Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

‘Team human’s a go-go’ Stiles whispers into his walkie talkie.

‘God you’re a douche, Stiles.’ Jackson’s voice says, crackling through the radio.

‘What the fuck Jackson? Team Humans the best name for our ragtag renegade bunch of rebels’.

Stiles can almost taste the eye roll from across the line, ‘Shut up Stiles.’

‘I like it.’ says Allison god rest her soul Argent from next to him. Thank god for Allison. Allison rules.

‘I don’t.’ Scott says grumpily from next to them.

Stiles rolls his eyes, ‘That’s just because you’re not technically human. Are you going to keep going on about that? Coz it’s getting annoying and its ruining my pre-blow up buzz. It’s not my fault you’re a werewolf.’

‘Uh well, it’s because I’m a werewolf that we are currently about to blow up a werewolf hunters base.

‘Argh, Scott! You ruin everything!’

‘That’s what you said about Gerard Argent! Don’t lump me in with him!’

‘Exactly, that’s why we’re here right now, blowing up his house and trying to save your furry werewolf ass.’

‘I’m not sure how blowing up the Argent compound is “saving my furry ass” by the way.’

‘Well,’ Stiles admitted, ‘it’s not really, but we’re using guerrilla tactics here Scott. Disrupt, create chaos, distract! That’s the name of the game! If we want to find your little furry friends, this is the way to do it.’

‘Will you guy’s shut up? I’ve almost got my charges set.’ come’s Danny’s voice from the other end of the line.

‘Me too.’ Echoes Jackson.

‘Lydia, are you all set to go?’ Stiles asks, heart beat racing again.

‘Yep, house looks empty. Blow up in t-minus 10 seconds.’

‘10’

‘Are you sure you’re OK with us blowing up your childhood, ancestral home?’ Stiles asks Allison, next to him.

‘9’

Allison rolls her eyes, ‘For the last time Stiles it’s not my childhood ancestral home. It’s Gerard’s compound.’

‘8’

‘Yeah but he’s still family.’

‘7’

‘Fuck that, he’s a crazy, psychotic, pill popping geriatric pain in my ass, a bit of a scare will do him good.’

‘6’

‘I knew I liked you for a reason Allison, I swear if Scott hadn’t got in first....’ Stiles say’s, petering off suggestively.

‘5’

Scott whines quietly beside them as Allison flashes Stiles a grin, ‘You’re alright too Stiles.’

‘4’

Scott’s whine gets louder and Stiles shushes him, ‘Calm your stupid werewolfey possessiveness Scott. I know you guys are sickeningly cute together.’

‘3’

Allison quickly kisses Scott on the cheek, which, thankfully, shuts him up and Stiles turns to face the house from their vantage point on the crest of the hill.

‘2’

Everyone covers their ears, especially Scott, who pulls on ear mufflers for his poor sensitive werewolf ears.

‘1’

 

The noise is deafening as the house explodes outwards, a fiery ball of splintered wood and burning embers. Almost immediately a siren sounds, not a fire alarm or a police one, but a specialised Argent Hunter siren and Stiles is already hollering into the walkie talkies to get their butts out of there as he, Allison and Scott hightail away from the cliff and through the preserve and toward Stiles’ jeep. He slips a few times and Scott is right there to catch him. Scott rules.

As they scramble into the jeep, they quickly bundle themselves out of there, Stiles, zipping through the many hidden back roads he and Scott had found the summer he got his license. Except they were more like large trails rather than actual roads, but just wide enough to fit the jeep.

Scott’s ears suddenly prick and his nose twitches, uh-oh, looks like they have company. Stiles hoped it’s the good kind of company, of the furry kind, not the crazy gun wielding kind.

‘They’re close’ Scott whispers with a grin. And Stiles flails a fist pump. They did it, they fucking did it.

It’s not the Argent's but the others. The very reason for the explosion they set. Stiles knew that Team Human would have to do something big to capture their attention and apparently blowing up the Argent Clans leader’s house was deemed worthy of that attention.

Stiles can see them now. As the jeep rushes through the preserve he can make out dark shapes bounding alongside them through the trees, their eyes bright blue, green and yellow. But apart from that they’re silent. Clever, any kind of howling would set the Argent's off.

The Argent's know the dynamite wasn’t really the wolves MO, so that was good. But what wasn’t good is that they’ve now possibly alerted the Argent's to the presence of a second pack of resistance and Stiles just didn’t trust the Argent's not to go turbo on the wolves when they felt threatened however. He knew momma Argent was one scary, ragey motherfucker, not that he’d ever say that to Allison.

Suddenly the wolves vanish and Stiles sees why, the jeep is heading toward the main preserve road.

He looks back one final time and he sees him. The Alpha. Bigger than all the others, shaggy black and impossibly elegant as he bounds through the trees, his eyes like bright red beacons and Stiles is drawn to them, almost unable to tear his eyes away until Scott has to grab the steering wheel from swerving off the road.

‘Whoa, sorry dude, I just saw the Alpha.’

‘I know, those eyes are pretty mesmerizing right?’

‘Totally. Do you think we have his attention now?’

‘Dude, even he couldn’t ignore that.’

Stiles had to agree with Scott. He just hoped it had been worth it, not just for his and his friend’s sake but for the town’s sake. Beacon Hills was in danger and Team Human wasn’t letting it go down without a fight.

***

It had all started 6 months ago with the change of principals at Beacon Hills High school. Actually, no, it had started a week before that when Scott was bitten. Anyway it all started the night Scott was bitten. Then turned into a werewolf and then was almost killed by Chris Argent. That’s when they (Team Human, or Team Stiles as it was back then) knew something was up.

So Scott was a werewolf and the Argent's were werewolf hunters, killers, and murderers. That was OK, because although Chris tried to kill Scott that night he didn’t really know what Scott looked like. All the Argent's knew that the wolf was young, a teenager and that had made the Argent's suspicious and rightly so, as there were others, Scott told him so and not just the one that bit Scott. Many others. Scott could scent them. Over the past six months the Argent family and their cronies had started to invade every nook and cranny of life at Beacon Hills including and most definitely their high school, trying to sniff out the Werewolves.

Jackson, Lydia and Danny (the rest of Team Human, back then) had been made aware of Scott’s condition when he accidentally wolfed out in front of them at Lacrosse training. Jackson had been instantly jealous, crowing about the fact he knew McCall couldn’t have been that naturally good at Lacrosse, Danny had been impressed but not surprised, he said he had been hacking into the police database and said that there had been spates of animal attacks and strange deaths in Beacon Hills for years. He had suspected something was up and was keen to help. Lydia had sniffed and told Scott that he looked horrible with those sideburns. Thankfully they had all decided to keep the secret and made a reluctant Jackson do the same. They were friends, of sorts and Scott needed all the friends he could get. So Team Human was born.

The new Argent girl, Allison, had made things even more complicated. She was new to the school, had moved with her crazy ass parents; nice but not to be trusted. Lydia said so, even though Scott begged to talk to her. He had developed the stupidest crush known to man, but they couldn’t be certain she knew nothing of what her family did. Stiles was sure she was spy, sent to infiltrate the young peoples of Beacon Hills. Scott crowed that she ‘smelled’ honest to him and Stiles had snorted, there was no way people could ‘smell’ honest, and Scott just wanted to get in her pants.

It wasn’t until they got their new principal that all hell broke loose. Gerard’s regime was harsh, the students hated it, the parents loved it and he had been put up as a very popular runner for the new mayor, which majorly sucked. Not just because he was a shitty principal, but he was the patriarch of the Argent family which meant he was double the crazy and double the smarts. Plus their old principal had gone ‘mysteriously’ missing a few weeks before the installation of Gerard Argent. And Stiles had a horrible feeling they’d never be seeing poor old Mr Hadley ever again.

‘This cannot happen Stiles.’ Lydia had said after 2 months of Gerard’s reign, slapping a flyer down in front of him in the library showing Gerard smarmy smiling face under the sign to “VOTE ONE, GERARD ARGENT”.

‘Gerard Argent, for Mayor? Fuck. That’s it, everything’s over, we’re fucked.’

‘I know, we’re screwed, not just Scott, but all of us. School is hell because of him. The curfew itself is the stupidest idea known to man. But you know the rumors about the expulsion of Greenburg? It’s true Stiles! The idiot got expelled for low grades. People don’t get expelled for low grades! And they’re instigated daily locker checks. What. The. Fuck. You need to fix this.’

Stiles sighed, ‘What do you want me to do about it.’

‘You’ve been researching werewolves in the area with Danny haven’t you? Because this needs to end, before Gerard gets voted in as mayor and starts to run this town as his own personal hunting barracks!’

‘You really think that’s going to happen?’

‘Remember what was on the news about Collarfield last year?’

Stiles nodded, he vaguely remembered at least a little bit, ‘They had a spate of animal attacks and then the entire town was almost burnt to the ground in a freak accident. Oh crap’ Stiles said, comprehension dawning on him, ‘those were no animal attacks and that wasn’t a freak accident were they, that was a war. That was the Argent's versus Werewolves round one wasn’t it? How the hell do you know all this?’

Lydia scoffed, throwing her strawberry blonde hair over her shoulders, ‘You’re not the only one who knows how to research Stiles. And the scary thing is Collarfield is only the top of the pile. The Argent's have been doing this for years. They find a town they believe to be infested with Werewolves and they infiltrate it. Every level of government the town possesses schools, council, police. Stiles your dad could be in danger. Not from werewolves but from the goddamn Argent's. You know they “got rid” of our previous principal right? They could do the same with the sheriff, especially if they want full control of the town.’

‘Fuck. But what can we do?’ That really was scary. It sounded like The Argent's wanted to take over the whole town, for what? Some kind of military werewolf hunting destination?

‘Well we at least have something those Collarfield people didn’t have. We have the knowledge of what the Argent's have been doing for years, decades. And we know there’s a population of Werewolves somewhere around here. We know that because Scott scents them every once in a while. And we know they’ve been fighting. The nights haven’t been this unsettled for years. I live right next to the preserve and I tell you those are wolf howls and gun shots are not in my imagination. It’s like a warzone every full moon, fuck every night. There has to be werewolves in the preserve. We just have to figure out if they’re on our side and whether we can trust them.’

Stiles scrubbed a hand through his hair, glancing at the clueless people scattered throughout the library, on one level he would kill to have no knowledge of all of this, be completely ignorant. On the other hand, mother fucking werewolves and hunters, it was like his favourite horror movie coming to life and he was in the thick of it, ‘It’s getting bad, isn’t it.’

‘Yep, the werewolves won’t stand a chance not since Jackson says that according to his father, Gerard’s a shoo-in for Mayor, now that he’s gotten the principal job. And Chris has been asking around about the Sheriffs position. Thankfully Jackson’s father assured him that Sheriff Stilinski is top notch and wasn’t leaving anytime soon.’

Stiles sucked in a breath, ‘But that’s not good, that just means they’re going to try harder to uproot him and it won’t be soon before dad goes mysteriously ‘missing’ like Mr Hadley.’

‘Exactly, plus the Argent's have settled and more family of theirs pour into Beacon Hills every week. It looks like they’re manning their battle stations and the clueless humans, once again, will be caught in the cross fire. Like Collarfield’

‘But why Beacon Hills? Surely there’s many other, better towns they have werewolf populations they can invade and set up shop.’

‘No idea, all I know is they targeted Beacon Hills about ten years ago, but then suddenly disappeared without a trace overnight. Something either spooked them, or they were run out of town, but that’s what we need to look into, I bet you a million dollars that whatever happened 10 years ago will have something to do with who the Werewolves we’re looking for are.’

‘So find out any incidents, occurrences that happened ten years ago and who was involved and we find our werewolves.’ Stiles summarizes.

‘Exactly.’ Lydia agrees.

So that night Stiles had asked his father, but, as always, his father stayed tight lipped about anything criminal that happened ten years ago, which meant two things. One; something did happen, of magnitude and criminal in nature 10 years ago and two; it hadn’t been solved yet. So Stiles sought out Danny, once again, and they hacked into the sheriff department’s database. Stiles only felt a little guilty about that, but he reasoned that if he was doing this to save his father’s life then he didn’t need to feel guilty. People could die.

They had found that in 2003 there were two outstanding criminal acts not solved. The first was the breaking and entering of a hardware store and the other was the Hale House Fire.

So that was it. The Hale house fire had been deemed arson and murder. Eleven people of the Hale family (pack) had died, the only survivors were Derek, his sister Laura and their uncle Peter.

The Hales must be Werewolves, but Stiles was pretty sure there was more than three now if Lydia was to be believed. She had described a pretty even battle field which meant the Argent's hadn’t been the only ones arming their battles stations over the years.

Stiles had decided right then and there that they desperately needed a meet, before things got more out of hand. So Stiles had turned to Scott.

When Stiles had explained his plan to Scott, he had looked scared, but determined. Even more so when Stiles mentioned Scott’s mum, head of nursing at Beacon Hills Hospital, might be in danger. She probably was, especially if the scary Victoria Argent had her way. She had already gotten a job as a secretary; there was no telling who she would target next.

It had been a tense night for all of them as they waited for Scott to return. They had all holed up in Stiles room and it had been past one before Scott had returned, ashen faced but unharmed.

He hadn’t even reached halfway through the preserve toward the remains of the old Hale House when he had been accosted by a sentry and knocked unconscious. They had taken him to their Alpha.

‘Who’s the Alpha?’ Stiles had asked. Despite all his and Danny’s research they had never gotten anything concrete on Pack hierarchy.

‘It was the uncle, Peter. He was super creepy, and had these crazy burns on his face. He said he was the one that bit me and apparently the pack had been waiting for me to contact them. I had been, what they call, ‘resistant’ to the pull of the pack and the Alpha because apparently I already have one.’

‘What, a pack or an Alpha.’

Scott had looked a little shamefaced, ‘Both.’

‘But who’s your Alpha - whoa. Do they mean me?’ Stiles asked incredulously. Because Alpha he was not.

Scott nodded, ‘I think so. It was weird, Peter kept going on about a human Alpha, and how rare it was, and how awesome you would be as a werewolf. And then I said you wanted a meeting and he was like sure, but not until halfway through the next cycle of the full moon because apparently wolfs can’t be trusted around the full moon.’

‘Well, we already know that.’ Stiles had said and Scott blushed remembering his first full moon when he had tried to kill his best friend. That had been fucking scary shit right there.

So they had planned it out and waited, waited through Gerard getting more popular as candidate for mayor, waited as the Argent instilled themselves more into the town and waited until Stiles couldn’t stand the inactivity. So when the night Stiles had been buzzing with energy, so he and Scott then waited at the precise time Peter had wanted him in the woods for four freaking hours and no one had come. Scott hadn’t even scented any wolves in the area.

Stiles had been pissed. Either Peter decided to cancel the meeting without telling them or something had happened to him, or he was dead. That sucked. Team Human would need help defeating the Argent's and if they wanted to take their town back they would need to get the wolves attention, somehow.

Something had to give and eventually, thankfully, something did. That something had been a bit of a surprise.

Things at school had gotten worse, almost to breaking point. The students didn’t just hate Gerard Argent, they detested him. It had gotten so bad that Allison, his granddaughter, had started getting bullied, simply because she was related to him. And although Team Human knew they couldn’t trust her they defended her in any way that they could, especially Scott who still held onto his stupid crush, until Jackson, albeit reluctantly, had used his social sway, as did Lydia and Danny to halt the attacks, it hadn’t been pretty but they managed it somehow.

It started to die down until Lydia, once again, accosted Stiles in the library, again. It was becoming a bit of a regular thing and as much as he liked her, Stiles started to question whether she actually knew how to use that disgustingly expensive cell she owned (he suspected she just liked scaring him in quiet places).

‘I can’t do this anymore Stiles.’

‘Can’t do what?’ Stiles sighed, putting away his chemistry homework. For some reason, since Scott’s meeting with Peter, Stiles had been elected the unofficial ‘leader’ of Team Human, so obviously, that meant everyone came to him with their stupid problems. He was still pretty skeptical about this whole human Alpha thing.

‘I can’t keep ignoring Allison. Not only is she pretty and smart and the prime candidate for best friend material but she keeps talking to me and thanking me for stopping the bullying, frankly its getting exhausting pretending to ignore her.’

Stiles thought about it for a moment, it had been hard keeping Scott away too. Perhaps an advantage could be sought from Allison’s friendship?, ‘Maybe we could use this to our advantage. If she does know what her family is up to you could pump her for information. If she doesn’t, she could become an invaluable ally.’

Lydia looked impressed, and scarily a little turned on by Stiles callousness, ‘Perfect, that’s settled then. Operation friend Allison will be enacted.’ And with that she clicked out of the library. That had been relatively painless, for a meeting with Lydia at least.

So Allison had become an unofficial member of Team Human. It had soon become clear she knew nothing of her family’s activities but she was, apparently, an Olympic grade archer and gymnast, which was kind of handy.

But Stiles and Lydia still protested against Scott letting her in on their and her family’s secret.

‘She needs a stronger tie to us before we can turn her against her family Scott. ’Lydia had said when Scott had asked.

Stiles hadn’t needed to have worried, because the moment Stiles had told Scott Allison wasn’t off limits anymore Scott had been in there like a shot. Strangely enough she had been more than accepting of his attentions and they soon became the goddamn cutest couple in Beacon Hills High. Even creepy Gerard had approved the match which was scary in more ways than one.

So there was that and after weeks of nagging Stiles and Lydia had given in to Scott’s insistence that Allison wouldn’t betray them. So they told her. Sure, she had been shocked at first when they told her about Scott being a werewolf, the even more disbelieving when he and Stiles explained to her about her family, until they gave her all their evidence. Police reports, the pattern of the Argents town hopping and town decimating, the disappearance of Omegas and then whole packs of Werewolves. And finally, the nail in the coffin, the Hale House Fire ten years ago.

Then she had believed them. At first she had been disgusted at her family, and extremely betrayed. She had gone scarily silent for a couple of days after telling them, she had returned with short pixie cut badass hair and the promise to start helping them, even giving them the blueprints to Gerard’s heavily fortified house.

In fact it had been Allison who was the one to suggest blowing his house up when the team were discussing ways of getting the Hale Packs attention.

Did Stiles mention that he liked Allison? They kind of scarily thought alike.

During all this Stiles hadn’t been idle. He and Danny decided to have a bit of fun with the Argent's woefully under protected security systems, using Danny’s hacking skills. Small stuff at first. They found the Argent radio number and blocked all ingoing and outgoing signals for a night. They hacked into the school system and disrupted Gerard Argent's email. This small stuff soon turned into Stiles, Scott and Jackson cutting the electricity and phone lines to the main Argent ‘Compound’ (Allison’s house) as they called it.

Stiles liked to call it guerrilla tactics, the techniques that small groups of militia perform to disrupt and create chaos because they don’t have the numbers for an all-out attack. They had also compiled a massive stockpile of intel on the Argent's.

In fact Stiles liked to think information was Team Humans main strength. Jackson’s father who was on the Town council had access to meeting minutes as well as numerous financial and litigation files on the Argent's as his dad was their lawyer. Jackson, who had been grumbling about missing out on all the fun had been more than happy to break into his dads filing system and photocopy anything he thought, might be useful.

And not only could Danny hack into any database in Beacon Hills, he was also currently gathering information from previous towns across America and Europe that the Argent's had levelled. Stiles, after a few nifty wrist moves, had a second key to the hard copies of every crime ever committed in Beacon Hills courtesy of his father. And Lydia, whose father was an architect, managed to get her hands on not only the blueprints to the main Argent compound but also details of Gerard’s security systems and the codes to shut them off which had made the whole blowing up business much easier than expected.

It was hard, though, to get an exact number of the amount of Argent's and hunters either currently living in the compound but also Beacon Hills itself. From Stiles’ observation, cars were constantly coming and going. The population was transient which made it harder to track and get a correct number.

So the levelling of Gerard’s house had been relatively easy to pull off with all the mad skills of Team Human, he just hoped the Hale Packs Alpha saw that too.

After the explosion everyone had managed to make it home OK and they all had each other as alibis just in case anyone was asking. It wasn’t until Stiles had almost passed out on his bed that he realised there was a note pinned to the outside of his window. How the hell did that get there?

All it read, in scratchy, yet elegant handwriting, was “That was stupid, if you wanted our attention all you had to do was ask. Come to the old Hale house at 9pm tomorrow evening. Bring your wolf – DH”

Success!

Stiles quickly looked out the window toward the street. There was nothing out there. He fist pumped enthusiastically and quickly texted the Team. Responses were immediate and mostly positive, except for Jackson who had told Stiles to stop fucking texting him when he was trying to fucking sleep.

Well thank you very fucking much Jackson.

Stiles glanced down at the note again and re-read it. His eyes lingering on the initials. DH. That obviously meant Derek Hale had left the note.

But what did that mean? Surely the Alpha should be the one to make the meetings, so wouldn’t that mean Peter? Unless Stiles’ hunch from the month before when they had been stood up was correct. That Peter was, in fact, dead and Derek was the new Alpha. Which meant that Derek would have to been the one that killed Peter if Danny’s werewolf lore was to be trusted. Which meant they were possibly dealing with another psycho and this one decidedly stronger and wolfier then Gerard Argent.

Except the note hadn’t seemed particularly menacing, in fact, if anything, it seemed exasperated, annoyed maybe, but not the words of a psycho. And Stiles knew exasperated when he heard it, read it, smelled it. In fact it was the emotion most commonly displayed toward the gangly, moley kid with ADHD for most of his life. He could deal with exasperated. He was an expert at dealing with exasperated.

However Stiles wasn’t so confident the next night. In fact not knowing barely anything about the Hale pack was unnerving in itself because despite his superior research skills and access to town records there had been barely anything on the Hales. Tantamount to their ability to stay under the radar, that had to be commended.

But Stiles hated going in blind. Hell, all his plans so far had been meticulously planned to the last second that he felt naked walking with Scott into the preserve at night, naked without information to arm him.

‘Halt.’ Said a young voice in front of them.

Stiles whirled around and Scott squinted in the darkness, surprise colouring his tone when he asked, tentatively into the darkness, ‘Isaac? Isaac is that you?’

A tall, curly haired guy stepped into the shallow moonlight.

Holey fuck it really was Isaac Lahey. Orphan lacrosse benchwarmer and quiet guy Isaac Lahey was a freaking werewolf.

‘Are you a werewolf?’ Scott asked eagerly.

‘Yeah.’ Isaac said, a little stiffly.

‘When did you get turned?’ Scott pressed. Stiles understood Scott’s enthusiasm; it must be nice to meet another person like you.

‘I got turned – look I’m not meant to talk to you. Just put on these blindfolds and then I can take you to see the Alpha.’

‘Really Isaac? Blindfolds?’ Stiles asked with a scoff.

Isaac sighs a very put upon sigh, ‘Yeah I know, but procedure for any human entering the hostile territory. At night.’

Stiles huffs, hostile territory indeed. But he puts it on. As does Scott.

Isaac leads them over leaves and through swishing trees until they come to a set of ascending steps. The air turns stuffy and damp and Stiles guesses that they’re underground, in a bunker of some sort. Stiles and Scott’s steps echo off the walls but if he didn’t have Isaac hand at his back he would be aware Isaac was there at all, he was very stealthy.

As they step through what feels like a doorway and Isaac shuts the door behind them he instructs them to take off their blindfolds.

‘The Alpha will be with you in a minute.’ Isaac says quietly as he leaves the room.

Stiles squints, adjusting his eyes to the low light coming from the lamp on the table. The walls are concrete and the room smells like mould. The room didn’t look like a meeting room it looked like an interrogation room.

Scott shared his uneasy expression. Stiles knew an interrogation room when he saw one, especially one like this, with no chairs, little light and dark, forbidding walls.

They wait about 10 minutes until the door opposite them opens with a groan.

In steps through a built guy who looks to be in his mid-twenties with dark hair and light green eyes dark jeans and a grey Henley and dark shoes, no burn scars, no discernable creepiness. Stiles shares a glance with Scott. This isn’t the Alpha that bit Scott. This isn’t Peter Hale. Which means this must be Derek Hale.

Alpha Derek Hale.

‘Where’s Peter.’ Scott asks immediately, Stiles hadn’t let him know about his suspicions about Peter.

‘Peter, Peter is indisposed.’ The guy says in a hard voice.

‘What the hell does that mean?’ Scott says, immediately angry.

‘It means his dead Scott.’ Stiles says flatly. He knows the look on this guy’s face, it’s the face of someone who has seen tragedy, it’s the look Stiles’ dad wears constantly, it’s a look that never truly leaves people. And this guy had known quite a fair bit of tragedy it seemed. Stiles could see it in the strain in his jaw, the tired eyes, the clenched fists and the hardness of his eyes.

The guy sharply looks at Stiles but nods, ‘Peter was killed 2 weeks ago by the Argent's.’

Stiles goes to call him on the lie then snaps his mouth shut. He knows Derek was the one to kill Peter. Why would he lie? Perhaps he doesn’t want to scare them. Yeah right.

Stiles is still uneasy, what would make someone turn on their family like that? Power, the greed for power? Stiles didn’t know, all he knows is that Derek Hale is not be trusted, not fully at least.

‘Who are you then?’ Scott persists and Stiles lets him. It would be better for Derek to underestimate how much Team Human knows of Derek’s family and his pack.

‘I’m Derek Hale. I’m his nephew.’

‘Who the hell is the Alpha than.’ Scott asks frustrated and Stiles watches Derek unblinkingly. Derek seems to shift under Stiles’ gaze.

‘Me, I’m the Alpha now’ Derek says with a flash of red eyes.

Stiles ignores the jolt in his stomach. Now is definitely not the time for anything like that. Especially in the vicinity of werewolves. He does, however, decide to change tactics. He was betting on Peter’s supposed fascination with a ‘human Alpha’. Now he would have to play on Derek’s newly minted Alpha status and need for information for an alliance.

Derek, however, jumps him on that.

‘Look, kids, I don’t know what Peter promised you but I’ve got my hands full already. The little stunt you pulled last night was stupid and dangerous. I don’t need any more betas and I certainly don’t need kids like you guys getting in the way.’

Stiles can feel Scott bristle next to him at being called a kid, but Stiles takes it in his stride. He suspected as much, Derek looked dead on his feet. But no one could take the awesomness of what they did last night, away from him. Explosions were always cool.

‘Look, we’re here for Scott, he needs help controlling the wolf, but we also want to help you guys, your pack.’

Derek snorts, ‘You can help by staying out of the way. Things are going to get ugly in this town and it would be better if you guys stayed out of it.’

Stile rolls his eyes, ‘We know things are ugly right now. That’s why we’re here. We can help!’

‘Help how? Getting in my way? What could you do that could possibly help me, help us huh? You’re what, 16? You know nothing.’

OK, that was uncalled for, Stiles was really mad now. Derek wasn’t the only one who wanted to protect the ones he loved.

‘Know nothing? I know this Derek Hale, I know my fucking town’s in danger. I know my dad’s in danger. I know people are dying, people are being bit, people are getting killed in the cross fire. And you guys are what? Having a tete a tete every night in the preserve? Every full moon? You’re building up your pack? And for what? You don’t even know what Gerard’s planning. You don’t even know where the Argent's convene; you have no idea what you’re up against. But, fuck, we do Derek. We fucking know, so if even if you don’t want our help, you’re going to get it. We deserve a bit of fucking respect.’

Stiles finishes, cheeks flushed, and breath heavy, but his eyes on Derek’s are unwavering. Derek’s eyebrows are high in surprise then furrow into consideration and his ears prick as if he can hear something Stiles can’t. Finally he releases a breath and answers Stiles.

‘What do you propose?’ He asks, in a low voice and Stiles let’s out the breath he’d been holding as he inwardly cheers, Derek may be a douche but he’s smart if he wants help from Team Human.

‘An alliance. A human/werewolf alliance. And promises for the intel that we have collected.’

Derek narrows his eyes, ‘What kind of promises?’

‘Scott needs instruction in being a werewolf. So there’s that, but we want in, in whatever you guys are planning. And we want what you know in exchange for what we know.’

‘How do I know what you’re telling me is the truth?’ Derek asked sceptically.

Stiles rolls his eyes, ‘Derek, dude, come on. We managed to blow up the house of the most upper ranked werewolf hunter in the state of California, possibly the whole of the United States and you doubt us? What the hell have you done lately that could rival that in awesomeness.’

Stiles is pretty sure Derek mutters ‘Stupid-ass idea’ under his breath when he resumes pacing, but he can’t be sure.

‘Fine, we’ll train Scott, he can be the go between.’ Derek says finally.

‘No, no offence to Scott, but I want in on this. I want to be hands on. Anything you guys are planning, I want to know and I want to be brought in on the process. And same with us and you.’

‘Fine then, Scott can train with us. You can come to pack meetings and I get to go to any and all meetings you and –‘

‘Team Human’ Stiles interjects.

‘Team Human, have’ Derek finishes drily, lips twitching slightly. Holy shit did sour face Derek Hale almost smile at Stiles? That deserved some kind of medal.

‘Deal.’ Stiles says with a grin. He loves it when a plan falls into place. He almost feels like rubbing his hands in glee and laughing manically like an evil villain.

‘Well if that’s the case, we’re about to have a pack meeting now. You coming?’ Derek asks, ruffling a hand through dark brown, almost black hair.

Stiles heart thumps wildly, Pack meeting? Awesome. ‘Hell yes I’m coming! You coming Scott?’

Scott looks slightly less enthusiastic, ‘Uh sure.’

‘Good, the earlier you meet the rest of the pack the better you can be integrated and trained. You both need to follow me.’

‘What? No blindfolds?’

‘Well you’ve seen my face now, seems a bit against the point doesn’t it?’ Derek says, flashing a red eyed smirk his way and Stiles gulps, for reasons he’s not really sure.

They make their way out of the dim, dank room and follow Derek through a labyrinth of rock hallways, lights flickering, and water dripping and if Stiles didn’t know any better he would say this was the perfect set up for a horror film, or serial killer movie. Two nubile, strapping young teenagers dumbly following a charismatic werewolf into his lair. Yeah that was pretty creepy.

Finally they start to head upwards, up a series of steps and then finally a set of rickety wooden stairs and the air started to taste less mustier until they reach a door.

Derek holds a hand on Stiles chest out to stop him going any further through the door and says in a low voice, just loud enough for Stiles to hear.

‘I might be the Alpha, but you’re about to enter a pack home which means each and every wolf in there is going to not only be highly territorial but highly possessive of their young and mates. Don’t maintain eye contact and if you feel threatened, in any way at all, submit your neck slightly. It should be enough that my Alpha status will protect you, at least for my pack, but we have widened, as you know, a lot lately and many wolves, betas and omegas, in there owe me less allegiance then they do to the president, they’re only here to kill hunters, Argents. So bear that in mind. You too Scott. Although they will trust you more then they will a human. Just watch it OK?’

Stiles rolls his eyes, ‘I can take care of myself Derek.’

Derek huffs a scoff and walks through open the door. His broad back blocks the room at first, then he shifts to the left and Stiles sucks in a breath.

Whatever he had been expecting from a pack house it was not this, this was incredible. Awesomely incredible.

What wasn’t incredible, however, was the chorus of snarls, howls and teeth gnashing that filled the room at the intruder’s entrance.

After that, all hell broke loose.

Chapter Text

The room was filled with glowing eyed werewolves of all walks of life and almost all were currently fully gunning for Stiles’ throat.

Stiles, however, was abruptly pulled from the firing line and shoved behind a protective wall of werewolf. Derek red eyed and semi crouched, Scott almost fully wolfed out.

Nice to know someone had his back in a den full of hostile freaking werewolves Stiles thinks and then flinches as the room is filled with the loudest roar Stiles had ever heard, emanating from Derek in front of him. It was so loud his eardrums hummed and the painting on the wall opposite them vibrated off its perch and crashed to the floor. No one paid attention because the roar did its job, the werewolves shut up abruptly, the room filled with submissive whimpers and bared throats from those who had been snarling.

Stiles heart felt like it was going to pump right out of his chest it was so loud and he felt like he might probably need a little sit down. The sit down would have to wait, however, Derek in front of him was still emanating anger, fury even though he had stopped the roar and his werewolves had stopped snarling. His body stiff with disapproval for his pack. The werewolves could most certainly sense it, their bodies almost bending with submission.

Except for one.

A blonde girl, Stiles’ age or older, incredibly curvy and wearing tight leather, stand where the rest sit and starts glaring daggers at Derek, teeth still bared.

‘What the fuck Derek. Why the fuck have you brought this omega and this, this human,’ she spits out as if Stiles was Gerard Argent himself, ‘to our pack meeting!’ It isn’t a question, it’s a demand for answers and Stiles almost expects Derek to start roaring again, he positions hands to cup his ears just in case. Derek doesn’t though.

‘Erica’ Derek growls warningly instead as Stiles subtly shifts from behind he and Scott. Scott has finally managed to control the wolf so that only his eyes are glowing and Stiles is incredibly proud, only five minutes within the presence of other werewolves, albeit incredibly hostile ones, has already done wonders for Scott’s wolfy control.

‘An alliance.’ Stiles pipes up from where he’s now squeezed in between Derek and Scott, almost sweating because of the combined body heat those two are giving off.

Erica, however, ignores him completely as if he were beneath her notice and never wavers her glare from Derek’s face. The other wolves remain completely silent but Stiles could swear he sees their ears prick, as they were watching something incredibly entertaining. Which it kind of is to be honest.

But Stiles wonders why Derek’s little alpha submissive thing didn’t work on Erica. Because Erica looks vicious and Stiles is vaguely scared for the sanctity of his throat.

Derek, however, loosens his stance, eyes locked on the blondes face, ‘Not that I should have to explain my decisions to you, or anyone’ he adds glancing at the other members of the pack in his presence, ‘But Stiles here, as his wolf Scott have proposed an alliance of sorts between us and them, humans, and I have accepted.’

Erica’s eyes bulge as her face turns an interesting shade of puce, she struggles to get her words out that’s how angry she seems, ‘Derek what the hell do these humans have that could possibly make us want them as allies. They’re weak, pathetic and very dangerous now, seeing as they know about our kind.’ She says, her face turning a more natural colour. To her statement some of the company make noises of agreement and Stiles suddenly realises what a precarious position he is in right now. He had expected Derek, as Alpha, to have full control of his wolves, but her forgot one important thing and that was the Derek was relatively new to being Alpha and if Stiles is seeing the situation clearly Derek still doesn’t have his packs full support, for one reason or another. And this Erica chick must be someone pretty important for Derek to consider her words. So pack would listen to her.

‘Intelligence Erica, something we’re sorely lacking. Stiles his team can help us in areas where we are weak. Do you want to continue fighting through the night against an enemy who can not only maim but kill us, without impunity and who are constantly ahead of us in the ball game? Or do you want to be pre-emptive, strike them before they strike us. Rid this town of the Argents once and for all.’

Stiles thinks that it’s a pretty good speech in their favour but the pack still look unconvinced, as does Erica, with a sneer on her lips, ‘I think we’re doing pretty well without their help Derek. Plus having them with us is a liability, they may be able to work on their little computers and get their information but who’s going to have to save their weak asses when they’re out there, in the open, with Argents guns at their backs.’

It is a good point Stiles concedes, he may have misjudged this Erica person, she was still a bitch, but a smart bitch, not a good combination for them.

This draws a few growls of support but before Derek can reply, up pipes a voice from their left.

‘I’m pretty sure blowing up Gerard Argents house a few nights ago makes your point invalid. Strength is relative Erica and what Stiles and his team lack in physical strength, they most certainly make it up in material strength. I have no doubt that they can get their hands on weapons that we can only dream of.’

Stiles whips his head around to the voice, and he can’t believe he missed the woman in his first inspection of the living room because she’s an absolute dead ringer for Derek, except a woman, with like breasts and stuff. He immediately likes her; she looks tough, badass but not like Erica. Erica carried her badassery like a defensive shield, this woman (Derek’s sister? Cousin?) carries hers like its built into her very bones, similar to Derek, her very essence screams badass. The leather jacket, dark jeans and combat boots help, too.

Derek inclines his head in her direction as whispers and looks of awe are passed in Stiles and Scott’s direction. Blowing up an Argent house was the thing to do to get in good with the Hale Pack apparently. Well score one for them.

Erica looks like she’s swallowed a lemon. And she sits down heavily, pouting in a sulk. Derek ignores her in favour of quite possibly his twin?

‘Stiles, Scott, meet Laura Hale, my sister and my only remaining Hale relative. She is also my second.’

Scott mutters out a ‘hi’, intimidated and awed as he is by strong women and Stiles inclines his head in her direction. Laura grins at them. ‘Nice to meet you boys, Derek here was originally in favour of throwing you to the wolves, so to speak, but I convinced him to give you guys a chance. So you owe me one.’

Derek sighs and Stiles answers back with a grin of his own, ‘Then we’re much obliged to you Laura Hale. Thanks to you we might actually have a fighting chance of saving this town.’

‘Yep, I knew I’d like him.’ Laura grins and mock whispers to Derek, throwing a wink at Scott. She reminds Stiles of his mum a little bit. Not in looks but it attitude. His mum had been tough but incredibly kind, generous and funny. She had a wicked sense of humour that Stiles liked to think he inherited. What the hell, Stiles totally inherited it.

Derek heaves another sigh and moves past them toward the table set out in the middle of the room. Now that the tension had cleared, Stiles notes that the living room, although huge, looks like any other living room and the werewolves, now not trying to gauge out the veins in his neck, are chatting and laughing loudly, positioned on couches and odd table chairs and stools, and some are standing. All in all there’s about 40 in the room, Stiles estimates, and they’re all placed around the table in the centre with has a map of which looks like the preserve on it.

Laura takes a place at Stiles side as Derek motions for Isaac and another guy with dark, curling hair and they lean over the map, talking in low voices.

‘So that explosion huh? That was pretty awesome, just for our sake?’

‘Yep, I mean we hate the Argents too, but it was mostly to get your attention or at least Derek’s attention after we were stood up by Peter.’

Laura’s face saddens at the mention of her dead uncles name but she quickly covers it, ‘Well you most certainly got Derek’s attention, he was ranting and raving all last night about how stupid it was and how dangerous. But I liked it. I think you guys can handle yourselves.’

Stiles smirks at her, he super-duper likes Laura Hale, more than her brother anyway, ‘So is this the pack?’ Stiles asks, motioning toward the werewolves seated around the table.’

‘Not all of them. These are what Derek likes to call his captains. So mostly everyone in here is some kind of leader within the pack and are able to fight, except for a few.’ Laura says darting a look at Erica who was flirting with the guy in the chair next to her.

‘So what’s her deal anyway? Why was she acting so uppity?’ Stiles asks, noticing the glance.

Laura grimaces slightly, ‘Erica is the chosen. And because of this the submission doesn’t work on her the way it does with the rest of the pack and she is able to challenge the Alpha if she wants to.’

‘The chosen?’

Laura smiles a little, ‘Sorry, I forget most humans know nothing of our culture. The chosen means the Alpha’s chosen mate. She is destined to become the future pack co-leader.’ Laura says, her voice slightly hollow.

‘Woah, what a second, did you say Derek chose her? Erica? To be his mate?’ Stiles asks disbelievingly. Erica was pretty and all but she kind of seemed like a pain in the ass.

Laura smiles a little at Stiles reaction, ‘No, I mean it’s called that but Derek really doesn’t have a lot of say in the matter. In fact it was his parents that brokered the deal with the Reyes pack back when they were children. Something to do with lands and stuff, boring. Anyway so it meant that the ties of the packs would become stronger, blah, blah, blah, if Derek and Erica were to become mated.’

‘Remind me what century we are living in here again? What kind of parents to do that to their children outside of, like, India?’

Laura sighs, ‘In Werewolf culture stuff like that happens all the time, it wasn’t particularly unusual. Except that Erica wanted nothing to do with Derek for about 10 years and because the Reyes pack is almost finished, her parents being dead, our parents being dead, the deal was thought to be dead in the water, so to speak.’

Stiles catches on immediately, ‘Ah but then Derek was named the Alpha.’

Laura grins, actually it’s more like bared teeth then anything, ‘Exactly, and who should come out of the woodwork when Derek is named one of the most powerful Alphas in California? Good ol’ Erica Reyes.’

‘But that deal should be dead, there’s nothing holding Derek to it, is there?’

‘Well there really shouldn’t be. It’s considered bad form to renege on a pack deal like that but our wolves would be more then understanding if he did. But no, Derek’s being Derek, as usual, stubborn and stupid and self-sacrificing. Derek thinks that being a perfect Alpha means he has to honour deals like this, but he really doesn’t, I just think he’s punishing himself.’

Stiles whistles lowly, no wonder Derek seemed so tense, Stiles would be tense too if he knew he had to spend the rest of his life bonded to someone like Erica.

The buzz of chatter in the room quietens suddenly as if everyone was cued into a signal Stiles couldn’t hear.

Derek straightens from where he was bent over the table and Stiles tries not to ogle how well his jeans fit his ass.

‘So, the alliance has been settled. For the exchange of information we will train Scott and open our communication channels with Stiles which means he will be sitting in on our meetings when he likes and I will be kept abreast of all news from his end.’

This announcement is generally met with nodding, except for the scoff from Erica. Derek ignores her.

‘Continuing on, Scott will be treated, henceforth as pack. Stiles will be treated equally so. In fact consider Stiles a captain, like yourselves. Any questions he asks should be answered. His life will never be threatened like it was earlier. Catch his scent and make sure he is kept safe when on our lands. Any threat to them is a threat to the pack. You will honour it. if I find that anyone’ Derek aims a glance in the direction of Erica, ‘and I mean anyone does, or wishes to or has intention to cause harm to either Stiles, Scott or their pack then the action taken will be the same if anyone wished that upon a true pack member. Either death or being kicked out. Have I made myself clear?’ Derek asks and the room is quite for the nods and the glares from Erica.

Stiles blinks a little, well, that was solemn and all encompassing, Derek most certainly didn’t leave any loopholes for his pack, Erica, to slip through.

The rest of the meeting was pretty boring. Derek calls upon reports from the boundary runners, on supply levels and on anything else of note. Laura talks about the need for better shelter for the ones in the pack unable to fight. And Isaac tentatively asks whether he will be the one to train Scott. Both are answered in the affirmative.

It isn’t until a beta named Boyd brings forth information regarding the omegas that Stiles pricks his ears in interest.

‘Although highly transient our population of omega’s has been depleted somewhat. Our last count before placed their numbers in the twenties. Today our count has reduced to the low teens. Now we haven’t lost them in the skirmishes because we haven’t recovered any bodies despite doing a sweep of the entire preserve. They may have moved on, we don’t know, but I just thought you should be kept in the know, Alpha.’

Derek nods at Boyd, his eyebrows furrowed, ‘Well it may be a case of them simpl-‘

‘When has this occurred?’ Stiles interrupts to the snarls of some of the people in the room and Derek’s raised eyebrow and quizzical look.

Boyd looks uncertainly at Derek who merely mutters, ‘What did I say about questions Boyd?’

Boyd hurries to answers Stiles’ question, ‘Well, as I said, within the past week.’

Stiles frowns, ‘Have you had any major skirmishes in that time?’

‘We had one, about three days ago.’

‘Was there anything unusual about that attack?’

Boyd furrows his forehead in thought, ‘Yes, actually, the Argents force was small. Smaller than previous and they had been very quiet. In fact it wasn’t until they were well into the preserve that we knew they were there. And Gerard was there, which is unusual because he usually doesn’t sully himself by participating in the battles.’

‘What is this about?’ Derek asks Stiles with a raised eyebrow.

‘It could be nothing,’ Stiles says arm outstretched semi addressing the pack and semi addressing Derek and Boyd, ‘But when Danny and I were looking into the past towns that Gerard and the Argents had destroyed and then moved on from there had been three particular things that made them stand out. One was that they were smallish towns with a small government system, easily hacked into. The second thing was that each town had a large and growing pack that either lived in the town itself of on the outskirts and thirdly but most importantly the packs omega population disappeared completely. Sure the pack werewolves were killed, maimed, almost decimated, but every werewolf body from what we could see had been recovered except for the omegas that fought.’

‘You think that the Argents are targeting omegas?’ Derek asks with something that may be bordering respect or at least interest. Score for Stiles.

‘Well correct me if I’m wrong, and I may be very wrong, but pack can sense pack right? So you can sense if someone is killed or hurt even if you’re not anywhere near them?’

Derek and Boyd nod.

‘But omegas aren’t pack members. So they may join for a few weeks, months, but they never stay do they? They move on, therefore your wolves don’t recognise them as pack and you don’t bond with them which means you can’t sense them like you do other pack members. So I’m guessing that the Argents know this, or at least Gerard does, so for some reason he’s taking omegas, kidnapping them because he knows you can’t feel it when he does.’

‘For what purpose?’ Derek asks as he starts to pace.

Stiles scrubs a hand through his hair, ‘I don’t know, perhaps he’s killing them, hunting them for sport. Or maybe he’s experimenting on them, trying to figure our better, faster ways to kill a werewolf, but whatever it is its been happening for the past ten years in countless towns all over the country and now the Argents are here, in Beacon Hills meeting the most resistance they’ve ever met from a pack before.’

‘What are you saying Stiles?’ Laura pipes up from next to him eyes on his face.

Stiles takes a breath, ‘I’m saying that whatever transpired from here ten years ago, from the fire, has somehow spurred the Argents into kidnapping omegas. I don’t really know how it all connects but my gut is telling me it all comes back to Beacon Hills. I think the Argents want to make this town their base and I think the omegas have something to do with it.’ Stiles finishes to silence, until Erica cuts in, ‘How do we know he’s telling the truth. He could be taking us for a ride.’

Derek growls a little, ‘I can tell, as can every other wolf here who just heard his steady heartbeat. He’s telling the truth.’

The room breaks out in mutterings for a minute and Derek calls an end to the pack meeting, promising further discussion tomorrow and dismisses them. He turns toward Scott and motions him over.

‘I suppose this is goodbye, for now?’ Scott says, a little dejectedly and Stiles laughs, ‘Dude you’re only going to be here the night. I’ll see you tomorrow like I usually will. I’m just glad we have holidays for the next couple of weeks. Imagine dealing with this shit on top of school?’

Scott smiles a little at that and leaves Stiles and Laura to walk over to where Derek is chatting to Isaac. Isaac eyes Scott warily like Scott’s a kid in a pottery shop and Isaac hopes he doesn’t break anything.

Stiles sags a little after the attention on him from this pack of wolves disperses and Scott leaves the room with Isaac. He feels like a weight has lifted off his shoulders now that he knows Scott is Derek’s responsibility.

‘That was good Stiles. When you deal with Werewolves usually it’s how you say, not what you say that more important and you did surprisingly well, like you were made for it.’ Laura says to him smiling and bumping his shoulder with hers, except she’s a werewolf and he’s a fragile human being so it will probably bruise tomorrow.

Stiles smiles, a little weakly at her but he watches Derek, Derek who hadn’t as much as spared him a glance after his speech, Derek as he catches hold of Erica’s arm and pulling her into the kitchen despite her indignant squawks and glares in Stiles’ general direction.

‘What’s up with them?’

Laura scowls at their retreating backs, ‘Just because he’s decided to mate her doesn’t mean he likes what she does. Erica should not have kept challenging his authority like that, not in front of his pack and especially not it front of you. Just because she has the ability to do so doesn’t mean she can do it for petty things like jealousy.’

‘Jealousy?’

Laura laughs, ‘I could smell it on her. She doesn’t take kindly to anyone being near her Alpha, especially not a human and especially not someone like you.’

‘Someone like me?’ Stiles squawks, he feels like he’s about to be offended.

‘Oh you know, smart, resourceful, pretty. Plus Derek practically stank of you when he came through the door, which was why everyone acted so defensive when you guys came in, they reacted to the scent rather than what they could see, it was weird, they’ve never reacted like that with another human before.’

Stiles ignores the pretty comment and focuses on the scent part, ‘We barely touched how could the scent have transferred?’

Laura shrugs, ‘You were in a small, enclosed space together, or perhaps human scent transfers faster than werewolf scent? Whatever happened, Erica was pissed.’ Laura didn’t sound too cut up about it, in fact she sounded positively gleeful. No love lost between those two apparently Stiles notes.

‘Do I need to watch my back?’ Stiles asks, a little nervous now. Erica had looked pretty and pretty vicious.

Laura snorts, ‘From Erica? Please. Her bark is much worse than her bite, and she’s desperate not to do anything serious to make Derek reconsider her as a mate, so I don’t think you have to worry about her.’

Stiles sags in relief, it was all so political, he didn’t mind politics usually, just not politics against someone who could easily snap his neck in a second.

Finally, Derek returns to the living room, followed by a sulky Erica who exits out the front door.

‘Lovers tiff Der?’ Laura asks mockingly as Derek scowls at her.

‘We are not lovers Laura, as well you know, and we do not tiff. I just simply made sure she knew that I don’t tolerate challenges mired in anything but wanting to improve the pack, not petty, stupid stuff, like-‘

‘Jealousy?’ Laura inquires delicately, checking her nails, Derek’s nostrils flare, ‘Caught that did you?’ he asks, resigned.

‘Yep, don’t worry though, it was strictly only me, everyone else was too busy checking out her rack.’

Derek sags in relief, ‘That’s good, we wouldn’t want the pack to be getting stupid ideas about things like that.’

Laura eyes Derek in amusement, ‘Didn’t think you cared what the pack thought of you Derek?’

‘I do, when it concerns the mating principal and Erica. This pack needs to be stable, it needs a mated stable pair.’

‘So you aren’t mated properly yet?’ Stiles asks, confused.

Derek eyes him suspiciously, ‘No, we’re not. There hasn’t been time. But when this is all over and we come out alive at the other end it will happen then.’

Stiles feels vaguely disappointed for some reason, but nods. It makes sense, but he can’t help shake the feeling that Derek seems to be putting it off. Call it a Stiles sense. He can’t dwell on it now though, he’s dead on his feet and desperately wants his bed.

Laura notices this and tsks, ‘Stiles, you look exhausted, I’ll take you home. Or you could stay here for the night?’

However Derek growls at the suggestion and glares at an innocent looking Laura, ‘No, I’ll take him home.’

Laura eyes him for a few moments and then smiles a little, ‘Sure Derek, you can take him home.’

Derek nods satisfied and leaves through the front door.

Stiles gapes after him, ‘Does he want me to stay here or does he expect me to follow him like a puppy.’

Laura is saved from replying by Derek who comes back to stand in the doorway, looking annoyed, ‘Coming?’ he asks abruptly and Stiles hastens to follow him, calling out a goodbye to Laura over his shoulder.

They leave through the side door and Stiles is caught by how bright the moons casts everything in the preserve, so bright he can make out the smallish huts and tents that circle the house and move out into a grassy meadow in the shade of a mountain. He keeps forgetting how large the preserve is, and it weirdly gratifies him to know that the wolves live in the heart of it, far away from the patrolled boundaries and Argent attacks. He tries to convince himself he feels like this for Scott, but in some weird way he feels an affinity with the wolves, especially with Laura and maybe even a little with Derek and more and more he wants to help them, for the sake of them not just for the sake of their town.

Derek leads him to a side clearing that runs adjacent to one of those smallish trail roads Stiles had used the night before to get away from the Argents, the preserve must be littered with them, beside it stands a car. A black Camaro and Stiles is impressed, Camaro’s weren’t inexpensive, but it somehow suited Derek: dark, flashy and fast, but strong and capable.

Jesus he must be getting tired if he’s thinking mushy metaphorical thoughts about Derek’s character through his car.

Stiles climbs in and buckles his seatbelt and Derek does the same, slowly driving out of the clearing and onto the makeshift road.

The journey back is quiet, Derek’s breathing lulling Stiles into a half sleep where he’s eyes are open but his body is in complete relaxation. He catches Derek looking at him a few times and ignores it until Derek does it a third time, his face scrunched in thought.

‘Jesus Derek, what?’ Stiles asks finally, making Derek jump in his seat.

‘Nothing.’ Derek says sullenly, annoyed at being caught, Stiles supposes.

‘No, come on Derek, you can’t just look at me like I’m a puzzle to solve and then not tell me what you’re thinking.’

Derek huffs a little then sighs, ‘Fine, it’s just, I get a weird vibe off you.’

‘A vibe.’ Stiles says flatly looking at Derek blankly.

‘Yeah, a vibe.’

‘Is that like a scent?’

‘Kind of?’

‘Well, what kind of vibe.’

‘It’s weird, I can’t really explain it, the only thing I can compare it to was to Peter or to my mum before she died.’

‘Peter was creepy!’

‘You never met Peter Stiles.’ Derek says patiently.

‘Scott did and he said Peter was creepy and I heard what he said about me and that’s extra creepy.’

‘What.’ Derek asks suddenly, all attention focussed on Stiles who blanches slightly, ‘What did Peter say about you?’

Stiles startles a little at Derek’s tone, ‘Well Peter said that Scott had resisted to pull to pack and the Alpha because he already had them. A pack which was us, I suppose, and an Alpha.’

‘Who did Peter say the Alpha was?’ Derek asks quietly, looking at Stiles intently as if he already knows the answer.

‘It was stupid, but he said, Peter, said the human Alpha was me.’ It comes out in a rush and Stiles watches Derek’s face. It remains blank but Derek had had time to school his feature Derek if he had been expecting the information. The only reaction Stiles gets is a tightening of the eyes and a slight twitch of the lips, not in a smile, but as if Derek wanted to say something but kept his mouth shut.

‘Is that stuff true, can there be a human Alpha?’ Stiles asks suddenly. At the time he had scoffed at Peter’s suggestion, thinking it as only ramblings of a creep or someone trying to lure him somewhere but seeing Derek’s reaction to it now has Stiles rethinking his assumptions.

Derek doesn’t answer him in a long while until Stiles goes to ask again and Derek cuts him off.

‘Only in Werewolf myth and lore is there spoken of a human Alpha. And that’s what we thought it all was, myth, legend with no truth to it. Not until Peter, after becoming Alpha after the fire had recently been talking about the scent of a human Alpha. He was going crazy, we all knew that. The fire had taken its toll on his mental stability as did the loss of his mate and child so we all dismissed it as his ramblings. It wasn’t until I caught scent of you in the tunnels that I thought it might have some merit to it.’

Stiles sits a little dumbfounded, it wasn’t true, it couldn’t be true. Before Scott, he had no ties to werewolves, not that he knew of. It was stupid, crazy, scary and maybe just a little bit awesome.

‘What the hell, is it genetic? Or does it just happen to a human in close contact with werewolves.’

‘No one knows, up until now, as I said, it was considered myth. It might still be. Peter could have been wrong, I could be wrong. I’ll have to ask Deaton in the morning.’ Derek says, frustrated.

‘Whoa, hold up, Deaton? As in Dr Deaton, veterinarian, Scott’s boss?’ Stiles asks, eyes wide.

‘Yeah, he’s kind of like a human werewolf guardian. He should know.’ Derek answers, eyes back on the road.

‘Well dude, I’m pretty sure I’m not, I’ll save you the trip, as awesome as it would be to be an Alpha, I don’t think that’s me.’

Derek gives him one last, long, searching look and then remains silent for the rest of the trip.

He doesn’t speak again until Stiles violently curses at seeing the police cruiser in the driveway. His dad was home. Fuck.

‘What’s wrong?’

‘Oh you know, nothing, except that I’m past curfew, like way past curfew and I haven’t contacted my dad to tell him where I’ve been.’

‘You could say you’ve been out with me.’ Derek suggests helpfully. Not.

‘Oh yeah I’ll tell my dad I’ve been going out with a guy in his mid-twenties that looks like a stand in for Abercrombie and Fitch who wears leather jackets and drives a Camaro, that should go over well with my dad, who happens to be the sheriff and owns lots of guns.’

Derek looks mildly offended, as if Stiles’ dad should be grateful that his son has a fake boyfriend like Derek.

Stiles growls, a little frustrated, tells Derek a curt goodbye and slips out of the car. When he goes back to look Derek is still sitting there, looking a little nonplussed, vaguely offended and frowning slightly. Stiles rolls his eyes and makes his way to the front door, praying that his dads gone to bed already.

No such luck.

He hasn’t, he’s sitting in the living room, glasses perched on his nose as he simultaneously watches the game on television and flicking through a crime report.

‘Stiles,’ he says with a look as Stiles walks in.

‘Dad.’ Stiles says, swallowing.

‘Mind telling me why you’re out past your curfew?’ His dad asks with a raised eyebrow.

‘Uh, doing some gaming with Scott, as always, lost track of time.’

His dad eyes him suspiciously but says no more until Stiles has got a step on the first stair to go up to his bedroom.

‘Oh and Stiles?’

‘Yeah Dad?’

‘You have visitors.’

What the fuck?

‘Visitors?’

‘Visitors in your room, I told them they should come back later but a bossy redhead told me they’d be fine to wait for you in your room.’

Stiles grimaces and shouts back, ‘Strawberry blonde,’ before racing up the stairs.

It’s as bad as he feared, Danny is reading one of his comics as he steps through his doorway, Lydia’s checking out his one of a kind Avengers action figures on his shelf, Allison’s asleep on his bed and Jackson is looking at him in amusement from over the top of his laptop. Stiles is only thankful his porn’s buried so deep in his computer that even marvelous hacker Danny couldn’t get at it.

‘Uh, why are you all here?’

Lydia rolls her eyes, ‘We want to know how it all went, silly, seeing as we haven’t had contact with you for like 2 hours.’

‘Ah well, good? I suppose? Derek’s the Alpha, not Peter, which is good and bad. Scott’s there now, he’s being trained, so that’s good too. Uh the pack is super scary but they’re OK. And they’ve been dropping omegas like flies.’ He finishes with a significant look at Danny who’s eyebrows fly down in thoughtfulness, ‘So no need to accost me in my bedroom, no need at all.’

‘Of course there is, we need to sort out our next plan of attack.’

Stiles rubs the back of his head, ‘Well I think we need to look into this omega situation more closely, Gerard’s planning something. I think we should put a tail on him.’

Lydia nods slowly, ‘Jacks and I can do that tomorrow. If he’s going to be doing anything suspicious it will be on the first day of holidays.’

Jackson scowls but makes no move to say anything.

‘Also I think the most important question here is why here and why now. Why did they abandon Beacon Hills ten years ago what made them clear out overnight? I think it has to do with the Hale’s so Danny and I can have a look at the history records for anything to do with that.’

‘I can ask my parents.’ Allison pops up, now sitting up in his bed.

Stiles nods in approval, ‘But nothing suspicious right?’

‘Right.’ She says smirking.

‘Good. Now you can all clear out? I’m stuffed.’ Stiles says falling next to Allison on his bed, eyes closed. He hears shuffled footsteps and murmurs as they do, in fact clear out, someone (Allison probably) drops a kiss on his forehead on their way out.

He waits until its silent and cracks an eye open and almost yells in fright as Lydia is still there, standing in the middle of his room eyeing him suspiciously.

Jesus, why is everyone so suspicious of him tonight!

‘What.’ Stiles yawns, ‘What now Lydia?’

‘You’re not telling us everything.’ She says defiantly, tapping her high heeled foot on his floor.

‘Argh, go away Lydia, I need to sleep.’

‘You do, but you look like your hiding something and I need to know what it is.’

‘Why should I tell you?’ Stiles asks, flailing a little dramatically in her direction.

Lydia rolls her eyes, ‘Because I’m your second best friend Stiles, I need to know stuff.’

Its Stiles’ turn to roll his eyes, ‘More like fourth, behind Allison and Danny.’

Lydia huffs, ‘Come on, just tell me, I could help.’

Stiles huffs, rolling off the bed and going to sit at his laptop, ‘Fine, but you can’t tell anyone, I mean I think Scott knows but he’d a little distracted at the moment.’

‘Cross my heart.’

Stiles takes a breath, ‘Ok, so you know when Scott met Peter and Peter said something about me being a human Alpha right? And we all said it was bullshit and continued on with our lives.’

‘Well you said it was bullshit.’ Lydia corrects him.

‘Yeah, well, anyway, Derek was talking about it tonight saying it was all myth and legend, but then he said he got a vibe off me.’

‘A vibe.’ Lydia says flatly

‘Yeah, a vibe, like an Alpha human vibey scent thing.’

‘Oh.’

‘Yeah oh, like what the hell? How am I, of all people, a freaking human Alpha.’

Lydia looks thoughtful, ‘Well I wouldn’t say that. Did Derek say any more?’

‘No, just that they don’t have alot information on human Alphas. And that, get this, he’s going to talk to a werewolf guidey person tomorrow, who is none other than the Beacon Hills vet.’

‘Dr Deaton?’

‘Yep, the one and only.’

‘Makes sense, he’s always cagey about something, usually about whether you should vaccinate your chickens but it doesn’t surprise me he knows about the supernatural.’

‘Do you think I could be a human Alpha?’ Stiles asks Lydia.

‘Maybe,’ Lydia says dubiously, ‘But I think what we really need is some kind of bestiary or proper werewolf lore book. I’ll have to find one, but in the meantime googling human Alphas might work.’

‘Good idea.’ Stiles says, reaching for his laptop, he’s exhausted but he knows he’s too keyed up to sleep, a lot has happened over the past couple of days and his bodies running high on adrenaline.

The first few pages of results bring up training pets and being a human Alpha to your dog so he knows who’s in charge, but also weird porn websites. They almost ready to give up when a link catches Stiles’ eye, the websites called “Werewolf Lore: legend and Myth.”

‘Looks promising.’ Lydia says squinting at the screen.

Stiles clicks on the link and up comes up pages of writing, no fonts, not heading, no links to other pages, just writing.

They have to sift through heaps of information on werewolves throughout history before coming across the term human Alpha.

“Considered mostly myth the Human Alpha has made cameos in werewolf lore for thousands of years. The human alpha is an Alpha who is human. The Alpha has been written to come across in many guises, sometimes it is a human pack member, other times it is an Alpha’s human mate, in some cases it is completely separate to a pack and resides in the human world helping omegas without packs. In some loosely documented cases the human alpha has toppled to wolf alpha to take charge of a pack. No one knows how the human alpha originates. Some believe them to be messiah like figures, being born every few centuries when werewolves are in need, others believe it to be hereditary, passed down from father to daughter, mother to son. Others believe them to be spirits, humans who appear out of nowhere to help and aid packs and then disappear when the work is done. However in all documentation Human Alpha’s have always been considered good omens within Werewolf culture, some ever revered as gods.”

And that’s it, that’s all that written on the subject of human Alphas. Stiles sighs.

‘Um wow. That’s a lot to take in.’ Lydia says her eyes wide, re-reading the text.

Stiles moans into his hands, ‘God I hope Derek doesn’t start telling his pack that I’m the messiah, I have too many things to juggle at the moment, plus we don’t even know if I am the human Alpha and this doesn’t tell us what identifies a human alpha. It just tells us that they happen.’

‘What about the weird vibe scent thing?’

‘Maybe I forgot to shower this morning? Look, it really doesn’t matter if I am the human Alpha or not, it doesn’t change anything, I’m still helping the wolves and we’re still kicking Argent ass, human Alpha or not.’

Lydia side eyes him but doesn’t argue, ‘Fine, but I’m not dropping this even if I have to research it myself. Is there anything else I should know?’ Lydia asks and Stiles drags himself to his bed, eyes closed, half asleep already.

‘Well, Derek’s mate, Erica, is a bitch, watch out for her.’ Stiles says sleepily and misses the look Lydia gives him as she tiptoes out the door. He’s snoring before she shuts it closed.

Chapter Text

Nothing major happens for the next couple of days. Jackson and Lydia tail Gerard’s car to no avail as he apparently hasn’t gone anywhere except the store and Allison’s house, which is confirmed by Allison who constantly complains at how insufferable he it, ‘God, he’s everywhere and he keeps making these stupid veiled speeches about “following in the families footsteps” and “upholding family tradition” to me, I swear dad wants to deck him about 80% of the time and mum keeps giving me these crazy bitch looks. Sometimes I just feel like blurting out that I’m in love with a werewolf and am currently plotting their downfall, I just don’t think that would go down too well, you know?’ Did Stiles mention how much he likes Allison? She’s so badass.

Stiles spends most of his time with Danny ‘researching’ the Hales, and by ‘researching’ he means Danny hacks into numerous Beacon Hills databases, including the Sheriff’s department and Stiles obsessively checks his phone for any news from Derek and researching the human Alpha.

Scott had apparently given Derek Stiles’ number to contact him in case of any news or upcoming pack meetings, and Stiles hadn’t internally freaked out over that, no siree, nor had he been obsessively checking his phone every few seconds since Scott had told him, this human Alpha stuff was really getting to his head and he needed information, fast. He would go over to Dr Deaton’s himself but he wasn’t sure whether he would be trusted, even though Deaton was ‘technically’ team human.

He would text Derek himself, but he didn’t get his number, dammit. Some supposed human Alpha he was turning out to be.

In fact things aren’t going well on team human’s end. After returning from pack training Scott’s tired and withdrawn. In fact Scott had been pretty cagey about the whole werewolf training thing, even to Allison.

‘So dude, how was it?’ Stiles had asked enthusiastically the next day of the meeting after some much needed sleep.

‘Alright.’ Scott had answered shortly.

‘Alright? Alright is for when you go to your grandma’s for dinner, this is hard-core werewolf training dude, with a pack and everything!’ Stiles says exasperatedly.

‘Look, it was kind of just like lacrosse practice, except harder.’ Scott says shrugging.

‘Did anyone wolf out? Did Derek wolf out?’ Stiles asks eagerly, because that would be completely awesome to see, a full Alpha from wolf.

‘What? No, no one did, Derek wasn’t even there.’ Scott says turning back to their videogame.

Stiles had felt kind of disappointed, he had expected more from Scott, more information, gossip and the like, but Scott was either clueless or he didn’t want to say anything and it was nagging at Stiles, it was almost like Scott was completely blocking him, like he didn’t want Stiles to know. Either way, it was unhelpful in terms of getting on good terms with the Hale pack. Stiles had always maintained his, their, best weapon was information and they had literally nothing on the Hales, their family or the Pack.

Although, thankfully, the mega awesome Danny had been able to get into the files concerning the investigation into the Hale House Fire. Stiles had been thankful he hadn’t had to snoop into the huge filing cabinet in the station, that could have gotten awkward, fast, seeing as the last time he had been caught snooping at the Sheriff Station he had to go a whole fortnight without Scott (those were the terms of his grounding, seeing as back then his only friend had been Scott).

The file had been huge. And the pictures of the Hale house after the fire looked entirely unrecognisable to the house now. He had skipped the photos of the victims, of Derek and Laura’s family, that felt too personal, like he was stepping over an invisible boundary, he awarded Derek and Laura respect in that matter, he knew he would have wanted them to see pictures of his mother’s cancer riddled body after she died. He and Danny were more interested in the Sheriff’s suspect list. And the list had been vast, which meant Stiles’ dad really had had no idea who it could have been. A few unrecognisable names had been circled, past arsonists and the like, but their interrogation had brought no results.

But there were no recognisable name’s, nothing that jumped out, nothing about the name Argent who Stiles had suspected had been the ones to start the fire in the first place. But there was no proof, nothing tangible to link them to the fire, nothing to pin on them. In one of the whole reasons Stiles wanted to see the file was to not only learn about the Hale fire and pick up clues as to why the Argents had left in such a hurry, but also to see if there could be made a tangible, evidence based link between the fire and the Argents, nothing would besmirch their name better in Beacon Hills then being caught as the responsible party for the murders of the Hales. But they had been smart. There was nothing, at least not enough to bring them to trial.

In fact the whole file, although vast wasn’t really helpful at all, not in terms of the Hale family. The investigation hadn’t really focused on the Hales itself. All that had written was that the Hales and their extended family lived there, no trouble with the kids all still at school, quiet but harmless, the parents were respectable members of the community and had been for quite some time. No one could think of any reason to want to hurt them. And all he and Danny could glean from the insurance investigation is that it was an ancestral home, hundreds of years old, and that was why the fire had caught so fast. Yeah right, more like professionals had done it, with very detailed knowledge of the house itself.

In fact Stiles and Danny had been almost ready to call it and head to the library for some actual research that wasn’t illegal when something caught Stiles’ eye, on one of the last pieces of file, a scrap piece of paper really that they passed over a hundred times. But on it was an etching of a necklace of some kind, and next to it the letters K A.

K A? Was it code, the writing had been in his father’s handwriting at least, and Stiles was pretty sure his dad never wrote in code and why would he anyway? The etching looked familiar at least, he was sure he had seen it, or something similar at least. But K A? What did that mean?

‘Could it be initials?’ Danny, brilliant, genius Danny had asked, squinting at the screen of his computer. Stiles could have kissed him except Danny was like not interested, ever, he hadn’t even thought of initials.

‘Like K A, as in Argent as in K. Argent? That could be something there.’ Stiles says excitedly, tracing the letters on the screen

‘Yeah but when Allison gave us a list of family members there was no one with a first name starting with K.’ Danny countered, manhandling Stiles away from his precious laptop.

‘Shit, yeah. Maybe she missed someone?’ Stiles said, sitting on his hands.

‘Maybe’ Danny had said doubtfully, hand flying across his keypad as he cross checked K. Argent across the entire file. The search came up blank.

‘Maybe it’s not Argent, maybe it’s not initials?’ Danny says uncertainly, ‘Maybe we’re getting excited over nothing.’

Stiles nodded, but he was sure he had seen that etching, and it seemed like too much of a coincidence that he knew the etching and that there were initials with a last name starting with K, it seemed unlikely that there wasn’t a link between the initials and the Argents and the fire. In fact Stiles was sure they were behind it. But it was all wrong somehow, the MO was wrong. The Argents, as he and Danny had found researching the previous towns they had infiltrated favoured more indirect approaches of attack. Picking wolves off one by one until the pack was completely weakened and then they ran the rest out of town. In fact even Collarfield was an anomaly, a mistake, fire had never, in fact been an Argent weapon. They preferred bows and guns and traps. Fire was too hard to control. Too wild.

The same with the Hale House fire, they deliberately directed themselves at the pack house even though the pack had been still, relatively strong. It was almost like something had pushed their hand. And then to leave the town that night? Metaphorically with their tale between their legs? It didn’t make sense, there was almost something sloppy about it, as if someone made a huge mistake, especially when you compare the usual historical meticulous Argent approach at exterminating a town of Werewolves.

It had been at this time that Stiles’ phone had rung. So deep in thought he almost fell off his chair and had frantically picked it up but let out a sigh of disappointment, to Danny’s amused look, that it was Allison. And not, in fact, Derek Hale.

‘Hey Allison.’

‘Stiles, I’m at home and you said to keep you informed about any new Argents appearing on our doorstep.’

‘Yeah?’

‘Well, my aunty’s in town. Catherine.’

‘The kickass one, but who’s now not so kickass because she apparently kills werewolves like your boyfriend for a living?’ Stiles says flippantly, crossing off the name Catherine on his list of Argents in town. It was a handy way to keep track of them. Every now and then Allison would ring with another name to cross off. The list had grown enormously, so enormous Stiles had started to get antsy.

Stiles can hear the laugh from the other end of the phone, ‘Yes that one, and don’t worry Stiles you know where my loyalties lie, just because Aunt Kate was my favourite, that doesn’t excuse her Gerard-esque murdering ways.’

Stiles makes a choked off sound at the name Kate, ‘Kate with a K?’ he asks, a little strangled.

‘Yeah? I know it’s weird but my family insists on using her birth name Catherine with a C, actually they didn’t until I was like 6? That’s weird right?’

Stiles wildly motions for Danny to bring the computer over as he takes another look at the etching, ‘This Aunt Kate doesn’t happen to have a necklace, with a wolf on it, does she?’

‘Well, yeah she did, it’s mine now though, she gave it to me for my seventh birthday I think?’

Stiles makes an aborted fist pump in the air as Danny eyes him bemusedly, he knew that he had seen that necklace somewhere before! He knew it, and K A would most certainly have to Kate Argent. He knew his dad was smarter then what everyone gave him credit for. He had almost single handily solved the case with a few initials. At least they had a link to a name, maybe Kate had worked alone on the fire?

‘Well I think you’re going to have more reasons to hate your aunt after I tell you what we’ve just found out.’

He feels Allison take a shallow breath on the other side of the phone and for the first time Stiles realises how hard this must be for her. To be told your families been lying to all of your life, to know that they hunt people, yes people, for a living must be an incredibly hard thing to overcome, overcome but then also help people who want to bring the Argents to justice? That takes serious lady balls. Stiles has to give her kudos for the way she’s handled herself, with grace and wit and she’s been an invaluable source of information, he would be in her debt for many years. Well Scott would be at least.

‘I think she may have been the one that killed Derek and Laura’s family.’

He hears her take another sharp breath and he understands. It’s one thing to suspect your family of doing something so wicked, and it’s another to have it confirmed, especially a favourite member. That sucks.

‘Oh god, that horrible witch. I don’t think I can stand being here any longer, not in the same house as her. I’m going to Scott’.’ And with that she hangs up the phone.

Stiles swallows and puts the phone down and explains to Danny who clucks his tongue in sympathy for Allison and Derek and Laura. Stiles agrees. But trying to sleep that night is hard.

Something still bugs him about the fire. Now they are pretty sure they know who did it, he can’t help but review his earlier comments. The fire had been sloppy, killing Derek’s family had been sloppy. Almost like someone had down it in a tantrum, in a fit of pique. Perhaps someone, someone going against family rules, someone frustrated with the attack. Like Kate Argent had gone out on her own to do it, like it was some kind of twisted, sick, rebelling against her family. Like she had snapped?

It was a likely theory considering how different the fire had been from what the Argents would usually had done. Stiles tosses and turns that night, impatient, once again to see Derek. Derek would be able to give some kind of insight into what happened, he feels hesitant about asking though. Stiles hates talking about his mother’s death, he can’t imagine what it would be like for Derek. But it feels important, his guts telling him there’s more to this, like the fire is some kind of lock and Derek’s the key.

It’s not until a couple of days later he gets the call he had been waiting for, except not from the person he wanted.

‘Hello?’

‘Stiles! It’s me, Laura. I stole this number from Derek’s phone. You won’t believe what name he’s put your number under.’

Stiles sighs, he doesn’t particularly care to be insulted this early in the morning, not from Derek Hale at least, ‘Why are you calling Laura?’

‘Fine’ She huffs, obviously disappointed Stiles doesn’t rise to her baiting, ‘There’s another pack meeting tonight, you’re invited, not sure if it’s important, but I thought you should know.’

‘Why didn’t Derek call himself?’ Stiles inquires, a little hurt.

‘Dunno, maybe he was going to leave it to last minute. Maybe he was planning to and I jumped the gun on him. Oh I know, maybe he wasn’t going to tell you at all!’ Laura says, a little too delighted at the last explanation.

Stiles harrumphs into the phone, ‘Fine, same time? And can I drive my jeep this time?’

‘I don’t think that will be a problem. I’ll let Derek know you’re coming. He’ll be thrilled!’

‘Really?’ Stiles asks sceptically.

Laura laughs, ‘He won’t know that he is, but he will be.’

‘What the hell does-‘ but she cuts him off by hanging up. Bitch.

Stiles is fidgety the rest of the day. Even a videogame marathon with Scott and Danny isn’t enough to calm him, it’s not til after a run that he finally feels a semblance of calm, probably because he’s tired.

In fact he’s almost in a zen like calm state (meaning half asleep) when Lydia bursts through his door and Jackson follows her calmly.

‘Stiles, wake the fuck up, you’re going to want to hear this!’

‘God, fucks sake, Lydia! See Jackson walking nice and calmly, look at Jackson, learn from Jackson. I swear you want to give me a heart attack, can’t you ever walk up to me like a normal person?’

All Lydia does is roll her eyes, ‘Where’s the fun in that? Anyway it doesn’t matter. So we’ve been tailing Gerard right?’ Lydia gets down to business, sitting down on his swingy computer chair.

‘Right?’

‘And he’s done nothing interesting for the past week right?’

‘Right. Get on with it’ Stiles motions.

‘Anyway, so nothing interesting. Me and Jackson are getting bored, so we get hot and heavy right?’

‘Ew’ Stiles says in reaction and Jackson smirks at him from where he’s leaning against the doorway.

‘So anyway, we’re kissing, and Gerard finally leaves the house, but not in his car. In one of those huge SUV's with the windows tinted, we only know it’s him because we see him limping to the car. And yes I said limping.’

‘So?’

‘So this time he doesn’t just go to the store, this time he head to the old meat packing district on the edge of town? With all those old warehouses.’

‘Yep, yep, yep, this is getting interesting.’ Stiles says leaning forward, motioning her to continue.

‘And then we couldn’t go any further because he’d see us.’ Lydia finishes with a flourish, and Stiles falls back on his bed.

‘Shit’

‘Yeah, shit. But at least we know he’s up to something and that he limps.’

‘We already knew he was up to something, all we know now is that he’s doing it in the meatpacking district which had like heaps of warehouses in it. And he’s old, old people limp all the time.’

Lydia looks annoyed, and Stiles feels bad that he snapped. He’s not having the best day, ‘Sorry, you guys did awesome work, I’m just nervous, I have another pack meeting today.’

‘Oh, well good luck? I hope you figure that stuff out.’ Lydia says in a meaningful voice and Stiles’ winces a bit at her unsubtlety, although all that’s here to hear is Jackson, Jackson who’s not paying them any attention as he plays on his cell.

‘Thanks, I’ll let you know, OK?’

‘You better.’ Is all she says before dragging Jackson out of the room by his popped collar leaving Stiles to fling himself back onto his bed to ponder the new information. Gerard could be having an orgy in there for all they knew. Stiles immediately shuddered at the thought, yeah, no, that was gross.

In fact his head kind of hurts, there’s all these loose ends floating around and nothing to connect them, like some kind of mental puzzle.

The omegas, the hale house fire, Kate, Gerard and his visit to the warehouses. His limp. Stiles just hopes the pack meeting tonight sheds some kind of light on whatever the fuck is happening in his town.

***

Its dark by the time he pulls up to the Hale House. Except the moons out so everything’s cast in a silvery shadow. It’s actually kind of pretty he surmises as he makes his way to the Hale House, opting to walk to the side door then through the front. As much as he trusted Derek, and maybe Laura, he hated having his back to any of the other werewolves. Call it instinct, survival instinct.

What is not instinct, however is the view he gets the moment he walks around the side of the house. In fact it makes him feel a little sick to be honest, because up against the wall is Erica with her bare legs around some guys waist, skirt rucked up almost to her waist, making out with him viciously, like serious lip biting shit, mostly on her end. And if weren’t Erica doing the lip biting, it’d be pretty hot.

Except Stiles feels some sort of sick satisfaction that he has a legitimate reason for hating her, because you don’t cheat on your to-be wolf mate, no matter how much you don’t love him and are only doing it for the glory of being an Alpha mate. In fact all these words are running through his mind in a second come to a complete stop when he steps closer and realises who the guy is.

He’d recognise those shoulders anywhere, and that butt. And those eyebrows.

It’s Derek Hale. Erica is making out passionately with Derek Hale. Her to-be mate.

Well that sucks.

And Stiles may or may not make a pathetic choked off noise in his throat, because it surprises him how much he’s dismayed by this development. Rationally he knew this kind of hanky panky might be going on because, hey, just because you can’t mate doesn’t mean you can’t do other shit right?

At the noise he makes, Derek immediately drops her and turns toward Stiles and if Stiles were in a laughing mood he’s have cackled at the deer caught in the headlights look that Derek’s sports, eyes wide, hair mussed, mouth glistening with pink lipstick, once again its be pretty hot if it weren’t Erica who put it there. But he’s not in a laughing mood, so he doesn’t, but somehow he manages to catch his voice and say with a small grin (grimace?).

‘Don’t mind me guys, just heading in for the meeting. Uh, have fun.’ he says with an inane wave of his hand as he quickly mounts the stairs, wrenches open the door and heads toward the living room, trying to not replay the scene in his head, trying not to scowl at the memory of the self-satisfied look on Erica’s lipstick smeared face. He really didn’t like her.

He doesn’t even know why he’s so angry. Not really. Except, he supposes, in the end he thought better of Derek. He thought better of Derek then to give in to some stupid pack deal made a million years ago. Thought better of him then to give in to the manipulative, selfish bitch that is Erica Reyes. Thought better of him to be making out against the side of a house like a teenager? With someone that isn’t me, says a small traitorous part of his brain. Stiles shakes his head, it’s really none of his business, no really he convinces himself, he’s here to save Beacon Hills and Scott and not to meddle in Werewolf affairs, especially not Alpha Derek Werewolf affairs.

The living room is only half filled when he enters, and despite a couple of side eyes and glares he’s mostly ignored as he enters, which is a plus. Stiles slumps into a dining chair anyway, suddenly exhausted and praying for his bed. He didn’t know why he was so excited to be here in the first place, all he does is feel miserable and sulky. So he sits there and does what he does best. He observes.

First he seeks out Laura, his ally. She, surprisingly hasn’t noticed he’s arrived, or she’s too caught up in whatever she’s arguing to Isaac about to care. In fact she looks quite agitated, the most he’s ever seen her. Isaac just looks pained, as if he’s not sure what to say to her. Abruptly she flails her hands exasperated at him, says something to make him flinch and walks away, toward Stiles who she acknowledges with a wave and a tired smile.

‘You OK?’ He asks concerned.

Laura just casts a wistful look in Isaac’s direction, who’s now studying the map on the table as if it holds all the secrets to the universe, ‘I will be. Just boys you know?’

Stiles looks at his hands, ‘Yeah I know.’

‘Ooh what boy? Tell me, tell me!’

‘Oh nobody, I just thought better of someone, you know? And then they turn around and do something that just disappoints you, but you shouldn’t have expected better? You barely knew them, didn’t even like them that much, so why do you feel like they’ve cut a hole in you.’ Stiles laments, picking at a scab on his palm, wincing when it starts to bleed again.

Laura casts another long look over at Isaac and reaches over to squeeze his hand, ‘You’re preaching to the choir Stiles. Sometimes you expect too much of people and the assumption bites you in the ass, like ill-fated karma.’

Stiles nods and notices that the rooms almost full. Derek and Erica then enter, Derek’s hair’s mussed and Erica’s suggestively pulling down her skirt to several wolf whistles. Stiles swallows his glare and decides upon a bland but semi interested face, at least Derek had the decency to wipe his face free of makeup before meeting the pack, that was a plus.

Derek, however, looks put out, a little annoyed and a lot embarrassed, in fact he looks like he’s about to say something to Stiles. An apology? An explanation? Stiles never finds out as Laura jumps in before he can say anything, ‘What the hell were you doing with Erica.’ Spitting out her name the same way Erica says humans, with distaste and disgust.

Derek, casting a quick look at Stiles growls out, ‘None of your business Laura.’

Laura eyes Stiles speculatively then bristles at Derek’s words, and Stiles can’t help but hide a smile, his mum would have done the same, ‘None of my business? Do you hear yourself Derek? I am your second in command and your last living family. Everything you do it my business and by “do” I mean Erica. You should stop this charade right now Derek, before it goes too far and Erica got her claws in too deep.’

This time Derek actually physically growls at her, lowly, vibrating from his chest, as he grits out ‘We’ve had this conversation Laura. There is a deal and I am honouring this deal if it kills me. And whatever Erica and I do is none of your business, none at all. So if you keep pushing, undermining my authority, I will make you submit and don’t think that being my older sister will stop me.’

Laura scowls and her eyes flash bright blue but she says no more, sitting herself back down next to Stiles, crossing her arms and glaring at Erica, who gives a little wave back with a smirk.

‘And you.’ Derek barks loudly at Stiles, Stiles who jumps about a foot in the air, ‘Wait for me after the meeting.’

He’s not asking he’s ordering and Stiles can’t help the flash of anger that lances through his body at being ordered around like that, it could be the fact that he’s tired, mentally and physically or because of what he caught Derek and Erica doing just before or the fact that Derek sort of chose Erica over his sister but suddenly he doesn’t feel fully in control, not when he answers at least, to Derek’s retreating back, ‘Since when do you decide you can order me around like that Derek? Because last time I checked, I am not a part of your pack, neither are you my Alpha, so mind your voice when you’re talking to me.’ Stiles doesn’t even recognise the low, controlled fury in his voice. In fact he didn’t know he was capable of sounding so menacing, it helps him to hold his ground when Derek turns to face him, red eyes flashing, nostrils flaring, but Derek says nothing, abruptly turning his back to Stiles and Laura and toward the pack and the table.

Stiles lets out a breath he’d been holding as he collapses back onto his chair, legs suddenly jellified. He looks at Laura who looks back at him with what can only be described as awe on her face.

‘What the hell was that?’ She breathes and Stiles shrugs, aiming for casual and missing by a few miles, ‘Derek needed to be put in his place is all.’

‘Um, but that was awesome, really awesome Stiles and I felt something weird come off you. Something really weird, like a scent or something.’ She says eyeing him suspiciously.

‘Or something?’ Stile inquires subtly, except he knows Laura can hear his heart pumping faster and faster.

‘It’s never happened, like ever with a human before and it was very slight, almost barely there.’

‘Laura, what was it.’ Stiles asks, getting frustrated.

Laura blushes a little, ‘Stiles, although the energy was directed at Derek in that little speech, I caught some of it and it made me. Well it made want to submit. To you. To a human.’ Laura looks both awed and embarrassed and confused, all in the one moment. She should give her brother a lesson in facial expression, Stiles thinks absently.

‘You don’t look surprised.’ She says, eyes narrowing and Stiles hastily reassures her, ‘Well I don’t know what it was Laura. I am human, anything I say or do, or direct energy at isn’t supposed to affect you guys but it did this time. Whatever.’ He says shrugging, again.

‘But Derek would have usually torn you a new one for “insubordination” like that, human or pack mate. But he didn’t.’

‘Maybe he knew I was right?’

‘Hmmm’ is all Laura says in return, eyeing him with interest. Stiles tries to ignore her, because if that, back there with Derek, was a manifestation of the human Alpha, he didn’t want anyone to know it. All kinds of shit could go wrong if people knew, the worst of it the werewolves tearing him limb from limb when they find out he has crazy wolf mind powers.

To take his mind of it he watches as Derek goes through the usual pack meeting routine asking his betas for boundary reports. Apparently the Argent attacks have lessened since the last pack meeting and the omega population has steadied. Derek and the pack react like its good news, but Stiles knows it isn’t, not really, it just means that the Argents are up to something, something different, something worse.

Boyd brings them all up to date with the new supplies that have come in and Isaac, of all people, suggests a party. The rest of the werewolves cheer and Derek grudgingly agrees. Smart move by Derek, Stiles thinks, being constantly on alert for the Argents must take its toll on the werewolves; it must be nice to have a reprieve, let their hair down, so to speak.

After that Derek dismisses them and turns towards Laura and Stiles, his anger faded somewhat. But before he can take a step Erica has thrown herself onto his back, forcing him to wrap his arms around her legs as she leans in to stage whisper in his ear, ‘Come on Derek, lets finish what we started before the meeting.’

To Stiles’ minute satisfaction Derek drops his arms and shakes her off, whispering something in her ear that makes Laura smirk as he gently pushes her toward the door when she refuses to move.

Laura quickly covers her smirk as Derek turns back to face them, ‘Laura, you should really go and enjoy the festivities.’ He says, raising his eyebrows at her as he jerks his head toward the door.

Laura rolls her eyes but huffs out a quick ‘Fine.’, their argument seemingly forgotten and leaving, not before motherly kissing Stiles on the cheek and shooting them both a grin as she saunters out the door.

Derek scowls at her and then snaps his eyes back to Stiles, who cringes slightly, waiting for Derek’s anger, however ‘Come with me.’ Is all he says as he turns to leave the living room. Stiles wordlessly does as his asked, he has no more energy to argue with the demanding Alpha.

He follows Derek through the hallway, up some stairs and into another hallway, then finally into a large plain bedroom. Stiles gulps a little as Derek locks the door behind him. He so very much didn’t want to be locked in a confined space with Derek Hale, not after their altercation earlier.

Derek, however, makes no room to come at Stiles, he just stands in the middle of the room, cracking his knuckles as if he’s nervous. Which can’t be right because he’s Derek Hale, Derek Hale doesn’t do nervous, Derek Hale doesn’t even know the meaning of the word.

‘So what do you want to talk about?’ Stiles asks tiredly when it looks like Derek’s not going to start talking anytime soon

‘I wanted to talk here because this room is soundproofed, against werewolves so you can keep your secrets a secret and we won’t be overheard. And there are some things I want to talk about. Well two things, actually, the first is I want to apologise what for what you, ah, witnessed beside the house earlier this evening.’

Stiles blinks. What? ‘Uh it’s totally fine, I guess. No need to apologise, you’re a werewolf and she’s your mate-‘

‘-treaty mate.’ Derek corrects, with a stern look.

‘Ok, treaty mate. Its fine, I’ll just take the front steps next time.’

Derek, surprise, surprise, isn’t happy with that as he cards his hand through his hair, mussing it up even more and Stiles can’t help but thinks it looks like sex hair, the development in Stiles thinking is interrupted by Derek, ‘No, it’s not, it’s not that, it’s just it was unprofessional, of me, to do that, in front of a human, who is not pack.’

Stiles snaps his eyes back to Derek’s face, frustrated, ‘Yes, OK, fine. Unprofessional, I get it. Now what else did you want to talk to me about?’

Derek looks at him with hurt? Is that hurt? What the hell? Stiles is kind of the injured party here, having to witness the grossness of Derek and Erica’s mate loving. Because Erica, ew, gross.

‘Well, I spoke to Deaton a few days ago about the human Alpha. And he says that there are no records of the Hale pack ever having one.’ Derek continues, still with the puppy dog eyes which should be illegal as they derail Stiles’ train of thought.

‘But they have existed in other packs?’

‘He says yes, that often they come to packs in times of dire need and help them. And they are either hereditary, coming from a family with a history of human Alpha’s or they come completely out of the blue.’

Stiles doesn’t know what makes him say it, but it is glaringly obvious, from his and Lydia’s research that Derek’s missing a reason for a human Alpha, ‘Or they can be the Alpha’s human mate, right?’

Derek stares at the ground and swallows, ‘Yes. That’s right. He also said there are a few markers that make a human Alpha. They’re usually young, they want to help werewolves and they can challenge an Alpha and force submission if they want to. Which makes them incredibly rare, and dangerous.’

Stiles heart beats faster, well that’s unfortunate, he thinks, ‘I fit all three, huh. And don’t deny that last one, the only reason you didn’t fight me back there was because I used my special werewolf submission juju on you.’

Derek tenses, ‘That’s correct.’ He grits out.

Stiles lets out a breath and sits down on Derek’s bed before his legs give out. It was a lot to take in, more then he should have to deal with, but, apparently he has a job to do, which mean protecting werewolves, he supposes. Now that he is, almost definitely a human Alpha. Stiles would revel in the awesomeness of the title later. Now he had other things to take care of.

 

‘Ok, human Alpha, fine. Keep it to yourself OK? I want to have a choice in this, I want to be able to choose, so don’t tell anyone, especially your sister, who already knows something weird is up.’

Derek nods, still watching Stiles with careful eyes.

Stiles takes a breath and continues, ‘So we found some things out too on our end. Gerard’s been visiting the warehouse district on the edge of town, but we don’t know which ones.’

‘You want me to send some people, see if they can scent anything?’ Derek asks, back in Alpha mode, yet again. Stiles is relieved and disappointed, relieved because he really didn’t know how to deal with vulnerable Derek and disappointed because vulnerable Derek was kind of hot.

‘Yeah, that would be good, narrow our search down, and figure what Gerard’s up to at least.’ Stiles says before continuing, hesitantly, ‘Also I have a personal question, about your family.’

Derek stiffens, but thankfully doesn’t snap Stiles’ neck at the mention of his dead family, in fact he looks resolved, ‘I meant what I said Stiles, I am pack so anything you ask me, I will answer. If it’s important to getting your town back, then I will try to help.’

Stiles is weirdly gratified at that statement, because it implies Derek cares about what is important to him and that is kind of nice, to have someone who has your back someone who can literally rip his enemies throats out, ‘It’s just we’ve been looking into the fire, me and Danny. The Hale House fire from ten years ago and we know that it’s unsolved.’

Derek nods his head stiffly, face completely blank.

‘Ok, so we’ve been pretty certain all along that it was the Argents that did it. But we don’t know why. But now we have found some kind of proof oh which Argent it actually was.’

‘Kate Argent.’ Derek says immediately, eyes not meeting Stiles, who is caught in surprise, ‘Well yeah, that’s right, we think it was Kate Argent. Or Catherine Argent as she’s known now, anyway I wanted to ask you if you had any more information about that. I mean I knew you were just a high schooler, like I am, when it all happened but I think whatever is happening now is somehow being spurred on by what happened back then, so whatever you can remember about that time would be great.’

Derek seems to stiffen, yet again, like being hard as a rock isn’t enough, like he needs to brace himself to say something, ‘Kate Argent seduced me when I was 14. She slept with me, made me think I was in love with her. Plied me with wolfs bane laced alcohol to get me drunk then got me to tell her very entrance into the house and what kinds of routines my family had. Then she fucked me, left the next day and that night my family had been burned to death.’ Derek says, in a monologue, voice tight, but bland, his hands clenched and his eyes on the window opposite him.

Stiles lets out a choked sound from the back of his throat, he’s shocked, he had never in his wildest nightmares would have expected that, not in a million years. Kate really was a psycho.

Derek turns a blank stare back on Stiles, ‘So yes, my family died because I was a stupid teenager who was led by his dick. And my family was massacred because I thought I loved Kate Argent.’

Stiles sucks in a breath, there was some serious guilt issues there, Derek, you can’t blame yourself for what she did. She would have done it anyway, with or without your help.’

‘How do you know!’ Derek says fiercely, eyes boring into Stiles’, blank façade finally broken, ‘How the hell do you know.’ He adds, his voice cracked.

‘I know because I know the pattern. Shit Derek, the Argents have been doing this whole sinister town takeover for decades, centuries even. But Beacon Hills was different, they were doing the exact same thing, but they didn’t count on something. They had added something to the mix that threw the whole thing off. Kate, I bet you a million dollars that Beacon Hills was Kate’s first major assignment within the Argent stronghold and she fucked up. She got sloppy and she got impatient.’

‘So you’re saying my family died because she’s a shit hunter.’

‘No, I’m saying she was so wrapped up in what she wanted to do, in her hate for your kind, that nothing would have stopped her. If she couldn’t get to you she would have found another way to get to your family. Faked being an insurance agent, house inspector, hell a school teacher even. Just because it was you that was used by her does not make it your fault.’

 

‘But it is. It will always be my fault. You don’t understand. She said it was. She ambushed me in the woods as I ran toward the burning house and tazered me. As I lay there, unable to move she came close and whispered in my ear, “It was always you, you know? You’re the one that did this. Your family’s deaths are on your head.” And then she left. I don’t get it Stiles, I don’t get it! She could have killed me. Why didn’t she kill me?’ Derek whispers, face open and raw looking at Stiles beseechingly, searching for answers. Stiles has none. It doesn’t make sense, none of this does. All he can do is shake his head.

Derek looks at Stiles like a drowning man and suddenly collapses to his knees, head in his hands, not crying, or sobbing just breathing quietly, like a man who has cried too much and has no tears left. Stiles looks down at him at a loss, so he does what he used to when his dad was overcome with grief at his mums death. Stiles walks to him and drops to his knees in front of him, bringing his arms up to hold Derek loosely. Not in a real hug, just comfort. And although Derek doesn’t lean into the touch, he doesn’t want out either and Stiles sees that as a good sign.

It was no wonder Derek was so intent in upholding Pack tradition and treaties, he felt like he had a whole family to make up for, a whole legacy to rebuild and Stiles couldn’t begrudge him that. Couldn’t think harshly on his decisions when he only thinks he’s doing right. Even Erica he couldn’t fault. Derek may not love her, but he loved his pack. He loved his sister and he would do anything to make that pack secure and if that meant mating with someone who he didn’t love? Then so be it. Derek, however had been truly scarred by what Kate had done to him, so scarred that he was afraid of love, he was afraid because all he had experienced of love had been marred with the death of his family. To Derek love was like poison, getting under your skin, marking you, than slowly killing you from the inside out. It wasn’t healthy, or productive, but to have your family taken from you like that was bound to cause issues with intimacy.

Stiles would gather that Derek hasn’t talked about it with anyone, except probably Laura, the shame being too strong, despite the fact that anyone could see how Kate twisted a naïve, innocent boy around her finger.
He hates Kate, Stiles decides in that moment. Not the stupid petty hate he reserves for people like Erica and Jackson, on occasion, but he truly hates her, with his entire being. He hates what she’s done, not only to Derek’s family but to Derek himself. And if he ever meets her, she better watch her back, because Alpha Stilinski has a very handy baseball bat in his room that would most certainly like to meet her.

Stiles doesn’t know how long he sits there with Derek, all he knows is that he somehow has to break the news of Kate being back in town, before anything else happens. Cruel maybe, but Stiles knew that Derek would rather be prepared to meet her then be unprepared.

Soon enough Derek’s breathing quietens and the rigid hold of his body relaxes, he almost sways into Stiles, nudging his head between Stiles’ neck and shoulder, not doing anything there, just enjoying the closeness of another Alpha, Stiles supposes.

It isn’t until a particularly loud bang from the enormous campfire outside goes off that Derek seems to wake from his stupor, stumbling back so fast from Stiles that Stiles lands on his butt.

‘Derek?’ Stiles ventures, tentatively, Derek’s eyes have faded to his normal hazel green, but his face still has that horrible haunted look and Stiles braces himself for what he’s about to say, ‘Derek, there’s something else you need to know.’

Derek makes no move to acknowledge him so Stiles continues, quietly.

‘Kate Argent is back in town.’

The reaction is immediate, Derek’s shoulders slump and his eyes grow weary, suddenly he looks very, very old and Stiles reaches out a tentative hand to comfort. Derek, however, flinches away from it, from touch and suddenly turns on his heel and walks out of the room, quickly, but unsteadily, as if he’s drunk.

Stiles listens as Derek thunks his way down the stairs and crashes out the front door and sighs, all he wanted to do was go home and sleep, but there was an emotionally vulnerable Alpha werewolf that was in no state to do, well, anything, really. So Stiles gets unsteadily to his feet, brushes off his butt and goes off to search for his Alpha.

Chapter Text

Stiles hears the festivities before he sees them. Making his way wearily through the living room the chattering voices, the music and the crackling of the bonfire become louder and louder and it isn’t until he steps out onto the balcony of the house that he sees the large pack clearing lit up with people and fires and for the first time he really feels the pack atmosphere. It washes over him, this feeling of contentment, of love and life and of family. He feels it from the tips of his toes to the top of his head. It energises him, his legs that had been dragging, straighten up and his mind that had been foggy since his strange encounter with Derek, clears. Being the human Alpha did have some perks after all Stiles thinks, his mind suddenly sharper.

Now he’s smarter he sees the danger of walking into pack city on his own. He may be unofficially the human Alpha but he had been on the receiving end of Scott’s out of control wolf and he did not want a repeat of that thank you very much. At the thought of Scott, Stiles frowns. He knows it’s selfish and stupid but in the midst of this in the midst of doing all this for Scott he feels somewhere along the line that he’s lost him. Or maybe Scott’s pulled away or maybe Stiles is the one who’s pulled away. In any case and despite all the good pack feelings Stiles can’t shake the deadening that occurs inside of himself when he thinks about Scott. Is he missing the point in all this? Did Scott become a less of a focus when Stiles found out his dad was in danger? Stiles shakes his head as he notices the wrestling matches taking place in the light of the bonfire, he had never put Scott out of focus, he had never, not once, deemed Scott’s safety as not paramount. Stiles watches as a Scott shaped body launches itself at an Isaac shaped body, laughing.

No, he confirms to himself, this is not my fault, Stiles had done everything in his power to help Scott and more widely help Beacon Hills and for once he can’t help but feel badly done by his best friend. He had always been there for Scott but who was the first person he spoke to when he realised the human Alpha thing might be real? Lydia. It had been Lydia. Six months ago that would have been Scott.

Stiles is drawn out of his thoughts when Laura bounds up to him on the steps.

‘Where’s Derek, big guy?’ Laura asks with a grin as she nudges him with her shoulder, her breath smelling faintly of beer.

‘I was just about to ask you the same question.’

Laura’s eyes narrow, ‘What do you mean?’

‘Well we were just talking, about stuff, sensitive stuff and he kind of had a bit of a meltdown and then ran off. I was going after him until I realised that you were all werewolves and I was a puny human being and some of you looked plenty hungry and I didn’t want to go out there alone and be eaten.’

Laura’s eyes suddenly glow bright blue and Stiles has no time to back up before she suddenly leans into his space, ‘Stiles, this is incredibly important and you need to answer truthfully OK? What were you two talking about?’
Stiles is taken aback by the seriousness of Laura’s tone, she didn’t seem mad, just intense and the way she didn’t react to the whole werewolves eating human joke he made is telling him she’s deadly serious.

Laura still scared him sometimes.

‘Kate! We were talking about Kate Argent and how she’s back in town.’ Stiles half whispers, his mind still caught up in the scene that had taken place 10 minutes beforehand. He couldn’t get the image of vulnerable, broken Derek out of his head.

‘She’s what?’ Laura snaps, claws visibly unsheathed.

‘She’s in Beacon Hills, her niece, Allison, confirmed it this afternoon.’ Stiles says mechanically and slowly, body tensed to fight or to run. He wasn’t sure.

Noticing his slight distress at her reaction Laura forces herself to relax, ‘Wow, a rat in the Argent household. Stilinski, I’m impressed.’ Laura says raising an eyebrow, then face suddently frowning again, ‘And so not the point right now Laura. Shit, you talked about Kate. Dammit, I was hoping the missing wolfs bane spiked wine from the cellar wasn’t Derek’s fault. Looks like I was wrong.’

Stiles sighs in resignation and realisation because what else do you do when some human brings up the reason for the massacre for your family, ‘Oh fuck, he’s going to get wasted, isn’t he.’

Laura sighs, ‘Yeah, he’s been such a good Alpha for so long and he had so much pressure placed on him at such a young age that I’m surprised he hasn’t done this earlier actually.’

Stiles blinks at her, confused, ‘Pressure? I thought he just became Alpha like a month ago?’

Laura smiles bitterly, ‘Officially, but unofficially he’s been running the pack since the fire. Since our family died. After the fire Peter had been in a coma for a year and when he came out of it he was Alpha but also incredibly changed, he wasn’t fit to lead. So Derek, who had inherited the blue eyes which manifest in the second in command to the Alpha continued to run it, obviously so Peter wouldn’t realise. He needn’t have worried though, Peter’s condition had weakened significantly over the years and it wasn’t until he started biting random teenagers like Scott and Isaac and then Boyd and then trying to bring them into the pack that Derek had to do something. In the end the death was a kindness, Peter didn’t even struggle. I get the feeling he accepted death on the night of the fire and had been waiting for it to take him ever since, back to his mate and back to his child. But it still took a toll on Derek. You should never have to kill your Alpha, and despite his weakened state Derek struggled to land a killing blow. It goes against all our instinct to kill an Alpha and it’s a testament to Derek’s strength that he managed to do it. We are all in his debt for that.’ Laura finishes, her eyes sad as she gazes out over the pack festivities.

Stiles is a little stunned, he couldn’t bring his head around the fact that Derek had been Alpha at 14 years of age. Stiles hadn’t even grown out of his tamagotchi when he was fourteen and he was pretty sure he was still well into pokemon. He couldn’t fathom it, not on top of everything that had happened with Derek and Kate and the destruction of almost his entire family. It took guts, and courage and ball to carry on with all that weight on your shoulders. It explained a lot about Derek.

So Derek’s breakdown was very serious business, people don’t just do all that and endure all that without collecting an enormous amount of baggage. Maybe, Stiles mused, maybe it would be good for Derek, to let his hair down, get wasted. Get laid. Stiles tries not to inwardly wince at that last one.

Stiles starts to pace. A thing he does when he’s thinking.

‘How much alcohol did he take?’ he asks Laura quickly.

 

‘About 25 bottles of wine.’ Laura answers him, noticing something’s amiss but not pushing it.

‘Fuck.’ Stiles answers, hand running through his short hair. That was a hell of a lot of alcohol, even for a werewolf.

‘Yep.’ Laura answers.

‘Maybe he needs to be alone Laura, have some Derek time.’ Stiles says, finally stopping to examine the scene. Everyone was having a good time, it would be easy to slink off unnoticed.

‘The reason I asked what you guys spoke about was because I needed to determine what kind of drunk Derek wanted.’ Laura says mirroring Stiles’ gaze, her eyes shrewd instead of speculative, as if she were worried about something.

‘Uh I’m completely lost.’ Stiles answers with a shrug.

‘OK, so now that we know it was Kate related angst I can be pretty certain he’s off somewhere, getting shitfaced, feeling guilty, bad but at least he’d be alone.’ Laura begins, her face frowning in thought.

‘Alone? I’m not following?’

‘If’ Laura continued, slightly exasperated, ‘If it was anything else, like other stuff he’d be doing something different’

‘Other stuff?’ Stiles interrupts.

‘I mean like, personally emotional, like rejection!’ Laura finishes triumphantly turning back to him eyes alight.

‘Rejection?’ Stiles is almost completely lost. What the hell was Laura thinking, who was rejecting Derek?

Laura bites her lip, ‘Well you guys did sort of sneak off. And I know for a fact that Derek likes it when people stand up to him, for the right reasons, so I just kind of thought…’ Laura trails off, looking at Stiles expectantly.

Stiles, finally, gets it, ‘You just thought that he had taken me off to sex me up? Is that it?’ he asks, a little gobsmacked, because that was an unexpected reading of the situation. No its not, said a traitorous part of his brain he shuts up pretty quickly.

‘Well you don’t have to sound so put out. Derek’s a great catch, if you don’t mind guilt ridden, angst wearing, baggage carrying, sour faced, emotionally stunted werewolves with a chip on their shoulder the size of Jamaica.’ Laura finishes off, ‘He has really good abs.’ Laura adds, helpfully, as if Stiles hadn’t noticed them before.

Stiles tries to shake the mental image of Derek with glistening abs and Jamaican style dreadlocks before he answered her.

‘Ah, well, no, that didn’t happen. Not exactly.’ He hedges.

Laura immediately turns on him, her eyes triumphant, ‘What do you mean, exactly. Don’t tell me you made out with my brother and neglected to mention it til now. Jesus Stiles!’

‘What? No, I haven’t made out with your brother.’ Stiles says distractedly, distracted because a new, much more pleasant image has overtaken the dreadlocks one, and this one is of Derek kissing him. Against a wall, with glistening abs.

Fuck.

‘Well then why did you say, “Not exactly”? What does that mean?’ Laura says flailing a little, and Stiles tries not to love her too much for that.

‘it just means, that there might have been some physical contact, in the form of hugging I guess you could call it? Hugging on my end anyway.’ Stiles says shrugging.

Laura looks at him like he’s grown an extra head, ‘Hugging.’ She says flatly.

‘Hugging’ he confirms with an embarrassed smile.

‘Stiles, I don’t think you realise just exactly what that means.’ Laura says slowly.

And Stiles has just about had it with the entire conversation, they should really be looking for Derek, ‘Um, enlighten me then.’ He says exasperated.

‘The fact that he allowed you to touch him means you’ve been accepted as pack. Which is kind of huge, the Hale pack hasn’t had humans since before the fire. In face Peter’s mate, Louise, had been human. This is huge!’ Laura says gleefully.

Stiles contains his feelings, barely, because being excited over being pack and being excited over being accepted by Derek into pack was quiet another, ‘What does that mean for me then?’

‘It means, dummy, that you have protection, now one will dare to touch you in a threatening manner, not now that you have the Alpha scent on you.’ Laura says grinning.

‘Oh, so no Stiles snacks on the menu tonight?’ Stiles counters with a grin of his own. Derek claimed you as pack, his mind crows at him gleefully.

Laura rolls her eyes, ‘Not tonight, at least.’ She says giving him a hug. A hard hug that leaves him slightly breathless. And at a count that’s two Hale hugs in an hour. Go Stiles!

Something continues to bug him, Stiles furrows his head in thought, ‘Before, you said Derek would do either do two things with the wine, what was the second thing?’

‘Oh, well, if it was rejection you mean? He’d deal with how any healthy member of the male species would.’ Laura says with a shrug and a grin.

Stiles is stumped, ‘Um pretend I know nothing of the male species.’

‘He’d go out and get laid Stiles. That what Alpha men do to feed their ego’s after being rejected. I was only worried about that in terms of that skank Erica. With Derek not in his right mind and her, the snake, looking for any opportunity to seal the bond, I wouldn’t put it past her to take advantage of drunk Derek.’ Laura says with narrowed eyes.

Stiles tends to agree with her.

‘Do you think she would be looking for him now? Because if he’s getting wasted it won’t matter his goal if Erica finds him like that. He’s a drunk guy and she’s a hot girl desperate to have sex with him, do you see where I’m going with this?’ Stiles says, a little agitated. Well a lot agitated.

Laura’s eyes widen and her body seems to vibrate with tension. ‘Fuck, yeah I do. We really need to find Derek.’

‘We really do, quick give me your phone.’ Stiles says, holding out his hand.

Laura passes it over and he quickly puts in his number, ‘I think it’d be better if we split up, covered more ground and when either of us finds him or Erica, we call. OK?’

‘Got it.’ Laura answers, her keen quick eyes already searching the crowd.

‘Good, now where would he go? You guys have awesome noses, you should know.’

Laura wrinkles her nose, ‘I would, normally, but there’s so many wolves out there tonight it would be really hard to actually pin point Derek’s scent, a scent that would also be tainted with wolfs bane, something that would really stuff up my scenting. No, I think I’ll have to do it the old fashioned way of finding Derek, looking for dark places or places away from people. Derek’s a total emo when it comes to find places to brood.’ Laura says with a quick smirk before taking off as only a werewolf could, exceedingly fast and exceedingly graceful.

Stiles surveys the scene in front of him and opts to look toward the outskirts, away from the bonfire and mecca of people because Derek did indeed seem like the type to lurk in the dark, being a creeper and all. Plus he didn’t really seem in the mood to party with other werewolves tonight.

However the only thing he finds as he picks his way through the dark are tent pegs and the noises of loud lovemaking. Every time he hears it he prays it isn’t Derek and Erica, mostly because he shares Laura’s distaste for her. Well that’s what he tells himself anyway. It’s got nothing to do with the tenuous connection they shared up in Derek’s room, or the vulnerable look on Derek’s face when he talked about Laura, and it had nothing to do with the burgeoning respect Stiles has for the Alpha. Not at all.

Stiles was great at denial.

In fact Stiles is almost about to give up on finding Derek in the dark when out of the corner of his eye he spies Erica. Erica who looked very much like she was sneaking off into the bushes, a triumphant look in her eye and Stiles suddenly gets a very bad feeling about where she might be heading. So he decides to follow her. Because apparently he’s James Bond now and that’s what he does.

Erica follows an old over grown trail, and Stiles tries to stay back far enough so she can’t scent him. He’s lucky he’s downwind from her and he’s lucky the party the werewolves are having is loud enough to drown out his clumsy attempts at being a super spy. But at this point it seems like there wouldn’t be much to stop her from going after Derek, like a predator going after innocent, unsuspecting prey.

Stiles tries to rid himself of the image of Derek looking vulnerable and broken, he couldn’t seem to equate it with the same capable, stern, tough image of Derek when he first met him. He had thought he didn’t like Derek? Or at least tolerated him at best so what were the feelings he got when he saw Erica in Derek’s arms or why was he feeling so panicked now at losing Derek. All he knew was that he wouldn’t let Erica get at him, not if he had to defend Derek to his last breath. If Derek had chosen to mate bond with Erica, then fine, but Stiles would damn well make sure Derek was in his right mind first, he deserved that respect at least.

With that thought Stiles rounds a final bend and gasps a little at the beautiful sight before him. He had always known the preserve was stunning but he had underestimated how pretty the sight of a babbling river, slivery in the moonlight with large dry pale stones interspersed within the gently flowing stream.

In fact Stiles is so taken with the sight he almost misses that Derek is on a large pale stone, looking up at the sky one arm behind his head and the other lifting a wine bottle to his lips. And he’s apparently singing? Only quietly and something clenches in Stiles’ gut, something he ignores because at that moment he spies Erica ahead of him.

And she’s not alone.

And Stiles lets out a sigh of relief when he sees Laura had already beaten him to the-protection-of-Derek’s-mate-bond as Laura has apparently gotten Erica in a headlock, hand over her mouth, almost fully wolfed out. Sweet.

Stiles (human) hadn’t been exactly sure how he would have warded Erica (super strong werewolf) off a Derek who looked completely trashed.

He shouldn’t have expected more of a fight as Laura promptly knocks Erica out and slings her over her shoulder quickly mouthing to Stiles to ‘Get Derek home’ and ‘call me’ as she starts to run back to the party. Stiles hastens to obey the her grabbing his phone out of his pocket.

He quickly dials Laura, eyes anxiously looking at Derek, Derek who thankfully appears oblivious, still mindlessly humming.

She picks up.

‘Laura! Thank fucking god you got her!’ Is all he can say in greeting.

‘I know I almost missed her scent, than caught it at last moment. The bitch tried to break my arm but she’s not really much of a fighter, I had it under control in seconds. I’m going to take her back to her tent as fast as possible and make her stay there. ’

Stiles laughs softly at her petulant tone, ‘What should I do with Derek then? Should I talk him down? Or leave him, now that you have Erica under control.’

‘Noooo you need to stay with him, the last and only time he did this before, I spent a week looking for him, until finding out he managed to make his way to new york. New fucking York, Stiles. That’s like across the whole country, in a week, as a wolf. And he didn’t remember any of it and I had to haul his sorry ass home. I do not want a repeat performance, I don’t care how you do it just get him back to the house. Promise him kisses, promise him more wine, heck seduce him if you have to, just get him home.’

Stiles reddens at the word seduce. He wouldn’t know how to if he tried, but he replies in the affirmative and hangs up.

How the hell was this his life? What poor choices had he made in order to end up here, in the middle of the preserve, at night, trying to coax home a possibly mentally disturbed, intoxicated and mildly poisoned werewolf with a truck load of issues.

Stiles takes a deep breath, ‘I can do this’ he says as he ungracefully scrambles up the rock ledge onto the rock Derek is lying on, still singing quietly under his breath.

Instead of being scared Derek simply stops humming, turning a darkened eye on Stiles, ‘I was wondering when you were going to come up.’ He slurs sleepily, taking another swig from the bottle in his hand.

Stiles takes a seat next to Derek and almost freezes when Derek rests the none bottle holding hand on his thigh. Stiles doesn’t really know how to handle that so he tries to ignore it despite the fact that Derek’s hand is like five centimetres away from being on his dick.

‘I like touching you, makes me feel,’ Derek pauses to yawn, eyes groggy, ‘Makes everything better.’

Stiles unconsciously threads his hand through Derek’s and almost smiles when Derek makes a contented noise at the back of his throat, squeezing his hand.

‘Why don’t we head home eh Derek? Your bed would be much more comfy then this rock.’ Stiles says, gingerly taking the foul smelling bottle from Derek’s slack grasp.

‘Are you asking me to bed?’ Derek says, smiling cheekily and Stiles takes in a breath. Nope, he was not dealing with giggly, flirty Derek, not tonight, it would make his head explode.

He doesn’t have to worry because Derek’s expression soon changes to one of sorrow, ‘No, you wouldn’t, you don’t even like me.’

Stiles heartbeat stutters as he whispers, ‘You can’t know that.’

Derek looks up at him, his earnest expression a little heart pulling-ly cute, ‘You always smell like fear, and sad and courage when you’re around me. Not sex, not like Kate and Erica.’ Derek finishes, his voice almost a whisper.

‘Isn’t that a good thing then? I’d hate to remind you of Kate.’ Stiles says, determinedly resisting the mention of Erica’s name. He was still majorly pissed at her.

Derek, however, continues as if he had never heard him, ‘She always stunk like sex, like lust. And I liked it. I liked that I did that to her.’ He whispers, again, like his mind is far away. And Stiles tries to ignore the lump in his throat. Sex equated to love in Derek’s head. How fucked up was that?

‘Hey, Derek, come back to me. Come back to here. You’re not fifteen anymore, Kate’s not here.’ Stiles says sharply when he feels Derek’s finger slip, tightening his hold.

Derek blinks dazedly, ‘She smelt like sex the night she killed my family. It’s why I don’t like Erica. She smells like Kate used to. Like heat, and overripe fruit and sweat.’

Stiles tries not to cringe at what sex and lust smells like, it almost seemed like a bit of a curse, the ability to scent emotion and feelings, and for the first time he’s thankful he’s not a werewolf, there was a limit to what he would want to know about people.

‘Why don’t you like me Stiles?’ Derek suddenly asks, into the night, his voice small and frightened, like a child’s, his hand clasping and unclasping Stiles’ like he didn’t know how to control it. in fact it was weird, Derek’s whole body is twitching slightly. Unnaturally so.

Stiles is struckdumb by the question, what the hell does he say to that? ‘I do like you Derek. Maybe not at first but I do now. I think you’re brave and a good Alpha and determined.’

Derek smiles, contented, until he frowns, ‘But not like Erica.’ He says, his face falling.

Stiles is momentarily confused, did Derek mean to ask why Stiles didn’t like Erica or why Stiles didn’t like Derek like Erica did.

‘Um.’ Is all he says in response and Derek looks crestfallen.

‘S OK, you know, I’m used to it. I liked Perry Whitman in third grade and he didn’t like me back, he used to trip me in the sand pit and make fun of my hair. And then I growled at him once and he never came near me again. None of the other kids did either. They were all scared of me.’

Stiles suddenly feels a great sadness for Derek. No wonder he had been so taken with Kate. Not only had she been older and good looking but she had probably been the first person outside of his family that had actually been close to him. Loneliness was incredible suffering for someone so used to family, to pack, the way Derek was.

‘You’re scared of me too.’ Derek says, into the sky. It wasn’t an accusation, it was as if Derek were stating a simple fact of life. It was unnerving Stiles at just how different intoxicated Derek was. Too unnerving, something about Derek didn’t feel quite right, the twitching, the childlike conversation. Stiles could almost feel the taint of something in the air around Derek.

Stiles squeezes his hand, ‘I was, at first. But I’m not now. I know I’ve got your protection now, I’m part of your pack Laura said.’

‘Pack means you can’t leave. You can’t leave me. Not like mum and dad and Peter. Pack means family, home.’

Stiles swallows the lump in his throat, Derek sounded so young, so lost and so terrified. And something was very wrong with him now that Stiles looked at him. He was pale, very pale and there was sweat dripping off him even though it was a cool night. Derek’s eyes, once a pale green, were now tinged with purple and they were wide with fright as if he were trapped in his own nightmare.

Stiles, however, is saved from replying by a singular mournful howl he hears in the distance.

Derek’s ears are instantly on alert and then the whole ground feels like its vibrating from the next sound they hear. It’s the collective sound of what feels like the whole packs howl. And that’s no hunting howl, even Stiles can hear that its a cry for help and a cry for blood. It sends shivers down his spine.

But it’s not only the howl he hears with his ears, it’s like he can hear it in his head, in his very soul. The howl reverberates around his chest and there is a strange disconnect he can feel at the back of his head, like something’s missing.

And suddenly it all clicks.

He’s an alpha of this pack, so he is feeling the disconnect of one of the pack, which means the Argents are attacking and they’ve taken someone.

Quickly he scrambles to his feet and rounds on Derek who has also risen groggily to his feet.

‘What is happening Derek?’ Stiles asks, unable to keep the anxiety out of his voice.

‘It’s an attack.’ Derek slurs, his eyes unsteady.

Stiles almost moans in frustration, ‘Yes, I gathered. But something weird is happening, I feel like something’s missing in my mind. Like a link not connecting. Who is it Derek? Who have the Argents taken?’

Just as he finishes they hear another cut off howl in the distance. It’s long and strangled and high in its distress. It even hurts Stiles to hear it.

‘Erica.’ Derek whispers, eyes wide.

‘What?’

‘They’ve taken Erica.’

Stiles stares. Shit, he could feel it too. Not Erica necessarily but he could feel the distress through the bond amplifying the sound of the howl in his head.

At least she wasn’t dead. Yet.

‘Fuck, come on Derek. I don’t care how skanky that bitch is, we can’t let the Argents grab her and do god knows what to her.’

Derek nods slowly but lays a heavy hand on Stiles shoulder, trying to stand upright.

‘Something’s wrong.’ He mutters, his eyes closed. And Stiles almost hits himself. Yes, he knew that, something was wrong with Derek.

‘Yeah I know buddy, but if we can just get you back to the house in one piece maybe we can help.’

Derek fervently shakes his head, ‘No, something’s wrong, really wrong, in my head and limbs.’ He slurs again, his voice going faint.

Stiles steps back to look at Derek, A Derek who looks exceptionally pale and shaky, like he can’t control his limbs properly. Shit, Derek wasn’t walking anytime soon, not with only Stiles as support.

Gently he lowers him to the ground, making sure Derek’s head is cushioned and he does the only think he can think of in this situation. He rings Laura.

‘Stiles’ she says breathless, the sounds of yelling and running in the background, ‘They’ve taken Erica. The idiot must have gone wandering after I fought her off Derek and she got herself caught. And it’s not just that, they’re more of them, more than I’ve ever seen and we’re getting hit, really badly.’

Stiles, in all his worry, suddenly remembers Scott. His best friend and constant companion and curses himself for being such a bad friend and not thinking of him before now. Of course Scott would be out there fighting, even if he were only a ‘pup’ as he keeps being referred to. Stiles doesn’t allow himself to wallow in worry, however, he has more than enough occupying his mind right now, Scott and all of his bullheadedness and wonderful loyalty can wait.

‘Yes, we can hear it too. But you know how Derek drank that wolfbane laced wine?’

‘Yeah.’ Laura says distractedly.

‘I think it’s poisoned him.’

Laura scoffs, ‘It’s meant to Stiles, that’s how we get drunk’

Stiles, undeterred, continues on hurriedly, ‘No, not like that, but seriously poisoned, like his face is really pale and he’s losing control of his limbs. He even can’t talk properly Laura, and before he was saying some really weird things, things that I’m not sure I was meant to hear.’

‘Shit.’ Laura breaths, quickly barking orders at some of the werewolves in the background, ‘Look, stay where you are, I’m going with some other betas to trace Erica’s scent but I’ll send Isaac and Boyd to come help you with Derek, I’ll have to give Deaton a ring too.’

‘Can you still feel him? Through the bond?’

‘Yeah, but he’s fuzzy, like something’s definitely not right. He’s felt like that all night, I just thought it was because of you, I didn’t even think he might have been poisoned.’

Stiles tries not to think over her words to closely, neither Derek’s drunken slurs. It was a bit too much for tonight. Erica missing was just the icing on the cake. Derek being indisposed was even worse. There was this clenching feeling in his chest that had nothing to do with the bond and everything to do with the Alpha werewolf lying in front of him. And Scott.

Suddenly he hears crashing in the trees behind him, and he sighs in relief when he sees Isaac and Boyd’s familiar faces

‘Shit.’ Isaac exclaims the moment he sees Derek, limbs twitching slightly and pale as a ghost. The betas quickly move to gently pick him up, effortlessly and Stiles follow them back along the path.

‘What we thinking?’ Isaac says to him finally, after a long silence, eyebrows drawn in worry.

‘Argents.’ Stiles say’s definitively.

‘I agree, but I don’t know how they would have gotten into the house to administer the poison in the first place, I mean if what Laura says is true and the alcohol was already tainted with wolfs bane, it wouldn’t be hard to slip a more dangerous dose without us scenting anything wrong with the alcohol. But the Argents don’t even know the exact location of the Hale house, there’s no records of this place, anywhere, not even in the archives. Laura said Derek got rid of them after the fire.’ And Stiles is suitably impressed. The kids smart, he knows why Laura likes him so much.

‘Kate would know.’ Stiles say’s bitterly, not mentioning the pictures of the hale house fire pictures in the police file.

‘It’s true then, she was the one who burnt down the house.’ Isaac says stiffly, eyes never leaving his Alpha’s prone body as he and Boyd moving gracefully and quickly over the forest floor.

‘I think so, I think my dad tried to pin it on her before the Argents fled the area but he never had any real proof. Just a sketching of a necklace that she gave to her niece after it all happened.’

‘Fuck that’s messed up.’ Boyd says finally, his voice heavy with grief and Stiles can’t help but wonder whether it’s over Derek or Erica gone missing.

Stiles decides not to mention Derek’s relationship with Kate, he was pretty sure it wasn’t his secret to tell, even if these were Derek’s pack mates.

‘But you guys would have scented an Argent if they got into the wine stores, right?’

‘Yeah, we would have. I mean I’ll do a sweep of the house when we get back, but I’ve never smelt anyone but pack.’ Isaac says again, shifting Derek’s weight as his limbs spasm.

Stiles nods. It doesn’t seem like a coincidence that both Erica and Derek are put out of action on the same night. He knows what’s happening. Classic army strategy, weaken the enemy, by first getting rid of the scouts, who were in the case the omegas and then trying to destabilize the enemy by taking out the leadership.

Isaac seemed to be thinking along the same lines as he snorts ‘Seems like someone got their information wrong.’

Stiles looks at him quizzically as Isaac continues, ‘Erica? Really? Idiots should have done their research, just because she’s in line to be the Alpha’s mate, that doesn’t mean she holds any real semblance of pack. She hasn’t even been pack for any real period of time. And the time she has spent with us has been spent pouting at Derek and questioning his leadership. It’s not like she holds any real power.’ He says disdainfully, either not noticing or ignoring the stiffening of Boyd’s back in front of him.

Stiles snorts, ‘Not like Laura?’

Isaac quirks a quick smile, ‘She’s the second, if they really wanted to take out the leadership they should have targeted Laura, or me or Boyd before they went for Erica.’

Stiles is saved from replying when they emerge into the clearing of the pack camp, the atmosphere completely changed from earlier. The once roaring fire had been put out, large pillows of black smoke casting the clearing in a dark haze. There is a distinct smell of smoke, gun powder and blood in the air. And instead of the joyful shouts and music from before there are hushed whispers, whimpers and quiet howls of exhaustion.

Before his eyes he sees white splintered bone knitting back together, earning a grimace from its owner, as well as cuts disappearing on the faces of people, blood still smearing their foreheads. It looks as his he had just entered an army war camp, which, he supposed, he had.

This people, at the moment, were soldiers and much as they were a pack. They had the Argents to thank for that.

As he, Isaac, Boyd and Derek pass through the camp the werewolves creep out from their huts and tents, reaching out and tentatively brushing their soot blackened hands over Derek’s prone form and then again, to his immense surprise, Stiles himself. Their hands brushing his shoulders, his forehead and his arms, their faces filled with curiosity, a little bit of awe and gratitude.

‘Isaac,’ he whispers, ‘Why are they doing this?’

Isaac looks surprised when he turns around to see Stiles being the centre of this attention, ‘You’re pack and you’ve just saved their Alpha. It’s instinct to show gratefulness. It’s an honour Stiles.’

Stiles loosens his shoulders a bit and sure enough people begin muttering whispers of thanks, and a jolt passes through him at each of their touch, like a slight electric shock, warming the pit of his stomach.

As they make their way through he finally notices what he didn’t before. Instead of an army like camp he had really thought had been here he sees that it’s more of a small village than anything else. The buildings, although small are structurally sound, as are the tents. And there are gardens vegetable patches everywhere as well as small stalls. On one end of the clearing is what looks like a school and there are bikes, at the moment forgotten on the ground, as well as toys and tools and generators for electricity. In fact, despite the smog and the wounded, it all looks rather pretty and Stiles suddenly comes to the realisation that these are people. People, who used to live alongside him in Beacon Hills, people who were forced from their homes because of the threat of the Argents. They’re not soldiers, not really. They’re refugees, seeking asylum from their Alpha. And they’re not simply fighting for their lives but their livelihoods. And it’s with this realisation that Stiles starts to feel their presence within himself, like a low thrum of energy now quiet muted but quietly angry and he knows he has to help these people. Not just for Scott, not just for his dad and not just for Derek but for them, to gain back what they lost.

They eventually make it to the house where Deaton is already there waiting for them, suitcase in hand. They make their way up to Derek’s room and place him on the bed as Deaton starts doing normal doctor checks like Derek’s pulse and blood pressure. Then he checks Derek’s eyes, and draws some blood, testing against some kind of paper that changes colour when the blood connects with it.

‘Well, it’s definitely wolfs bane. But not a kind I’ve seen in a long while .’ Deaton says, finally speaking.

‘What do you mean?’ Stiles asks.

‘Well I mostly deal with wolf banes that heal, or are used for recreational use. This strain is rare, very rare, because the werewolves I associate with won’t use it, won’t go near it.’

Isaac lets out a frustrated little sigh and Stiles struggles not to do the same, Deaton was infuriating at the best of times, but Derek could be dying and Erica was missing, they needed information, fast.

‘So what does it do?’

Deaton sighs, ‘It’s designed to kill, effectively which I think was the point here with Derek. But in smaller doses it incapacitates and can be used as a torture device as it has many painful side effects.’

Isaac winces as Boyd frowns, ’Sounds like it has the Argents written all over it.’

Deaton nods, ‘The last time I have been in contact with this particular wolfs bane was in connection with the Argents.’

‘So killing huh? Why didn’t Derek die?’

‘It seems like he didn’t consume enough of it to die. By stopping him drinking it you may have saved his life.’

Stiles eyes widens, ‘Shit.’

‘Yeah, a life debt to an Alpha is a pretty heady thing.’ Deaton replies, before fussing back over Derek’s prone form.
Stiles turns to Isaac, ‘But Erica’s not dead. So what’s the game with her?’

Isaac frowns in thought, ‘Well, leverage? Maybe she’s a hostage?’

‘Not really their style though. We know they want to destabilize the pack but why just not kill her?’ Stiles says ignoring Boyd’s slight shift in agitation beside him.

Isaac shakes her head and turns back to Deaton, ‘How long til Derek recovers?’

‘It depends. I’ve never actually dealt with a poisoning with this type of wolfs bane, but he’s an Alpha, with a strong pack. So I with proper werewolf protocol I would say a few days, at least.’

Stiles lets out a sigh of relief. Derek was going to be alright. He tried to ignore how much better that made him feel as he asks ‘Werewolf protocol?’

‘He means pack healing, touch or will is enough to heal wounds that we can’t heal ourselves.’ Boyd answers, already kneeling down to clasp Derek’s hand in his. It looks vaguely pack intimate as Isaac joins him so Stiles leaves, adrenaline already wearing off in his system that he almost collapses onto the steps to the porch on the front of the house.

He jumps when Deaton sits down next to him.

‘He’s going to need you now too Stiles. You’re part of his pack too.’

Stiles sighs, ‘Yeah I know. I just had a quick question.’

‘Shoot’ Deaton says smiling.

‘It’s just,’ Stiles hesitates, running a hand through his hair, he couldn’t quite get Derek’s voice saying he needed him out of his head, ‘You mentioned side effects, what side effects were you talking about?’

Deaton frowns, ‘Well I can’t say I’m an expert by any means as my knowledge tends to lean toward healing rather than torture, but I believe the poison can elicit hallucinations and memories, either horrible ones or they distort the ones already there.’

‘What else? Can it make werewolves say things, things that they can’t control?’ Because no matter how much he wanted it to be true he couldn’t trust a drugged out poisoned Derek.

‘Uh I believe it can also incite what they call “a loosening of the tongue” whereby the poison forces the werewolf to revert to a childlike state and recall their emotions or feelings in a highly simplified manner, its often a defence mechanism against the horrid hallucinations or the memories, a way of grasping at the present in order to maintain the right state of mind. Only very powerful werewolves are able to achieve that state or wolves in the presence of a powerful werewolf or an Alpha.’

Stiles mulls the information over in his mind, ‘So what they say in these states aren’t true?’

‘They can be manifestations of our subconscious or simple mechanisms to deal with the warring within their minds. In every case I’ve studied, every wolf was different.’

Deaton clasps a hand to Stiles’ shoulder before he leaves and Stiles barely notices it, so deep in thought. However he is shocked out of his reverie by shouts of glee and cries of joy, and he watches as groups of werewolves return from the trees into the arms of their loved ones. Stiles, however forgets them almost instantly when he sees an injured Scott stumble into the clearing.

Stiles is on his feet before he can help himself and sprints to Scott’s side before Scott can collapses completely.

Scott’s shirt is gone and his chest is a maze of slash knife wounds. However the bullet wound in his side that’s not healing gets Stiles’ attention the most. It looks black and rotted, the veins either side contaminated with what looks like black blood. He smells like death.

‘What’s wrong with him?’ Stiles shout’s desperately as he lowers Scott to the ground, careful not to touch the wound. His chest is heavy with grief. Not Scott, not Scott, anyone but Scott. He couldn’t lose him, not now, he didn’t care that Scott had been distant lately, he just couldn’t lose him. Scott was his family.

A kindly older lady kneels down next to him and checks the wound with quick fingers and clucks her tongue, ‘Lance, get the bullets.’ She says sharply to the young boy in a cap next to her who quickly rushes off.

‘What’s wrong with him?’ Stiles asks, again, panic dissipating a bit when he sees Scott stirring and his chest heaving.

‘Wolfs bane bullet deary, nothing to be worried about. We’ll soon get it fixed.’ She says patting his shoulder and Stiles allows himself to relax into it, minutely.

Scott was going to be OK. Stiles held on to that thought as he held onto Scott’s shoulders.

Derek may be poisoned, Erica may be missing.

But Scott was going to be OK.