Ch. 13 Aftermath

Myrddin didn't even bother checking his phone to see the time. If the red liquid didn't destroy it the rain surely did.

So after a while he picks himself up off the steps and goes to the railing. There's a fence to stop anything or anyone from falling onto the field from the bleachers. And Myrddin just begins kicking it to vent the frustration he felt. And most of it was at his sister. He knows she isn't the mastermind behind this, because there's no way she's smart enough to pull this off. But she probably blabbered about his nickname she gave him without a second thought. If he has a younger sibling in middle school it isn't hard to think someone else would too.

He kicks the fence maybe a dozen times as the rain comes down heavier. And after he exhausts himself he just grips the railing as hard as he can before letting it go and looking off into the woods that are part of the Preserve.

A minute later he shoves his hands in his pockets and begins making his way back home. He makes sure to go the long way around the school to not get spotted by the teachers.

——————

He opens the door with his red key and walks into his house.

"Myrddin? Is that you? It's raining so hard outside! What happened to calling me when you were ready to come home?!" Ada asks from the kitchen.

The sound of a plate being set in the sink can be heard and Ada makes her way to the living room to see her son. "Did someone drive yo-"

Ada sees her son and she freezes. Her hands go to her mouth as her eyes water. "Myr!" She cries out before running to him.

Her baby boy is thoroughly soaked. His hair is dyed red and his white dress shirt is also dyed red. His glasses look tinted and the expression on his face absolutely shatters her heart.

Myrddin looks up from the floor. "I'm physically alright mom. Did the school call you already….?"

Ada grabs her sons shoulder with her left hand and with her right hand she checks his hair. After realizing the red wasn't coming out she brought her son's head to her chest to hold him close. "What happened to you?!" Tears begins streaming down her face.

There is some hesitation from Myrddin before he wraps his arms around his mom. He didn't want to get her drenched from his suit or for any of the red liquid still on him to get on her. But after feeling the motherly warmth he couldn't help but hug her.

Footsteps can be heard from upstairs going towards the stairs.

"What happened? Did the idiot get caught in the rain after pathetically leaving the dance early?" Gwen haughtily says as she descends to the first floor.

After she gets halfway down she sees Ada hugging Myr with red hair. Her eyes widen and a smirk grows on her face. "OMG! He died his hair!"

Ada looks at her daughter and the fear of God strikes Gwen when she sees her mothers expression.

Gwen is used to being scolded or told off. But the pain and anger in her moms face made Gwen concerned and worried. She may pretend not to care about her mom and brother, but there is still a part of her deep down that cares for them.

Ada doesn't say a word to Gwen. She doesn't need to. And she doesn't know what to say. She can only guess what happened since Myrddin isn't talking to her. She doesn't remember the last time they hugged like this, It was like when he was younger and his vision first started to degrade or when something terrible happened.

Gwen isn't sure what to do. And she just ends up being stuck on the stairs.

"I-I'm going to take a shower. The school can tell you what happened…" Myrddin kicks his shoes off and walks away from his mom. He ignores Gwen and goes to the closest bathroom on the first floor so he doesn't drip throughout the house.

Ada watches her son go around the corner to a hall and runs to grab her phone. She has Natalie Martin's phone number and instantly calls. She knows Natalie was a teacher chaperone and will have answers.

Gwen comes down the stairs but leaves her left hand on the wooden railing. "What did Myr do?"

Ada has her phone to her ear and turns towards her daughter. "I-I don't…. I don't know what happened… I'm calling Ms. Martin to get some answers right now…"

The phone rings twice before the call gets picked up.

"Ada! Is Myrddin home?!" Natalie immediately asks.

"He just got home, what happened?!" Ada demands in a worried and angry tone.

"Things are crazy here right now. It's good that he's home, we had Sheriff Stalinski and other officers out looking for him. Did he tell you anything? And is he hurt?" Natalie tries to talk over the loud chatter in the gymnasium. Even after the dance was called off the rain makes it hard to evacuate everyone early. And they can't just throw the students out into the rain.

"He didn't say anything, and he was freezing. His hair was RED! What the hell happened!?" Ada doesn't like that she wasn't told what happened.

"Right now we have some teachers going through the footage to see who set this up-" Shouts can be heard through the phone but they die down and Natalie continues. "Someone pulled a cruel prank or something. Myrddin was announced as homecoming king and when he was about to be crowned a red solution of paint and other liquids was dropped from the ceiling onto Myrddin-"

"WHAT?!" Ada shouts as her furry explodes. "You're telling me someone covered Myrddin with blood like Carrie?!"

Natalie covers her other ear to try and block out the students. "We don't think there was any blood-"

"Oh! That makes me feel SO much better Natalie! What the hell has the school been doing?! Why wasn't I informed?!" Ada shouts.

"We- I-… Sorry, things are just so hectic here. An officer should be showing up at your home soon if they haven't already" Natalie wouldn't know how she would react if it was her daughter so she understands Ada's reaction.

"When did this happen?"

——————

Myrddin is in the bathroom and he looks at himself in the mirror. His hair is clearly dyed red like his previously white shirt. His glasses also don't help the red visual situation either.

Hot water runs from the faucet and Myrddin tries to clean his glasses off. But he doubts anything will help them at this point. Maybe just make the red tint less noticeable. At least it rained and didn't let the red liquid dry on him. But that obviously didn't help his hair.

After doing what he can for his glasses he takes his clothes off. The suit at this point is just a wet puddle of fabric. He hangs it on a towel rack and placed a towel beneath it and gets into the shower. Being able to not see red for the first time in a while was nice. But his hair was even more annoying now that it's red, and it's red all the way to the roots.

He looks down at his hands but can barely see his fingers. He has to hold them close to his face to barely be able to see them. Whenever he opens his eyes without wearing his glasses it's like a jarring feeling is persistent no matter the situation. Like his mind is trying to make sense of what it's seeing but it can't. He doesn't think his vision got worse tonight, but he knows it didn't help it either.

And Gwen's words ring in his thoughts. She talked like he was the cause of this. Like he wanted to be drenched and have his hair dyed. Be humiliated in front of the entire school live. Like he wanted his phone and suit to be ruined.

The hot water running over him feels much better than the rain.

"How did someone pull this off?" Myrddin asks himself. They would have had to rig the voting. Been able to remotely drop the red liquid on a specific spot. Somehow get up to the ceiling and rig the bucket up there. And know he would actually be there. Among a few other things. And if someone was smart enough to do all this he doubts they would allow themselves to be caught easily.

Myrddin doesn't even know why someone would go to such lengths. There's 100s of things someone can do to him that won't risk getting expelled as a consequence.

"You're telling me the only way to find out who did this is if they were caught on camera?! The camera system that hasn't been updated in how long?!"

Myrddin can hear his mom shout. He turns the water off and steps out. After drying himself he wraps a towel around his waist and goes to the living room. There isn't a change of clothes anywhere else but his room and the stairs are from the living room. Great.

Gwen's eyes slightly widen for a second when she sees her brother with his red hair. It definitely does not help him in the looks department.

Myrddin stands in front of Gwen while Ada shouts from the kitchen. "Who did you tell about calling me Velma?"

"What?" Gwen wasn't ready for that pitch. It was the wildest curveball she had ever seen.

"Someone in the crowd shouted Velma. So I'll ask you again, who did you tell that you call me Velma?" Myrddin looks down at his sister with a neutral expression, but his eyes are anything but calm.

"I didn't even tell anyone that we're siblings. Why would I tell them you looks like Velma when you look for your glasses? What does that get me?" Gwen defends herself.

Myrddin takes a deep breath. "The person who 'Carrie-ed' me might be connected in some weird way. I'm already done trying to play your big brother. Just tell me so I can do what you're doing to me, and pretend we aren't related. Tell me and I won't talk to you again unless I absolutely have to"

Gwen is surprised by how serious he is. "I- it could have been anyone in my friend group. I might have said it offhandedly when we saw the video of you asking for your glasses after the fight…"

"I want a list of names. After that we are just two strangers living in the same house" Myrddin then goes to the stairs and makes his way to his room.

——————

Myrddin has his broken pair of glasses and his red tinted glasses out on his desk.

He's trying to think of a plan on what to do moving forward.

A good place to start would be cross referencing the last names of any of Gwen's friends last names to anyone in his school. He also has to make sure if the school actually catches the right person or not.

And the videos of this incident might just make this easy as well. Why would someone do this and not have it recorded. But that doesn't fully work since it was homecoming and the school probably was recording this itself.

The next best thing is to figure out how someone rigged the voting. Which might actually be easier than he's making it sound.

"What are you going to do with their names?" Gwen asks from the other side of the door.

Myrddin gets up and opens the door. "I'm going to see if they have any older sibling in my school. Anything more than that doesn't involve you"

Gwen sees that even Myrddin's eyebrows are red. "Whatever… h-here" She hands him a list of names. And it's long.

But Myrddin can't see how many names are on it. He just takes the paper and goes to close the door.

"Are you ok?" Gwen quickly asks.

Myrddin leaves the door open a little bit. "Would you be ok?"

Gwen looks down at the floor. "No, I wouldn't be"

"And that's the difference between us" Myrddin closes the door.

She thought the question was rhetorical. How would anyone be ok after that? She just… She saw the video and it was….. horrible, to say the least. Even her worst enemies don't deserve what happened to her brother. And she's so confused by what Myrddin meant by his last words. What's the difference between them?

——————

*Knock* *Knock* *Knock*

Ada knocks on her son's door and whispers: "You awake Myrddin? Do you want to talk? I just got off the phone…"

Myrddin opens the door and he's wearing the tinted glasses. "That was a long phone call"

Ada brings her son into a bear hug. She doesn't know how he can act like nothing happened and even attempt a joke. "I'm so sorry!"

"About…. what? Crush-ing… me?" Myrddin struggles to say while in the death-bear hug. "It's not like you did this"

Ada loosens her hold but doesn't let him free. "Gwen tells me you think someone did this that knows she calls you Velma…"

"I think that's a good place to start with what I can do right now" Myrddin says. He really can't do much else unless he talks with the school.

"Here…" Ada takes a step back and hands him a piece of paper. "It's some of the moms I talk to… we vent to each other about our kids"

Myrddin has a feeling that some wine bottles are also involved in these venting sessions or whatever they do. He takes the note. "Thanks mom. But it's not yours or Gwen's fault this happened"

"But-" Ada tries to interject but Myrddin cuts her off.

"I don't think it's completely related. If someone wanted to make fun of me because I'm going blind they would just take my glasses and pay keep-away. I think this was just someone trying to be funny. But they said it a little too quick so there is a sliver of a chance it might have been connected. I'd rather rule everything out that I can" Myrddin explains.

"But the school failed you. I… I fai-" Ada begins crying more.

"The school is set up to fail. And you did what you could, I know that. I don't expect you to protect me from everything. And you gave them hell for this right?" Myrddin hugs his mom this time.

Ada sniffles and nods. "They haven't seen nothing yet"

After a few minutes Ada calms down and Myrddin has her sit on the chair in front of his desk while he sits on his the edge of his bed.

Ada sees that his laptop is open to the 2010 Beacon Hills student roster and there's a piece of paper with Gwen's handwriting listing a bunch of names with Myrddin's own notes next to the names. She wipes her eyes and looks over at her son with his red hair and tinted glasses. "You aren't- *sniffle* going to become the villain are you?"

Myrddin shakes his head and gives a small smile. "You raised me better than that"

This causes a quivering smile to spread on Ada's face. "The sheriff is personally going to personally lead this investigation…"

Myrddin figures Stiles is glad about this. And he might be able to get some updates from Stiles too. But…

Ada follows Myrddin's gaze to his phone that she figures is just an expensive paperweight at this point. "We can get you a new phone, and lens for your glasses"

"That would be good" Myrddin would appreciate that, but it's not like he texts anyone. He probably just has a few missed calls or texts from Scott and Stiles. But Stiles probably is getting updates from his dad and sharing them with Scott. "Any updates?"

"A few…" Ada takes a breath. "They found that the cameras at the school caught 5 kids and they're currently being questioned. These are the ones that set up the bucket on the ceiling. They're all on the homecoming committee, so they're looking into the others on the committee as well"

Myrddin has a sad smile. This won't be as fun if they all get caught. He needs the investigation to look further beyond the committee. But this is some useful info. "Are they going to try and find what they doused me in? There's clearly chemicals and paint mixed together"

Ada nods. "They're currently trying to figure out what it was. And they said to take you to the hospital as soon as you start feeling anything off. Melissa said that you should be fine, but just to be safe we should keep a close eye on you"

Myrddin is reminded that Scott's mom is a nurse. "So far I feel good all things considered, just a bit tired"

"If anything changes, immediately let me know" Ada seriously scans Myrddin from head to toe. "And they said as soon as they figure what that stuff was they'd call me"

"That's good. I'll probably take another shower before I go to sleep as well" Myrddin's knows his mom was going to ask him to do that anyway just to be safe.

"Just to be safe" Ada gives him a smile that fades to a look of concern. "Do you want to go to school Monday?"

"Yeah, no reason my grades should suffer because of this" Myrddin looks over at his backpack.

Ada leans forward and places a hand on his knee. "Your teachers can just give you the homework. Natalie said the school is willing to work with us on whatever you need moving forward"

"The worse thing to do is not go. That would just create even more drama if I didn't show up. It would also make showing up later that much harder. Plus me leaving school might be exactly what the person behind this wants, so I'd rather just go to school like this didn't happen to annoy that person" Myrddin explains his reasoning, but it still doesn't help his mom.

"But you can't pretend this didn't happen! Something like this…" Ada begins boiling with anger again at the people who would do this to her son.

"I'm not going to pretend it didn't happen, but I don't want to make a big deal about it. Things are already bad and now I just want to do some damage control" Myrddin grabs his moms hand with both of his and firmly holds it. "Plus I doubt the school will let anyone bully me anytime soon. This thing is probably gonna blow up on the internet"

Ada's eyes widen. "I need to tell your father about this before he finds out on his own. Maybe he can come home sooner? He might be able to do something about this"

"Mom" Myrddin shakes her arm a little. "Calling dad is fine, but I'd rather not interfere with his project. We will see him for longer if we just wait until his project is over and he comes home for his extended vacation right? And I don't know how dad can help if he were here in person, just calling or video chatting him would have the same effect and wouldn't delay him and his project"

"You're right but-" Ada stops herself.

Myrddin looks at his mom. "You've done a great job, and I know you'll continue to do a great job. I can't ask for more. We will get through this"

Ads puts her other hand over her son's hands and brings them to her forehead. "This isn't fair. I'm supposed to be the one comforting you y'know"