another night's dawn (teen wolf, derek/stiles)
another night's dawn
chapter eight
The grimy cement obviously wasn’t deemed necessary to a broom treatment when it was a dark, creepy corridor that led to a werewolf torture chamber. He could feel trekked earth, and probably glass, trying to break the skin on his palms and cut through his trousers.
derek/stiles. ♢ teen wolf. ♢ pg-13. ♢ pre-slash, au after 1x11.
if i owned them, my fanfics would actually be episodes.
another night's dawn.
chapter eight.
It was weeks later before Stiles could breathe without his ribs aching. He would get winded climbing the stairs, have to pause half way up just to feed his starving lungs. It was two weeks after that that his father stopped watching him like a hawk. As soon as Stiles and Scott had gotten back to their hijinks ways, he supposed that things were back to normal and left his son to do what he pleased until he screwed up enough to end up in a jail cell.
It was the first time in nearly a month that Stiles was able to go off and do what he’d been itching to since he left the clearing: seek out Derek. He’d seen Brenna and Zane around town, knew from Scott that they were staying until Laura was avenged and Peter was dead, but even Scott hadn’t seen the Hale. He was always gone on the rare occasions that he’d sought him out.
But Stiles had questions and only Derek had the answers. That legitimate reason though didn’t abate the nervousness fluttering in his stomach. The last time he’d seen Derek, the man was angry, angrier than he’d seen him before. It didn’t instill the greatest reassurance that he’d be leaving the property without his blood being spilled, as he pulled up to the decrepit home.
Chris Argent’s SUV was long gone from the side of the house, and layers of fresh brick sat on top of one another to match the foundation of the high porch, new wood was alarmingly stark against the burnt dark boards to cover the living room. He guessed that room was a necessity to conceal, but not the second and third stories burnt out into a massive skylight.
“What are you doing here?” Derek’s voice sounded from behind Stiles.
The teen whipped around in surprise to find Derek watching him, his hands shoved into his jeans pockets. It was weird to see the wolf without his leather jacket for once. His shadow was way past five o’clock, but not quite beardy yet, and he looked exhausted. It struck something in Stiles, because for all the stuff they’d gone through, his hardened exterior never faltered enough to look tired.
“I need to ask you something.”
“No.” Derek responded shortly, glowering at him as he walked by.
“Why does everyone say that?” Stiles groused under his breath, throwing his hands up in exaggeration as he turned to face Derek’s back. “It’s about Peter.” His heart jumped into his throat as growls vibrated out of Derek’s chest from the name. “He said that he wanted me. Obviously, he means for his pack. He said…”
“I was there, I know what he said. Get to your point.” Derek’s tone was clipped and sounded like he was losing his patience quickly. If you could even call Derek’s ability to refrain from maiming Stiles ‘patient’.
“He said,” the teen emphasized, continuing on as if Derek hadn’t cut him off, “That he’d find a way to convince me to let him bite me. I need to know if my father’s safe. I need to make sure that you’ll stop him before it comes anywhere near Peter killing him or bringing him into the loop on any of this.”
Derek eyed the human with an unreadable expression for several moments, causing Stiles to fidget under his gaze. “I can’t promise that.”
Stiles exploded, stepping forward several steps with a finger raised toward the wolf, “You owe me.”
“I owe you nothing!” Derek raged back even fiercer than Stiles.
“I helped get you out of that hole, I figured out your clue and called Brenna and Zane, I helped them find Scott, I talked him down from a ledge after being so distraught over the fact that Allison found out he’s a werewolf, and all four of you were about to be wolf soup if I hadn’t driven Argent’s car into him. You’re welcome by the way.”
Derek scoffed, “In your heroic recounts, you seem to forget that you also got yourself caught by the Argents and brought them here, let Kate and her hunters escape to go for reinforcements that are sure to come after all of us any day now, and let Peter get away in your bumbling attempts at being the hero. But you’re not, Stiles. You’re human, you’re nothing. You’ll never be the hero.”
Stiles took deep breaths, feeling the sting from the words, his anger dissipating and being replaced by resignation. “Maybe not. Maybe I’m just going to be the sidekick in all of this that screws up and needs everyone else to fix his messes. But I’m here. I’m human and I’m still standing here after facing your Uncle, the psycho Alpha, four times. Once in the school where I managed to lock him in a locker room before he escaped through the roof. The second time at the hospital, third on the lacrosse field after he bit Lydia who still hasn’t woken up yet after a month and we don’t know what the hell she is. The fourth time was here.” With each instance, he ticked off a finger. “I’m human, but I haven’t been killed yet and the worst I have to say for all of this is some nightmares that I’ll probably have to pay triple figures an hour to a therapist for in the long run, and some bruised ribs.”
“Why are you still here?” Derek questioned, his brow furrowed in a rare display of curiosity as he crossed his arms against his chest.
“Because I’m the reason Scott was bit. If it wasn’t for me, he wouldn’t have been in the woods that night. It’s my fault that all of this is happening.” It was the first time admitting his guilt aloud, and it settled in his chest like a weight. If he was standing in front of anyone else, there would be tears in his eyes at the feeling, but he refused to show more weakness to the wolf. As is, he watched the anger ripple over Derek’s face.
“Listen, it’s happening because of me, not you.” Derek said shortly, his tone brooking no room for Stiles to ask what he meant. “This still would be happening, just with different people. Peter wants a pack and he wants to mark Beacon Hills as his. If it hadn’t been Scott or even you that night, it would’ve been one of the cops. It could’ve been your dad, which means you or Scott could’ve still ended up bitten, if not both of you.”
Stiles hadn’t thought of it like that. He felt his stomach jump sickly at the thought of his father coming home with yellowed eyes and bared fangs aimed for his son’s throat. Would he survive the bite, would his father even? If they had, would they become some sort of family like the Hales where everyone was wolves and went around running from hunters? Would he have bit Scott, and in turn would he go and bite his mother and just spread it through the town like some sort of disease? The thoughts running rampant through his mind were a lot to take in.
“I’m not going to promise that any of you stay safe. There will be causalities and I really don’t care who they are, as long as the Alpha is dead in the end.” Derek’s hard exterior covered the turmoil under the surface. He’d never admit it to the infuriating kid, but he had managed to help a hell of a lot more than Scott had since first being turned. He would like to repay him by protecting the Sheriff, but there were no guarantees in this.
“He’s all I have left. You know what that’s like.” Stiles played the dead relatives card shamelessly. He needed to know that his dad would make it out of the impending war in one piece. “If you could’ve gone to someone to help you protect Laura, wouldn’t you?”
Before he could blink, Stiles was pressed against the driver’s side of his jeep with a snarling wolf growling in his face. Derek was still human but his eyes were the blue of his wolf, teeth elongated. “Alright, alright, I’m sorry.” Stiles forced out quickly, his heart hammering in his throat.
“You don’t know anything about Laura or what happened and if you ever mention her again, I will tear your ribcage out and make wind chimes from the bones for your father.” Derek thrust Stiles back forcefully against the Jeep, watching the anger flash into the human’s eyes at the same time the window behind his head imploded, sending glass raining in the interior.
“And don’t threaten my father.” Stiles tried menace back as good as the wolf could give, but he knew any threat he attempted wouldn’t come close to the vivid imagery of his ribs broken into individual bones, clanking in the wind from the hook his mother used to hang plants from, when his father got home from working a long shift. “You’ll be paying for that window.”
“I paid for the hood of your Jeep, didn’t I?” Derek snapped before he could stop himself, shoving off of Stiles with a disgusted expression. It was a reflection on himself for revealing that bit of information.
“That was you?” Stiles asked incredulously. When he’d taken his Jeep to get fixed after the Alpha mangled it at the school, he’d dropped it off with a mind-boggling estimation on how much it would cost to fix. He hadn’t the faintest idea on how he was supposed to pay for it, but when the mechanic had called to tell him it was ready and to come pick it up, he’d told Stiles that the bill wasn’t a problem when the teen tried to ask about payment plans. He’d just figured that it was a solid for the Sheriff’s son and didn’t give it much of a second thought with everything else going on.
“Look,” Derek said, feeling a migraine coming on and trying to heal itself away as it niggled against his skull while he dealt with the human annoyance. “I can’t make promises that he’ll be safe, but between me, Zane and Brenna, we’ll make sure he’s never vulnerable to the Alpha. That’s the best I can do right now.”
“That’s all I was asking for.” Stiles said softly, shaking his head as he looked at the gaping hole of his window. That was going to be hell on his ears driving all the way home. He opened the door, flicking away the shards of thick glass from his seat. “What about Scott’s Mom? He’s already gone after her once.”
“She’s protected. He knows now that he won’t persuade Scott by turning her or hurting her. He wants it to be about choice right now, it makes it easier for him and it wastes less of his energy.”
Stiles shook his head. No matter how much he researched, he didn’t think he’d ever manage to understand the goings on of a pack. Most of the stuff he found online was probably false information put out by wolves themselves so that no one actually figured anything out, anyways.
Derek watched as Stiles finished picking the glass out of his car, before tossing a look over at Derek and climbing in.
He listened until the car was out of range, no oddities in the drive - aside from the kid’s preference in music - that required him to go and assist. He would only admit to himself in the loneliness of the forest though, that the kid had balls that he’d never considered before. He was definitely more adept for this situation than Scott, who was too busy trying to get into Allison’s pants. Derek was all too familiar with how bad of a road that could end up being.
Stiles, however big of a pain in the ass he might be, had been nearly invaluable with some of these things. Without him, they could still be stumbling around with their thumbs up their asses trying to figure out who the Alpha was. He was smart, smarter than anyone gave him credit for, and would be a valuable member to any pack which is precisely why Peter would want him. Any abilities he’d garner from the bite would hone in his mind and remove all of his more annoying quirks in the long run. A wolf would make Stiles a formidable asset. He’d strengthen the Alpha considerably.
Which is why Derek knew he’d have to protect the kid. He wasn’t going to let his Uncle have another human to turn and siphon strength from. Especially not the strength that came with this particular human, who had something brewing beneath the surface. Because Derek knew his strength, knew how much force he would’ve had to put behind his shove in order to break the glass of Stiles’ window.
And he hadn’t used nearly enough to do that.
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Epilogue
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The epilogue will be up in the next 24 hours. Probably sooner, maybe within the next few hours. Final notes and thanks will be at the end of that. I can't believe this one's almost done! But, now I can start on A Warm Gun its sequel for the Teen Wolf Big Bang. There will be one/two/three shot stories in between those two stories to keep the 'verse alive 'til AWG can be posted in December. :)
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