Author:
jonjokeatTitle: Baffling Burgers, Batman!
Rating: PG
Pairing/s: None
Character/s: Stiles, Scott, Sheriff Stilinski, Dr. Deaton (and others)
Summary: A little paranoia never hurt anyone, in fact...
Warnings: Spoilers for s03e04
Word Count: 919
Prompt: Death
Author's Notes: Crossover: Terry Pratchett’s Discworld
Not mine except for the mistakes.
Any comments would be greatly appreciated.
Stiles ran up the path to his house, barrelled through the door and slammed it behind him.
“Dad”, he yelled.
“In here”, his father replied from the kitchen.
He was just about to take a bite out of a juicy burger as Stiles walked in.
“No...Oh no!” Stiles exclaimed, wrenching the burger from this dad’s hands.
“What? I thought you’d bought them for us. They were on the table when I came in.”
“Shit!”
“Language, Stiles!”
“I didn’t buy them and besides you being banned from eating them... I don’t trust them”.
Stiles put the burger back in the bag, took one longing look at the curly fries, screwed the bag up and threw it in the trash. “There’s been too many deaths lately. I don’t trust anything.”
The sheriff shrugged, “You’re being paranoid Stiles, Scott probably bought them.”
“Er... no! Scott’s too busy right now and anyway since when did Scott do things like that?!”
“Maybe... but I still think you’re overreacting. And what am I going to eat?”
“I’m sorry Dad. Go and sit down and I’ll bring you a sandwich.”
“Yeah, thanks”, the sheriff huffed as he left the kitchen, still mourning the loss of his burger.
Stiles set to work making sandwiches while trying to solve the puzzle of the burgers. Scott was the only one of his friends who knew about the spare key under the rock outside and he knew Scott hadn’t bought the burgers, so who had? His suspicions growing, Stiles took his dad’s food into the living room.
“Any luck with the case?” He tried to make it sound light and conversational.
“No”, his dad replied, frowning, “To be honest we don’t have a clue.”
Stiles thought about filling his dad in on the druid angle; the three-fold death; the three virgins and the three with military links but after his dad had shouted at him at school, he was reluctant to say anything until there was proof.
Returning to the kitchen to eat his own sandwich, he paused, looked at the trash can and mumbled “To hell with paranoia.” He opened the cabinet under the sink, grabbed some plastic gloves and a small plastic bag. Putting the gloves on, he retrieved the burger bag from the trash, broke off a piece of one of the burgers and placed it in the plastic bag with a couple of fries and a chunk of bun. He put the bag in his backpack, made sure the rest went back in the trash and pulled out the whole garbage bag and tied it off. He wanted to make sure none of it was left in the house. He called to his dad that he was heading off to the animal clinic to see Scott and headed for the back door. He dropped off the trash and ran to his jeep.
He piled through the door of the clinic yelling for Scott.
“What... Stiles? Stop shouting”, Scott said, as he emerged from the back where all the dogs had started barking. “What’s wrong?”
“Did you leave burgers and fries in our kitchen for me and my dad?”
“No”, Scott answered, looking confused. “Why would I do that?”
“Yeah. Exactly. You wouldn’t!”
“What’s going on Stiles? You’re not making any sense.”
Deaton had joined them, curious about the fuss.
“When I got home from school my dad was about to put a burger in his mouth and I stopped him, of course, his heart can’t take it and he thought I’d bought them because there were two burgers and curly fries. So how had they got there - I don’t know anyone who would buy them for us and then I got paranoid so...” he reached into his backpack and pulled out the small plastic bag of food, “Ta-da!”
Scott just looked more confused but Deaton took the bag from Stiles hand.
“I’d better test it then.”
When Deaton returned he was grim-faced, “Strychnine”, he said, “Thank God you stopped your father from eating it. I’m going to ring the sheriff now, unless you want to Stiles.”
Stiles shook his head.
“Ok, and you better ring around the pack, make sure everyone is aware of the danger”.
Scott and Stiles pulled their phones out and started dialing. “I’ll do team human”, Scott said, “If you can start on the werewolves”.
Stiles nodded and then grinned, “Any old excuse to call Allison!”
Much later, Stiles pulled up outside his house. The crime scene investigators were still there as he walked up to the door.
“All done?” he asked.
“Nearly” replied the officer, “If you can give us ten minutes.”
Walking around the side of the house to the back yard Stiles looked up and froze, there was a tall man all in black astride a white horse. He turned to look at the boy.
“STILES”.
After a bit of choking Stiles breathed out, “Death?”
“YES”.
“Oh my God. Why are you here? Who’s going to die? It’s not my dad, is it? Please say it’s not my dad, he’s fine, I’ve been watching what he eats and...”
“STILES”. Death interrupted. “IT’S NOT YOUR DAD”, and he pointed to the dumpster where Stiles had deposited the trash earlier. Stiles heard a scrabbling noise and then saw a tiny figure carrying a tiny scythe emerge from behind the garbage. Stiles’ mouth dropped open and he stared at Death.
“DEATH OF RATS WAS SOMEWHAT APPREHENSIVE ABOUT COMING TO BEACON HILLS, GIVEN THE RECENT EVENTS. SO BINKY AND I DECIDED TO ACCOMPANY HIM.