Gee, why won't Scott just submit to Derek...
I was going through some older pro-scott posts on tumblr, and of course a Scott hater had to come on the post to whine about it.
One of the things that hit me, was their claim that they ‘liked Scott in s1, but that in s2 ‘Scott didn’t ask for help’, and ‘helped everyone except for Derek’
And it made me remember that when they say that, what they actually meant was ‘Scott didn’t submit to Derek’
See, in s1, Scott despite Derek’s bad behavior, was desperate enough to accept Derek’s ‘help’, put up with Derek’s abuse, and despite Stiles advising him against it, let Derek ‘train’ him. Which basically came down to letting Derek beat him up in a way that was in no way helpful to actually teaching Scott how to control his shift.
But what these people forget, is that by the end of s1, Derek betrayed Scott. not just in Code Breaker, which if you stretch canon, can be claimed to be for Scott’s own good. (you know if you ignore the lying, manipulation and so on...)
But no, Code Breaker wasn’t the real problem. ‘Co-Captain’ was. Derek took Stiles to the clinic to find out who’d sent that text to Allison to lure her to the school, and found out that Peter was the alpha. They didn't take Scott with them, because Peter had made it look like the text came from Melissa.
At that point Derek had a choice, to keep standing up to Peter, or to give in to his uncle.He chose the second.
So when Scott next faced Derek, he was shocked to find out that not only was Peter the Alpha, but to see Derek stand there and side with Peter. To have Derek stand by and do nothing as Peter violated Scott, and forced his memories of the fire into Scott’s mind. And even worse... they then left this half naked sixteen year old boy writhing on the floor after this assault, abandoning him to anyone who might have found him there.
Could you imagine how many fics there would be about that utter horrifying betrayal, if it had happened to Derek? Or hell, to Stiles? Or Isaac?
But because it happened to Scott, most people seem to utterly forget it, and then they wonder why in s2, Scott didn’t trust Derek, and wouldn’t accept him as his Alpha?
And to go back to Codebreaker. Even though I'll admit that the betrayal in Code Breaker wasn’t as bad as the one in Co-Captain, but that didn't mean it didn't hurt, considering it came on top of the first one. Especially since it happened after Scott was still willing to save Derek, (despite Stiles trying to get in the way of it by hiing that he'd already figured out how to find Derek). Scott despite this, risked himself, knowing the Argents were already after him, to go save Derek from them.
And to then find out that either Derek had lied to him about a cure all along, or that Derekreally didn’t know it wasn’t a cure, and still took Scott’s only hope of a cure away from him. Either option is just as horrifyingly bad. Yet at no point did Derek try to explain himself, or apologize in anyway..
So then we come to s2.
Derek has betrayed Scott, he has basically made it clear he can’t be trusted or relied on. And on top of that in s201 Gerard makes it clear that he’s throwing out the Code. That he’ll kill any werewolf in town, regardless of age, regardless of how or why they got the bite. Scott knows that Derek heard this threat, since Derek was holding him back from saving that Omega.
And to then find out that, regardless of this clear threat to any werewolf in town, Derek decided to manipulate three other teens into taking the bite, directly risking their lives. (and as we find out later from Boyd, he didn’t fully explain this threat to them) To not even start on Derek’s treatment of Jackson, or Derek’s attempted murder of Lydia.
Yet somehow, all of that, still isn’t seen as reason enough for Scott to not just submit to Derek, and do whatever Derek tells him to? Scott is supposed to just submit to this violent abusive white man, who has done nothing to Scott, but betray him, endanger other kids Scott knows as classmates and make stupid mistake after stupid mistake, with no plan whatsoever to deal with Gerard?
People complain that Scott trusted Theo in 5a, yet based on the information Scott actually had, Theo did more to earn Scott’s trust in 5a, than Derek ever did in s1-s3a.
And this is where fanon becomes the problem. because most fanfics don’t deal with canon Derek; They don’t deal with creepy violent abusive anti-hero Derek of s1 or full on villain Derek of s2. They try and paint him as this sweet stoic guy who meant well, ignoring his actual behavior. And showing more sympathy for the full grown white man, than they do for the Latino teenager who has to put up with Derek’s horrible treatment of him.
Because of this, they also ignore that the easiest solution for Scott, to get rid of both Derek and Gerard, and the threat they both posed to him, would have been to use them against one another.
All Scott had to do, was tell Gerard where Derek was hiding. Simple solution, hand Derek over to Gerard; hell, in Battlefield, Gerard was threatening not just Scott’s Mom, Scott’s best friend, and everyone else on or around the field. And Scott had already been told by Isaac that Boyd and Erica had already run off, so as far as he knew they’d have been safe. All Scott had to do was tell Gerard the location of Derek’s hide out, and send Gerard after Derek.
Scott already knew that the moment Gerard managed to get the bite from Derek, that he’d be taken down.
Easy fix, easy sollution.
But did Scott do so? No. Despite the threat, Scott still refused to give up and/or betray derek.
Because despite everything Derek had done to him and others, Scott still cared about him, and wanted to protect him.
But I guess that doesn’t matter, does it?