Chapter 7

"Hoosiers is not only the best basketball movie ever. It is the best sports movie ever made."

"No."

"It's got Gene Hackman and Dennis Hopper."

"No."

"Lydia, I swear to God you're gonna like it."

"No."

"I am not watching The Notebook again. Sage help me out here."

Sage leaned in her seat watching the couple in amusement, she shook her head at the blue-eyed jock causing him to huff as he got out of the car.

"You have him so wrapped around your perfect little finger don't you?" Sage giggled to herself when she heard Jackson yell out for someone to help him find the Notebook. Lydia smirked at the blonde while applying some lipgloss.

"I'm glad that you agreed to join us. I feel like we haven't had as much time to hang out." Sage frowned slightly after hearing Lydia's confession, she felt a little guilty not being there for Lydia as well as Stiles. She knew she was hanging around Stiles much more but she was connected to both humans so she needed to spend equal time with both of them.

"Sorry Lyds, I know I've been hanging around Stiles a lot but I promise we will make at least 2 days a week for each other." The blonde said causing Lydia to smile.

Sage distracted herself by sending a text to Stiles while Lydia started to take an endless amount of selfies of herself. The blonde had sighed, looking up at the video store only to notice the flickering lights. Her eyebrows furrowed as she tried to listen to what was going on, she immediately stilled in her seat hearing the telltale sound of a growl that most likely belonged to the alpha.

Lydia was about to ask the blonde to take a picture with her but when she had noticed the expression on her face she stopped, "what's wrong?"

Sage was about to warn her friend but by then the alpha had already rushed out through the window, startling Lydia causing her to let out a scream. Sage quickly rushed to her friend's side taking her face in her hands. "Lydia, call the police okay- I'm gonna go check on Jackson. Stay here and call the cops."

The strawberry blonde shakily nodded her head, tears stained her cheeks as she quickly dialled 911, watching as her blonde friend ran inside.

*~*

Sage brushed the EMT hands off her before focusing on her shaking friend, Lydia had been staring off into space for the last ten minutes. Sage held the girl in her arms, causing Lydia to silently ease up, the blonde knew it was because of the connection they shared and was just glad that she could be there for her friend.

Sage frowned as she heard Jackson yell at the EMTs, "I don't need to go to the hospital. I'm fine." Jackson yelled. Noticing the commotion, Sheriff Stilinski heads over while leaving his other Deputies to keep the people back. "Why the hell can't I just go home?" Jackson yelled.

The Sheriff didn't look fazed by his tone. "I hear ya, but the EMT says you hit your head pretty hard. They just wanna make sure you don't have a concussion."

Jackson huffed, his blue's hardening the more annoyed he got. "What part of I'm fine are you having a problem grasping? Okay, I wanna go home."

"And I understand that." Sage wondered where the man could have gotten so much patience but then she remembered that he had an ADHD riddled filled son.

The blue-eyed jock clenched his jaw tightly, the anger evident in his tone. "No, you don't understand, which kind of blows my mind, since it should be a pretty basic concept to grasp for a minimum - wage rent - a - cop like you! Okay, now, I wanna go home!" He practically yelled.

"Jackson!" Sage snapped making him turn to look at her, with a shocked look on his face. "There is no excuse for you to talk to the sheriff like that when he's just doing his job. So get your head out of your fucking ass and come comfort your terrified girlfriend." Sage finally finished saying while she rubbed Lydia's arm trying to comfort the poor girl. Jackson looked down in shame as he made his way over to the duo while the sheriff just gave the blonde a grateful look.

"Oh, whoa, is that a dead body?" Stiles exclaimed, a tone of awe in his tone. He made an 'O' shape with his mouth when he saw the scolding look his father sent him and his cheeks practically burned with embarrassment when he saw Sage looking at him with amusement flashing through her ocean-blue eyes.

*~*

"Just a friendly reminder: Parent/Teacher conferences are tonight. Students below a C average are required to attend. I won't name you since the shame and self-disgust should be more than enough punishment. Has anyone seen Scott McCall?" Mr Harris asked, looking at Stiles, Sage frowned down at her phone still waiting to hear from Lydia, she had only messaged the blonde once today saying that she was 'fine' but the blonde knew better.

Sage looked up when she heard someone walk into class, it was Jackson- she hadn't heard from him after last night. The sheriff had offered to drop her home but she didn't want to leave Lydia alone so she kindly declined while riding back with the couple.

"Jackson, if you need to leave early for any reason... You let me know." Harris says making Stiles look at him in shock and disbelief. He or no one actually had ever seen the man act remotely appealing to anyone.

"Everyone, start reading Chapter Nine. And Mr Stilinski try putting the highlighter down between paragraphs. It's Chemistry. Not a colouring book" He said making Stiles look up at him then tilted his head back, spitting the cap out and catching it. Sage felt her stomach flutter a little at the action, everything that Stiles did was adorable but this was something different. Stiles looked over at the girl with a smile causing her cheeks for the first time since knowing him to flush pink.

After a few seconds, Stiles leans toward Danny who is sitting in front of him, "Danny? Can I ask you a question?"

"No."

"I'm going to anyway. Did Lydia show up in your homeroom today?"

"No."

"Can I ask you another question?"

"Answer still no."

"Do you know what happened to them last night?" Stiles asked making Sage look up at him, he had managed to call her last night when she got home to ask her what had happened but she couldn't tell him much seeing as she was only in the car with Lydia at the time. But she knows that she had seen the Alpha. "He wouldn't tell me," Danny said slowly.

"But he's your best friend." Stiles said and Danny just shrugged, "One more question."

"What?!"

"Do you find me attractive?" Stiles asked making Sage look at him weirdly, she had already hinted to the boy that she found him attractive so she never quite understood where this fascination with being attractive to guys came from. She watched in amusement as the boy continued to lean forward in his seat until he finally fell forward. He quickly caught himself, a blush painted his cheeks when he caught Sage laughing at him.

*~*

Stiles hurries down the hall with his phone to his ear, Sage following him as she texted Lydia that she would be over soon. "What?"

"Finally! Are you getting any of my texts?"

"All nine million of them."

"You have any clue what's going on? Lydia's totally MIA, Jackson looks like he had a time bomb inserted into his face, another random guy is dead and you need to do something about it."

"Like what?"

"Something."

"I'll deal with it later." Scott hung up making Stiles look down at his phone and sigh, Sage stopped in front of the boy causing him to look up at her. "Wanna come with me to check on Lydia?" The boy quickly nodded while taking her hand, the both of them ignoring the faint spark that travelled between them as he hauled her towards his jeep.

*~*

"Sweetheart, Sage and Stiles are here to see you." Natalie Martin said as she opened the door to her daughter's room, letting Sage and Stiles in. "What the hell is a Stiles?" Natalie turns to Stiles with an embarrassed smile while Sage silently giggled to herself, "She's had a little something to ease her nerves. Go right in."

"Thanks, Ms Martin," Sage said and Natalie smiled at her as she left the room. "What are you doing here?" Lydia asked as Sage walked over to the bed, "I know you didn't check your text but I came to check up on you." The blonde said, sitting down next to the drug-filled girl. "Why?" Lydia asked.

"Because you're my best friend. How are you feeling?" The blonde asked making Lydia smile and lean in closer to her, "I feel ffffffantastic." Lydia said making Sage hum while she heard Stiles's heartbeat pick up slightly. She looked over to him only to notice he was frantically looking around the room with a hint of pink on his cheeks.

Sage snorted a little, she can't believe him. Maybe she could- he was a guy- a teenage boy with riddled filled hormones at that. Noticing the blondes stare on him, Stiles quickly ran to Lydia's nightstand picking up the bottle of pills that were set on top of it. "I bet you can't say, uh, 'I saw Susie sitin' in a shoe-shine shop' ten times fast." He said and Lydia looked at him with a challenging smirk.

"I saw Shusie... I shaw... I saw..." Lydia's gaze drifts and Sage looks at her concerned, "Lydia? What did you see?" Sage asked softly, she was in the car with Lydia when the alpha burst through the video store, but she had no idea what kind of image the girl had in her head. "Something..."

"Something... like a mountain lion?"

"A mountain lion..."

"Are you sure you saw a mountain lion, or are you just saying that because that's what the police told you?" Stiles asked the girl.

"A mountain lion..." Lydia answers again making Stiles and Sage glance at each other. Sage looked over and saw a stuffed animal on Lydia's nightstand. She took it in her hands before looking back at the strawberry blonde, "Lydia hun, what's this?" She asked and Lydia looked at it, "A mountain lion."

"Oh, you're so high," Stiles muttered and Lydia rested her head in Sage's lap making her sigh and gently run her fingers through Lydia's hair. The blonde looked down at Lydia whose eyes have fluttered close. "I guess we should leave and let you get back to the whole post-traumatic stress thing," Stiles said, noticing the girl had passed out.

"No, stay." Lydia muttered making Sage raise her eyebrows, "You want us to stay, you sure Lyds?" She asked and the girl nodded looking up at her "Yes. Please, stay. Please, Jackson." Lydia said before falling back onto the bed. Sage scrunched up her eyebrows while muttering how just because both her and Jackson had blonde hair and blue eyes, they in no way looked alike.

As she had finished tucking Lydia in bed, Lydia's phone had gone off. Stiles reached over grabbing it before his eyes widen in horror.

"What?"

Stiles shoved the phone in the vampires face, Sage squinted not knowing exactly what she was looking at until she saw the black shadow and the red eyes belonging to the alpha. Lydia had managed to capture it on camera.

*~*

Sage watched as the human began pacing back and forth in his room, currently leaving another heated voicemail to the young werewolf. "Hey, it's me again. Look, I found something, and I don't know what to do, okay? So if you could turn your phone on right now, that'd be great. Or else I'll kill you. Do you understand me? I'm gonna kill you. And I'm too upset to come up with a witty description about how exactly I'm gonna kill you, but I'm just gonna do it, okay? I'm gonna—ugh! Goodbye. God."

He frustratedly hung up his phone before fishing out Lydia's phone from his pocket, Sage let the boy do what he wanted to do as she started to sketch in her notepad. He had asked the blonde what they should do after they stumbled across the captured picture of the alpha on the Martin girls phone, but Sage had told the boy that it was his call.

After a while, Sage looked up from her notepad after had drawn a faint outline of what looked like a bullet leaving a gun and the bumper of a car. Stiles sighed as he hit the delete button on Lydia's phone.

"I did the right thing right?"

Sage sighed, closing her notebook as she looked at the Stilinski boy. "Yes, she doesn't need this stress on her. If it becomes a threat to her life then I'll tell her." Sage said as Stiles sat down next to her.

"And, does that include you being a vampire?" Stiles asked, nut before the blonde could answer him the sheriff had come into the boy's room.

"I-uh, sorry did I interrupt something." Stiles quickly stood up from his bed, "W-what, dad no!" Sage giggled to herself making her way towards the sheriff sticking her hand out. "Hi Sheriff, we haven't been properly introduced. I'm Sage Guerrière, a friend of Stiles." The girl said as she shook the man's hand.

"Well, it's nice to meet you Sage, is that a French accent I hear?"

"Yes sir, born and raised." The man smiled while throwing an impressed look to his son.

"Well." He started, looking over at his son, "Please tell me I'm gonna hear good news at the Parent/Teacher thing tonight."

Stiles messed with a blue ball in his fingers and shrugged. "Depends on how you define 'good news'."

"I define it as you getting straight A's with no behavioural issues." Sage giggled as she sat on the edge of Stiles's bed knowing that the 'no behavioural issues' was a no go.

Stiles inhaled, frowning slightly. "You might want to rethink that definition." He looked up at his dad nervously, and Sheriff sighed, nodding.

"Enough said," Sheriff mumbled, "It was nice meeting you Sage, you'll have to come for dinner one day." The man said before leaving the two teens alone.

It was quiet for a moment, but Stiles had turned to face the girl in question.

"So, you never finished telling me about vampires."

*~*

"So, to sum up- you only need to feed every other day, you can walk out in the sun because of your magical ring, you were turned at 17, and the reason why your eyes are purple is because you are some type of royal vampire called a guardian?" Stiles questioned the blonde who slightly nodded her head at him.

Sage had told him everything apart from the meaning of being a guardian, she knew that would be Stiles's next question seeing as she spent the last ten minutes explaining why a ring could help her walk out during the day- which then had led the boy to start waving his arms about when he found out about witches and magic. But that was a story for another day.

She just summed up for the boy that one of her closest friends while growing up was born into a family of witches so when she had turned they had gifted her a daylight ring. Stiles had then linked the ring to the necklace she always wore around her neck, the amethyst stone that always seemed to shine when she was near him. She explained how there was a spell on it that hid her scent and another one that hid part of her guardian power away.

"So a guardian-" The human started, "Is that like a protector?" Sage smiled at the boy, she knew he was quick to pick up on things but it was still fascinating how well he was at it.

"Exactly, there are a fair share amount of us out in the world but there can only be a maximum of two in each family." Sage started off while she continued to sketch in her notepad, "Guardians connect to one person in their lifetime, a bond is formed between them- the vampire feels the need to protect them at any cost. The person which they have connected to instantly trusts them forming a strong connection over time, there are telltale details of when a vampire connects with someone but my connection is a little strange."

The human furrowed his eyebrows at the ocean eyed blonde, "Yo-you have already connected to someone?" Stiles tried not to stammer as he asked the girl the question he dreaded knowing the answer to. He felt a little jealousy bubble up in his stomach thinking of how the girl he had an unhealthy crush on had connected to someone.

Sage smirked a bit, her eyes lighting up after hearing the stammer in his voice, "Yeah in fact I have." She said, fully turning to look at the boy, "He's pretty adorable if you ask me." Stiles looked away from the girl feeling his face heat up in embarrassment, he had no right feeling the way he was, Sage didn't know about his crush. Or maybe she did, Stiles knew he was a bit awkward and obvious when it came to certain things and this was one of those things.

"Y-yeah, he's pretty lucky then." Sage giggled at his harsh tone, she threw her arms around the boy's neck causing him to stiff but eventually melt into her arms. "I connected to you dummy, don't tell me you don't feel a pull between us."

"Y-yeah, I mean of course I do. I just thought it was because-"

"Because..."

"Erm, nevermind." He cleared his throat, "So why is our connection strange?" He asked diverting the conversation back on track, he didn't want to tell the girl he liked her just as yet. He had time.

"Oh, remember I said vampires can only connect to one person in their lifetime?" Stiles nodded, "Well I connected with you and Lydia." Stiles's eyes widen slightly at the girl's confession, he didn't really understand all of that yet but he made it his mission to research more on Guardians and their connections as soon as he could- seeing as he so happened to be connected to one. He wanted to ask the girl more but her eyes quickly flickered between her ocean blue and her vampire purple.

"I gotta go."

"W-what where?"

"For a run."

"A run?" Sage smirked at the boy, answering him when she whooshed out of his room leaving him star-struck.

"Good God that girl is awesome."

*~*

Sage arrived at the school just as all the parents were leaving, she stepped out of the shadows as her eyes flickered around the parking lot looking for anyone she knew. Finally, her gaze found Scott and Allison who seemed to be getting scolded by their parents. She started to make her way over to them hoping to lessen the tension between the parents, but a scream suddenly had her head whirling around, looking for where the sound had come from.

Screams of terror were heard throughout the parking lot and she immediately watched as the parents and few students all started shoving each other to get to their cars. She quickly looked around trying to figure out why people were screaming, it couldn't have been the alpha- she would have sensed him. So what the hell was it?

Everyone was panicking as they tried to reach for their cars to flee from the danger that lurked in the school parking lot and not caring who they shoved to get away. Her ears suddenly perked up at the sound of an animal's growls and footsteps.

As she continued to look for the animal she spotted the Sheriff shove people out of the way, not noticing the car that suddenly pulled out behind him. Before she knew it, she was shoving the man away letting the car knock her over. She cursed when she looked and saw two of her fingers were broken and out of there place.

"Oh my god! Are you okay?" The Sheriff asked her, his tone filled with concern as he kneeled beside her. Sage smiled softly at the man showing him that she was fine, she sucked in a slight breath when the man continued to look over her in worry, she hadn't had a father figure look at her like that in a while. It brought a sudden warmth to her heart.

Sage quickly nodded to the man who helped her up, he wanted to question and scold her but after still hearing the panicked voices of people around them, the sheriff pulled up his pant leg, revealing the gun in its holster. But before he could fire the sound of two gunshots ran throughout the parking lot.

Sage looked up and saw that Chris Argent had shot and killed a mountain lion.

An actual mountain lion.

*~*