the more time went by the more he could hear the crackle of flames, eating up the dead and polished wood floor.

"-eaton!" Scott called as he appeared in between the bleachers and the wall in front of him.

Deaton almost passed out at the sight of him. He almost looked like-- No. No. He was dead.

Scott slowly shifted back to his human form, sweat covered him from head to toe, blending in with the blood from his ungodly number of wounds. He looked ready to drop at any moment.

"Get out of here, Scott. This whole place is going down." Deaton pleaded as he tried to break free of his restraints.

"I'm not leaving you." Scott began inching his way through the slim crevice and grabbed Deatons leg to pull him out. As he put his hands on the metal bar of the bleachers they burned from the heat.

The smell made Deaton cringe.

Once he was out, he could see the entire battlefield as it was. Or at least what remained.

Everything was up in flames. Burning Warlocks screamed as they sent their final magical blasts in death. Derek carried Isaac on his shoulders and headed for the door.

Scott exhaustedly transformed his hand and ran his claws through the duct tape wrappings.

"Scott, you can barely move. Get out of here!" Deaton got up and began helping him exit the gymnasium. Their exit was slowly being consumed by a wall of fire.

"Come on.... work with me, Scott-- you always do..... even.... if you're fashionably late at times..." Deaton spoke as Scott's eyelids lowered while they limped for the exit.

"No reason..." Scott mumbled.

"Come on stay with me. What are you saying?"

One half of the exit doors had been swallowed by flames as if following a trail of gas. It was closing in on the next and they still had over a few hundred feet to travel.

"If... I didn't save you..... then it was all...for no reason." Scott concluded before throwing Deaton towards the exit door.

"WOAh!" Deaton yelled as he cleared the distance and flew through the door just as the flames covered it.

"NO!" Deaton got up and tried to re-enter only for the fire to sear his skin.

"Watch out!" Stiles pushed past him from down the hall with a fire extinguisher in hand.

He covered the floors and doorway in the white mist until the flames died down. In it's wake Scott emerged, being carried by Boyd. The Grey Lion giant didn't look as damaged as the rest of them. Just steaming and bleeding from a few areas.

Erica came out behind him, patting the flames from her golden hair as she hissed angrily.

They all stood in the hallway awkwardly. Out of breath and monstrous before noticing.

"Where's Gerard?" Derek said.

"Where's Marc--" Before Stiles could finish that question, a blast emanated from the ceiling back in the gymnasium.

Marco soared down to the flaming gymnasium floors with his mountain ash bandaging wrapped around Gerards throat as if to steer the deformed Kanima. When they hit the ground, a shockwave of flames and Warlock ash spread and cleared the area.

Gerard looked long past dead. A portion of his skull was missing, a silver spear stuck deep in his chest and one of his horns had been broken off and shoved in his eye.

Somehow. Someway. That wasn't the worse part.

The markings on Marco's arm gleamed a pure bone white. He was bigger once again now standing at over eight feet. Pieces of his dreads turned blond resembling the fur of a lion. Red sparks like the start of a flame accompanied by smoke ran up his arm and matched the color of his eyes.

As if one change wasn't enough.

Marco was somehow an Alpha.

A crunch echoed through the high school as he stomped Gerards head in and let out a roar that burst the windows all around them. Everyone transformed immediately once more, and Boyd and Erica ran back inside as if called to battle.

Stiles ran for them but stopped as the flames rose at the doorway. Why would they go back? The whole gym was about to collapse.

He felt a hand on his shoulder and turned around to find Deaton holding him back as he wiped the smoke off his brown skin.

"They aren't done.... but I think we are."

Stiles couldn't help but look back into the flames.

Marco staggered like a risen corpse. His Grey Lions followed-- he snapped at them when they got too close, flashing his vermillion eyes.

"...How.....how.."

"Marco.... is many things. But he is not an Alpha. Nor is he the Blue-Eyed Beast. Not really."

"Then what did we just see...?" Stiles asked.

"Marco thirsts for revenge. So do many others within.... he carries them with him. That's all I know.... that's all we may ever know." Deaton answered exhaustedly.

Sirens in the distance rose.

"We need to go. Now!" Derek commanded as he carried Isaac and Scott.

And with that, they fled the highschool. All they could do was hope the flames didn't burn away it's entirety.

It felt almost poetic to Stiles as he ran with his pack. The Warlocks were an embodiment of greed and cruelty. It was those two things that brought them to Beacon Hills, after Marco. A walking graveyard of wishes for revenge and so much more. And it was that same thing that brought the Warlocks to their demise. Greed and cruelty. Those flames ate them out of existence long before the physical ones. It was predestined when they entered Beacon Hills.

Like the old saying about cornered cats becoming fierce Lions. What did they become when they were Lions in the first place? Stiles got his answer as they fled the burning high school.

They became Marco. That was the only answer.