Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

"How's that, folks? A half dozen beautiful Alpha bachelorettes seeking mates this heat cycle. Could you be the lucky Omega that catches their eye? Only time will tell!"

"Did you hear that, Scott? Only time...will tell," Stiles mocks, snorting out a laugh. He heaves a scrap of apple at the town square video screen, short-circuiting the feed a second. Real big loss there. He’s crying invisible tears over it.

The same brainwashing Heat Week propaganda’s been playing over and over for hours now, on a continuous loop, beamed in direct from the West Capitol compound, with no way to change the channel or turn it off. If there was anything better to do than sit here and watch it, Stiles would be doing it. He’d be doing it so hard. As it is, somehow there isn’t anything better to do, and he could probably repeat the script word-for-word by now. Pretty much.

Of course his interpretation would be much more entertaining than whoever this bozo is reading off the prompter. He'd actually use this thing some people like to call a ‘sense of humor.’ A sense of humor and none of the makeup.

Less of the makeup.

Maybe a little makeup.

"How much do you wanna bet all those ladies are going to come to Beacon Hills and fight over me? Hey, wow...thank you for that face of disgust. Just wait. I'll be living in the lap of luxury. It's calling my name. What's that?" He cups a hand to his ear.

"Better keep dreaming, Stiles," Scott says, and Allison grins from where she's got her head crooked on his shoulder.

Everyone's against him.

Stiles scoffs, "Ye have little faith. While you and Allison are here in Beacon Hills, aka ‘been there, done thats ville,’ I'll be in the big city, sipping champanya and eating all the curly fries I can shove in my face. Try not to drool too much on the video screen, okay?"

"Hey, don't go putting your foot in your mouth before anything's even happened, dude. You can always tag along with us this week, anyway... If it doesn't, you know,” he frowns, “happen for you. I mean..."

Did Stiles— Did he just feel a slap to the face? Was that—

"Don't worry, Stiles," Allison smiles. "I think you'll get picked."

"Thank you, Allison. At least there's someone around here who sees me for the catch that I am. You're missing out, Scott."

“I bet,” Scott says.

Allison winks at Stiles though, no mocking to it, and for a second, it actually has him starting to believe he will get picked. That it’s only a matter of time, and not the stupidest joke in the world. He wonders if she realizes the power she wields.

At first, Stiles hadn't really liked Allison, just for the fact that she was stealing away the best bud of all best buds, the bestest bud he'd ever known. Emphasis on ‘best.’ Much, much emphasis on ‘best.’ And only. ‘Only’ would be a good word, too.

But Allison’s too nice for anyone to hold any kind of real grudge against and besides, a few more compliments like that and Stiles'll be eating out of the palm of her hand, just like Scott; that could get awkward on date night.

It doesn't hurt that when it comes to Scott, Stiles is soft. Or that Allison looks like a goddess, either. Next to Lydia, she's the prettiest girl in town. Even prettier than Lydia, some days, but Stiles feels like a traitor for thinking it. Not just for the fact that he’s had a crush on her since forever, but because Allison’s Scott’s lady love, and you don’t go around fantasizing about your friend’s lady love.

At least you don’t tell them about it, if you do.

Point being, Stiles’d probably literally eat out of her hand if she asked nicely and batted her eyelashes. Hell, even if she didn’t ask nicely. He could go for that, too.

"Now, let's take a look at this year's bachelors!" the announcer bursts out. He sounds way too excited for a bunch of losers who’re getting dates through political intervention, Stiles thinks.

Yeah okay, so he has no room to talk. No mate in his life, no mate in the near future and probably, let's just be generous, no mate in the next ten years, either.

Maybe the eleventh year’ll be his year. That sounds like a reachable goal.

He’s the one who needs an intervention. And not just the kind where his dad tries to pawn him off on his coworkers’ daughters, like Stiles’s the last dented melon that no one wants.

One word: awkward. No, two words: awkward and painful. Three words: awkward and painful and why? Does he have ‘loser’ written on his face?

Rhetorical question. That was a rhetorical question.

"—nly have three this season, ladies and gentlemen, so the competition for their attention is going to be even tenser than usual. First up is Alpha Daniel Mahealani, from the coastal precincts."

"What're you assfaces doing out here?"

Crap.

Stiles catches Scott's eyes. There's a shared look.

It's the ‘Why, why, why again, why ever, why? Did I mention why?’ look. Also known as the ‘Jackson Look.’

"I know thinking’s not your strong suit, Jackson, but here’s a thought," Stiles turns toward his approach, "for such a popular guy, you really have nothing better to do than bottom feed with us half the time. What’s that all about? Curious minds..."

"What can I say?" Jackson smirks. "Beating on you's my favorite pastime."

"Yeah, well, maybe that's why you don't have a heatmate this year," Scott mumbles and Stiles can't tell if him pulling Allison closer is to make Jackson jealous or just to use her as a shield. He'd give Scott the benefit of the doubt, but Scott's never really been prone to bragging. Not to mention, Allison could probably kick Jackson’s ass from here to space and back. And Stiles would pay to see that. "Did you ever think about that?"

Jackson spits out a laugh.

Stiles huffs and wipes his face. "Thanks. For that. Really. The water’s out at our house; I was wondering when I’d next get to take a shower."

"Neither of you testicles knows anything. Lydia's just taking her sweet time. It's called ‘the chase.’ But you wouldn't know anything about that, would you, Stiles?"

"Stop, please, you're killing me with wit," Stiles monotones.

"Besides," Jackson says, totally ignoring that grade-A insult, "even if she doesn't get with me this heat, it's not like I'll be poked and prodded at the meat market tomorrow, like all the Omega virgins. Stiles, you're still carrying your v-card, right? I haven't heard any girls pointing and laughing at you lately, so I guess you must be."

"Jackson, you're still carrying your d-bag card, right?"

Jackson frumps up his mouth in false pity. Not a good look. "Awe, that sounds like a yes to still being a widdle virgin. Maybe one of the Alphas'll pick you and put you out of your misery. We all know that’s the only way you’ll ever get any. They could teach you a thing or two hundred."

"Hey, you’re right. Maybe they will put me out of my misery this year. And then I can have them put you out of yours, too.” Stiles gives him a tight smile. “The slower and more painful, the better."

"You know what, Stiles—"

"Guys," Allison interrupts, ever the kind, beautiful angel of mercy that she is. She's stamped out a number of fights between the three of them since she moved here, and Stiles’s face is forever grateful.

Not that he’s not sure a broken nose or swollen eye wouldn’t actually improve the view somehow. Or at least give him some cool points with the ladies. They like the bad boy types. Better than…whatever type Stiles is. He has the lack of play to prove it.

Allison motions toward the video screen. "Please, could you be quiet? I want to hear this."

Stiles looks up at the feed just in time to catch an eyeful of dimples, dimples, dimples. When he first saw Allison smile, he swore someone could get lost in those things (hey, maybe that's where Scott disappears to sometimes), but this Alpha Mahealani has her beat in spades. It's like whenever he smiles, his face gets half gouged by them, which sounds pretty gruesome, but somehow it works on him.

"Who's that?" Jackson snorts and shoves Stiles over — ow — to steal a seat on their bench.

"Could you not?" Stiles doesn't have a heatmate, but even he can't make anything good out of Jackson all up in his personal space. He's not that desperate.

...He hopes he never will be.

"That's Alpha Danny Mahealani," Allison says, with that ever-present smile of hers. Seriously, she must be part goddess of sweetness or something. "He's our age. Mm, I think they said he lives on the coast."

"Our age and an Alpha?" Stiles says. "I feel really good about myself right now."

"Get a good look, Stiles." Jackson reaches over to cup Stiles’s chin with an unforgiving hand. "That could be your new boyfriend."

"Hah hah," Stiles says, pushing him off. But really, stranger things have happened.

He's come to terms with his gangly body and unfortunate baby face and how he's pretty much been an Omega since the day he was born, and nothing good ever comes from being an Omega, in his opinion. But even the most insignificant specks have to prepare for the worst, as the saying goes. Of the three Alpha males, Alpha Mahealani's probably the least terrifying. He’s young and new to the whole alphadom, and he doesn’t act like he has something to prove, so maybe he’s not that into throwing his power around, yet. Plus he’s an objectively attractive dude, and he actually smiles, which is more than Stiles can say about the other two guys. The one, Alpha Peter Hale, is just creepy, and though he does smile a lot, too, there's this calculated predatoriness to it that makes Stiles have the whole fight-or-flight response—without any of the fight, and a whole, whole, whole lot of flight. Run away, run away.

Supposedly, he challenged and killed the Alpha up in the del Rey compound. But some people claim Peter just sat her down for a very convincing chat, and she willingly gave power over to him. And then was never seen or heard from again. Sure, that happens all the time after convincing chats. Either way, it doesn’t really do him any favors in Stiles’s opinion. Still raises his hackles.

And Peter’s nephew, Derek — now Alpha Derek Hale — who ran Beacon Hills and several neighboring compounds with his sister, until she passed away two years ago...yeah, well.

Stiles just thinks he's probably also a homicidal maniac, by now. He wears this intense, ‘I will kill you in your sleep’ expression in most of the footage they play, and the one picture they keep posting of him smiling just looks faked to lycan hell.

The wonders of Photoshop.

The few times that Stiles's seen him around the compound for yearly inspections hasn’t done much to disprove his theory, either. But from what he can remember of Derek when they were younger, and Derek actually still lived in Beacon Hills, it’s a new development. Newer. Ever since the arson up at the Hale house that killed most of his family, six years ago. Stiles wasn't good friends with Derek before that – or ever, really – but he vaguely remembers that Derek used to be different. Happier different. Less intimidating different. Less self-aware different. He was more of a social butterfly. He wasn't off cocooning himself somewhere, like he is now.

Stiles can't really blame him if the loss of his family just took everything good right along with it. That’s not exactly a foreign concept for Stiles.

For some reason, he also remembers that Derek was weirdly shady, too. Literally, he was like a shadow, just there. Whenever Stiles would turn around. At the ice cream shop? There. In the library? There. At his own house in the creepy woods, where Stiles would snoop around after school? There.

Okay, Stiles’ll give him that one. That one is totally his doing.

At the time, he’d kind of been a little obsessed with Derek, for…reasons unknown. Sadomasochism or some kind of death wish, probably. So maybe it hadn’t been that Derek was always there, but that Stiles just really noticed when he was.

It’d been hard not to notice him.

It still is.

The jury's out on if that's a good thing or not. Stiles is thinking no.

Derek hasn't been to visit the compound lately, though, so Stiles has had to live on memories and presumptions from the news broadcasts, of which there are few. Derek's apparently even more reclusive now than ever, a troll who hardly comes out from under his bridge.

"Don't forget, Laura Hale picked an Omega from here a few years ago. So it's not impossible," Allison says over the footage of Peter Hale at some event, waving to the crowd, posing for pictures, signing autographs for fans. He looks like he loves it all. And weirdly like he was made for it—or like it was made for him.

"How old’s that geezer?" Jackson scowls. It’s times like these Stiles is reminded, and with great joy, just how bad Jackson is at hiding when he feels threatened. Even by a video clip.

That’s just sad.

"He's not old at all," Allison laughs. "Maybe thirties, early forties at most? Lydia was talking about him earlier."

Jackson goes rigid at Stiles's side. But then, just as fast he shrugs and shakes his head, tries to play it cool. Which he really sucks at, too. His heart is picking up speed, right in Stiles’s ear. "He's not her type."

"Sounded like she was pretty interested in him, type or not," Allison offers loosely, a little teasing. She looks over at Jackson out of the corner of her eye.

"Uh-oh, Jackson," Stiles starts, jostling his shoulder. "Maybe you should go and brush up on the old begging technique."

"Shut up," Jackson snaps and goes back to watching the footage with a bodily stiffness that makes Stiles uncomfortable, in the sheer radiation of it. "I’m better than him, anyway."

"Whatever helps you sleep at night, pal," Stiles says.

In a truly shocking turn of events (and by “truly” Stiles means “not at all”), Jackson’s really crappy charade doesn't last long after that. Not a minute later, before the announcer's even gotten through with Peter's segment, he’s pushing off the bench — and off Stiles, again, ow — and stumbling away in the direction of Lydia’s house.

Stiles really hates him – like, really, really, really hates him – but even he has to spare Jackson pity enough to tune out the sound of him yelling Lydia's name down the street, like some lost puppy, if just because it sounds so pathetic and Stiles kind of really wants to forget the low to which weremanity has just sunk.

But he’s one to talk. If Lydia ever threw him even half a bone, he’d probably be like that too, or worse. Definitely worse. But he’s too used to her pretending like he doesn’t exist to be getting his hopes up anymore, no matter how many times she touches up her lip gloss right in front of him.

It should be illegal.

So he just takes his frustration out on Jackson, who Lydia does throw half a bone. It’s a fair trade, in his opinion.

"Did Lydia seriously talk to you about Peter Hale?" Scott asks after a while, combing at Allison's hair.

Really, sick. They make him sick with all the touching and lovey-dovey and mates forever and ever. Put a ring on it and let’s move on already. Preferably to a scenario that also includes Stiles. Just a thought.

"Yeah, she did," Allison says. Her eyes crinkle under the brunt of another smile, "But...I might've exaggerated her interest in him just a little? Or maybe a lot?"

Her grin's infectious. Scott's got one not half a second later, and then Stiles can feel his own, too. He starts laughing.

Allison's winning him over. She's definitely a keeper.

^

"I remember the first time I went to a choosing ceremony. The Alphas were really something else, then."

"Yeah, Dad, hate to rain on your nostalgia parade here, but you're leaving out a key detail. It's purple. As in, not black or blue or gray or white or brown or even any other color but purple. Purple." Stiles makes an abortive flail at the suit his father's laid out on his bed. It's a three-piece, all made out of the same Play-doh purple velour.

Velour. Why is that a real thing? Who sat down and decided the world needed it?

To make matters worse, there's a white dress shirt set out next to the suit, with ruffles at the collar and sleeves, and can someone just shoot him now?

Really, he doesn't need any help looking like a doofus. He’s got that covered.

"C'mon, purple is a very...it's. It's a regal col— awe hell, Stiles. Look, my father gave me this suit because his father gave it to him, and now I'm giving it to you. All the Stilinski men have had to wear this at least once in their lives. It's one of our traditions."

Grand dad should've made burning it the tradition.

"Just because your dad made you wear it doesn’t mean you have to punish me, too. "

His dad sighs. "You know things have been tight around here, the last few years. If I could buy you a decent black suit, I would, Stiles. I even asked Melissa if she could give me something of Scott's, but she said his best suit's got holes and rips all over. This is the best option we've got. Besides, it'll really...well, it’ll set you apart from the crowd."

"The sad thing is I think you actually really tried to make that sound convincing."

"Stiles, you have to look at this from a positive angle. I'm really trying here. Give me something to work with."

"I would rather go there naked. Are you happy, Dad? It's come to that. Public nudity. Your call. Purple suit or birthday suit."

His father gives him a flat look. "I think I'll go with purple." He picks up the dress shirt and hands it to Stiles, who, let's face it, takes it only after his dad manually pries his fingers open one-by-one and shoves the hanger into them. "I know it looks bad now, but you haven't even tried it on yet."

"I think I can picture it well enough in the old noggin’." It's not a pretty picture, either.

Someone, anyone. Really, just...anyone, shoot him.

"Stiles, I met your mother when I was wearing that suit."

No. Not the mom card.

It's his one true kryptonite. And cake. And Lydia. Lip gloss.

"She said it really brought out my eyes."

Your eyes are gray, Dad, he wants to say. What comes out is:

"Well, she was clearly the queen of tact."

"Stiles..." His dad frowns, starts doing that thing where he pinches the bridge of his nose and makes Stiles feel all constipated with guilt. "Just...just do it, Stiles. I don't want to fight about this. Get in the bathroom and put it on. The sooner you do, the sooner it’s done."

"Now that’s some logic right there…"

“Get your ass in the bathroom.”

^

Scott's face says it all, really.

He slows down as he approaches Stiles, and Allison just...buries her smile in his shoulder.

Yeah.

Well.

"Dude, what are you wearing?" If Scott's trying to hold back his laughter for Stiles's sake, it's really not working.

Yeah, he’s not even trying. Him, trying? No. Trying does not exist in his universe, right now.

"All right," Stiles says, holding his hands up in surrender. "Just, let's just get it all out now. I already look like a piñata. You might as well get a few blows in, too. Maybe some candy’ll fall out of the pockets. I don’t know."

"I mean, dude...you're wearing a purple suit. What else is there to say?"

"A lot, apparently. Everyone's laughing at me. Which wouldn't ordinarily bother me, but today it's pretty much killing me slowly. There’s no way an Alpha's gonna pick someone dressed like a disco vampire. Not gonna happen. Never gonna happen. Would you pick me?"

Scott caps a hand over Stiles's shoulder, grimacing. "You know I’d always pick you. If I were an alpha, I’d totally pick you today."

Stiles sighs. "It was nice knowing you, Scott. I enjoyed this thing we called a friendship, but now I have to move on to the death stage."

"Hey, Stiles," Allison says, "I think I might have something to cheer you up."

"Oh yeah?" Somehow he doubts this mystical promise of hers to turn a day like this around, but he’s willing to let her try. He doesn’t exactly have much to lose, right now.

She separates away from Scott and comes around behind Stiles to gently turn him toward all the virgin Omegas crowding in the town square, in front of the huge stage that’s been set up for the Alphas.

And…

Okay?

Is this it?

Staring at a bunch of other losers? Losers who are better dressed than him, even.

Not to fault her idea of Things That Make Stiles Happy or discourage her soft hands on him, but he's pretty unimpressed. Actually, he may feel even worse, now. No one else is wearing a purple suit. Or ruffles. Not even any of the girls. Half the guys look like James Bond. This is going to be a long day.

She leans in close to whisper in his ear, "Look at the far left of the crowd."

Honestly? It takes him a second to get over the goosebumps that her breath raises on his skin.

He doesn't see what she’s talking about at first. He’s usually horrible at this game, and her sweet smell is doing a real number on his ability to concentrate. But then—

"Oh my god."

"What?" Scott comes up beside them, looking out over the crowd, lit with anxiety. "Stiles, what?"

Stiles makes a frantic gesture at Jackson.

Jackson.

Jackson in the crowd of Omega virgins. In a suit. Jackson—

Jackson Whittemore!

"Oh my god!" Stiles says again, on a breathless laugh.

"Stiles, what?!"

Allison turns and, with those soft, soft hands, tilts Scott’s head until she's sure he's looking dead at him, too.

"Dude!" Scott shouts. “Jackson’s there!”

Behind them, Allison claps her hands over her mouth to stifle her laughing.

"Oh my god, this..." Stiles trails off, reveling in the moment. It's a sweet one. Jackson, Mr. Suck-It-I’m-A-Beta Jackson, is an Omega. And a virgin. He’s no better than Stiles, after all. They’re actually equal. Mind? Blown. Confidence? Skyrocketing.

No, scratch that. Still wearing the purple suit. But still.

"This is the best day of my life. I don't...I don't know what to do with myself anymore. Nothing can ever top this moment. Nothing else has meaning. …I can die happy."

"I thought he was a Beta," Scott says, and he sounds about as confused as Stiles is excited. He's struggling not to laugh, though, his voice all rubbery with restraint. "He told everyone he was a Beta. He was in the Beta classes with me. He felt like a Beta. How…how’d he lie about it? I never—what? And he and Lydia, like, all the time— Dude."

"Lydia told me she just fluffed up the stories about them. They’ve done things, but not that," Allison bites at her lip as she speaks, almost reluctant. "She found out his family paid off the class recorder to say that he was Beta class, and they must've somehow been doping him so everyone bought it. They definitely have the money. Jackson and Lydia got into a fight about her taking her time choosing a heatmate and he just, he blurted it out. But I guess she rejected him after all? And since he’s actually here, that must mean his parents couldn't pay off the Alpha administrations, too. Lydia told me to keep it a secret…but that seems kind of useless now."

"Hey, how long've you known that? You should've told me. I could've kept it secret," Scott frowns, voice pitching a little high.

Right. Sure. He would never have kept that secret.

Not from Stiles, at least.

Allison gives Scott a quick peck on the cheek in compensation, which works all too easily because he just gets this goofy grin on his face and looks at his feet. Interrogation totally dropped.

Jealous, thy name is Stiles.

"I just didn't want to embarrass him," Allison says eventually. "Lydia said she didn't think even Jackson knew he was an Omega until, like, a week or two ago. If even that long. She said he started getting really panicked all of a sudden, last week." Allison really must have a heart of gold because she glances over at Jackson with something like sympathy, as she talks. Sometimes Stiles envies her ability to somehow see the good in people.

But now is not one of those times. He’s having a party inside his head.

And by the look of it, Scott is too.

Pity for Jackson? Not really happening.

When Stiles has the presence of mind to look around a little, it seems like a lot of other people are confused as hell about it, too. They're staring at Jackson or whispering and trying not to point (failing hard). Jackson's fielding questions from all directions with fake smiles and shrugs. But he’s red in the face, like Stiles has never seen before, and he keeps dipping his head in embarrassment and looking around for someone to save him and readjusting the edges of his suit, as if it doesn’t fit quite right.

Suddenly Stiles doesn't feel so bad about what he’s wearing. At least people’ll have something else to talk about tomorrow, besides him. And by and large, Jackson being an Omega is a lot more news-worthy than Stiles wearing something from a pimp's closet. His embarrassment will last a few weeks, tops. Jackson’s will carry on for a lifetime.

It’s a beautiful thing.

"People are really going to rip him apart after today," Scott muses, actually sounding concerned for a second. "He bosses the Omegas and Betas around like he’s an Alpha, and now he’s an Omega... This is seriously warped."

"Yeah..." Allison trails off. "Maybe that's why he's been so touchy about Lydia, the last couple days. I guess if she'd gotten with him, he wouldn't be here, and no one’d know he wasn’t a Beta."

"I don't know about you guys," Stiles cuts in, "but today's really starting to look up for me."

Scott snorts.

"Listen up!" Mayor Finstock's voice suddenly claps over the loudspeaker, punctuated by a high-pitched feedback that has everyone groaning, including him. "Damn it, who set this thing up...one second. Is it, is it ready now? Is it—this was supposed to be ready to go by the time I—" he scowls at someone somewhere, tapping the podium microphone cautiously. "Testing, one, two... Okay, there, good. Great. No one's ears are bleeding anymore. I realize that the Choosing is always a big deal for you Omegas, but I need for you to get your sorry asses into rows of twenty, oldest in front, youngest in back. And hurry up. There are way too many of you this year— what're you doing with your lives? The Alphas have come a long way to see you all, so let's not make a bad impression. That's the last thing we wanna do. We already look pretty pathetic as it is! Get your asses in gear!"

"Pathetic, good word choice."

"Awe, c'mon, Stiles. Yesterday you were telling us about how you're gonna go out and score yourself an Alpha, right? So? Go get one."

"Now's not the time for jokes, Scott. I'm wearing a purple suit. Do you see the ruffles? Nothing can make this better."

"Jackson's a virgin Omega. Just remember that."

Stiles slaps Scott hard on the back. Gives him a soldierly nod. Of all the good things to focus on right now — and there aren’t many — that’s the goodest. "I appreciate that. You know me well."

Scott laughs. "Get going already!"

^

As he slots himself in with all the other Omegas, a sharp, familiar ache starts building in his chest. It's hard to separate from the pound of his heart and the fact that even his guts feel like they're sweating buckets, but it's there. He ignores it in favor of trying to gnaw his bottom lip down to nothing and the crushing pity of everyone within a five hundred foot radius.

Definitely the worst dressed here. Pretty definitely.

He's only two rows behind Jackson, and five people to the left, and it's almost too easy to get Jackson's attention, just long enough to wave and mime-laugh at him. Jackson flicks him off and turns back around. If for nothing else but that, today will have been a good day.

^

Stiles passes the first three-quarters of the ceremony a). making up shit about the Alphas in his head, b). pulling faces at everyone and no one and c). watching the way Jackson puffs up as each female Alpha comes down his row, and then deflates when, one-by-one, they don't choose him. It's kind of icing on the cake for Stiles (really, trying hard not to laugh every single time), but he can unwillingly admit to some kind of a solidarity with Jackson because none of them pick him, either.

Understandable.

Key phrase: purple suit.

He's probably a little more used to rejection than Jackson is, anyway, so maybe he even has the upper hand in this case.

Wow, what a silver lining.

And at least he won't wake up to a town that feels cheated by years of lies, tomorrow. So there’s that, too.

None of the female Alphas pick anyone, actually. The last one's making her way back up to the stage with only her guards in tow. It's usually like that, though. The Beacon Hills compound is pretty much a no man’s land in terms of the Choosing ceremonies. Save Laura Hale picking her heatmate here over half a decade ago — some Greenberg guy literally no one could remember having ever seen, until he was chosen at the ceremony, and even then people were still like, "who?" — no other heatmate’s ever come out of this place. Even the press hardly gives the town any play, and they like to suck the soul and cents out of everything. There’s only a small pack of cameras and reporters from the local news station along either side of the Omega rows, and Stiles is pretty sure they’re just going through the motions at this point, like everyone else.

All told, he can’t help being a little impressed none of the ladies did pick Jackson, though. He's from a wealthier family in town, and his black suit fits him like none of Stiles’s clothes have ever fit him. His hair is slicked back, and he looks like he even has some makeup on, at least to disguise his blemishes. Stiles may have made a pact with Scott to hate Jackson until either they die or he dies, but even Stiles can see how at least eighty or ninety percent of the girls in town — and some of the guys...and probably the livestock too, Stiles really can't judge — have a soft spot for him, all dickish qualities aside. There’re a lot of things a pretty face can buy in the world.

Stiles wouldn’t know. He’s more of a winning personality.

The Alpha ladies must just have really good taste, especially considering they’re picking purely for aestheticism and sex. They can call it like they see it, and they've likely seen a lot. Maybe faces like Jackson’s are a dime a dozen back home, where they’re from, and without the douchebag part.

What did they call it like, when they saw Stiles? He can't blame them, but it stings a little, all the shame in his head that never goes anywhere.

They'll go on to the next compounds in the circuit and find someone much more fitting there, Stiles guesses. He'll watch reruns of it on the video screen later. Listen to all the commentary about his purple suit. The fun's just never-ending around here.

Really, a purple suit.

Black seems to be the color du choice of the Rich and the Douchebag this year, which makes him stand out even more. Alongside Jackson, the rest of the wealthy Omegas are wearing black suits or dresses, and all of the Alphas have on black, too: the ladies, these sleek party dresses the likes of which don't exist in Beacon Hills — even on the rich girls — with black jewelry and the crown of large spikes that all Alphas wear for public events, and Derek in a black suit and tie, with a black shirt, black shoes, black hair, black spikes. Probably even has on black cufflinks and underwear. Black socks.

He looks like Death came to life just for the occasion.

Alpha Mahealani's the only outlier, which seems on par for how Stiles judged him in the video footage. He's got on a dark blue suit, with a white shirt and tie. His Alpha spikes are blue too, and he’s wearing that dimpled smile of his; he probably doesn’t go anywhere without it. That thing must be as good as cash money. Just—even if he wasn’t an Alpha, he could probably get things for free with it.

"Now," Mayor Finstock coughs awkwardly, looking down at his note cards as the last female Alpha resumes her seat. "Since Peter Hale found his mate in Landrove Lake— what, really? That train wreck of a… I had a girlfriend from there once, she was the worst. She was always calling me ‘Cupcake’ and I don’t know about you, but—" he looks out at the crowd with a laugh that quickly dies off in his throat, like he forgot where he was for a second, “—I, uh…yeah, look, no one likes to be called ‘Cupcake.’ End of story.”

Why is that pinging as a lie? Just why?

Stiles really doesn't know how Finstock became the mayor at all. He can't even remember an election. One day Finstock just started calling himself the mayor, and no one wanted to pick a fight with his brand of hostile weirdness.

"Anyway. That's all beside the point. So we've got the two Alpha males left. They were introduced at the beginning of the evening, but in case any of you chuckleheads weren't paying attention, to my left is Alpha Danny Ma—Maha—Mahealani? What even is that—is that even a real name? …He, let's see. He’s eighteen, one of the youngest Alphas on record and he heads up the Long Beach community. That's. Wow, eighteen and an Alpha. Well, aren't you a little overachiever?"

There's a huge crack of derision in the comment, but Alpha Mahealani only gets this embarrassed smile on his face, which he ducks his head to hide. It's so uncharacteristic of all the Alphas Stiles has ever seen that he can't help liking him for it. Seems like a humble, down-to-earth dude, all things considered.

"And to his left is Alpha Derek Hale. Of course we all know him and love him, etcetera etcetera. But again, you all probably weren't paying attention, so here’re the Spark Notes."

Stiles glances up at him, along with the rest of the crowd, and feels his heart thud in his chest, like he's just been spooked.

Derek's not—

Stiles looks over either shoulder, seriously confusing the people in the row behind him.

He turns a cautious eye back up to the stage and—yeah. Yep.

Yep.

Derek's staring him down.

He makes a face. What?

It's the purple suit, isn't it?

Finstock is jumbling through all of his achievements, and Derek's just—

staring at him.

Stiles must be seeing things.

He catches Scott's eyes in the crowd and just shakes his head.

Scott cocks his own head. What, dude?

Stiles tries to convey back the fact that Derek — Derek Hale, Alpha Derek frickin’ Hale — is staring at him, Scott, how can you not get this?, but somehow it just makes Scott scrunch up his face.

Because he's not a mind-reader. Right. That would do it.

What? Scott mouths.

"We should let the guest go first. Etiquette and all that," Mayor Finstock gruffs, through Stiles's psychic dialogue with Scott. It was already down the drain, anyway.

Really, is it too much to ask for a little telepathic ability, every once in a while?

"Alpha Mahealani, you’re up,” Finstock says, “go out there and find yourself a nice shewolf to take home to dear, sweet, old mommy and daddy."

Despite what Finstock just said, Alpha Mahealani looks to Derek before he even so much as sits forward in his chair or raises a foot. Derek gives him a nod, a brief flick of his fingers. And that’s that. Permission granted. Take your pick.

Even among the Alphas, there's a sense of order; the younger always defers to the elder. Not to mention that Beacon Hills is Derek's territory, his pack, and therefore each one of the other Alphas has to have his permission to pick from it.

He could've denied any of them the right, if he really wanted to. Stiles has seen things like that happen before, in broadcasts of other Choosings. Alphas cockblocking Alphas because of rivalries or bad blood. Or just because they can, even, to make a point not to mess with them.

But Derek’s apparently not the type. Or he just can’t be bothered to give a damn about Beacon Hills.

It’s probably the latter, considering how the compound’s gone down the drain over the years.

Alpha Mahealani's guards rise quickly and assume the position, two in front, two behind, as he descends the stage stairs and starts combing along the first rows of Omegas.

He doesn't stop or even slow until he comes to the girl right next to Jackson, someone Stiles recognizes from school, though he can’t remember her name. Alpha Mahealani gives her a long once-over, but smiles and walks on to the girl directly on the other side of Jackson, to which he does the exact same thing. There are gasps popping off in the crowd, both at the prospect of a Beacon Hills girl being chosen by an Alpha, and then the disappointment of him moving on.

These people need to learn how to get comfortable with rejection. Stiles is a pro at it. He plans to put it on job applications under ‘skills,’ that’s how much of an expert he is.

Alpha Mahealani makes his way down Stiles's row without stopping at all, except to give Stiles a small quirk at the corner of his mouth.

Thanks, really...the purple, right? Stiles thinks to say, but the guards look like they mean business. They have guns and knives and these things called “muscles." Can’t forget the armor. And the muscles, did he mention those?

Not five minutes later, Alpha Mahealani comes to the end of the last Omega row and circles around to go back to the stage, all eyes on him.

So. Another rejection for Beacon Hills. Stiles has absolutely no pride for his compound, except on Choosing days. There're some real gems here. Including himself. First and foremost him. He's a real diamond in the rough, if he can say that. He’d make a great heatmate.

Who’s he kidding?

He looks back up at the stage, and, to his confusion, Derek's still staring at him.

Okay, it's not that bad a suit!

…What is he saying? Not that bad a suit? Even he doesn't believe that one. Take it out back and shoot it.

A commotion breaks out in the crowd suddenly, and Stiles looks over in time to see that Alpha Mahealani, rather than making a direct line for the stage, has instead cut back down one of the rows — Jackson's row.

He’s going back for one of the girls?

Oh man, what a slap in the face for Jackson! Standing right next to the person who gets picked. So close he could literally reach out and touch Alpha Mahealani. Outed to the whole town as a virgin and an Omega, and no one, not Lydia or the other Beacon Hills girls or the female Alphas or Alpha Mahealani, wants him, all in one evening. This day just keeping getting better and bett—

Alpha Mahealani passes right by the one girl and pulls up short of the other. Right in front of Jackson.

Jackson stumbles back a step, choking out this disbelieving sound.

Wait…

What?

And cue the shock and amazement.

A very soft, reassuring smile catches Alpha Mahealani's mouth, dimples blunt, and he raises a hand to wipe his scent over Jackson's face.

Stiles goes slackjawed.

Seriously...what?

"No—!" Jackson stumbles back as Alpha Mahealani's hand makes contact with his forehead, but the guards have already circled around behind him and pin in him place. He starts struggling against them for all he’s worth, though it’s clumsy and muted, sloppy, like he can't really comprehend what's happening to him and his body isn't doing him any favors.

He's being claimed. By a dude. An Alpha Mahealani-type dude.

Stiles finds himself looking stupidly over at Scott, who's looking back at him with a weird jumble of bafflement and hilarity all over his face. Allison's beside him, smiling in some kind of pleasant disbelief. Stiles's dad, just off work, is standing right behind them and squinting at Alpha Mahealani and Jackson, mouth hung wide. The whole scene is some screwed-up family portrait, but Stiles takes comfort in knowing they’re as dumbfounded as he is.

It's not the first time an Alpha's claimed an Omega of the same sex, not by a long shot, but it's less common and for sure has never happened in Beacon Hills. This is literally history being made.

There's a tension to the air that makes Stiles start fidgeting with his coat collar, the ruffles on his shirt. He catches a glimpse of Jackson's face as they go to lead him off — he's frantic to find his parents in the crowd, it seems like — and there are angry tears just streaming openly down his face. He’s not doing anything to hide or stop them, either. He’s just letting them come, shouting for the guards to get off me, this isn’t right, you can’t do this, I’m not even supposed to be here, I’m not an Omega! And Alpha Mahealani’s just—walking beside him, patient, trying his best to wipe the tears off, though Jackson flinches away from his hands and keeps spitting back "no" over and over.

He just royally embarrassed himself in front of the entire compound and, more importantly, the entire country watching. Stiles should be busting a gut laughing right about now, and he feels like he needs to, but for some reason he can't. His heart’s just going a mile a minute, the hearts of everyone going a mile a minute in his ears. There's something scary about someone who's so afraid, they don't care how they look anymore. Especially when that someone is Jackson, who always, always cares how he looks. Stiles’s getting a little sick with it, the fear and panic Jackson’s little show inspired.

Derek is still staring at him, when he chances a glance back at the stage, and he throws a prayer up to the sky.

Please, seriously, a freak tornado or lightning bolt to the head would be really good right about now.

Mayor Finstock gets up to resume the podium, but he's quiet a minute, just frowning and bug-eyed. He tries to compose himself with some frenzied shake of his head, even though it really doesn’t help. Then again, he always looks somehow stunned and disappointed at the same time. "Well...that was. Wow. That was interesting, huh? What am I saying? We should all feel…uh, honored. Yeah, honored that Alpha Mahealani chose one of ours. Finally, am I right? I was beginning to think it'd never happen again. But look at us now! Beacon Hills is back on the map, baby! Eat wolfsbane, Landrove Lake!"

Is he really giving a victory speech? After what just happened?

"Now let's see if we can't go two-for-two, huh? Alpha Hale, they're all yours. Go to town. Seriously. If you want them all, hey, who’m I to stop you, right? Yeah! Have at ‘em, buddy!" Laughing, he motions out toward the crowd, that it's Derek's for the taking.

Stiles is gonna die.

Derek doesn't bother getting up from his seat, which calms Stiles down for all of negative .00000001 seconds. Instead, he grabs the sleeve of the guard closest to him and reels her in to whisper something so low, Stiles can’t make it out. Can’t hear it over his heart, clawing up his throat.

The guard nods and stands, makes a gesture for the other guards to stand, too.

Derek stays on the stage as they file down into the crowd of Omegas, and they don't waste time snaking up and down every row to feel anybody out. They slice down the side aisle with a purpose.

Stiles wills them to turn down every row before his; and now— turn now— now— now— go now— he chants in his head, but they don't. Until they get to his row.

Derek doesn't even have to come, doesn’t have to touch or smell or mark what’s his— he knows exactly who he wants and no one will challenge him. Not on his own turf. He doesn’t even have to—

This isn’t happening.

They stalk closer and closer, and Stiles's palms get clammy, and his face is hot, and he looks over at his dad, and his dad's watching the guards, and he looks at Scott, and Scott's watching him, and he looks back up at Derek and—

The guards stop in front of him and fan out around him, like the points on a compass.

He gets flustered, looking from armored face to armored face. Then there's a hand on his back. One on his shoulder. Blood is rushing loud through his ears. His heart is squeezing itself apart, pushing straight out of his chest, it has to be. The crowd is buzzing, but he can't single out any words. Can’t say any, himself. They’ve closed in on him, caged him in. He’s trapped.

There's nowhere to go.

He won't be proud of this later, but he just— just right there, down for the count, faints.

Chapter Text

Stiles stirs at the soft knuckles tracing his cheek.

"Nurse Lydia..." he mumbles, licking absently at the smile on his face. “’r you here to take my temp-ature?”

The unmistakable shine of Allison's laugh pricks his lids.

“Stiles?” his dad says, far away. Andddd now his head is somehow transposed on Lydia’s body.

Bad, wrong, no, no, no—

Stiles can’t throw his eyes open fast enough to chase away that fantastic mental image. There are just some things that should never been seen, and that is definitely near the top of the list, if not at the top.

He finds himself staring up at the glow stars and the half-burnout overhead light of his own ceiling, breathing hard in a sudden jolt of panic. Allison’s bent down at the side of his bed, Scott hovering over her shoulder, his dad at the foot, all of them watching him with careful stares. That's... Yeah. This really isn't looking good. People don’t gather around you for no reason. There’s always a reason. Usually it’s something normal, like being sick or dead. Not because you just got saddled with an alpha for heat week.

At least he’s home, in his own bed.

He groans in embarrassment and envelopes his hands over his face. Groans again for good measure, in case the world didn’t hear him the first time.

The world never hears him. Case in point: no lightning bolt to the head. And the purple suit. And the fact that Derek freakin’ Hale—

"…Tell me I just dreamed that whole thing," he mutters.

"Nope, you're spoken for, dude," Scott says. Does he sound happy about it? "You, uh...got an Alpha, just like you said you would."

It's probably one of those instances where it’s just so awkward, there's nothing else to do but joke and laugh. Stiles kind of wants to laugh, too.

Except oh wait, he doesn't.

"You know, I could really use some good news here."

"The suit worked?" his father offers.

"Really, Dad? Define 'worked.'" Stiles sits up just to squint at his dad's slack expression. The room spins a little, and in vain he grips his comforter up tight. "—I'm going to be shipped off to cuckoo Alphaville and that's all you got? It worked? Hey, let’s put you in it. Maybe he won’t know the difference."

"Stiles, give me a little credit. I've never been in this position before." His dad finds his knee under the comforter, squeezing it reassuringly. It only really makes Stiles feel even worse, though. He has bad associations with that gesture, like being sick and his mom dying — and, oh, being chosen by an Alpha, add that to the list. He forces himself not to shrug away from it, but it feels like his father can read the discomfort all over his face, anyway, especially when, not a second later, he’s taking his hand back.

"Well...yeah, neither have I, so." He picks at one of the sleeve buttons on the suit coat, scowling ugly at himself. "We're just both up a creek here, I guess."

Allison wraps her hands around his wrist, which surprisingly does absolutely nothing to comfort him. The one time he's got a pretty girl on his bed — holding his hand, even — and it's for this. This! What cosmic force's cornflakes did he piss in, in a past life? Seriously, is there some kind of outstanding karma bounty out on his head or something?

Apparently, his body still has the ability to flush anyway, all pessimism aside. Nice, good. Great. That’s just…great.

“You missed everything, Stiles,” Scott says. “A half hour after you fainted, a ton of reporters came to the compound. They kept trying to come into your house, so your dad gave one of Alpha Hale’s guards some of your clothes, and Alpha Hale left with him, like he was you. They put a jacket over his head and everything so no one could tell, and I guess in all the chaos, they didn’t even realize he was a Beta, either… A couple of them stuck around because they wanted us to do interviews about you, but your dad said he’d arrest them for trespassing if they didn’t get the hell out of here. And then he took out his taser. It was pretty cool.”

“He left? Without me? So what, am I done? Am I good?”

“Don’t I wish, kiddo," his father mutters.

“Derek said he’d send another car. It should be here around eight," Allison says, and it’s like a douse of cold water down his back.

"Now there’s some real motivation." He looks around for the clock he doesn't have, gnawing at the tip of his thumb. "What time is it?"

"Mm, you were out for a few hours, so we only have a little while. It's after seven."

When he glances down at Allison, when he really pays attention to her face, she has this soft frown to her mouth and the kind of sympathy in her eyes that unsettles him; it makes him think of his mom, not of her eyes but everyone else’s at her funeral, and afterward, in the street or at school or at the store—everyone knew, and everyone thought he needed to be reminded daily about how bad they felt for him, how terrible it was, how much death sucked, in case he forgot. He’s always heard that getting picked by an Alpha is supposed to be an honor, but here he is, feeling like someone’s just died.

Except for his mom’s funeral, he's never really seen his father broken down, not even a little. He knows, with a heavy hand of unfounded guilt, that his dad reserves it for when he’s by himself. But there's a strange pallor to his face now, too, and a calculation in his movements, like he’s trying not to step on Stiles’s toes or complicate things any more than they already are. Looking over at Scott yields a similar effect, and Stiles gets the heebie-jeebies.

It all makes Stiles want to take a running leap out his window. See if he can outrun fate.

He sucks in a poor excuse for a breath and nods.

"You guys are really..." He loosens himself from their hold on him and climbs out of bed, body shaky, head light. So fainting’s a real inconvenience. He should do it again soon. Maybe he can just faint his way through heat week and wake up on the other side. "You're really underestimating me here. I mean I've been through a lot in my life. I think I can handle one Alpha. There’s no need to get weepy about it. I'll be back in a few days, right? It's not like I'm going there to die. Hey, I get to live the life of an Alpha’s mate. That’s a good thing. I’ve pretty much got it made, now. I may never even come back."

Scott lets out this weird, awkward laugh that has Stiles’s stomach flipping. "Champagne and curly fries, right, Stiles?"

"Exactly. I intend to take him for everything he’s worth."

He's gonna die. He's so gonna die.

And Derek's gonna kill him.

Why the hell did Derek pick him, anyway? Did he not see the purple suit? Can Stiles demand a recount for this kind of thing?

Maybe he really is going to be put out of his misery. Maybe this is going to be a mercy killing. Weakest link of the pack? Target locked, end of line.

"Dad, uh…can you do me a favor, though?" he asks, shaking off the thought and crossing his room to the old chest of drawers in the corner. He trundles the top one open, but finds himself unable do more than just stare at his underwear, his socks. Something about the moment feels weird, almost like as soon as he touches them, he’ll be gone.

"Anything," his father says behind him, a wet tinge in his voice. "Name it."

"Get a bottle of kerosene, some matches, and burn this suit. Preferably with me still in it."

^

"So...this is awkward," Stiles says, dropping down next to Scott on the stoop and propping his lacrosse bag — a glorified suitcase — against the stair railing. If nothing else, at least he's out of the purple suit and into some reasonable clothes, now. It's the small victories, really.

Derek’s already picked him. No need to be impressive anymore. Not that Stiles would go with ‘impressive’ for that suit.

More like ‘blight upon weremanity.’ Or maybe ‘the suit where embarrassment comes to die.’

"Yeah… Really awkward," Scott mumbles. There's not much else to say than that. Not unless they want to get into the heavy stuff, and neither of them do. Best left untouched. Stiles likes it better that way.

“I still can’t believe Jackson’s an Omega. I always thought there was something weird about him, but I guess it makes sense now.”

"What isn’t weird about him?”

Scott snickers. “True.”

“What happened to him, anyway?"

"I don't know. Alpha Mahealani's people took him back to his house, I guess.” Scott shrugs. “He probably got to pack and say bye to his family, too?"

"I mean, did you...” Stiles feels around for what he’s trying to get at here. Even he’s not quite sure. “But did you see him any more after I fainted? Did he look scared? Did you see he was crying?"

"Yeah," Scott says.

"Yeah to what? Seeing him more or him…you know, crying?"

"No, yeah, I saw him crying. It was really weird." Scott leans over to pick a splinter off one of the rotting steps. "Today doesn't seem real."

"You're telling me." And then, Stiles is slammed with a sudden rush of embarrassment. "So wait...which do you think is worse, crying or fainting on national television?"

Scott raises a brow at him. Stiles, are you serious right now? That’s what that means. Too easy.

"Yeah, I'm serious. I want to leave with some dignity. Lie to me if you have to."

"Crying's totally worse."

It’s kind of reassuring that Scott knows to lie when Stiles really needs him to. Even if he can tell it’s a lie. Still reassuring.

He nods sagely. "Thought so."

”It was actually kind of weird, though. Like…Derek jumped out of his seat when you fainted? He kinda wolfed out, too. A little. It freaked people out. He's the one who carried you back to your house. But he seemed really anxious to leave, even before all the press came. Maybe your dad flashed his aconite gun at him?”

The concept of Derek being frantic about anything, much less Stiles, doesn’t compute at all. A shiver goes down his spine; he bursts out with a laugh, just to chase off the feeling of it. ”No—what? He didn’t… He did all that?”

A few houses down, a pair of headlights peel onto his street, stamping out any response from Scott. Haloed behind them is a black car, lost to darkness except for the metal grill on the front and some .

Scott looks down at his watch. "Wow, eight o'clock on the dot."

Stiles's father must've been keeping a lookout from the living room window because suddenly he's coming through the door unprompted, Allison close at his heels.

Not a minute later, a vintage, black deathtrap of a car pulls into their driveway. Stiles feels like puking all over his shoes. Or maybe puking all over the car. That outta be a clear enough message, right?

Derek’s probably inside it, waiting for him. The windows are blacked out, though. Too dark to tell, not for lack of trying.

Stiles swallows hard and stands up, roping a hand through his bag strap. He really can't figure out if it's a testament to his cowardice or his bravery that he hasn't seriously just up and run away, yet. This is supposed to be an honor, though. It’s a good thing. The compound’ll probably benefit a lot from it, even if he doesn’t, and that’s pretty important. Anyway, he's seen what's happened before, when chosen Omegas tried to back out or fight their way out, even; they just made it that much harder on themselves and their compounds. Stiles has a mean streak sometimes, but even he’s not enough of an asshole to screw over the entirety of Beacon Hills (not on purpose, at least), if just because that would mean also screwing over his father and Scott and Allison and Lydia and a whole bunch of other people who wouldn’t deserve it, along with them.

Besides, he finds he has some strange determination to handle this better than Jackson. If nothing else can get him through, finally one-upping him’ll be enough. Stiles could probably live on the fumes of that alone for the rest of his life, actually.

The driver — a stocky, older man in a black uniform— climbs out of the car and all but stumbles over to Stiles to take his bag from him, with the tip of his hat and a smile. For a second, Stiles thinks he might break something in his excitement. Like a hip.

At least someone’s happy about all this.

"Star treatment, huh, Stiles?" Scott whispers, caught up in some middle-ground of fear and awe.

Stiles can only nod. For once, there's no sarcastic remark at the ready in his brain. His tongue just feels like lead in his mouth

His father settles his hands on either of Stiles’s shoulders, bends down to press a kiss against the back of his head. He hasn't done that since Stiles was a kid. Even then it was embarrassing, not to mention now.

First with the knee-holding, now the head-kissing… Why does it feel like he really is going off to die?

"If..." his father starts, "if he does anything, and I mean anything, to you, you just—"

"Dad, it's fine." Stiles shrugs out of his grip and stands up, Scott following sluggishly after him. "I'll be fine. I'm pretty sure this is all some colossal joke, anyway, but even if it's not, there are a lot scarier things out there than a week with an Alpha. Actually, I should be the one telling you to take care of yourself. What are you gonna do without me for a week?"

His dad frowns.

The driver scurries back over to them and bows low at the bottom of the stairs. Stiles just shifts on his feet, uncomfortable. Is he supposed to be moving, here? Is there supposed to be some sort of forward motion?

"Sir, when you're ready," the driver says, and Stiles makes a point to ask his name later. It’s probably Winston or Beauregard or Cheshire, something fancy like that.

Stiles forces himself to smile as he plods forward down the steps. It’s a short distance, but he drags it out.

He turns back at the bottom, for one last look at Scott, Allison and his dad, all standing in close on the stoop. He saves them to memory, just as they are. You know, in case he does die. Which is still a very real, very painful possibility.

"Dude. What’s with the sad faces? I'll be back before you know it. I’m like a disease—you can't get rid of me that easily. Alpha Hale might even send me home early for bad behavior. Buyer’s remorse or something."

That gets the corners of their mouths turning up, but it's not really enough. There's still something missing. Looming overhead, like a frickin’ rainstorm rolling in. Or a tornado. A…monsoon. Stiles never was good at good-byes, anyway.

Is anyone? Is there someone out there who’s a great good-byer? What would that entail? And when are byes ever good? Unless they’re good riddances.

Maybe it’s not good to be good at good-byes. Maybe Stiles is ahead of the game, in that respect. It must mean he hasn’t had to do them nearly enough to be able to get good at them.

He’d take a second to be grateful for that, if it weren’t for the fact that Derek’s deathmobile is idling in his driveway.

"Hey,” he throws over his shoulder as he turns toward the car, “watch for me on the video screen. I'm sure they won't be able to get enough of this clown face."

^

Derek’s not waiting for him inside, but Stiles finds himself all wired and jittery with anxiety, nonetheless — more wired and jittery than he’s ever been before, which is a feat in and of itself. He jerks all over the place because he can’t keep still, presses every button in the back, opens every compartment, lets his nerves eat through several bags of pretzels from the fold-out console. He even tries to explain to the driver, Garrison, the history of the pretzel, but all Garrison does is smile at him like he’s only pretending to listen; that makes Stiles hate himself a little.

This car is new and it’s taking Stiles somewhere new and it smells like a prelude already, weak with what he assumes is Derek’s scent. He hasn’t smelled it in so long, it’s hard to be one hundred percent sure, but he feels like it’s right. He’s right. Somehow he remembers it enough.

In any case, it doesn’t do anything to take the edge off. It puts more edge on, actually. There’s an edge on an edge on an edge. On an edge.

Even though the windows are tinted, and Garrison has some kind of soft classical music playing that would ordinarily put Stiles on the good ship La La Land, he watches every mile pass under the wheels.

^

So not every mile. Slight exaggeration.

Somehow, about two-thirds of the way there, he manages to nod off. Must've been all the excitement of the day (or that purple suit has life-sucking powers). Usually he's bouncing off the walls until at least two or three in the morning, if he isn't pulling all-nighters. He’s especially always prided himself on never falling asleep in cars, a fact which pretty much made his family second-guess any and all road trips.

Never apparently ended today.

He wakes up to a sizable smear of drool down his chin and, more importantly, the opening of the back door. Then the cool air, the fresh night smell, bright lights, some stranger saying, "Omega Stilinski, we're here. Omega Stilinski." Crickets. Frogs. Other nighttime animals.

Belatedly, he realizes it's Garrison who's talking to him. Garrison, the driver. Of the car you’re in. Right. He glances out the door and sees him there, bent down at the knees and hat in hand, looking inside at him with nothing but pride.

"Rides like a dream, doesn't it?" he says, sliding his hat back on. He must really enjoy his job.

That's a good sign, considering his boss is about to sex Stiles up.

"Uh..." Stiles sits up awkwardly, bones protesting. He wipes the spit off with the back of his hand. "Uh, yeah. It’s nice."

"Mr. Hale’s very attentive, especially to his cars. You could call him a collector."

A collector. Of cars. Like any respectable dude. The only things Stiles has ever collected are rocks and disappointment.

Garrison makes a gesture for him to get out of the car, but Stiles hesitates.

He hesitates so hard that when he does eventually grow the balls to just get out, just do it, Stiles, do it now, he goes so fast that he trips over the lip of the door frame and nearly crashes his skull right through the door window. Except he catches himself just before that actually happens. Just barely. Comes face-to-face with the child-proof lock, an inch from taking his eye out.

And this, ladies and gentlemen, is the Chosen of an Alpha. Gagging on his own heart right now.

Garrison makes a strangled sound and comes scrambling around from the popped trunk.

"Omega Stilinski, are you all right?" He hovers. He hovers over Stiles without actually helping him out. At all. Not even so much as a hand on his shoulder. Forget a hand, Stiles could really use Garrison just putting him out of his misery, right here in the driveway. That would be nice.

That would be generous.

“Sir?”

"Ye-ah…?” he wheezes — in a manly way — at the door. “Fine, Gary."

"Garrison, sir."

"Sorry."

"I'll just..." Garrison frowns. There's something about his voice that Stiles recognizes, the good old run away, run away desperation. He can't blame him. He does usually inspire awe. And not the good kind, either. "I'll just retrieve your bag, sir."

"Thanks, yeah. That’s fine," Stiles says, and struggles out of his death-grip on the door.

There are dents, he swears, where his fingers were almost literally clawed in so hard.

Good thing there was no actual clawage. That would’ve been way worse.

Really, just...not a good day all-around. He’ll probably have to pay for the damages. …With the salary he doesn’t make at the job he doesn’t have.

That about sums it up.

Stiles's middle name is pretty much "struck dumb" at any given time, but when he finally manages to get out of the car in one piece, his jaw drops at the sheer—the sheer hugeness of Derek’s estate. Ahead of him is probably the biggest building he's ever seen. And it's only a house.

It's a house on steroids.

No, it’s a house that’s taken steroids for years and is now in a rage. A rage of...roids.

It looks like it could fit everyone in Beacon Hills inside it comfortably, and then some. The exterior’s a gray-white brick, with all kinds of shrubs and trees and ivy grown close. There are spotlights every few feet, too, casting huge wakes of light and shadow up the sides, and each light in the place seems to be lit. It feels alive, somehow, though Stiles bets there's probably no more than a handful of people in it at any given time.

There's a fountain front and center, even. A fountain. Which has a wolf sitting up in some flowery crescent moon type deal, with its snout tipped up like it's howling — except it's spitting water instead.

Good one. Real clever.

Sometimes, because Beacon Hills has pretty much gone to shit ever since Laura Hale died, there're water restrictions: no water after 6PM, no water between the hours of blank and blank, no watering gardens, no hot water for showers, boil water before drinking. There's something inherently disturbing about the fountain, in comparison. The house, too, all that wasted electricity and wasted space, wasted money. But the fountain... Stiles snorts. Looks to his right for where Scott should be and opens his mouth to say something smart.

No Scott. Right.

He jolts at a thundering, metallic clang and turns around just in time to catch the shuddering lock of a pair of tall, wrought-iron gates.

Well, that’s not ominous at all.

A lump swells in his throat, alongside the rush of goosebumps over his skin. He doesn't know why, but in that moment, his brain goes straight to Jackson. He wonders how Alpha Mahealani's treating him. What he thinks of him. What they think of each other. If he's feeling just like Stiles is. Maybe he’s still crying.

That last thought makes Stiles feel a little better. He can’t help a small smirk.

Garrison comes around to him with his bag. He smiles seeing Stiles smiling, which makes Stiles feel kind of bad. If he only knew why.

No, Garrison’d probably laugh at Jackson, too.

"Sir?" he says.

“Oh no, I just… I was, uh." Stiles flaps a pointed finger over his shoulder. "So where’s all the press? I kinda figured they’d be all over this place by now?”

“You and Mr. Derek are taking them on quite a detour, I heard. He’s used to being evasive, and they’re used to chasing him, unfortunately. But he should be returning shortly, now that the real you has gotten here in one piece.” Garrison gestures toward the house. “Shall I take you to his room?”

"Sure, great..." Stiles croaks around the lump still lodged tightly in his throat. "Lead the way."

To Hell.

^

What little Stiles takes in on the beeline for Derek’s room is pretty much that Derek either really loves negative space or really hates decorating. The main floor of the house seems like the only place that's been staged, and even that peters off as Garrison takes Stiles further into the belly of the beast, where probably almost no one is allowed and keeping up pretenses isn't a thing that needs done. The second and third floors are even more barren, and coldly so, like the rooms and halls never had anyone to warm them to begin with, much less retain any of that warmth -- or even just a sign they'd been there at all -- after they left. The place reads way more like a crypt than a lived-in home. Stiles is afraid to even touch anything for fear of disturbing the dead, and he really can’t remember if the bottoms of his shoes are clean.

Wow, great priorities. He’s just been ordered to basically serve his virginity up to a freakin' Alpha who lives among death, and he’s worried about scuffing the floors. Somehow that realization just makes him want to drag his feet even harder.

He only resigns himself to following closely behind Garrison and doing what he does, like a good, little Omega. If it's okay for the help to do, it's probably okay for guests to do, he figures. He’ll work it out as he goes. He’ll try not to make trouble if he doesn’t have to (if he doesn’t somehow just luck into it anyway, like usually happens).

What feels like an hour later, they finally slow to a stop in front of a generic, white door, at the end of a long hallway. There’re no bells or whistles. No pits of darkness ready to suck him in. No sign that the door’s even Derek’s. It's kind of underwhelming, considering.

Considering he was expecting pits of darkness and eternal damnation. Something along those lines.

Stiles balks. The thing’s not even black.

"Really?" he says. "Really? This is it?"

Garrison looks at him like he doesn't quite understand.

He’s not really sure he knows where he’s going with this, either.

"I mean, thanks, dude. Garrison. Thanks for bringing me here." To the torture chamber.

He holds out a hand for Garrison to shake.

Garrison only regards it with a suspicious eye, doesn’t make any move to shake it.

And…right. Did Stiles grow an extra thumb or something? A huge wart? Is there a rash?

"Thank you, sir. It's been my pleasure. I'll be your driver for the rest of your stay, if you need to go anywhere."

Stiles really isn't sure why Garrison's leaving him hanging. He reels his hand back, wipes it on his pants. Is there still some drool on it, maybe?

Do the Obscenely Powerful & Co not shake hands anymore?

"Hey so, Garrison...how 'bout you swing me back to my house, then?"

Garrison chuckles.

Well. Points for trying.

"With Mr. Derek's permission, of course."

Mr. Derek's permission. It would be like that.

"Thanks, Garrison. I'll keep that in mind."

“Very good, sir.”

Garrison waits around until Stiles has a hand on the knob, and then he turns and disappears down some hall or through some hidden door, behind some panel in the wall, Stiles doesn't know. Maybe there's a secret slip-n-slide under one of the potted plants or something. One second Garrison’s there and the next, poof, nothing. Stiles’s alone now, with only his thoughts and Derek’s door. Neither of which is very good to be left alone with for any significant amount of time.

He can't make himself actually turn the knob at first. He's not sure if Derek's going to be in the room, waiting for him. Stiles can just picture harmlessly putting his bag on the bed and then, bam!, all of a sudden he's being tackled by a shadow from the corner.

Because Derek? Yeah, again, always there.

Stiles hasn't gotten a good look at him up-close for a few years, but he’s well acquainted with the fact that while they may be around the same height by now, Derek’s got more than a few pounds on him. And girth. There’s just…more girthage in general. He’s, from what Stiles could tell at the ceremony, pretty obviously familiar with this thing other people like to call "exercise" and actually do voluntarily, but which Stiles kind of approaches with a "fake it 'til you make it" attitude.

That just means he's always faking it, because making it not really a point of interest, at this…point in time. He did about enough to keep himself benched on the lacrosse team, and he's put in a few good sprints running away from Jackson over the years, but all it's really gotten him is a little contouring on the pieces of wood he calls a body. Lydia probably even has more muscle mass than him, and her most strenuous exercises are shopping and filing her nails.

And lip gloss.

Eventually, Stiles bites the bullet and just throws the door open with a bang, so loud the knob sounds like it leaves an indent in the wall.

On one hand, smooth move, dumbass.

On the other hand, no one comes startling out of any corners. He finds no beady, red eyes watching him from the shadows. He doesn't hear any other heartbeat than his own, either, which is encouraging. But he's Stiles. He's been wrong before.

Slowly, he pushes forward into the room, swaying from side to side for any sudden movements, ears pricked for any strange noises. It’s almost too quiet, and for a second he considers if this isn’t gonna turn into a horror movie. Things are always too quiet before the murder of the hapless victim. And Stiles’s just about the haplessiest of all hapless victims right now. If Derek’s planning to kill him, this would be the perfect cinematic moment to do it.

But still, nothing.

He takes in a good, long whiff, though the smell is overwhelmingly new and discombobulating, and he can’t single anything out from it. And yet it’s familiar, the same from the car, the same from some point of knowing Derek way back in his past, just unbearably stronger. Stiles can almost taste it going down his throat, like he's swallowed a piece of smoked wood and sharp ginger. There's something else to it that Stiles can't place, too, but that’s always how scents are. There’re parts that are just too organic to the body, and you have to make up new names for them or suffer sleepless night after sleepless night trying to decode them. Stiles does, at least.

His dad’s is pineaffle because he has this weird pine-tree-waffle-syrup combination, underneath the steel and cinnamon. Scott’s is orangion, for the orange-onion thing he has going on, which took Stiles a while to get used to, at first. But Scott was worth it. His mom’s was pumpkorn. Self-explanatory.

Derek’s is…Stiles doesn’t know yet. It might take a while to figure out. He still can’t quite pin down Jackson’s, and he’s known him for years.

Then again, he’s probably not really trying nearly hard enough. No loss there.

When he's calm enough to actually step outside his own head for half a second, he realizes Derek’s room is conservatively small, especially compared to the overcompensation of the rest of the house (thinking back on it now, wow, someone has a small dick). There's a bed squarely in the middle of the far wall, barely big enough for two people. It's dressed down in black sheets (real shocker there), with two black-wood nightstands on either side, one harboring a holograph clock, the other a sleek, metal lamp. Derek has a modest metal bookshelf slanted in one corner, just a few feet off the bed, and a black-wood armoire in the corner opposite. Between them is a black-cushioned bench, which sits under a large window curtained in gray.

Directly to Stiles's right is a metal desk and chair, untouched except for the sleek computer setup on top (kind of drooling over that). To his left is a low black-wood table, decked out with a large spread of food.

His stomach gurgles.

Drooling is suddenly an understatement. More like waterfalls erupting from his mouth.

"…Snacks?"

It says something that Derek's scent is so overpowering that even Stiles didn't smell the food right away.

He heaves his lacrosse bag onto the bed and flings himself to his knees at the altar that is the holiest of all things. Where to start, where to start?

"If nothing else, I'll eat well this week."

He’s halfway to swallowing the first mini pastry when his father's voice cuts in:

Stiles!

"What?" he asks through a mouthful, spitting crumbs everywhere.

And then it comes rushing back to him.

That conversation they'd had in the kitchen, right before Stiles had gone out to wait for the car with Scott.

Stiles, his father had started, hunched over the table. There’re a few things you should remember when dealing with Alphas. Now I want you to listen carefully. Number one: never walk ahead of them. They see it as a challenge to their authority. Number two: never offend them, if you can help it. At that one, he'd just given Stiles this useless look, like the "if you can help it" was just not even in Stiles's realm of possibility at that point, anymore. And number three: never eat before them.

"Oh my god—"

In a flash, Stiles hacks the pastry out in his hand, all gnarled up from his teeth, shiny with spit. He makes a face and dumps it in one of the napkins on the table, balls it up tight. Grabs a few more napkins for good measure. He scrambles up for a place to hide it — desk drawer? armoire? open the window and launch it? — but just ends up stuffing it in his back pocket, choked up with nerves.

"I'm dead, I'm so— I'm so dead right now. That was my last meal. I didn’t even get to eat it. Holy God—"

Somehow, in his fear-addled brain, it all adds up to the trusty fight-or-flight response, and he, as always, chooses flight. He has his bag swept up so fast it knocks into his ass, and he, in turn, stumbles into the door, grabbing sloppily for the knob. It's really not the food. Or the rules. It's this place. He can't be here. He doesn't belong here. This is wrong. This is just— the wrongest wrong that ever wronged.

He opens the door and of course standing right there is Derek.

Alpha Derek.

Wearing the same black everything he was before. He even has that same look on his face, like he's going to burn a hole right through Stiles's skull with his eyes. And those spikes—yeah, even sharper and bigger up close.

'Sharp' and 'big' — two words that should never go together.

Stiles's mouth falls open in an agonized frown. His eyes boggle around for something, anything. The sharp sensation is back in his chest, throbbing under his racing heart. This could either be the best or worst time to go into cardiac arrest.

"Uh—hey. Hey, you. Despite what it looks like, I wasn't leaving. If, you know, if that's what, what you're thinking this looks like. I was just—"

Derek takes a step forward, and Stiles flinches back.

And then feels really stupid really fast, because all Derek does is grab the bag off his arm and walk it back into the room.

…All right.

"Shut the door," he says over his shoulder.

Stiles does without hesitation, too unbelievably intimidated to even bother opening his mouth to argue. Going to just— just lay down and die, right here, right now.

He turns around to Derek unpinning his spikes and sitting them on a display in his armoire. Unbuttoning and shrugging off his suit jacket to hang up next to it.

"Is it naked time already?" Stiles asks.

Derek actually has the capacity to look stunned.

Shut up, Stiles!

And that would be the voice of Scott in his head, now.

"Cuz you know, I mean, with all due respect," Stiles waves a hand at nothing, grabbing at nothing. He's going to puke up his heart right now; it's ready to fly, just pushing all this word vomit up ahead of it. "I mean, I have a really gnarly body. You don't want to see all this naked. It might…it might actually blind you."

Derek starts across the room, and Stiles flinches again, almost tripping back over the table of food.

And for the second time in so many minutes, he feels really stupid really fast because Derek just sidesteps him and goes for a door Stiles hadn't noticed before, situated next to the food table. He disappears through it and comes back out a few beats later, with his tie loose and the top buttons of his shirt undone, his sleeves rolled up past his elbows, just the slightest hint of biceps straining out.

Wow. That’s a good look.

…What. Whoa, whoa, whoa—

"That's the closet," he says through Stiles’s momentary meltdown, motioning back toward the door, his voice soft but commanding, even for such a small setting. "Walk through it to get to the bathroom in the back."

Stiles gives him a shifty look. "...Thanks?"

This isn't exactly going how he had expected it to.

There's a lot less...touching. And nakedness. De-virginalization. Things of a sexual nature.

Derek cocks his head. "What was wrong with it?"

"…Uh, what?"

"The pastry." Derek’s eyes are unblinking. "Why’d you spit it out?"

Stiles blows a raspberry, "I...have no idea what you're talking about."

"Your back pocket."

Alpha, Stiles. Alpha. This is an Alpha. Just because your dad can’t smell so good anymore doesn’t mean your tricks work on anybody else.

Stiles pulls the wad of napkins out and unfolds it like it's a present for himself, something he's never seen before. He makes a surprised face, tries to force a laugh. "Oh, this? You, you're talking about this?"

"Are you going to answer me?"

"My dad," Stiles sucks a sharp breath through his teeth, "he told me we're not supposed to eat before Alphas. So...yeah, well, I forgot and tried to, you know, "rectify" the situation. Alpha Hale."

"I don't follow those rules," Derek says, and gently pushes Stiles out of the way to pick the table of food up and walk it over to the window bench, without so much as a grunt to say it's a struggle.

Uh. Sure. Okay.

…Did Stiles just get foodblocked? He scratches the back of his head aimlessly, nothing better to do. Derek can't eat all that food by himself, right?

Derek takes a seat on the bench. "Come here."

"Go...there?" Stiles points at the empty spot next to him, stalling.

Derek just raises a brow.

"Okay then." Stiles moves way quicker than he'd like to (what happened to dragging his feet? No? Well…), but Derek doesn't just jump him when he sits down, so he tries to give him the benefit of the doubt and quash his paranoia. It’s not working out so well.

Him and paranoia…going down with this ship.

With nerves at the helm.

"Your file had a different first name. Not Stiles," Derek says as he picks up a small pastry and tears it in half. "But you prefer Stiles, right?"

"My file…?" Stiles’s momentarily distracted by how offensively edible it looks in his hands. Is Derek going to eat in front of him? Because that is a torture he couldn’t even begin to endure. That is the torture of all tortures. The granddaddy of torture. "Oh yeah. Stiles is good. Or Dude. Or Hey You. I'll respond to pretty much any of those."

Derek hums his understanding. He holds half the pastry up to Stiles's mouth.

Stiles moves to grab it from him, but he jerks it back, says a quiet "no," eyes intent on Stiles.

So… What?

Hand-feeding?

Stiles is...

Huh, okay. Not as adverse to being fed as he would've thought. Not especially when the food smells as good as it does and is being shoved right up under his nose.

He should just—

“Dude, I am not eating from your hand.”

“It's tradition,” is all Derek says, face unreadable. “I have to take care of you this week.”

“I’m pretty good at taking care of myself.”

Derek doesn’t have a response to that. He just gets this perturbed look on his face, like he’s not sure what he should do next. Like Stiles had gone off-script.

Okay. Good discussion.

Stiles doesn't know what to do with himself for a second. He feels weird about Derek hand-feeding him, but suddenly he also feels weird about just going to town on the food himself, with his own hands.

If he did let Derek feed him, it’s not like anyone’s here to know about it but the two of them. He can’t really see Derek going out and doing an interview about how he fed his Chosen like a baby, and Stiles sure as Hell isn’t gonna tell anyone. Besides, he’s just lazy and hungry enough for it to make complete sense, right now. Maybe this is how he should’ve been eating all his life. Like a king.

Not to mention it’s better than him resisting and Derek shoving it down his throat anyway.

"Okay. Yeah, okay...why not?" He opens his mouth and after a beat, Derek comes back into himself enough to lay the sweet bread on his tongue. The backs of his fingers catch a little on Stiles's lips, accidentally. And the pastry—it tastes sort of different than before. Sort of smoky and gingery. Like Derek’s smell.

Alpha-flavored pastry. Bet they don’t sell that in the supermarket bakery.

"Don't call me “Alpha Hale.” It's just “Derek” to you," Derek says around popping the other half of the pastry in his own mouth, licking his fingers.

"Okay, Derek," Stiles tests, kind of roguishly.

There's a small twitch to Derek's lips; Stiles barely catches it.

A few minutes pass in silence, after that. It’s just Derek picking up whatever he wants and breaking it in half, feeding the first to Stiles, the second to himself. Stiles couldn't find an offensive food if it killed him, but there must be some kind of drug in the Hale kitchen because he's never tasted anything this good in his life.

There's something about Derek touching the food first — his scent transfer or pheromones, maybe — that really sets off a hunger for more in Stiles, too. And not just for food. He's heard things about how just being around Alphas makes heat worse, so he figures that it's a sign his heat is coming on, maybe a little faster than usual. But all told, it’s still pretty weak; he probably wouldn't even have noticed it, if not for the quiet of the room. And he probably wouldn’t want to literally just, like, literally suck on Derek’s fingers right now, either.

That’s enough of that thought. That thought should never have even existed.

"So...sort of awkward question here, but why did you pick me?" he asks on a lull in their little food routine, to distract himself.

There's an odd uneven glint in Derek's eyes, when he next looks at him. It strikes Stiles as vulnerable, but that must be wrong. Alphas don’t do vulnerable. Derek doesn’t do vulnerable.

"Should I not have?"

Stiles pulls a face. "Dude, it was me in a purple suit. It doesn't get much worse than that. Unless…you picked me because of the suit? In which case, I think you should have a serious sit-down with your taste."

Derek holds a half-bitten shrimp up to his lips. And that would be the universal way of telling him to shut up.

But he can't shut up. Not even after he's bitten into the shrimp and tasted the salt and the spice and Derek's mouth already there — the latter of which makes his skin prick up. "Was this some sort of publicity stunt? Because I wouldn't blame you if it was. It's kind of like a freak show, the way they do things. Even for you guys. I could almost get behind you just picking me to make a statement. That’s kind of how my life goes in general, so I’m, I guess I’m used to it by now." He doesn't know if he honestly buys any of that or if he's just throwing out some wild explanation in the hopes that saying it’ll make it true, and somehow Derek really won't want to screw him.

But Derek sidesteps his rambling train with: "You haven't started your heat yet."

Stiles bristles. "...No?" he offers as dimly as possible. Could they have this conversation when Derek's fingers are not in or around his mouth? Just a thought.

"When will it come on?" Derek looks down at the food for something else to shove in Stiles's face. He's not even fazed by this. It's like it's a job interview or something.

Mr. Stilinski, what are your qualifications? Your level of experience? Do you have any skills? On a scale of one to loser, how much of a virgin are you, exactly?

Derek probably does have sex so much it’s just another duty to him. He is an Alpha, after all. It’s more than likely people throw themselves at him for that fact alone. Not to mention everything else he has…going on.

Imagine, the struggles of an Alpha: too much power, too much money and too much sex.

Stiles’s struggles: too much school, too much energy and too much Stiles.

He clears his throat. "Tomorrow night. I think. When it should…bust in here." Why is it so awkward to admit? He’s a guy. Derek’s a guy. They’re both pretty much grownups. They’ve both done the whole heat thing before. And he talks about heat stuff with Scott all the time.

Okay, so Scott talks at him about heat and Stiles just kind of interjects whenever Scott stops emoing out about his own problems (problems named “Allison”). But still. That counts for something.

With Derek, though, it's just embarrassing. Excruciating. He feels like he's a middle-schooler again, talking about boners and sex with his dad. Or, really, not talking about it, and just having his father lecture him about all the things he hadn’t even been doing yet.

Still isn’t even doing.

"I’m kind of a late bloomer. Every year. Hell, I may even skip it entirely this year. You might just be better off with another Omega. Any other Omega, really. I could put in a good recommendation for someone else."

"I don't need any recommendations," Derek says, quiet.

Yeah. Didn’t think that’d work. Stiles has had a lot of bad ideas tonight.

Not really different from any other night.

"Well, I don't know about you but I have to pee," he blurts out, voice all over the place. He shoots up without waiting for a response and then thinks better of it, turning around. "Or do I need your permission?"

Derek shakes his head, not looking up at him. "Take a shower if you want. There are some towels and pair of pajamas on the sink."

"I have my own pajamas."

"Fine." And still not making eye-contact. "Do whatever you want."

A beat passes where Stiles can't quite understand what's just been said, that an Alpha is actually conceding to him, an Omega. There has to be something more to it, some kind of trick or test, maybe some kind of code. His father hadn't had any words of wisdom about this. "Yes, Alpha Hale, sir," he mutters unthinking, halfway to saluting him before he stops himself.

Derek's expression doesn't change, though. He doesn't get some offended, murderous glint in his eyes or tack on any orders or even say anything else, really, as Stiles turns for his bag on the bed. No way in Hell is he wearing an Alpha's idea of heat week pajamas. It'll probably end up being some tiny banana hammock number that hides nothing. Or one of those crotch-less outfits he's seen in porn, for easy access.

Icing on the cake.

Just. Icing on the cake.

^

The pajamas turn out to be ordinary gray pants and a black, long-sleeve shirt, except they both have "DH" stitched on them in cursive, over the left breast and hip. Does this guy own anything that isn’t soul-sucking black or gray?

If Stiles were a Magic 8 Ball, he’d go with “sources say no.”

He takes more than his fair share of time in the shower; really, he takes enough shower for everyone in Beacon Hills, and enough shower for the last eighteen years of not showering regularly. And then he just rummages around the bathroom for a while afterward, delaying the inevitable. He smells all of Derek's soaps and colognes— and accidentally spritzes some in his eye. He makes it a game with himself to guess what all the portable machines in the cabinets are for — maybe razors, maybe claw sharpeners, maybe dismemberment devices for unruly pack members — and messes around with the ones that look less intense. He sets off the sensor on the toilet too, just to watch it flush automatically. Several times.

Normal Stiles stuff.

He also opens the window to see how badly he’d break his entire body if he jumped, all werewolf strength aside.

Pretty badly. Yeah, that’s not happening. There are rose bushes right under the ledge, too. Insult, meet injury.

Derek’s probably got his Alpha senses targeted on him like a heat-seeking missile, anyway. One step out of line, and he’s counting Alpha teeth up close and personal. Resistance, meet pain.

He expects Derek to be waiting up to jump him as soon as he comes back through the closet door. But, like everything else, he's wrong.

Zero for, what, twenty? Thirty? Somewhere around infinity, if he counts back through his entire life and goes for the safe estimate.

Derek's curled up on the far edge of the bed, broad back to him. The covers are turned down on the empty side, all the invitation in the world for Stiles to get in.

Okay, Stiles, this is either an elaborate trap, meant to lull you into a false sense of security or an elaborate trap, meant to lull you into a false sense of security.

Dead. Done. Dying right here.

He considers just camping out on the bench, but even if Derek does want to do something, the two feet between it and the bed aren’t exactly the Grand Canyon. Besides, maybe it's like the sooner Stiles gets it over with, the sooner it...gets over with.

Well, that was a real leap of logic.

He leaves the closet door cracked open for just enough light to stumble over to the bed and paw himself under the covers, careful not to touch Derek, even accidentally. The pillow is warm, he finds, as is the mattress, like someone was lying there in his spot, not a minute before him. Like Derek just switched sides. It even smells fresh with his scent, when Stiles presses his face to the pillow.

He almost holds his breath, waiting for Derek to surge up and make a move on him.

But he doesn't. Even though Stiles can hear his heart racing, faster than his own.

Chapter Text

It wakes him up at 4:31, so the holograph clock reads. There's a boiling starvation under his skin, just begging to be smothered, and his dick is plywood in his pajamas, wet already from an orgasm or twenty. Crappp.

With a groan, he tumbles out of bed and staggers into the closet, where Derek's scent overwhelms him, forcing his knees to buckle. He can't make it to the bathroom, can’t even crawl another two measly feet, before he's pitching into a row of Derek's suit jackets and bringing himself off furiously in his hand.

^

His head clears a little after that. Enough for him to a). feel supremely embarrassed that he jerked off to Derek’s clothes (knowing how picky rich peoples’ fabrics are, he probably even ruined some of them), and b). stumble to the bathroom and rub another orgasm out into the toilet. The whole place is full of Derek's scent, his stupid pheromones, and Stiles can't help focusing on him — not Lydia and her lip gloss and strawberry blonde hair and short skirts and perfect skin, but Derek — as he touches himself. His dark features, his sure command, the cut of a suit on him, how he must’ve looked wolfing out at the ceremony, the way his fingers snagged Stiles’s lips when he fed him — accidentally (not accidentally) — how he'd licked his own fingers after the fact, like he was chasing Stiles's mouth on them. Things Stiles hadn't even realized he'd noticed until now.

Derek can probably hear him in here, too. He’s not being quiet at all. Derek might—

He bites off a loud groan into the heel of his hand, coming all over his fingers.

…So.

Yeah.

So his heat’s a little early. And maybe a little more intense than usual.

Yeah, ‘a little,’ as in the opposite of ‘a lot.’ A whole…lot. This is really bad.

Alpha pheromones. The world’s next Viagra.

He flushes the toilet and bangs over into the sink, shoves the back of his head under the spout. Considers the window again.

Maybe his boner would break his fall.

^

Derek's not faking sleep this time, when Stiles nudges back out into the bedroom, through the closet door. He's sitting up in bed, caught in the wedge of light from the closet, his eyes glowing red, face set in frustrated lines and what seems like half the comforter caught up in a death grip at his waist.

He takes in a deep breath.

Takes in Stiles.

He looks all tensed to jump him. Stiles's dick is, like, half-mast already, just from that alone, the possessiveness of Derek’s eyes on him, the way he’s so intent. He clings to the edge of the door, breathing open-mouthed.

"That should be taken care of," Derek says. His voice— it sounds thick. Just…thick. Thick. There’s no other word for it but that.

Well, forget half-masted. His dick’s just gone to town.

That should be taken care of.

You should be taken care of.

Fucked, Stiles. Fucked.

Let him fuck you.

He can feel the beads of sweat rolling down his back, sticking Derek’s shirt to his skin. So much for that little bath in the sink and jerking off. Twice.

"No," Stiles rags, "I'm fine. Really. I'm just—" he holds his hand up, a request for a brief timeout, a second to decide his next play. "I'm just...” Words are fighting him, too, resisting arrest. “I’m going to go die on the bench."

"No," Derek grunts. “Just—”

"Uh, yeah." Stiles does his best to cut a determined shuffle across the room — not sure where he suddenly got the balls to stand up to an Alpha (maybe that's a question for another time entirely) — and sling a shaky knee onto the bench. Which smells like Derek. Of course because he was just sitting there, not five hours ago, you incredible, unbelievable moron.

There’s—no escape. There’s just…death. Death from coming too much.

You need to be fucked. He wants to fuck you.

Stiles curls up in the fetal position and shuts his eyes, pressing an unforgiving hand to his dick. He tries to ease it down by sheer force at first; then, when that clearly doesn’t work, by sheer willpower, picturing some of the most unattractive things he can think of (Mayor Finstock in lingerie, his father’s head on Lydia’s body, enough said). But none of it works. None of it sticks long enough to overcome Derek under his skin, Derek in his brain, Derek all over him. He's so wet, it’s embarrassing. He can even smell it. Derek can probably—

"Get back in bed," Derek says behind him. What is that, a threat? Good luck with that.

"Rather not!" Stiles barks.

"Fine."

He hears the bed shift as Derek gets up, the stark pad of feet across the floor. Then, in a blink, Derek's bent over him and he's being hauled into the air.

"Whoa, hey! I didn't sign up for this!" It could be that Derek isn’t holding him all that tightly or that Stiles is stronger than he gives himself credit for, but he kicks up such a struggle in the two seconds it takes to get from bench to bed that he upends himself from Derek’s arms, falling face-first into the soft steel of the mattress. He sputters through a mouthful of pillow, gets himself flipped over just in time to see Derek hunch toward him, stop and have his face twist up into something that veers uncomfortably close to the sudden onset of complete and total panic.

"What the hell’s your problem!” Stiles shouts, which only makes the air in the room somehow feel upended, uneven in Derek’s favor, rather than his own. Derek sinks back a step, then another, looking wholly overcome.

Stiles gapes up at him, every muscle in his body tensed, shuddering from just that brief second of contact between them. Now, in a static lull, it takes a few beats for him to string together any usable sentences, but the fact that Derek takes yet another damning step back is pretty inspirational. "You know, you—you, you really suck as this whole Alpha thing. Aren’t you supposed to…like, just take and force and maul and maim—lemme freakin’ spell it out: you’re the Alpha here!" He doesn't even recognize his voice anymore; it's just blown out, coarse and cracking too much as he yells. And he doesn’t know why he’s trying to convince Derek to fuck him, anyway, why he cares that Derek suddenly seems to think he’s beneath pond scum, not fit to touch. Sure, it’s a matter of soul-crushing inadequacy, but he’s dealt with that before, tons of times. Why should this one be any different?

"There’s a heat room down the hall, around the corner," Derek says, tone pitched low, strained. Stiles barely catches the sight of his teeth, barely sees the glint of them sharpened to points in the light of the closet, but that's enough. His skin breaks out in goosebumps, and it's like he can't think of anything else right then but those teeth and Derek biting him, holding him down and fucking him and just — biting him until he bleeds. Biting him so hard it sticks for more than ten seconds, so everyone knows who was there first.

His dick spasms out a jolt of pre-come.

"Oh my godddd," he wheezes, and Derek takes a step toward the bed. "Fuck," he says, harsher, "can you just— can you just not with the, with the teeth?"

"What?"

"The teeth — and just, you — you in general, all of you over there, in that direction, your freakin’ face—"

“You’ve gotta be kidding me.”

“Yeah, nope, I’m not! Who’s kidding? Not Stiles!”

It must be too much time spent with Scott because Stiles expects Derek to scream back at him, to get just as worked up as him, if not even more, to feed off his agitation and make him feel justified in it. But Derek just takes in a deep breath and casts his eyes at the door. His hands curl and uncurl in fists at his side.

“There’s a heat room down the hall,” he says again. “This place is soundproofed, but there’s an intercom in there. You can buzz the main floor for Garrison to come lock you in. He should still be awake. You’ll be safe there for the week.”

“—What?”

“Or you can stay here. I’ll sleep somewhere else tonight. Tomorrow… I’ll leave the house, if you need me to.”

Before the words have even settled, Derek’s gone from the room.

^

Stiles thinks that it'll get better, once Derek is gone. Even just a little bit. Just a tiny, little bit.

He's wrong.

He's always wrong— why is he always wrong?

He stuffs his head against one of the pillows and jerks off, lungs full of Derek's smell, skin seared under his phantom touch.

^

He finds the heat room exactly where Derek said it would be. At a glance, it’s a lot nicer than the one they have back home, but it’s not exactly a feat to be better than a glorified pantry. This place actually looks livable, with a bed and a video screen, a tall shelf full of books and magazines and some empty drawers for just enough clothes to last a week. It has an adjoining bathroom, which also beats the hell out of an old pot on the ground, and a medicine cabinet stocked full of all kinds of happy pills and suppressors to make things more comfortable. Stiles peels one of the suppressant patches off its card and slaps it on his arm, even as he recalls one of the less awkward conversations his dad had with him about them, that they’re not cheap and pretty much do jack if you’re already in full heat mode, so be careful not to wait too long and end up wasting them.

”Great… What use is medicine you have to take before you even get sick?” he asks himself in the mirror.

He drags himself back out into the room and over to the video screen, just stares at himself in its black reflection for a couple beats, thinking about too much to really be thinking about anything. It takes a little guessing, but he finds the power button, and it’s a relief to see himself disappear behind the drone of some news footage – a Choosing ceremony, he pieces together belatedly.

It’s not of the one in Beacon Hills – a small mercy – but one in Germany, or maybe Austria. An older Omega male has just been picked by an Alpha female, and there’s a distinct lack of fainting and crying. In fact, there are only huge smiles and the eagerness of a man who knows he’s about to get laid for the first time. He’s practically dripping with relief, and people are cheering for him in the crowd.

It doesn’t seem very fair. As eighteen grew closer and closer and his chances with Lydia even further and further away, Stiles had often thought about what it’d be like to be Chosen. He’d worked out all kinds of scenarios in his head and his reactions to each, how calm and cool he’d have been, despite his excitement, and how he definitely wouldn’t have made the Alpha regret picking him. He’d even practiced a few select skills, as best be he could by himself, just to be sure he had something to offer, and he’d way more than thoroughly resolved himself to do anything the Alpha wanted, just on the promise that they’d eventually touch him and let him touch them back, deign to have sex with him even just once. But thinking back on them now, most of those fantasies had centered around female Alphas; the few with guys had almost always just devolved into a lot of awkward laughing and unending questions. and Stiles had especially never let himself think about Derek, if just because that one hit a little too close to home. In a phrase: he hadn't planned for any of this. Derek had gone and and thrown a big, fat wrench in the machine, and now Stiles is sitting in some self-imposed exile, with only his hand and a useless patch for company.

If Derek were female, Stiles would probably have been a lot less combative. He would’ve been eager. He would’ve looked like the Omega on the screen, and Scott would’ve been off in the audience, cheering for him. He wouldn’t be scared.

Okay, also scared. Just…not. Not as scared as this.

The second his heat hit, Stiles would've come running, if Derek were a girl. Say, a strawberry blonde one, with nice skin and a serious talent for shopping and lip gloss.

Stiles would've thrown himself onto the bed with a rose between his teeth, if Derek were a girl.

He would've literally gotten down on bended knee and begged Derek to touch him, if Derek were a girl. Stiles would’ve been bound and determined to have a whole lot of fun, in as many ways possible, for as long as possible, if Derek were a girl. He wouldn’t have shouted and fought and chased her out of the room in revulsion.

At least not intentionally.

Shit.

^

Derek’s not a girl. He’s not a girl at all. He has non-girl parts and a non-girl face. There’s a definite five o’clock shadow. His chest isn’t soft. His hips aren’t full. His jawline and cheekbones could probably cut diamonds. He doesn’t wear lip gloss and he doesn’t have strawberry blonde hair, and there’s no way in Hell, even in the dark with his eyes shut, that Stiles could ever pretend he does.

…What’s wrong with that, exactly?

^

Shit.

Shit. Shit, shit, shit.

^

Stiles's entire body is like a dousing rod for Derek. He’s being pulled along through the halls, in a ship that always develops a mind of its own during heat. He can’t remember an occasion where the lure was ever this strong, though, not since his first time. Everyone’s strikes differently, and neither he nor his dad had known exactly what to expect. They’d meant to cover all their bases, but in the end it had come early, and Stiles had wound up halfway across town, humping the Martins’ house in a daze. He can’t even remember having done it, just that he woke up hours later in his own bed, with his father standing over him and splinters in dark places. His dad could hardly even look him in the eye when he told him, and he’d honestly preferred it that way. And for some reason, all these years later Lydia still at least pities him enough to act like she never has any idea what he’s talking about, whenever he diarrhea-of-the-mouth’s it at her.

But even that. Even that Stiles can’t remember feeling like this. Maybe it’s just a matter of time having dulled the memories. Or maybe it’s stronger this go around because Derek isn’t Lydia. He’s an Alpha. All his pheromones are contriving against Stiles. It’s purely biological. It’s supposed to be like this, and there’s—

What’s worse is that on top of everything, if Stiles is being completely honest with himself, there’s always been something about Derek that’s gotten under his skin. Like a tender but insistent hook, turning him in Derek’s direction. With him gone from Beacon Hills the last few years, it was easy enough for Stiles to forget that feeling, but now he’s in Derek’s house, wearing his clothes, eating his food, sleeping in his bed, sharing his air and his heat. That hook has become what feels like a hundred, and all the excuses Stiles used to make for it – that he was just interested in Derek because his mother was the Alpha or jealous that Derek had such a huge family, that he was good-looking and popular, a Beta who might even be an Alpha of his own one day with his whole life set out perfectly for him, everything at his fingertips – those excuses were thin then, and they’re non-existent now, and Stiles is making no effort to lock himself up anywhere.

^

He finds Derek in a small museum of a room on the main level. It’s full of floor-to-ceiling shelves of what Stiles guesses are historic relics and art pieces, books, tattered clothing and brittle papers preserved behind glass, a modest shrine to the Hale pack and the blood of their past. He's sitting in a large, red chair along the far wall of windows, almost a statue in himself. There are a couple of blankets spread out at his feet, like he’s going to camp here for the night. He’s slipping a small dagger in and out of a sheath, just to busy his hands, but his eyes pin Stiles as soon as he cracks the door open and butts his head inside.

Prepare to die.

Stiles just kind of stands there gawking for a second, until Derek clears his throat, and everything comes rushing in.

Stiles is a fan of doors, lately, he really loves doors. Doors and him? Like this. He slinks into the room and shuts it behind him, but doesn't stray far, keeping one hand firmly on the knob, his back melting into the grooves.

He takes a deep breath, which is a terrible idea because the smell of Derek is everywhere in here, heady and heavy. He feels like he’s fifteen again, about to lose his mind and start humping anything he can get his hands on. The big globe in the corner is looking pretty nice right now.

He tries not to even glance in Derek's general direction because Derek is looking at him, and he can feel it; that alone is almost too much.

"So I figure that you started this," he says after a moment, swallowing heavily against the onslaught of Derek burning down his throat, "and you should finish it. So..." There's an audible shift in the room. "Finish it.”

“You don’t know what you’re saying,” Derek mutters, eyes turned toward the carpet now. “Go back to the heat room, Stiles. Have Garrison lock you in. You’ll be safe there.”

“No way, dude. You picked me. You totally want to have sex with me. So let’s have sex. No take-backs.”

“Stiles, you’re not thinking str—”

“Give me a little credit here,” Stiles says. “Besides…" He knocks his knuckles back against the door, some kind of helpful hint for the wisdom he's about to impart on the world, "I just jerked off in that potted plant in what felt like aisle twelve of your massive freakin’ house.”

He sees Derek mouth ‘aisle twelve’ on the cusp of a quiet snort, like he might’ve laughed if he were anybody else.

“So I figure my window for thinking clearly is still pretty open right now.” Stiles slags a hand over his face, slick with sweat; it's probably beet red, too, he can feel the heat of it against his palms. Attractive. “Despite any outward appearances to the…you know, to the contrary.”

“What do you mean? That isn’t how you always look?”

A laugh pops out of Stiles, unstoppable and heat-slow. "Sarcasm. Nice."

"I feel like maybe that's the language you understand the best."

Okay, apt observation, he’ll give him that. Maybe there's actually a reason Derek's the Alpha, aside from the fact that it was kind of automatically dumped in his lap after his sister died.

It’s either that or he remembers Stiles from when they were younger, too, which… No one remembers Stiles, and if they do, it’s not because he’s the cool, funny guy he thinks he is in his head. It’s for things like humping their front porch or wearing a purple suit or taking a dive at the exact worst moment possible.

"So...what do we do, then?" Stiles can't even ask for it outright. He presses a stifling hand to his crotch, body asking all the right questions for him. "What'd the other Omegas do? Give me tips. Tell me how this works."

“Don’t make yourself do something you don’t want to do. I won’t force you, Stiles. Go back to the heat room and try to get some sleep. We can figure everything out in the morning."

“No, really. I’m down for this. I’m good with this. Let’s do it.” He nods, swallowing heavily. “Tell me what to do. I want to have some fun…and if you want to have some fun, then we should be having the fun together.”

Derek sits forward in his seat, dagger hung between his knees, forgotten in his hands, "Are you sure? You don’t sound—”

"Dude…” Stiles sighs. He blinks the sweat off his lashes. “Yes, I’m sure, okay? You keep stalling. Are you sure you want to do it? Are you having second thoughts?”

"No. I just thought you’d—” Derek frowns against the words, eats them back, starts over differently, “I've never been screamed at before. I don't have any tips for you. Not any I'd want you to try. The other Omegas I chose were happy to be here. They were too happy... So I just let them do whatever they wanted. I think I was the one who ended up more scared of them. One of them turned out to be this obsessed fanatic."

Stiles squints off at nothing, trying to keep focused. “Dude…you don’t, you don’t have to worry about that with me,” he barely pushes out. His head is starting to swim.

"If I didn’t have to, I’d never have chosen any of them. But I had to keep up appearances. I have to keep up appearances, Stiles." Derek stands up and walks the dagger back over to its stand on one of the shelves. There's a great deal of care and attention in his movements, a respect for the past.

Or he just wants something else to look at besides Stiles right now. Stiles wouldn’t blame him. He’s glad he can’t see himself, honestly. It can't be a pretty picture.

It’s such a sharp contrast to how he suddenly can't seem to stop looking at Derek, can't stop following the flex of his muscles under his clothes, the movements of his hands. Stiles pretends his own hand is Derek’s, touching him. It has him whining through his teeth.

“So is this…this is just for appearances,” he breathes out. “Meaningless sex. I can be okay with that.”

"Sort of. In a way, everything I do is for appearances. There are rules I have to follow.” Derek turns and takes a few steps toward him, but they're tentative, like he's calculating his approach, stalking a prey he doesn't want to startle.

Stiles being the prey. …And too horny to startle, really.

“I go against them as much as I can, but there’s always a point where you have to draw the line. Otherwise, people start doubting you. Doubt breeds challengers, Stiles. I can't have that. One step in the wrong direction, and it's all over."

"Yeah. Sure... Fair enough, big guy."

"You asked me why I picked you." Derek's probably five feet away now, and it's like Stiles can feel his heat, his voice crawling up his skin, coming inside him.

"For appearances. Or something. Just following orders. I get it. Don’t worry, I get it," Stiles exhales high, body arching off the door, into Derek’s gravitation. He doesn't even—he can't even stop himself. But Derek doesn't take advantage.

He doesn't do anything for a minute. He just stands there, watching Stiles come undone, which only seems to urge the process on faster.

"Not for appearances," Derek mutters after too long. Too long just staring. "Did you see the suit you were wearing?"

Stiles can't manage anything more than a breathy laugh.

Derek touches the side of Stiles's neck then, just barely, a ghost of his fingertips, and Stiles's whole body seizes up in a shudder. He can’t keep his eyes open in the brunt of it, senses Derek eclipse him through the blackout of his lids, feels Derek hovering in close, coming to eat him.

"Tell me to stop, Stiles," Derek murmurs, thick through his teeth, pressing his palms over the blush of heat on Stiles's cheeks. He draws Stiles forward against his mouth, or maybe it's Stiles who falls into him, so consumed he can't tell the difference.

^

It's one of the many details that Stiles’ll probably leave out later on, but Derek throws him over his shoulder easily and carries him back to his bedroom.

^

Another thing: he's so keyed up that he comes before Derek's even so much as put him on the bed and kissed him again.

^

Apparently he falls asleep after that because the next thing he knows, he's waking up to Derek pressed along his side, thumb rubbing aimless circles under the hem of his shirt, scenting his neck, but lazily. The tickle of his breath sets off shocks of goosebumps over Stiles's skin. He tries not to move too much, but Derek is a furnace against him, and he racks in a hollow breath.

Derek mouths something into his skin.

“What?” he asks, trying to focus, his throat dry.

"...Can I touch you?" It sounds sluggish and unconcerned. But Stiles can feel how Derek tenses up for the answer, like he’s preparing himself for another one of Stiles’s epic rejections. "Take off your clothes?"

Why is he even asking? Does Stiles need to sit him down and tell him what an Alpha is or something?

"You kind of already are. And yes? Yes..." he scowls at his awkwardness. "That would be a yes." Not like his body isn't already crying for it again. What an inconvenience, this whole heat-world-life-existence thing. Is there no refractory period with an Alpha? Usually he goes into a daze every five or six hours, jerks off and that’s it. Once in a while, he’ll have a really intense one that’ll last longer and take a few more orgasms (or humping of houses) to settle, but this— this is working itself up to be some kind of bad daze over and over and over again. Coming only affords him an hour, maybe two, of muddled clarity in between, and then he’s drunk again. He can feel himself already starting to slip. For the millionth time tonight.

"I won't hurt you," Derek says, and then he's sitting up to tug Stiles's shirt off; it gets caught around his arms, though, because reality is just like that for Stiles. It's an awkward, embarrassing place to be all the time.

He'd completely forgotten about the suppressant patch almost the second he'd put it on, but Derek takes pause at it, bringing its presence back to the surface in sharp relief. He traces his finger around the edges, makes a sound in his throat, almost too quiet to hear, easily ignored. But something in it sparks Stiles to scramble fast to rip the patch off. He balls it up as best he can, despite its sticky grip, and flings it over the side of the bed.

"Pretend you didn't see that," he says on a pant, grabbing for Derek's hands and urging him on where he's gone frozen. "It's good. We're good. Come on."

Derek holds himself still for another long moment, but then Stiles starts peeling down his own zipper and undoing the button, and Derek shoves Stiles' hands back to do the job himself. He hooks his thumbs under the waistband of Stiles's pants, and Stiles has to fight himself not to instinctively cover up as they get stripped away. Even the accidental graze of Derek's fingertips is kind of making it harder and harder to care at all, though. He stretches against the muggy heat of the room, no relief for his skin, and Derek soothes him back with a steady palm. Looks over him appraisingly.

Nothing to see here, Stiles thinks offhand, hot in the face.

"Your skin’s burning," Derek says, leaning over him.

"Thanks, Captain Obvi—ohhh—" that would be Derek's mouth, following the path of his hand, wet heat over unbearable heat, tracing along the lines of Stiles's chest with his tongue, the constellations of moles and freckles on his stomach, licking off the sheer of sweat over every inch of his skin. He sets his teeth against one of Stiles's nipples, and Stiles just full-on moans.

He can't even find the brain to feel self-conscious about it, and apparently it’s all the encouragement Derek needs because he attacks Stiles's nipples with a dogged vengeance after he hears it, trying to coax it out again—or maybe even melt them, his mouth is so hot. And the sound, it comes easily, over and over, no fight against it, and harder when Derek drags off him long enough to say, "It...it drove me nuts, being in the same room with you, and you not wanting me to touch you. I had to leave. But even downstairs, I could smell you. It was like I could feel everything you did to yourself." Each sentence punctuated with the slick of his mouth over Stiles’s skin.

"Oh god," Stiles pants. "You—you can't just say stuff like—" and his voice gives out under the graze of Derek's sharpened teeth against his throat.

"Can't I?" he murmurs. "I'm the Alpha. I can do what I want. Right?"

Stiles moans again. He's really not gonna make it out of this alive—

Abruptly, Derek climbs off him.

Stiles hardly has time to humor his typical self-hate mantra of well, you really did it this time, before Derek's grabbing his ankles and dragging him toward the foot of the bed. He sinks down on one knee between Stiles's legs, eyes lost on the view, drawing a feather touch up the insides of Stiles’s thighs. "I bet...I could just slide right inside you. I bet you're all ready for me."

“Derek…fuck.”

You need to be fucked.

Slide right inside, let him…let him slide right inside you, Stiles. Doesn’t that sound good? Let him do it.

You’ve wanted it for years. You weren’t running around the woods near his house for shits and giggles.

Oh fuck…

Let him do it—

Stiles just nods dizzily, half-frantic, strangling the sheets in his hands. He needs— he just needs—

"Should I try?" Derek says low, through his own staggered breath. "Should we see? See if I fit?"

If he's waiting for an answer, Stiles never has the sense to give him one. His body is speaking volumes for him, though, taut, shaking, a ruddy red down to his toes. Wherever Derek touches, he rises to meet him, like Derek's hands have his life in them. He's not going to make it.

"You're too quiet," Derek mutters after a pause, drawing his knuckles slowly up the back of Stiles's leg again. “Stiles Stilinski has nothing to say?”

Bleary, Stiles blinks his eyes down at him, sees Derek looking absently at something on his stomach. He shivers when he realizes it's the dribbles of pre-come puddling in his navel, marks of his wreckage. He’s going to come so hard— His heart’s gonna explode out of his chest—

"Let's fix that," Derek says. His elbows knock Stiles's knees as he pushes the waist of his sleep pants down over his dick, huge to Stiles's eyes and straining toward his body, flushed red and wet at the tip. He cages a loose fist around Stiles's dick, tugs it, milks him to distraction, until Stiles feels like he's about to dissolve straight through his skin. Then Derek's turning his face into Stiles's knee and biting at him, while he slowly starts to work his cock up into him, making little chuffing noises against his skin, as if he's trying to restrain himself.

He chokes out the most ragged, surprised sound into Stiles’s kneecap, when he’s inside him all the way, skin to skin.

Stiles goes off at that, the sense that he's weakened an Alpha somehow and the heavy weight of Derek finally suffocating out that rabid emptiness inside him. Even the uncomfortable stretch just inflames it. He whites out.

^

He comes to with Derek still inside him. It can't have been more than a few minutes, but his head is clearer, and his body’s lax. Derek's hung over him, beaded with sweat, dragging his fingers distractedly through the come on Stiles's chest. Stiles can feel the stressed thud of his heartbeat where they're joined, the restraint in his shaking muscles. He’s laboring in shallow breaths, too, and his eyes are red, claws out.

"I am the worst lay ever," Stiles croaks, flinging an arm over his face, still just as hot and itchy as it was before. Great. He hasn’t stopped with the blushing. "Who just blacks out…? Oh, real good job, Stilinski. I have high hopes for my future, I do."

Derek makes a blunt sound, more beast than man, and just draws almost entirely out of him, which is maybe the weirdest feeling Stiles has ever known. Then, nearly too fast, he’s rolling back into him with the surety and accuracy of a well-oiled piston, forcing Stiles a few inches up the bed.

"Whoa!" Stiles shouts, body gone tense. Before he can get in another word, another thought, Derek's thrusting into him again, and again, and again, without abandon, hands squeezing hard into the flesh of Stiles’s sides. His teeth find the meat of Stiles’s shoulder and bite into him, pin him to the spot.

Any clarity Stiles had, any discomfort of strangeness there is, is suddenly overcome by the intense need to have Derek. It’s like a brick to the head, how badly he wants him, how eager his body is for Derek’s cock, his orgasm, his come inside him. How the only thought going through his head as Derek fucks him is that he needs them, he needs them and he’ll rage if he doesn’t get them. He’s needed them for years. He’s wanted them for years.

Stiles whines and surges into Derek’s rut, starts cursing for it.

He’s never been so greedy in his life.

^

Derek knots him. Holds Stiles’s hips tight against the bed, claws pocking up sickle smiles of blood. Knots him so long. Presses kisses to his slack mouth. Licks the sweat off his jaw. Whispers this encouraging, possessive filth against his ear. Knots him until Stiles tightens up and comes again.

^

He wakes up to a stream of sunlight in his eyes and the smell of hot breakfast filling his stomach with a ghost fullness. His body snags on a yawn, and he rolls over into a full stretch, joints popping. Lazily, he thinks his ass should probably be hurting a whole helluva lot right about now, but that's the beauty of heat: it girds the body and cancels out any physical pain for a week. Someone could get their hand cut off, but as long as it’s heat, they’d keep going like nothing happened. Stiles kind of wishes that that part of it would stick around longer. He’d be invincible.

Unfortunately, heat doesn’t cancel out mental pain. Or thought. Or embarrassment. Or shame. All the old classics, all of Stiles’s best buddies. And apparently the whole thing about sex — mating — making your head a lot clearer than flying solo is actually true. Stiles is painfully himself right now, in all his glory. Until the next daze comes around.

Please let that be soon. The thing about dazes is that, as awkward and at times humiliating as they can be, Stiles kind of enjoys not being himself for a little while.

So long as it doesn’t lead to humping any more houses. One experience is enough for a lifetime.

He rolls a glance over at Derek, who's sitting on the bench with a tablet in hand, thumbing through all the latest world crises. He's half-naked, and Stiles feels a frustrating awkwardness build all of a sudden. He's not sure if it's because his own body just can't match up or because it's gonna be a lot more difficult to coolly brush off what happened last night, with all the shirtless dude sitting just feet away. Or maybe it's because his body knows it can have that (correction, did, did have that), and he can't find the balls or the brains to ask for it again without being drunk off his ass on heat.

It’s all three. It’s just all of them. All of them in one nice, little package.

He should really figure out how to ask, though. That would be good. That would be great. That’d be fantastic.

Hey, Derek, so…about the whole sex thing. How about tickets to an encore presentation? Maybe the noon showing?

How about no?

Speaking of things people should really do: Derek should really not sit around half-naked.

More importantly in the grand scheme of things, that same table from last night is sitting in front of him, stocked full of new dishes, some of them still steaming. Food, a subject Stiles can handle.

His stomach gurgles, and he just nods in agreement. Took the words right out of his mouth. If he could mate with food during heat, he’d probably be set for life.

"That better be for me," he grumbles, pitching his arm over the side of the bed. "I deserve a big breakfast. The biggest. Huge. Gigantic. Are you getting the picture?" He makes a gimme hand, and Derek cocks a brow at him without even lifting his eyes from the tablet.

So apparently Stiles’s body’s into that.

Just curious, does Derek realize it's hot? Has he been told before in the weekly report hey, Alpha, urgent news: the Nova compound is running low on water, there's tension between the Frampton and Hodge compounds and that eyebrow thing, by the way? Pretty sexy, just to let you know… So what do you want to do about that water?, and now he does it whenever he can work it in? Stiles can’t really blame him.

He sits up, yawning and scrubbing a hand through the peach fuzz he calls hair. The movement catches Derek's eyes. He casts his tablet off on the floor with a somewhat cautious carelessness.

"Come here," he says, leaning forward. Stiles can't help the initial glance over the shoulder, just to make sure he's the one Derek's talking to and not some busty Omega, who's just materialized out of the closet.

"If you insist." He gathers the sheets up around him and somehow manages to gracelessly trip himself over into the empty cushion opposite Derek on the bench. He can be pretty smooth when he wants to be.

Complete luck. Incredible, rare luck that his ass made it into the seat and not his face.

Derek just snorts at him.

"Hey, don't go dissing these sweet moves. You wish you were this slick."

"No," Derek disagrees, with a brief smirk.

It's only sitting here, away from the bed, in the sun and Derek's gaze, that Stiles realizes just how wiped he is.

"Are you feeling okay? You should eat something."

"Have you met me? Do you know who you're talking to? I'm the king of eating. You should see me with curly fries. I hold the record," Stiles says, as Derek grabs a nugget of caramel granola and pulls it apart in gooey halves.

Gooey is good. He can work with gooey.

Derek holds the granola to Stiles’s lips. He doesn't even hesitate opening his mouth, this time.

It tastes really good, first of all, and secondly, weirdly familiar, beyond Derek’s scent on it, which Stiles had expected. Something vaguely there, just a little, between the caramel and honey and oats and chocolate… It tastes like…

Like—

Stiles’s cheeks explode with heat; he can feel them burning. His come. It tastes like Derek’s scent and his own come. Derek hasn’t washed his hands since—

“Is it okay?” Derek asks, watching him chew. No, he’s watching Stiles’s inferior brain figure things out.

“Yeah.” Stiles doesn’t really know what to say that won’t come across narcissistic. “My, uh…compliments to the chef.”

So he knows what his own spunk tastes like. It’s called curiosity. More importantly, Derek has pretty terrible hygiene, especially considering he has water that actually runs and access to enough soap to last an eternity of lifetimes. There’s really no excuse. Unless Derek's just one kinky bastard.

But besides all that, there must be something about this, Derek feeding him. Last night, he said it was to take care of him, but Stiles isn’t sure if it’s an Alpha thing or just a heatmate thing. If Derek tries to feed everyone in his pack this way or just the Omegas...if it's a perk of being someone he wants to fuck for a week or a perk of being in his pack at all.

If he'd had time (and actually, in any span of reality, had believed he’d ever be picked by an Alpha), he could've done a little research before coming here. Research would've made him feel more in control. It's not like he's in a bad place, but there's nothing wrong with having some control. Even the illusion of it would be nice.

It got him through losing his mom. Fact-checking. Reading the way outdated encyclopedias at the library. Random searches on the town hall computer.

It got him through a lot.

"Do you—" he scratches at the back of his neck, swallowing, "did the others let you do this for them? Or did they feed you?"

"I fed them. I told you it was tradition.”

“Yeah, but do you enjoy it?”

Derek shrugs. “It’s tradition.”

“Yeah, I got that, Sherlock. But just because something’s tradition doesn’t mean you have to do it. You said so yourself.”

A snort pops out of Derek, almost a laugh. He holds up the other half of the granola between them. "Are you going to eat or just talk me to death?"

"Nice evasion there, pal," Stiles says, but doesn't push beyond that. He might as well enjoy it while it last, whatever Derek’s motivations. The second he gets home, he'll be lucky if his dad even gives him a plate for the takeout, much less feeds it to him piece-by-piece.

"One more question though," he says, holding up his hand against the half strip of bacon slicking Derek's fingers with grease.

Derek's eyebrows climb.

Speak, dumbass, is what that means, if Stiles had to make an educated guess. He's getting to be a real fast learner at this whole Translate Derek's Facial Expressions thing.

That's not going to matter in another few days, either.

"What's with your driver and handshakes?"

"My driver and handshakes?" Derek parrots back at him.

"He wouldn't shake my hand last night. Is that not cool to do anymore? What, are we supposed to sniff each other's butts now or something? Us townies out in the boondocks are behind by, like, two years. You have to catch me up, here. If I'm making more of a fool of myself than usual, dude, put me out of my misery."

"He's not allowed to touch you."

"Why no—oh. Oh." Stiles looks at Derek's hand, holding up the bacon. Territory. He's Derek's territory for heat. That took him longer to realize than he's proud of. "Tradition again?"

Garrison not helping him at the car makes a lot more sense now, too.

"You would've smelled like him."

"Just a little. And I took a shower, remember."

"It doesn’t matter. It’s tradition, Stiles. After you’re chosen, no one can touch you but me."

"What about my dad, though? My friends? There were some pretty hardcore good-bye hugs."

"You'd have smelled like them anyway, even if I'd come weeks ago and told them not to touch you until after heat. After a certain point, scent transfer is almost permanent. Didn't anyone ever teach you that? You live in a house for so long and you start to smell like it, even if you can't tell. It’s the same with people."

Stiles knows all that. Families, friends, they share scents sometimes. Stiles smells kinda like his dad, and his dad him. Stiles smells a little like Scott and vice versa. Scott and his mom smell alike— which has made for some pretty embarrassing incidents, but that's neither here nor there at this point in time.

Sometimes, Stiles still even smells his mom on himself or his dad. It’s usually only for a second, though, and it’s pretty rare these days.

"Strangers like Garrison are different. Besides," Derek says, gaze pointedly not watching as Stiles finally opens his mouth for the bacon, "now I know who you let touch you."

Stiles feels a spike of heat rush up his spine. And then it just blooms over his face. Well, sure, he wasn’t trying for cool and collected, anyway. No big deal.

“Are you friends with Jackson Whittemore?” Derek says, strangely off-topic, almost like he wants a distraction from what he just said, too.

Did it have to be Jackson, though? Of all the things in the world, Derek landed on Jackson?

“Truthfully? He’s pretty much the definition of the word ‘asshole.’ Anything you can imagine an asshole doing, he’s don—that sounded really different in my head. But probably no less accurate.” And now would be the time to end that thought and leave it alone to die.

“He made Alpha Mahealani into a laughing stock at his own party, last night.”

Stiles snorts. “That’s Jackson for you. What’d he do? Throw a tantrum?” Please say he threw a tantrum.

“No. Is that something he does a lot?” Derek’s eyes are caught on the bare expanse of Stiles’s chest, peeking out over the top of his sheet toga, but he’s not really looking at it. Stiles feels self-conscious anyway, overlapped with the disappointment that Jackson didn’t cry.

”In my head he does.”

For half a second, Derek gives him half a smile.

“I told you I don’t like to follow all the rules. But other people do. The press latches onto every little step out of order. There were video feeds and photos of Jackson dragging Danny out of the party early, all over the place this morning. They’re questioning his authority, if he can’t even control his first heatmate.”

Sounds like something Jackson would try. Always doing whatever he wants. Always getting his way, somehow. The guy’s touched, he must be. Spends his whole life being treated like he’s a Beta, when he’s really an Omega. Gets outed to the compound but somehow skirts being raked over the coals because an Alpha picks him the very same day. Then basically bosses around the Alpha at the Alpha’s own party, in front of the whole world.

At a party.

What, Stiles didn’t deserve a party? Clearly, that’s the key issue here.

“Where’s my party?” he asks.

Derek shrugs, sitting forward to grab a pretzel off the far end of the table. “I don’t do well with parties.”

“Wow, really?” Stiles says, a little bitter. “Could’ve fooled me.”

Derek shoots a curious glance over his shoulder at him, brow raised. He looks like he could say something, but he doesn’t have to.

Yeah. Stiles kind of sucks at parties, too. But come on. It’s the thought. Doesn’t he at least get a thought?

“Do you want a party?” Derek asks eventually.

“Yeah,” Stiles says, no hesitation. “Hell yes. Get on that. Get on that right now. I want the works. Put my face on the balloons. And the cake. I want to eat my face.”

Derek just shakes his head. Stiles can’t tell if it’s at him or at the thought of the party in general. Maybe both.

Derek would look stupid in a party hat.

Chapter Text

Not to toot his own horn or anything, but after that first time Stiles figures that Derek’ll want to have sex as much and as often as possible, and he’s actually pretty beyond okay with that, all things considered. He is a teenage boy, after all, and a newly-minted non-virgin. Let the sexing begin.

But there’s this problem — it’s called being wrong. All the time.

Rather than charging ahead full steam, Derek actually backs off. He doesn’t so much as bat an eyelash Stiles’s way. Doesn’t chain Stiles to the bed, doesn’t get down on his knees and declare his love for Stiles’s ass. He just…backs off. Like, for some deranged reason, he’s leaving the ball in Stiles’s court. Who even does that?

It almost makes Stiles wonder if he was such a bad lay that Derek doesn’t want to do it ever again. That would the logical conclusion, considering he’s involved.

No almost about it. He straight up wonders. He doubts. He actually considers worrying, even.

But he tells himself Derek wouldn’t have done the things he did this morning, if he weren’t still interested. Right? He wouldn’t have been sitting there naked, he wouldn’t have fed Stiles, he wouldn’t have given half a damn if Stiles wanted a party or not.

Even if it was just a joke and there isn’t going to be one.

There’s definitely not going to be one.

He must just be a tease.

He’s gotta be teasing him. Yeah. Withholding the goods.

A very quiet, subtle tease. That’s it. Derek’s just so good at it, it’s hard to tell he cares at all. His touches, what few there are, are too brief. His distance, as he takes Stiles on a tour of the house – not his house, the house – too purposeful. The eye contact he spares, too flighty. So much so that compared to the way he was earlier, it feels put-on. Fake. Like he’s actually trying to provoke Stiles with it.

Unless he’s just not and Stiles is making up straws to grasp. It wouldn’t be the first time.

Stiles is used to being ignored. It’s not a big deal. He’s cool about it. Being ignored is, like, the most non-substantial thing for him. In fact, it makes him getting away with things a lot easier. So really, it’s like a cool, mutant power. He’s almost invisible.

Except during heat, apparently being ignored is unacceptable.

It being Derek who’s doing it…apparently also unacceptable. Alpha Derek, who’s dropping pheromones all over the place and doing nothing about them. No…no manners at all. Stiles is half a second off telling him to keep that crap to himself, if there’s not gonna be any follow-through.

They barely make it through the main floor before Stiles is crawling the walls of Derek’s conference room, so undone he can hardly stand on his own shaking feet, but too chicken to say anything. That was a really short refractory period from breakfast—

“Oh man,” he wheezes, stumbling into a side table that has a vase on it for all of five seconds, before it’s tipping over and shattering against the floor in a mess of shards.

“…Shit,” he says, delayed, but he can’t make himself care, can’t focus. Not with Derek turning around halfway across the room, his eyes lit up red, chest ragged with breath.

“D-dude...”

“Stiles,” Derek says, almost threatens.

He’ll be embarrassed by what he does next. He’ll be totally embarrassed later, but right now, he can’t grasp what the word ‘embarrassment’ means, and right now, he doesn’t have half a clue if Derek even really wants him again, and he can’t think. So he just—commits to the first bad idea that comes to him. He angles his back to Derek and starts riding the edge of the table, head thudding into the wall.

Derek’s on him before he can get a good rhythm going, spinning him about-face and snatching up his wrists.

“You’re not doing that,” he growls and hikes Stiles up onto the table, the glass of the vase crunching under his shoes. He strangles his hands in the waist of Stiles’s shorts, but doesn’t pull them off, just—presses his forehead hard against Stiles’s. “Let me—let me, tell me it’s okay, tell me I can—”

Stiles nods against him, scrambling his hands up to help Derek.

The table rocks unstable as Derek jerks Stiles's shorts off enough to get at him, and then he’s folding Stiles’s thighs back and freeing his own dick. He can’t get inside him fast enough, but when he’s slid in to the root, he buries his face in the crook of Stiles’s neck, that same surprised, undone sound in his throat.

Stiles claws against his back to get him moving right away, but Derek just keeps frustratingly still for a minute, shaking, trying to catch his breath. And for that long, agonizing minute, all the satisfaction Stiles gets is his heart thudding to the throb of Derek inside him.

“If I had it my way,” Derek mutters near voiceless, mouth wet under Stiles’s jaw, “you wouldn’t have kept it from me until you were so far gone. I would’ve been on you the second I first smelled it, so I could draw it out.”

The table rattles under the force of his first thrust. Stiles hiccups out a gasp.

“—I’d do anything you asked me to,” Derek seethes, snapping into him again, “—if you just said the word. Do you even realize?” He sucks at the whimpers in Stiles’s throat.

Stiles’s head sags into Derek’s shoulder, his own shoulders riding up the wall with Derek’s thrusts. There’s the popping of the glass under the heels of Derek’s shoes. The way the table legs are clapping against the floor—

Derek’s hands skate down over his ass, pulling him desperately closer, “I could smell it half an hour ago.” His lips are sloppy on Stiles’s cheek, his ear, “I could’ve been fucking you for half an hour—“

“Derek,” Stiles groans, biting a mouthful of Derek’s shirt collar.

“But no,” Derek grunts, pace fast, erratic. Thorough. “You’re gonna come already, aren’t you? You’re squeezing so tight around me— Stiles.”

Stiles chokes out a moan, every muscle in his body screwing up as he comes all over his shirt, like Derek willed it himself.

^

Derek has the control enough to strip Stiles of his shorts completely, before he slips back inside him and finds his own orgasm, knotting him despite the fact that Stiles falls asleep almost as soon as he’s started.

^

Seriously, Stiles has never slept so much in his entire life.

Derek wakes him up a while later, not on purpose. It takes him a minute to realize they’re back in Derek’s room. He’s lying freshly-clothed in Derek’s bed and Derek’s clicking around on his computer, over on the other side of the room. The clock reads 3:24, almost twelve hours since his heat first kicked in.

He feels calm, in his right mind, but—

Yeah, okay, so it wasn’t the typing that woke him up. He’s on the edge of another daze. Well, that downtime was even shorter than the last. Let’s see…rough estimate here but he has a good hour, hour fifteen maybe, before he’s humping the furnit—

Oh wow.

Oh damn.

“Dude,” Stiles groans, burying his face in the pillow. He really does suck at this whole heatmate thing. First, he’s kicking Derek out of his own room, then he’s blacking out, and now he’s going for tables and breaking vases. The cherry on top was probably falling asleep when Derek was knotting him. He’s a real piece of work. Derek’s going to rip his throat out. Just—put him out of his misery already.

He hears Derek get up and come around to the head of the bed, and Stiles tenses for impact.

But Derek just traces a gentle hand along the back of his skull. That’s it. Then he’s backing off. Again with the backing off.

He walks away and comes back with a cup of iced tea and a small plate of dried meat and fruit that Stiles smells and hears more than sees, until he’s dragging his head off the pillow to look.

He’s almost disappointed — seriously, we’re going with disappointed? Okay, yeah…disappointed — when Derek just leaves both on the bedside table and retreats back to his computer.

…And that would be backing off times three, now.

He’s not—

Huh. No hand-feeding?

Is this because of the vase thing? Or the falling asleep thing? Both? Stiles’s existence in general?

“Hey, what,” he gruffs at the bare stretch of Derek’s back— oh, cool tattoo. “I don’t get the Alpha treatment anymore? You’re not gonna feed me? I think I already forgot how to do it myself, to be honest.”

For the most part, it’s easy to regret the things that come out of his mouth, but sometimes it’s especially easy. Like now. It’s not a good idea to start making demands at people you’ve obviously offended. And judging by the way Derek’s acting, he must be pretty offended. And more than Stiles usually offends people, which…

Is exactly what his dad meant with that look in the kitchen.

A little slow on the uptake there, Stiles.

Derek doesn’t turn around to face him when he answers, “Do you really want me to?” His voice sounds weird.

Not offended.

Not angry.

Not anything Stiles would expect from someone who’s just been royally under-fucked.

It’s definitely more…hurt?

Cautious?

Too dry and too wet at the same time.

Whatever it is, it feels like it’s curdling under Stiles’s skin.

Something weird’s really going on here. Stiles didn’t know Alphas had settings beyond Maim, Hurt, Kill, Threaten, Destroy— He woke up in the Twilight Zone and now he’s the intimidating Alpha and Derek’s the shy, little, virgin Omega, right? Is that it? “I have to tell you I’m…really confused by that question. You really confuse me. Derek, you’re confusing. Did I mention the confusing part?”

Somehow, Derek gets a ‘yes’ from all that and Stiles is kind of relieved because he didn’t have to say it outright. He works better in other people’s wakes, not driving the boat himself. He’s a follower, not a leader, and he’s okay with that.

He sits up when Derek stands and wordlessly trundles his chair over to the bed.

Derek takes a while to pick something off the plate, once he’s gotten himself settled, and it makes Stiles’s antsy because he’s just very, very quiet about it— and either Stiles’s brain is playing tricks on him or somehow he can already tell the difference between Derek’s usual quiet and his very, very quiet. Derek doesn’t look at him, either. Looks over him, looks beyond him, looks around him. Looks through him.

So we’re back to this again?

“Did I do something wrong?” Stiles says, on a highly impulsive ‘look that gift house in the mouth’ note. “I mean, of course I did, I’m me. But I offended you, didn’t I? Is that why you’re treating me like a leper? Man, I’m sorry. I officially apologize. For, you know…pretty much me being me.”

Derek’s eyes slim at him just the smallest bit, but not in anger. Disbelief. “No. Why would you think that?”

“Man, I don’t know, why would I think that… Oh, wait. Maybe it’s because you seem like you don’t want to have anything to do with me right now. Which is seriously coincidental with me falling asleep on you and trying to hump your table and breaking your stuff. So…I don’t know. I’m just dumb, I guess.”

Derek scowls, his heartbeat picking up a little. “You’re not dumb. That’s not it. Don’t put words in my mouth.”

“That’s not it? So there is something, then? Something that’s different now? As in, ‘one of these things is not like the other’ different?” Stiles rubs a hand over his face, but it doesn’t do anything to reset his nerves or distract him from the fact that his own heartbeat is speeding up to try and catch Derek’s. They’re already having a fight.

And the Worst Heatmate criteria is now complete. His dad would be proud.

“I’m forcing myself on you,” Derek says.

Stiles’s mouth falls so wide he could catch flies.

What?

Were they not in the same room or something, earlier? On the same continent? …The same planet? Of all the things wrong with the last few hours, that was not one of them. And all of the wrong things were pretty much Stiles’s fault, anyway. Derek has nothing to be sorry for.

“Did you miss the part where I came to you last night? Or when I helped you take my shorts off earlier? I thought that was pretty crystal.”

“Stiles,” Derek sighs.

Stiles’s skin pricks up. Derek’s being too weirdly vulnerable right now. It doesn’t suit him, and Stiles feels like he broke him.

He broke Derek Hale.

“I want you to want it. Not just when you’re so dazed anything’ll do. Not because I'm an Alpha or because you feel like you have some obligation to your compound. But the second I picked you, it wasn't your choice anymore. Jesus, Stiles, you put on a suppressant patch last night. That shouldn't be how this goes. The other Omegas wanted to be here. You don’t. I’m not going to keep forcing myself on you.”

Stiles drops his head heavy into his hands, groaning. That table thing's just never going to die, is it? And is Derek seriously have a moral crisis right now? “What are you even saying? And why are you saying it? For the record, I kinda actually do want to be here now, but even if I didn’t, you’re the Alpha. I’m the Omega. The lowest of the totem pole, didn’t you get the memo? You could, theoretically, do whatever you wanted to me. You could cut me into little pieces and scatter me to the wind. But please don’t, dude.”

“Stiles,” Derek shakes his head, this terrible gape to his mouth, “I don’t want a “kinda.” I want—,” he cuts himself off, teeth sharp, “I don’t want to do what I want. I want to do what you want. I know I picked you, so you must think you have some obligation to stay here and tolerate this, but you don’t. It’s your heat, too. I don’t want it to be something you end up regretting. Or something you regret already. I should just take you home.”

Stiles laughs, nervous and confused. Derek’s giving him the ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ speech, except that he’s making it pretty clear it is Stiles, not him. There’s gotta be a low circle of Hell for Omegas who disappoint their Alphas so much that, rather than just kill them, they send them home. “Take me home? Derek, what the Hell. And you say you can't have people doubting you? What'd they think if you just did that? Alpha Lets Omega Leave Early. That'll look great on the feeds.” He’s sitting here beating himself up about being a bad lay and Derek’s bringing in a horse of a completely different color.

“It doesn't matter. This was a mistake. I never should’ve picked you. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“I don’t know what you were thinking either, if that helps. Seriously, what the Hell, Derek?”

“I thought once you got here, you’d—“ and again with the cutting-off thing. “I don’t want to take advantage of you, Stiles. I didn’t want to take advantage of you.”

“Isn’t that the whole point of this?”

“No. I don’t want it to be.”

“And anyway,” Stiles continues, despite him, “way to make me feel good about myself. A mistake? Really? That’s the word you’re going with?”

“I didn’t mean it like that,” Derek scowls.

“Kind of hard not to mean it like that.”

“Stiles—”

“This is a lot better than I thought it’d be.” Stiles says, before Derek can cut him off at the knees any more that he already has. He considers his honesty for a second, stunned at how easy it was to just say. But he’s gonna go with it. Like he has a choice where his mouth is concerned, anyway. “Sure, at first I was a little…a lot pissed about this, but that was when I didn’t know what to expect. It definitely wasn’t this and you.” He frowns. “That sounded pretty bad, but it’s a good thing. I could’ve ended up with someone like yo—” Probably not the best idea to start attacking the blood relations when souls are being bared and all that Hallmark stuff.

“My uncle?” Derek says, blunt.

“I was gonna say someone like Alpha Mahealani, actually. That guy looked like a serious hardass. Who smiles that much? Someone with something to hide, that’s who. And he picked Jackson, so clearly,” he taps a finger against his head, “not all there up here.”

The laugh Derek gives that is just a hard, clipped puff of air, the turning up of his mouth for a tick. God, he’s really bent out of shape about this.

Twilight Zone…

“I thought I made this clear last night, but I’m cool with this. What’s, you know, happening here. It’s fun?” Bad word choice. “Beyond fun. It’s actually pretty fantastic.” Way overboard. No middle ground, he just cruised right on over it. Good job laying all his cards out at once. He coughs. “Look, I’m just really confused why you need me to give you the go-ahead, here. If anything, you should be reassuring me that I didn’t royally suck. Again, you, Alpha, me, Omega. You, most powerful werewolf in all the land, me, bug. Dirt, lower than dirt. But if you need it—”

“I do,” Derek says. “And you’re not dirt. Don't talk about yourself like that.”

“That’s like asking me to rewire my brain. But look, okay, this is me reassuring you. Get a good look.” He swipes his hands up and down in front of him in comically large arcs. “I, Stiles Stilinski, want to be here. Do you need me to sign a legal statement? I don’t want you to send me home. Okay? I’m sorry I didn’t give you the right signals — is there, like, some Bat Signal I can put up in the sky, but for things of a sex-shualll nature? And also, just for your information, I was waiting on you to make a move this morning. When you didn’t, I thought maybe this wasn’t working out for you, so I— I went for the path of least resistance? As in…your table. Because that’s how I and my low self-esteem roll. So really, this is all your fault. Way to go. You could’ve jumped my bones anytime, but you just had to play hard to get. And you want to send me home? You should send…yourself home.”

Derek just kind of stares at him, which is apparently his cue to keep going.

"I never thought I'd get chosen, so I'm having to learn as I go here. Give me a little time to catch up with the curve. But for the record, please continue to treat me like a king. Feel free to just do it. Sex me up, Derek. Twenty-four seven, breakfast, lunch and dinner.”

Derek has not blinked the entire time Stiles has been talking.

Now he really broke him.

“Are we cool?” he says. “I…can’t believe I’m sitting here, reassuring someone who looks like you. How many times did I just say the word ‘sex’?"

Derek raises a brow at him. That'll never get old.

“You really never developed a filter, did you?”

”Genetic mutation,” Stiles says. “Dad’s side.”

Derek purses his lips and looks off at something on the floor, barely smothering a laugh.

Repressed much?

"I don’t really remember much of what you said, but you mentioned about…” Stiles pulls at the air in front of him, “This isn’t verbatim, but you said something about if you could, you’d take your time? Do anything I asked you to? I'd like to make good on that.”

Derek looks down at the plate of food in his hands, just stares at it, like he’d counted on Stiles not remembering that and the food is going to save him. Stiles’s tried that before, too. Never works.

So Stiles isn’t the only sap during heat. It’s nice to see someone els—

Derek is blushing, a splotchy red slap straight from cheek to chin.

It kind of gives Stiles a rush of heady power. Power over an Alpha. He can feel his own face starting to turn hot in response, and he shuffles through a few faces, bullying up the spine to say the rest because apparently Derek needs him to spell things out, before he just goes to town. “We could do that. If you still wanted to. Even though I fell asleep on you. And even though I apparently have it bad for your furniture.”

Hey, things die faster if you stop bringing them up. Just a thought.

“You know what, let’s just forget that even happened. How much do I owe you for that vase, by the way?”

“It was my mother’s. It was expensive,” Derek says. "With that and the damage to the car door, you're indebted to me for life.”

“Life?”

Derek nods.

…Stiles could be okay with that.

^

After Stiles’s been fed way more than he should be legally allowed (aka ‘a buffet’), they take a bath together. They take a bath, and Derek takes his time, like he said he would.

It’s awkward at first because at that point, the daze isn’t bad enough yet that Stiles is free from his extreme case of self-aware-itis and no, really, this is, like, concrete evidence I’m attractive to guys, now confusion. But once he gets out of his own way, it gets a lot better. A whole, whole lot better. And Derek is more than attentive to make up for all of Stiles’s inexperience and fear, to the point that Stiles almost feels like he’s the one in control.

It’s not dragging an Alpha out of a huge party, but he’ll take it.

^

Even by his standards, Derek practically stuffs Stiles with food. Then eventually fucks him hungry again. Feeds him and fucks him. The next six days unfold to this tune, and Stiles gets clearer and clearer-headed every day, but no less drummed up for Derek. In any way, shape or form. Which is only surprising in that it’s not really surprising at all.

That Thing Stiles had for him when they were younger seeps back in around the edges of the heat, too. That nagging, unshakeable obsession, overtop the clinginess of his dazes.

At first it's just a heat-ache for Derek’s cock. His body, the weight pressing into Stiles. His touch, his taste. How his smell hits Stiles like a double-whammy, both calms and buzzes him at the same time. But then it's his eyes, whatever Stiles can do to get him to look at him. And his teeth, marking Stiles as his, however impermanent. Then his voice. Him talking, saying anything, the dirty assertions and the casual conversation in between, trading stories with Stiles, though he stays guarded about some things and doesn’t push Stiles when he’s a little guarded, too.

Stiles gets to know him as much as he can, considering the time and situation. Gets to the point where he actually starts to feel sort of jealous of the Omegas who came before him. How Derek must’ve treated them. What he told them about his life, how he touched and kissed and fucked them. If he knotted them as long as he knots Stiles. If he liked them better or would prefer them now, given the choice again.

Male pride, is what it is.

What it should be.

Or the heat, itself. It makes everyone a little too gullible, a little too easily influenced. That's it.

He’s probably the king of all the land right now, in terms of those two things.

He doesn't have any room for comparison, but this is likely the best heat he's ever going to have. It's all downhill from here. How can someone exactly top an Alpha?

He’s never going to get a mate after this. They’ll see his track record, tuck tail and run. He’ll be blacklisted.

Well, at least he’s getting free food out of it.

^

And a crash course in sex. For which those zero future partners will probably send invisible ‘thank you’ cards to Derek for life.

Stiles learns he has kinks. A lot of them. Like the bath sex— fantastic. Play-fighting? Let’s do it. Derek scratching him and biting him and licking away the blood? Stiles is suddenly no longer squeamish. Derek fucking him awake and fucking him to sleep? Sounds good. Derek holding him down? He didn’t need to go anywhere, anyway. Eating things off Derek’s body? Best plate in the world. And the knotting, which Stiles had always just kind of balked at before, in health class or when he was watching porn, is surprisingly starting to really work for him.

Can’t forget the way Derek calls him by his first name sometimes, too, as if it’s a dirty secret between them. Tacks it onto the end of things like come for me and let me inside you and touch yourself, I wanna watch. Stiles swears in the future now, whenever his father’s yelling at him, he’s probably going to get unfortunately aroused.

And just for his own peace of mind, Stiles likes how he can smell himself on Derek, just barely, if he touches the same spot long enough, if he focuses hard enough. And he really, really likes Derek's triskele tattoo. He even kisses it once, in the spur of the moment, which makes Derek recoil and then come back at him with a desperate, hungry apology against his mouth.

Derek tells him later that it's his fifteenth year tattoo, a ritual thing only the Alpha families and New Age hippies do anymore. He picked it himself, on the surface to symbolize the three stages of the moon and the triad of Alpha-Beta-Omega. But, more personally, it represents the immortality of the three most important people in his life: the top spiral is his grandmother and the one on the right his mother, both of whom were Alphas, respectively; the one on the left is for his sister, at the time not an Alpha herself, but with all the character, strength and ingenuity to become one, someday. Derek hadn’t doubted her right for a second, enough that he’d gotten it written in permanence on his skin.

It wigs Stiles out at first, after he knows. That he kissed something that’s basically in memoriam of Derek's family. But Derek just shakes his head and says it felt like he was paying homage to them. Which actually settles Stiles guilt a lot, surprisingly. But not surprisingly, at the same time. He likes it when people still pay their respects to his mother, when they show they haven’t forgotten her yet because he definitely hasn’t, and it’s nice to be reminded that she was important to more than just him and his dad, that she still isn’t completely gone. It’s probably the same for Derek.

Stiles would like to have gotten to know the Hales, beyond just seeing them around town when he was young and thinking they were unapproachable, beyond all the news reports and fact spitting after the fire. It would’ve been nice to be able to help them live on in memories.

^

Stiles swipes at the condensation on the window of Derek’s Camaro, which they’ve just pretty spectacularly desecrated, peering out at the sterile perfection of the garage around them like it’ll be less somber through the haze. Garrison mentioned Derek being a bit of a car collector, but what he seems to have left out is that Derek’s collection isn’t much more than a modest start, only enough to take up about a tenth of the space dedicated to it, and so far mostly composed of duplicates. Decoys, Stiles guesses, for tricking the press and fans.

Except for the Camaro. There’s only one of them. Stiles would assign some significance to it, that Derek didn’t protest his choosing it to screw around in, but he’s been pretty agreeable so far this week, and there’s no use looking for meaning or encouragement in complacency. Stiles tried that before with Lydia, and where did it ever get him but confused and over-invested? He’d argue it’s a tried and true method—of never getting anything you want.

“So which is your favorite car?” he says, only half expecting an answer.

Derek shrugs, a loud effort considering he’s splayed out low against the leather seat, stuck to it with the tack of sweat. He watches the idle stroke of Stiles’s finger on the window, turning something over in his head. “This one is the fastest. I like it for that.”

“That’s…pretty important.”

Stiles sits forward and reaches around the front seat for his shirt, not sure why he suddenly has the impulse to put it on, despite the sweat all over him, except that it gives his hands something to do.

"I have to take you out," Derek says.

"Hey, what?” Stiles snorts, muffled in the struggle with his shirt. “Was I that bad? Give me another chance here. It’s my first time in a car. My model wasn’t exactly built for backseats."

Derek reaches over to help him, or maybe to torture him—Stiles can’t really tell when the end results are the same: hot blush up his back, the sudden Sahara in his mouth, a thousand prickles along his scalp at just the ghost of Derek’s fingers trying to help roll the shirt down his side, where it’s sticking.

"To dinner.” Derek sits up himself but doesn’t move for his clothes. “I have to take you to out to dinner. To shut the press up. They’ll think something’s wrong if you don’t show your face at least once this week. I think they want you in the purple suit. Did you bring it with you?”

“Oh yeah, I never leave home without it.”

“I have some suits in different cuts. I’m sure one of them will fit you.”

“Just curious, was the press as disappointed with the lack of party-age as I am? Jackson gets a party. Lots of Omegas get parties. Stiles gets one measly dinner.”

“No party,” Derek says, but there’s a smile alongside it, this wide, toothy piece of crap that tells Stiles Derek’s enjoying his pain, or at least pretending to. It’s kind of telling that that’s what gets Derek smiling the biggest, so far that Stiles has seen, even if it’s not genuine. Still counts, especially for someone who doesn’t smile all that much to begin with. Beggars can’t be choosers.

"You're the funniest guy in the world. A serious barrel of laughs, that’s Alpha Hale." Stiles snorts again and leans over for his pants, shoved up under the passenger side seat by someone’s foot. He’s not mad, but it feels like he might be a step off pretending a little too well. “Nice that you find pleasure in others’ pain.”

Derek reaches to trace his thumb aimlessly along the bare stretch of Stiles’s forearm, as effective as a gun at getting him to freeze in place. More effective than anything he’s ever known before, and that’s saying something.

It won’t matter in another day. He shouldn’t let it matter now, but he can’t help it.

“I don’t do parties because there's too much risk. Too many people, too much distraction... It's like inviting something to go wrong,” Derek says, simply enough. "And because I never learned to share well.”

Something lurches in Stiles’s chest. He doesn’t respond for a long moment, more sand in his mouth. Derek’s hand falls away, and it shouldn’t make sense that that only makes Stiles feel it more, but the universe loves torturing him, so what does he know, right?

“That’s nice. That’s—” he nods with a start, too fast, swallowing against his own uselessness, “—that’s good. Good point there.” He grabs around for any other words, even the worst ones, has something poised and then loses it watching Derek root around for his own clothes and make quick work pouring himself back into them, like it’s second nature for him to get dressed in the backseat of a car.

“You can have the bathroom first.” Derek turns to open the door on his side.

“Hey—“ Stiles says, purely out of reflex, because he has nothing else to follow it for a few beats.

Split half in, half out of the car, Derek angles a look back at him, eyebrows raised, fingers wrapped firmly around the handle.

“Do you ever…” Stiles rubs a hand over his mouth, almost literally trying to mold the words he wants. Or erase them. “When you’re around me, do you ever feel this, like…this sensation in your chest? Like a hook? Or a tug? Or—whatever?”

Stiles has always been pretty good at reading what he wants into something, but the expression Derek makes—the lack of any expression at all, really—doesn’t give him much to work with but a whole lot of nothing.

“…Acid reflux?” Derek asks, deadpan.

It takes Stiles by such surprise that he can’t help a spit of laughter. In fact, he doesn’t think he stops laughing the whole way back to Derek’s room, just laughing and repeating it and laughing and manhandling Derek around like it’s the funniest thing in the world. And then laughing some more. Somewhere in the middle of everything, he even asks Derek if he wants to sleep with a bucket beside the bed, just in case, to which Derek smirks and answers that he already does; that only has Stiles laughing again, so loud and comical it goes beyond just embarrassing himself—he feels embarrassed for Derek, too, having to pretend like he doesn’t notice what a relentless ass Stiles is making of himself.

But laughing off disappointment is definitely less painful than the alternative. Sometimes it feels like that’s the only life lesson that’s stuck for Stiles. That and not jamming metal things in electrical outlets. You only have to learn that lesson once. Twice, if you’re too curious for your own good.

He spends about ninety percent of his shower reliving an old health class lecture about sufferers of the Halved Mate Phenomenon, wherein one werewolf finds their absolute and everything’s great, except for the fact that said absolute doesn’t exactly feel the same way about them, and probably never will. At the time, Stiles had thought the health teacher was talking directly to him, that she had observed the sad state of his one-sided relationship with Lydia and used it for some quality lesson-plan inspiration. Derek hadn’t even been a blip on the radar then, long since moved out of the compound and off Stiles’s mind but for the brief glimpses of him and Laura on the video screen every few weeks. No hooks to speak of, except the one Stiles thought Lydia pretty securely had in him.

Thinking back on it now, though, it feels like maybe he didn’t know the half of it—no pun intended.

If nothing else — if he even is Halved — at least Derek’s giving him some pretty fantastic spank bank material to live off of for a while.

^

By the time their limousine pulls to a stop in front of what Derek told him was the premiere restaurant in the city, there's a massive crowd of press and bystanders pinballing against each other out front, barely held back by wood barricades. They’re snapping photos of the car, like even that’s worth something to someone, somewhere. A few people have video recorders hoisted up on their shoulders, too. Purple spotlights run along the clouds in the sky overhead.

Purple, nice touch.

There are even—fans? Fans holding blown-up pictures of Derek (correction: Derek posters) and signs that spell out messages to him (PICK ME NEXT YEAR! I TURN 18 IN JAUNARY! I LOVE YOU!). Half the crowd has on Derek t-shirts and cheap plastic spike crowns in neon colors, too. Stiles has seen this all before, replayed over and over on the town square video screen every year. He's seen footage just like this. He knows Alphas have fans. He knows.

Even still, it's like nothing he's ever seen before. Being in the eye of the storm makes everything look different. And he’s a little weirded out by the jealousy he’s starting to feel, wondering what Derek thinks of the untainted adoration these people have for him, how willing they are to give themselves to him without really even knowing him.

It makes his initial rejection of Derek — and Derek’s version of a meltdown about it — even more stand-out in comparison. Here’s a mass of people beyond willing to be his heatmates, and it’s just the tip of the iceberg, just a sample. Somehow, Derek ended up with him.

When Stiles glances over at him, Derek has a stony look on his face. He's not one for attention, Stiles knows that, but it somehow seems like self-sabotage for a man in his position to be so unwelcome to it. For all of his Alpha finesse, he's still kind of a baby at it, too easy to read. Maybe he'll get more diplomatic and tolerant as he gets older.

Maybe he'll just keep pulling in on himself.

Stiles swallows back the hairball of nerves crawling up his throat. This is unreal.

Unreal, says the dude sharing his heat with Derek Hale. Alpha Derek Hale.

"I'll get out first," Derek says, thumbing absently over the back of Stiles’s neck. "You're red."

"Yeah, well...we can't all be James Bonds. Some of us have to be Mr. McGoos."

Derek lowers his head to hide his smile. It's too quick, and when he straightens back up, his face is hard again; Stiles doesn't like it.

"Have you ever seen something like this on the video screens in your compound?"

"Yeah, but somehow I'm suddenly forgetting everything I've ever known. What's my name?"

"This'll do that to you." Derek fingers his own collar, tries to loosen it. He looks like he's going to have a conniption, but he's holding it together. "They'll ask you questions, take your picture. Some of them’ll want to get a rise out of you, too, just because it sells. They'll have researched you. Everything about you is fair game. We'll stay a minute or two, but that's it. If they mention your mother or my family, we’re done."

"Researched me? My mom?" Stiles can't even conceptualize that. Someone actually wasted time looking him up? Well, sympathy to that poor bastard. Especially if they had to slop through what Stiles likes to refer to as the “Dark Days.”

What if they know about him humping Lydia’s house?

"They aren’t allowed in the restaurant."

"That's...good to know." At least Stiles won’t have to worry about press releases coming out about him stuffing his face.

Again, it’s the little things in life.

"I'm here, every step," Derek says, which is really not reassuring because in the next second, he's getting out of the car and leaving Stiles to his own devices in the backseat.

If nothing else, Derek knows how to make an exit.

Outside, the crowd roars. Stiles can hear people shouting Alpha Hale! and Over here! Smile! Give us a smile! They’re already starting to barrage him with questions he doesn't even bother answering, much less saying "no comment" to.

Stiles looks on in awe through the blacked-out windows, watches how Derek stands there, how long he gives each camera, what his body language is like, what schooled gestures he offers. Stiles can’t see his face, but he bets Derek’s not smiling, no matter how much the crowd demands it.

Stiles mops at his brow with his tux sleeve.

There've never been this many people interested in his life. It's kind of exhilarating, in a way. His heart is beating too fast, but it's a good fear. It's the sort of fear that makes him feel overly awake. Hopped up on energy. People want to ask him questions. People care about who he is. People’ve paid attention to his life. He's important.

Even if it's just because of Derek, Stiles can't help giving in a little to flattery. He's never felt important — really important — in his life (except maybe to his parents, who, let's face it, had to say he was important because they made him), but people are going to be at home watching this broadcast. His dad and Scott and Allison and the rest of Beacon Hills are going to be watching him. Lydia’ll be watching him. Jackson might even, too. He could say something really meaningful and become the voice of a nation. He could start a revolution. He could be the next big thing.

People'll see him and want to put him in movies and have him speak on the news about his life and beg for his autograph. There’ll be posters with his face on them. Maybe even t-shirts and trading cards.

He can feel his head swelling already.

And of course the world would decide to check him on that.

He gets out of the car without issue (thank God, considering the last time he got out of a car, he almost cracked his skull.) But when Garrison goes to shut the door behind him, it closes on the tail of his suit jacket, and he doesn't realize it until he's trying to take a step forward and getting yanked back hard into the side of the car.

The camera flashes go off like wild. People call his name. There’s even a Purple Prince! or two in there.

Garrison scrambles to help him help himself.

His cheeks are burning. He throws a disbelieving look over at Derek, who's watching the both of them with his teeth bit into his bottom lip, like he's fighting off a laugh.

No help. Just, no help at all. Absolutely useless, that’s what Derek is.

After a second, Garrison gets the door popped open and Stiles tries his level best to not faceplant in front of the world, but life is a vengeful beast, and that would be the ground in his mouth right now. Mmm…nice bouquet.

This is his life.

And this is going to be the moment everyone writes about tomorrow, isn't it?

Derek’s got him righted before he can fully realize the concept of death by humiliation, and he ducks in close to Stiles to straighten his jacket, hiding his laugh and broad, open smile from the press. "Come on, let’s go get this over with."

"Going," Stiles says, even though it's Derek who turns — only after he’s schooled his smile back — and guides him forward through the crowd.

Stiles makes a solid effort to smile at everyone, despite the overwhelming urge to projectile vomit. He tries out several different waves, too, going for charming. But the flashes keep catching his eyes, and he has to duck away from them every other second, stumbling over his feet. He’s gonna explode.

They make it to the front doors of the restaurant without any other incidents, but then Derek’s turning the both of them around and making a loose gesture at the crowd.

The crowd seems to surge on them. Stiles thinks, for a disorienting second, that they're going to keep coming and coming until they stampede right over the two of them, but a few guards manage to hold them back. Again, just barely.

Derek's arm drops from his shoulders. Comes back a beat later lower, tight around his waist.

"Mr. Stilinski," one of the reporters starts, tall and harsh-featured, nearly slapping Stiles’s face with a huge mike.

Seriously, dude, isn’t technology supposed to get smaller as the years go by?

"How have the past few days been with Alpha Hale?"

"Uh," Stiles waffles, and with it his fantasy of charm and effortless brilliance pops. "Fine? Good? I— I mean, yeah, fine. No...problems. He hasn't eaten me, right?" He snorts out a laugh, which he swallows back fast, when he realizes these people have the sense of humor of a piece of wood.

"What've you two been doing?"

Stiles's face puckers. Really? Aren't there rules here? Nothing below the belt?

Literally.

"Next question," Derek says beside him, in a threat of a voice.

"Are you a native of Beacon Hills?" another reporter asks, and Stiles could kiss her.

"Yeah, born and raised." He’s glad for the easy question, but couldn’t they just google that? Clearly, they’re going for the juicy stuff, here.

"Earlier in the week, we saw a clip of your father harassing some reporters. He seemed very agitated that you'd been chosen. Have his feelings about it changed at all?"

"I... I don't know. I guess so?” Somehow he’s surprised by that. A little ashamed. “I'm pretty sure he's not agitated anymore. I haven't really checked in about it. He's probably happier now that there’s proof I’m still alive."

Derek pinches the small of his back, where no one can see (except in the horrible expression he makes that everyone takes a picture of.)

"Where's your purple suit?" someone yells from the back, but Stiles can't figure out who. Not even when he puts a hand up to block out all the flashing lights and camera glares.

"Hopefully burning in a barrel somewhere."

That actually earns a laugh from a few people; the sound boosts Stiles’s morale a little.

"Was it your idea to wear it?"

"No, it was my dad's. A form of torture. Probably for all the years I’ve shaved off his life, so far. Sorry, Dad."

"Alpha Hale, was that why you picked him?"

Stiles looks over to see Derek cocking his eyebrow for the millionth time. He's kind of interested in that answer, actually. Beyond "dude, you smell like a Bed, Bath & Beyond."

"No," Derek just says. And that's that.

"Why did you pick him, then? Compared to the past Omegas both you and your sister chose, this seems like quite a drastic departure. What made you go this direction?”

Stiles isn’t well-versed in all the Omegas the Hale family’s had through their doors, but that was an insult, wasn’t it?

“I had my reasons,” Derek just says.

“Especially in relation to Alpha Mahealani’s incident with his Omega, who’s also from Beacon Hills, do you have any comment to the sources that are claiming that that compound is out of control?”

“Beacon Hills isn’t out of control,” Stiles remarks.

"The actions of Alpha Mahealani and his Omega are their business. They have no bearing on the Beacon Hills compound as a whole. We're done with questions," Derek says, just this side of contemptuous.

Suddenly, there's another beastly surge in the crowd, like a scorned lover or dueler finding the chink in the opponent's armor and just wanting to let loose on it over and over and over again.

Derek quickly steers Stiles around and opens the door for him to go in first.

"Hey, does this make me the Alpha in this whole...scenario?" he says, though, in some strange urge to diffuse the situation. "Because I’m cool with that. "

"Just go."

"Going."

^

Stiles can’t remember being stared at so much or so hard in his life. Not even during the fifth grade Lucanery pageant, when he barfed on stage in front of everybody. The people in the restaurant are trying to pretend like they're not staring, which somehow makes it even more obvious that they are. He can hear the typing of texts, the dings and vibrations of messages received from table to table, the shutter snaps as they take photos. This is the most tactless room he's ever been in.

They could learn a thing or two from his mom.

So much for press not being allowed inside.

He keeps close to Derek as the maître d' leads them on a winding path toward the back, nearly stumbling into him so many times that Derek just ends up putting an arm around him again, if only to keep him from taking them both down.

There's a man sitting at the empty table the maître d’s gunning for, tucked up in a corner. He has his back to Stiles though, the only identifier being his long, slicked-down, brown hair.

Derek doesn't say a word to clue Stiles in. But he goes from annoyed-tense to danger-tense in zero flat. His hand tightens around Stiles.

No, thanks, Stiles doesn’t need to breathe. Or know this apparently vital information. Derek’s gonna murder this guy, but that’s cool—

They're to the table in five seconds anyway. Stiles fights off Derek’s arm and circles around to see the man’s a smiling Alpha Peter Hale, with his hands caged together under his chin. And he's not actually there — he's a hologram.

He—it? looks up at Stiles, like it can actually see him standing there, gawking at it.

Stiles follows the hologram's light trail up to what looks like a projector lens in the ceiling corner, catching particles of dust in its glare. Huh. Cool.

"Hello," the Peter hologram says behind him, and Stiles whips back to face him. "You must be Stiles."

He regards it awkwardly. "Yes, and you're a hologram."

It laughs, though it seems patronizing. "Aren’t you sharp."

"Stiles," Derek says, coming around next to him. Somehow, he boxes himself in front of Stiles a little, though Stiles could’ve sworn he was standing right up against the table. "This is my Uncle Peter. I’m sure he just wanted to say hi. Then he was leaving." His voice is lower than Stiles has ever heard it before, even lower than it was for the press outside.

Stiles ignores him completely. "This is awesome! I've never seen a hologram up close before. Do you mind—?" he leans over Derek like he’s not even there and passes his hand straight through Peter's chest. This must be what seeing a ghost is like.

"Ouch," Peter says, a bit of a tease to it, and Stiles pulls his hand back, suddenly very aware of where he is and what he’s doing. Did Peter really feel it?

Peter just smiles. Even when he looks at Derek he doesn’t stop, despite Derek's obvious frothing at the mouth.

Seriously, rabies shot, table twelve.

"You picked an interesting Omega this time, Derek. I've read all about him in the feeds. Not everyone can wear a purple suit and get away with it, can they? There're some very interesting Omegas in Beacon Hills."

"I've said my greetings. You can leave now," Derek monotones, overly strained.

The hologram turns back to Stiles, offers him a pitying expression. "He used to be much less of an antisocial little brute when he was younger. Where did we go wrong, Stiles? Now he just runs around, grunting and frowning and pushing people like a neanderthal."

Stiles doesn't know why that makes him laugh. It's an insult, he shouldn't laugh. But he can't help it. Nervous reaction. Derek's about to go full-up on a hologram of his uncle, and then the whole restaurant’ll break out into a riot, and Stiles is going to be the one hiding under a table while good food goes to waste. No big deal.

"I'm going to end your transmission," Derek mutters and, passing behind Stiles, adds, "Don't say a word to him."

So Stiles does the exact opposite. Telling him not to talk is like telling someone not to push the shiny, red button right in front of them.

He sits down with a low "Wow. I don't envy you right now."

"We're not the closest of family anymore," Peter admits freely. Too freely. Like they’re friends already or he wants to win Stiles over to his side.

"So, what? Did you steal his toys when you were little or make fun of his comics or something? Not that he’s the Mother Teresa of tempers, but, I mean, did I mention he looks like he really hates you?"

Peter's smile actually wavers at that, but not for long. The little hairs on Stiles's neck stand straight up. "We've just never quite seen eye-to-eye on things, you could say. He's a bit too soft."

"Soft?" Stiles snorts. But he believes it. No, he knows it, in cold, hard facts. Lots of...hard facts. He's spent the last seven days in Derek's softness.

But if Peter thinks that Derek is soft, what must Peter be like? All prejudgments and gossip aside, Stiles doesn't really know him at all. He hardly even remembers seeing him around Beacon Hills, when the Hales still lived there.

Suddenly, Stiles's wishing for the awkwardness of the reporters again and the staring, the bright lights to focus on. Or food. Wow, speaking of which, this place really smells good.

He glances around for a waiter, fingers drumming on the table.

"Well," Peter breathes resignedly, smiling still. "I'm sure he'll turn me off any second now. I just wanted to meet you. But I should be getting back to my own date. Please tell Derek it was good to see him and I meant no offense. I know he won't believe you, but better you than me."

The hologram cuts out abruptly, whether because of Peter's creeper magic or because Derek got to the projector. But the point is he’s gone, and the prophecy of Derek flipping tables is very likely not going to come to pass anymore.

That might've actually been pretty cool to see. Another story to tell Scott, at least. Something to overshadow Stiles’s date with the ground out front, too.

Derek shows back up a minute later, expression blank. He kicks the chair Peter's hologram had been in away from the table and takes a seat in the one closest to Stiles, everyone's eyes — and cameras — on him. He sends a dirty look around the room, as if to say, “post this footage and die.”

“Evening, sunshine,” Stiles remarks.

He should really start calling Derek “Sunshine,” completely unironically.

"He didn't bother you, did he?"

"We had a great talk about the weather and puppies," Stiles says, picking at the tassel on the menu.

"Stiles, damn it. I meant it when I said you shouldn't talk to him."

“I kinda got that before, when you spelled it out with the whole “don’t talk to him” bit. But it was fine. He seemed okay.”

“I’m serious, Stiles.” Derek looks angry. Stiles knows it’s not at him — okay, he thinks it’s not at him, at least — but it feels like it is, all the same. He’s not going to make a distinction when it’s coming at him.

“Okay, I get it. You don’t have to tell me twice. I had it under control. Nothing happened.”

“You don’t get it. You shouldn’t question me when I tell you these things. You should just do what I say. I’ve already been there and I know better.”

Stiles's mouth drops wide.

If he thought Derek warped back into the bridge troll around the press, that was nothing compared to the aggressive stonewall he’s putting up right now.

"Correction," Stiles says, scowling in defense, "I’m an Omega, not a kid. I know you really don't owe me anything, but there seems like, like there’s something you’re just dying to tell someone, and I might as well be that someone because I’d kind of like to think I’m a trustworthy person, who you can, you know, trust. Go figure. I could do without the cryptic bullshit, though. You're going to have to give me something to go on here, before I just shut somebody out because you say you know better." Not that Stiles had any plans to call Peter up for a nice chit-chat or tea party, but seriously, he’s kind of his own man, here. He doesn’t need a lookout. Least of all one who’s still, at the end of the day, pretty much a stranger.

He can make bad decisions on his own and be happy because they’re his. And at least when Peter decapitates him, he’ll be comfortable knowing he got to that sad, sad place all by himself.

"Just trust me," is all Derek gives him, but he looks a little pained about it.

"I would, but, oh wait, we've only known each other a week." Somehow that sounds bitterer than Stiles meant it. But he doesn’t need another father.

"We've known each other since we were little," Derek asserts. Like it matters. Like they ever actually said more than two words to each other, back then.

"Wow, you know, I forgot playing t-ball at recess is the true foundation of a lasting friendship."

Derek's brow furrows. Neanderthal 101. "Stiles, I don't want to talk about it here."

"Does that mean you will talk about it somewhere else? Or does it mean ‘end of discussion’ because you can’t be seen arguing with one of those out of control Beacon Hills Omegas?” Why is he pushing this? Why does it matter? “Because one of those answers is incorrect. Do you need a hint?"

Derek just looks at him for a long minute, like he almost can't believe Stiles had the balls to say any of what he just said (Stiles can't really believe it either, now that he's replaying it in his head). He can tell Derek's weighing his options, though, rather than just shutting him down entirely, which is a little surprising. When it comes down to it, he doesn't have to tell Stiles anything; Stiles knows that. He goes home tomorrow, and they'll probably never talk to each other again. It won't matter in the long run, and maybe Stiles can’t handle the truth, anyway.

He doesn’t even know why he’s pushing it. Why he cares. It’s not because he’s stupid enough to think this heat means something more than it does. It’s not because he’s insulted; he’s already over what Derek said— he’s halfway to conceding its truth, even. And Derek could just save his sob story for one of those biopic specials, if he really needs to tell someone, sometime.

But something about this just has Stiles feeling like he needs to make Derek talk to him about it, and not ignore it. In the same way that he sometimes thinks it’d be for the best if someone just sat him down and made him talk — really made him talk — about how hard his mom’s death still is on him and his dad. Because he won’t do it otherwise, and at least if someone made him, they’d be taking responsibility for wanting a share in his pain, and he’d be free of the responsibility of having forced it on them. He might resent them for it, but at least he wouldn’t feel guilty about it. And at least he wouldn’t be alone in it, anymore.

Even Stiles and his dad haven’t really sat down and just bared it all to each other. Sometimes his dad will say things when he’s half-crocked, but it’s not the same.

That’s why Stiles is pushing. He feels like—

He knows where Derek’s coming from. He knows some of what Derek’s going through, and Derek can trust him with it.

In a way…it’s like he’s looking at himself.

He’s looking at himself.

…Wow.

”Uh…” he says, more to himself, nervously gnawing at a hang nail as he looks over at Derek sitting there, all tensed up, lost in his own head, too.

Wow.

Oh god.

If he makes Derek talk to him about this kind of stuff, maybe Derek will force him to talk, too, and he—

“Wow, uh…” Stiles looks around for the waiter again. Does no one work here? “So hey, here’s a deal for you, Derek: I’m just going to take back everything I said. Forget I even said it. It’s unsaid. Erased from time and space as we know it. We’re going to redo that. Yes, I will stay away from Peter. You know better. I should just trust you. I don’t need to know anything. That’s your business. We’re good. Let’s eat. No talking.”

"No," Derek mutters, after a long pause.

”No?” Stiles mimics. No eat? No food? No talk? No good? No what?

“No, you shouldn’t just trust me.” He catches Stiles’s eyes. “You shouldn’t trust anyone.”

The waiter comes, then. Derek orders for Stiles who, yeah, was too dumbfounded to, anyway.

^

After that, it gets better. Not surprising, considering the starting point was pretty low.

Derek loosens up some. It's probably because he gets a huge steak to take his frustration out on, but also, Stiles suspects, because Derek has him to focus on. He gives Stiles half his plate, even though Stiles has an entire meal for himself and then some, with all the sides and in-between froufrou courses. Stiles actually seems to reach a limit at one point, which he never thought could happen. But it turns out to be a false alarm because as soon as the waiters bring out the cake, he's going to town again.

He’s really going to miss eating well.

There are just as many people outside when they finally leave at last call, but Derek doesn't stop to take questions this time. Doesn't let Stiles stop, either, although he kind of wants to, just to see what they have to say, how good their research skills really are. From one aficionado to another.

But he trusts Derek’s instincts about the situation, and he should’ve trusted them back there with Peter, too. He shouldn’t have gone around picking fights, but he just really hated being told what to do, being told not to trust someone based completely on assertions, without any kind of hard proof or olive branch extended to let him in on whatever the bad blood was.

If nothing else, tonight’s really sunk in the fact that there's something about Derek that is still such an open wound, it makes it very easy to lose ground with him and even easier for him to turn defensive and demanding, especially when he feels threatened. Even with such a non-threat as Stiles, Derek’s had moments this past week where he was putting on that same tough guy act. Because he needed control. He needs control, even if it's only for show, even if it's only over stuff as insignificant as whose hologram Stiles talks to for two seconds, before dinner. Stiles guesses that it's some kind of residue of Derek not having had control over all the significant things in his life — the murder of his family in the house fire or the loss of his sister or becoming an alpha, having to all of a sudden just know how to run compounds, to take care of and be responsible for an entire pack, to be depended on and held accountable if he failed, to face the very real threat of people wanting to oust him, just like they tried to before… Not to mention whatever the hell Peter must've done to make Derek rear up like he did, earlier.

Stiles gets it. Trying to keep a tight fist around the small things is Derek's way of coping through the big things, like research is for Stiles. Stiles even should probably be sort of proud that, regardless of the circumstances, an Alpha somehow feels threatened by him, if only just a little. But on the best days it's only annoyed him, and on the worst he kind of really hates it. Like today. Which is why, when they're firmly locked in the privacy of the limousine, Stiles just looks at Derek and opens his arms wide.

Derek gets this expression on his face like he's not sure what it means, like he’s suspicious of the intention behind it. Like he thinks that if he surrenders to Stiles, it'll mean more than it should or he'll be giving something crucial away, letting Stiles have too much control over him to turn around and wreck him later.

Stiles persists.

"It's just a hug, dude," he says, affecting a dull tone so he doesn't spook him. Weird, Derek's actually scared of something as asinine as this is. "I'm pretty good at them. Call me crazy, but it seems like you kind of need one. Or several. In varying intensities."

For a tense minute, Stiles thinks Derek's just going to reject it. He almost does. Stiles’s heart picks up some, watching Derek silently fight with himself. His heart is beating fast, too. Faster than it has all night.

He can hold Stiles like he wants to break him when they have sex, but this—this is hard for him.

Stiles wiggles his fingers, waiting.

Without a word, Derek leans toward him.

He doesn't come all the way, and he doesn't raise his arms to return the hug. He just hangs there, hovering between Stiles’s arms, until Stiles gets the bright idea to close them around him and pull him in the rest of the way. His spikes push uncomfortably into the side of Stiles's head, but Stiles doesn't care enough to do anything about them. Neither does Derek.

“…How long’s it been since you had one of these,” Stiles says into his hair, somehow not really a question.

Derek sags against him.

^

They stay like that the entire ride home. Right up until the car pulls to a stop outside Derek's house. And then Derek's clambering out of Stiles's arms before Garrison can open the door and catch him weak.

“What the Hell…” Stiles slurs at a confused Garrison.

Chapter Text

Inside the house, Stiles is kind of too wiped to argue when Derek tells him to go on to the bedroom without him. He needs to make a few private calls, he says (possibly to smooth over Stiles’s nationally-broadcast bombs earlier; possibly to also arrange a mercy killing). It occurs to Stiles, only belatedly, that it was a lie.

Maybe by ‘make some calls’ what Derek really means is that he wants to go somewhere out of sight and break things or hit things or tear things apart. Or some combination of the three. Stiles doesn’t really know why that’s the direction his mind chooses to go in, first. Despite that he’s apparently been conditioned to humor these ideas of Derek as a harsh and savage alpha, ninety-nine point nine nine nine percent of the last several days has proven otherwise. Derek had even held himself back in the face of his uncle, which seemed to take a lot. But he did kick the chair, and maybe with it the switch back to Stiles’s old habits, at least for the moment. It’s not like only a week can undo years of assumptions about how the world is supposed to work.

He can’t lie and say he doesn’t understand the satisfaction of breaking stuff in anger, though. Even if for him it was just that one time, when he ripped the hood ornament off the hearse that drove his mother’s coffin to the cemetery. He’d really tried to force it back on, but the car hadn’t taken it back, no matter how much he’d wanted it to. It was pretty fitting, now that he thinks about it.

Stiles doesn’t hear anything as he slugs through the long walk to Derek’s bedroom, and he doesn’t hear anything for the five minutes that he stands outside the door, ears pricked up. Not even so much as a footstep or the foundation settling, no kick of the air conditioning.

The place is a morgue.

He remembers Derek telling him something about soundproofing or noise cancelling systems or whatever to keep spying at a minimum (that minimum being zero), but he guesses it never really sank in until now. A blessing and a curse.

In any case, he trips into the bedroom and down onto the bed with a raspberry of a sigh, bored already. It’s kind of weird, he’s been so attached to Derek at the hip — yeah, we’ll go with the diplomatic “hip” — all week that it only makes the solitariness that much more apparent. By default, Stiles always sort of needs a point to focus on, something to do, some way to be useful, or his brain starts to nag him into any and every impulse that comes to mind, and all he ends up with is a bunch of half-baked ventures and a lot of frustration. But with Derek gone, rather than getting overwhelmed by everything else, it’s like all he can focus on is that. It’s like there’s a void there, where Derek should be, and it’s the most demanding thing in the room. Stiles gets the same sensation with Scott and his dad sometimes, too. But this is definitely the quickest it’s ever happened.

Or maybe it happened a long time ago, when Derek first left Beacon Hills, and Stiles just got so used to the void, he had to have it filled and emptied again to realize it never left.

Absently, his hand coasts the bed for nothing, looking for nothing at all — looking for Derek — and knocks into Derek’s tablet, just lying there, forgotten. And suddenly he’s not tired at all. Maybe he can call home or Google himself or see if Derek has a diary.

“Dear Diary,” he says to no one, smirking. “Today I became a man at the hands of a sex god. His name: Stiles ‘The Stiles’ Stilinski.”

Derek probably has a shitload of porn on the thing, too. He probably goes for the really vanilla stuff. Just to throw everyone for a loop. It’s always the ones who look like they want to tie you up.

Stiles hooks the tablet over to him with a lone lazy finger, in no hurry to go to the trouble of propping himself up on an elbow. But the promise of Derek humiliation awaits, and there’s no one around to deny him a good invasion of privacy.

There’re, like, twenty buttons along the sides of the thing, just begging Stiles to touch them all, every single one. But he’s gonna try to practice some restraint for once and go with the huge one that has an imprint of an eye on it; it seems to be subtly saying, “Seriously, dummy, I’m your button!”

The screen flashes on and a green WELCOME goes bounding across it to the jingle of a little boot-up music jam. Before Stiles can really get a groove going, it quiets and splits down the middle with two touch-buttons:

VOICE / SILENT

Intrigued, thy name is Stiles. He taps the VOICE one—

And lets out a startled little cough of a laugh when a robotic woman starts to talk, seemingly out of nowhere.

“Face scan engaged.”

The tablet sensor reads Stiles’s face before he can even comprehend what’s happening or wonder if his ugly expression is somehow gonna mess it up. “Welcome, Stiles Stilinski.” Stilinsky, it says. Even advanced technology can’t get it right. And since it recognized him just fine, does that mean the picture of him on file has the same ugly expression? He really doesn't want to think too hard about that.

“My name is Erica, which stands for “Electronic Response Intuiting Computer Assistant.” Please use the stylus for the preservation of my surface.”

Stiles’s face goes from fish-mouthed to clown-smiling in less than a second. “Whoa, nice,” he breathes, awestruck. Then, “Wait, what’s a stylus? It’s, like, the singular of Stile—”

“Stylus – a pen used for writing on electronic touch surfaces. Please disengage it from the side compartment. The trigger is the little green button.”

”I knew that.” Stiles searches out the aforementioned button and isn’t ready for the small white tube that spits out at him when he presses it.

“Nice one, Stilinski.” He fumbles it up in his fingers, holding it out for some serious examination. It’s really just a pen with no ink, no clicker. There’s a pointed tip, grooves in the side for grippage, and a small cutout of the company’s eye logo on the flat back end. Otherwise, it’s nothing special. It doesn’t do anything. Doesn’t shoot lasers come apart to reveal any high-tech weaponry.

“I know this guy back home who has one of these. But,” he scratches the tip against his palm just to be sure there’s no trick to it, no bells or whistles, “he never let me mess with it. He was the kid with all the cool toys. Scientific fact, there’s always one of them in every group, and they’re usually assholes.”

“Is that so,” the voice — Erica — says. Sounds like she’s really on the edge of her seat about it, too. Like she could listen to him go on and on about it. What other choice would she have? Finally, someone who has to listen to every word out of his mouth.

Greatest invention or greatest invention?

“What would you like to do this evening?” Erica asks.

“What can I do?”

Columns of tiny icons shuffle up from the steely, sterile background — ‘apps,’ Stiles vaguely remembers Jackson calling them, but who knows if he wasn’t just making stuff up for shits and giggles. Erica starts down the rows, lighting up each one as she reads off the names and functions.

He stops her at the internet, already impatient to see what kind of damage he can really do with this thing. “Let’s go with that, the internet.”

“Good idea, Stiles.”

He gets a little thrill at her saying his name. Pairing it with “good idea” didn’t hurt.

A standard search engine enlarges over the screen, one that Stiles has never used, but one that looks familiar enough all the same.

“Where would you like to go? Please click the address bar—” it highlights itself “—or search bar—” also highlighted “—to begin.”

“Wait,” Stiles says, “actually, can I make a call instead?”

“Of course. What number would you like me to call?" The web page minimizes itself, and a large number pad quickly takes its place.

If Stiles knows anything about his dad, it's that he'll be on duty right now. He likes to use work to keep busy. He and Stiles are the same in that respect -- in a lot of respects, but that one especially. If they're not careful, they end up too invested in their own thoughts, and the only thing that works to distract them is throwing themselves into something else that requires even more of an investment. They can't just sit still or be idle. “Can you call the Beacon Hills Police Department?”

”There are seven possibilities for “Beacon Hills Police Department.” Please select the correct number from the drop-down menu.”

He picks out the number of his father’s office. Even if he's not there, Stiles can always call the home phone or Scott's cell, ruin whatever plans with Allison he's got going on. He could even try the hospital, see if Scott's mom’s there. She’d probably actually be happy to hear his voice on the other end of the line for once. It’d beat him calling in to ask about dead bodies and what exactly does happen if you accidentally ingest, say, poison ivy?

“You have selected the number for the sheriff's office of the Beacon Hills Police Department,” Erica says. “Say ‘call’ if correct."

He can't speak fast enough.

"Calling... Please wait.”

“Hello, this is the sheriff’s office of the Beacon Hills Police Department. Deputy Fitzgerald speaking,” an unfamiliar voice says after a few rings; Stiles can't put a face to the name, despite the fact that the station is like a second home to him, and has been for years. After his mom died, his father was always bringing him around, afraid something bad would happen if he let him out of his sight for even a second. It got to be that Stiles was there so much, having to keep an eye on him practically became a requisite of cadet training. Not much has changed over the years, except his dad’s resolve to try and keep him away from the place and out of police business and his resolve to insert himself into it, as often as possible.

“Hello? Hello, who’s there? This is Deputy Fitzgerald speaking.”

Stiles’s throat clenches up some. He has to swallow first. “Sorry, is the sheriff there?”

“He’s out on a call right now. What can I help you with? Can I take a message for him?”

Stiles is silent a beat. If he leaves a message, it’ll just make his dad worry. His dad’s a worrier. He shouldn’t leave one. “No. That’s okay. Thanks.”

“No problem.”

With a click, the call ends and Erica brings the number pad back up. “Can I make another call for you, Stiles?”

Calling Scott proves to be another lesson in disappointment because his phone's off. At least Erica has the capacity to apologize in his place.

"Can I make another call for you, Stiles?" she asks again.

He could try for oh-and-three and call the hospital, but they're probably swamped, and anyway, Mrs. McCall's almost as big a worrier as his dad. Even if Stiles did get through to her, she might just take him calling as some desperate cry for help, and then it'd spiral out into a game of Telephone with his dad, and before Stiles could blink, there'd be cruisers full of cops outside Derek's house, waiting to swarm the house.

He’ll be home tomorrow. It's not like he can't wait another few hours. “The internet’s cool. Thanks.”

Once Erica’s enlarged the homepage again, he taps the stylus against the search bar. It prompts a letter pad across the lower half of the screen, and she reads the characters off as he chooses them.

“S-T-I-L-E-S-S-T-I-L-I-N-S-K-I. You are searching ‘Stiles Stilinsky.’ Click SEARCH if correct.”

It’s physically impossible not to search for yourself at least once in your life. He’s got no shame.

So this is his millionth time. No one’s counting. At least now something’ll come up, other than a few old school awards, the Lucanery Pageant “incident” and his mom’s obituary.

He clicks SEARCH.

The browser seems to lag for a couple seconds before it spits him back onto the homepage, the search bar blank of his name.

“I’m sorry,” Erica says, and is it possible she sounds robotically sympathetic? “It appears the term ‘Stiles Stilinsky’ and all of its derivatives have been blocked from search on this console, at this time.”

“Wha…” Stiles scowls. “Huh?”

“User Derek Hale has placed a block on the term ‘Stiles Stilinsky’ and all of its derivatives until May 19th, at 6PM. All content will be blocked.”

That’s tomorrow, way after Stiles is supposed to have gone home.

“So, what? I can’t search for myself?” Dumb question, way to be.

“That is correct.”

“Why not?”

“No reason was noted in the restriction instructions.”

So…Stiles can’t look himself up. Minor wrench in the operation.

Maybe it’s for the best. It was probably logical forethought on Derek’s part to put up the block, anyway. Stiles got a five-second taste of how intense the press could be, tonight. A five-second taste, compared to Derek’s entire life with it. There’s no telling what kind of good and bad things have been said about Stiles — and Derek in relation to him — the past several days, and he doesn’t think he could keep his curiosity from tearing through anything and everything he could find with his name in it, without the block there to stop him. He jokes a lot and he’s got the knee-jerk sarcasm down to a science, and maybe he could handle everything like the champ he is, but at heart he’s a sensitive guy. Lydia never bought it as one of his many selling points, but he is. Things get to him.

Doesn’t mean he can’t be annoyed about the block. In fact, he’s gonna do his level best to up his annoyance, just out of spite. Geez, really, how did he get through eighteen years without having Derek, The Shield, around to keep away the big bad wolves? How is Stiles not dead yet? Dismembered in a ditch somewhere? Decapitated by good old Uncle Petey?

Again, sensitive guy here.

Okay. He can’t search himself.

But maybe he can search Derek.

Yeah, Stiles, because Derek is that stupid…

He clicks back over to the search bar anyway. Erica reads the letters off for him.

“D-E-R-E-K-H-A-L-E. You are searching ‘Derek Hale.’ Click SEARCH if correct.”

It looks promising for only a millisecond before he’s being cycled back to the homepage and the search bar comes up blank. Again.

“I’m sorry. It appears the term ‘Derek Hale’ and all of its derivatives have also been blocked from search on this console, at this time.”

Did Stiles really believe, for even one moment, that that was going to work? Wishful thinking, at best. Not his greatest idea.

He taps the search bar again. One last try.

“J-A-C-K-S-O-N-W-H-I-T-T-E-M-O-R-E. You are searching ‘Jackson Whittemore.’ Click SEARCH if correct.”

No sooner has he laid the stylus on the SEARCH button than thousands upon thousands of results spring up, as if to spite the two blocked searches before it.

And that would be the epitome of ‘unblocked’ right there.

So Derek didn’t childproof everything.

The top five rated results are all videos. Stiles nods appreciatively, snickering through the dopily sinister smile on his face. This is going to be good.

He clicks on the first one, dubbed Alpha Mahealani Submits to Omega? (because with a title like that, it has to be the first one). It enlarges to cover the whole of the screen, a loading circle blinking around in the center. Nice to know even the high-tech stuff isn’t safe from buffering problems.

“One moment for complete loading,” Erica says. “If you would like a better viewing experience, please turn the tablet ninety degrees.”

That Stiles does. As soon as he’s got it flipped long-ways, the video starts.

It’s a newscast on the footage from Alpha Mahealani’s party, the one that Derek mentioned a few days ago. The reporter starts off introducing the clip with pretty throw-away words, mostly just background to set up the scene, saying what Stiles kind of already knows or could figure out on his own. He forwards to the part with less talking and more action.

The footage opens with a brief montage of scenes from the party. The huge party, in the back gardens of what looks like Alpha Mahealani’s house. The quality of the picture is actually surprisingly clear as it pans around the place, so it must be from one of the press cameras, though Stiles bets there’re several dozen — even several hundred — other lower quality versions alongside this one, just like he bets there’re a ton of people wanting to cash in their videos of his and Derek’s dinner tonight, despite any threats on their lives.

Alpha threats don’t really seem to have much sway where huge press payoffs are concerned, it turns out. Stiles would bother being more surprised if he weren’t currently jonesing on the high of watching Jackson get humiliated for all the world to see.

When it finally settles in on Alpha Mahealani, the camera’s maybe ten feet away from him. Close enough to pick up the shine of his suit buttons as clearly as it does his conversation with the party guests standing around him. He has Jackson at his side, looking a little sick, feverishly pale and covered with sweat. He keeps almost too close to Alpha Mahealani, swaying on his feet, one hand wringing over and over in Alpha Mahealani’s suit sleeve. His head must weigh a ton, too, because it keeps wilting into Alpha Mahealani’s shoulder. That or he’s just using him as a sweat rag. But he tries — tries and is failing — to nod and engage when people talk at him, tries to put on a good smile, tries to be the douchebag the party deserves.

In slow-motion, Stiles flinches back. That’s an Omega heat-face. Hundred bucks says that’s exactly what he looked like, that first night with Derek. Minus the cheekbones and the nice suit.

And Derek still screwed him. Now that’s true Alpha diplomacy.

This is so much more embarrassing, though. There’s gotta be over five hundred other people at the party, all of them looking like they stepped off a magazine cover, with cameras and attention poised for the next headline. And considering that Jackson acted like a Beta all his life, he and his parents must’ve been working overtime to suppress his heats; this must’ve been his first real one. Couple that with Alpha pheromones and cameras and stress, and it was a perfect storm. The reporters knew what they were coming for. Stiles can’t even muster up a laugh about it. For once, maybe some pity’s in order for Jackson. Pity or mockery, whichever comes easiest.

Surprisingly, it turns out to actually be envy. Instead of humiliating himself by humping everything and everyone at the party, Jackson somehow rerouted his heat enough to cause a scandal that could literally destroy Alpha Mahealani.

Touched. It’s gotta be. The dude is just literally touched.

But why Alpha Mahealani let him get this bad, why he didn’t take him somewhere to cool off or end the party early, Stiles doesn’t get. He’d seemed like a pretty decent guy, all things considered, and Stiles can’t imagine the same person he saw at the Choosing is the one who’d subject Jackson to something like this.

Unless somehow, in the few hours between the Choosing and the party, Jackson pissed him off enough to warrant this level of embarrassment as punishment.

…Not a real stretch of the imagination.

The camera zooms in as Jackson hooks a shaky arm around Alpha Mahealani’s neck and pulls him down to whisper in his ear. Either the camera audio doesn’t pick up what he says or he doesn’t talk for a minute, because they just stand there like that, frozen, no sound except for that of the party around them. Alpha Mahealani’s face is soft, though. Understanding.

And then, all of a sudden, a subtitle goes across the screen that reads I really need to fuck you.

Stiles could’ve gone his whole life without ever seeing those words, in that order, come out of Jackson’s mouth.

He has to look away for a second, even. Beyond just being scarred for life, speaking as one Chosen Omega to another, that was almost too brutal to witness. Even considering his raging hateboner for Jackson. There’s a bad taste in his mouth now, the unfamiliar one of secondhand-embarrassment.

Unfamiliar because Stiles is usually tasting firsthand-embarrassment and is the cause of the secondhand kind.

This whole thing should be comedic gold, though. He bets Scott’s back in Beacon Hills still laughing his ass off about it. Stiles should be, too. He really should be. If he were at home, he’d probably be glued to a video screen with Scott, watching it on repeat, no greater joy in the world.

But it just seems too personal now, here. If there were video out there of him like that— not if, when. When video comes out of him falling or talking to Peter or arguing with Derek… He doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do with that. Things were tense enough, not to mention having to worry if they were being immortalized on film, to be dissected over and over again by people who weren’t even there.

It’s going to be hard to live down just thinking this, but not even Jackson deserves to be put on display or embarrassed like that. Stiles had the privilege of getting to know and hate him the old-fashioned way, through years of living in the same compound, suffering under his fake-Beta crap and terrible personality. But to everyone else in the country, the party video was their first impression of him. To everyone who meets Jackson outside Beacon Hills from now on, he’ll be the "I need to fuck you" Omega.

And Stiles’ll be the "faceplants outside restaurants" Omega.

When he puts it in perspective like that, the future’s not really looking good for him. Suddenly, the sympathy he’s mustered for Jackson is dying. Even in epithets, Jackson still wins. The “Fuck You” Omega is so much better than the “Faceplant” Omega. The “Fuck You” Omega gets shit done. The “Faceplant” Omega just makes it worse.

Stiles chances a glance back at the tablet out the corner of his eye — like he’s watching a freakin’ horror movie or something, Night of the Living Boners — and sees Jackson grab a fistful of Alpha Mahealani’s collar and start hauling him through the crowd, face scrunched up and ugly compared to Alpha Mahealani’s blank expression. Sounds of shock scale off around them, higher and higher as they get further and further across the grounds, but not one of the guests stands in their way.

The weirdest thing about it isn’t that Jackson does it, but that it seems like Alpha Mahealani, on top of going without anything near a struggle, actually motions for his guards to stand down when they start toward the two of them.

“It was planned…?” Stiles mutters.

“Excuse me, I didn’t catch that,” Erica says, flat.

“Nothing. Sorry, Erica.”

“Okay.”

Stiles exits out of the video as soon as the newscaster comes back on, goes for the next one on the page without a thought, before Erica can prompt him. It’s of a press conference, dated the morning after the party. Alpha Mahealani looks completely unimpressed, as he sits under the unforgiving lights and fields questions about the party “scandal.”

Which he pretty obviously doesn’t think is one.

Did you discipline him for insubordination?

—No.

Have you begun making preparations in the event he challenges you as Alpha?

—I haven’t. I’m not worried about that happening. He shrugs.

Any insight into why he acted the way he did?

—There were extenuating circumstances. I think anyone has a right to be a little rude when they’re as out of their element as he was. I was never in any danger. I didn’t feel challenged. I understood his position and he mine. It’s that simple.

Okay, so Stiles is developing a small mancrush on this guy, if just for his inborn tact.

Care to elaborate on those extenuating circumstances?

—Not really. That’s between Jackson and his family.

You have to admit it does seem a bit problematic to have an Omega force an Alpha out of a room.

—Yes, but not without asking why. I already said I didn’t feel threatened. No matter how it looked, I went willingly. That should be all that matters. Who cares who led?

That raises a serious stink of disapproving noise in the audience, and Alpha Mahealani, so far solemn-faced, looks at some point off-screen, his jaw tightening so much a dimple starts to show.

—The people who’ve made an issue out of this are not part of my camp, he says, after a few seconds’ pause, turning his attention back to the audience. And they’re wasting their time. Just like I am, sitting here. And with that, he gets up and walks out of the conference. Like it’s just that simple to do.

It is for an Alpha.

Stiles laughs. Alpha Mahealani, throwing shade so well it's practically an art. That’s the kind of Alpha he would want to be, if he were one. And if he were anyone else but himself. He’s pretty sure that level of devil-may-care attitude just wasn’t built into his model, Alpha status notwithstanding.

The video stops shortly after Alpha Mahealani’s blunt escape and Erica asks if she can play the next one for him. “Sure, go ahead.”

This one’s dated only two days later, smack in the middle of heat week, and titled “Alpha Mahealani Criticizes Critics.” It looks like he’s attending one of those Banquets For Important People that Stiles has only ever seen on video screens. The controversial thing this time —because apparently Alpha Mahealani’s eighteen and attracts controversy like horny Omegas — is that he’s not flying solo; Jackson’s there with him.

Speaking of horny Omegas.

Stiles was at the peak of his heat that day. There’s no way Derek would’ve taken him anywhere. He wouldn’t’ve taken himself anywhere. He’d been on Derek every hour, on the hour, whether Derek had wanted him or not. It had made for some awkward mid-pee jumping of bones, but Stiles hadn’t cared at the time (now…not so much with the not caring. More with the caring. The caring a lot. He interrupted Derek peeing on more than one occasion. Nothing’s sacred anymore.) He can’t imagine Jackson wasn’t like that too, if not even worse. Alpha Mahealani taking him out was just asking for trouble.

Again, seriously wondering if Jackson didn’t just piss him off enough for Alpha Mahealani to want to embarrass the crap out of him in public, as much as possible.

Nah. He probably begged Alpha Mahealani to take him along. It just seems like something he’d do. Probably told him he could handle it. It’ll be easy. I’m Jackson Whittemore, I can do anything. Smirk, smirk, smirk.

The two of them stop outside the banquet hall to answer questions, the same as Stiles and Derek did at the restaurant. There are screaming fans all around them, and both Alpha Mahealani and Jackson are all smiles, though Jackson’s keep melting off, quicker and quicker each time, like he’s slowly but surely getting overwhelmed, too much to focus on and just not enough attention to manage it.

The cameras pan away from their faces and down to what looks like a gold collar and leash, overtop the neck of Jackson’s dark green suit and white shirt. In lieu of a tie…guy’s got on a leash.

Kind of a little heavy-handed, considering the whole werewolf-dog thing.

Stiles doesn’t know if it’s some kind of new fashion trend or political statement. Maybe Alpha Mahealani just really likes bondage and wanted to shout it from the rooftops. But he’s only barely holding onto the end, giving Jackson so much slack the chain swings every time Jackson so much as moves.

The first thing out of one reporter’s mouth is a question about it.

Alpha Mahealani just grins deeper, his dimples deep-set and somehow mischievous. “Well, I was given such a hard time about being able to control my heatmate, I thought that the leash might shut up some of the critics.”

“We didn’t expect to see you tonight, Omega Whittemore. How’re you taking this all in?”

Despite the hound of the mics and cameras and flashing lights, Jackson manages a half-assed shit-eating grin. But that’s all he manages. It turns out he isn’t much better at handling the public than Stiles was. He actually might be worse, if his ‘I’m talking normally, but if you really listen to anything I’m saying, it makes absolutely no sense, I’m so horny right now’ schtick is anything to go by. Which gives Stiles an equal and endless sort of ‘this will never die because I will not let it’ satisfaction. Jackson doesn’t say anything profound. He doesn’t change the world with a look. He just is…Jackson. The Jackson Stiles knows and doesn’t love, bogged down with his heat and wearing a leash.

Still, to his credit, he somehow hasn’t run Alpha Mahealani out of the country yet.

It seems like it would take a lot to really shake Alpha Mahealani, though, and what he does near the end of the video proves that one hundred percent, without a doubt; doubt is dead, dead and buried. After maybe a half dozen more questions, he politely declines the rest and actually lets go of the leash and follows Jackson’s lead into the banquet hall. The crowd erupts behind them.

If people think he’s one of the “bad” Alphas, Stiles kind of worries for the future. At least Alpha Mahealani can roll with the punches and doesn’t shy away from calling a spotlight on the backward stuff the administrations enforce, and at least he has a sense of humor about it, even if it lands him in hot water. Jackson could learn a thing or two from him about loosening up – probably everyone could.

The video ends and Erica asks Stiles if he’d like to watch the next in the series, which looks like a roundtable discussion on the incident. He’ll pass on that bloodbath. It’ll just end up being a bunch of extremist traditionalists who think they know what’s best for everyone, despite the fact that they’re likely rich, at least Beta class and have never been told ‘no’ in their lives. Stiles clicks back out to the main page and keys in a new search.

“P-E-T-E-R-H-A-L-E. You are searching ‘Peter Hale.’ Click SEARCH if correct.”

He doesn’t know what he expects to find. A Wikipedia page summarizing everything Peter’s ever done, with special emphasis on what he did to Derek, would be nice. Or a Derek fansite detailing their falling-out, why he and Derek seem to have a relationship Stiles could never imagine having with a member of his own family or friends. It’s one thing to have someone taken away from you by sheer force of nature, but to actually voluntarily cut them out like a tumor… To be pushed to the point that you can’t even stand to look at them or talk to them— what did Peter do to warrant that?

But Erica denies the search. There’s no date-until block, just an indefinite one. A ‘blocked until such time that user Derek Hale removes it’ block. It’ll probably coincide curiously with the day Peter dies.

Even when Stiles just does a general tablet search for anything containing Peter’s name, Erica says they’re also off-limits to him. Maybe even to Derek himself.

^

He falls asleep hours later, clothes and shoes and lights still on, Erica prompting him to restart his game of Frustrated Turtles over and over again.

Derek’s nowhere to be seen. Never came to bed.

^

Stiles doesn’t move all night except for once, briefly, when he startles awake at Derek lifting him to skin him out of his suit jacket. His shoes have already been taken off, he realizes dully.

"Go back to sleep," Derek mumbles, loosening his tie for him.

Can't argue with that.

^

The next morning is awkward and uncomfortable for Stiles, mostly because every minute passed is building up to another one of those good-byes he’s so great at. It’s only been a week. They’ve only had a week, but Stiles was actually starting to like Derek a little.

Just a little.

A little meaning a lot, again. It’s going to be weird going back to pretending like they don’t know each other. It’s going to be weird to see him on the video screens and know what happened this week and have that be it. Stiles isn’t good at it, giving people up. He likes to pretend he's not selfish, except for that. It’s just a thing with him. You lose one person, and it starts a trend. One down, one less to go. You waste time better spent on other things waiting for it to happen, until sometimes it's all you can think about, all you can see when you look at someone.

In a way, this is probably for the best, then. A clean break. No waiting for the day it ends because it's already come.

He should be grateful.

Packing doesn't take long because Stiles hardly got anything out of his bag in the first place; he mostly just wore Derek all week. He throws on a t-shirt and jeans, startlingly fresh with his scent. It's strange to think he probably smells like Derek now, will smell like Derek to his dad and Scott and Allison for a little while, and it's strange that he finds his own smell strange on his own clothes.

It’s a mindboggling concept. Really.

But there’s no Derek on them. That’s what the strangeness is, he thinks.

He and Derek have a regular sit-down breakfast at a small table in the bleach-white kitchen that Derek waves the workers out of. Derek makes it himself. Just eggs and bacon, some toast. He doesn't touch any of it, doesn't feed Stiles, and somehow Stiles thinks the food is missing something for it.

But he can’t bring himself to demand Derek do it, like he could even one day ago. The dynamic’s different, now. Lack of Derek-flavor aside, he isn’t half bad a cook, anyway, considering he’s probably had people doing it for him most of his life. And food is food; there’s no wrong in that equation, for Stiles.

As they eat, Derek asks him what he did on the tablet last night. With the exception of the blocked searches, Stiles tells him. Tells him about calling home and playing games and Jackson’s leash, which Derek just raises his brow at and says, “Danny has a death wish." They talk in vague terms, careful not to start anything that would require time past their good-bye. Derek never reveals what he was off doing, never brings up Peter or the fight at the restaurant or what, exactly, he meant by telling Stiles he shouldn't trust anyone. And Stiles doesn’t bug him about any of it. Things like that are better left ignored, especially when there's no point.

‘Stiff’ would be a good word for how it all feels. ‘Reserved,’ too. And ‘cramped.’ ‘Closed-off.’ ‘Itchy.’

…Itchy? That pretty much sums it up, right there.

^

The good-bye is the most awkward part of the whole deal, somehow worse than the one back in Beacon Hills. At least with his dad and Scott and Allison, Stiles knew he’d see them again. Derek, he’s not so sure about. If by ‘not so sure’ he means he’s so sure he’s not ever gonna see Derek again after today. Not in this capacity. Maybe on the video screens, maybe as an Alpha coming in to inspect the compound, but not as a heatmate, not as a friend.

Neither of them really says anything meaningful, though the looks are somehow unguarded and searching. They've shared the same bed, the same bathtub, the same clothes, for the past seven days, but even Stiles really can't come up with anything. What’s the etiquette in this situation? Are they supposed to shake hands and say “good work back there” or make out or cry a single manly tear? Share one last farewell jerk-off in the backseat of the car, for old time’s sake?

Eventually Stiles just offers, "Well, this wasn't as bad as I thought it was gonna be. Thanks for not eating me, really. My dad’ll appreciate that. And thanks for the whole—devirginalization thing, too. I don’t…know how my dad’ll feel about that part."

Derek only nods, the puniest excuse for a smile on his face.

“Is that really the best you can do? After all this time together? I’m giving you some grade-A good-bye here. You better smile for real or you’re gonna make me think you can’t wait to get rid of me. Is that the lasting impression you want to leave me with?”

Derek actually does him one better than just a smile or a nod: he opens his arms up for a hug.

Stiles stumbles back into the side of the car dramatically, holding a hand over his face like he can’t even bear to look at Derek like that. He sort of actually can’t. Derek just seems out of his element, unsure. “Hey, don’t kill me with shock here. Unless…you’re trying to kill me with kindness?”

Derek huffs, though it’s not harsh. “Come on,” he says. “You said I need practice.”

“You pose a good argument,” Stiles counters, trailing a little cough of a laugh. But he makes Derek sweat. Gives him a good game of “will I or won’t I?”

For all of two seconds.

For all of two seconds, he waffles around on his feet before shuffling forward. “This better not be some kind of trap.”

Derek reels him in loosely, clapping a hand hard against his back, half to get him to – “Shut up, Stiles.”

As far as hugs go, it’s nothing special. Stiles has had better. Derek stays tense, keeps his distance somehow, doesn’t seem to want to be there and can’t wait to leave. Even still, when he lets go of Stiles, Stiles doesn’t do the same back.

Which turns out to be a really telling note to end things on. But Derek doesn’t turn it around on him.

^

Stiles knows the ratio of finding your mate. He knows it’s rare, and almost everyone has to settle for second best or almost as good as or well, he was there at the time or she finally gave in, I finally wore her down! But there’s a nagging feeling, this kind of sober twist in his gut that Stiles just walked away from his, and he keeps having this tick in his hands and in his throat, in his legs, to just jump out of the car or tell Garrison to turn around or just... Just do something other than sit there like a sack of potatoes, pulling at the lock nub in the door.

But he already did do something; he asked Derek about it yesterday. Okay, not in exact terms, but if Derek felt the same pull, he would’ve said something. Right? Stiles wouldn’t have had to spell it out. Derek would’ve just known what he was talking about. If they’re mates, wouldn’t he have said something? Alphas don’t just meet their mates every day and not say something. More than “acid reflux.”

After a minute Stiles just laughs, slaps a hand against the armrest. He knows he can get hung up about the weirdest stuff, but come on. Dude. Derek’s an Alpha. Of course it would feel more, just, everything with him. Of course with all the pheromones flying, Stiles would get confused, chalk things up to being more than they actually are. Even without them, it’s not like Stiles is a stranger to overreacting. And it was his first time, too; he just hasn’t had the opportunity to build up a callous disregard for his sexual partners yet. Once he’s had a lot more sex with a lot more people, it won’t be like this. He won’t think every one of them is suddenly The One.

You’re a dumbass, he thinks. You had a memorable-in-a-good-way heat for once, and you kept the sexing of inanimate objects to a minimum. Call it a win and let that be it. Derek’s not chasing down the car. He let you go easily. He didn’t even watch you leave. At best, you’re overthinking it, like always; at worst, you’re Halved. Neither of which Derek’s really obligated to help you with. Get a grip, Stiles.

He shakes his head. Now it really is time to snap back to reality.

Sitting there in the car, it comes to him though. Derek’s smell wasn’t familiar to him just because he knew him when they were little or because he smelled it in the car before he met him. It was familiar because—

Because one of the underlying parts of it that he couldn’t name at first is also part of his own scent. All this time, it was so familiar - so right in front of his face - he didn't recognize it.

Derek’s scent is overpoweringly smoked wood and ginger, but beneath them is... Mushroom. The kinds from the woods, that smell like dirt and rain. It's the sort of thing people at school used to pick on Stiles for. Of all the stuff in the world to smell like, his genes had combo'd up to fungus. It was years before he'd learned to appreciate the finer merits of being compared to something that could survive in shit and death and spread like wildfire.

Stiles presses the sleeve of his shirt to his face, inhaling. He turns back into the headrest. Back to his sleeve. Back to the headrest.

It’s there. The same smell, weak in Derek’s scent, strong in Stiles’s.

Freakin' fungus.

^

There are a ton of people waiting outside the compound gates, when Garrison pulls up to the guard booth to be let in. In the twenty odd seconds it takes for the guards to give clearance and start cranking the gates open, the reporters overtake the car, starting up a shuddery sway back and forth. Stiles can see the dulled flashing of the cameras through the windows, can hear the doorknobs snapping as their yanked at. The locks hold, but Stiles shoves over into the middle of the backseat anyway, even just for that measly foot of space between them and him if they manage to get in.

This also looked a lot different on the video screens.

"Don’t worry, Omega Stilinski. The car is reinforced for just this reason.” Garrison meets Stiles eyes through the rearview mirror, as if to throw him a lifeline, blowing the horn as he tries to edge the car forward through the crowd. His voice is a little too strained.

"‘Reinforced’ is a nice word. I like ‘reinforced.’ That’s actually my favorite word right now. "

"Mr. Derek told them not to bother you. I’m sure Alpha Mahealani did, as well, for Omega Whittemore. …I guess they didn’t listen.”

All of a sudden Stiles goes cold. He can’t think of anything smart to say. He can’t think of anything to say at all. Up until the past week, he’d had this understanding of how everything worked: Alphas were on top of the world, sitting pretty – richer than everyone, more beautiful, more adored, more important, more powerful. Disobey them and die, that’s what he’d always thought. But now and here, it finally sinks in how wrong he was. This is the kind of world where – Alpha, Beta or Omega – you’re only as powerful as other people allow you to be. The second you fall out of favor or ask something of them that they don’t like, that power can be taken away, and easily.

In a lot of ways, Derek might as well be an Omega for all the say he really has.

“…Guess they didn’t,” Stiles says.

”At least Mr. Derek was able to put up blocks against them coming into the compound. You shouldn't be bothered, once we're inside the gates.” Garrison lays on the horn again. “At least there’s that much.”

^

A bubble of panic wells up in Stiles when they turn onto his street and he sees the lineup of at least three police cruisers outside his house; one is nothing to him, two is a little strange, and three is something even the most jaded cop’s kid would stop and stare at. But then the dark shadows of a pair of news vans catch his eye on the other side of the street, and he realizes that three cruisers is his dad’s idea of a press welcome wagon. He doesn’t want to think about what all favors his dad had to call in to get anyone to agree to what basically boiled down to barricade work for an Omega heatmate, but it’s a pretty relieving thing compared to the zoo at the front gates and the lingering clench of his stomach.

Scott and Allison waiting on his stoop is also a relieving sight, and Stiles topples out of the car so fast, even he can’t keep up with himself for a second. He almost trips into them, he’s so excited to get to them.

"Stiles!" Scott says, a big grin on his face. He shoots up and gives Stiles a one-armed hug. Allison is up a second later, supplying the other arm.

Behind them, there’s the sound of car doors opening and closing, of voices telling people to keep their distance and the pings of photos being taken, the hush of reporters staging the scene, wringing out every little detail where they can’t get a direct interview. A couple house doors open and close, too, neighbors coming out to watch, like spying through their blinds wasn’t good enough.

"It's great to have you back, Stiles," Allison says, and he can just tell she's smiling, even though her face is tucked out of sight, over his shoulder.

"Your dad's inside changing,” Scott says. “He begged off work early, he said. My mom would've come, but she got called into the hospital. She says ‘hi,’ though."

A hand nudges at Stiles’s back.

He doesn’t want to let go of either of them, but after a second he does, turning to find Garrison holding up his bag for him.

“Sorry to interrupt,” he says. “I'll return this to you and be on my way.”

Stiles takes it and butts his knuckles into Garrison’s shoulder. "So you can touch me now, huh, Gary? Hey, don’t go getting any ideas."

Garrison doesn’t bother correcting the nickname. He just nods and tips his hat at him, smiling. “It’s been my pleasure, sir. Have a good evening.”

^

His dad really doesn't want to know anything about what happened. Really doesn’t. Really, really doesn’t. At all. He's satisfied that Stiles made it back in one piece and doesn't seem too traumatized. In fact, those are his exact words. "Stiles, I'm glad you're back in one piece, kiddo. You don't look too traumatized. I guess we’ll live to see another day.” Punctuated with a hug that lasts long enough for about ten.

Allison, on the other hand, seems to want to know everything. As they sit there at the kitchen table, she gets this glint in her eyes and lays her chin in her hands, like she thinks she knows exactly what they did and just wants to put Stiles through the torture of confirming it in every gory detail. The scary thing is, Stiles can't exactly tell if she's joking or not.

And Scott—well, his face is scrunched up like he's torn between the both of them. Stiles has had to sit through more than his fair share of too much information sessions with Scott, and it's kind of refreshing to be on the giving end of that special torture for once, but the weight of his father sitting two chairs away is a serious buzz kill.

Stiles tries to keep it as vague as he can for him.

For himself, too.

Chapter Text

Except for a couple birthdays and one or two school shindigs, Stiles has never been invited to a real no-paper-hats-no-clown-no-balloons party in his life. That is, apparently, until he became an Alpha’s heatmate. Now, all of a sudden, it seems like he has some kind of social credit with the elites in the compound. People who’ve never spared him or his dad a second glance actually willingly come into their house to see him. Congratulate him. Tell him how proud they are of him. Tell his dad what a good job he did with him. And the best part is that Jackson’s parents decide to throw a huge party for the both of them at their house, a couple weekends after they’ve both gotten back.

As in, Jackson and Stiles. Two. Dos. The both of them. ‘Both’ is a magical word.

Stiles’s dad flips the invitation over and over in his hands the morning it comes, looking at it with this mask of reservation that tells Stiles he thinks it’s not a good idea but won’t quite go the distance and admit it out loud. He wears that mask a lot.

“Dad, it's just a party,” Stiles says from his lean against the living room table, milk jug in hand. “I’ll have you and Scott and Allison with me, anyway. Nothing the Stilinski pack can’t handle, right? And Allison’s pretty good with a bow.”

“I know, kiddo. It’s just that I have to work that night…” His dad rubs a hand over his mouth, raising his brow. Like he’s considering something. If the gold lettering is real gold is what Stiles wants to know. Priorities.

“Dad, come on. So you have to work. Scott and Allison’ll be there. It’s the Whittemores, not drug lords — and you would know if they were, you good cop, you. Come on, Dad? Huh, Daddy-o?” Stiles gives him a big smile, stowing the milk in an empty spot on the table between his dad's case files to do an energetic, double thumbs-up maneuver.

“…Well,” his dad says after a minute. Stiles can’t quite tell if it’s a well-yes or a well-no. Or just a well. Well-well. Well-maybe.

"Even the press is already starting to move on to the new, shiny thing. Stop living in the past."

“Okay, Stiles… You’re right,” his dad clarifies, relaxing some. “You’re right. It’s just a party.” He gets up and goes over to jostle Stiles’s shoulder, conceding a loose smile of his own. He hands him back the invitation. “You went off with an Alpha for a week. Neither of us liked it, but you, you really handled that well. I can let you go to the other side of the compound for a few hours. But I’m gonna be listening close to the APB, in case any calls come in down that way.”

“There’ll be no calls, I’ll make sure of it myself. If I see a crime about to be committed, I’ll just, I’ll say, ‘hey guys, my dad works hard enough as it is. Can we hold off ‘til tomorrow?’ One look at me and they’ll stop in their tracks. And if not…well, it was nice knowing you.”

His dad grins and shakes his head.

“Thanks mucho, Dad— gotta go tell Scott we’re a go.”

“I’m off tonight so be back for dinner.”

“Got it!”

So Stiles didn’t need Derek to get a party, after all. But as he bangs out the back door, he can’t help the thought that Derek being there would be nice.

^

Getting invited to the party sure takes the sting out of sitting down at one of the library computers that afternoon and pulling up every last article and video about him that he can find. He can’t help it. It’s like picking a scab until it scars; he just keeps going and going and going, no search block to stop him. He’s so engrossed in the cesspit that is Stiles-bashing that Mrs. Argent, the senior librarian and Allison’s intensely attractive, intensely scary mom, has to shut the computer down on him and manually show him the door.

Manually and roughly.

She clearly lifts weights in her free time.

^

The morning of the party a gift arrives. It’s a dark — almost black — purple silk suit, cut pretty close to what Stiles’s guesses are his measurements, though he’s never had a suit tailor-made for him to know. There’s no tag or note to say who it’s from, but he can smell Derek all over it, like he’d had it sent straight after days and days of wearing it. Sure, if Derek threw himself in the dryer and shrank a few sizes first.

Still, it reeks of him.

Stiles’s dad regards it the same as he did the Whittemore’s party invitation, with a heavy dose of hesitance and distrust, touching it only once, though Stiles can’t seem to stop. He’s never had anything made out of silk before, and wow, if this isn’t how to do a purple suit as right as a purple suit can ever be done. Reality should be taking notes right now, so as to avoid any unfortunate purple suits in the future, that’s how great this one is. Stiles would like to marry it. Just a thought.

He waits until his dad’s gone to work to take it upstairs, sack down on his bed and drape the blazer over his face, drugging himself on the stink of silk and Derek. It’s not like anyone but him has to know.

^

Turns out, there is a note. Stiles finds it when he shoves his hands in the pant pockets, as he gives himself a once-over in front of the mirror that night. It’s folded up small and buried way in the bottom, as if Derek didn’t want him to see it right away or didn’t want the messenger knowing it was there to sneak a peek at.

To uphold your legacy is all it says, but that’s enough. That’s Derek. Stiles smirks. He’ll be the Purple Prince until the day he dies, won’t he? The faceplanting-in-front-of-everyone, yeah-I-was-born-with-this-face, Derek-must’ve-been-paid-off-to-pick-me, how-could-anyone-get-pleasure-from-that Purple Prince. Straight from the critics’ mouths.

He folds the note back up and hides it away in the one breast pocket, under the green kerchief his dad gave him to put there as a pocket square.

So Derek’s kind of going to the party with him, after all.

^

If he’d had any lingering doubts that the suit’s a good one, they die off completely when he walks into the party with his posse of two, and Lydia, the Lydia, the Lydia Martin whose house he humped, actually, from all the way across the Whittemore’s small country of a living room, gives him an approving twice-over. There’s even a smile, a small teasing fire engine red smile on her face, and she’s doing this thing, this playing with her hair thing that she does, curling it slowly around her fingertips, first one way, then the other, coy.

And for some reason, she’s completely ignoring Jackson, who’s standing probably not even ten feet away from her, throwing back cider like it’s a lifeline.

Slack-jawed, Stiles turns to Scott, just to make sure he’s seeing it, too.

Scott leans into him with a twin expression, says out the corner of his mouth, “Dude, she totally wants you now…”

“So I’m not just imagining things again? Good to know,” he mutters back.

“You should go over and talk to her.”

“What? No—no, I…I couldn’t do that. Could I do that? Should I? Should I do that? She wants me to, right? That was practically—” he pulls at the air, “—that look was practically a ‘come hither’ one, right? She wants all of this—me.”

“I could go and talk to her for you, Stiles?” Allison offers easily, like it’s not the single most intimidating thing in the world, talking to Lydia Martin. And Stiles says that as a dude who got picked by an Alpha. Allison must be immune to all of Lydia’s vibes. All of her perfect, man-eating, powerful, brilliant, hot vibes.

Stiles feels safe in his assessment that even Derek would get a run for his money, in terms of the ability to shut things down with a glance. He’s pretty sure Lydia has some form of telekinesis, even, because sometimes she’ll just look at him, and Stiles’ll find himself suddenly out of control of his own body, doing things involuntarily. Like…spontaneously combusting.

In the undiplomatic sense.

“Would you? That would be good. That would be better, probably. You can sell me better. Get me in on a good foot. Lay it on thick, Allison.”

Allison soothes a hand over his back, her face soft, “I’ll try my best.” She’s looking at him as if he’s just turned into a sad little kid and she has to be gentle with him.

He’s not proud of that. But he is relieved. Really relieved. And right now, relief trumps self-pity, ten to one.

A thousand to one, maybe even a million to one.

She moves to float — girls just float, they do, in Stiles’s opinion they do — off into the crowd, but all of a sudden and, more importantly, without thought, Stiles shoots a hand out to stop her.

“No, wait.”

“What?” Scott says beside him, to match the confusion on Allison’s face.

Stiles doesn’t even know what he’s doing for a good ten seconds. He pauses to have absolutely no idea, none at all. But then his brain’s catching up— and the note in his pocket, the expensive suit he’s got on, where he was just a week ago, who he was with.

“I should do this myself,” he says. And then boggles at the words. Really? Really, he just put that sentence together?

Scott doesn’t have to say anything for Stiles to get punched in the head with the complete disbelief radiating off of him. Allison looks skeptical, too.

Well, thanks for the votes of confidence. If this were an election, he’d be scratched off the ballot. He’d scratch himself off the ballot.

No. Wait a second.

Derek saw something in him that was worth taking a chance on, that he wanted to get to know better, even if only for a week. If Stiles’s gonna get Lydia to see it, too, then he’s going to have to do it himself. He’s not going to score any points with her sending a messenger. She’s never been impressed or won over by awkwardness and passivity before. He knows, he’s tried. That’s been his game since he knew what game was. Lydia likes guys like Jackson, who move things instead of being moved. She goes for the confident, overly-aggressive type, even when they’re clearly douchebags. Especially when they’re clearly douchebags. Stiles thinks it’s probably because douchebags take less work to manipulate by masterminds like Lydia, but he’s pretty bad at manipulation on any level, so all he has are guesses to go on, here.

“I should do this myself. It’ll be better if I go. She’ll appreciate that more. I think.”

Allison smiles, nodding a little in concession. He bets they’ve talked about this kind of stuff before, at their sleepovers and in the ladies room and before the pillow fights.

Stiles grins goofily.

“Sounds like a good idea, Stiles,” she says, thankfully unaware of his dirty, dirty mind.

Scott’s got his hands on Stiles’s shoulders in a blink, loosening him up like he’s about to go three rounds with the undisputed champion, in a no-rules street fight.

Considering Lydia’s knife-sharp wit, that’s not the out of the picture entirely.

In fact, Stiles can see his balls being cut off pretty easily.

“You can do this, Stiles,” Scott says, “she’s just a girl. She’s just a person, you’re a person, just…two people talking. It’s not hard.”

“Thanks. How long have you been waiting to use that gem, Scott?” Stiles says, but he can feel himself getting pumped anyway. Scott may have more than his fair share of doubts, but at least he cares enough to pretend when it matters.

“It worked when I was trying to psyche myself up to talk to Allison, dude. Just go over there already!” Scott cracks back, shoving him forward into the crowd of sharply dressed vultures.

^

It takes him a solid twenty minutes to make his way over to where Lydia was standing, because half the people he passes stop him to congratulate him or lie about how happy they are to see him or pretend they know him or ask about Derek, trying to poke around for any good dirt on him. Stiles fakes as much politeness as he can muster, the first few exchanges, but it gets under his skin fast, and by the time he’s gotten across the room, he’s openly scowling and Lydia’s of course nowhere to be found.

Of course.

But Jackson’s still there.

Stiles is the luckiest guy in the world.

He just gawks at Jackson for a second, like he’s to blame for Lydia not being there.

Dude, he probably is. Now that Stiles really looks at him, this close up and for the first time since they both got back, he can see there’s something different about him. Something’s off, more than usual. He’s not all there. Some of his marbles are loose. He’s somewhere else in his head, and the way his eyes are glazed over is unsettling. He’s radiating a vibe, too, and not a fun one, either – a get-the-fuck-away-from-me one.

So, his default.

He startles suddenly, startling Stiles in turn, and shoots him with a glare.

“What do you want, assface?”

Stiles holds his hands up, surrendering. “Nice to see you, too, Jackson.” In a sick way, it is kind of nice. After having been smothered in fake-love by everyone else within a fifty foot radius, he can always trust Jackson to treat him like dirt.

Probably not a good idea to ask the angry ex this, but, “I just wanted to know where Lydia went.”

“Why don’t you go sniff her out yourself?” Jackson sneers into another sip of cider. So much for Alpha Mahealani rubbing off on him.

Or…he rubbed off on Jackson so much, Jackson just three-sixty’d back around to where he started? Douchebag Physics.

“You’re as cheerful as always, dude. Hey, she looked at me first. No need to take it out on Stiles. Lydia’s her own person. She can do what she wants. I’m just the…apparently sexually viable target. Rejection’s not a good look for you.”

Jackson frowns, brow furrowing hard. “Stiles, what the hell’re you even talking about?” He looks genuinely confused.

“I don’t know, what’re you talking about?” Stiles offers quickly, clumsily, making a face.

So Jackson’s not pissed about Lydia making eyes at him? The uptight lost puppy act’s for somethi—one.

Someone else. One, as in person.

Alpha Mahealani.

Dude’s got some manpain for Alpha Mahealani.

A laugh pops out of Stiles, and Jackson jumps, actually jumps at it, he’s wound so tight. He scowls over at Stiles. He doesn’t even have to say ‘shut up’ for Stiles to read, loud and clear, that that’s what he’d really like him to do right now. Or forever, if he got his way. Staple Stiles’s mouth shut.

And maybe the laughter dies off pretty fast, but the smile on Stiles’s face sure doesn’t go anywhere. He stumbles back a little, nodding, pocketing his hands. “Taking a pit stop to the Heartbreak Hotel there, huh, Jackson?” he says, this close to going over and pushing Jackson around a little, just to get a bigger rise out of him. That’s what he’d be doing to Scott right about now, if it were him. Messing with him, teasing him and riling him up until he spilled the beans. But Jackson and he don’t work like that. If he did touch him right now, his ass and the floor would probably be trading insurance info real fast.

Jackson doesn’t even bother with a reply. He just shoves his empty cup into Stiles’s chest and stalks off with a snort, leaving Stiles behind, scrambling to catch it.

Despite his best efforts, the glass smashes into the floor.

Yeah. Good.

Stiles looks around, catches a few wide-eyed stares.

Heartbreak Hotel…so, a little too much?

^

He spends the next half hour following Lydia’s scent around the Whittemore’s house, but always seems to just miss her. This gives new meaning to the term ‘the chase.’

When he finally catches up to her, it’s in a basement den. People are lazily sitting in sofas and chairs around a powered down video screen or milling around, downing drinks and talking low in the dim lighting. Lydia’s with Jackson off in one corner, giving him a one-sided hug, his hands dead at his sides.

Stiles glances around the room for something to pretend to do while he secretly spies on them and sees Allison and Scott cuddled up on one of the loveseats. Why don’t they just sew themselves together?

He slides through the Tetris game of people between him and them and throws himself down next to Scott, startling the both of them. “So let me tell you a really interesting story.”

“Hey…Stiles,” Scott mumbles. Disappointed? Good. Stiles’s gonna share the wealth

“For an hour, this guy follows a really great girl around a party, thinking, hey, maybe she’ll finally give him the time of day. He endures awkward conversation after awkward conversation, one of which has him almost getting set up with all three of this strangers' sons, possibly at the same time. When he finally finds her, she’s necking her old flame in a dark corner. The boy goes home, wallows in the misery of two rejections in as many weeks and overdoses on his meds. The end.”

“Bummer,” Scott says.

“Yeah, in lieu of flowers, please send donations to the Foundation for the Terminally Unmated.”

Allison reaches across Scott and pinches Stiles lightly. “They’re just hugging. And they’re not getting back together.”

“Hugging, necking… Both of which are defined as ‘things not happening to Stiles’ in the dictionary off life.”

“I’d offer to neck you, but I don’t think it’d be the same,” Scott says, grinning.

Stiles nods, “Thanks. Thanks for stepping up, Scott. You’re a good friend. By the way, don’t be offended if I don’t try and talk you out of that thought.”

“None taken, dude.”

“Oh hey,” Allison leans forward and picks up what looks like a remote from the coffee table in front of them. One of the buttons is blinking red. “There’s a broadcast streaming from the Capitol.”

So that’s what that looks like. Stiles has always heard about it but he’s never actually seen a VS remote, much less the infamous Red Light. The only video screen he’s ever had intimate relations with is the one in the town square, and it’s on nonstop from six in the morning until midnight — sometimes even later than that, if something important’s happening. But the key detail there is nonstop; there’s no remote to control it because if there were, people would be able to turn it off. Him people. Half the compound people. Three quarters of the compound people.

Everyone in the compound people. But Stiles most of all. He’d consider it an honor to turn it off.

“Do you think anyone’d mind if I turned it on? You’re kinda supposed to,” Allison says, biting her lip.

“Here.” Scott takes the remote from her. “I’ll do it. If someone gets mad, then it’s at me.”

Allison just laughs and ducks her head, shy at his chivalry.

Stiles would take that as his cue to leave, but their general mushiness is kind of starting to grow on him. One fungus for another fungus.

Suddenly, he’s thinking of Derek. Derek, fungus, mushroom, scents, fungus, Derek. It makes sense.

What if the message is about him? What if it’s Derek being grilled at a press conference? Or Derek having to smooth over all of Stiles’s faux pas in heat week? Derek hurt? Derek attacked? Derek’s house being burnt down again? Peter hurting Derek? Peter—

Stiles can’t snatch the control from Scott fast enough. “I’ll do it. Get a room,” he says and looks up to realize the screen is already on, that Scott had turned it on sometime during his mental ramble. The embarrassment takes a second to settle in.

“O…kay?” Scott croaks.

“—st tuning in,” the female newscaster is saying, just this side of emotionless, “we have received word that tonight at the christening of fellow pack member, Beta Yolanda Gomez’s, new yacht, Alpha Daniel Mahealani was attacked by a challenger Beta. I repeat, Alpha Daniel Mahealani was attack by a challenger Beta—”

Stiles is relieved that it’s a Daniel, not a Derek, for all of one second before it punches him in the gut, and his mouth falls slack. His eyes go immediately to Jackson in the corner, already pulling away from Lydia and coming toward the screen in quick, lurching steps, his expression strained. He’s not even bothering to acknowledge the people in his way, who automatically move to the side to let him through.

Stiles’s stomach flips.

“—sources say he is in stable condition at his home in Long Beach, but Dr. Alan Deaton has been called in to oversee his recovery. We informed you earlier in the week of several Betas and Omegas from his own and outside packs expressing interest in challenging him formally, but this was, as far as we know, an unrelated and informal incident. I’m—” She tilts her head, listening for something. “Okay, I’m being told an undocumented source has submitted footage of the attack. We’re going to go ahead and play that for you now, in the interest of full disclosure. Please, if you have young children or a fragile constitution, be advised that this is graphic.”

They don’t waste any time cueing it up. The video is handheld-quality, no press versions yet, with a great close-up of Alpha Mahealani as he moves through the crowd, talking to his pack members. It’s a nice evening, the sun still up in the background, the sea breeze floating peoples’ hair, a band playing some kind of low-key elevator music. In all respects, it looks like a nice, normal night. Not a night for killing. What is a night for killing?

Stiles licks at his lips, shoving the end of his sleeve in his mouth to chew the buttons.

There’s no warning before it happens, and it happens fast, right as Alpha Mahealani starts laughing at a joke. A young man with short brown hair and an ugly sneer appears out of nowhere and drives a knife down into his back, over and over and over again, until Beta guards swarm in and drag him off him, kicking and snarling. Alpha Mahealani tries to shift in a knee-jerk response, but he can’t maintain it, so brief it’s there and gone in seconds. He just wilts down onto his hands and knees, suit jacket cut to shreds, back steaming with wolfsbane vapors, no one daring to touch him. He spits blood from his mouth. Everyone at the party is screaming and shouting, crying even, and the camera person loses their shit, making the camera jerk and dive all over the place.

“…Holy shit,” Scott says as the footage cuts out.

Stiles can’t find the voice to agree. He looks over at Jackson, who’s shaking with rawness.

Stiles is gonna puke.

Someone tried to kill Alpha Mahealani—

“That’s so terrible… I can’t believe they just showed that.” Allison whispers, voice hollow but wet. “I’m—I’m glad he’s okay. Poor Jackson.”

“Poor Jackson?” Scott hisses, giving her a look like she’s just said she’s dumping him and is gonna run off with Jackson, instead. “Poor Alpha Mahealani. He’s only getting jumped because of Jackson. You saw all the crap they gave him for picking him. They think he’s weak. Everyone wants to tear him down. He actually seems like one of the good guys, and now everyone is trying to kill him. For what? Picking Jackson.”

“Authorities have not released information on the identity of the Beta or how he was able to sneak the knife into the party. We—oh, we’ve just received word that a representative of Alpha Mahealani will stream in via hologram in a minute or two. Please stand by. We’ll replay the footage of the attack momentarily.”

“Scott,” Allison says. “When did you know you loved me?”

“I don’t know… Probably—” Scott grins, out of place considering, “—probably the first day I saw you.”

Do the Whittemores have a spare canon in their pool house? Can Stiles just shoot himself to the moon right now? Get the hell out of Dodge?

“I’m not saying that Jackson is in love with Alpha Mahealani, but clearly he cares a great deal about him. He looks very upset right now,” Allison offers softly. “Maybe you can have a little compassion for him, this one time.”

“Compassion for Jackson? No way.”

Beside him, Stiles flinches at the thought of being compassionate toward Jackson, of all people. They've sunk to a new low, even if it is one that he can maybe, kinda, sorta understand. “Sorry, buddy,” he says, “but you and Jackson are pretty much twins, in terms of the lovey and the dovey. Brothers from another mother. Take a look at Jackson and then imagine if Allison had been jumped, even, like, right after you met her. See if you don’t look the same. Even I’m having trouble telling you apart right now.” It’s a sad truth, it really is.

Scott doesn’t know what to say to that for a beat. He just looks at Jackson, who’s standing probably a foot away from the screen by now, watching the footage being replayed, frozen solid except for the harsh undercurrent of shaking. Lydia’s standing next to him, too, rubbing his back, crooking her head against his shoulder.

Someone tried to kill Alpha Mahealani—

“Are you okay, Stiles?” Scott asks, which surprises him. Half because it’s a random question, half because he—

Half because Scott can read him so well; he forgets that, sometimes. His heart is still coming down from its high, not fast enough. For a second there, he thought the message was going to be about Derek. For a second, he'd let a crushing fist of fear and panic and anger twist him up his insides, and it still hasn’t quite let go. All for nothing.

"I mean," Scott continues, "you got chosen, too. Derek kind of was your first. I remember I heard Alphas leave an impression, even if they're not your mate. If Jackson looks like that because of it… I mean, if you, if you need to talk about it or—"

“Dude, I'm good," Stiles says. He licks his lips, shrugging, pulling a careless grin that he can’t hold very long. “I know I haven't exactly had the opportunity to show it all that much, but I have a pretty fast turnover rate. I do everything high speed. Even love. Love ‘em and leave ‘em, that’s my modus operandi. Leave them wanting more, you know. So…” He nods, snaps his fingers messily. “Yeah. There we are. I was pretty much over Derek an hour after we met.”

Scott just quirks a brow at him. That says it all.

In all honesty, the only reason he’s not moping around like Jackson is because he’s kind of a pro at ignoring things he doesn’t want to deal with. ‘Ignore the problem and it goes away,’ that’s always been his motto. Compartmentalizing Derek. In a large indestructible compartment, with black box level security.

So far it’s been working out okay. In fact, it’s been working out a little too okay. Maybe he should be more worried at how easily he puts things aside. But there’s been so much going lately, anyway, even if he had wanted to sit and get his mope on, he wouldn’t have been able to. Everyone asking him about the whole experience has sort of helped him in a way, too, to just distance himself from it. Like it’s only a story to tell over and over again, rather than actual undeniable factoids.

He’s told it so much, he’s almost gotten desensitized to it. It’s not really him, it’s not really Derek. It’s just a made-up story with made-up people that he pares down or embellishes as he sees fit. It’s even become more a source of annoyance, if anything. It’s all people want to talk about, when they see him. Nothing about him. Just about him in relation to Derek and him in relation to Derek’s house and him in relation to Derek’s lifestyle and him in relation to Derek’s heat and Derek’s fetishes and Derek’s secrets and Derek’s angst.

But there’ll still be moments, like getting the suit or reading Derek’s note or seeing the red light, where Derek sneaks back in as something more than a compartmentalized annoyance or character in a story. Like reminders to Stiles that Derek’s real, what they did was real and how he feels about it all is still real, no matter how hard he ignores it.

What if the red light had been about Derek? What would Stiles have done?

“I’m being informed we’re ready to receive transmission from the Mahealani homestead,” the reporter cuts in on his thoughts. “We’ll send it to Boyd in the holoroom.”

“Thank you, Jennifer,” Boyd says, and he nods over toward a woman sitting across from him, pixelation giving away that she’s the hologram representative.

That’s the moment Jackson chooses to viciously rip away from Lydia and stagger for the door, upsetting half the crowd around him. The whole thing looks painful, and Lydia just stands there for a beat or two, empty-handed and stunned.

Everything seems to freeze up for a long minute afterward, no one moving except for their eyes, which dart around at everyone else’s, checking for something. Their mouths hang wide, brows heavy, the newscaster questioning Alpha Mahealani’s representative in the background. No one’s really paying attention to that.

Slowly, almost literally in actual slow-motion, Lydia drifts over to the loveseat in Jackson’s wake, arms crossed. “Stiles,” she says, completely in control of—of everything, really, the entire world, under her fingertips. No one else is saying or doing anything, but here she is, a renegade of motion. Stiles looks up at her in awe.

She touches at her hair, fixing it absently. “Take me out tomorrow night.”

^

It’s pretty much the worst date of Stiles’s life, and also the best, somehow co-mingled into one unfortunately fortunate thing. Stiles does everything wrong that’s possible to do wrong (way beyond the ‘three strikes’ rule, if Lydia has one. He’s been thrown out of the game. Banned for the rest of the season. Never to touch a bat again. Not even his own. And all that implies.) But for some reason, Lydia doesn’t berate him or tell him to take her home or trade him out for another guy, halfway through. She doesn’t even roll her eyes, which Stiles is too used to to not notice a sudden lack. Not when he tells her how pretty she looks for the tenth time, not when he exaggerates his pronunciation of the French on the dinner menus. Not even when he breaks the holiest of all holy date etiquette and brings up the Exes. But in his defense it’s practically a reflex he can’t control. Not much about Jackson’s been circulating through the rumor mill lately, and if anyone knows what’s up, it’s Lydia.

She doesn’t know anything, though. Or she just doesn’t want to say. It feels true enough to Stiles that he doesn’t push for more, but Lydia can’t seem to shake this anxious look for the rest of the date, as if she’s looking around for someone, waiting for something. Stiles orders the chicken, and feels like he eats a big plate of inadequacy and guilt, instead; he never should’ve asked.

Somehow, despite just about everything, at the end of the date she fixes his collar and gives him a soft peck on the cheek. “Thanks for tonight,” she says, turning to slip her key in the door.

He can only nod in response, higher brain function too fried for much else. She kissed him. Lip-to-cheek, inches from the mouth. A real kiss.

As soon as she’s gone inside and turned out the foyer lights, Stiles wilts into the Martin's front door. He grins at his watery reflection in the small cutout window, presses his fingers gingerly around the mark, careful not to smudge it. He could totally get away with never washing his face again. No one would blame him.

When he gets home, he finds a note from his dad on the fridge (Hope your date was good, slugger. And by the way, you better have read this and be in bed before I get home. No funny business. –Dad) and another present from Derek, thrown on his bed at what Stiles can only call a "begrudging angle."

The sleek black box contradicts the fact that inside there’s just a keychain-size bottle of aconite spray and a note wrapped around it.

You may get a lot of unwanted attention in the next few weeks. You might need this.

Don’t try it out on yourself.

^

His dad finds him an hour later, moaning in the bathroom, trying to flush his eyes out.

Somewhere, Derek is making a really poor attempt to stifle a smirk, Stiles can just feel it. He can see it in his head.

^

Stiles can count on one hand the number of noteworthy things that happen in the few months after his brush with celebrity.

1). He gets a job and he gets a car. In that order, considering that while the car is technically his mom's old blue Jeep, it requires this little thing called "money" to run on another little thing called "gas." Luckily, his job just so happens to provide him a steady flow of money to buy said gas. It doesn't, however, provide him enough to also get insurance, and his dad pretty much forbids him from ever driving the thing, but Stiles doesn't really take him seriously, especially when it rains and he swings by the police station to pick him up from work, so he doesn't have to walk home in it. He always radiates too much relief, despite the frowns and loud words. So Stiles figures it's an issue his dad can be pushed some on, as long as he doesn't push too hard.

The job's in the research department of the main library. The whole thing is still pretty random, considering he never even officially applied or anything. One day Mrs. Argent just stopped him on the sidewalk and grudgingly told him that Mr. Harris was going to be leaving soon and they’d need a new person to fill his spot. Stiles was in the library too much already, she'd said, and she’d seen how detail-oriented and hard a worker he could be – those aren’t exactly the words she'd used, but at the time he'd chosen to feel complimented, nonetheless.

He’s one to typically look a gift horse in the mouth, but he'd tamped back the urge just that once. He agreed to the job then and there, before she could change her mind. He'd even considered making her swear a blood oath, just in case she decided to change her mind anyway. Not that blood oaths with him really hold any weight.

Even though it's all probably just a plot for Mrs. Argent to work him to an early grave, at least he’s able to help out at home for once. The idea of his dad not having to work half as much as he does is real motivation for Stiles to try his hardest, no matter what the circumstances end up being.

2). He and Lydia start dating.

He finds out real quick that all those years spent pining for her and idolizing her pretty much guaranteed certain death to any relationship they would ever have. In his head, he could control how suave he was, how Lydia would react (out of character, every time: too soft, too nice, too eager), how they would just fit together, be the perfect complement for one another. And it was perfect. Perfectly perfect. But that’s kind of the unavoidable thing about real life: it’s not a dream and it’s far from perfect. On a good day, sometimes it’s just one big pile of suck, even. And, needless to be reminded, Stiles has a pretty good track record with being wrong about almost everything.

He tries, anyway, just because he feels like it has to work; there’s no other choice. When he was out of his mind his first heat, instinct told him to go and hump her house – doesn’t that mean something? He’s liked her in one way or another for as long as he can remember. That has to mean something, imply some kinda innate biological compatibility, if nothing else. He didn’t spend all these years liking her to just give up now, in the face of a little awkwardness.

A lot. Of awkwardness. But awkwardness he can handle. Awkwardness and he are copacetic. He really tries. Relationships require work, he knows that. The good stuff’s not meant to be easy.

He doesn’t, however, know why Lydia tries. He could say that because Jackson’s apparently already taken and, thanks to getting chosen, Stiles’s suddenly the second most popular guy in the compound, she’s just with him for the publicity; that makes sense. She’s a mathematician through-and-through, even in her friendships, always calculating what others can do for her, the risks, the rewards. But Stiles thinks not even popularity’s worth awkward date after awkward date.

The craziest thing is that he’d break it off — he, him, Stiles, Stiles ‘Screw-up’ Stilinski break up with Lydia ‘The Lydia’ Martin — if not for the fact that he needs it to work out so badly. Not just because he thinks it should, but because of how easily she becomes the one thing in his life that helps him take his mind off Derek. Which gradually gets harder and harder to do, especially as things start drifting back to normal and all the distraction of being small-scale famous dissipates. Work isn’t enough to keep his attention. Bothering his dad isn’t enough. Hanging out with Scott and Allison isn’t enough, and he hates how seeing them together, seeing them happy and unaffected, just reminds him of things he’d rather stop dwelling on. At least with Lydia, he’s usually too nervous to think about much else than impressing her or, at the very least, not taking her down with him when he trips over his own feet.

He can’t blame her if she’s using him in the same way, if he’s just some convenient harmless distraction to take her mind off Jackson. He kind of hopes that’s what it amounts to, if just to appease his massive guilt and make some sense of the world again.

Eventually, they hit a comfortable spot, where he’s more himself and so is she, and they become something between acquaintances and friends. Moments of mutual understanding and trust come up more frequently and they manage to make each other laugh at least once in a while, which, in Stiles’s book, is the best part. But even that doesn’t kindle any real sparks.

3). The world decides to check Alpha Mahealani’s supposed “weakness” and “unsuitability” as an Alpha a hell of a lot more than just getting knifed at that one party.

He gets over a dozen challenges in a matter of weeks, an unprecedented amount for any Alpha in such a short span of time, even one so young and untried. It reminds Stiles too much of how many challenges Derek's gotten over the years -- at first because he was young, too, when he became Alpha, but gradually more and more as people have begun to realize that his ineptitude isn't just a symptom of inexperience, but maybe a sign of some more innate failure.

The press loves every second of it. Two of Danny's challenges are informal attacks, which he survives (one just barely), but the rest are official matches, broadcast across the country on Saturday nights for the sick curiosity of everyone. Bets are made. People take sides. Stiles doesn’t miss a single one because he’s the king of sick curiosity, but also because he likes Alpha Mahealani and thinks that just by watching, he’ll somehow help him win. Kind of like how he always thought he helped Scott play lacrosse better, just by cheering him on from the bench. A less observant observer would think all the goals he scored were because of Allison, but no. Totally thanks to the Stiles Effect. He should’ve been MVP last year.

Besides, he has nothing better to do, since the only people he’d want to hang out with on a Saturday night are either sitting right beside him, at work late, consoling their ex at his house or…off in their mansion, probably not even thinking about him.

The self-pity is lessened only a lot by the fact that he’s never seen anyone get killed in real-time in his life — body bags, sure, a serious papercut, no biggie — but Alpha Mahealani has to kill a few of the challengers. It’s pretty clear he doesn’t want to, and he tries his best to stop at just permanent maiming, but some of them are so powerful (or so stupid) that even two or three rounds of thorough Alpha-asskicking don’t sway them off the prize.

The good thing is that Alpha Mahealani survives them all. The bad thing — other than the killing and the maiming and the blood and the attempts at his life to begin with — is that everyone in the compound relearns just how badly Jackson handles stress.

4). Jackson leaves one night, too late for anyone but the gate guards to notice, and they're easy enough to keep quiet if you have the money.

His parents run around town the next day, crying and shouting and just generally flipping their shit. They turn the compound upside down, asking anyone and everyone — including Stiles — if they know anything. If Jackson talked to them about his plans beforehand, if they took bribes to cover for him, if they have any idea where he’s going because no one they’ve called has seen him.

It makes the national broadcasts, and once one of the search parties finally finds Jackson — halfway to Alpha Mahealani’s place and no worse for the wear, but still an incredible unrepentant dumbass — Alpha Mahealani has to, yet again, attend a press conference to defend Jackson, and himself by proxy. He uses the opportunity to tell everyone that he’s gotten Derek's permission to take Jackson in as his mate, and that, mate or not, pack or not, he won’t tolerate anyone talking trash about Jackson again. It seems like a fairly unrealistic declaration to make, all things considered, but Stiles believes Alpha Mahealani believes he can see it through. Why he would want to, Stiles still doesn't get, but...

Watching it all unfold on the video screen, he's overcome with an intense and hostile sense of jealousy. Even with Lydia sitting right next to him, his hand on her knee.

And 5). Derek.

Just Derek.

Half of it is apparently Stiles's complete inability to not obsess over people he likes (case in point: Lydia). The other half, though, that's totally on Derek. Every few days with the presents and the notes and reminding Stiles that he still exists. Stiles would assume Derek’s just stringing him along for shits and giggles, but this is normal. He thinks. This is what Chosen Omegas get. Favor from their Alpha. Gratitude. Gifts in exchange for getting to have free reign over their bodies for a week.

The first few weeks, both Alpha Mahealani and Derek send stuff to the compound, too: a more reliable water system and more solar towers, faster turbines, nicer computers for the library, primer cuts of meat, bigger, brighter fruits and vegetables, things even beyond what Stiles can imagine they need or will need for the next eternity and a half. And all of it in either the Whittemores' or Stiles and his father’s names, which means people come up to them and thank them and bring them more presents and treat them like they’re the ones to be honored, instead of the Alphas.

Jackson may be used to it, but Stiles has never known that kind of attention and extravagance in his life, and after a while it all just serves to make him really uncomfortable, especially considering how much it undercuts his whole plan to forget Derek as soon as possible. In some half-assed protest, he eventually stops opening Derek’s presents altogether, lets them pile up in his closet and lets his dirty clothes pile up on top of them. They really are just products of all that tradition mumbo-jumbo and nothing more, he keeps having to tell himself. It’s what all the Alphas are expected to do: pretend like they actually care for a little while, for the image. Derek’s doing it make himself look good, that's it, and Stiles is letting it mean too much.

But it's hard to help. It’s like Derek died and all Stiles has to compensate for his loss are consolations and things. Nice things and nicer notes, but neither enough. It’s the same as with his mom. All he has left of her are memories and stories and things, when he’d rather have her. He’d give up all of it if he could just have her back. He’d even forget he ever loved her if he could have another chance to love her again. He doesn’t need things. He never did.

In a fit of boredom one day, Stiles looks up what he thinks is Derek’s number on the internet. It turns out to be one of his personal assistant’s lines. She refuses to give him Derek’s personal number when he asks, even when he repeats his name three times, like he should have some kind of clout. She eventually asks if he’d like to leave a message, and he just says to tell Derek he called, to please call him back as soon as he can.

The first time Derek ignores him, he figures it was just the assistant’s fault. Cross wires or a garbled message, something. The second time, it seems more personal. The third is pretty loud and clear, and by the fourth, when the assistant asks if he’d like to leave a message, Stiles just says to tell Derek to stop with the presents.

After that, he doesn't get any more.

^

Oh, and numero five-and-a-half: he also finds out a bunch of people in the compound hate him. More than usual. And just for the fact that he got to spend a week with the holy, holy Derek Hale.

The preteen girls are the most hardcore. Also the scariest.

^

About three months and some change after the Choosing, Stiles finds out Derek’s coming to Beacon Hills for a surprise compound survey. He has to work all day, so he knows he’ll probably miss him, but it doesn’t stop him thinking maybe Derek’ll suddenly need to do some research at the library. Because sometimes people just suddenly need to do research at the library. Before he started working there, it was an almost-daily occurrence for him. If he wasn’t at Scott’s house or the police station, he was in the library. For all he really knows, Derek could be that way, too. It could happen.

On Jupiter.

Derek doesn’t randomly just show up in front of him. Even when Stiles takes a wandering stroll around the square during his lunch break, Derek doesn’t pop out from the bushes to say “hi” or practice another hug on him, like Stiles thinks — hopes, it’s a hope — he will. They’re playing his arrival on the video screen, though, and Stiles can smell him in the air, somewhere around. It’s enough to raise goosebumps on his skin, ones that don’t go away for almost a half hour and stay even longer than that in memory.

After work, he changes into his purple suit in the bathroom and meets Lydia, Scott and Allison at the nicest restaurant in town, for a double date they'd planned out weeks ago. It’s the sort of froufrou place that has rules: suit jackets required, no sandals or sneakers, no tabs, no Stiles Stilinski unless accompanied by an adult. It isn’t exactly the kind of place Stiles feels comfortable patronizing, not least of all because he can hardly afford the free bread, much less a fully-coursed meal. But even when he’d drummed up every half-assed (and fully-assed) excuse he could think of to try and get out of it, Lydia hadn’t cared. She’d just let him say his piece, and then she’d patted his cheek and told him where to be, at what time and in which clothes. Death threats may also have been involved, which somehow seemed even more threatening when accompanied by the filing of nails.

In the universe that is Lydia Martin, Stiles is Pluto, the smallest and farthest out, really no influence on anything and not even a planet anymore. That’s about it.

He’s pretty sure the only reason they even get a table in the place is because of Lydia, too. Lydia and Allison. The maître d’ takes one look at him and Scott and curls his lip (so much for any credit being Chosen had afforded him; he must’ve spent it all already — thus ends an era) but then Lydia and Allison are smiling at the guy, and he gets flustered and can’t escort the four of them off to a table fast enough.

Correction, he escorts Lydia and Allison to a table, and Scott and Stiles stumble after them, like the dogs they are.

And Stiles and Scott are okay with that.

As long as the dogs get to eat.

^

Stiles is pretty much dumping salad down his throat when he notices it: the goosebumps on his skin again. And—

The feel of the hook pulling taut at the sudden warmth of Derek’s scent up his nose. A fresh wave of it, too strong to be just a whiff lingering from Stiles’s suit or the ghost of it on the air, brought in by the door. A fresh, strong, sharp wave, straight from the source itself.

His head snaps up, lettuce guts hanging from his mouth, and he looks all around the place expectantly, like Derek’s just going to be standing right behind him, waiting.

“Stiles, you okay?” Scott asks.

Stiles whips back around fast, bug-eyed. “What, huh?” He shoves the wayward lettuce in his mouth and actually does a huge service by practicing the brand new art of ‘chewing and swallowing’ before he talks again. “I…I just thought I smelled something weird. Do you smell that?” He blinks hard.

“It’d help if you told us what it smells like,” Lydia says, complete with a disinterested look on her face that really sells it.

“Smoke? Maybe it was something in the kitchen… Never mind.” He should just ignore it. Ignore it and it’ll go away. Derek and his hangers-on probably just walked by the restaurant, that’s it.

Stiles goes back to his salad, trying his best to shrug away the heavy weight of Allison and Scott’s eyes on him. It’s bad enough he’s having delusions. He doesn’t need pity, too.

The smell doesn’t go away, though. Neither does the hook. It gets stronger, digs right up under his ribs and starts pulling, insistent, so hard it feels like he could get upended out of his seat (on a scale of one to definitely, how crazy would Scott, Allison and Lydia think he is if that actually happened? Just Stiles, throwing himself on the floor out of nowhere.) He keeps turning looks over his shoulder, turning looks at Allison and Scott and Lydia, turning looks at the other tables, waiting for what he doesn’t know. All of them to morph into Derek and this to end up just a really vivid dream?

He’s halfway to grabbing for a roll when the restaurant doors open again, and Mayor Finstock’s voice practically cracks glass all over the place, it’s so loud and sharp.

“I’m payin’, I insist! That’ll look great in the feeds.”

Okay, no cracking glass. But it makes Stiles’s lettuce go down wrong. He coughs hard.

He almost doesn’t hear the maître d’ then say, “Alpha Hale, so good to serve you again after so long.” But he does hear it. And that would be Stiles’s hackles raising. He can just about feel—yeah, those would be Derek’s eyes boring through the back of his skull, as he answers the maître d’:

“It’s been a few years, yeah.”

It must be because he hasn’t heard it for months, but Derek’s voice makes Stiles hands clammy, his cheeks immediately turn hot. The goosebumps come again.

Time to lay down his head and die in his side salad.

“Hey, Stiles,” Scott mutters, nodding toward the front, “Alpha Hale’s over there. Do you want to leave? We can leave if you want, if it’s gonna be awkward.”

Stiles goes slackjawed at Scott for a second. “Hey, how many times do I have to tell you I’m good? It’s cool. We’re all cool here. No one’s gonna explode if Derek and I eat at the same place once in a while.”

“I just…sorry. I just don’t want you to feel weird. We haven’t gotten our food yet—”

“It’s cool, Scott. Really. He probably doesn’t even remember me.”

“He’s looking at you like he does,” Allison says, not helpful either, really.

Stiles gives her the same look he just gave Scott. “He probably just remembers me as the classic loveable screw-up I was cast to be. What, should I say something like, ‘hey, buddy, remember that time a few months ago, when we kinda shared a bed? What d’ya say to sharing a dinner roll, too?’ I don’t think that’ll go over too well.”

Allison has the generosity enough to at least cover her pitying smile with her hand. She lowers her eyes, too. Because apparently Stiles is something to be embarrassed about right now.

He makes a motion toward Lydia, “I’m kind of on a date, anyway.”

“This isn’t a date-date,” she reminds him. Practically sings it at him, and he scowls, wounded.

She twirls her fork around her fingers, evil genius at work. “You should go talk to him.”

“And you should stop ganging up on me.” As soon as it’s out of his mouth, he flinches back because he’s never talked to Lydia like that, and she’s looking at him like she knows it, too. Wow, yeah. Staring down the mouth of the beast, here. Mental note: never contradict Lydia ever again.

Starting tomorrow.

“Uh, anyway…” He looks past her. “If you want him over here so bad, why don’t you go talk to him?”

Lydia shrugs, hair bouncing. “Fine.” She moves to get up, but Stiles almost overturns the table in his haste to fling himself across it and buckle her back in her seat with his hands.

“I didn’t really mean that, come on! Are you trying to get me killed?!”

Lydia shrugs again, relaxes against his grip without much of a fight at all. That’s not suspicious. She’s gonna make a run for it the second he slacks off, isn’t she? He can see it in her eyes.

“They’ve already gone to their table, genius,” she just says slowly, pushing his hands off her like they reek or something. “And your suit’s getting in the salad.”

“What?” Stiles straightens up fast and looks down the front of his suit, now bedazzled with dressing and croutons, a wet chunk of lettuce or twenty.

Nothing good ever comes of him in a suit.

“Awe man, you gotta be kidding me.” He starts picking them off, one by one.

“You better go to the bathroom and try to get that stuff off before the stains set,” Allison says, turning and digging in her purse for something.

“Bathroom, yes. Yeah.” He looks around confused for a second. He can’t quite get himself going on that plan. Two seconds ago, he was worried about Derek coming over to their table, now he’s bathing in salad dressing. Even he can’t process that fast. “Bathroom. Good call. Where is that exactly?”

“Here,” Allison hands Stiles a small tube that he thinks, for one uncomfortable second, might accidentally be a tampon, “a little stain remover. Don’t ever put water on anything silk. Just wipe everything off as best you can and use this on the stains, okay?”

“Thanks, MacGyver,” Stiles salutes with the tube and lurches away from the table to go showcase his ineptitude to the rest of the dining room, on the way to the bathroom.

“It’s in the back,” Scott barks behind him, which is, you know, not really helpful in the greater scheme of avoiding this altogether. But Stiles gives him a weak little wave of gratitude anyway. A+ for effort.

Always A+ for effort. Usually A+ for execution, too, but in this case, Stiles is gonna give him an F. An F for this whole situation, that stands for are you freakin' kidding me?

This is probably some sort of cosmic way for him and Derek to somehow bump into each other in the bathroom, both going for the soap at the same time. Or maybe Derek’ll be assuming proper form at the urinal, and Stiles’ll have an uncontrollable urge to jump him, like he did during heat week. A trained-in response.

He does get unfortunate boners sometimes when his dad uses his first name now, he’s found out. So it’s not out of the realm of possibilities. Tonight’s specials: baked salmon and a golden shower for two.

But Derek and Mayor Finstock and a bunch of other important people (that Stiles probably could name off just for having too many facts in his head) are sitting at a roundtable along the back wall, in a little nook —Alpha’s get nooks, go figure.

Stiles realizes he has to kind of walk by them to get to the bathroom. No big deal. He can handle it. In fact, it’s Derek who might have the problem. All this hotness just waltzi—

Yeah, gonna stop himself right there and go with a preemptive ‘no’ on that one.

Even if he didn’t have to walk by their table, Derek’s scent is pulling him in anyway, like the Death Star tractor beam to his Millennium Falcon, no matter how hard he tries to veer in the opposite direction. His body doesn’t cooperate, no surprise there. He’s clumsy, he can feel it more in the way people are gawking at him as he passes than anything else. He must look like a giant fool.

He tries not to even glance at Derek as he nears their table. That’s the first mistake because once he caves and actually does — and finds that Derek’s not even trying not to look at him, just outright staring — it hits him full-force and he gets sucked in. Can’t look away, couldn’t even if he’d had years to build up to this moment. Were Derek’s eyes always so light? Sharp? What color even is that? Does it exist in nature?

Stiles’ll have to make a word up for it too, if it doesn’t. Maybe brayown, grazel…he should really quit while he's behind.

He figures a wave’ll diffuse the awkward one-sided tension, a nothing fancy ‘hey, how’re you? Good? No time to chat, important places to be’ sort of gesturoonie, and he goes for his little three-finger wave as he passes. But of course Mayor Finstock has to stop his sad, sad attempt at cool disregard in its tracks.

“You missed your mouth there by a long shot, Bilinski,” he says, laughing so big Stiles could probably count his teeth if he had the urge to shove his face in there.

So stopping would be the second mistake. Pretty apparently if just because he has to get bagged on by the mayor. But he stops. He can’t help himself. It’s part of today’s self-hate regimen.

He gives Finstock a nod somewhere between embarrassment and annoyance. Not between. It’s both. It’s just…both. “Yeah, it’s a fashion statement. Go green.” He showcases his mess of a suit with his hands, to a few looks of pure horror. “…Literally.”

“Well, it looks terrible! People will think you’re crazy if you walk around like that. Go take care of yourself.”

Stiles wants to point out that the only reason he even stopped in the first place was because Finstock called him out. But he just nods again and makes another crucial mistake in looking over at Derek. Looking at him at all, ever, at any point in his life. Especially this close up. Scent burning down his throat again. “Um, yeah. Thanks, good idea, I was just—”

“Are you with a date?” Derek asks, gaze steady on him.

“Yeah.” Stiles swallows, forcing a grin. “Took the words right out of my mouth. That would be it. It’s a new development in my life, since we…talked last time.” He glances up at the ceiling. It should come crashing down on him any second now. …Any second. “You know, can’t keep the ladies off me now. So I’m playing the field.”

“Atta boy!” Mayor Finstock crows, startling everyone — even he-of-the-epic-stone-face Derek — at the table. “Round the bases!”

Derek waits for Finstock to calm down a little before he nods and says, “Good.” There’s a soft tick at his mouth, and Stiles just—pretends like he doesn’t notice. Trick of the light. Or something. Mouth ticks don’t mean anything. Derek could just want to laugh at the idea of Stiles dating. In which case, Stiles doesn’t really need clarification. Some things are better left up to interpretation.

“Yeah. Good is right. My social calendar’s full. I’m having to, you know,” he shuffles one hand over the other in front of him, “do this kind of stackage maneuver. And…stack things up. Like cards. Stacking…”

What the hell.

“Well, get your ass in gear, Bilinski, that stuff’ll stain! And take it from me, women don’t enjoy men who act like babies. Next time you’re eating, you might wanna try and actually get the food in your mouth. Aim for the mouth. That’s the key. Say it with me, Bilinski—”

Stiles throws one last, parting look at Derek and coughs an awkward laugh before he gets the hell away from the table and Mayor Finstock’s scarring attempt at a pep talk concerning his mouth.

^

Mistake number three is expecting Derek — or even Mayor Finstock — to come charging through the bathroom door like a bull. But, as always in being wrong, Stiles cleans up his suit in an unsettling peace and quiet, no one, not any one person, Derek or not-Derek, coming in or going out.

It kicks his brain, usually in overdrive, into over-overdrive. For a few minutes, he just stares at himself in the mirror, trying to compose himself, trying to will his spine back into existence, trying to talk himself out of just going out to Derek’s table and dragging him somewhere to talk to him, vomit his hea—the past seven months at him. Or something.

”What, so Derek can reject you in front of the whole restaurant? Yeah, good thinking. Great idea. That’s the best idea you’ve ever had. That idea should be patented, it’s so damn good.”

Dumbass.

On the plus-side, his suit seems to come out pretty well, considering the whole salad explosion down his front and that he tends to makes stains stainier when he tries to clean them.

^

He walks back to his own table, stiff as a board, careful to look anywhere but back at Derek.

Dumbass.

^

Derek leaves for home late that evening, no surprise last-minute trip out to Stiles’s house to rehash the good old days or demand Stiles go back with him. Stiles kind of hates that he stumbled into Expectations when he wasn’t looking, but trying to get his brain to stop obsessing over something works about as well as stopping a careening train with a wall of tissue, no matter how resolute he thinks he is.

He spends half his shift the next day slipping in and out of the computer lab to torment himself reading through everything he can get his hands on about being Halved. The more he sees, the more he thinks that’s what this is. That’s what he’s got, and the only hopes for treatment are dangerous trial suppressants and distance.

Distance.

It probably was for the best that Derek kept his, last night. A mercy, even.

He called in a mercy killing after all.

Chapter Text

The Choosing comes around again before Stiles is really ready for it.

He’d decided pretty early on — the same night he ran into Derek at the restaurant, not so coincidentally — that he wasn’t going to go and had surprised himself in actually sticking by that decision. Up until the ceremony was a few weeks away, the video screen started playing footage about it non-stop and excitement spread through the compound like a frickin’ plague. Stiles became the go-to for advice on how to land an Alpha, even though he still really had no idea how he’d done it, and despite his resolution to not care, he couldn’t help the small well of frustration whenever anyone asked about Derek, specifically. It didn’t help that every time he took his lunch break in the square or walked a few blocks over to see Scott at the vet clinic or met Lydia for dinner, Derek’s Alpha segment was playing. The first few times, Stiles had walked on faster in spite, but eventually his legs hadn’t wanted to move at all, and he’d watched the five minute piece so many times, he’d dreamed about it. Lydia and Scott had both caught him watching once or twice, had tried to make something of it. He’d just claimed he was doing his part to be “socially aware.”

Yeah, that’s what it is. Socially aware of Derek.

Not to mention his two oldest friends, sick-curiosity and self-loathing, have also been on his back about it, louder and louder as the days have counted down. They’ve been doing a really good job planting un-ignorable seeds in his head, where no one else could: what if Derek picks someone and why hasn’t he picked someone yet and what if he doesn’t pick anyone? What if Stiles screwed him up? What if he picks someone in Beacon Hills again? What if he picks someone Stiles knows? What if he picks someone Stiles faux Yoda’d? It’s those stupid, little seeds that eventually drive him to just give the hell in. It’s not like him being there will have any influence over Derek or anyone else, though. In fact, him not going would probably say more than him going. But like with cheering on Scott from the lacrosse bench and never missing one of Alpha Mahealani’s challenge matches, Stiles still somehow believes just watching something will afford him some kind of control over it.

It makes Scott happy, at least, that he says he’ll go. Because, Scott claims, it just wouldn’t be the same without Stiles’s special brand of commentary. But there’s an undercurrent of this is a fat lie, dumbass to it that makes Stiles doubt their entire friendship and pay extra close attention to him for a few days after, waiting for him to slip up and drop a fatal clue about his endgame.

Somehow, Lydia manages to get out of going period, despite Allison having some pretty effective persuasion tactics herself. Namely, her ability to shoot things.

More importantly, Lydia apparently has immunity to not only her best friend, but also the pitiful, walking puppy face that is Scott McCall. Stiles is still working on that, himself. After ten long years, it’s not going so well.

Much more importantly, Lydia flat out rejects Stiles when he asks if she wants him to come over, so they can watch the ceremony on her VS, instead. Even when he offers to cuddle with her.

Especially when he offers to cuddle with her.

She’s pretty obviously subscribed to whatever newsletter Scott’s peddling. Or maybe it’s her newsletter Scott’s subscribed to. The latter seems more logical, considering she's evil. Besides that, every excuse she gives him pings as a lie. It's not hard to tell something's up.

Whatever. Stiles’ll just hold it over their heads for the rest of his life, if anything—when everything goes south. All their faults.

Whatever. Stiles’ll just hold it over their heads for the rest of his life, if anything—when everything goes south. All their faults. At least it won’t be his fault. He’s wiping his hands clean of the whole thing. Any actions beyond this point will be out of his control. If he ends up mass murdering everyone in the square, it’ll be on their consciences. He hopes they can live with themselves.

In a weak rebellion, he doesn’t bother dressing up like he’s supposed to. Even if you’re not in line to be chosen, it’s always a “good idea” to look your best because a). the thing’s going to be broadcast, b). you don’t want to shame your compound on a national broadcast, do you? c). really, do you? and d). the Alphas, while technically contained to the virgin Omegas being offered, can always, at the drop of a hat, just jump the track and decide to mate with you, no questions asked, even right there in the dirt if they want to. Bearing that in mind, don’t you want to look your best, on the trillion to one odds that that might ever actually happen?

Besides, ratty jeans and a t-shirt are still a massive step up from what Stiles was wearing last year, so he figures the world can cut him some slack for once in his life.

He does wear his tuxedo print shirt, though, if that makes it any less offensive.

He’s thinking probably not.

It’s not a comfort at all, but somehow he thinks his attire is gonna be the least of his problems. He can already feel the buzz of his heat starting to work itself up under his skin, and even if he doesn’t concentrate, there are notes of a familiar scent in the air, despite being holed up in his room as he is, with the window shut and his shirt collar pulled over his nose like a gas mask. He can feel that hook again, starting to pull.

^

Scott and Allison are holding down a standing spot back behind the last row of Omegas, with a direct view of the stage ahead and the triple-threat of video screens that’ve been strung up overhead. It’s a nicer setup than last year, Stiles guesses because of the fact that two Omegas were chosen from here, and Beacon Hills now has some clout with the administrations. “Unruly” reputation notwithstanding.

So this is the Stiles Stilinski Effect in full force.

"It's good you got this over with, right?" Scott says, slinging an arm over Stiles's shoulders. "Look at how nervous they all are."

They do look nervous. They feel nervous. They reek of nervousness. He hadn’t really noticed it last year, probably because he was almost literally pissing bricks himself, but it must’ve been just like this. Even though this is supposed to be an honor, half the Omegas are looking up at the empty stage like they’re about to be summoned to their executions. The other half, well…douchebags. They’re holding their heads high, so sure they’ll be chosen, dressed and ready to impress. Serve me up, I’m good and done. Jackson 2.0.

Even though Jackson hadn’t even been like that, last year. Crying, remember. He’d cried.

And Stiles had fainted. Still remains the worse of the two.

It’s weird, being behind the ropes. He’s come to the Choosings ever since he was allowed to, but now that he’s been through it, it feels different on this side of the fence. Like he’s a peeping tom, almost. About to see something he has no right to. He can’t enjoy it like he used to.

Well, damn.

"Did I look like that?" Stiles asks, cringing.

"Worse," Allison says, with a flirty grin that almost, almost softens the blow.

"Thanks," Stiles snorts. "I appreciate the honesty."

“You looked like you were gonna lie down and start digging your own grave, dude,” Scott says, pushing Stiles around, tickling him a little.

Stiles shoves him off and smiles open-mouthed, makes sure he shows enough teeth and tongue for all the sarcasm to really shine through. “Thanks. I get it. You’ve got jokes.”

“It was pretty bad,” Scott keeps up. Because he hasn’t filled his Torture Stiles quota for the day. “And the purple suit just,” he makes a face, “highlighted it.”

“Have I told you lately how much I appreciate our friendship, Scott? It’s a bright spot in my life, really.”

“Should I be telling you two to get a room?” Allison asks, just as Mayor Finstock comes vaulting up onto the stage, like he’s about to rally the team before the big game. It’s a total one-eighty from last year. He actually seems happy to be here, and for him that’s pretty weird.

“Listen up, everybody,” he barks into the microphone, to a familiar squeal of feedback. He powers through it this time, though, with a huge, gameshow host grin, “All right, we’re ready to roll. Time to get you virgin Omegas off the market! Did you brush your teeth this morning? Are you wearing clean underwear? Stand up straight! I see you back there in the back! No Alpha in their right mind’s gonna pick somebody with scoliosis!”

“Dude,” Scott says, as Finstock turns to hustle back behind the stage and round up the Alphas. “Does Finstock have a mate?”

Stiles dies a little inside. A lot. His whole left side? Dead.

He scowls. “Why do you make me think about these things, Scott? Do you want me to die young?”

“I’ve seen him hanging around with Mr. Harris a lot? They're always bickering,” Allison offers. “Maybe there’s something to it?”

“No, I think they’re just...friends?” Scott says. “Right? Are they even friends? What makes you think they’re mates? Wouldn’t they have had, like, a ceremony? We would’ve heard about it.”

“Someone shoot me now,” Stiles says, sagging into the rope wall closing the Omegas off from the crowd. There’s really no reason to be picturing Mr. Harris and Mayor Finstock bumping uglies.

But there it is, anyway. Thank you, Scott and Allison, thank you.

Thankfully, the mental image is cut short by the sound of footsteps coming back onto the stage, and Stiles rights himself so fast, his head spins a little.

No. No, the head-spinning would be because of Derek’s scent. The scent Stiles’s been doing his best to ignore up to this point just…socking him right in the nose, in all its unadulterated glory. There’s nothing between them now to weaken it, no windows or walls, no t-shirt masks to do what God intended. Stiles can feel his skin clamming up even worse under his clothes, heat making his throat go tight. He feels his body lurch some, too, arch forward of its own accord, his feet antsy, ready to take off with or without the rest of him.

There’re five remain female Alphas alongside Derek, who’ve also come away empty-handed from the other compound Choosings so far. They’re all wearing variations of green dresses or pantsuits, which Stiles guesses is the color this year, and they all pretty much radiate hotness. Like the sun. Derek, on the other hand, is wearing a black suit, the same one he’s worn to all the other Choosings this cycle, maybe even the same one he wore last year.

Except he has a dark purple pocket square in his breast pocket. Not a green one to match the ladies or a black one to match his black soul, but a purple one, in the same shade as the suit he sent Stiles.

The Beta guards file in and quickly assume position, two standing at ease behind each chair, two crouched down in front of them.

It takes Derek all of two seconds to pinpoint Stiles in the crowd, once he’s gotten himself settled. Who knows why he even bothers to look.

Stiles just gapes up at him. It’s good that Mayor Finstock comes back onstage then, or Stiles would be—

Doing absolutely nothing else but gape at Derek.

Pretty much just like what he’s doing right now.

And Derek’s just staring back.

Well. Yeah, this is a great day for werekind.

“All right, let’s get this show on the road! We had two Omegas chosen last year, let’s go for three this yeah, huh? Huh? How about all six? Total knockout! Whaddya say?!”

Something in Stiles says let’s not.

^

On par with Mayor Finstock’s unbelievably motivating speech — the kind of “motivating” that’s more synonymous with “scarring,” that is — none of the female Alphas pick anyone. One by one, they carve a disinterested path through all the rows and an even more disinterested path back up to their seats on the stage.

Even the nice ceremony setup, all the press cameras and the clout of having had two Omegas chosen last year isn’t quite enough to overrun the fact that one of those Omegas ended up being the catalyst for Alpha Mahealani almost getting killed before the year was out. Stiles isn’t sure which is better: the fact that, up until last year, hardly anyone knew their compound even existed or the stigma that having sex with one of their Omegas will land you in a casket. It’s just warped enough to make him a little proud.

Half the crowd is wilting under the weight of disappointment, but Finstock looks the most brutalized by far. He’d started yanking at his hair three quarters of the way through the fourth Alpha’s turn, and every time he’d had to go back to the podium to cue the next one, his comments had gotten cruder and cruder, until he was just pretty much digging everyone’s grave for them. By the time Derek’s turn rolls around, he’s reverted back to his old self entirely. Actually, at this point, he may have seen his old self on the side of the metaphorical road and just passed on by it entirely.

“Okay,” he says. Great, time for another inspiring pep talk. “This is just getting sad, now.” He shakes his head at something off to the side. “Okay. We have one Alpha left: Derek Hale. Our guy. If you’ve been alive the past few weeks, you know all there is to know about him because they’ve been blasting it nonstop on the video screen in the square! But in case you’ve been living under a rock, let me just tell you that last year, he picked Stilinski back there. Stilinski, put your hand up, let everyone know where you are, buddy!”

Staggered, Stiles doesn’t move a muscle. But it doesn’t matter because all of a sudden Scott’s grabbing for his arm and lifting it up to flop around at everyone like a dope.

“What the hell, dude!” Stiles rips his arm back.

Mayor Finstock gives them a weird look. “…Okay then. Ah, bottom line, if you stand up straight — you in the back, what did I say?! — and fly right,” he stabs at the air with his pointer fingers, “maybe he’ll pick one of you this year, too. Put us out of our misery here, Derek, for crying out loud…” With a jerky flourish, he steps back from the podium and basically gives up.

No one really moves for a second after that because sometimes Finstock’s mere existence just stuns people into a state of confused immobility.

Except Derek.

Derek moves.

He actually gets up from his chair and starts forward. No consulting the guards, no distance maintained, no indifference.

Last time, he’d let his posse do all the heavy lifting, and at the other Choosings so far this cycle, he hadn’t even allowed that much. There, he’d just shaken his head when the mayors and Alphas had invited him to their Omegas, and that had been newsworthy, but unremarkable, nothing more than a bit story mentioned at the end of the live streams every night. Stiles had convinced himself that that was what would happen in Beacon Hills, too, really just for his own self-preservation. If the world were to ever give him even a hundredth of the mercy he thought he’d earned, today would be that day. Derek would stay seated, decline the invitation with a shake of his head, and everyone would pack up and go home.

But no, this time Derek’s using those stubborn tree trunks he calls legs and walking himself down the stage stairs like a big boy, all eyes hanging on his every move, breaths being held, people fluffing themselves up for him. And of course he’s taking his sweet time going down each row, really dragging it out, stopping so much it’s like his shoes have lead in them. Like he just can’t bear to get to the end.

Well, Stiles didn’t need that tall order of mercy anyway. He’ll just coast on no mercy for the rest of his inevitably short life. He’s done pretty okay so far.

He can’t help wishing Derek would at least trip or something, though. Give him some measure of schadenfreude, if he can’t have the mercy.

The world doesn’t come through on that end, either, but under the brunt of Derek’s eyes abruptly meeting his through the crop of Omegas, Stiles can’t hold onto why he wanted it in the first place. Derek looks away fast – too fast to be accidental – and continues along. Another row down, he looks again, and again, halfway through the next, just quick, sliding glances, coming more and more frequently, the closer he gets to him.

Stiles stomach clenches. He has to readjust the shakiness out of his legs, and then he has a stupid thought, one whose reservoir deepens with each look that connects, every drag of another breath, all the inches being eaten away between them: what if Derek picks him again? He was just saying to himself earlier that it’s not beyond the range of possibilities. It’s not like it’s never happened. Alphas develop crushes and attractions just like the rest of them. They pick mates, they find someone they like and stick to them. All Derek’s deliberation could be because he’s realized he’s being pulled in by Stiles’s tractor beam, and he’s struggling to resist.

It’s a half-formed hope at best when Derek pulls short in front of a female Omega, almost the last one in the last row, only a few steps away from the rope barricade and Stiles. From the back, all Stiles can see is white hair gathered at the nape of her neck and a flower shawl thrown over the shoulders of a blue dress, but he doesn’t need a face to know it’s Ms. Hagin, one of the oldest Omegas in the compound who still qualifies for Choosings. She’s gone twenty-eight years never being Chosen and never finding anyone to choose herself. She’s old enough to be Derek’s mother. She gives a surprised laugh, like she realizes it, too.

Up on stage, Mayor Finstock stumbles into the podium, sending another loud whine of feedback through the air when the microphone judders over the edge and hits the ground.

Turns out that’s nothing compared to the timber of him yelling: “You gotta be kidding me!” No microphone necessary to hear it, even from space.

Scott moves to unwind Stiles's hands from the barricade, which he’s got choked up in a death grip and didn’t even realize. They sting with rope burn, stiff and throbbing, keeping time with the rush of the blood pounding through his heart, against his skull.

^

”So that was kind of weird, huh?” Scott says later on, jarring the comfortable lull they’d fallen into over their muted jam session with a tissue box guitar and soup pot drums in Stiles’s living room. Jarring, too, because it’s already been several hours since the ceremony ended and all the Alphas left, and Scott waiting that long to ask can only mean he’s been biding his time for some signal Stiles is sure he didn’t give.

“There’s a limited amount of time before you go off with Allison to do your Beta heat thing, and I go off to hump Lydia’s house again.” Stiles rubs at his cheek with the tip of his straw drumstick, drags it down to gnaw at it a little. “Do you really want to use it to talk about that?”

“I just mean—” There must be something more to the disinterested expression Stiles fixes to his face that stops Scott cold. He’s never really been deterred by disinterest alone before. He has a knack for going on and on about things no one else cares about; Stiles has always felt a sameness there. “It was a bust.”

“It was,” Stiles says. “One good thing about it: no one will talk trash about Ms. Hagin anymore. I’m not sure Derek knows what he’s gotten himself into. She’s tough. She yelled at me in the library once.”

Scott grins. “About what?” One of the rubber band strings snapped under his fingers, and he curses.

“We didn’t have some book she thought she’d reserved.” Stiles shrugs. All the hairs on his arm stand up. He shrugs again, but can’t shake off the feeling that his body’s come awake to something that’s too far off to really focus in on. “She’s…she’s gonna wipe the floor with him.”

“If she does, I hope they get it on tape,” Scott says, and it’s weird how sometimes you can get so used to liking someone that you forget how much you do until they do or say something awesome, and it hits you all over again. Stiles feels the corners of his mouth turn up. Evil’s a good color on Scott.

”Hey, I’m only a couple tens away from that guitar I want, over in the Hodge compound. I know I’m never actually gonna blow that much money, but it’s cool to be so close.”

“That’s great, Scott.” Stiles shrugs a third time, setting his hands hard to start back drumming, but his fingers only shake, pattering the straws against the pots. He buries them in his lap and shoots a look at the empty window. He pushes his hearing out through it, as far as it can go, feels around for anything. All that comes back is the one hotel in town checking in a group of Beta guards on leave for heat, the rumble of engines, people walking, talking about the ceremony, phones ringing, birds. Nothing out of the ordinary. “You’ll get it one day. The guitar.”

“So Lydia and you aren’t… You’re still not getting together for this cycle, right? Or are you?” That, Scott must’ve been biding his time to ask, too. “Are we not supposed to double tonight? Do you think that’ll be weird?”

“Yes, weird. And yes, the date’s still on. Last I heard, at least. Unless Lydia said something? Did—” Stiles leans forward. Too late to bother even trying for casual, not that he can ever actually pull that off. “Did she say anything?”

“Not to me. Allison didn’t mention anything.”

Stiles can’t make himself relax for a long beat after that, like he’d expected a different answer. Even when he eventually does ease back against the sofa, there’s still something pulling him forward, wanting to hoist him up, draw him out the front door. It’s not possible. Derek’s long gone. He’s back at his house by now, settled in with Ms. Hagin already, probably feeding her or screwing her. The hook’s supposed to go away when Derek leaves. Stiles shouldn’t be feeling it now. “Then we’re still on,” he says, teeth set a little tight. “Can’t wait.”

Scott takes that with a sober nod, which seems to be the cue for them to slip into another comfortable silence. Except this one isn’t comfortable at all for either of them; by now Stiles is jittery all over, and Scot’s known him too long and is too sensitive not to pick up on it being the bad kind of jittery. To his credit, he doesn’t say anything, but Stiles almost wishes he would, just for the distraction to focus on.

Scott glances over his shoulder at the door, attention held too long for Stiles to be reassured that he’s feeling phantoms, that he’s just over here, going nuts by himself. There’s a car driving down the street. Parking in the driveway. An engine being silenced. A door opening and footsteps on the walk.

“I’m—” he cuts himself off and shoots to his feet, feels the heavy sway of his body, not so much out of clumsiness but the weight of the hook pulling taut. He turns for the kitchen, trying not to breathe in the smell of Derek. “I’m gonna get some milk. Want anything?”

Behind him, Scott opens his mouth to answer, but there’s only the sound of a knock at the front door. Stiles stands there, unmoving for a second, and then he’s swinging into the kitchen, yanking the fridge door open and grabbing for the milk, slow to pull away from the coolness inside. He uncaps the jug and takes a painful swig.

In the living room, Scott gets up. Stiles hears him round the sofa and then the door’s being opened, albeit hesitantly.

“—Stiles,” Scot’s voice pitches high. “I think it’s for you.”

Stiles swallows another mouthful of milk, tries to swallow back the pickup of his heartbeat with it, but it won’t go. He takes in a few deep breaths of Derek, and, before he’s really ready, he’s launching himself back into the living room, milk jug a reassuring defense at his side. If Derek’s come back just to rub everything in his face or poke around for some ego-stroking, Stiles at least wants to have something over him. Milk has to be it. He doesn’t have anything else on hand.

Derek’s standing at the door in Beta guard gear. It makes sense. Or maybe it doesn’t and Stiles has just resigned himself to go along with whatever’s about to come his way. Derek has a face mask crooked up under one arm, not like it would do much good masking his Alpha presence, but Stiles guesses it must’ve been good enough to get him through the gate keepers or a mob of press and fans would be at the door right now, too.

“Hey, there’s a Beta at the door who looks a lot like our Alpha, Scott,” Stiles says. “Weird.”

“Can I talk to you.” For all it should be a question, it doesn’t really sound like one. “Somewhere else,” he adds, careful not to look at Scott when he says it. Like he cares if it would offend him or something.

Stiles scratches the bottom edge of the milk jug up and down his thigh. “Don’t you have a heatmate to be entertaining?”

Derek looks at Scott then, assessing something. He shifts his eyes back to Stiles. “I want to talk to you.”

“I’m kind of busy. I just got my milk and everything, so…”

“They didn’t notice it was you at the gates,” Scott says. Stiles almost resents him for coming between him and probably the only real kiss off he’s ever gonna have. If he can’t get rid of the Derek in his head, at least he can chase off the real thing before he gets even more strung out.

“Sometimes people believe what they can see more than what they can feel,” Derek says. “What reason would I have to come back? They weren’t notified to expect me. They could only see an inch of my face. I was in the car with Beta guards who work with me every day. They all smell like me or my house. People would rather make excuses than risk looking stupid.”

“So they didn’t make you take off your masks? Just to be sure?”

Derek rolls his eyes at that, but then, begrudgingly says, “No, and they looked stupid, anyway. I’m going to have them replaced.” He looks past Scott. “Stiles, can we go somewhere and talk?”

“If I cared, I'd kind of be in an ignoring you stage right now,” Stiles mutters without thinking. Or he’s been thinking too much already, and that’s the diamond from the coal. “You know, just fyi.”

“You can ignore me after we talk. I have some things to say. You need to hear them.”

Stiles really hates that he knew he was going to go with Derek the second he saw him at the door. If for no other reason he’d own up to than his own freakin’ horrible curiosity.

^

There’s only one place in the entire compound that offers any kind of traction when it comes to privacy, and that’s the Hales’ old house. It was built in the thick of woods on the west side of the compound, buried so deep in that even whistles from the wind don’t hold up, and gated off since the fire out of respect. Stiles knew that’s where they were headed as soon as Derek had turned onto the only street that cut a path through the trees, and as the blackened frame rises out of the horizon ahead, he can’t help feeling a cold trickle of dread down his back.

He and Scott used to come up here sometimes and snoop around or get trashed on bane brew and set off fire crackers in the clearing, a few hundred feet away (Stiles is that kind of enabler). He used to come up here before Scott, too, and before the fire. He can still picture how the house used to look. It was a tangible place to him before it was just a shell on the video screen or silent pictures in the papers, details on his dad’s case files. He’d even gone inside it once, when he’d gotten caught spying and had had to wait with Derek’s mom in their kitchen, until his dad could come get him.

That was a long time ago, though.

Derek cuts the engine of the car and just stares out the windshield at the house, one hand tight on the steering wheel. It must be a thousand times harder for him to look at it. He seems like he’s forcing himself to, even, punishing himself for something.

Stiles gets antsy in the silence, so much so that he just starts pulling faces, drumming his fingers on the dash, looking at his watch, looking at it again, and again, for something to do. But Derek doesn’t take the bait.

Stiles finally works up to a “So,” nodding at nothing. "Ms. Hagin. Good choice. How does she feel about you ditching her?”

Derek glances over at him. He doesn't say anything.

“Whoa, slow down, chief. You're talking a mile a minute.” Even Stiles finds the sarcasm in his tone aggravating.

Derek looks back at the house. “She’s a family friend. It was a spur of the moment decision.”

“So…?”

“So I wouldn’t have to go to any of the other Choosings. I had to pick someone so I could have an excuse to go home and not have to come out for a week. She’s a friend—”

“Who you Ditched. Capital ‘D.’”

“I didn’t ditch her.” There might be something more there, a sore spot about ditching or being ditched that Derek doesn’t like having poked, because his voice drops over the word and he frowns. It hasn’t escaped Stiles that he doesn’t really know that much about Derek, after all.

“I told her I wanted to come back. She understood. We wouldn’t have slept together, even if I had stayed.”

Derek stops after that, like it’s Stiles’s turn to pick up the slack, but he can’t think of anything to say to that last part that won’t come off too invested. He rewinds back a few sentences. “Why did you come back?”

“I’m sitting here in a car with you, aren’t I?” There’s another sore spot there, for some reason, but at least this one Derek tries to make up for. His frown softens some. He looks back toward his old house. “I’m thinking of coming back to live in Beacon Hills.”

Somehow Stiles feels like he was just given the slip, even though Derek’s still sitting right in front of him. It doesn’t seem like Derek came all the way back here just to relay moving plans to him.

"Good for you. Isn’t that a terrible idea?"

“Terr— Why?”

Stiles gets the feeling that there’s a wrong answer to that question, and he’s about to pick it. "Don’t you need, like, all the guards and fences and that huge house to deter challengers? Beacon Hills is so small and the guards apparently suck? You’d be a sitting duck, here. Isn’t that why you left? Because of the fire? Someone tried to kill your family, Derek. No, actually they didn’t try, they did. They succeeded, seventy-percent success rate."

Definitely the wrong words, if not the wrong answer completely.

Derek turns his attention back to Stiles. "That was Laura’s dream. She wanted that big house. She wanted—a house like we used to have. …A home like we used to have. For our pack. But it’s too far from some of the compounds, and too much money goes into it. I’m not my sister. I don’t know how— I. I just need to make some changes.”

“That’s great. Good for you. What does any of that have to do with me?”

"We didn’t leave because Laura felt threatened. There were other reasons."

"Death seems like the only reason you really need. What’s to stop someone from trying it again?"

"At this point, do you care if anyone does?"

"No, I experience no empathy for other were beings.” Stiles socks Derek in the shoulder, apparently only hard enough to hurt himself. “Of course I do, dude. What kind of depressing question is that? I said I was ignoring you. It’s not like I want you to go and get killed.” He shakes his fingers out with a winch. “What other reasons? Did the arsonists, what, come back to finish you off or something? Because even more reason to not move back here. Do you need me to draw you a picture?”

“Laura decided to move us because of me. She didn’t want me living in that house and she didn’t—” Derek huffs, but then his expression gives a little and he angles a look at the driver side door, hiding himself from Stiles. “…She thought she could control me better if we weren’t here.”

“Control you better? Like…what? Testing out her new Alpha powers on you? Pack dynamics? Or wait, you wanted to go rogue on the arsonists and seek revenge? That’s awesome.”

“No, not like pack dynamics,” Derek says to the trees out his window. “Or revenge. You watch too many movies.”

“Then what? Drop a clue here.”

“I’ve been dropping clues. I can’t help it. You can’t help it.” He pushes back against his seat, like he needs more room and can’t get it, can’t easily push the seat adjust button or level the seat with sheer force. “...We're mates, Stiles.”

Stiles starts laughing, an evasive reaction, and Derek just talks over it.

“I thought it would go away if we weren't around each other. Eventually.” He looks over at Stiles again, but he can’t hold his eyes. "I've known since we were younger."

The reflex to laugh dies in Stiles’s chest on a shuddering breath.

“I was a sixteen-year-old going through heat, and my mate was an eleven-year-old. I couldn’t control myself. My family had to chain me up. When there was a good excuse to leave, we did. To kill two birds with one stone. We could start over somewhere safer, and I wouldn't have to worry about hurting you.”

For a second, Stiles can’t process anything Derek’s just said, so hung up on trying to remember where he was and what he was doing when he was eleven. Getting molested wouldn’t have fit in well with recess and homework and Stiles’s sudden discovery of Lydia Martin.

“I’m your mate?” Stiles asks. He almost laughs again. Derek's basically sitting here telling him that what he forced himself to ignore for the past year is totally right, and he can’t find any vindication to feel. All he can muster is anger. No, anger’s too clean; he’s pissed. Pissed that his instincts were right, but he came up with excuse after excuse to prove them wrong. Pissed that Derek knew and just blew him off, acted dumb. Freakin’ acid reflux. After the week they had, after everything, Derek just let him go, even knowing what he knew. Like it was nothing. All this time, and nothing?

“You’ve known this since you were little,” he says. "Like, throwing animal crackers little?”

Derek just nods.

Stiles follows the line of Derek’s arm to his grip on the wheel, knuckles splotched white, thumb worrying a line back and forth in the leather. “So let me get this straight—you’ve known since we were little, and you just… What would you call it, Derek?” He heaves out a hard breath. It might as well be a laugh, for how it forces his mouth into an ugly grin. “And the Choosing last year—what was the genius plot behind that move?”

Derek doesn’t give him anything, but that’s everything. He doesn’t move, he doesn’t speak. He doesn’t even try to lie. That’s enough for Stiles. “Was it a test? Or—a test-drive? You just wanted to take a spin before you decided, no, I don’t think I want this one after all? Send him back, he’s not good enough for me. That’s why you played dumb, right? When I asked?”

“Don’t put words in my mouth.”

“Then use some of your own. I have this strange feeling it’s gonna be a really good story.”

“I thought it’d be easier that way,” Derek’s still talking to the window. “I thought you wouldn’t get attached, and then you could—”

“Fuck you,” Stiles says, automatic. He tenses up, ready to shove out of the car, but Derek’s voice stops him.

“Stiles, my life is hard.”

“Oh man, I’m crying buckets for you here. Whose isn’t, dumbass? I thought I was freakin' Halved for the last eight months.”

Derek undoes his seatbelt with a fury and turns abruptly toward him. Stiles thinks he might reach out and grab him, but he doesn’t. “Stiles, you don’t understand.”

“Then help me! I’m not a mind read—”

“Peter tried to kill Laura.”

Stiles flinches back, feels the full force of the words like a weight he’s just been asked to bear. “What?”

“I don’t just have to worry about challengers or fanatics, Stiles. I have to worry about my own family. The people I’m supposed to be able to trust the most. You think Alphas have it easy, but every day is another day everything could be taken away from you. You could wake up an Alpha and go to sleep an Omega—or worse, in a casket.”

Stiles’s voice won’t work. Neither will his brain. He opens and closes his mouth a few times, and nothing comes out but the beating of his heart.

“Why did he do that?” Derek offers for him, brows raised.

Stiles makes a frantic “duh!” gesture with his hands. That’s all he can manage, but it’s plenty loud.

It takes a minute for Derek to manage much of anything, either. His jaw stays set in silence for a long pause. Stiles may have thought, once, that he’d earned some of Derek’s trust by letting Derek have some of his, but it seems like it’s going to be a longer process.

“…As long as I’ve known my uncle, I’ve known he resented my mother for becoming the Alpha when my grandmother passed away. He thought it should’ve been him. But she was always better than him at everything. It would've taken a lot more than a challenge for him to ever get it."

"Like...not like the arson, right? You're not—" Stiles hesitates. "But he almost didn't make it out. They arrested the challengers."

"I don't know. It's just a thought." Derek shrugs it off sharply. "When he realized my mother had transferred her power to Laura right before the challengers could get it, I guess something in him just finally snapped. It took years for him to heal completely, Stiles, and all that time, he had nothing to do but sit and get more and more worked up.” It sounds like Derek’s getting more and more worked up, too, and the tension in the car is starting to make Stiles’s skin crawl. He can feel the soft buzz of the air vibrating against him, rippling out from Derek, who’s begun to shake, almost imperceptibly; he’s failing to ground it in the curl of his fists on the wheel. “By the time he’d finally healed, my sister had already gotten sick, and he just—he’d been living with us because my sister insisted, and I could just see it in his eyes that he wanted it. He wanted to challenge her. I couldn’t leave him alone with her because I never knew when he was going to try something.”

“Okay," Stiles says, uselessly. This is the kind of conversation that usually builds up to mutual sharing, to bonding over familiar pain, and he kind of wants to bail before Derek can go any further. He’s made a point, up until this second in his life, to never let conversations become this serious. He could get out of the car. He could just—

No. Derek owes this to him. And maybe he owes it to Derek, too, somehow. Screw the awkwardness and screw making Derek feel bad and screw the guilt and screw the burn of his lungs wanting to seize up in panic. Stiles needs to know. He needs to not ignore this problem. That hasn’t done him any good so far. He can’t ignore it, and he can’t try and just joke his way out of it.

"I asked Laura if she could feel it too. She just said to let it happen. If, if he wanted it that badly, don’t stop him.” Derek couldn’t be holding himself any more rigidly in his seat if he tried. “Do you know what it’s like to have a family member tell you to just let them die? Not even die, but be murdered? By their own uncle?”

“I really don’t want to think about that,” Stiles says, too honest. His arms itch with the urge to touch Derek or hug him, but he holds back. It doesn’t feel right. He’s still too mad. His dad would hug him, if he’d just unloaded something like that, angry or not. Scott would hug him, too. But they’re both better men than he is. “No, I don’t know what that’s like.”

"I caught him at it one night.” Stiles watches Derek’s claws start to sharpen out to points, slowly but unchecked. As if Derek’s reliving the scene right there in the car, as he tells it. “He was going to cut her down. We got into a fight, and I barely won. I could’ve killed him; I probably should’ve. But I threw him out, instead. I told him to never come back. And he didn't. Do you know why?"

Now's not the time for jokes, any more than before. One comes anyway, mechanically: "Belated religious rebirth?" Stiles cringes.

Derek shakes his head, the muscles in his jaw straining. "My sister died that night, and I became the Alpha."

"That...would do it," Stiles mumbles. Not a ‘sorry,’ not a ‘that really sucks, man.’ Just a foot in Stiles’s mouth. Regret isn’t a strong enough word for the feeling that washes over him, then.

Derek seems to get caught up in it, too, his shoulders sewing up in a way that makes the guard breastplate shift and creak.

“What does any of that have to do with us?” Stiles says quickly. “I’m not Peter, Derek. I’m not going to betray you. You can trust me. Didn’t I do a decent job of showing you that? I think me letting you have your wild way with me and not slaughtering you in your sleep was a pretty good start.”

“I never thought you would. I was never worried about you hurting me.”

Somehow, even in the crushing depression of Derek’s life story, Stiles still can scrounge up a little offense at that.

“Peter will never go away. That’s the point. The press will never go away. The challengers will never go away. Stiles, I didn’t want to bring you into that. You saw what happened to Danny. Jackson’s a target by association. And that’s just one example. I didn’t want you to have to deal with that. You getting hurt because of me or you having to see me get hurt. You know what it’s like to lose someone.”

“You just jumped, like, twenty guns, dude! I thought we were just two guys having sex, and you’d not only decided I’d agree to be your mate, but also that someone would probably want to kill me for it?” Stiles can feel his own claws peeking out, his vision edging red. He doesn’t need Derek making decisions for him or turning his mom’s death around on him as some excuse for his own stupid choices. “Maybe you think you have to deal with everything on your own, but I’m pretty sure I have a stake in this. At least this. Let me decide who and what I’d be okay dying for.

"You’re right about one thing, though—I do know what it’s like to lose someone. That doesn’t mean I don’t want to get close to anyone ever again. If anything, it’s the opposite. My life would suck without my dad and my friends. Yeah, it’d suck even more if I lost them, but if I had to choose, I’d take the good and bad over nothing.” The word dries out his mouth. He tries not to focus on the house out front, but he can’t help it. “But I guess you work on different logic. You don’t want me to lose you, so you take yourself out of the equation before it can happen. …Yeah.” He sounds more understanding that he means to be, but that’s the problem: he does understand. “I don’t need you to shield me from life, Derek. I know how shitty it can get. I can handle it. If your idea of protecting me is taking away my choic—”

“I know you can handle it, Stiles!” It bursts out of him, and his face cages up immediately. He’s slow to say anything else for beat. “You can handle anything. I know that. I’ve seen it.”

“Then what’s your deal?"

“You shouldn’t have to handle it! I can’t handle it. That’s the problem!”

Stiles lurches forward under the force of his disbelief, hands flung wide into the passenger-side window, the shoulder of Derek’s seat. “What?!” The car rocks around them.

Derek fists his hands over the sheaths of his thigh armor. He takes a harsh breath to calm himself down, but it doesn’t really work, so he takes another. He’s shaking so hard now that Stiles can feel it in his own bones. “I—can’t…I can’t even handle the thought of you in danger. If we were together, it could be like that every day. At least when we’re not together, I know you’re safe. I know no one wants to hurt you to try and get to me. I know I won’t hurt you. I can’t lose another person.”

“So…this is really about you, then.” Stiles purses his lips, head bobbing at nothing. “No matter what, you think if we’re together, I’m a liability. What’re you even doing here, then? Why’d you ever even pick me in the first place? Let me introduce you to my good friend, Logic.”

“I don’t know,” Derek tries, but Stiles is on him, fast.

“You don’t know? Aw, the hell you don’t know!”

“I’m selfish, Stiles, okay?” Derek blinks, and his eyes are ringed red. “I’m not a nice guy. I didn’t want anyone else to pick you.”

“And when I threw myself at you, you just figured that was a reward for your good deed?”

The silence drags on for a long moment. If Derek doesn’t even want to answer the question – if he’s having to gather up the courage or the words or both – Stiles is sure he’s not going to want to hear any of it.

“I thought it would be enough to get everything out of my system. Then I could leave you alone.”

There was literally no good response he could’ve given, no saving grace to Stiles’s third degree, and Stiles’s eyes still go wide in surprise.

“But when I saw you down there today, I realized wanted it again,” Derek says. He sounds like he’s taken several steps backward, even still sitting stiff in the driver’s seat. “That week we had. I want you again. I want you all the time. I want to be able to come here and see you whenever I want. I want to be able to take you out. I want to see what comes of this. I don’t want to have to avoid you for the rest of my life.”

“Oh well good for you, then. Great, thanks. You want me now. You’re good to take the risk now. It only took you all this time to figure that out. What about what I want? What if I don’t want to be your mate? Huh? What if it’s too big a risk for me? What if that ship sailed months ago and I don’t give a flying crap about you anymore?” Stiles throws his hands up. “Oh wait, right. You’re the Alpha, who cares what I want?”

“Stiles—”

“No, really, I get it. We run on your clock. When you want something, you get it on your terms. When you don’t, it’s out of sight, out of mind, right? Did you enjoy dicking me around with all those presents, though? That was a nice touch. Jackson got gift cards and fruit baskets from Alpha Mahealani. Neutral stuff. I think I could’ve understood what a gift card meant. Gift cards don’t really lend well to fantasies, you know?”

“I wanted to take care of you.” Stiles makes a face at the sentimentality of it. Derek pushes on, “When you asked me to stop, I did.”

“And the ignored calls were for my own good too, right? So I wouldn't get too attached?"

“I’m sorry, Stiles, okay?” The gravel in his voice almost negates the words; it definitely makes Stiles’s balls clench up in apprehension. Derek moves to reach for him, but something in Stiles’s eyes pins his hand in mid-air between them. “I made a mistake.”

“A mistake? One? Many. Relearn English.” He lolls his head back against the headrest, a mocking laugh bubbling out of him. “Mistakes seem to come with the territory with you.”

“What can I do to fix this? Tell me what to do.” It should sound weird, hearing an Alpha talk like that, but all it does is remind Stiles of heat last year, when Derek freaked out about everything and Stiles had to reassure him (that makes a lot more sense now, considering.) Stiles comes to the sudden realization that maybe that alternate universe where he’s the Alpha and Derek’s the Omega is closer than he thought. Derek postures a lot and he has the title, and he’d definitely win in a challenge between them, but it seems like whenever he gets around Stiles, he ends up walking on egg shells or screwing up.

Stiles’s whole body deflates at the thought. When he next speaks, it’s in his voice, too, this surrendering tiredness.

“I—I don’t know. Okay? I don’t know what you can do.” He undoes his seatbelt and turns for the door, pushing it open.

“Where are you going?” Derek reaches over the console and grabs a hold of Stiles’s sleeve before he can get too far out. Not tightly or forcefully, but just enough that Stiles feels the temptation to sag back into it, let Derek dig in a firmer grip, draw him back and keep him. It’d be easy. “I’ll drive you home at least.”

“No, you’ve already done enough for me. I need to just get out of the car.” Stiles shakes his head again, prying Derek’s hand off his shirt. He really does need to get out. If he doesn’t get out now, he won’t be able to later, and he needs a minute to at least pretend like he’s not going to just let Derek off the hook so easily. Because that's what Stiles does. That's what Stiles always does. He can hold grudges like it’s a talent, but once someone’s in with him, he always lets them off the hook. Stiles is the hook master. “That’s what you can do for me. You can shut up and let me get out of the car. Give me some room.”

Derek’s brow furrows. A few tense seconds pass where Stiles thinks he won’t take that for an answer, that he’ll finally exert his Alphaness and make Stiles stay. He opens his mouth to say something. It says open, even as his teeth click shut, grinding on silence.

He does what Stiles asks and lets him get out of the car.

^

Unsurprisingly, the six mile walk back to his house is no good for anyone. All it does is make Stiles’s legs sore, his resolve weak and resentment a constant companion. A trio of companions, actually. There’s one for him actually regretting, even a little, that he got out of the car; another for him coming up with a few hundred great insults with no one around to tell them to; and another for him ever enjoying anything in his life related to Derek freakin’ Hale.

Because Derek’s right: all other issues aside, if they do try to date or mate or whatever, Stiles is going to have a nice, big target set on his back. Not just for the press to hit time and time again, but for challengers and jealous fans and pack mates who’ll think the way to their Alpha is through him. He’d be an Alpha by association at best and an Omega hanger-on at worst, and neither one of those comes without their ugly sides. He doesn’t know if he wants to take that kind of risk—for someone whose idea of helping is leaving, no less. Besides, he doesn’t know if he actually could handle it. Sometimes he really is all talk.

A friendly face is waiting on his stoop when he practically crawls up onto it, he’s so wiped.

“You’re not already in heat, are you? You were gone a while.” Scott cocks a brow, edging away from him some.

“Good evening to you, too.” Stiles snorts, scrubbing his sleeve over his cheeks hard for effect. “I know the two might look similar, but no, Scott, you’re safe. This is the face of a werewolf who’s been walking through the woods for the past two hours. What’re you still doing here?”

“I wanted to wait around for a while, in case you came back. And I figured I should make sure your dad knew what was going on when he got home, in case you were too—if you couldn’t call him. But I guess he’s working a double, maybe. Did you hear?”

“Hear what?”

“A Chosen Omega killed the Alpha who picked her.”

“You’re kidding, right? How the hell—” Stiles can’t help a choke of indignation, his arms flung out in two wide, jerky arcs. “I take a walk in the woods for a few hours and miss everything!”

Scott’s face twitches in a half flinch. “When I heard, I thought what if you were the Omega? And Alpha Hale was the Alpha? But it’s all over the place now. Some Omega down in So Cal. She’s an Alpha now.”

”What a way to kick off this cycle. She definitely deserves a party.”

Scott makes a show of peering all around them. “So where’s Alpha Hale? You didn’t…” He squints back up at Stiles. “You didn’t kill him, too, did you?”

“Yeah, Scott, I offed him. I’m an Alpha now, too. Alphahoods for everybody tonight.”

“Okay. That wasn’t what I was expecting you to say. I mean, no. I mean.” He sighs. “It was. I know you wouldn’t do that. But I thought—you've been moping around a lot. I thought maybe you’d be happy after you talked to him.”

“Moping? About… That's, that’s why you wanted me to go to the Choosing ceremony. Because you think I've been moping.”

“I don’t know. Maybe?” Scott glances around for help, making an ugly sound in his throat. “All I know is that you're dating the girl of your dreams, and you don't seem happy. I just want you to be happy, Stiles.”

“Hey,” Stiles rubs a hand over his face, not sure why he does it but for something to do. To reset himself, maybe. “Okay, just. I’m not moping. I’m good. Shouldn’t you be going home to get ready for the date?”

“You’re not…like, spoken for now, dude?”

“No, I’m not ‘spoken for.’ What is this, the prairie? I want to go on a date tonight. I’m allowed to go on dates, aren’t I?”

“I really don’t know.” Scott pulls a face. One that says he really doesn’t want to know, either. No clarification necessary for him. None. Zippo. “And actually, Lydia wanted me to tell you that there’s—wait,” he fishes his phone out of his pocket to read off a text, “there’s no way in hell she’s going to touch an Alpha’s Chosen, so see you in a week, if you’re still an idiot.”

”I wasn’t Chosen.” Stiles goes to grab the phone from him, but Scott’s too fast, pocketing it back out of sight before Stiles’s fingers even ghost the case. “Still an idiot? What does that mean? What would make me stop being an idiot?”

“I don’t really want to repeat what she told me to tell you, if you asked that. Don’t make me.”

“So…great.” Stiles scowls. “Lydia's basically Alphazoned me. My choices for heat this year are my right hand or an emotionally-repressed Alpha who…thinks his dick equals my death. I feel good about these choices, I do.”

“I don’t envy you,” Scott says.

“I don’t envy me either.”

^

Yeah, so, the choices… Really not choices at all, it turns out. And even if they were, on a multiple choice test they’d read more like:

a). Derek
b). Derek
c). Derek
d). Your hand…then ultimately Derek
e). Don’t even bother thinking about Lydia
f). Seriously? Why is there even an ‘f’? Oh yeah, Derek

That he can still smell Derek, that he can still feel him even miles away in his old house, when he should be many more miles away in his new house, isn’t helping anyone. In fact it’s hurting everyone. Just hurting everyone. But especially Stiles.

He roots out his old, ratty Batman mask from beneath all of Derek’s presents in the back of his closet, just to try and at least block the smell out the rest of the way, if he can’t block anything else out. It doesn’t really do much good, but he at least feels like a nineteen-year-old badass.

Cheating. This is just cheating. I made a mistake, he says, I’m sorry, he says, what can I do to fix it? Convenient that it’s during heat he unloads all this on Stiles, when Stiles’s defenses are pretty much lower than dirt as it is.

What a dick move.

Brilliant and Lydia-level manipulative. But still. Dick move.

Stiles goes downstairs and stands in their heatroom, eyes the locks piled up on one of the shelves and mentally urges them to make the decision for him. They don’t move to shut him in. Neither does he.

^

He has a lot of trouble getting to sleep that night, but in the long run it doesn’t really matter because not even an hour later, he’s jolting awake to a hard-on and about ten coats of sweat sticking him to his bed sheets. He rips the Batman mask off and takes in huge gulp-fulls of air, which works out great for him because, hey, oxygen. But then, hey, full-onset heat and Derek’s scent and six-miles away pheromones. All in Stiles’s nose, under his skin—

Mother of god—!

He rolls over and stuffs his face against his pillow, starts to brutally rut into his mattress.

^

It’s roughly five minutes after the third orgasm that Stiles gives up, just gives the hell up, and, hand pressed tightly to his crotch, waddles down to his Jeep in his boxers and t-shirt, no use changing to impress. He’s careful not to make too much noise because his dad got home late and is sacked out on the living room sofa, too tired even for the stairs. The rev of the engine will probably wake him up, but at least Stiles’ll be halfway down the block before the guilt catches up.

As soon as he’s out of his neighborhood and onto the back road to Derek’s place, he cranks the radio and powers down every window for the cold whip of the breeze.

^

Derek’s standing in front of his house when Stiles pulls up behind his car, like he heard him coming or maybe he’s hardly moved since Stiles left, except to shed the Beta guard gear. He doesn’t move now either, not until Stiles cuts the Jeep off and just sits there staring at him, listening to the engine ping.

“You’re a cheater,” Stiles barks at him, when Derek starts forward. “This is a dick move.”

That stills Derek back. “Turn around and go home,” he says, voice missing some layers, too weak. It barely has any weight against the pick-up of his heartbeat. “I can call your dad to come get you, if you need it. I’ll be out of here in the morning.”

“No way. You’re here now. I might as well use you, right?”

Stiles kind of expects Derek to just roll his eyes and go into his house, shut the door so hard it falls off its hinges and makes yet another hole in the place that keeps nothing and no one out. But he only sighs. And sighs again. And then he’s coming slowly down the slope, toward the driver’s side of Stiles’s Jeep. His expression is the picture of reserved, but as soon as he’s close enough to reach, he puts a hand through the open window to just barely graze Stiles’s face. His heartbeat is going so wild now, it’s making his fingers shake.

Stiles shudders against the touch, shutting his eyes. “Da—amnnnn… Is it gonna be like this every time?”

Derek doesn’t say anything right away, just concentrates on touching Stiles, soothing down the heat on his cheeks, thumbing back the sweat gathering in his hairline. “Probably,” he admits, drawing his fingers back. Stiles follows the loss intently. “As long as I’m Alpha. If we’re together.”

“Okay. Great. More, more talking later. Touching though. More touching first. Now,” Stiles stammers, turning to shove the door open despite the fact that Derek’s standing its way.

Derek falls back quickly to let the door wing out and keeps his distance as Stiles pretty literally slimes out of the Jeep and comes up on wobbly legs, shutting the door behind him with a heavy hand. He sags back into it a second to regain himself.

“There’s still time. I can take you back. I can call your father.”

Stiles pushes off the car. “You owe me a week. Give me a chance to get you out of my system.”

Derek flinches, but lets him lead the way up to the house and doesn’t touch him the whole way there, not even to try and right Stiles as he stumbles, though Stiles can feel him flinch over and over with abortive reflexes. It makes no sense. Didn’t he just say “more touching”? This is negative touching. This is the anti-touch. He looks back to make sure Derek’s following after him, and there isn’t even eye contact.

The restraint makes it all the more surprising when Derek finally does touch him, to get a hand firmly around his arm and urge him to the left as he goes to put a foot on the main staircase. “Don’t walk in the middle, they’re not that stable.”

“Thanks,” he breathes. Heat resilience might not make him feel it, but him breaking a dozen bones could really put a crimp in the mood for Derek.

Derek doesn’t let go of him until they’ve cleared the top of the steps and are veering around into his room — the one he’s commandeered at least, maybe his before the fire, maybe not. By that point, Stiles is too overwhelmed by the novelty of everything and the illicitness of being in the Hale house to really register the loss of contact. What he does, register, though, is that there are a few pieces of what would really generously be considered “furniture” in the otherwise barbecued room: stacked plastic storage containers to act as a dresser, a green plastic patio chair and white table for a desk, boxes of candles for a lamp. The pièce de résistance of the thing has to be the pile of blankets and pillows in the far corner, like Derek just couldn’t be assed to bring a mattress into the room, much less the frame to put it in. And considering those finer points, a headboard would just be way out of the question.

The holes in the roof and the walls explain it all. Even the blankets and pillows are a risk if it rains, but they can be washed, moved, packed up. Plastic dries. Wood, on the other hand, rots. Metal rusts. Mattresses are unwieldy and would mildew. This house isn’t even a home anymore, and by the look of it, Derek isn’t really trying to make it one, but he never stays anywhere else when he comes back to Beacon Hills. This is all he needs, right here. This terrible reminder of what he used to have and the punishment of not letting himself have much more than that.

Despite the thick scent of the woods coming in through the holes, the room still smells strongly of him. The pile of blankets, especially, is hot and rank with his smell, and Stiles’s knees almost buckle. He sways forward.

Laboring to catch his breath, he glances over his shoulder at Derek, who’s taken up a stiff pose in the doorway, arms crossed over his chest and a look on his face that makes Stiles think he’s going to turn and leave.

“I didn’t think you’d come back. I didn’t think we’d do this here,” he says. He unwinds his arms, but only to clip them to the doorframe, holding himself back. “I would’ve taken you somewhere nicer.”

“No,” Stiles insists, “no, you really wouldn’t have. Here is good, it’s really, really—” He toes out of his shoes and nearly stumbles headlong into the nest of blankets, pushing his face into one of the pillows. He takes his time dragging it against his face, marking it, before he flops over onto his back with a blunted pant, looking up at Derek.

Derek hasn’t moved from the doorway. He’s a cage for a heart that is still beating madly out of his chest. His eyes, indistinguishable in the dark, bleed into red. Seeing him give up a little control to his arousal, where the rest of him is still so restrained, has Stiles’s mouth falling wide, his hands fisting and unfisting in the blankets.

The night air, before almost a cool relief against Stiles’s skin, turns stifling and boxy, as if it’s just been lit between them. He stretches in protest, though it doesn’t help.

“What’re you waiting for?” he croaks, to get Derek moving, doing something more than just standing there, not touching him. “Seriously… You want a written invitation? Come on. Derek. Show me how fucking sorry you are.”

Derek doesn’t take up the challenge right away, but then, wordlessly, he’s slipping out of his own shoes and shedding his Henley in the six steps it takes to get to Stiles. He crumbles at his feet, drags his palms up Stiles’s bare shins to spreads his knees. He hooks him in close.

“I can smell her on you,” he says between rough heaves of breath, distracted, leaning down over Stiles.

Stiles reaches up to grab his shoulders and pull him in even closer, but Derek intercepts him halfway, cuffs Stiles’s hands at the wrists and draws them against his mouth to breathe them in deep. He looks down at Stiles, eyes hooding, and licks a slow line from the root of his thumb up to the tip of his middle finger.

Stiles chokes on a groan. “—I jerked off,” he says, helplessly, arching up against Derek. “A lot.”

Derek’s teeth grow out as he tastes more of Stiles, pushing his tongue between Stiles’s fingers, wrapping his mouth around the tips, turning his hands over to graze his knuckles.

Stiles can’t help following every lick with a sloppy, unsatisfying thrust, driving his hard-on into Derek’s, lips parted around his clipped breaths.

“Tell me you never let her touch you like this,” Derek growls low against Stiles’s palm. He lets go of his hands and grabs fistfuls of his shirt, instead, yanking at it for a second like he can’t figure out why it’s there or how it works. Then he’s pulling it away from Stiles’s chest and cutting it straight down the middle with his claws.

“My favorite shirt…dude,” Stiles wheezes. Derek just pins his arms back against the blankets and gets his lips on him, all over him, his face, his jaw, his neck, the lines of muscle he’s developed hefting books and pushing carts at the library, the last few months. Derek inhales hard over each spot before he wets it and sucks with the hot plush of his lips, his tongue. Trying to cover Lydia up.

“You did,” he mumbles, shaky and provoked, setting shivers running through Stiles’s body at the faint scrape of his teeth, the roughness of his voice. “Did you screw her?” His heart is thundering in Stiles’s ears, even louder than before, and Stiles’s is trying hard to match.

Stiles can’t answer him for a second, for too many seconds, until Derek gets his mouth right on his ear and says it again, tight through his teeth, already starting a slow rut to calm back Stiles’s frantic thrusts, hands winding to fists in either half of his shirt, “Stiles, did you screw her?” His breath comes in short, warm pants along Stiles’s skin, and he’s kissing him raw. “Tell me you didn’t.”

A joke gets caught in Stiles’s throat. He can only shake his head against Derek trying to devour him.

Derek makes a low noise of contentment in the pit of his throat and sinks back on his haunches to strip Stiles’s boxers off, even though Stiles’s legs don’t seem to want to cooperate.

“Did you, fuck—I mean, Derek, did you, since—” Stiles’s voice twists up into a groan as Derek undoes his belt, takes his own dick out from his fly and slides into him without any warning, one hand squeezing the meat of his thigh, the other coming up under the back of Stiles’s neck. Stiles’s own hands dig deep into Derek’s shoulders. He feels the slick of blood under his fingers, the tensing of Derek’s muscles around his claws.

“No,” Derek gasps, dragging Stiles up in a desperate kiss. “No one—”

^

Stiles wakes up early the next morning with the feeling that he’s just been thrown out of a dream. His arm tenses instinctively where it’s curled around Derek, like his first reflex is to grab onto something before he can lose the dream completely. He looks around himself with the thud of his heart in his ear, at the blackened wood of Derek’s room and all the furniture being turned warm by the sunrise, the blanket that was pulled over him at some point, his and Derek’s clothes abandoned all over the floor. None of it disappears. He’s really here, in the Hale house, in Derek’s makeshift bed, his t-shirt-turned-vest rucked up around his shoulders in a vise to hold him down. He relaxes back with a hesitant sound. Something about it still seems off. Looking over at Derek again, he finds it, but slowly: he’s never actually seen him sleep before.

It feels like he should have at least once, if not a bunch of times already, but he slept too much during their week together last year and the most he can remember catching Derek do is lie down. Even that had been a pretty rare sight. Stiles would fall asleep to Derek being awake and wake to Derek already up, taking care of Alpha business or waiting for him to get up so they could mess around. It was almost like he didn’t sleep at all the whole time, maybe out of some sense of overwhelming guilt or latent fears that Stiles would murder him in his sleep. But here he is now, sacked out next to Stiles, looking angelic.

If angels drool and mouth-breathe.

Can’t win them all.

Stiles snorts.

He’s had his fair share of moments where he didn’t like Derek, this past year. He’s still kind of thinking he doesn’t like him too much right now, either, but he feels like for some reason, it would be impossible to ever truly hate him. Definitely not when he looks like he does – all drool aside – and definitely not when his top priority with Stiles seems to have been to protect him. Stiles can’t really fault him for that, even if his methods were a little bit completely terrible.

There’s something about Derek that makes it impossible to leave him alone, too. Stiles starts touching him. He can’t not. He traces the bridge of his nose, the jut of his chin, thumbing the field of stubble over his jaw, his brows. For research.

It’s interesting how another person can feel so different than you do. Even the softness of skin is different or the texture of hair, how Derek’s comes in thicker than Stiles’s, how there don’t seem to be any cowlicks or patches that grow up when they should grow down. He has longer eyelashes than Stiles, his bones are sharper under his skin. He doesn’t have the whole connect-the-dots mole thing going on. His nose doesn’t turn up. They’re both the same species, but it’s almost like they’re not.

When Stiles goes to touch Derek’s mouth, Derek nips at him.

“Hey, whoa—” Stiles pulls his hand back, panting out a startled laugh. “Hey. Uh. I thought you were asleep there.”

Derek opens his eyes, but only barely, still trying to hold onto the pretense of sleep. His voice is scratchy, “I was. Hair trigger.”

“Oh.” Stiles’s mouth pops open and shut a few times. “Yeah. Sorry about that, then.”

Derek shakes his head, knuckling the trail of spit off his chin.

The room goes quiet for a minute, Stiles just watching him, him just watching Stiles. It’s not an uncomfortable silence, which is a strange phenomenon in and of itself for Stiles, but he still feels the need to fill it anyway, maybe just out of reflex. “Are we supposed to talk now?”

Derek draws up a shoulder in an amenable shrug. “We can if you want to.”

“I do have a few questions.”

“Knowing you, a few is a lot.” He punctuates that with a cocked brow, as if daring Stiles to challenge it.

“Okay, a lot. Yeah. You got me there. But I think I’ve earned them, color me crazy.”

Derek’s response to that is a guilty silence.

“So we’re mates,” Stiles starts, words rubbery in his mouth, like he still wants to laugh them off. “What does it feel like for you? This one site I looked at said it’s a little different for everyone, which is why it’s so hard to research. Is it, like…what’s yours like?”

Derek lays his fingers against the expanse of Stiles’s chest, taps them just enough to get goosebumps rising. “Prickles all over my skin, but on the inside. Since I can remember. I always wanted to be around you. I wanted to touch you and smell you. I wanted you to smell like me, and I hated that you never did… It was frustrating.”

“By “frustrating” you must mean “easy.” Practically a neon arrow from Mother Nature, pointing to me.”

Derek’s eyes slim, but he gets the shadow of a grin on his face. “Easy? I wasn’t the one always creeping around your house tempting fate, acting like I was just “playing” or I’d “gotten lost.” And I didn’t hump your house, my first heat.”

“Yeah, because you’re parents chained your ass u—” Stiles stills. “Repeat that last sentence.”

“You don’t remember that?” Derek reaches over to haul Stiles half on top of him easily, like he’s just another one of the blankets.

Stiles bunches his shoulders against a tickle of heat and braces himself up on his elbows, hovering over Derek. He licks at the sudden dryness in his mouth. “What I remember is my dad telling me I humped Lydia Martin’s house. So unless you moonlight as a strawberry blonde temptress,” his brows crawl toward his hairline, “I think there’re some holes in your memory.”

“This house, Stiles. The one you’re in right now. It was when Laura chose Omega Greenberg from here. Your dad told you a different story? You really don’t remember? They went back to the new house, but I stayed here for a few days to check up on things for her. You came and started climbing the front door, begging me to let you in.”

“You’re making this up,” Stiles says, the entirety of his world view hinged on the thought that maybe Derek’s better at lying than he thought. He’s lived the last six years thinking he humped Lydia’s house. It’s become an indisputable part of him by now.

“You’re lucky I’d learned to control myself by then. Barely.”

Goosebumps pock up all over Stiles’s skin. Derek’s eye twitches. He takes in a deep breath, but he doesn’t move more than that.

“I called your father and told him what had happened. He came over and got you. He had the sirens going and everything.”

“No joke?”

“What do you think?”

“Oh wow,” Stiles mouths, head thunking into Derek’s chest. He lets out a strangled moan. “Oh my god, Lydia really had no freakin’ clue what I was talking about. She wasn’t just being nice. Why the hell would my dad say it was her house? Why would he do that?”

Derek hesitantly curls a hand around the back of Stiles’s head, fingertips just barely brushing at the nape of his neck, bringing up a new rush of goosebumps. “I think he was trying to protect you. It was a lot of things, Stiles: our age difference and me being in the Alpha family, the fire, you losing your mom… I wasn’t the only one who thought keeping my distance would be the best thing for you.”

“Did my dad—” Stiles picks his face up from his slow death on Derek’s pectorals. “He told you to stay away from me?”

“Not in so many words. But I got the picture. He was just trying to protect you.”

“I’m getting tired of all these kid gloves,” Stiles mutters. “I’ve made it through relatively unscathed so far, you know? I'm doing pretty good here.”

“Nobody doubts that. But I can’t just turn it off. Your dad’s probably the same way. To him, you’ll always need to be protected; it’s a habit he’s been working for nineteen years. They’re hard to break. You have to give him some time.”

“My dad’s my dad. We’ve had nineteen years together. What’s your excuse? It can’t just be because we’re mates. You’re up against nineteen years of solid father-son bonding.”

“Give me nineteen years. I’m sure I’ll figure out a few good ones.”

Stiles can’t help his sarcastic laugh to cover over the genuine spark of pleasure at the smoothness of that line. He pretty much set Derek up perfectly for it, and it still worked.

“Weak, dude.”

Derek pushes up to kiss him, more a chaste experiment than any kind of demand. He lies back, and Stiles watches his eyes marble around, almost like he hadn’t meant to do it. “I’m serious. About wanting to come back here and be with you. I mean that,” he says to the patch of sky over Stiles’s shoulder. “But it’s a lot to risk. If you don’t want me here, I’ll figure something else out.”

“Hey,” Stiles says, mouth tingling. “Hey,” he says again, a placeholder to recoup the words he’s forgotten. “I’m not gonna be the reason you don’t come home, dude. I could deal with seeing you around the compound, even if that’s all I could do.”

Derek’s eyes float back to Stiles’s face, but he avoids meeting his gaze, focuses instead on the round of his chin or the dotting of his moles, the great view up his nostrils.

“No…” Stiles mutters, more to himself. “I couldn’t.” He pins Derek’s wayward attention with a kiss of his own, but Derek lies like a corpse beneath him, suddenly restrained again. “Seriously,” Stiles mumbles against his mouth, pulling back with a grunt. “Okay, let’s figure this out. Hypothetically speaking, if we did start dating, how long would it take for the press to find out?”

“A few days, maybe a couple weeks or months if we don’t do too much, too soon.” Derek squints at what might be the mirage of a disconcerting future playing out on the ceiling. “Living in Beacon Hills might make it a little easier to go under the radar for longer. There aren’t so many people here, and I can block outside press from coming in.”

Stiles has to concentrate to keep himself from frowning. Even then, it still manages to slip through, just a quick twitch. “There’ll be no going back after they know.”

Derek’s expression hardens, but Stiles can’t help feeling it’s not meant for him. It must suck to know that just by being who he is, Derek could jeopardize the well-being of everyone around him, and the only way to protect anyone that he’s found works without fail, one hundred percent of the time, is not letting them stay around him. Transferring his power to someone else might work, too, and Stiles has an inkling that maybe Derek would be happier without so much pressure, but he’s not about to brooch that subject so soon.

“This isn’t a binding contract,” Derek says. “If it gets too hard, we can end it. I don’t have to stay here. Neither do you. Mates or not, I’m not stupid enough to believe everything will be perfect or easy. The second you want out, that’s it.”

“You are stupid enough to believe that once you start something with a Stilinski, you’ll be able to stop.”

Gently, Derek pushes Stiles’s head to the side, if just so Stiles can’t comment on the mocking grin that comes over his face. “Maybe I am. I must be, to risk pulling you into the spotlight with me.”

“Hey, it’s also my risk to take,” Stiles says, reaching to push at Derek’s face, too, which Derek only barely tolerates with another meaner smile. “You never know until you try, right? It could be a lot better than you think. If anything, now you have a reason not to be such a sucky Alpha, so people won’t want to murder me.”

When Derek grins again, his teeth are cut to points. “Try repeating that.”

Stiles snorts. “I guess what I’m saying with all this is that I kind of understand what you were trying to do. And I also kind of forgive you. Preemptively. If I forgive my dad, I’ll have to forgive you, too…in nineteen years. But, at this point, the grudges are out of my control, okay? You’ve racked up a few, man. There’s one for you ignoring my calls, and you not just being upfront with me from the start, and you basically cockblocking both yourself and me at the same time. For years. That takes special skills, buddy. Special skills. Derek, you’re…special.”

“Great. Thanks,” Derek says, shutting his eyes. Stiles feels all the tenseness drain out of Derek, like he’s fallen back asleep in the width of a blink.

“You’re welcome. I’ll be putting you through torture for years to come, potentially. As my dad would say, you’re on probation. And I don’t mess around with probation. Scott’s been on probation since we were sixteen and he kissed Lydia behind my back.” So…realistically, probation means nothing, considering Stiles pretty much dropped that issue a couple months after it happened and has only now realized that fact.

“Fair enough,” Derek murmurs, eyes still closed. “I’ll try to behave myself.”

“One more question, though,” Stiles says, “and this one is serious. As opposed to the others, which were—okay, also serious.”

“What?”

“You stuck around last night because you thought I’d come back, didn’t you?”

“No.” Derek shifts beneath him, upending him a little. He cracks up one eye, just enough that Stiles can make out a couple chips of color between his lashes. “I thought you’d go find that Beta. It’s probably what you should’ve done.”

“Dude, don’t try and kick my teeth in when I just forgave you nineteen years in advance.” Stiles lines up a flick with the hollow between Derek’s collar bones, but Derek snatches his hand back before he can do any damage, pressing it firmly to his chest.

“Seriously.” Stiles tests his grip. It’s solid. “What would you have done if I’d gone to Lydia’s instead? You would’ve really just gone back to your other house?”

“That’s more than one more question.” Derek’s voice doesn’t waver, though his eyes do, slanting off at something across the room for a second.

“Humor me. Pretend this whole conversation has just been one long question.”

Derek doesn’t answer him right away, his grip sliding lax on Stiles’s wrist, as if he’s just remembered he has no right to hold onto him. “I would’ve gone back.”

There’s the taint of a lie to it, but Stiles doesn’t call him on it. Sometimes you can learn more from letting people go on lying than forcing the truth; it’s more fun, anyway. “And done what? Pined from a distance? I gotta tell you, that might really conflict with you being a good Alpha.”

“It already does. At least if I’m living here, I’ll probably get so sick of you, I won’t get distracted as much.”

“Ouch.”

Derek wraps his arms tightly around Stiles. Not enough to hurt like Stiles kind of wants it to, but a far cry from Derek’s reservation in their last hug.

“Okay, yeah.” Stiles grits his teeth against a shiver, shakes it off when it lingers. “I have one more question. One.”

Derek’s palm is light on the back of his neck as he guides Stiles against his mouth for another kiss, this one wholly deliberate, warm but chaste and trembling, suffering under restraint. Stiles could handle more questions being answered that way, honestly, and he’s starting to feel like in a little while, neither of them’ll be up for much talk at all, except through kisses. Derek’s just being an overachiever, starting the ball rolling early.

“Were you crying earlier?”

"Crying? Earlier when?” Derek frowns. He leans up and presses their lips together again. If he’s trying for distracting, it’s possibly working. Really well.

“Yeah, uh. Yeah,” is the best Stiles can do at first. “When you were knotting me. I felt some drops on my face.”

“It was sweat."

“If eyes could sweat, then maybe you’d have a leg to stand on.”

“I wasn’t crying. Sweat got in my eye. I blinked it out.”

“It’s okay. I’m just glad to know someone’s crying over me because they’re happy.” The honest tone of his voice surprises him. He’d meant it to come out like a joke. “I mean, if you’re lucky, I’ll only hold it over your head for a few months—”

“Stiles.”

“Shut up?”

“No.” Derek looks up at him, an openness coming over his face that Stiles has missed for months; as much of a guru as he is about finding things on the internet, video screen footage and press photos have never been able to capture it. Derek traces the corner of his mouth with his thumb. “Keep talking.”

^

Stiles calls his dad later on to give him the quick and not-dirty about what’s going down. Over the line, his father’s voice is a mixture of apprehension and the kind of confusion that comes from being the last to know (“I thought you were dating Lydia” – “I was pretty much a glorified handbag for her” – “but Alpha Hale picked someone yesterday” – “that was a ruse, Dad, to distract the press” – “but I didn’t think you even really liked him, son” – “well, I guess I’m a good actor”), but for the most part he bows to Stiles’s judgment and tells him that he’s happy if Stiles is happy. There’s the distinct sound of a taser being tested in the background, though that part Stiles decides not to relay to Derek (it’d be a safe bet to say that Derek heard it loud and clear, anyway).

“My dad says hi,” Stiles says, as soon as he’s hung up. “He wants you to come over for dinner one night, before the press gets wind of everything.”

Derek steels himself with a deep breath.

“I’d rather have to face a challenger,” he mutters out the side of his mouth.

Stiles might not be the only one with a new target on his back.

^

It’s a solid month before Derek can dupe the press again, seeding rumors that he’s expected to show up at an LA movie premiere weekend, when in fact he’s sent an empty car along in his place and sneaked back to Beacon Hills, instead. Stiles hadn’t even expected it to be that soon, what with the press having overdrawn every last angle from the Omega-turned-Alpha story and salivating for something new, and he can’t lie that the first emotion he experiences upon opening the back door is happiness.

He drags Derek inside the house quickly. “Did anyone follow you? No one tailed you, right?”

“Calm down,” Derek says, touching at the tense rise of Stiles’s shoulders. “I’ve had a few years to learn how to get lost. We’re still safe. If you’re gonna get so worked up like this every time I come to see you, maybe I—”

“No, I’m cool. I’m fine. It’s good.”

Stiles can read the doubt plainly off Derek’s face, but he just accepts what Stiles said with a small nod, looking around at the kitchen. “Where’s your father?”

“Working at the dining table.”

When they roll into the dining room, Stiles finds that his dad’s already swept all the files he was working on to one side, his hands folded over each other in front of him. He has his Interrogation Face on.

Stiles almost turns them both back around.

The Interrogation Face is never good. Or…always good? For work and serving up criminals cold, but never when it’s aimed at Stiles. Stiles who is not a criminal, as far as he knows. And Derek who—whose past is maybe still a little questionable. Stiles doesn’t exactly know everything about him, yet. That could be a problem.

His dad means business.

He means so much business, he stands up from the table and actually walks around to pull out two of the chairs on the other side. Then he’s winding back to his own seat and looking over at them expectantly, not one crease of emotion on his face. And all this without one word.

So sitting down’s apparently in Stiles and Derek’s future. Good to know

“Dad, uhh. I think you’ve met Derek before. Derek, this is my dad.” Stiles motions between them with one hand, scratching at the back of his neck with the other, aiming for cool. “The exit’s right behind you, by the way.”