A/N

Hey guys... thanks so much for reading. Okay, I know this apology and this chapter are long overdue. College kicked me kinda hard, to the point where I didn't have much motivation or want to work on this anymore. I think I have recovered though... finishing this chapter gave me an opening to try some new things that I think will make the next few chapters more exciting. The ending to this chapter is supposed to tie into the beginning of chapter one. We are now in part two of the story, or will be in chapter 13, which was originally the main focus before I got off track. Part 2 is the 60 hours Stiles is alone with the nogitsune, before the story picks up again in Letharia Vulpina. This chapter is the events at the end of the previous episode, Riddled. I'm super excited for part 2 and I hope you are as well. I apologize for my major absence. In the middle of it I passed my two year anniversary of writing on this website so yay... as well as the year anniversary of finishing NTAF. I know things haven't been as organized as they were during that story and I apologize again for the inconsistency. I blame college. I feel like that is common on this medium so I hope I can be forgiven. I hope you guys like this chapter and continue reading and being patient with me. As always review, check out my other stories, and enjoy!

Ch. 12

My Poor Brain

Stiles winced as light after light zoomed by. From his rather limited vantage point, all Stiles could see was the rather uninteresting hospital ceiling followed by all-too-long flashes of blinding fluorescent light. The bumps and sharp turns had his shoulders careening from side to side on the gurney, and it would probably make sense for Stiles to close his eyes. But he couldn't do that. So even as each new light pierced him and made his headache worsen, he was calmed by the fact that it was one more moment away from the nogitsune's control. Eventually, the winding road of the gurney came to a halt, and with it, briefly, Stiles' heart. He wasn't scared per se... He had done hospital tests before. Like the x-ray he had gotten on his arm after falling out of a tree with Scott. Or the x-ray on his leg after hunting a Wendigo with John. Or the x-ray on his wrist after hunting a ghost with John. Or the... Anyway, you get it. The day has long passed since Stiles was afraid of hospitals. So as he was led into the MRI room by an amicable forty-ish doctor, and as he sat on the table connected to the long, arched equipment that would dissect his brain, it wasn't fear that was making Stiles' left leg bounce up and down restlessly. It was nerves.

Stiles had never liked all those x-rays, all those tests. Yes, he had gotten used to them, and yes, they were necessary to his continued healthy existence and hunter career, but he had never liked them. All that sitting still, clenching his eyes to the point of pain to prevent even the slightest twitch that would make the process start all over again. And all under the watchful eye of John or Dean, or Sam in the very beginning, their arms crossed, their expressions sour, daring him to move, daring him to make another mistake. Dean was so concerned about Stiles' health to the point of indirect anger, but John... well, he always acted like it was Stiles' fault he had gotten hurt. Even though it hadn't been Stiles' idea to go in that cave in the first place-

The point is, those tests had been excruciatingly difficult but reasonable. They were (relatively) short. Their outcomes were predictable. If Stiles thought his arm was broken, he was usually right. And then Stiles would go home in a new, brightly-colored cast, and his family would disappear with some guilty hugs and some chocolate to make him feel better. And Sam and Dean would call him every week to see how he was doing. And the day after getting his cast off, Stiles would open the front door to find his brothers wearing sheepish expressions, standing behind a grim-looking John. And the cycle would begin anew.

But this test... Stiles didn't know what the outcome would be. He couldn't see the end. He couldn't see a probable outcome where the nogitsune had itself probed by a large electrical machine and everyone made it out okay. There was nothing wrong with his brain, Stiles knew there was nothing wrong with his brain. (The nogitsune would not be stupid enough to possess someone with brain damage. If there was one thing Stiles had figured out in his brief and tiring possession it was that the nogitsune's mind was only as powerful as his own. And that was his most terrifying revelation.) Stiles was nervous because his car had been found in the hospital parking lot three hours before he himself had arrived, and that meant this was some sort of plan. Had to be. Coincidences like that don't happen when a demon is possessing a Winchester.

"Stiles?" Melissa's voice called, far off in the distance. Stiles squinted against the harsh fluorescents and found her face mere inches from his own, a stethoscope pressed to his chest. "You alright there, honey? I think I lost you there for a sec." Stiles nodded once, swiftly. "Ok, then I need you to breathe in deeply."

Stiles complied, and soon Melissa finished her tests. With a concerned smile, she complied her things and scurried into the observation room next to the amicable doctor and his dad.

Oh god, Dad... Stiles couldn't even imagine what his father must be going through. To not know whether or not his son had the same illness that killed his wife or whether it was so much worse... To choose between hoping for dementia or a demon. Stiles, at least, never had to make that choice. He had always known which one it was.

All of a sudden, the double doors to the operation room swung open to reveal an out-of-breath and wistful Scott, who in two strides crossed the entire room and enveloped Stiles in a crushing hug.

"Sc-ott-" Stiles gasped as best as he could, what with the immense weight on his ribs, and the emotional turmoil in his brain. "I- can't- really breathe-"

"I don't care." Scott mumbled. "Stiles, I don't- I don't-" All at once Scott straightened, crushing weight disappearing, and he placed two confining hands on either of Stiles' shoulders and stared at him meaningfully. It was heartbreakingly kind, and no, those were not tears in Stiles' eyes, but he couldn't help but feel uncomfortable under Scott's gaze. Like Scott, pure as he was, could see straight into Stiles' soul. And Stiles didn't want him doing that, didn't want to risk him seeing how bad it really was.

"Stiles," Scott said sternly, "if this doesn't go the way we want it to..." Stiles gulped because it already had. "We'll do something." He squeezed Stiles' shoulders in a gesture meant to be comforting. "I'lldo something."

It took Stiles a moment to process exactly what that something was, but Scott looked so sure that the answer was soon obvious. And then Stiles was flooded with all kinds of emotion he didn't know how to process. Fear, mainly. Because it was pretty hard to be a hunter and a werewolf. And Scott, Scott knew that, and he was still willing to risk it, to risk the WInchesters and who the hell else coming after them for turning one of their own, Scott was willing to risk hell to keep Stiles alive, and the thought was simultaneously relieving and terrifying and- and it did not actually matter. Because Stiles didn't have dementia.

So all Stiles could do was give Scott a crushing hug of his own and wish down to all of his bones that this could have gone another way.

And all too soon Scott was gone and Stiles was alone with his poor brain.

"Now, Stiles, the test will last about 45 minutes." The doctor said once Stiles was lying down and the not-tears had dried from his cheeks. "You will hear a clanging noise, like a hammer hitting an anvil. Those are the electrical pulses made by the machine. For the test to work best, it's best if you don't move."

Right, okay. He can do this. Stiles shifted his shoulders, trying to get comfortable.

"Even a little."

Great.

The clanging noise started, and Stiles tried not to wince at how eardrum-splittingly horrible it was.

He can do this.

Ten minutes in, Stiles got used to the sound to the point where his mind was able to wander. He thought about all those old tests for a while. How John had glowered throughout their entireties, how Melissa's mouth would always be in a tight line because she did not like John Winchester. How Sam, at the first one, was still in high school and was showing his math homework to Stiles to distract him. How Dean, when Sam wasn't looking, flipped through the problems to see if he could do them. How they never told Sheriff Stilinski what had happened, not until the cast was on and Stiles was tucked in bed.

He can do this. But maybe he should think about something else. Like that SAT in a couple weeks that he is totally going to nail.

Twenty minutes in, Stiles started feeling weird.

It was his fingers first. It took him a while to notice, but when Stiles tried to twitch his fingers to relieve himself of the stationary discomfort, they wouldn't budge. Alarmed, Stiles tried rolling his shoulders back, not caring if he disrupted the test. His shoulders would not move. His heart, however, began to beat rapidly against his chest. No. Not now.

Stiles felt the panic in his chest bloom, and he tried to crush it down because he could not have a panic attack in a loud metal box, he would not have a panic attack in a small metal box, but the more confining he imagined it the more the panic grew and grew until his breath was growing shorter and his vision was swimming and he did not even notice how his shoulders were obeying him now as he struggled for some purchase, he closed his eyes tightly-

-and opened them to a blue-black room.

He was standing next to the MRI scanner in his street clothes- a blue-and-black-striped hoodie, sneakers, and jeans- and the whole room was enveloped in a dark, bluish haze that told Stiles that this was something very similar to a dream.

Sensing movement behind him, Stiles turned, but with a quickening heart he discovered nothing there.

"Have you figured out my riddle yet?"

The voice. That voice, the voice locked into his head. It came from behind the empty scanner, and Stiles swiveled around it to find the source but again found nothing.

"If you solve it," the raspy voice spoke again, "we might consider letting them go." The nogitsune appeared then, standing in the same spot Stiles had stood seconds before, creeping out from behind the scanner with the grace of every kind of terrible nightmare. Its head was covered in the same dirty bandages, its teeth the same glinting silver, and it leered at Stiles with a ferocity that made him shiver.

"Letting who go?" Stiles asked, voice wavering. Behind the nogitsune, Stiles saw the observation room, where Melissa and his Dad were pouring somberly over a computer.

The nogitsune, as if reading Stiles' mind, turned towards them. No...

"Your friends." it whispered. "Your family. Everyone who ever meant something to you."

The words felt like a punch to the gut, and Stiles stumbled at their gravity. It would do it. Stiles knew that the nogitsune had the power and ferocity to follow through on its threats. It would kill them all. Dad. Melissa. Scott. Lydia. Allison. Derek. Isaac. Ethan. Danny. Aiden. Sam. Dean. Cas, if the s-o-b gets resurrected.

The nogitsune whirled back to him and sneered. "We're going to destroy all of them, Stiles!" it roared. That one word, we, chilled Stiles to the bone, made him shudder, to the point where he almost missed the nogitsune's next words. "One by one."

He could picture it. The nogitsune, with Stiles' body, would be a powerful weapon. Immune to mountain ash and wolfsbane, it could power through even the basest defences with the reflexes and training Stiles had been developing for years.

"Why?" Stiles asked, breaking a little. Why me?

The nogitsune did not respond with a concrete answer. Of course it would not. It created chaos for chaos' sake, it did not need to justify its actions. Instead, the gravelly voice replied with something far more sinister.

"Everyone has it, but no one can lose it. What is it?"

Stiles was transported back to the cave, to being cold and alone and afraid. Even now, warm and awake, the answer escaped him. There was nothing everyone had: not fears or hopes or even abilities. "I don't know."

"Everyone has it but no one can lose it." It rasped again, creeping around the scanner, and Stiles matched its steps so that they were caught in an uneasy circle. "What is it, Stiles?"

"I don't know." Stiles said, firmer this time. He tried hardening his eyes to a glare but the tears made it hard to see. Stiles settled for a glower. They kept circling, the hazy blue light throwing the medical instruments into hazy relief and casting strange shadows-

-wait a minute.

"Everyone has it, but no one can lose it!" The nogitsune roared, its rasp rebounding off the walls as it leaned forward menacingly, close enough that Stiles could count every one of its sharp metal teeth. Stiles stumbled back in surprise, and he quickly glanced at the nogitsune's feet. The nogitsune's oddly sneakered feet.

And as predicted, there was no shadow.

"WHAT IS IT, STILES?"

The bandages were throwing him off. They were meant to. Looking away from their decayed yellowness for perhaps the first time, Stiles saw a sweatshirt and jeans that mirrored his own. Height that mirrored his own. He could have sworn that the nogitsune had towered over him... But this was a dream. Or at least a very strange reality. Maybe it had been taller, maybe not, it didn't matter anymore, because Stiles was sure he was staring at his doppleganger. His very own-

"Shadow."

Slowly, much too slow for Stiles' horror, the nogitsune raised a slender hand and began to pull at those horrible, yellow bandages. It unwound them and unwound them until they formed a puddle at its feet- his feet- and- and- and- it was certainly strange because mirrors are usually flipped. This wasn't flipped. Stiles saw his own steadfast smirk for what it really was. And he knew, through the shock and the hurt he knew what this meant. This wasn't demon possession, this was something else entirely. The nogitsune was part of him now, probably always had been and he knew-

As if on cue, the lights flickered. Stiles opened his eyes stared at the walls of the MRI scanner with disdain and stretched, craning his neck this way and that, rolling his shoulders back. Then he moved, out passed the distracted adults and into the antechamber where he had undressed. Finding his clothes was easy, and lacing up his sneakers took no time at all. The hospital hallway was dark and flashing when he stepped into it again. Nurses and patients alike were rushing past him in flurries, not even caring as he went against the grain, as he moved with chilling purpose, and as he glared at the solitary stationary figure in the elevator at the end of the hall. Oh, she was annoying. But she was alone. Stiles walked up to her, face blank, eyes expectant.

"You know me?" Noshiko asked challengingly, which, given how much younger she was, was kind of adorable. He didn't even bother affirming, it was obvious. "Then you know I won't be deterred by your choice of host. Even if it is a hunter."

Stiles smirked because well, that had been the best perk. "You threatening us?" he asked, relishing the way that word rolled off his tongue. Us. He liked that. He could almost feel his shadow squirm in disapproval.

Two Oni appeared at Noshiko's sides, dark and menacing, and Stiles resisted the urge to roll his eyes at her dramatics. He wasn't that much of a hypocrite.

"Now I'm threatening you." she said. Her stance was tall but Stiles caught the flicker of worry behind her eyes.

"We're not really afraid of your little fireflies."

There was chaos in this hospital, and lots of it. So much that Stiles could practically snatch it out of the air. What chance did smoke soldiers have against power like that?

Noshiko seemed to realize this, because under her hard anger was genuine fear, and trapped in her ears were the screams of the civilians of Oak Creek. She wasn't here to fight him. She wasn't strong enough. Stiles turned away in distaste, off to find a real challenge amidst this sea of chaos, and as he walked away he heard her call.

"If the Oni can't defeat you, I know someone who will!" she yelled, and Stiles rolled off her words with ease.

"They can't defeat me." he murmured. He stretched out his new, strong hands. He strided with his powerful legs. "The Oni do not stand a chance against Stiles Winchester."

Stiles Winchester.

He liked the sound of that.

-break-

So now here we are. You know the story: Stiles Winchester, AKA the nogitsune, caused an electrical disaster at Beacon Hills Memorial Hospital, injuring several people, including the well-regarded Isaac Lahey. That was the last anyone ever saw of Stiles until over two days later, when he showed up in the basement of Beacon Hills High School with a glorified dog whistle and a peace offering that was, unbeknownst at the time, false. What happened in the missing 60 hours? We know that Stiles rigged a trap in the woods, framed Derek and Argent for murder, planted a real bomb and a fake bomb, and stole 100,000 dollars of blood money, but that can't be it. For an immortal trickster, accomplishing all of that couldn't have taken two days. So what did he do in between the plotting, the murder, and the scheming?

60 hours, as Stiles will attest to, is a long time to be locked inside your own head, fighting for control. 60 hours was a long time to be kicking and screaming, fighting tooth and nail on no sleep and no progress. 60 hours was a daunting, dare say impossible amount of time to keep struggling. So maybe it was impossible to keep struggling. And maybe at some points, Stiles stopped fighting, let his body sag against his mental restraints and give in to the torment. Maybe the guilt Stiles would find himself harboring well after the next 60 hours would not be completely unfounded. Maybe there's a reason Winchesters are destined to end up in hell.