—(Mark)—
I wake up at 5:00 AM to knocking. I don't even bother putting on pants; I just go and answer the door in my boxers.
It's not even a second later that I am bombarded by Stiles ranting about Scott being a possible werewolf since his encounter with the wolf in the forest.
I don't let him finish before I place my hand over his face to stop him from continuing.
"Is that all?" I ask. This all could have been done later and not so goddam early in the morning. All I ask for is one day of full sleep.
"Dude, we're being serious. I could be a werewolf!" Scott adds.
"Want a cookie? Good for you." I push Stiles back a bit so I have the space to close the door and go back to sleep.
I go to close the door when Scott slams his hand on it, his eyes turning yellow as he literally growls at me while staring into my eyes.
I lose control as my wolf nature sees this as a challenge. I quickly grab Scott by his shirt, drag him in, lift him off the floor, and slam him into the ground.
I know my eyes have shifted by the way everything is a mix of yellow and red hues.
I am able to compose myself when Scott breaks eye contact. His head turns away to the side. My hand place on the back of his neck pinning him to the floor.
I flip him over so he faces me and growl out.
"I know you're new to this, but if you ever challenge me again in my own home, I'll break something. Understand?" I say, making him look at me by grabbing his face with one hand.
He nods. I let him go and stand up. I look up at Stiles and go to him. He flinches away when I reach him, but I grab him by his shirt and drag him in. He opens his mouth to speak.
"Hey. Mark, bud—"
"Shut up. Help Scott up and go sit on the couch while I put on some clothes." Just one morning. Just one is all I ask for. Before I go to my room, I start my coffee machine.
I quickly change into something, grab my coffee, and sit across from them.
"What do you know?" I ask.
"That you hit like a truck," Scott says.
I just stare at him. He looks away.
"That I start to shift when I get angry and that something is wrong because I feel a pull in my sleep."
"The anger thing is something that will settle down eventually, but you have to work on it. That pull is from the Alpha that bit you. It's probably trying to make you part of its pack."
"Alpha?" Scott asks, puzzled.
"You know the structure of wolf packs? Alphas, Betas, and Omegas. It's a real thing in werewolf packs. Not in wolf packs; that's a myth."
"So what are you?" Stiles asks.
"It's complicated. I'm in an in-between phase of an Alpha and Beta. Scott's an Omega since he's packless and so the weakest of the werewolves."
"Why?"
"A pack is everything to us. You're more temperamental when alone. I have my own pack, but I still struggle part of the pack due to past trauma. The only reason I'm out here alone is so that I can eventually get better to be part of the pack."
"What's the last thing you remember of that night?"
He takes a moment and hesitates before speaking.
"…you naked in my room."
"Before that," I say, feeling my face heat a little. Dammit, I could've sworn he was knocked out.
"Are we ju—" Stile starts.
"You finish that, and I'll give you the same treatment I gave Scott," I threaten.
"What you naked in m—" he stops mid-sentence as he sees my eyes shift. I'm definitely not in the mood for his jokes .
"There was the werewolf with the red eyes before it ran away and then two more figures about 7 feet tall appeared ," he hurriedly mentions, trying to take my attention away from Stiles.
"That was James and me. We heard its howls that night and decided to check it out. We eventually found it biting you. If you want a shot at finding out who's the Alpha that turned you, you should start at the field."
"Should we go to the field together? Maybe you can catch something we might miss," Stiles suggests.
"Sure." I might as well go with them, but not right now.
They stand up to get going. I pretend to be on the same page with them, but the moment they clear the door, I close it and go back to bed.
—(Scott)—
"Ah I think he meant later" Stiles say when we hear him close the door
"What gave that away?" I say with sarcasm
Stiles and I leave Mark's house, walking quickly toward Stiles' Jeep. The morning air is cool, and the tension from our encounter with Mark still lingers.
"Did you see that? He just... manhandled me like it was nothing!" I say, still trying to process what happened.
Stiles looks at me. "Dude, he slammed you into the ground like you weighed nothing. And those eyes... are so different from yours."
"Yeah, that was intense. I thought he was just human, so I thought showing him would make him believe, but he just lost it," I reply, rubbing the back of my neck where Mark's grip had left a lingering ache.
"I knew he was strong, but that's on a whole different level. It's like he's... I don't know" Stiles says, shaking his head in disbelief.
I take a deep breath, trying to calm down. "At least we got some answers. He's some kind of in-between Alpha and Beta. And the pull I've been feeling... it's from the Alpha that bit me."
Stiles nods. "Yeah, that explains a lot. But man, he was serious about that pack stuff. He said being alone makes everything worse."
"I can feel it, you know? The anger, the confusion. Mark was right about that," I admit, feeling a bit less lost now that we have some information.
"And we need to find that Alpha. Starting at the field makes sense," Stiles says.
"Yeah, we do. But we have to be careful. If Mark's anything to go by, werewolves are way more dangerous than we thought," I reply, glancing back at Mark's house. "And we need to figure out how to handle this without getting ourselves killed."
Stiles grins, trying to lighten the mood. "Hey, if we survived Mark, we can survive anything, right?"
I chuckle, though it's a bit strained. "Yeah, right. Let's hope so."
"Fuck off already," Mark says through his window "werewolves have great hearing also you should know that Scott"
As we quicken our pace and reach Stiles' Jeep, Mark's warning still echoes in my mind, about working on my anger.
We need to find that Alpha and figure out how to control these new abilities before they control me. But that could wait until after class and give Mark the space he needs to calm down.