Haunted

Chapter 11: Superheroes

Clark got Lydia to drop him off at the preserve, making some nonsense up about how he wanted to jog home. In reality, after the long day that he'd had, Clark had no interest in running. He didn't even feel like the long walk he had to the house, but he knew that getting Lydia to drop him off outside the fire-damaged house would lead to a lot more questions than he wanted to answer. Clark waited until the car lights had disappeared from light before turning and beginning his trek.

He could hear police dogs in the distance. The talk around school was that they still hadn't found half of a body that joggers had discovered out in the woods over a week ago. He thought they would have given up their search after being so unsuccessful but, from the number of dogs he could hear out in force, he assumed a clue had been found to reinvigorate the case.

Clark wasn't concerned about the dogs. He could easily avoid them on his walk to the house. He strolled in the direction of the house as if he was taking a pleasant walk in the park, taking in the sight of trees... trees... and more trees. His hearing focused on keeping track of where the dogs were, the ring of his phone so close by was especially loud and made Clark jump. He hastily retrieved the phone from his pocket, turning the sound down before taking a look at the caller ID: unknown.

Clark momentarily considered ignoring it but the curiosity of who was calling resulted in him pressing the button to accept the call. He moved the phone to his ear, more than ready to hang up if it was some nonsense sales pitch or scam call. "Hello?" He answered.

"Clark?" The voice on the phone sounded familiar but Clark couldn't place it from one word. He could tell, however, that the caller wasn't completely confident that they had the right number.

"Who wants to know?" Clark responded.

"It's Stiles." The fellow teenager spoke as if it should have been obvious.

Clark paused. He didn't remember giving Stiles - or Scott - his number. "How did you get my number?"

"I called Danny."

"You called Danny just to get my number from him?" Clark spoke incredulously, knowing full well he was being hypocritical after he'd received both Scott and Stiles' address by phoning Danny. Stiles, however, didn't know that so he allowed himself to be as judgemental towards him as he wanted to be.

"No. I called Danny thinking he'd know what the latest is on Jackson," Stiles corrected. "He hadn't heard anything but said you went to the hospital with him."

"You're calling me to find out how Jackson is," Clark surmised.

"Yes." Stiles confirmed, his 'isn't-that-obvious' tone coming out again.

"Since when did you care about Jackson?" Clark questioned.

"I don't." Stiles' response was blunt. "But it was my best friend who injured him-"

Clark cut him off. "Shit," he swore. He'd been so caught up with Jackson and the hospital that he had completely forgotten about Scott's involvement. "Did he lose control?" His thoughts flashbacked to his first lacrosse trial when he'd almost lost control. Lacrosse and werewolves did not seem to be a good mix.

"He tried to kill me."

"Well, the key word there is tried," Clark responded with a fake optimism.

"Yeah and if he plays the game on Wednesday, he going to try to kill again. Lacrosse is kind of a violent game. It's going to get him angry and trigger the change," Stiles replied.

"Then stop him from playing the game," Clark retorted. Now that really was obvious.

"Easier said than done. Scott was determined to make first line. He didn't look convince when I told him he couldn't play Wednesday," Stiles responded.