Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/7005013.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Underage
  Category:
      M/M
  Fandom:
      Teen_Wolf_(TV)
  Relationship:
      Derek_Hale/Stiles_Stilinski
  Additional Tags:
      Post-Apocalypse, Dystopia, Post-Nuclear_War, Alternate_Universe_-
      Werewolves_Are_Known, Alpha/Beta/Omega_Dynamics, Alpha_Derek, Werewolf
      Derek, Older_Derek, Omega_Stiles, FTM_Stiles, Stiles_Stilinski_Takes_Care
      Of_Derek_Hale, and_the_stray_children_he_loves_to_collect, aka_the_Hale
      Pack, Feral_Behavior, Minor_Violence, Historical_References, Religious
      Discussion, Falling_In_Love, Sexual_Tension, Sexual_Content, Mating
      Cycles/In_Heat, Mating_Bites, Mpreg, Threats_of_Rape/Non-Con, Attempted
      Rape/Non-Con, Implied/Referenced_Suicide, Physical_Abuse, Implications_of
      Forced_Marriage, Marriage_of_Convenience, Age_Difference, Size
      Difference, Disabled_Character, Fluff_and_Hurt/Comfort, Angst_and_Feels,
      Derek_Has_Nightmares, Stiles_Dreams, Drought_Conditions, Inspired_by_Mad
      Max
  Collections:
      Stiles_Stilinski_and_Derek_Hale
  Stats:
      Published: 2016-05-29 Completed: 2016-09-11 Chapters: 13/13 Words: 43060
****** Leaving Paradise ******
by NARKOTIKA
Summary
     A boy dreams of freedom, a broken man finds home, and they learn to
     love in a world where it feels more impossible than water falling
     from the sky.
***** Chapter 1 *****
Chapter Notes
                 ❀ maybe_we_could_be_the_start_of_something ❀
See the end of the chapter for more notes
Stiles Stilinski loved to dream about water. 
He had never seen the land when it was green.
His father did. His father was just a boy before the drought came. He used to
talk about it all the time. He used to talk about his own father, the wheat
they grew, the pride they felt. He always believed in the land, even after the
Water Wars first began tearing the world apart.
It didn't end there. The Fuel Wars started soon after, ending what little peace
remained between the last of the united countries. Everyone turned on each
other—the allies on their unions, states within their own nations, then towns,
and then neighbors.
Most people who were able to left, but Stiles' father had his reasons for
staying. He was convinced the land would come back. It just needed water.
And he was right.
It was called Paradise for a reason.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
His hair was darker at one point, if he tried real hard to remember. More like
his mother's. But over the years the sun brightened it, added a slight shine,
softened the color to be more like his father's. Now the only thing that
remained of his mother was how easily his pale skin burned and how, like her,
the only thing that helped was covering up from head to toe. He hated it, but
the white linens eased the sun's wrath, kept out the dust, kept in the heat.
Tit for tat.
Stiles loved sayings from the Old World. He loved the books, the ones he'd
found—his most sacred treasures—and hidden away, safe from the hands of the
Colonel. The people from Before loved their sayings and their recipes and their
religions. They loved their lists of words and their meanings, their fix-it
manuals, their magazines. People had so much to say, and Stiles did, too. The
Colonel didn't like it very much, all the things he shared, all the things he'd
tell a friend if he had one. Instead he had this grown man, an alpha old enough
to be his father yet too old to want to put up with an eleven-year-old's
ramblings.
The Colonel was an impatient man. He hated waiting, especially when it was for
something he so desperately wanted.
Stiles often wondered why the people from Before were always in such a hurry.
Those people from Before, with their books and their Internet and their phones
and their big, tall cities and their ticking, ticking, ticking clocks—time—just
another thing that fell away with the Old World. Those people, always rushed,
always late. Stiles guessed that's why they called called themselves the human
race.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
When Stiles turned twelve, his father died.
He struck a deal with the Colonel.
And he learned the true power of the thing called time.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
He was newly thirteen when the Colonel first snapped and hit him. "There's only
one hell and it's the one we live in now," the Colonel had growled between
gritted teeth, right into Stiles' shocked, tearful face.
He hadn't spoken for a week after that. Not about God, or religion, or books,
or any of it.
Even if he'd wanted to, who would listen?
The Wasteland was a very lonely place, and his family was in the ground now. He
had no one. He could go months at a time before seeing a new face. The only one
he ever saw was the Colonel, and sometimes, maybe the Colonel's Jackals, with
their grim, crooked grins and their leering gazes, when they'd drop off his
portions or replace his canteens or come by and watch him, like wolves watch
prey, simply because they could. Stiles would count his blessings, thank the
spirit in the sky for never sending one into the Colonel's path—a wolf, that
is. Were.
So he remained alone, with his books and his thoughts and the ghosts of his
childhood watching over him. He often imagined he was living in a fairytale of
sorts, trapped in a place he couldn't escape from, by a man who thought himself
righteous and holy, who thought locking Stiles away in the desert was really
for his protection, that controlling the water and the portions and the
bordering land made him as great as the name he called himself.
The Colonel thought he was a god, but Stiles knew better.
This land belonged to Stiles. It was his father's. And before it was his
father's, it was his grandfather's. The land was fertile, but it was thirsty.
The Colonel controlled the water. And so the land remained dry. But it was
still his. It was barren and untouched and brown. But it was his. And that was
one thing the Colonel couldn't take away from him.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
Stiles loved to dream about water, or, more specifically—rain.
He loved to dream about clouds rolling in, collecting over the valley, heavy
and dark and healing.
He loved to dream that the water would begin to fall as a trickle, like how he
imagined a kiss would be, soft at first, a promise of what was to come, and
then—all at once.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
Stiles found that hope was what kept him from dying.
Not the portions, not the water canteens, not the roof over his head or his
books.
Out here, none of that mattered. Only a good head and a strong heart. Hope got
you nowhere.
But Stiles liked having it anyway.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
"You've angered me, Stiles."
"We have a deal."
The Colonel pinched the bridge of his nose, sighing heavily, like he was
dealing with a petulant child. He was, really. Dealing with a child.
"You promised," Siles said, fourteen and a half, bare arms already purpling
from where the Jackals had gripped him too hard and forced him down onto his
knees. "We said we'd wait for the rain."
The Colonel smiled. "Yes. We did say that, didn't we?"
Stiles swallowed past his fear. "You can't touch me. I'm not eighteen."
"Stiles," the Colonel sighed once more, rising from his chair. "You've been
harboring a feral little wretch in the house for months." He brushed his
fingers through Stiles' hair for a moment and then tugged. "Did you really
think this would go unpunished?"
"He's your son!"
The Colonel paused, snatched Stiles by the chin, and Stiles knew another bruise
was already forming. He held his breath, too scared to move in fear that it
would only anger the Colonel further.
"He's a frail pup who can barely breathe on his own," the Colonel coldly
remarked, watching Stiles' face for even a glimmer of a reaction. "Fucking his
mother was a mistake. She failed to do the one thing we paid her for. I left
him to die for a reason."
Stiles had never wanted to see the Colonel's neck be snapped like a stick more
than in that moment.
"But," the Colonel said, loosening his grip on Stiles' chin, "if you insist on
wasting my resources to help that disappointment survive, I guess I have no
choice, do I?"
Stiles sharply looked up, and he should have known, he should have known-
"No-"
The Colonel was already walking toward him, beginning to loosely unbind the
thermal wire.
"No,Rafael, please, don't-" Stiles began to scramble back, but two Jackals were
already on him, forcing him still, on his knees, even as he writhed and cried
out, pleading for the Colonel to forgive him, to show mercy like only the
strongest of leaders do.
"What's happening?" came a confused little voice, and Stiles choked on a sob,
felt all the air leave his lungs in the same second.
The Colonel lined himself up behind Stiles, planting a soft kiss on the omega's
forehead. "What did I tell you, sweetheart?"
Stiles went limp, head falling to the side. "Look away, Scott," he whispered to
the little boy in the corner of the room. "Just close your eyes, cover your
ears, and count to ten, alright?" He tried for a smile, voice wavering, and
Scott only hesitated for one more moment before his eyes fluttered shut, he
turned to face the wall, little hands coming up to cover his ears, and began
counting.
The Colonel tsked down at Stiles and murmured, "You just never shut up, huh?"
And without another second to spare, pulled the wire over Stiles' neck, choking
him, branding him, nearly killing him.
When Stiles closed his eyes, he expected to see a light, the kind they talked
about in the books, the kind that meant you were going to a better place.
Instead, he saw rain.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
The rundown at the southern end of the Ridge wasn't exactly a secret, but its
stream came from outside the valley and had been contaminated during the Long
Winter, making it deadly.
Which was why Stiles was surprised when he found a real living, breathing man
with his head half under the flow, bathing in it and somehow not yet dead.
His momentary shock fell backseat to his feet as he dropped his canteen to the
ground and began sprinting, linens flying, headscarf tearing off as he ran,
ran, ran to warn the man, to save him before Stiles had to be alone once more.
He was shouting, waving his arms. "Stop! The water's no good! Stop!" But the
man couldn't hear him, couldn't see him, and Stiles felt like a burst of air
was flooding to his face as the man finally turned to face the land, to face
Stiles.
He was dark, a sharp contrast to what Stiles was used to seeing when he'd look
in the mirror. His hair was even darker than the rest of him, inky and unkempt
and everywhere—on his head, his face, his chest—and Stiles was left with only a
split second to wager the color of the man's eyes before he was waking up in
his bed, drenched in sweat, gasping, and wet between his legs.
No.
He was fifteen and his first heat had come.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
Late into Stiles' sixteenth year, his house was nearly full to capacity.
Scott now had six foster siblings.
Stiles received a proper beating for each.
And always, always, he prayed for rain.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
"There's a shadow," Erica said, the first one to notice the figure slowly
trailing the distance from the south toward the house.
Stiles had ignored it, continued turning pages in his book, nose buried between
one chapter and the next, bent over backward after an exhausting handful of
moments of trying to find a comfortable position in the armchair.
"It's a man," Lydia announced a while later, positioned dead center in front of
the window, collecting all the information she needed, her siblings gathered
around her.
That peeked Stiles' curiosity. Could be a new Jackal. The kids rarely got
excited over guests anymore. Stiles stood, plopping his book down on the
cushion, walking over to the window to see what all the fuss was about.
He squinted. Were his eyes deceiving him?
Jackson nudged him. "Who is he?"
Stiles tilted his head, gazing out at the sand and the red set of the sun,
watching the man draw closer and closer. "He looks like a dream I had before."
His heart seized suddenly, and he stumbled into a panic, shooing all the
children up into the bunk, warning them not to come out. He went for the sawed-
off shotgun, swinging the door wide open, barreling out onto the porch.
"Stop where you are!"
The figure paused, swaying in place. Stiles could only barely make him out
through the dream-mist, the hazy waves of heat distorting the man's image.
Before Stiles could get another word out, the man suddenly fell to his knees.
Stiles swallowed past the dryness in his throat and stepped off the porch,
shotgun held up, aimed on the dark figure, as he slowly, cautiously, closed the
distance between them.
He left a handful of paces and paused, but by the time he had come within
proper earshot of the man, he had already smelt it. Alpha. And the man had
probably smelt him, too. He swallowed again, opening his mouth, but no words
came out. He couldn't say anything at all, not for a lack of trying, but
because this man, this alpha, was just staring at him, enraptured, slightly
bewildered, but mostly just-
"Am I dead?"
Stiles paused once more. "No."
The man thought on this, Stiles could see the wheels turning in his head. "Then
how are you here?" His voice was deep and rough, parched from lack of water,
his lips cracked, hair scraggly and dark, and just so much of it.
"How are you here?" Stiles questioned, readjusting his grip on the shotgun.
"You're a stranger. Strangers don't last long out here."
No. Not a stranger, Stiles' mind supplied, drowning in green eyes, unable to
stop. This was him. This was him.
The man continued to sway in place, staring up at Stiles like the heavens were
calling for him. "The runoff," the man said, and Stiles could see the color
beginning to drain from his face. "At the mouth of the valley-"
And Stiles suddenly understood, all of it clicking into place, any trace of
doubt in his mind disappearing, immediately followed by dread. He lowered his
gun without another thought, pulling the keffiyeh away from his face, letting
it fall to his shoulders. This is the man from my dreams.
Stiles felt himself smile, a momentary flash of his innocent youth—seventeen
and young, for one moment, here and now. "Bringer of rain,"he whispered, and
the man promptly turned to the side, vomited, bending at the knees,
and passed out right there into the sand.
Chapter End Notes
     Hiya, wonderful people! Brace yourselves, this is gonna be a big-ass
     note.
     Alternate summary:
     The year is 2087.
     This is the future—where the Old World is just a twisted tale, where
     only 0.01% of the population remains, where children no longer have a
     childhood, where in a wasteland without water, vengeance will rain.
     This is Paradise: the luckiest little slice of Earth, completely
     untouched by radioactive contamination, home to Stiles Stilinski, an
     omega trapped in a deadly deal for his life, counting down the days
     until he'll have to surrender his father's land and become an
     unwilling mate to the wicked Colonel of the Ridge.
     The only thing that can save him? Rain. But in the middle of a
     decades-long drought, could a wandering, radiation-poisoned alpha
     with demons of his own just be his last hope?
     Main inspirations:
     -Mad Max
     -Young Ones
     -Z for Zachariah
     -Fallout
     Genes/mutations as a result of biological warfare:
     -a/b/o (80% chance):
     >betas = most common
     >alphas = second most common
     >omegas = least common
     -supernatural/were (10% chance):
     >no hierarchy, meaning they'd only receive a dynamic if they also
     inherit the a/b/o gene
     Please take care to mind your own wellbeing by keeping an eye on the
     tags (side note: the suicide reference tag is for later chapters and
     is brought up all of twice; it is very brief and not at all graphic/
     detailed). Also, not everything is going to be scientifically
     accurate, but alas, this is a work of fiction. Feel free to shoot me
     a message/ask on Tumblr or drop me a comment if you've got any
     questions or concerns.
     Hope you're as hyped as I am!
***** Chapter 2 *****
Chapter Notes
             ❀ How_long_did_you_starve?_How_long_did_you_suffer? ❀
See the end of the chapter for more notes
Stiles didn't move at first, brows drawing together as seconds ticked by and
the alpha continued to lay there face-down in the sand. He took a cautious
step forward, and then another, and another, and when the man still didn't
budge, Stiles poked the mouth of his shotgun into the man's side.
"He dead?" Erica hollered from the porch.
Stiles dropped to his knees and after multiple heaving attempts, managed to
shove the alpha onto his back. He bent and pressed an ear to the man's chest,
relief flooding his veins when he heard the steady thumpthumpthump of the
alpha's heart. "Not yet!" he called back to the house, and looked at the
man's face.
He was beautiful in a rough sort of way, but he was older than Stiles had
realized, too old for him to be kneeling there and getting all flushed and
flustered, really. He was no stray orphan, that was for sure, not a child
Stiles would pick up and bring home. Early to mid-thirties probably, maybe
more. Stiles shook his head. Whatever this man's age, the Colonel is double it.
From a distance, when he'd seen the man through the dream-mist, his body had
looked just this side of average build, height indiscernible, features a
blurred mix of dark skin and hair and tattered clothes, not unlike the Jackals.
But up close, really looking, Stiles could see that his beard was so dense and
so dark that no light could escape it, his arms heavily muscled, hard and
tanned, and the skin on his face was weathered. The man was practically as
brown as a stretch of dirt. A second glance told Stiles that most of it
probably was, in fact, just dirt.
"Boyd!" he yelled toward the house, slinging the shotgun over a shoulder and
beginning to pull one of the alpha's heavy arms over the other. Boyd joined him
a moment later, taking up the other side, and somehow, though still being just
shy of fourteen and underfed, managed to bear a better part of the alpha's
weight as they hauled him back to the house.
They had to strip him, soak him and scour him raw, but not before Stiles
searched his pockets and sleeves, yanked off the man's boots, dug around the
seams and linings of the man's pants until he had collected every last knife
and gun and dumped them all into Kira's firearm deposit, a bin full of bleach
with an artful No blood in the house! written across it, which, courtesy of
Scott and Isaac, was paired with an assortment of animal stickers. Stiles also
found a faded photograph, which he tucked into the waist of his linens without
a second thought, dismissing the look Boyd shot him.
The alpha liked to mutter to himself and though he remained mostly unconscious,
he had brief moments of clarity in which he'd mindlessly growl and gnash his
teeth a whole lot, and then pass right out again. Stiles had to scorch the
man's clothes and shoes, then his own and Boyd's, and they scrubbed themselves
until Stiles was satisfied, the scathing sun drying them off within minutes.
Stiles decided to hack off the awful length of the alpha's overgrown hair and
beard as well, just for good measure, but he kind of regretted it afterward
because it made it all the more difficult to keep himself focused on the task
at hand and not on the man's distractingly attractive face.
They put the alpha in the room below the bunk, right next to Stiles', at the
end of the hall, the furthest one from the front of the house, the one that
used to be his father's. The bed creaked as they flopped him onto the mattress.
"Who is he?" Kira asked.
"He's the Green Man!" Isaac chirped.
"He's the Dream Man," corrected Lydia.
"He's real hairy." Jackson sniffed.
Stiles carried his tin box to the bed and pulled out a needle. The kids
silently watched as he extracted a measure of Glory Water, found a prominent
vein on the soft inside of the alpha's arm and stuck the needle in.
And a while later, when the alpha began to shiver, and Stiles pulled the covers
up over him, the omega finally said, "He's the Rain Man," and herded them all
out so their guest could sleep in peace.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
Derek woke wheezing and gasping. The omega's scent was still there, in the
room, on his skin, in his lungs. It filled the space like air.
He'd slept—as good a death sentence as running naked through the Wasteland. A
mistake—because the nightmares were relentless, and now the sight and smell of
warm blood and scorched skin and dead eyes and the soft, sad sound of Laura's
voice cut through his mind like a knife, shaking him fully awake.
Hallucinations. But they feel so real. How long had it been since Derek had
seen his sister? How long had he been here?
He suddenly jolted upright, or at least tried to, but the sickness exhausted
him down to the very marrow of his bones, punched the last speck of energy
right from his lungs. He made a frustrated grunt in the back of his throat, and
it came out as a growl. It was hard to say when it was exactly that he had let
the wolf in his blood bury him alive, hide Derek Hale in the shell of a body
that used to be a man. This is what you are. This is what you were created to
be.
The only thing he was now was a ghost. A ghost trying to find home, where all
the ghosts of his childhood would be waiting.
The door creaked open, and Derek held himself still. A moment later, the omega
was standing over him, soft and lovely against the dim moonlight, a thing of
such utter beauty that Derek immediately knew he was never meant to lay eyes
upon him. A desert flower, a rose in the Wasteland. An angel, otherworldly,
guarding me, scum of this wretched Earth.
The omega sat beside him, the mattress slightly dipping, and he put a damp
cloth to Derek's brow.
"You got a name?" he whispered after a moment, and this time, when Derek
replied, it came not as a growl, but as something soft and pitiful, a whimper,
and he hated himself for it. He chose to not attempt to say anything more in
the end, stubbornly refusing to share with this boy even one syllable of his
name, biting it back. His name belonged to him and him alone. It was the last
piece of himself he had.
The omega didn't seem to mind, simply smiled and pointed at himself. "Stiles."
Derek rolled it around on his tongue, allowed this foreign name but not his
own. He hadn't seen anyone in so many days, over a hundred maybe, especially
not an omega, and not ever this close, and the boy's scent was doing funny
things to his head. He didn't like it, but he couldn't stop staring at him,
either.
"What do you see?" Stiles asked softly, wringing the cloth out into the bowl by
the bed, and when Derek remained obstinately silent, he looked down at the
alpha, and the alpha looked evenly back at him, and he smiled again. "Why do
you look at me like that?"
The moment I saw you, I thought death had taken me. He internally shook his
head. You look like everything I can never have.
It hurt to look at him, so Derek closed his eyes. He regretted it the instant
he saw Laura's face beneath his lids, and he gritted his teeth against the
onslaught of frightful images. The omega's hand was cool against his temple,
smoothing back the damp, hacked-off mat of his hair.
He'd heal. He'd escape. He'd keep heading west. He'd find Beacon Hills, his
childhood home, his sister, and he would forget this boy with gentle hands and
kind eyes and compassion had ever even existed. Fool. There was no such thing
as compassion, not in this world—only survival.
But then the cloth was back on his forehead and he opened his eyes and Stiles
was smiling down at him, a breathtaking thing, and a surge of something deadly
flooded Derek's chest: hope.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
On the third day, the Rain Man's fever finally broke.
Feeding him was a difficult task because Stiles was cutting into his own
portions to keep the man alive. He spent half of his time trying to get the
alpha to keep the food down, a piece of him chipping away every time the man
vomited it up into the wastebasket. He wondered how the man had kept on all the
muscle he had. He wondered how the man could be so large and solid, especially
considering he was starved half to death by the time he had made it to the
Ridge. Stiles practically had sticks for arms, what little protein there was in
his diet refusing to cling to his bones. It made him slightly jealous, made him
avoid brushing up against hard surfaces and knocking his elbows into things; it
all proved just how frail he was, especially when the bruises would bloom by
the day's end, a reminder, and he hated that part of himself. The Colonel
didn't mind. Stiles spat at that thought. I don't belong to the Colonel. I am
not a thing.
Lydia suggested they toss the Rain Man off the Ridge, feed him to the famished
coyotes. He's a dead man, she had said. Dead man means dead weight.
But Stiles refused to give up. He waited and he prayed and he prayed and he
waited, even when the Glory Water began dwindling, even as he began giving some
of his portions up all together, even when his stomach would cramp so hard from
hunger that when he laid in bed long after all the others were asleep, he'd
curl his legs up into his chest and softly cry into the bony dips of his
knees—Stiles did not give up. The hunger was nothing new, but that didn't mean
it got any easier. It didn't for Stiles, at least. Jackson liked to tease him.
He'd joke that if they ever got a proper breeze out in this desert, Stiles
would sound like a wind chime, air whistling past his ribs, his fingers and
toes. He was no skeleton, but he was always hungry, and it showed as time
dragged on.
This routine lasted more than twenty days, and the Rain Man was showing no
improvement besides that first passing of the fever. Stiles was getting tired
of starving, and he was tired of waiting, and he was tired of praying to a God
that wasn't answering. The Rain Man didn't wake.
He didn't wake until he did.
It was late in the day, after second meal, and Stiles was hunched over his
needlework, busy tailoring a new shirt for Boyd after he had to scorch the
boy's favorite. He heard a creak from the alpha's room, and his eyes snapped to
the gap under the man's door. A shadow passed over the floor, and Stiles was
scrambling up, herding everyone to the ladder.
"Up, up, up," he directed, bundling a sleepy Scott onto Boyd's back, "quickly,
quickly", urging them up through the hole in the ceiling, onto the second
level. He had only a moment to spare before he turned, the Rain Man stood in
the entry, and their eyes met.
He was a lot more intimidating standing up at his full height than Stiles
remembered. His broad shoulders filled the frame of the doorway, his head
nearly knocking the top.
"I suppose a thank-you is in order," the Rain Man said gruffly, his voice deep
from not being used, and startling, so much so that Stiles was at a complete
loss for words. It was strange to hear him speak after so many days of his
silence.
Stiles nervously glanced down at the children's books on the table. "You
hungry?" he asked suddenly.
The man nodded, gaze penetrating and hot on the back of Stiles' neck as the
omega turned to fill a bowl with water, tearing open a portion packet and
dumping it in. The water began to fizz, bubbling up, and Stiles took the time
to fill the man a plate of beans and rice. When he turned back, the water bowl
was filled with a fluffy loaf of bread. Stiles placed it all on the table and
handed the alpha a spoon.
The Rain Man hesitated only a moment before he pulled out a chair and seated
himself, tearing into the meal like, well, a starving man. Stiles was worried
that if he kept eating at such a speed he'd vomit it all up, but the omega held
his tongue and just watched.
When his plate was more than halfway empty, the Rain Man paused, looking up at
Stiles as if suddenly remembering he was still there. He straightened, wiping
the back of his hand over his mouth.
"You were hungry," Stiles said, and internally smacked himself. He lowered his
head, a habitual sign of submission beaten into him since he was little more
than a child. The man gave him a taken aback look, then grunted and shoveled
some more beans into his mouth.
"You came from the south?" Stiles asked.
"East."
"East?" Only death resided to the east, the sick land stretching cruelly for
miles upon desolate, unending miles. "You crossed the Big Nothing?"
"Did you hear that?" came a sharp whisper from above, followed by a loud smack,
and Stiles swallowed, looking at the alpha, but the man simply continued
shoveling food into his mouth, unaware. "He crossed the Great White," Erica
hissed in awe.
"The White Sea?"
"He's gotta be a road warrior, swear he's gotta be," Kira's giddy, high-pitched
whisper carried down to where Stiles and the Rain Man were seated, and Stiles
felt his heart skip a beat, waiting for the man to leap across the table and
strangle him until his eyes popped out of their sockets.
But it didn't happen. The Rain Man was completely oblivious.
Stiles scrambled up to fetch the alpha some water, making as much noise as
possible—scraping the canteen forward over the counter and unplugging it into a
pitcher, letting it drown out the titters escaping the bunk.
When the Rain Man was finished eating, he leaned back in his chair and murmured
a quiet thank-you as Stiles carried the dirty dishes and cutlery to the sink.
When he turned back, the alpha was holding one of the children's books in his
hand, and Stiles froze. 
"Those-" he jolted forward, snatching the book away. "These are personal," he
muttered, whisking them all into his arms and tearing away from the table so he
could hide them. 
"Is there anyone else here?"
Stiles tripped, catching himself at the last minute, and whirled around.
"No."
The Rain Man nodded, absorbing this, and then he was pushing away from the
table, and in two strides he was standing in front of Stiles.
Stiles dropped the books, pressing himself back against the wall, and waited
for a fist to fly, but instead, the Rain Man just tilted his head down, bracing
his hands on either side of Stiles' head, his lips within kissing distance of
Stiles' neck, and when Stiles felt his heartbeat skyrocket, the alpha asked
again, steadily, breath hot against the omega's pinkening ear: "Is there anyone
else here?"
Isaac landed on the floor with a thud and was running for them as fast as his
little legs could take him, frantically waving his arms, and he latched himself
to the alpha's leg with a soft thud, pounding his little fists into the man's
thigh. "No! No, no, no! Bad! You meanie! Don't hurt him!"
Derek looked down at Isaac like he was taking notice of a common insect. He
looked up at Stiles, and back down at Isaac, then up at Stiles once more. He
stepped away, and Stiles pulled Isaac behind him.
Erica stuck her head out of the hole in the ceiling, blonde curls tumbling down
around her face. "Who was supposed to watch Isaac?"
Two more heads popped out. "Someone's gonna get an earful," Jackson teased
Lydia, and she shoved him back up through the hole.
"He's a little rascal," was her excuse, raising an it-is-what-it-is kind of
brow at Stiles.
The Rain Man seated himself again, taking a sip from his water. "Well, I guess
that answers that."
"He's harmless," Lydia reasoned, climbing down, and Derek was staring at her
wild, strawberry blonde head of hair. Stiles saw him bristle slightly when she
added, "He let you nurse him back to health without a single rape and-or murder
attempt. That's something."
"He was sick, if you hadn't noticed." Stiles appraised Derek for a moment. "How
many people have you killed?"
"None who didn't try to kill me first," the alpha replied evenly, taking
another sip of water. The deep greens of his eyes had secrets, and Stiles
suddenly wanted them.
Lydia laughed and walked over to take Isaac's hand. "See?" She grinned
viciously at the man. "Harmless."
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
Stiles Stilinski, Derek learned, was seventeen, an Aquarius, and had an eerie
fixation with God, of all things. He was pale, probably the palest person Derek
had seen since he was a young boy. The omega was unmarred by war, unscathed by
hard labor, untouched by the sun. Derek imagined that if snow still existed, it
would look like this boy. How have you been surviving out here? Where did you
come from, you who was not made for this Earth? he wanted to ask but did not.
Derek carved the thirtieth little slit into the frame of his bed. Anyone else
might have looked at it and thought it was a record of how much sex he'd had
here.
Thirty days. He hadn't stayed anywhere this long since he was a teenager, back
when he was fighting for a cause he couldn't know anything less about. He
needed to head west, to get home, to find Laura. Thirty days ago, he wouldn't
have thought of anything else. But Stiles had now—in some way Derek couldn't
quite put his finger on—complicated his mission, and the journey to his death
no longer held the same allure.
"What's the Rain Man do?" he heard Scott ask from the other room, sounding
barely over a whisper. Derek had to strain to hear.
It was laughable. He was a wolf and yet he could barely hear any better than
an average man. Sometimes worse. He cursed the wolf in his blood. Maybe if he'd
learned not to rely on it so much he'd be able to see his sister again some
day. Instead he'd likely die with a bullet in his back without ever having
heard his killer approaching. 
"The Rain Man brings rain," Lydia said simply.
"Why's the rain matter?" Jackson scoffed. "The Colonel's got all the water we
need. We don't need the rain."
"It'll save Stiles," Boyd said.
"He'll save Stiles?"
"The rain will save Stiles."
"The Rain Man will bring rain." Erica's voice was shrouded with approval. "He's
gonna make it real green-like."
Later on in the early evening, Stiles hid Derek up in the bunk with the
children, making sure the alpha had every last one of his possessions, from his
biggest gun down to the discolored photograph Derek had been too stubborn to
ask about. He wondered if Stiles knew he was a wolf. He has to know. Derek's
thoughts darkened like they always did. He knows and he pities you for it. A
broken wolf, probably couldn't even protect him if it came down to it.
He heard engines in the distance, but he had to wait until they were much
closer to be able to tell how many. Three. They pulled up to the front of the
house, and one engine cut. A heavy gait on the porch, followed by two others
and a polite knock on the door. Derek heard Stiles turn the handle.
"Hello, Stiles," came the stomach-turning voice of a man. The other two pairs
of feet stepped further into the house. "My," sighed the voice, and Derek's
nausea returned to him tenfold.
There was the sound of a kiss, a noise so repulsive that Derek knew he wouldn't
forget it for all his days to come.
"How I've missed you," the voice purred.
The door creaked on its hinges and slammed shut.
"My little dove."
Chapter End Notes
     I'm sooo tired, man. I finished this draft mid-week, and I had to sit
     down and re-write the whole thing because it had disappeared like
     motherfucking magic. So tired. SO TIRED. Okay.
     Side note: werewolves are biologically bigger/taller than humans
     since the gene was created to be used as a weapon. Size difference
     enthusiasts, you are so very welcome. Also, the whole meal portions
     thing is inspired by Star Wars VII.
     Dream-mist = a mirage
     Glory Water = medicine for radiation sickness
     The Big Nothing/White Sea/Great White = the biggest stretch of
     wasteland lying to the east, taking up the majority of the midwest up
     to the Californian border
     Tune in next Sunday for more!
***** Chapter 3 *****
Chapter Notes
     ❀ How_do_you_believe_in_a_god_that's_been_watching_all_the_hell_from
                               a_heaven_above? ❀
See the end of the chapter for more notes
The desert made Derek feel deaf. Or maybe he really was deaf. Some days it was
harder to tell than others. But crouching there in the bunk, trying to focus
every bit of himself on what was going on down below, only reminded him of how
weak of a wolf he really was. His hearing betrayed him for the thousandth time,
and Derek was forced to sit still, silently waiting. He shifted forward when he
heard Stiles shout loud enough for all the kids' heads to turn in unison.
"Get your sausage-lookin' phalanges off that!" Stiles snapped, and then silence
fell over Derek's ears once more. He was tempted to growl out in frustration,
but Lydia, looking like she had just read his mind, shot him a murderous glare,
and so Derek held his tongue until the heavy tread of feet departed from the
house, walked off the porch, and the roar of engines lit up the night once
more, peeling off across the desert.
Derek was the last one to emerge from the bunk, carefully retreating down the
ladder, fatigue from the sickness still stubbornly sewn into his limbs. The
kids were setting the table, and Stiles was hurriedly unboxing a new ration
pack, clumsily filling several bowls, and Derek, despite his miserable hearing,
was able to make out the fierce growl of Stiles' stomach above all the other
noises in the kitchen.
Stiles looked up at him. "You sitting?"
Derek sat.
Stiles ate rapidly, without rest, and not for the first time, a wave of guilt
swept over Derek. You starved for me, didn't you? Strayed to the brink of death
for me? You shouldn't have, beauty. I am not worth even a moment of your
suffering.
"Who was here?"
Stiles paused, cheeks round with half-chewed food. Derek waited.
"The Colonel," Boyd quietly said.
Derek furrowed his brows.
"The Colonel of the Ridge," Lydia said. Stiles stared down at his plate,
shoulders twitching. He said nothing.
"The Colonel brings the food," Jackson said.
"The Colonel brings the water," Kira sadly added.
"Not for long." Erica patted Kira's head. "The Rain Man will do that now."
Derek continued to watch Stiles. "That all he was here for?"
Stiles fiddled with his spoon. "He came in his rig. It had him and two other
men in it and it did what most cars do. It came in one direction and left in
the other. That's all I can tell you about it."
Derek wanted to further interrogate him, but Stiles tugged his linens further
around his neck and continued eating, ending the conversation.
Later that night, before bed, Derek saw Stiles hunched over at the table, a
book falling apart in his lap. There were stray pages scattered in front of
him, most with tears and crude rumples and creases. It looked unsalvageable.
Derek gritted his teeth, headed down the hall, and shut his bedroom door behind
himself.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
Once Derek was finally up to revisiting the outside world, he learned that the
house wasn't exactly what one would call a house.
It was an assortment of cargo containers, stacked this way and that, one atop
the other in various directions, forming something in the general shape of what
one could assume was a dwelling, but only really resembled a house from the
inside looking out. The front porch was the only part of the outside that
wasn't metal, wooden boards wrapping over the front and around the sides,
shading the front door from the desert sun. There were a handful of windows, no
glass. It must've taken lots of planning to build, out here in the sand and
heat, without proper provisions. The halls and doorways and floors replicated
that of a true house, the ventilation and design telling of someone who put
love and consideration for safety into building it. Derek thought of Beacon
Hills, of the preserve, the house that stood for generations on his family's
lands, the home of his youth. He shook his head, and Erica giggled from her
spot on her footstool, watching Derek sharply knock his whispering ghosts away.
"Wrench," Boyd directed, sticking his hand out from under the powder-blue Jeep.
Erica put it in his palm.
"So when's the rain coming?" Erica asked Derek. He blankly stared back at her.
She raised a brow. "Well?"
"Leave him alone, Erica," Boyd muttered.
"You're the Rain Man," Erica said seriously, eyes never straying from the
alpha. "You're here for a reason. Stiles can't wait forever."
Derek turned his eyes to the motorbike at the other end of the garage.
"That one works. Not too well, though." Erica sighed, following his gaze. "The
Colonel tried to kill it. Said he didn't want Stiles going off and getting
himself hurt." Derek frowned. "Boyd'll fix it right proper, though. Boyd can
fix anything."
Looks like he's got his hands full. The Jeep was ancient. Derek wasn't sure
there was any fix in the world that could save it.
Boyd popped his head out from under the vehicle, wiping his face on a rag. He
chugged the water Erica gave him.
Derek took in the rest of his surroundings—the supply of water canteens stacked
up against one side of the garage, the odd rope and shovel, the mane of wild
red approaching from the house, a bright flame against the shimmering waves of
heat. And once Lydia came to collect Erica, Boyd and Derek were left alone save
for the sound of clicking tools and their own steady exhalations.
Neither of them were talkers, which didn't exactly make it uncomfortable, but
Boyd was still a boy. He should have things to talk about. Derek was the broken
one, the aging man who had seen things no one should ever have to see. Then
again, the world they lived in was ruthless without regard for age. Children
died. Bad men lived. That was life. Did Stiles find you, too? Did he save you
like he saved me?
"I was sick like you when he found me." Boyd didn't look at Derek, but had
somehow read his mind. Derek was starting to learn that these kids had a sixth
sense for that kind of thing. "He found me in the Badlands, when the Colonel
still let him ride out to the outers of the Ridge. I was ten." He wiped his
hands off on the rag, started sorting his tools back into a tool box, and Derek
frowned once more at the mention of the Colonel. "I'd be dead if it wasn't for
him." Boyd closed the box. "So would the others." He didn't look at Derek when
he quietly added, "You would be, too."
Derek couldn't bring himself to be thankful, but he didn't let his thoughts
betray his words. "He's different from what I'm used to," he carefully said
instead.
"S'pose." Boyd stood and nodded for Derek to follow him back to the house. "I
was called Vernon, after the gully my parents fucked next to." He frowned,
wiping the back of an arm over his glistening brow. "Stiles told me I could
pick a new name for myself if I hated it so much. Usually people just try to
take it from you." A pang of understanding bubbled up inside of Derek. "So,
yeah, guess that makes him different." He swung the door open. "Guess that's
what made me stay." The door slammed shut behind him, leaving Derek halfway up
porch, paused in his own tracks.
He felt the sweat on the back of his neck, the dry, suffocating air all around
him, the blistering heat on his back, baking his shoulders through his shirt.
He could leave. He could leave now. He could've left in the morning, the day
before, three days before that, a week ago. There was no life for him out here
in the desert and dust. Staying was never an option, but somehow, though the
entire world still rested in the same place it had rested for all these years,
the thought of leaving made something in Derek feel uneasy.
He turned away from the long stretch of wasteland that dwelled to the west and
headed back inside.
 
                                     ❀❀❀ 
 
He didn't mean for it to happen, but Derek learned pretty early on that denying
his attraction to Stiles was a losing game.
Stiles was beautiful, a pure, good thing, dropped into the middle of a cruel
world plagued by nothing but darkness and iniquity. His existence was something
Derek could not fathom. Not to say that he was a thing to worship or shelter,
Derek knew those were actions of a man ruled by his cock, but Stiles was a rare
creature in that he believed in so many things; in fact, Derek was sure that
Stiles didn't just believe in everything, but that he truly,
genuinely loved everything. Every grain of sand. Every ray of light. It wasn't
naiveté so much as it was...faith.
Derek had witnessed it to its full extent once, before the children had woken,
when he wandered past Stiles' open bedroom door in the early morning. Not even
the sun had fully risen, but there Stiles was, wrapped in his usual sheer
linens, kneeling, facing the window of his room. His beloved books were stacked
all over, on his bed, his small bedside table, strewn along the floor, but
Derek paid them no mind as he observed for several moments as Stiles clasped
his hands together, closed his eyes, and murmured into the still quiet of
the shadowy, dozy, not-yet-awake world.
"Who do you pray to?" Derek had asked, and Stiles' shoulders tensed, taken off
guard. He didn't turn.
"Whoever will listen," he replied, resuming.
Derek assessed him for a long, quiet while, waited until Stiles rose from his
place on the floor, the sun steadily rising, casting faint streaks of light
into the room. "How?" Derek didn't mean for it to sound so hostile, but he
couldn't help it. It annoyed him. Why should he have to hide that? "How can
your god allow any of this?" This world. This life. "Where has your god been?"
He stood before the doorway of the omega's room, not inside, not blocking it,
but he didn't try to make himself any less imposing, either. "Where is your god
now?"
Stiles was occupied by his linens, his back to the alpha, but Derek could see
his shrug.
"How can you believe in a god," Derek said, "that sees this hell we live in and
does nothing?"
"He hasn't done nothing." Stiles threw the end of a linen around his neck,
rucking it up over his throat, and finally turned. He looked up at the alpha,
eyes big and sure and suddenly melting the anger in Derek all away. He shrugged
once more, looking elsewhere. "He brought you to me, didn't he?"
Stiles passed him, retreated back down the hall, and Derek was still watching
the gentle sway of the omega's hips when the sunlight slanted in at a certain
angle, directly into Derek's eye, something in his brain telling him:
 focus—keep moving, home, Laura—and something in his bloodstream telling him:
 not on this.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
Derek learned about Erica when she collapsed to the sand one afternoon and
began uncontrollably shaking.
Boyd was calm and collected, positioning Erica on her side, watching her limbs
to make sure she didn't hurt herself as they waited it out. He carried her into
the house, to the sofa, and Stiles took only one look before he crossed the
room and quickly held her, folded her into him like a blanket, hiding her from
the world, saving her with a skillful precision Derek didn't like knowing he
had.
"It's not just her," Lydia told him quietly, later, after third meal, when
everyone had left Stiles and Erica alone in the main room as Stiles softly
hummed into the girl's hair, refusing to let go. "Lady Luck protected me. Boyd
and Jackson, too. But the sickness was not kind to the younger ones." Lydia
combed out a stubborn knot at the end of one of her red locks. Your hair looks
like fire, Derek wanted to note approvingly. I had a sister with hair like
yours.She's dead. Everyone I love is dead.
"Bring the rain soon," Lydia murmured, nudging her elbow into Derek's side.
"The Colonel gets angry over lots of stuff, but he'll fume when the rain
comes." She smiled, but it was mostly sad, and Derek tasted phantom blood on
his tongue as she said, "The Colonel doesn't rule the land. The land belongs to
all of us. The food, the water—all of it. It belongs to everyone. So bring the
rain, Rain Man. We deserve something good." She pat his arm, turning away.
"Especially Stiles."
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
In the night, Derek was scared to sleep. He feared the bittersweet relief of
rest, of shutting his eyes against the weariness that occupied his bones. Sleep
brought the nightmares, the reminder that Laura was always—still—waiting for
him. He had grown accustomed to the creaks and groans of the house, of certain
sounds that meant Stiles had gotten up to get water, or that he had decided to
crack open another book in the middle of the night, or that he was touching
himself, bringing relief, relaxing, undressing, coming on his own fingers, even
when a fully-grown, alpha stranger was right next door—and Derek decided
denying what the real problem was would only serve to exhaust him further, so
he admitted it: the nightmares were there, but that wasn't the only reason he
couldn't sleep.
The truth was, he hadn't been touched by anyone in years. A traitorous part of
his brain wondered what would happen if he creaked open Stiles' door, stepped
forward into the dark room, crawled into his bed, pulled up the thin sheet that
the omega wore. Would Stiles welcome his touch? Let his pale legs fall open
around Derek's waist? Let Derek press inside his wetness?
And every time these thoughts entered his mind, Derek forced them away,
disgusted with himself. Why would Stiles want him? A broken wolf, a damaged
alpha, old enough to realize he really is too old for the omega? Why would
Stiles want him? No good. No good for him. Stiles deserved someone who could
make him happy, like the things he liked, understand him, someone who wasn't
fucked in the head, scared of their own thoughts, ready for death at every
moment, someone who would stay. Like the Colonel? Derek pulled away from that
thought. The Colonel could live a thousand lifetimes and never deserve Stiles.
Derek succumbed to the dark comfort of sleep.
So could I.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
  
When Derek first learned that Scott was the Colonel's, he searched Stiles out,
dark thoughts clouding his mind.
The Colonel had had Stiles. He'd laid atop Stiles and filled him with child.
How had Derek been so blind? Of course Stiles was mated to the Colonel. He
didn't exactly understand the dynamic of their relationship, but they had Scott
together, and the Colonel housed Stiles, fed him, allowed him to keep the
orphaned children. He could have slain them. A lesser man would have.
"Are you with child?" he asked immediately, standing mere feet from Stiles in
the kitchen.
Stiles looked momentarily stunned but eventually shook his head. "How would
I be?"
Derek stared, bewildered once more. "Scott," he said, and nothing more.
Stiles seemed to understand Derek's thought process all of a sudden, and his
vision clouded over with something dark and full of hatred, bowing his head.
"I'm not mated to the Colonel." A beat. "And I didn't carry Scott inside me,
but he's mine all the same."
Derek wished he could savor the flood of relief that threatened to overwhelm
him, but he tamped it down, took great effort to extinguish it.
He looked at Stiles' pale face and for a split second, entertained the idea
of taking the omega with him when he would leave. Maybe he shouldn't be in such
a rush to die. Maybe this desert offered more than met the eye. And though
Derek had lived for thousands of days, not one of them could prepare him for
those that were yet to come.
Chapter End Notes
     Age range:
     Isaac = 5
     Scott = 7
     Kira = 8
     Jackson = 10
     Erica = 11
     Lydia = 12
     Boyd = 13
     Badlands = any land contaminated by radiation
     Hope you liked this one!
***** Chapter 4 *****
Chapter Notes
                      ❀ you_gotta_believe_in_something ❀
See the end of the chapter for more notes
When he was young, and the Colonel was more tolerant and not yet hardened by
age and grief, Stiles would climb up to the top of the Ridge and look out at
the world. He'd imagine the land, how it was Before, when people lived
everywhere and the Wasteland was green and wet. He'd perch on a rock out by the
Pass and watch the people in Town, the weathered men—with their grimy, dirt-
stricken faces and worn clothes—the strong fathers, the dependable mothers—who
possessed a certain kind of gentleness that the world could not ever rip away
from them—the elders—whose eyes said all, eyes that had seen the Old World,
that knew that there was once a better time before all became dust and dirt—and
the children—who fled from their innocence with a fierceness that ended up
protecting them more than not.
Stiles would draw a story in his mind for everyone, of who they would've been
had the world not died, how their lives would be different. Stiles knew his
father would be a policeman, like the books talked about. He would "serve and
protect" as it used to be said, kind of like the road warriors that were
dispatched during the Last War, when the Long Winter had not yet spread to
every corner of the world. And Stiles knew he, himself, would read. The same
way he read now, only there would be more books. And a lot more time. And his
father would still be alive, probably. And the Colonel would never have him.
And the Rain Man would not have to save him. Because rain would happen all the
time.
 
                                     ❀❀❀ 
                                        
Derek wasn't allowed to go to Town. It was reasonable considering Stiles was
treated like a possession, and Derek didn't need to ask too many questions
to know he'd probably end up being killed if he was found in the house, so he
said nothing, even if it annoyed him, watching Stiles and the kids disappear in
the bed of a truck that pulled up to pick them up with the sunrise. The only
thing was, Derek had reached a limit. He refused to sit in the house and do
nothing for even one more second.
So he walked.
He approached from the side of the bedrock, hoping to just come off as another
wanderer, and the trek helped some, ruining his fresh clothes, dirt clinging to
his skin, damp with sweat. No pair of eyes stayed on him too long, none except
that of an elderly human man with skin dark as Boyd's, who was hunched over
beneath the shade of a hut with the female version of himself crouched beside
him. Their contemplating gazes lingered no more than a few seconds, but Derek
felt naked and held at gunpoint all the same. He kept walking.
It was high noon by the time he caught sight of Stiles, the flash of the
omega's white linens peeking out from over a high ledge, then just as quickly
disappearing. He emerged in the crowd a handful of seconds later, the kids
trailing behind him like baby ducklings. A group of raggedy children stopped
and stared, the crowd parting slightly for, as a few were quick to call him,
'the Colonel's dove', kissing their palms and pressing them to their foreheads
in a display of reverence. The children kept themselves at a distance, their
eyes wide, and Derek realized that Stiles was probably the palest person they'd
ever lay eyes on in this lifetime.
Derek watched from afar as Stiles visited certain stalls in the sea of tents
erected into a market, trading portions and water for spare mechanic parts,
fabric, and other little things Derek paid no mind to. The omega drew closer,
and Derek hunched further into himself, hiding in the shadows, head down,
inconspicuous. The ringing in his ear quickly grew, and Derek could only make
out the tail end of Stiles' brief interaction with a stall owner before
continuing past, the kids on his heels. "Pray for rain," the grizzled man
murmured.
"Pray for rain," Stiles returned, allowing a smile small before slipping away.
And this prayer continued in parting with every shop owner as Stiles advanced
toward the old man and woman in the hut by the bedrock, who received the omega
with warm looks of affection. Derek glanced up just as Stiles bent and kneeled
before them right there in the sand, kissing each of their dark, wrinkled
hands, excitement and joy beaming from his face.
"You grow more beautiful each time I see you," the old woman said, cupping
Stiles' cheek.
"Too bad it'll mean the death of him, then," the old man muttered, pulling
Scott up onto one knee, and the old woman gave him a look that made Derek
snort. He tuned out as Stiles spoke with them, though it was largely his own
pitiful hearing that allowed him to hear only certain parts of the
conversation. "There's a wolf," the old man said suddenly, and Derek froze.
"Here?" Stiles asked, surprised, and Derek's brows drew together. 
"We saw him not long ago. He came sniffing around from the desert." The old man
kept his gaze steadily trained on Stiles. "You wouldn't know anything about
that, would you?"
"About a wolf?"
"About a man."
Stiles fiddled with his linens, refusing eye contact. "Not a wolf."
The old woman frowned. "You wouldn't know a wolf if it bit you on your hind,
Stiles," she said, waving the children into the hut. "He was wearing your
father's boots."
Stiles' head shot up. "He's supposed to be at the house."
"Stiles."
"How do you know? How do you know he's a wolf?"
"We know."
"Of course you do," Stiles grumbled.
The woman held him suddenly. "This will not end well, Stiles. You're risking
everything."
Derek saw the omega's shoulders begin shaking, and he realized that Stiles was
laughing. "What, like everything I have isn't already on the line?"
The old man shook his head, hands clasped together. "You need to ask yourself
if he's worth it."
Stiles stood. "I couldn't let him die."
"You don't know him."
"I saved a life and that's all that matters." Stiles shoved open the flap of
the hut. "Say goodbye to Deaton and Marin," he told the kids, sweeping Scott up
into his arms.
"You're playing a dangerous game," Deaton said, and Derek winced, hearing the
creaks in his bones as the old man stood. "Your eighteenth year is close. What
are you hoping for?"
"Alan," Marin calmly said, tangling her fingers with Stiles'. "He's made his
decision."
Deaton's frown deepened. "I wish there was more I could do," he quietly said,
regretful.
Stiles deflated some. "Blaming yourself does nothing," he said. "I made that
deal."
"You were a child."
"I had to do something."
Derek had half a mind to busy himself, look less suspicious, but his hearing
was being kind and he couldn't afford even a moment's distraction.
"There's still time," Stiles said, something too sad in his voice to tolerate.
It made Derek's skin crawl.
Marin smiled at the omega and hugged him. "Still so much hope in you," she
murmured. "So much like your mother."
Stiles shortly departed with the children, and Derek was moving before his
brain could catch on. Deaton and Marin looked up, irritatingly calm as they
watched him approach. He stood awkwardly, the sun hotly beating down on him as
they all stared at each other for what seemed like forever.
"Pray for rain," Deaton finally said, clear and steady, something knowing and
keen rooted in his gaze.
Derek stepped back. "Pray for rain," he said, and disappeared into the crowd.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
The Rain Man was a wolf.
It made Stiles blush real hard when that sunk in.
The Rain Man is a wolf.
He was too embarrassed to touch himself that night, but he dreamt.
Oh, he dreamt.
He dreamt of the usual, of water—a sea, a river, a waterfall—and the ache
inside him gushed like an aquifer. He quivered with it, squeezed his legs
together, tried to ignore it, but the dream was all-consuming, inescapable. It
made way for wandering thoughts of others things, like large, calloused hands,
broad, tanned shoulders, dark, untrimmed faces, and green, green eyes.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
"Your faith astounds me," Derek said, not for the first time.
The omega turned a page in his book. "Everyone believes in something."
How can I tell you how wrong you are? How do I tell you I am the living proof?
"Have you told your god he left the world in the hands of the wrong people?"
Derek asked.
"Everything happens for a reason."
"Right," Derek said, clenching his fists against the onslaught of warm blood
and smoke filling his lungs, clouding his head. "Including the deal you made
with the Colonel?"
Stiles froze. "How do you know about that?"
"Does it matter? I know."
"It's not important."
"You're a bad liar."
"Am I? I've kept you hidden for this long." Stiles said it bitingly, but he
finally met Derek's eyes, and that was a small victory in Derek's books.
"Are you going to tell me?"
Stiles held his book up. "No."
"Then I'll make my assumptions."
"Be my guest. You are one after all."
"And what are you? The Colonel's caged little dove—untouchable,
forbidden, owned."
"He doesn't own me."
"Then what would you call it?"
Stiles glared at him. "I am not a thing. I made a deal to keep my father's
land. That's all."
It was Derek's turn to freeze.
"If the rain doesn't come by the time I'm eighteen, the Colonel takes the
land," Stiles said, lifting his book again. "Assumptions, indeed."
"You're not as smart as I thought you were if you think that'll be the only
thing he takes."
Stiles jolted up, slamming his book closed. "You know nothing, Rain Man."
"Your faith blinds you."
"You don't know anything about my faith."
"Faith makes people reckless."
"I can say the same about those who lack it."
They stared at each other, the air prickling with anger and something else,
something softer yet more volatile. Derek glanced down at the omega's small,
linen-wrapped breasts and looked away again. "You won't be safe forever," Derek
said softly. "There are bad people out there."
Stiles looked down at his feet, shaking his head, and laughed. "You think I
don't know that?" His voice was almost a whisper. "But how would I live with
myself if I didn't believe things could be different?"
 
                                     ❀❀❀ 
 
"Where were you trying to go?" Stiles finally asked one day, adding the
finishing touches to Boyd's new shirt. He didn't look up from his needlework.
Derek allowed the ringing in his ear to distract him for a moment before
replying, "Home."
"Home?"
"West."
Stiles' fingers paused. 
"What is it?"
Stiles shook his head.
"Tell me."
Stiles placed the shirt down, unable to meet Derek's eyes.
"Tell me."
"Nothing lies in the west."
Mark time.
Stiles looked up, and whatever he saw on Derek's face made his lips press
together, his head bowing in regret.
"You lie," Derek whispered.
"No-"
"You're lying."
I'll see you soon.
"The Colonel said-"
"Said what?" Derek snapped, jerking up from the table, chair knocking over.
"You believe him? You believe a single word out of his fucking mouth?"
"I wouldn't lie to you." Stiles straightened, refusing to look away.
"No. But the king of your desert wouldn't even hesitate. He'd tell you
anything. How do you think he's kept you here so long?"
Now Stiles stood, jaw set. "You don't know anything," he snarled, and Derek was
momentarily taken aback. "You don't know a fucking thing."
"I know that you've kept these children safe, and yourself, somehow, and now
you pray to a god, you pray he'll save you, you pray for rain, and you
think—what? That I'll bring it? That I'll bring the rain?"
"You will-"
"Rain Man, Rain Man, he says, I'm no fucking Rain Man—I'm barely even a man."
"I don't believe that."
"You think your god has brought me here to bring you rain."
"I-"
"You think he would intervene like that, that he has the power to do what he's
done to this earth, to save what needs saving, to save you? Look around!" Derek
spread his arms, gesturing at the whole fucking world. "God didn't do this! We
did!"
Stiles stood silent, hands clenched at his sides, and Derek looked at the
omega's pale face. He exhaled through his nose, defeated.
I wasn't meant to be saved by you. If there is a god, he sent you to me, not
the other way around. I can't save you like that. I can't be what you need. I'm
not anything you think I am.
"Will you still go?" Stiles whispered.
Yes, Derek wanted to answer. I will always go. You don't want a life with me,
angel.
He walked out.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
For an entire week, Derek didn't sleep, haunted by Laura's waiting ghost, her
voice constantly in his ear—mark time, brother, mark time—until one night, the
darkness was somehow, in some way, less threatening as Derek closed his eyes to
rest.
The terrors were calm, the scary images remaining hidden.
That night, Derek didn't startle himself awake from a nightmare.
That night, Derek dreamt for the first time since he was a boy.
There was softness, like that of linens, a pleasant voice, pale skin, the eyes
of a doe—big, hazel, hypnotizing—and lots and lots of rain.
Chapter End Notes
     Town = populated by the people of the Ridge, resides before the Pass
     the Pass = main entrance/exit to the Ridge, facing westward
     the Last War = complete global nuclear fallout, the end of the end
     the Long Winter = nuclear winter
     road warriors = the last soldiers sent out to maintain order before
     the federal government collapsed
     I aged Deaton (80ish) and Marin (75ish) way up for the sake of plot.
     Also, in this fic they're spouses, not siblings.
     Have a great Father's Day!
***** Chapter 5 *****
Chapter Notes
        ❀ life_cannot_grow_where_man_has_been_But_inside_you,_you_still
                                   believe ❀
See the end of the chapter for more notes
A long, long time ago, when Stiles' father and mother were both alive and they
were a happy family, the Colonel was a nicer man.
The Colonel went by the name Rafael, and he didn't have Jackals back then, or
if he did, he treated them like actual people—friends, even—not like annoying
flies to swat at. The Colonel owned most of the land along the Ridge, but
Stiles' father also had some, and though the Colonel didn't like that, he never
tried to do anything about it, either. At least not until Stiles' father died.
Stiles buried his father, and on that very same day, the Colonel came for him.
He was twelve. Twelve, starving, and an orphan. He was as good as dead. The
Colonel wouldn't kill him, though, Stiles knew that. The Colonel was not so
merciful. No, he'd rip Stiles' home away from him, take the land for himself,
rape him, impregnate him, make him birth children of a loveless mating. All the
future held was suffering. But there was something inside of Stiles that wasn't
ready to give up, a certain drive that refused to go down without a
fight. Believe, it whispered. You have to believe.
So he greeted the Colonel out on his father's porch and announced that the rain
would decide for them.
The Colonel had laughed. "You know I can take whatever I want," he had said
darkly, calmly, a fact—true as the sun rising in the east and setting in the
west—and the men that were once his equals crowed from behind him, most of
their faces scarred and branded, property of the Colonel, expendable. "And why
should I agree to this?" the Colonel humoured Stiles.
"Because you have nothing to lose." Stiles felt his hands tremble. "Or do you
think the rain could come?"
The Colonel had appraised him for an insufferable minute, but it was a lot more
time than Stiles had expected the alpha to take, so he bit his tongue and said
nothing, just waited.
"You know I'm not a patient man," the Colonel slowly said, though no anger was
written into his tanned, aging face. "I want what's mine, Stiles."
"And you'll have it," Stiles replied, though his voice shook. "Take me now and
I will fight you at every turn. I'll shoot myself. And if I can't find a gun,
I'll slit my own throat, and if you hide every last thing with a pointed end
away from me, I will bite my own tongue in half and bleed myself to death." The
Jackals grew quiet, their mindless hooting and howling falling slack in the
dry, early evening air. "But if you wait," Stiles continued, steadier, more
collected with the added satisfaction of finally being taken seriously, "I will
go willingly." However willing I can pretend to be. "I'll give you my
land." You won't ever erase the true people of this desert. "I'll bear your
children." I'll hate you more than I'll ever love them. "And you'll keep me
forever, because I've come to you all on my own, the way you really want me
to."
"Colonel-"
"Great One-"
"Quiet."
The Colonel stared at Stiles, one foot up the stairs of the porch. The air
crackled with tension, and Stiles savored the last sweet breaths he'd ever take
as a free person.
"Alright, then."
Stiles felt like he'd faint. "A-Alright?"
The Colonel took his foot off the porch. He calmly combed a hand through his
hair. "Alright."
He departed without another word, tearing away on his motorbike, his Jackals
splitting off behind him, the desert sand rising up in a hazy puff of dust.
Stiles buckled, dropping down, knobby knees hitting the old wood of the porch.
He was too shaken to allow himself relief, only the awe of what had just
happened remaining, eating him alive. The tears came suddenly, salty and wet,
such a novel feeling against his usually chapped lips, and it reminded him of
how thirsty he was, how dependent he'd been his whole life, how his father was
dead, buried, never coming back, and how stupid he had been to believe, even
for a second, that the rain could ever really come.
 
                                     ❀❀❀ 
                                        
Stiles didn't know what made him lie to the Rain Man about his deal with the
Colonel, but what he did know was that he didn't want to find out what the
alpha would do if he knew the truth. Not that he would necessarily do anything,
but Stiles most certainly didn't want to risk it. He wasn't blind. He saw the
way the Rain Man looked at him. It was different from how the Colonel or the
Jackals would, less predatory and more tender, a way that made Stiles warm from
head to toe, even when he was nowhere near the sun or sand. He liked it.
And maybe it was selfish. Maybe the Rain Man had a right to know how truly
dangerous harboring him in the house was. But Stiles couldn't bear to give up
their carefully balanced start of a life together, what the Rain Man could mean
for him. The alpha wasn't just a means to an end anymore, but a welcomed
fixture in a house that had been missing a certain kind of something for a
long, long time. That first moment Stiles had laid eyes on the Rain Man, his
heart had sighed, and that sigh washed through his veins, bloomed across his
skin, sprouted from the parts inside him he had not known even existed,
scattered from somewhere deep within, from that place that had never felt the
warmth of the burning desert, the truth wrath of the dying world, that had
never seen the light. It poured out of him from that place that had taken all
of his hope and given him only despair. There you are, it said. I've finally
found you.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
One day, in the middle of Jackson tattling on Erica, she just snapped and bit
him right in front of Stiles. Derek was so stunned he just stood and watched.
She said, "If I'm getting punished for it, I'm going to actually do it." She
ran off before Stiles could react, leaving a sniffling Jackson behind for
Stiles to rush over to and hold.
"I'm sorry," Jackson hiccuped a while later, trying to reign in his tears,
stubbornly stifling his cries.
"It's okay," Stiles told him, combing his fingers through the boy's hair. "It
should never be a shame to you."
Derek was struck with a sudden recollection of his childhood, playing and
fighting with Laura, a time when children still had a short few years to hold
onto their fleeting youth. He remembered being just a boy, no older than
Jackson, probably younger, and feeling that first cruel shock of reality, of
the world he'd been handed, ripping his home, his family away, snatching him
from the people he loved. He was just a boy.
He was just a boy and he never cried again.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
"My mom was like you," Stiles told him.
"Like me?"
Stiles laughed. "Yeah. She didn't really think the land would ever be green
again, either." He sighed. "But Dad did. Marin says I'm like Mom more than I'm
like him, though." A dip formed between the omega's brows as he considered it.
"I don't think so," he said eventually. "Dad believed in the land, and so did
I. And I had hope." The corner of his mouth lifted. "Mom did, too. She didn't
believe in that much, but she believed in hope. And she believed in Dad. So I
guess that makes me kinda like her anyway."
Derek was quiet. "Why are you telling me this?"
"Why not?"
Derek didn't know how to respond.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
The first time Derek saw Stiles undress was an accident.
It was late into the night, the house lit only by one oil lamp and the light of
the moon. He hadn't been able to sleep, his ghosts invading his every thought.
He was laying across his bed, and it was by chance that he had glanced to his
left, and through the gap of his open door, seen Stiles at the end of the hall,
in the main room, unhurriedly stripping his linens off.
First the head covering went, falling to the omega's shoulders. Then the
shoulders were bared, and when he half-turned to head to bed, that first layer
of his linens pulling away from his throat entirely, Derek's heart lodged
itself in his throat.
A prominent line of raised skin, a scar as straight as an arrow, ran across the
omega's pale neck, upsetting and out of place and most unquestionably not
a mark of an accident—you don't know that, you don't know anything—but that of
ownership.
It's not that Derek hadn't questioned the Colonel's true character, but he had
wanted to believe in Stiles' unrelenting faith. This may have been Stiles'
father's land, but the isolation triggered other thoughts in Derek's head. The
Colonel treated Stiles like his treasure, his property, keeping up his end of
the bargain by respecting physical borders and autonomy, but also hiding Stiles
away in a selfish, inapt manner—ruining the bike in the garage, controlling all
supply of food and water, creating complete dependency—actions of a man with
more than just a plan to be handed the land when the time would come.
And the Colonel wasn't the only one with a cock, but the only thing that kept
the Jackals from stepping out of line was how much they feared the wrath of
their king. The Colonel's word overrode all else. Even a childish deal made by
a young, lonely omega out in the heart of the desert.
Derek didn't look away. His eyes followed Stiles' movements as the omega
continued to peel away each layer of linen—torso, legs, all looking unharmed
and pale as the rest of him, to Derek's unsettling relief.
The change struck something inside him, like a zap, jolting him. When had he
started to care so much? Who was he in the grand scheme of it all? No one.
Stiles paused in front of his own door, his eyes meeting Derek's, holding the
lamp up, washing the space between them in its warm, golden light. He held his
discarded linens in one arm. What remained was a simple shift, thin and white
and not leaving very much to the imagination. Derek swallowed.
Beacon Hills was and would always be the next step. Whatever got him closer,
that was the choice Derek would make. That'd been his only choice for the last
fifteen years. He'd known nothing else. He wouldn't stop now. Even if it meant
leaving all of this behind.
Stiles blew out the flame, plunging them into darkness.
 
                                     ❀❀❀ 
 
The Rain Man started helping Boyd in the garage. When Stiles would step out of
the house, most times he'd find them hunched over together, covered in grease,
tinkering with different parts, trying to fix the motorbike. Other times they
were strewn halfway under the Jeep, the Rain Man quietly pointing out certain
components and segments to Boyd, what-to-dos and what-nots. The Rain Man was
teaching Boyd, and he wasn't...child-proof, in the most general sense.
But Stiles quickly learned that the alpha had a way with the kids that wasn't
too rough or too cruel or too stingy, so they all got on well enough. Isaac
still had his moments of distrust, but overall, the Rain Man had become a
popular target for climbing and annoying and learning.
Stiles couldn't complain.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
The first year after his father's death was the hardest. His mother passed when
he was still quite young, too young to remember her properly but old enough to
have vague, hazy memories. After making the deal with the Colonel, Stiles
thought he'd kill himself if the elements chose to take their sweet time. How
could he be so stupid? What good was that deal? All it did was delay the
inevitable. He was foolish to think anything could save him, especially the
rain. Hope was a dangerous thing.
But as time passed, Stiles grew less resentful to his younger self and allowed
that hope, that faith, to guide him, to wake him in the morning, to let him
sleep at night. The thought of the rain not coming, of the deal just being a
form of bought time, became a distant idea that Stiles felt stranger to. It was
no longer about waiting for his impending fate, of facing the days with the
constant knowledge that he'd one day be owned by the Colonel in every
conceivable way, but it was about belief. And he did believe, truly, with every
ounce of his being, that something good had to happen.
And he was right.
Perhaps that was what he had been waiting for. Something different from
himself. Something rougher, braver. Someone. Someone resilient and tenacious
and driven by the promise of death. Stiles was too soft, too gentle, too
trusting to survive in a place like this desert, and yet he had never been able
to bring himself to leave it. Paradise was his home. The sand was in his blood.
The Rain Man was different. He was strong, in the traditional way, the only way
that mattered in the Wasteland. But he had ghosts and dreams and things that
haunted him, like Stiles, and he was quite sad, quite broken, also like Stiles.
"Have you had them long?" Stiles worked up the courage to ask. "Your dreams?"
The Rain Man laid quietly across the porch, unresponsive at first, like he
always was. "We all have dreams," he finally answered.
"What are yours about?"
The Rain Man didn't answer.
"Mine are of here, mostly," Stiles half-lied.
The Rain Man snorted. "Paradise? How can you dream about this place?" He let
his eyes fall open, trailing them over Stiles' face. "How can you love it so
much?"
Stiles shrugged and looked away. "That's how love works, right? Even when it
hurts, or doesn't return, or does nothing for you, you still love it." He tried
not to think that maybe that was how the Colonel's brain worked.
"No," the Rain Man replied, sitting up. He said nothing more for a moment, and
then: "There's more to love than this." This. As in Stiles' home, all he'd ever
known, the land his father died trying to save. The Rain Man cleared his
throat. "I wouldn't really know, anyway." 
Stiles couldn't help but laugh. "Don't tell me you've never mated."
"I haven't."
Stiles felt his jaw drop.
The Rain Man was quick to clarify, saying, "I've rutted. It's not the same as
mating."
Stiles flushed. "I know that. I meant only that-" he felt his blush deepen "-
you're...attractive." He wanted to curl up into a ball and disappear. I don't
know you, but you're more than just a handsome face, Rain Man. "It's hard to
imagine you not ever falling in love."
"Falling in love?" Stiles refused to meet the alpha's eyes. "And you?" Oh, have
mercy. "You've never mated." An observation. "Have you rutted?"
Stiles sucked in a sharp breath, the warmth in his cheeks eating away at him.
"No," he said quietly.
The Rain Man didn't laugh or say anything.
Stiles fidgeted, hands balled into his linens as he dwelled over his own words.
"I don't think I'll...do that just yet." He sunk his feet into the sand. "I
want to be in love." A small truth.
When he looked back, the Rain Man was watching him intensely. He whispered it
this time: "Love?"
"Yeah!" Jackson laughed, running out of the house, the rest of the rascals on
his tail. "Stiles wants love," he teased.
"A wedding!" Kira piped up, patiently waiting as Lydia tied her scarf over her
head, a meager shield from the sun. Stiles turned ruddy again and sheepishly
laughed down at his toes, shaking his head. Weddings were a silly, archaic
custom that Stiles wouldn't even know about had it not been for his books.
"And a ring!" Erica added, plopping down next to the Rain Man.
The alpha's brows drew together in that lost, grouchy way of his. "Mating,"
Stiles explained, overheating from the fevered desert and, of course, utter
embarrassment. "They used to call it marriage in the Old World." The very idea
was absurd, and Stiles couldn't help but feel mortified. This world they lived
in did not allow minor moments of happiness, symbols of devotion and undying
love. All that mattered was surviving one day to the next. 
He was hesitant to see the Rain Man's reaction, but there was nothing
unpleasant or demeaning written across the alpha's face when their eyes met
again. Only amusement. The hint of a smile.
"You never told me what you dream about," Stiles said later.
The Rain Man leaned against the doorframe. "How about a truth for a truth?" He
crossed his arms. "I'll tell you what I dream about if you tell me what you
dream about."
Stiles opened his mouth to remind the Rain Man that he had already told him,
but the alpha shut him up with a raised brow.
"What you really dream about," the Rain Man said.
Stiles chewed his lip.
"Rain."
The Rain Man uncrossed his arms.
"I dream about rain."
The Rain Man's gaze roamed over his face. He nodded once, as if receiving a
most important answer. "Me, too," he quietly said, and then just as quickly as
he had entered the room, he was gone.
 
                                     ❀❀❀ 
 
"The sky is trying to tell us something," came Kira's voice from outside, awed
and speculating.
"Don't be silly, the sky can't talk," Jackson responded, dismissive, and then
his voice trailed off, ceasing altogether.
"Everything can talk," Erica said, more daydreamy than usual. "We just have to
learn how to listen."
Stiles walked out onto the porch. He stepped down into the sand, slotting
himself between the children, whose eyes were wide and trained directly on the
northern sky, right overhead the house.
Stiles turned, looked up, and that's when he laid eyes on the first cloud he
had ever seen in his life.
Chapter End Notes
     I'll be going on vacation for 2-3 weeks so you may not see an update
     for a while unless I manage to find the time. I hate leaving you guys
     hanging, but we'll see how I manage. Hope everyone is having an
     awesome summer!
***** Chapter 6 *****
Chapter Notes
                 ❀ I_have_only_love_Is_that_a_choice,_still? ❀
See the end of the chapter for more notes
Derek dreamed.
His dreams—they weren't exactly dreams because they weren't the most pleasant
of hallucinations, but they were certainly not nightmares, because Derek,
haunted and broken and always running, was not afraid—were filled with Stiles
and rain,so much rain.
They were strange, a foreign form of phantasm he was unused to. He was more
familiar with his ghosts and his night terrors, the demons that threatened to
consume him every time he closed his eyes. He was unaccustomed to the way these
dreams made him feel—the vulnerable relief when he didn't wake from a cold
sweat, the guilt, because maybe he deserved to be terrorized by his own mind,
and the strange sense of sadness that would settle over him when he'd finally
wake.
"I dream about rain."
"Me, too."
But that wasn't completely true.
I also dream of you.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
The Rain Man was more of a closed book than the ancient muck-covered ones
Stiles liked to dig up in his spare time. He did not share things about
himself. He did not see the need to fill silences with words, pointless or no,
like Stiles did. He most certainly was not the sociable type, that much was
obvious, and Stiles, who prided himself on being able to read people, was
unable to unravel the mystery behind the Rain Man.
But sometimes—rarely—the Rain Man let his guard down. When he was so focused on
screwing in a motorcycle part or unwiring something in the Jeep or staring out
the window, sitting still in a chair, for one moment, not surviving, but just
being. Sometimes his mask slipped. Sometimes Stiles could see the hell on his
face, and he'd just know that wherever the Rain Man had been, now he was
somewhere better. That's what kept Stiles from prying, if nothing else.
And when he thought of the Rain Man leaving, of him moving on, of the desert
just being a stop on the way, it made Stiles feel heavy. It was stupid to get
attached. There was nothing here in the desert—not that there was anything
beyond the Ridge, either, the Colonel had made that clear to Stiles on multiple
different accounts—to make the Rain Man stay. Not even the lonely little cloud
that passed over Paradise seemed to sway him. There was nothing here. Just
Stiles.
So he'd shove the thought to the back of his mind. He'd ignore the panic that
arose in him when he imagined it. And he'd quietly, subtly, so as not to let
the Rain Man read him, pray that he'd choose to stick around after all, whether
more clouds came or not.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
Despite their initial meeting, Isaac had considerably warmed up to Derek with
each day that passed. The boy liked to follow him around, a pup on his tail,
and anything Isaac did, Scott also wanted to do, so Derek had gained two little
admirers, despite the lack of entertainment Derek afforded, observing and
following suit until they grew bored or one of the other kids swept them away.
After third meal, they'd crawl into his lap as Stiles read them all stories
from his books, snuggling down into his sides, burrowing themselves between
Derek and the cushions. When they'd doze off, Stiles would peel one off him
like a leech and carry them up to the bunk one by one. Eventually, Derek just
found it easier to carry them up himself. Stiles had a hard enough time getting
everyone else to bed, anyway.
"You're good with him," Stiles told Derek one night, as Derek put Isaac down
with the rest of his siblings. "He doesn't usually like alphas." Derek wasn't
sure what to make of that. It wasn't really a compliment, and he didn't take it
as one considering the standard of alphas that Stiles and the children were
accustomed to. He doesn't usually like alphas.Derek pressed his lips
together. Cora liked him, too, and he failed her. He glanced down at Isaac's
peaceful face. Remember not to trust too easily, little one.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
Stiles wouldn't stop fidgeting.
More than usual, at least. His knee was bouncing, fingers twitching in his lap.
Derek was tempted enough to pause his tinkering at the table, get up, and walk
the space over to the sofa to still the omega's leg himself. "What is it?" he
questioned before his feet could betray him.
Stiles froze. Derek heard the skip in his heartbeat. The omega hesitated before
he stood, slowly walked over and came to a stop in front of the alpha, biting
his lip in a way that made Derek have to look away. "I've got a secret," Stiles
confessed, and then Derek tensed, waiting for the omega to drop some sort of
bomb on him—"You died all those days ago and this is the afterlife" or "I'm
just a ghost like everyone else you're always seeing".
Derek sat with his heart lodged in his throat as Stiles ran to his room to
retrieve something. When the boy returned, he pulled out the chair next to
Derek's and sat himself down. Their knees brushed as the omega scooted closer.
"It's-" Stiles glanced up at Derek, pulling whatever he was holding away from
where he was tightly clutching it to his chest "-not much." He held a satchel.
It weighed heavily of the same beta scent that clung to the room Derek slept
in, the clothes he wore—Stiles' father's.
Stiles popped the buckle on the satchel and reached in, pulling out a wooden
box. He placed it on the table between them, reached inside the fold of linen
covering his front to pull out a hidden key hanging from the thread around his
neck. Derek's ears buzzed as he waited. Stiles gave a short pause, fingers
light on the intricate frame of the box, key ready in hand. Derek heard the
omega's nervous exhale before he slid the head into the lock, clicked it open,
and lifted the lid.
Of all the things Derek was prepared to see, it wasn't this. Inside the box lay
an arrangement of vials and little pouches, all of them filled with-
"Are those-"
"Seeds."
Derek's eyes sharply met Stiles'. "How?" he whispered, lifting a vial up
against the glow of the table lantern. The sound of their cascade was
beautiful—like uncooked beans in a tin. He couldn't look away. "How do you have
these?"
"My father," is all Stiles said, eyes glued to the vial in Derek's hand.
Derek put it back suddenly. "This isn't possible."
"But it is." 
"It shouldn't be."
"It is."
"You could be killed for this."
Stiles didn't reply at first, simply adjusted the vials, running gentle,
reverent touches over their distinctive lids. "I know," he quietly said,
shutting the box. He met Derek's eyes, and the light of the lantern cast a glow
in the omega's amber eyes, setting them aflame. It made Derek's breath hitch.
"We can make it green again," Stiles whispered. Derek should have looked away
or shook his head or fucking kissed him—anything to protect the omega from
making plans for a future that could only disappoint him—but he did none of
that, just gazed back at the boy who believed so unconditionally in the land
and the rain and the world.
"The Rain Man and the Keeper of the Seeds," Stiles murmured, lips quirking.
"It's got a certain ring to it, don't you think?"
Derek didn't smile, but it was certainly something close to it.
                                        
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
Scott, though the son of the Colonel, didn't remind Derek of the boy's sire at
all. He was a good kid, listened well enough and had a goofy smile. He didn't
look much like his father, either.
Derek sat with Scott and Isaac on the porch, watching the boys while Lydia went
in to help Stiles make second meal. Scott started getting fussy over the toy
they were sharing and before Derek could process what was happening, he raised
his little fist and socked Isaac right in the arm.
Stiles came out to the sound of Isaac's cries. He gave Scott a disappointed,
knowing look before gathering Isaac up and taking him back into the house
without a word. Scott returned to his toy, the last minute seemingly forgotten.
"You shouldn't hit your brother like that," Derek said without thinking. "You
shouldn't hurt the people you love."
Scott didn't look up when he asked, with all the innocence of a child, "Then
why does Daddy hit Stiles?"
Derek blinked.
Scott kept playing with his toy.
Derek turned and faced the garage, elbows perched on his knees, watching the
twisting motion of Boyd's arm as he tightened a screw on the bike. He slowly
lowered his face into his hands. Should have put a bullet in him when I had the
chance. Derek was angry with himself for failing Stiles, and swore to kill the
Colonel before he left this place.
Why are you leaving?
He stood, what felt like hours later, took Scott's hand, and walked them inside
for second meal. They all sat as normal, eating and talking and frowning sadly
down at their bowls when all the food was gone, and when Derek had stepped back
out of the house, instead of joining Boyd in the garage, he wandered out into
the vastness of the desert, feet carrying him toward Town. Before he could
change his mind, he started walking.
Why are you running?
Derek started planning.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
He stood in the stall, in front of a tray of rings, hoping one would stand out,
to magically call to him like the sirens from Stiles' books, but, of course,
none of them did, and so he just stood there, the people passing by all around
him, as he continued to stare down at the selection, like an idiot, wondering
what he had even been thinking.
"See som'in ya like?" the stall owner asked. Derek looked up and met a row of
missing teeth. He grunted, looking back down.
His thoughts wandered. He was stupid to have believed Stiles, to trust that the
Colonel wasn't after more than the land. He thought of the scar across Stiles'
neck. He swore to himself he'd replicate every ounce of Stiles' pain back onto
the Colonel—tenfold. Stiles deserved that much.
He wondered if Stiles cried. Maybe not. Stiles was proud. He wouldn't want to
show any weakness. Stiles didn't just have the hint of desert-dwelling
ancestry, but he seemed to know the Wasteland like the sky knows the
sun—effortlessly, unconditionally, selflessly. He had fierceness in him, and
the determination yielded from generations of families born under the scorching
sun. Derek shook his head. Stiles definitely wouldn't have cried.
"So he told you about the weddings, did he?" Derek snapped his head to the
side. Deaton evenly looked back at him. The old man plucked up a ring at random
and examined it. "Am I wrong?"
Derek swallowed, parched from the journey, and shifted from one foot to the
other. He said nothing.
Deaton appraised him for a moment, then plopped the ring back into the tray and
began hobbling away. He paused when Derek didn't immediately follow him, and
half-turned, nodding the alpha forward. "Let us talk, road warrior."
Derek's spine went stiff, and he took cautious steps forward, following the old
man from a distance. They came to a stop in front of Deaton's hut, where Marin
greeted them with a soft smile. She pulled the flap of the hut back. After a
moment's hesitation, Derek walked in.
The interior of the hut was as meager as it looked from the outside. Whatever
their trade, the old couple kept it well-hidden.
When Marin began speaking, Derek shifted closer so as not to miss anything
important.
"It seems our boy is better at keeping secrets than we gave him credit for,"
she said, though her voice was more fond than anything else. "It's truly
something that he's managed to hide you this long." She gestured for Derek to
sit, and he obeyed, stiffly settling, though still overly cautious.
Marin chuckled. "You need not suspect us, wolf. What could two old raisins
possibly do to you?"
"What's a raisin?" Derek said flatly.
Marin chortled. "I like this one," she said to no one in particular. Deaton
visibly had to hold himself back from rolling his eyes, but Derek could hear
the fondness in the man's snort even with his left ear's hearing already
beginning to wane.
"Do you still carry your badge?" Deaton asked Derek, momentarily surprising the
alpha.
Derek collected himself back into a mask of indifference. "No," he said
shortly.
Deaton assessed him in that way he tended to do, and Derek sat there and let
himself be assessed until Marin was forced to break the silence. "I take it
Stiles told you about his deal with the Colonel."
Derek looked at her. "No." He gritted his teeth. "Not the truth, anyway."
Marin softly shook her head. She looked youthful from a distance, more so than
she had up close that first time Derek had seen her. Maybe his eyesight was
beginning to fail him, too.
"That boy," Marin muttered. "He just never listens." She patted her own hand.
"Thinks of everyone but himself."
Deaton harrumphed, placing his hand over hers. "The wolf may be the answer," he
quietly murmured, and Marin looked up, brows drawn together. "There is only one
way Stiles can be saved now." Deaton met Derek's eyes. "And you know what that
is, don't you, wolf?"
Derek swallowed, and Marin pulled away from her mate, standing. She looked at
Derek, closing the distance between them, dark, wrinkled hand reaching out
towards him. Derek forced himself to sit still. Her hand was not smooth, but it
wasn't unkind and punishing, so Derek relaxed, and Marin pressed her palm to
his rough cheek, searching Derek's eyes for something, and when she found it,
she whispered, "Take care of our boy," turned away, and left the hut.
Deaton stayed seated as he watched his mate leave. "I'd always tell Stiles that
we came together when the world was still okay, her and I," he said. "She
wasn't anything I ever expected." He sighed, and it looked like it took great
effort, chest rising and falling in slow, halted measures. "I'm sure you can
imagine," he said offhandedly, hands on his knees as he rose.
The man turned his back to Derek and began rummaging through a chest. He pulled
out a cloth, unraveling it to extract what was hidden within. When he turned
back, Derek's throat tightened at seeing was the man was holding.
"Colonel Alan Deaton," he murmured, cradling the silver badge in his hand. He
huffed. "Ironic, no?" Derek didn't say anything—couldn't. Deaton looked up, and
he chuckled grimly at Derek's expression. "I know a soldier when I see one,
wolf."
Derek looked away.
Deaton wrapped the badge back up in its cloth. He held it out to Derek. "A
present."
"I don't want it."
"It's not for you."
Derek leveled a look at the older man. Stubbornold crow. He took the badge in
its cloth and shoved it into his jacket.
"He wouldn't like any of them," Deaton stated at the mouth of the hut, holding
the flap open for Derek.
Derek raised a brow in question.
"The rings," Deaton clarified. "It's better to wait and find the perfect one."
He smiled as Marin approached from the stalls. He looked up at the alpha. "Tell
me I won't have to worry about him."
Derek stepped out of the hut. He turned back. "I'll do right by him."
Deaton nodded, satisfied with the answer. "Pray for rain."
"Pray for rain."
"Be good to him," Marin pleaded as she stood by her mate. She smiled wistfully.
"He always believed in the little things."
"And be careful, wolf," Deaton said in parting, gaze trained on the sky.
"Something big is coming."
 
                                     ❀❀❀ 
 
What Deaton failed to mention was that the 'something big' was coming fast and
hard and without mercy.
The house was within sight by the time the winds picked up in the distance,
sand beginning to fly into the air, really starting to pelt his skin, a wave of
red building on Derek's tail.
"He's here, Stiles!" Lydia's voice rose above the gusts building momentum.
"He's here!"
He reached the porch in a matter of seconds, heart pounding in his ears, and
Stiles threw open the door, pulling him inside. Boyd hauled the hatch shut,
locking the regular door behind it. The room was dark, windows latched and
barred, all sunlight cut off from reaching inside.
"What were you thinking?" Stiles hissed, and Derek stepped back, still catching
his breath. "Are you a mad man? You're lucky the Jackals didn't catch you or
you you'd be hanging by a rope off the Ridge right now getting flayed by this
storm!"
Stiles was as breathless as Derek, cheeks flushed in anger and worry, the lamps
and lanterns casting confused, messy shadows across his pale, anxious face, and
Derek took a moment to chide himself for being so reckless, for leaving without
saying anything—And yet you'd still leave again.
The children were huddled together in the main room, quiet and subdued,
staring, waiting.
"Sorry."
Stiles blinked, taken aback, mouth opening and closing. He clicked it shut at
last, arms crossed. Derek wondered when the last time was that someone
apologized to him, for hurting him in any way, for doing him wrong. Perhaps no
one ever had.
"I'm sorry." Derek awkwardly scratched at his beard. "I wasn't thinking."
Stiles stared up at him and huffed, turning away. "Don't do it again."
Erica waved Derek over. "We're learning about Icarus."
"He doesn't know what that means, Erica," Jackson remarked, rolling his eyes.
"Come and see," Erica said to Derek, shoving Jackson off a cushion, patting the
open spot for the alpha to sit.
Stiles and the rest of the kids wiggled over, making room for Derek's hulking
frame.
"Well?" Erica snapped her fingers, grabbing his attention. "You coming or not?"
Derek met Stiles' eyes.
He joined them.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
There was a thick atmosphere around him, the air stuffy and hot, too hot, even
for Stiles, who had known nothing but desert since the day he was born. He
wanted to dunk himself in cold, cold water, wash the haze and hurt away. There
was an ache inside him that was building, refusing to be ignored. He lolled
back against the sofa, devoid of the children who were all in bed now, watching
the Rain Man's lips moving, forming words that Stiles was struggling to make
out.
"-safe-"
"-care of you-"
"-only way-"
And then, suddenly, the Rain Man was right there. Stiles ran his fingers up his
arm, onto his chest, feeling for the alpha's heat. He gripped the back of the
Rain Man's neck, fingers twisting in his hair.
Then, with his final bit of strength, he pulled the Rain Man's face down toward
his own. His head left the cushions. The Rain Man's skin was almost touching
his, his mouth so close. Stiles felt the roughness of his beard, his warm
breath, smelled the leather and gasoline, tasted the dirt and salt and sweat.
The Rain Man's lips were startlingly soft against his.
His head thumped back against the sofa, eyes fluttering open, a rush of heat
flooding through him, and the Rain Man gazed down at him with those deep green
eyes, nostrils flaring.
"Marry me, Stiles."
Chapter End Notes
     Aaaaand I'm back—as are weekly updates. Hope this chapter was worth
     the wait! Not too happy with how it turned out, but I'm pooped so let
     me know what you guys think. Thanks to everyone who left a comment/
     kudos, you guys seriously rock:-)
     Tons of love, my little moonpies xx
***** Chapter 7 *****
Chapter Notes
                       ❀ pluviophile_(n)_-let_it_rain ❀
See the end of the chapter for more notes
Derek stared down at the photograph in his hand. Laura stared back. He rubbed
his thumb over one corner, a habit, then quickly withdrew it, frowning down at
the coin-sized smudge of discoloration by his sister's face. Would I still
remember what you look like? If I didn't have this? Would I still see you so
vividly when I shut my eyes? He folded the photograph into his pocket, going
back to marking off the forty-second slit into his bedframe. Lydia walked in a
heartbeat later.
"Why're you hiding in here?"
Derek gave her a look. Why do you think?
Lydia rolled her eyes and crossed her arms, tossing her fiery hair back. "The
storm isn't letting up. He's just as trapped as you are."
"It's different."
"Different how?"
"It just is."
"Stubborn mule."
Derek snorted, despite himself. He placed his knife on the night table. "I
don't know what I'll do."
Lydia shifted. "What does that mean?"
"Means exactly what I said."
"What?" Lydia shook her head. "You think you'll force yourself on him?"
Derek shrugged. "Maybe. Is that not how they bred us to be? The people from the
Old World? To follow our animal instincts, our carnal impulses?" He stood,
towering over her. "You would know, with all the books Stiles has taught you to
understand. What do they say about their creation? About us?" Lydia's jaw
twitched. "What do they say about me?" She frowned then, and Derek looked away.
"They say just that, don't they?"
Lydia grabbed him, and Derek's eyes snapped down to her hand. She gripped his
arm tighter. "You won't." She refused to release his gaze. "You won't hurt
him."
Derek shook his head. "You don't know that," he said, but Lydia was having none
of it. She lifted her chin, head high, and for a moment she reminded Derek of
his sister—both of them—determined and unrelenting and too young to fear truth.
He wilted, rigged muscles going lax, catching himself on the edge of the bed.
"I don't know if I'll be able to control myself," he admitted, and it scared
him just saying it out loud.
Lydia uncrossed her arms. "It's up to you, Rain Man." She looked him over. "You
wouldn't hurt him," she said. "Youcan't. That's just-" she shrugged, attempting
nonchalance, but the softness in her voice gave her away "-not who you are."
She left.
Derek stayed in his room, locked away, distracting himself with the sound of
the dust storm as Stiles' heat grew in intensity, the omega's voice and scent
beckoning to him from a room away. The walls were not paper thin in any regard,
but that wouldn't have mattered anyway because Derek's wolf senses had decided
to come around and cooperate with him. Every smell and sound was magnified,
every atom in his body growing more and more attuned to Stiles'. At the peak of
the omega's heat, Derek had almost given in, driven insane by the sweet smell
of the boy, and was ready to pull himself out of his trousers to jerk himself
to completion when Lydia knocked and called him for third meal.
He didn't join them. He didn't trust himself.
Neither did Stiles.
And when he heard his name being gasped out, muffled into a pillow like the
whisper of wind in the dead of night, it took everything in him not to rut
against the mattress like some greeny. He'd sooner die of mortification than
give in to temptation, and after short deliberation he considered that maybe
that wouldn't be the worst thing. Death would probably feel like a skipped meal
compared to this.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
"It's not there."
"If you haven't noticed, I can't exactly see."
"Do it blind, then."
"Jackson."
"Ugh," came Erica's groan, and the sound of feet shuffling back. "Let me."
There was a thud and a scrape and a flame sparking to life in the pitch-black
darkness. "It's a miracle you guys survived as long as you did," Erica said,
and she lit the table lamp.
"Speak for yourself, Twitchy," Jackson shot back, smug, offended face lit by
the flickering lamplight. Boyd pushed him back, blocking Erica from making
things physical. "Oh, that's just fresh," Jackson taunted over Boyd's shoulder.
"Let the grease rat come to your rescue."
Derek walked into the room, large shadow engulfing the children. They grew
quiet as he approached. Erica managed to sneak an elbow to Jackson's ribs,
sticking her tongue out at him.
"Storm's over," Boyd said, stating the obvious. "Stiles is still in bed. We
were gonna start shoveling without him." Kira walked over and took Derek's
hand, tugging him toward the door.
The alpha had to put a little extra effort into pulling the hatch open. "Stand
back," he gruffly said to the kids, and hauled it the rest of the way open.
Sunlight shot into the house like a bullet, bright and blinding. The children
took some time to adjust, squinting and shielding their eyes and looking away.
Derek inhaled the dry, overturned desert air, a sweet relief to his lungs.
Though Stiles' heat had waned, the air inside the house was still dense with
the built up pheromones of the last three days.
He kicked in the little wall of sand that had built up in front of the door,
opening up the entryway, and stepped out. The kids loaded out after him,
pulling on their sun covers, and they all got to work.
The sand hadn't packed in all too much considering the length of the storm, but
it still took more than a while to clear it, especially where the garage was
concerned. Boyd had covered the bike and the Jeep with a tarp, which was a
small mercy amidst the rest of the crap that was now partly buried beneath
random mounds of sand. The kids wandered back inside bit by bit, drained and
overheated. Derek and Boyd were left to do the heavy lifting, clearing out the
sand and stacking the water canteens and portion packages anew, making sure
none of them had been spoiled. Derek paused to rest a moment, pulling the end
of his shirt up to wipe the sweat and dust from his brow. He glanced over at
the house and paused.
Stiles stood by the front door, arms wrapped around himself. He had forgone his
usual linens and was wearing a plain white shift with itty straps that had
Derek staring longer than usual.
"Hungry?" Boyd murmured on his way past the alpha, and Derek could practically
feel the smirk in his voice. He watched Stiles pull Boyd in by his cheeks, pale
hands framing the boy's dark, sweaty face to look him over properly, fondly
chucking his chin and sending him inside to wash up. He looked over at Derek
and made a slight movement with his head, nodding towards the house. Come eat.
Derek subtly inhaled, Stiles' scent wafting over him, and to his quiet relief,
the tangy perfume of the omega's heat had subsided for the most part.
He nodded back, dropping his shovel.
 
                                     ❀❀❀ 
 
The tension in the air was little more than bearable as the day passed on and
Stiles' heat faded back to his usual sweet scent. The omega was out pinning up
a fresh batch of laundry on the line, dress softly lifting in the breeze. Derek
forced himself away from the window, gathered himself enough to go talk to the
boy. Stiles didn't hear as he approached, just stood with a shirt in his hands,
unmoving. In his eyes was a ten-mile stare.
"Have you thought about what I said?"
Stiles startled, eyes snapping to Derek's. He quickly looked away, delaying his
answer before quietly saying, "Yes."
Derek found himself distracted by the gentle rise and fall of the
omega's chest, where his pale skin disappeared beneath his equally pale dress.
"And?"
"I-" Stiles glanced up at Derek again, just as quickly darting his eyes away, a
flush staining his cheeks "-don't know." He pinned up the shirt in his hands.
"It's a lot to think about."
Derek stepped closer. "It's the only way, Stiles."
"Because it could bring the rain."
"Because then the Colonel won't be able to take you when the rain doesn't
come."
Stiles' jaw clicked shut so fast Derek had to hold back a wince. The omega
faced him. "What happened to leaving? Finding home? That's what you wanted,
right?"
Now it was Derek's turn to clench his teeth. "I want-" he looked away, lowered
his voice: "I want you to be safe."
When Stiles didn't reply, he looked back at the omega, and there was something
sad in his eyes that Derek couldn't bear. 
Of course Stiles wouldn't be jumping up and down, sunbeams shooting out of his
face in excitement. Stiles never wanted it like this, a mating as a means to an
end. Derek was scarred and grisly and humorless. He was not simple. He was not
an easy thing. He was more baggage than he was probably worth, so why would
Stiles walk the winding path if it led to him? It only made sense that someone
as fair and bright as Stiles would not want to be sullied by the likes of
Derek.
When he spoke again, the resignation was palpable in his voice. "I won't mate
you if you don't want it," he quietly assured.
I think I will always want you. Even when I die. Especially then.
And he's frightened by that because, in Derek's experience, wanting something
could never end in anything but disappointment. Stiles was the first thing he'd
wanted since he set out to find home all those years ago.
Stiles suddenly stepped into Derek's space, and the alpha braced himself,
looking down into those clear, amber eyes.
"I want," Stiles whispered, and the warmth of his breath radiated through every
fiber of Derek's being. He said it again, urgently, breathlessly: "I want."
"You do?"
"Silly wolf."
Stiles smiled, and all Derek could think was, Oh, shit.
 
                                     ❀❀❀ 
 
Kira placed a folded paper boat on Derek's knee.
"When you and Stiles are married can we visit an ocean?" she asked, nudging the
boat upstream—up Derek's thick thigh. "I've never been." She nudged the boat
further toward him, insistently. Derek held his palm out and she placed it
there.
"When me and Stiles are married-" Derek's heart seized before he let himself
promise anything, suddenly fearful he would let her down. Kira stared up at him
with bright, inky eyes. When he didn't finish his sentence, she took his hand
and folded his rough fingers in over her little boat. She patted his closed
fist for good measure.
"When me and Stiles are married we can go to all the oceans," Derek told her,
and he didn't stop himself because he truly meant it. "How about that?" Kira
beamed. "Just to say that we did."
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
It took some planning, but the wedding was finally underway.
The kids had strung up white bed sheets everywhere, using the clothing lines
and the wooden porch to hang their fortress upright, airy linens swaying in the
breeze, forming a soft backdrop. They positioned Derek at the foot of the
stairs, where he was told to wait. The children sat at polar ends on the porch
steps, half of them to the left, the other half on the right, forming a
makeshift aisle, a small, quiet little audience gazing up at him as they waited
for Stiles.
The breeze had really started to pick up that day, billowing the pinned sheets
like sails on a ship, and it was made even more obvious when Stiles stepped
through the front door and out onto the deck, linens and veil immediately
shifting with the wind. Derek's mouth went dry as he took the omega in, and all
the children turned to see. 
He was so beautiful Derek had to look away.
Only the sound of the wind in the sheets remained as Stiles walked to him. It
was as if everyone in the whole world was holding their breath—including Derek.
He forced himself to look up again when Stiles was halfway down the porch.
Their eyes met and it was like staring into the sun. Derek held his hand out, a
gesture that came so naturally he couldn't even question it. Stiles' hand felt
small in his, was engulfed by Derek's thick, calloused fingers. When Stiles
stood in front of him, and Derek had to tilt his head down to meet his eyes
through the thin, white veil, he took the omega's other hand, and the beating
of Stiles' heart finally bypassed the ringing in his ears, flooding through.
Their pulses were like tattoos, burning and beating into each other.
Erica cleared her throat: Focus.
Derek started: "Blood of my blood."
"Bone of my bone," Stiles said. "I give you my body-"
"-that we two might be one. I give you my spirit-"
"-'til our life shall be done."
Derek stepped closer. He swallowed, hesitated only a moment, and lifted the
omega's veil back.
Stiles gazed up at him without pause, eyes bright and molten. Derek searched
for words, for a way to make this easier, less about survival and more about
having this moment as it should be had. "I know this isn't-" he furrowed his
brows, upset with himself and the world "-the way you wanted this to happen for
you."
Of all things to do, Stiles smiled. "I've got a secret," he said, and pressed
onto his tiptoes, cupping the alpha's cheek to bring his lips close. His breath
was warm on the shell of Derek's ear when he whispered, "I dreamt we fell in
love."
He cupped the other side of Derek's face, fingers running through the alpha's
coarse beard, tilting his face down toward his own.
"Kiss me, Rain Man."
And so Derek did.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
"I hate it," Stiles whispered, Derek's thumb tracing the edge of the scar on
his neck. "Please." He squeezed the hand Derek had on his hip. "It's ugly."
Nothing about you could be ugly.
Derek made a low, reassuring noise in the back of his throat. He couldn't bear
to see Stiles hurt like this, but Derek didn't think he could cause him more
pain—even to remove the lingering evidence of the Colonel.
"It'll hurt," he reminded Stiles, brushing the omega's cheek, cradling the side
of his face.
"I've had worse," the boy remarked casually, but Derek hated the words because
he knew they were true. "Please," Stiles whispered again, and Derek's hands
dropped, held the side of omega's neck. He leaned in, breath hot on Stiles'
skin, and the boy shivered as Derek held him.
He bit down where the soft dip of the boy's neck met the curve of his shoulder,
covering the scar Stiles hated so much, jaw locking, and emotions were suddenly
running so swiftly and deeply through him that it pained him to pull away only
a few heartbeats later. He kissed the place where his teeth had sunk in, red
staining his lips, and lapped the slight trickle of blood right up, pulling
away, fearful that it had been too painful, too much.
But then Stiles' hand was on the back of his neck, pulling him in for another
kiss, and it was only when they came apart for air that Derek realized that the
omega hadn't made a single sound of pain at all.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
The mating mark on Stiles' neck was still fresh, the children's cheers not yet
died down, when the shadow of that first cloud peeked out over the house, dark
and stormy and such a contrast to the clear, pale blue that made up the other
half of the desert sky. The sun was still out at the opposite end of the
valley. The clouds rolled in, casting an odd, ethereal glow upon everything the
light touched from afar.
The rain came suddenly—not that a warning would have been any less shocking.
It was the strangest feeling, pelting Derek's skin, ice cold—I'm here! I'm
happening!—and yet he couldn't process it.
It's raining. It's raining. I'm mated to Stiles and it's raining.
He looked over at the boy—arms out, head tilted back, eyes closed, skimpy
linens already soaked through as he twirled around, taking it all in.
"Derek," he heard himself say, voice rising above the downpour, and Stiles
stopped, turned back to look at him, breathless and smiling brighter than the
sun ever could.
Hope is not a mistake.
"My name is Derek."
Chapter End Notes
     UPDATED FAST AF CUS I LOVE YOU BITCH Y YOU DO THIS TO ME
     Couple things:
     1. Edited tags! Edited that long-ass summary! Kinda! Edited music
     links! EDITS FTW!
     2. I was having a hard time trying to write up wedding vows that
     sounded okay, and I just ended up borrowing the ones I heard on the
     show Outlander. Coolio.
     3. HOLY MOLY HONEY WE MARRIED THE KIDS
     Drop a comment and let me know what you think! (Translation: I thrive
     off validation)
***** Chapter 8 *****
Chapter Notes
                        ❀ this_is_another_green_world ❀
See the end of the chapter for more notes
My mate has a name.
Stiles scarcely slept and woke up still smiling.
Derek.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
The rain didn't stop.
They formed a plan for when the Colonel would inevitably pay them a visit.
Derek was prepared for a fight, health completely renewed as opposed to the
last time he had glimpsed the sick fuck himself. But they had a plan. They had
a plan that didn't make him any less tense, and three days into the downpour,
everyone around him was walking on eggshells.
"You should be more afraid," Derek had said.
"I'm not," Stiles replied.
"You should be."
"I'm not."
Then, over the sound of the rain, in the distance: the roar of engines.
Derek and the children climbed up into the bunk like last time, silent and
hidden. Stiles greeted the Jackals out on the porch, shotgun casually leaned up
by the door. He wore his linens all the way up to his neck, covering his
scar—whether it was out of habit or to hide the new mating mark, Derek wasn't
sure. Stiles was smart. It was probably best that they didn't shove it in the
Colonel's face right away. He held his breath.
The Colonel's boots heavily hit the sand. He took his time in approaching the
house. Derek didn't dare to peek out the bunk's window.
"Well, isn't this an interesting development?" the Colonel coolly remarked.
Derek tried to focus in on Stiles' heartbeat, but the rain was too loud against
the roof, the ringing in his ears fading in and out at irritating intervals.
"A blessing," Stiles corrected.
The Colonel laughed. "Is it, now?" Patronizing son of a bitch. "What kind of a
blessing fucks the king of the desert over?"
Derek tightened his grip on his gun, pulling it from his jacket. He gave the
kids a reassuring glance as they huddled together in the corner, barricaded
between their mattresses.
"The rain feeds the land and the people," Stiles steadily replied, voice
unwavering, and for a brief moment, fondness bubbled up inside Derek's
chest. Knew you were a brave one. "Is that not what we all wish for?"
The Colonel's laugh echoed despite the storm. No other sounds, and then his
feet were moving again, sloshing against the drenched sand and mud.
The sound of Stiles scraping the shotgun up into his hands.
Give me the signal.
"You're not welcome here," Stiles said, shotgun's barrel clicking into place,
making the Colonel stop in his tracks. "Don't tell me you're here to go back on
your word? What kind of honorable man does that?" The sound of the Jackals'
firearms went up, magazines being loaded, safeties going off. Derek gritted his
teeth.
Signal me.
"We had a deal."
Signal me.
"We did."
Stiles.
"Don't hurt yourself, little dove."
He couldn't believe his ears.
The Colonel's feet retreated, the engines revving, and the Jackals and their
king tore off in their rigs, back across the desert.
Derek's heart was still pounding away in his ears when the last car swerved
off, the children scrambling down the ladder. When Derek didn't follow them,
Stiles poked his head up into the bunk and climbed through.
Derek stood on unsteady legs, gun still in hand, adrenaline pumping, and strode
toward Stiles in two steps. "What did you do?"
Stiles frowned. "Wow. Right to it, huh?"
"We had a plan."
Stiles rolled his eyes. "He would've flipped his shit if he knew you even
existed."
"We had a plan. You follow the plan."
"Well, I didn't! What are you going to do, punish me?"
Derek recoiled. "Why would you say that?"
"Guess it's just what I'm used to," the omega muttered, looking down.
Derek stared at Stiles—at his mate—and sighed. "Why do you insist on putting
yourself at risk?"
"Because that's what people do when they care about someone." Stiles met
Derek's gaze, shrugging like it should be obvious. It'd been so long since
Derek had anyone do that—care about him—that he forgot what it entailed.
"If he knew you and I had mated-" Stiles' hand unconsciously reached for the
bite mark on his neck "-he'd take me. He wouldn't even care about the deal
because I broke it before he could."
Now it was Derek's turn to look away, cursing under his breath. "He wouldn't
just give you up this easily," he darkly groused. "I don't believe him."
"Why would he lie?"
"Why wouldn't he?"
Stiles threw his hands up, as exasperated as Derek felt. "He left! He drove
away! What more could you want?"
"I don't trust him," Derek growled, and moved around the omega to climb down.
"Nobody trusts anyone," Stiles said, letting him go. "That's the problem."
Derek refused to be swayed by Stiles' reasoning. But the boy knew the Colonel
well, more than Derek wanted to admit, so Derek took it upon himself to storm
away and sulk in his own miserable paranoia, far from where Stiles would be
able to fear what Derek feared.
Stiles deserved safety, protection from a wolf—a true alpha—that wasn't broken,
half-deaf, haunted by his ghosts. Stiles deserved the love he kept trying to
give everyone else. I'd give you the world, Derek thought. But you deserve so
much more than that. He shook his head, Laura's voice ringing in his
ears. Maybe if I was more. Maybe if I was enough.
Derek didn't believe in anything, so he looked at everything with the same
indifference. Having this, building a life here with Stiles, was not any more
or any less ludicrous than the idea of rain or a god that lived in the sky.
But Stiles believed. There was so much that Derek couldn't give him, and the
thought of letting him down, of not being good enough, was almost worse than
not trying at all. The stars and the rain and the dreams that Stiles saw, Derek
wanted to see them, too. He wanted to believe in something as much as Stiles
believed in everything. And he kind of did, didn't he?
He believed in Stiles.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
Around Town, Derek officially became known as Stiles' hired hand. 
Rumor had it that he slept in the garage, where he worked on the omega's Jeep
day and night, trying to breathe life into the engine that once roared across
the desert flats, pale and icy blue, like a star shooting across the sky. It
was half-true—at least the part about Derek slaving over the Jeep. And slave
over it he did, going so far as to say that she would be up and running in no
time.
Stiles would see him working tirelessly out there late into the night, then
bright and early at dawn, and almost always bare-chested, sweaty and hyper-
focused. "Crazy man," Erica would say, shaking her head with a sly grin. But
Stiles couldn't really complain. Seeing a piece of his mother, a piece of
himself being revived like that—it wasn't unwelcome in the least.
And being mated was not what Stiles thought it would be. Then again, their
mating was a most unconventional one. He wasn't sure what he had expected to
come of them after the Colonel left them alone. Their relationship hadn't
really developed beyond that first kiss at the wedding, and sometimes Stiles
found himself daydreaming about it, wanting other things, wanting more, growing
wet between his legs when he lay in bed at night, as he often did when he
thought about the alpha sleeping just a room away.
It was not what he had dreamed of, but it wasn't...bad.
Derek had known what Stiles wanted, however childish and silly it was, and
still he had offered it, a way to protect Stiles, to keep him safe. Stiles
couldn't fault him for that. But it wasn't the first time he wished things
could have worked out differently. The rain had come, and now they were mated,
in vain as it may have been. Stiles wouldn't let himself mourn the death of
another dream, though. The circumstances that brought them together were not
the most poetic, but Stiles believed that he and Derek could build something
together, here in their little corner of the world. Perhaps Stiles could love
him. He was so different and wild. When the light made Derek's bare skin glow
on those early mornings, he was the most beautiful thing Stiles had ever seen.
But maybe Derek didn't want him back. Maybe Derek was just a good man, a man
who helped and saved and sacrificed and expected nothing in return.
Maybe Derek was lost.
Stiles wanted to find him.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
The rain called it quits too soon for Stiles' preference, but Derek didn't
particularly mind. The rain made the children sniffle and sneeze, and Stiles
said that that was what happened when people got cold. Cold. Derek had huffed,
reminded again of the magic Stiles possessed. Derek had never experienced cold
climate before, and now that the land was wet and quenched and cool, he
realized it didn't really affect him all that much anyway, what with the wolf
blood running through his veins.
When the storm cleared and the sun shined once more, Stiles introduced Derek to
the tractor in the shed, a standard motor that apparently went back a couple
generations in the family. Didn't take much to start her up, but once she was
going, boy, she was going.Derek only paused to take a break when he glanced up
from where he was plowing the field and saw Stiles lounging out on the porch,
head knocked back—asleep. The kids were running around a couple yards out
front, slinging mud at each other. Derek sighed and cut the engine.
"Wasn't this your idea?" he loudly questioned as he walked up, and Stiles
flailed himself awake.
The omega rubbed at his eyes. "Sure it was."
"Weren't we gonna start planting?"
"Definitely."
Derek raised a brow. 
"We will! Just let me take a break." Stiles pillowed his head in his arms,
reclining again. Derek watched the fan of the omega's dark lashes against his
pale, speckled cheeks for a moment before letting him be. Stiles liked to do
things at his own pace, which was fine and all that, but Derek discovered
pretty early on that the boy also had a knack for procrastination.
He was at the end of the field, sweating and grunting his way through digging
up a large rock embedded in the soil when a shadow fell over him. "Break over?"
he asked, voice dripping with sarcasm. Stiles ignored him and reached out to
run his fingers through Derek's damp, matted hair. It grew back during the
weeks he'd been here but not nearly long enough to bother him.
"I can cut it," Stiles said, not so much a suggestion as it was a request.
Derek glanced down at his dirt-covered hands, sand stuck under his nails, the
stubborn boulder still snuggly immersed in the dirt. Stiles' priorities were
just as confusing as the rest of him. "I'll be quick," the omega said. "I'll
bring out the seeds afterward." The promise lured Derek in, and he squinted up
at Stiles for a moment before grunting to show his surrender.
Stiles sat him on the lowest porch step, then took up position a level behind
him, shears in hand, legs spread around Derek's middle. He worked diligently,
with an experience that must've come from cutting the kids' hair over the
years, and quietly—a contrast to his usual running mouth. Derek couldn't
completely relax with a blade so close to his skull and neck, but Stiles' hands
were gentle, as they always were, and soon enough there was more hair in the
dirt than there probably was on his head.
Stiles stood and came around to Derek's front. He raked his fingers through the
alpha's hair, then softly tugged on the strands behind his ears, making sure
they had been trimmed evenly. He nodded to himself, then haphazardly ran his
fingers down through Derek's beard. "I like this," he said approvingly,
grinning, then pulled away, leaving it untouched. He jogged up into the house
and returned with the box of seeds.
"I stayed up a couple nights ago to plan the field out," he said, lifting the
lid and pulling out the fattest sack. "Wheat goes first."
Derek stared down at it. How could something so little become something so
great?
"It's what my family grew." Stiles set the box aside. "We'll plant others, too,
of course. Fruits, nuts—all of it." He thrust the wheat out to Derek. "Here."
Derek took it. He stood there for a moment, weighing it in his hand. "You're
nervous," he observed, the flutter of Stiles heartbeat loud and clear.
"I'm hopeful."
"But you're scared."
"I'm not scared of anything."
"It'll work."
Stiles looked up, lips parting. Derek's cheeks warmed. Who would've thought
that he would be the one reassuring Stiles that the seeds would take and grow?
"You think so, Rain Man?" Stiles smiled from ear to ear.
Derek didn't know how to respond, so he turned and walked them back to the
tractor. Boyd helped him hook up the seed drill.
"It's gonna be so green," Kira giggled, shaking with uncontainable excitement.
Erica beamed next to her, smiling so big Derek thought her cheeks would split.
"We won't have to worry about portions anymore," Lydia said, something like
realization and relief in her voice.
"Or water." Jackson nodded toward the huge barrels by the garage, full to the
brim with fresh rainfall.
"We'll have so much food in the house!" Scott was bouncing out of his skin,
tugging on Kira's sleeve, her little shadow.
The kids went back to slinging mud, running off again, leaving Stiles and Derek
alone once more. Derek didn't know what was running through his head when he
decided to say, "You never know—maybe one day we'll be storing food for more
than just us."
A crease formed between Stiles' brows. "Why?" His eyes lit up. "You think we'll
find more kids?"
"That's-" Derek snorted and shook his head "-not exactly what I meant." He was
sure Laura would be laughing if she wasn't already dead and withering away in
the scorched shell of their childhood home.
Stiles flushed a moment later, averting his eyes, understanding, and Derek
climbed up into the tractor to hide the warmth in his own cheeks.
Not that he was. Blushing. Nope.
Not Derek.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
Weeks passed.
Not moving was still new for Derek. Not moving meant rest, shelter, time to
talk—the latter being the most difficult concept to wrap his head around. The
world wasn't built for the old ways, and life had gone so backwards that the
normalcy of Stiles' seemed crazy to Derek. 
Derek didn't remember how to talk, so he listened. Stiles knew compassion, knew
talking, was the owner of smarts given to him by his parents and Marin and
Deaton, who taught him how to read about the Old World. Stiles told him all
about how Deaton's hut used to be filled from floor to ceiling with books. He'd
given them all to Stiles over the years. It explained the emptiness of the hut.
All that Deaton and Marin had was their knowledge of how the world died, a
firsthand account forever fixed in their heads. And each other. They had each
other. Derek didn't think it was the worst way to live.
"How'd you end up with them?" Derek asked in the main room one night, leaned up
against a sofa. "The kids?" Stiles always managed to pull more than a few
monosyllabic words from him. Sometimes he even succeeded in having Derek
initiate the conversation.
Stiles laughed to himself, and his face glowed brighter against the lamp light.
"It started with Scott, for obvious reasons." He flicked a grain of sand across
the floor. "Scott was supposed to be the Colonel's alpha heir, a wolf, but his
mother was poisoned during the pregnancy. The Colonel paid her, but he had
enemies, and as Scott grew older it was clear that the pregnancy hadn't gone as
well as he thought." Stiles took a breath, and Derek could faintly hear his
heartrate speed up. "So the Colonel had him dumped off in the foothills, hoping
the coyotes would get to him." Derek clenched his fists. Lower than scum. "I
heard his screaming," Stiles whispered, eyes glazed over as if he was reliving
it in his head. "I don't know how, but-" he swallowed "-he didn't have a single
scratch. He was all alone, crying his little lungs out." Anger etched into his
face again. "Everyone is expendable to him," Stiles spat. "Even his own son."
The anger subsided some. "I found Boyd a few months later. I didn't really
think, just brought him back home with me. He was sick, he needed me, that was
all that mattered."
"Where did he come from?"
Stiles thought on it for a moment. "I asked, once. He didn't tell me, and I
never brought it up again. He was so much more quiet than he is now, believe it
or not. He left something bad behind, and that was all I needed to know. And
the others, well, Jackson and Lydia were orphaned and taken in by Deaton and
Marin for a while, and Erica was a little thief in the market. Found them all
about a year after Boyd. Kira was a spectacle at the Pass, chained to a post
like an animal. I looked at her, this little girl, thirsty and stick-thin with
the brightest smile I'd ever seen, and asked her why she was put there, and..."
Stiles trailed off. "She said her parents didn't want her anymore because there
was something inside her, something bad, like a demon. It broke my heart."
Derek felt heavy in the chest. "She was so happy to come home. She didn't let
it hurt her, what her parents did. That was the same place I found Isaac a
couple months ago. I saw the bruises, and I just knew. He used to get bad
dreams all the time. He still does once in a while, I think, but he doesn't
like to tell me. He says I worry too much." Stiles let out a soft breath. Derek
assumed they had gotten to the end, when Stiles suddenly said, "There was a
girl."
He was staring into the lamp. "Allison. Her parents were bounty hunters. They
worked for the Colonel. They left one day without saying anything. They were
gone for months before I brought her home with me. My father had been dead only
days." Stiles' voice went rough, and Derek didn't want to look at him because
he knew he would see tears. "I guess that was the real beginning. She couldn't
have been any older than me, maybe a little younger, even. I guess I just
wanted a friend," he said, and it killed Derek to hear how Stiles had to
suffer. "She wandered out to the rundown in the south one day, the same one you
came from. I warned her." His voice trailed off again. "Sometimes I think she
did it on purpose," he brokenly whispered, and Derek felt his throat tighten.
There was another pause before Stiles continued, and when he spoke again his
voice was barely even a whisper. "I couldn't save her."
Derek reached out his hand and placed it on Stiles' knee. He held it there,
warm and grounding. Perhaps it was how sad Stiles was. Maybe it was because his
words sounded like Derek's, when he couldn't sleep at night and he'd play back
his sister's voice in his head.
Before he could change his mind, Derek reached into his jacket and pulled out a
folded cloth. He handed it to Stiles. 
The room was deathly quiet as the omega unraveled it. He stared at the badge in
his lap for a moment, and Derek felt both deaf and blind when he couldn't hear
nor scent out how Stiles was feeling.
"How do you have this?"
Derek cleared his throat. "Deaton gave it to me," he said. "A wedding present."
Stiles looked up at him, and the tears spilled over. Derek wanted to fold him
into his arms and hide him away from all the hurt. Before he could take it
back, from his pocket he pulled another badge, smaller, rounder, in way worse
shape. He placed it in Stiles' lap.
"You're-"
"Road warrior."
Stiles didn't move, and then he was laughing, throwing his head back and baring
the length of his pale neck to Derek's eyes. "I knew it." He turned his head
and smiled at Derek once more, despite his tears. The flush in his cheeks was
doing things to Derek. "I knew it all along, Rain Man." He slid over and
pressed his side to Derek's, cradling Derek's badge in his hands like a
treasure. "I'm mated to a soldier," he murmured, and Derek felt the corner of
his lips tilt up. "Will you tell me about it?"
Derek softly sighed. "Maybe one day." Without thinking, he curled his arm
around the omega, holding him close, and he was prepared for Stiles to tense up
or pull away, but the boy just sunk back into Derek's warmth and ran his
fingers over Derek's badge and sighed, troubles seeming to float away.
Stiles was in every crevice of Derek's mind. He'd smarted and smiled and
laughed his way in, and Derek was afraid that he was losing his heart to his
mate.
He wanted to laugh. Under the right circumstances, that would be a good thing.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
"And then," Erica said, "he warned Icarus not to fly too close to the sun-"
"But also not too close to the sea," Kira added.
"Right. But Icarus did fly up too high and the sun melted the wax."
"And the feathers came apart."
"And Icarus fell into the sea."
Derek thought on this for a moment. "Why didn't he listen?"
"There's a word for it. Stiles, what's the word?" Erica asked over her
shoulder.
"Hubris," Stiles answered, chasing after a naked, mud-covered Isaac. "Over-
confidence. Blinding pride."
"That." Erica rifled through the shelf for another book, this one less thick.
Derek didn't know how to read, but Erica found it enjoyable to recant
everything Stiles taught her. "This is the story of Peter Pan," she began,
opening up to the first page. "He's a boy who never grows up."
It became routine. The children would take turns reading to Derek before they
went to bed. Sometimes they'd request Stiles to read. After bedtime, Derek
occasionally found himself leaning over a page, Stiles teaching him letters and
then words. After a while, he began to join Isaac and Scott as Stiles taught
them during the day. His face warmed the first time he joined them at the table
during a lesson, but Stiles didn't laugh at him or anything, and the kids were
more than happy to have him.
The days went by without any sign of green. Stiles wasn't worried, so Derek
wasn't worried. And the kids were always brimming with excitement. It'd be so
pretty to say the children believed in the seeds in the same way Stiles
believed in the rain and the land. But the truth was, the children believed in
the seeds the way Derek believed in Stiles.
He caught Stiles in the early morning, before they had even had first meal.
The omega was crouched out in the middle of the field. Derek walked towards
him. When he was but a few feet back, he stopped.
"Look," Stiles whispered.
I am.
"Look at it." Derek couldn't see his face, but he knew Stiles was smiling.
The sprout was tiny, not nearly what Derek had expected. But it was leafy and
alive and so green it hurt Derek's eyes.
Stiles stood and threw himself into Derek's arms, hugging the alpha close,
burying his face in Derek's chest as he laughed. "It's alive," he gasped out.
"It's alive."
Derek held him, and he smiled into the boy's hair, the sun rising over the
Ridge.
"They don't call me Rain Man for nothing."
Chapter End Notes
     Just in case anyone forgot, road warriors = the last soldiers sent
     out to maintain order before the federal government collapsed.
     I don't know anything about guns.
     I don't know anything about farming.
     Send help.
***** Chapter 9 *****
Chapter Notes
                           ❀ you_are_my_everything ❀
See the end of the chapter for more notes
He woke in a sweat. Fifth time in a week, not so much about the ghosts
anymore—no, not the night terrors—but about pining after the impossible. The
dreams left him waiting—for what, Derek wasn't quite sure. Perhaps for them to
become reality, or for the darker hallucinations to take over. He wasn't used
to craving sleep. Sleep had always been a losing battle, but now Derek welcomed
it, savored the sweetness until the dreams dissipated too soon into the morning
light. That was one thing he had bitterly learned—that waking from a sweet
dream pained the heart more than a nightmare.
How do I look at you? he'd think every time he and Stiles were in the same
room, eyes on the floor, the wall, anywhere but on the omega who now haunted
his every waking moment—even his sleeping ones. How do I pretend I don't want
you when I've tasted you in my dreams? When I've known the way your softness
would feel against my body, the sounds you'd make with my mouth on you, making
you come undone?
These fucking dreams—Stiles, with his facts and his hope and his smiles and his
laugh and his eyes and the way he'd manage to wind Derek up by doing absolutely
nothing.
You come to me in the night.
Stiles—sharp and so, so clever.
You move through my dreams like they belong to you.
Stiles—who believed in rain and weddings and falling in love.
They do.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
The coyotes grew particularly fond of their own howls as the first summer moon
climbed into the sky. Stiles enjoyed howling back occasionally, just so they'd
know he was still there. They were his first friends, crying out into the night
as far back as he could remember, comforting him until he fell asleep,
especially after his father died. The fact that the smallest coyote would be
able to tear the head off a jackal was a comforting thought, he supposed. Maybe
one day they'd come down and meet him face to face, when the land was real
green and Stiles could spoil them with ripe fruits and the like.
Another howl in the distance, bouncing off the walls of the Ridge. The kids
threw their heads back and howled in turn, the night lighting up beneath the
glow of the full moon. When Stiles peeked his eyes open, he saw that Derek had
his head thrown back, too.
 
                                     ❀❀❀ 
 
"What's this?"
Derek shrugged, placing the little contraption down on the porch. Stiles
steered it out of Isaac's grabby hands. "Deaton said it takes pictures."
Stiles blinked up at the alpha. "He said what?"
"It takes-"
"It's a camera!"
Jackson and Erica lunged for it at the same time, biting and scratching to get
to it first. Boyd managed to pluck it up amidst the scuffle, handing it to a
patiently waiting Lydia.
Stiles was smiling big. "We can use it to keep track of our progress," he said,
nodding towards the field. Derek shrugged, pushing his sleeves up to his
elbows, exposing solid wrists and strong forearms. Stiles watched the expanse
of Derek's back, the stretch of his shirt over his broad shoulders, as the
alpha retreated to the irrigation ditch he was working on. The afternoon was
humid with the rain clouds rolling in again, though they still hovered at the
edge of the valley. Derek's loosely hanging hands were big and sturdy like the
rest of him. Stiles swallowed. Derek could probably scoop up the entirety of
the desert with those hands.
"If you stare any harder you might burn a hole through him," Jackson muttered
on his way into the house. Stiles snapped his eyes away, cheeks warming. He
pulled Isaac into his lap and buried his face into the boy's curls. When he
glanced up again, Derek was watching him. He looked away first, skin heating,
and for once it wasn't because of the desert sun or sand.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
"'You are'-" Derek frowned down at the paper "-'cor-cord-cordi-al'-"
"Cordially invited." Kira took the paper back and recycled it to Stiles, also a
guest.
"Tonight," Erica said.
"Third meal, hosted by the girls," Lydia explained. "Don't be late." She raised
a knowing brow at Derek.
"That's what you're gonna wear?" Boyd snorted, watching as Derek ran a wet hand
through his hair and over his grimy face.
Derek grunted. "It's what I always wear. What's wrong with it?"
Boyd hopped down from the Jeep. He rummaged through some boxes near the water
canteens until he found what he was looking for. He pulled out a fairly well-
worn pair of dark jeans and a henley without any stains or holes in it. He
tossed them at Derek. "You should probably take a bath first. When was the last
time you had one of those?"
Derek grunted again and pulled his shirt over his head.
The girls were late in preparing the meal, despite their insistence for
everyone else to gather on time. Derek sat himself awkwardly on the sofa,
waiting to be directed to the table. Isaac and Scott crawled into his lap with
a book as they waited, and Derek was only one page in, stumbling over a lengthy
word, when Stiles made his entrance from the hallway.
Derek's breath caught somewhere in his throat. Stiles was wearing a dress, one
Derek hadn't seen before, and his hair was slightly damp, the subtle smell of
soap wafting off him. He smiled brightly as Isaac climbed off the couch and
barreled over to him, and the omega lifted him into his arms to plant a wet
kiss on the boy's cheek. Derek was still looking at him when Lydia called them
all to the table, placing the last dish down.
It was hard to focus on the food, which was delightful and filling and must've
come as a result of lots of bartering in Town considering the extra bread
portions and sweet puddings towards the end, but Derek's head was filled with
nothing but the omega sitting across from him, who was flushed and laughing and
looking so warm and soft in the combined lighting of the waning sun and lamps
and candles, skin glowing, soft and delicate-
No, Derek corrected himself—not delicate. Delicate was the one thing that
Stiles Stilinski was not. He was singing to and reading to and raising the
children in the middle of the Wasteland. He was howling back at the coyotes at
the stroke of midnight. He was the reverberating echoes of a gunshot,
ricocheting off of the steeply sloping sides of the Ridge. He was a dream-mist
on bare skin in the driest depths of the desert. He was the heat of the
unforgiving sand, the rage of the billowing red storms. Derek had known
delicate things to be soft and comforting and pretty, and Stiles was all those
things—but he was not delicate.
He was breathtaking. He was wild and strong and brave. He was light and water
and air—he was everything Derek needed to live another day. He was the most
beautiful thing Derek had ever laid his eyes upon.
He was Derek's very heart.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
Erica was grinning from ear to ear as she pulled out a big, black disk from the
bookshelf. She arranged it in the wooden box on legs, adjusted the needle, and
suddenly, music flooded the room, upbeat and jovial. Derek was entranced. 
"Let's dance," Erica said giddily, cheeks pink, blonde hair wildly spilling
over her shoulders as she spun around. She latched onto Derek's hands, pulling
him toward the center of the floor.
"I don't know how to dance," Derek said plainly, feet firmly planted.
Erica rolled her eyes, tugging him forward again. "Neither do I!"
They spun in circles mostly, and Erica tired herself out pretty quickly by
doing cartwheels and jumping around with her siblings. Isaac and Scott were the
first to conk out, of course, and the rest of them drifted up to the bunk for
bed, one by one. Stiles and Derek stood across from each other once Boyd and
Lydia bid them goodnight, candlelight casting dreamy, dim shadows across their
bodies, the summer sun just beginning to set out on the horizon. Stiles smiled
shyly and walked over to the record player, replacing the disk with another.
This time, the melody was slow and soft, sensuous. When Stiles looked up, Derek
was watching him, waiting.
It didn't take much coaxing for Derek to dance this time around—none, in
fact—and Stiles found this amusing, softly laughing into Derek's shoulder as
the alpha pulled him in by the hips, large hands warm and heavy on Stiles'
middle, cradling his waist. Stiles wrapped his hands around Derek's neck, and
as his laughs died down, he lifted his head slightly, forehead brushing against
Derek's temple as they softly swayed in place. He pulled back further, looking
up at the alpha, waiting. Must have said something, asked a question, and Derek
didn't hear. Wouldn't be the first time it happened. Derek grunted,
embarrassed, but Stiles simply repeated himself louder: "Do you have a family?"
Derek sighed, somehow afraid to look at the omega. "Did." He didn't want to
talk about how they all burned with the rest of the world, about how Laura, if
she was still out there, was the only family he had left, and how memories of
her haunted him night and day. And as much as he hated how openly the omega
looked at him, without judgment or disgust, making Derek feel raw and exposed,
Stiles was here right now—real and beautiful and unafraid—and the longer he was
here, the more Derek didn't want to let him go. He knew he had to say something
or the omega would assume he'd never explain. 
"I'm looking for my sister," he said. "I've been looking for her for a long
time. She was a road warrior like me, dispatched out here. I was deployed back
east."
Stiles searched his face for a moment. "How long has it been?"
"Before the Last War."
"Before?"
"Yes."
"That was fifteen years ago."
"And I was fifteen years old."
"You were a kid."
"Well, when it ended I wasn't anymore, so."
Stiles stared at him, and for a moment Derek regretted saying anything at all,
but then Stiles was shaking his head, jaw clenching. "You were a child. And
they did that to you. They made you into a weapon."
Derek fixed his gaze over the boy's head. "We were all supposed to be together.
Laura and I were going to be the last ones to meet my family. I got a call from
her the day before it all ended. She told me they were gone, that the bay was
dust. They were all dead. The last thing she said was, 'Mark time, brother,
mark time. I'll see you soon.'" Derek blinked down at the omega and swallowed.
"She meant, 'I'll be waiting for you.'"
The music kept playing in the background, their movements paused. "I'm sorry,"
Stiles whispered, gently cupping Derek's cheek. Derek had no choice but to meet
his gaze. The omega's hand was soft and lovely, his fingertips tracing the
stubble on Derek's jaw. He smelled like the sun and sky. He smelled like the
sand, warm and real and everywhere. Derek wanted to pin him down and know him
inside out.
"Why do you look at me that way, Rain Man?" Stiles murmured, pressing their
foreheads together.
Brush it off, shake it away, the dust of my life before this—the life I lived
without you.
"You make me-" Derek pushed forward, pulled Stiles in, pressed their fronts
together, tilted his head down and held his breath "-fucking crazy." 
His eyes slipped shut as Stiles curled his fingers into the fabric of Derek's
shirt and tentatively kissed his mouth. It was tender and timid in its
clumsiness, but then it occurred to Derek that the omega had only ever shared a
kiss with one man before him, and the Colonel most certainly did not bother
wasting time in being on the receiving end of things because he so loved to
just take. The fleeting thought angered Derek, and he seized Stiles tighter
around the waist, surged down to properly kiss him.
"No one else-" Stiles suddenly pulled away gasping, as if reading Derek's mind.
"It was you, my first." He pressed their lips together again for emphasis. "All
of it will be you, all of me."
Derek felt the boy shiver and suck in one last sharp breath before Derek dove
back in. His tongue parted the omega's lips, coaxing a sweet, startled moan
from him, and Derek swallowed it up. Stiles dug his hands into Derek's
shoulders as Derek wrapped his arms around the boy and lifted him up, and
Stiles urged them backward, down the hall, to his bed.
The omega gasped, spine arching, head tilting back as Derek laid him across the
bedding, pulling his shirt over his head. Derek felt more of an animal than
ever, so massive and monstrous in his appetites, mounting this lovely creature
he had sprawled out beneath him. He descended, draping his large body over the
youth, fitting himself into the cradle of the omega's legs, and said, "Tell me
if you want me to stop," against Stiles' mouth, and the boy's no came out
urgent and earnest before Derek all but devoured him, thumbs on his cheeks,
deepening their kiss with every touch and gasp, big arms flexing to hold
himself up.
Stiles' fingers gripped the muscle of his back and shoulders, followed the
trails of jagged scars. "What-" he gasped, and Derek crushed their lips
together again, chasing away the ghosts.
"Bad places," Derek rasped. He buried his face in Stiles' neck, pressed his
rough cheek and mouth to the soft, warm skin there, grounding himself. "Bad
people." He'd associated himself in utilitarian terms for so long that Derek
had forgotten what it was like to be looked at any other way. And now he
suddenly had a mate—someone who saw Derek's body as Derek's body and not just
as a weapon or target. Stiles lifted a hand to cup the back of Derek's head,
squeezing his shapely, pale legs tighter around Derek's waist, as if to hold
him there in case Derek tried to pull away, to run from this. Derek's lips
trailed across the omega's jaw, down over the mating bite on Stiles' neck. He
wasn't the only one with memories of the past carved into his flesh. Stiles
turned his face to the side as Derek traced a thumb over the long scar across
his throat. "What happened?"
Stiles covered Derek's hand with his own and smiled slightly, dismal and self-
deprecating, looking over Derek's shoulder with a tired sadness. "He said I
talked too much."
Derek cupped his cheek, made their eyes meet. He pulled the omega's arms back
around his neck, holding him close as they kissed and began to rock against
each other. I'll make you forget. Every horrible thing that's ever happened to
you, I'll erase. He placed a hand, big and heavy, on Stiles' leg, just below
the hem of his dress. He hesitated until Stiles whined against his mouth, and
then he obeyed, pushing the omega's dress up his thighs until it pooled around
his waist. Stiles gave him only a moment's breath before he lifted the dress
the rest of the way over his own head, tossing it to the floor. Derek swallowed
past the sudden dryness in his throat, gazing down at the omega's pliant body,
the way his hips met his waist met the cradle of his ribs, how his pale skin
was dotted with tiny constellations and his breasts, though only slightly less
than a handful, made Derek's mouth water and his cock throb and his breath
catch somewhere in his chest. "I don't-" Derek furrowed his brows "-know how to
be...gentle. Anymore."
Stiles spread his legs further, dragging Derek's hand down to where he was wet
and emptily clutching for Derek, ready and waiting. "My warrior." He helped
shove off Derek's jeans, a demanding little thing, cheeks flushed a lovely
shade of pink as Derek shucked them away, cock hard and hot and large, pressing
between Stiles' pale legs. "My Rain Man," Stiles sighed, lovely and supple,
whimpering into Derek's mouth as the alpha took himself in hand and began to
push in.
He watched Stiles' face, ready to stop at the omega's signal. "Okay?" he
grunted, voice surprisingly steady despite the thundering of his heart. Stiles
stubbornly nodded, though his eyes noticeably watered. Derek pressed his lips
to the omega's cheek, kissed the corner of the boy's mouth, where Stiles was
biting his lip, and stuttered into a slow grind, letting him get used to
Derek's size. When Stiles began softly kissing back, Derek closed the last
few inches until his hips were flush, cock buried to the hilt in Stiles'
dripping cunt. The omega's breathing was already ragged as he ran his hands
over Derek's shoulders, buried his face in the crook of the alpha's neck. Derek
thrust slowly, distracting Stiles with caresses, running his hands over the
boy's body, until Stiles began rocking up into him, undulating his hips—more,
more—and Derek was soon steadily rutting between Stiles' thighs, breathing
hard, nothing but keening sobs possessing Stiles' trembling form.
Derek kissed every inch of skin he could reach, sucked bruises into the
inviting tilt of Stiles' fair neck, over the mating mark, groaning low as the
tightness between his legs rapidly increased. Stiles sunk his teeth into
Derek's shoulder to quiet himself, and Derek swore, bowing his head and
thrusting harder, making Stiles gasp out, brows furrowed, eyes shut. Derek
pressed their mouths together hungrily and swallowed up the omega's desperate
moans. He could see Stiles' eyes—an amber sunrise—opposite the tangerine sunset
burning through the window's downy, pale curtains. He felt the slide of their
chests together—Derek, solid and broad, and Stiles, soft and plush, flushed
from the tips of his ears all the way down to the pink of his peaked, pebbled
nipples. Derek bowed his head and wrapped his mouth around one, and Stiles
bucked, arching up into him, fingers dragging through Derek's hair as the alpha
sucked and laved.
Derek was growing dizzy from the tightness and the wetness and the scent that
was Stiles and him, together, and he knew he was going to come. He hadn't come
in a long time. He knew he should pull out and spill his seed between them, on
their skin, even on the bedsheets—anywhere but inside this young, fertile
omega—but when Stiles reached down and gripped his bare ass, urging him on, all
coherent thoughts sailed from Derek's mind, and he thrust with abandon.
He kissed Stiles' bruised lips, sucked out the desperate gasps and hungry
moans, ate up the soft simpers that escaped the omega. "Do it, please, do it,"
Stiles begged, high-pitched and needy, rocking his hips up to meet Derek's,
demanding that the alpha finish inside him. "Please, Derek."Derek swore,
looping an arm under the omega's neck, pressing their cheeks together, breath
hot against the bite mark on his mate's neck, as he pistoned his hips—climbing,
climbing, climbing-
Stiles writhed as he came, head thrown back, choking on a sob, and Derek
tumbled over after him, coming heavy and hot inside Stiles with a cutoff
fuck growled into the omega's ear before he finally collapsed atop the youth.
Nothing but the sound of his own heavy breathing until he felt Stiles stroking
his hair, pressing tender kisses to his brow, reverently touching Derek's
shoulders and arms. When he pulled back, only enough to let the omega breathe
easier, he let his eyes rake over the sight beneath him: Stiles—sweaty,
breathless, a puddle of wetness and come leaking out of his wrecked cunt,
dribbling down between his thighs. Just looking at him made Derek want to have
him again, over and over, all night, into the morning.
He used his discarded shirt to mop up their mess, tenderly touching Stiles'
sensitive opening, wiping away the evidence of where they had been joined
together. So much for a clean shirt.
Stiles pulled him back down, letting Derek blanket him. He placed his head over
Stiles' breast, eyes shutting, letting the omega's beating heart pacify him.
Stiles combed his fingers through Derek's hair, cradling the alpha in his arms,
and began humming. It sounded far away, but Derek felt the vibrations, and
they calmed his racing mind and heart, tamed the howling wolf in him. The light
of the setting sun still stubbornly stained the room a dim, warm, shadowy
orange as they succumbed to sleep.
Outside, it began to rain.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
                                        
Derek sat in the driver's seat of the Jeep, parked right outside the garage,
staring out at the vastness of the land. He had taken her for a test drive
earlier and had come to the conclusion that she was finally ready to reclaim
her place amongst the dust and sand. The stars overhead twinkled and shined,
taunting Derek from lightyears away. What's in us is out there, Stiles had
said. We're all connected.
"Derek?" Stiles called from inside the house. After a moment, he came out onto
the porch. He rubbed his naked arms for a moment, bracing himself against the
cool night air. Derek glanced away from him to assess the Ridge once more, mind
wandering to the thought of what laid beyond. Stiles stepped further out, bare
feet against the edge of the porch. "Come back to me," he said, simple as that.
And so Derek did.
Chapter End Notes
     *finger guns*
***** Chapter 10 *****
Chapter Notes
                     ❀ in_the_muddy_water_we're_falling ❀
See the end of the chapter for more notes
He shivered when he felt Derek's calloused palms running down his arms, warm
lips pressing to his neck, whiskers tickling his skin. His hands ran up Stiles'
sides to clutch his waist, just above where his linen was tied, and he slid
deft fingers between the folds and tugged, pulling the end of it with him as he
moved off. Stiles was helpless to him, letting himself be drawn back to his
room—their room, nowadays—for another round of early morning coupling. Now that
they'd had each other, they were always wanting more. 

Halfway down he hall, Derek lifted Stiles with an arm under his ass, using the
other to help the omega wrap his legs around his waist, and feeling his
strength made Stiles dizzy, weak, wet. Derek laid him back against the rumpled
sheets and began picking Stiles' linens apart like he was unwrapping a present,
pulling the folds of Stiles' dress away from his quivering body like he was
coaxing a flower to unfurl. Stiles shivered again when Derek crawled down
between his legs, held his thighs apart, and began kissing a trail from his
navel to his dripping, flushed sex. His breath was hot against Stiles' wetness,
which seemed ever-flowing and relentless these days, like a mighty river, and
when the alpha descended, it took everything in Stiles not to cry out and wake
the kids.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
It didn't rain again.
Days continued on, the land shriveling back up, the sun a hot brand on their
backs. It was as if they had dreamt it all—the soil and the seeds and the water
falling from the sky.
They worked on the field, and Stiles reread every word in every possible book
he had about growing, and still the hot sun beat down from its spotless, pale
sky and the land grew thirsty again and the sand was just sand once more. After
they had to go back to rationing the water, Derek would occasionally kneel
between Stiles' thighs and lick him until he could drink from his mate—water,
water, water-
Aquifer, his mind had supplied, and now he knew for a fact that that was the
only thing that could be their saving grace. Every day they went out to the
field, searching for something—anything—some sign of hope. There was nothing.
Just sand, as Derek feared. If they kept irrigating this useless dirt,
eventually they'd end up drawing from the drinking water, but Stiles insisted
they keep going.
"There has to be something," he said, and Derek didn't have the heart to tell
him it just wasn't true. The land was dead down to the core of the Earth and
Derek knew it—he'd always known it—but he couldn't tell Stiles that. He was
humouring the process now, silently making calculations about water supply.
He'd play along until it was life-threatening, probably, and then he'd tell the
omega, even if it meant shattering his mate's heart.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
  
"Where do we go when we die?"
"We go to the Night Lands where we become stars."
Scott wrinkled his nose. "I don't want to be a star."
"Not even a shooting star? Making people's wishes come true?" Erica proposed.
"Technically, when you make a wish upon a star, you're actually a few million
light years late," Lydia said offhandedly.
"Hear that?" Jackson smirked across the table at Scott, tearing off a piece of
his bread and popping it into his mouth. "We die, we become dead stars, and
then we collect dead dreams—just like yours from last night." Boyd shut him up
with one look. 
Isaac looked up at Stiles. "Is your daddy a star?"
"Yes," Stiles said.
"And your mommy?"
"Yes."
Kira thought on this. "I don't think you'll be one."
Stiles furrowed his brows. "Why not?"
"You'll probably just end up being the moon. That's what the Rain Man thinks
you are, anyway."
Derek choked on his food, dropping his spoon back into his plate. Stiles wasn't
sporting a blush, but his lips quirked into a small smile. He didn't meet
Derek's eyes, which Derek found odd. Stiles was all about confrontation.
"I'm tired," Isaac announced halfway through the meal.
"Yeah, well, I've been tired since before you were born," Stiles snapped
suddenly, and everyone went still, shocked. The omega didn't look up from his
dish. "Eat your food," he said quietly.
They passed the rest of the meal in silence.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
Stiles was out in the field again, sitting across from the little sprig. Only
it wasn't a sprig anymore so much as it was a ripened stalk of wheat, bright
green and tall. It was also lonely, with no others to accompany it in the
barren field.
"How long's he been out there?" Derek asked. He'd asked the same thing the day
before. And the day before that. He'd been asking for a long time now. Every
morning for the past month, though he couldn't be entirely sure. He'd stopped
notching slits into his bedframe around day ninety-nine, mainly because he'd
practically moved into Stiles' room, but also because continuing to count the
days seemed wrong somehow. It was something prisoners did, or slaves. Not men
who'd been handed a good, honest life with good, honest people.
Lydia didn't look at him when she answered, "I don't think he's slept."
Derek clenched his jaw. "Are you telling me he was out there all night?" The
alpha cursed his failing senses for the thousandth time.
Lydia shrugged, gaze still trained out the window. "Why don't you go ask him
yourself?" She turned and left. Erica, uncharacteristically quiet, got up from
the sofa a few seconds later and followed after her sister. Derek rubbed a hand
over his face. What would he say? What could he say? The seeds hadn't taken.
The rain did nothing. The soil was stagnated. Your hope is killing you, angel. 
"I really don't feel like talking to or seeing anyone."
Derek frowned down at the omega's linen-covered back. "Then we don't have to
talk," he said. "And you don't have to look at me."
Stiles heavily sighed, a single, drawn out breath of exasperation. He stood and
turned after a moment and walked straight into Derek's chest. "Take me to bed."
Derek did.
"Do you remember the people you've killed?" Stiles asked, head pillowed on
Derek's chest.
I've never forgotten them."All the time," he replied.
"Do you wish you could forget them?"
"I wouldn't want to." Stiles tilted his head up, letting Derek's breath brush
over his temple. "You should never stop thinking about a life you've taken.
That's the price you pay for taking it."
"Do you see them?" Stiles whispered, and Derek couldn't answer because that one
hit too close to home, so he kissed the omega's brow, Stiles understood, and
they hushed so they could sleep.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
"What is it with you today?" his mother had asked his father one morning.
Stiles remembered well because he was five and it was one of his only memories
of the Long Winter.
"Oh, you know," his father had said. "Sun shining. Birds chirping." His mother
had raised a brow, as if reminding him that they were in an underground vault.
Sitting here now, waiting for the seeds to grow, Stiles wondered how she had
laughed so easily at his father's words. This disappointment after coming so
far—it killed him. Hoping had brought nothing but pain in the end. It wasn't
enough anymore.
He curled up around the frail, golden stalk of wheat, protecting it from the
unkind heat of the sand, the punishing whip of the winds. I'm sorry. I'm sorry
none of it was enough. I'm sorry you're the only one. The stalk swayed, bowing
over, wilting, nudging up against Stiles' cheek as his tears fell, as if to
say, I'm sorry, too.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
Derek was out for another test run with the Jeep when he spotted the speck in
the distance, something glinting against the sunlight, blinding him, and then a
dot suddenly moving across the flats—human-shaped. A few yards more, and Derek
was slamming down on the gas, the form sharpening into the figure of a man, a
pair of binoculars jutting out from his face.
Spy.
The man took a moment to spot the vehicle coming at him, but then he was
sprinting off, aiming to lose Derek in the foothills. Not fast enough. Derek
was on his tail and speeding past, cutting him off. The man—a boy,
really—jerked back, tripping himself ass-first into the sand. He reeked of
fear, and Derek was afraid he'd piss himself. He swung out of the Jeep,
stalking toward the boy, who scrambled back on shaky, bandage-wrapped hands. He
opened his mouth and Derek slammed down on him, arm over the kid's throat,
knees pinning his arms into the sand by his head.
"Who sent you?" Derek snarled.
The boy looked like he was going to bite his tongue, so Derek raised a hand,
claws extending. The kid quickly sputtered out, "The Colonel, please, it was
the Colonel," and Derek decided that he couldn't be any older than Stiles,
maybe fifteen, sixteen.
"You tell your Colonel nothing, understand?" Derek growled, bearing his teeth,
fangs protruding from his gums.
The boy whimpered, turning his head to the side as he squirmed. "I understand!
Please, just-"
He didn't believe the boy. Of course he didn't, but he didn't have a choice—he
couldn't kill a kid, even if said kid was likely posted out here for weeks,
collecting intel, reporting back to the Colonel in exchange for nothing but his
own life, probably. They were all victims of circumstance out here, and now the
damage was done. The Colonel had known he existed, but now he'd know what Derek
was to Stiles, how the omega carried Derek's mating mark on his neck.
Derek released him, already striding towards the Jeep. He was tearing back off
towards the house before the boy could even stand again.
He knew the Colonel would come for them. He knew it was all too good to last,
too good to be anything but temporary. He didn't sleep for three nights and
involuntarily gave in on the fourth, nodding off after laying his eyes to rest
only a moment, Stiles' calm, dreaming face branded behind his lids after hours
of watching over him. He woke suddenly, burning hot, sweating buckets. Where
was he? Bed. House. Desert. The years slid back into place. The fallen world
righted itself.
A mercifully cool hand touched his cheek. When he looked up, he was met with
Stiles' worried face. The omega's eyes were soft and weepy, like he was
suddenly seeing everything Derek always kept locked away in his head. He leaned
down and kissed Derek's brow. "Me, too. I have the bad dreams, too." Derek's
breathing steadied. Maybe everyone had the bad dreams, everyone left in the
world.
Stiles cradled the alpha's head against his soft chest, threading his fingers
through Derek's hair, lips warmly brushing against Derek's better ear as he
breathed, "I love you, my Rain Man." It was so soft that Derek wasn't sure he
had heard it right. It stole the breath from his lungs, and in the end, he
chose to ignore the omega. He was half-deaf, after all. Maybe Stiles would
assume he didn't hear him. Maybe he had finally gone completely deaf. Maybe he
was hallucinating it. Either way, the implication was too impossible, so he
drifted off to sleep instead, far too quickly to wish the omega in his arms a
happy birthday.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
  
Stiles was on edge throughout the day, as though he wanted to say something,
but didn't quite know how to bring it up. "Derek," he softly began after third
meal, out by the garage, watching Derek putter around the bike as the children
remained inside, occupied by their books. Derek had been dreading this since he
woke up. The omega fidgeted, fingers lacing, unlacing, amber eyes bright and
warm when he said, impossibly tender, "I love you."
Derek stared at him for a long, hard moment. He had no idea what he could
possibly say to make this better, to fix it. "No, you don't." It was clearly
not the reaction Stiles was hoping for because his wavering little smile
sharply turned into a frown, taken aback. Derek couldn't bear the hurt and
confusion etched into the omega's pale, troubled face, and suddenly his skin
felt too tight, the garage too small.
Stiles picked up a handful of sand, opened his fist, and showed Derek. "Look.
I'll swear on this that I do. How's that?"
"That's a crap thing to swear on."
"This sand is older and truer than everything." The hesitance in his voice
sounded foreign to Derek's ears. "Surely it's the best thing to swear on?"
Derek huffed.
"It's truer than us," Stiles said softly, letting the sand spill from his
fingers.
Derek shook his head and pushed past him. "You don't love me, Stiles," he
repeated.
"Why? Why don't I love you?" Stiles was flat-out offended now, tense and
anxious. "Because I'm too young? Because I've been so disrespected and hurt all
my life that I'd fall for any alpha that showed me a lick of kindness?"
Yes. And that was the awful truth, wasn't it?
"You're a good man." You've known nothing but wretched ones. Of course I'd seem
like a good man. Derek wasn't a miracle. He shouldn't be praised for being
decent, for not bringing Stiles deliberate pain. He was a poor excuse for an
alpha—and a mate, a voice that sounded like Laura's added.
"Stop punishing yourself!" Stiles cried out, tugging at Derek's shirt.
"You don't know-"
"I do," Stiles snapped. "My whole family was torn apart because of
that monster!" His eyes grew unshed with resentful tears. "My mother was ripped
away from me and raped until she killed herself. My father's cold body was laid
out in front of this house the day I turned twelve. I was beaten for taking in
orphans, for riding, for depending on myself—every single freedom I had was
taken from me. And you want to know the worst part? The Colonel isn't even the
only Jackal who's ever tried to hurt me for it." Stiles spat it all out with a
hatred Derek didn't know he even possessed, silencing the alpha, making him
flinch back. "I know, Derek." The boy raised his head, refusing to concede to
his distress. "I know better than anyone."
Derek lowered his head in shame. Not the only Jackal. He stared down at his
hands because he didn't deserve to gaze upon the omega. Not the only
Jackal. How could he be so thick-skulled? He's young and bears fruit. Of
course other alphas wanted to mount him. Of course the Colonel isn't the only
dirty rat in this desert. Of course leaving Stiles all alone was his doing.
"I know what I feel," Stiles whispered, and Derek shook his head. "What did you
expect? What did you want me to do?" Stiles had such a sadness in his voice
that it made Derek physically ill. "You mated me! You made love to me! You were
everything I wanted! How dare you say I don't love you?" Derek couldn't meet
his eyes, but he could tell from the quaking of the omega's shoulders that he
was crying now. "You ruined it," Stiles snarled. "Something's died in me. It
took a long time for it to happen, but it's dead. You took the one thing I
thought was mine to give and turned it into dirt, and I hate you for it, Derek
Hale, I hate you!"
"I never asked for this," Derek snapped back, turning away.
"What do you want me to say?" Stiles shuffled around him, futilely followed
after Derek's withdrawing form, trying to get the alpha to look at him. "You
want me to apologize? Say I'm sorry for saving your life?"
"I never asked for this!" Derek surged forward and gripped him by his pale
shoulders. "I never asked for this, Stiles! I never asked for this!"
Stiles yanked himself out of Derek's grip, tears streaking his face, and began
storming back to the house.
"Stiles, wait," Derek sighed. The omega ignored him, marching up the porch
steps. "Stiles-"
Stiles whipped around and lunged at him, which Derek did not at all anticipate,
and he went down hard on his side as they fell into the dirt together. Derek
grunted and rolled them as Stiles thrashed and yelled. "Stop," Derek begged,
trying to control Stiles' flailing limbs, fighting back against the omega's
raging burst of strength. "Stiles, just stop-" he pinned the omega as best as
he could, and still Stiles relentlessly writhed, crying out. "Fuck—stop!"
Stiles fell back into the sand, stubborn tears staining his flushed cheeks as
he went limp.
"Please," Derek sighed. You don't want a life with me, angel. "Don't be naive,"
he said instead, because he was an idiot, and he hated himself the second the
words left his mouth.
Stiles sucked in a breath so sharp and cutting that it was crystal clear to
Derek's ears. "I may be naive," Stiles said lowly, an exasperated tremor rising
in his voice, "but at least I'm not a selfish, jaded asshole!"
"Selfish? Selfish?" Derek growled back, anger just as equally evident in his
furrowed brows and gritted teeth. "You think staying here for you was selfish?
You think giving up the only chance of ever seeing my sister again was
selfish?" His heart was in his throat. "What about loving you? You think that
was selfish?"
It rushed to his chest, suddenly—a flood of water that was terrifyingly clear.
Stiles had once been a trickle, and now he flowed over Derek's skin and through
his veins and inside his heart. He was here with Derek, with his face so close,
always chasing Derek with the light when the alpha ran to the shadows, exposing
everything with his bright smiles and laughter, and Derek had opened his mouth
until his lungs were full of Stiles' water. He hoped so much that his wolf was
a secret fish, that he could swim with this and relearn how to breathe, because
he—no matter how much he tried to stop himself—loved Stiles, probably, and it
was drowning him.
The omega lay beneath him, hair surrounded by a halo of sand, chest heaving,
like after one of their ruts, but this time Derek was the most naked and the
most scared he'd ever been. He didn't know how to explain that the omega was
asking the impossible of him, but Stiles would resent him forever if he didn't
confess what was in his heart.
"My sister, I-" he forced himself to meet the omega's eyes. "I see her."
Stiles searched his face for a moment.
Derek scrambled off of him.
"Derek-" 
"I see her!" Stiles stared back at him as they stood. "I see her, Stiles. I
always see her. She's everywhere. All the time." The hallucinations meant he
was crazy, so Derek never admitted they were there, not out loud, at least, not
to anybody—he hadn't had anybody, no one except Laura's voice, really—until
Stiles. He'd just quietly accepted, in his own scattered brain, that he'd
finally gone mad. "She's in Beacon Hills." Spit it out. "I can't-" the words
were stuck in his throat. Stiles reached up and cupped Derek's face, unwilling
to allow him to slip away again to the secret place he hid when the hurt was
too great. "I can't do it again," he choked out, and it strangled the last of
his composure from his chest. "I can't lose you." Please love me this way.
There's no other way I know how to be. I am only this.
"Oh, Derek," Stiles breathed, and Derek shut his eyes, an ache lifting from his
shoulders as their foreheads brushed, and for a merciful moment, there was just
quiet. Then Stiles reminded Derek for the millionth time, "I'm tough," and
Derek didn't have the heart to tell him, My sister was tough, too. 
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
Weeks dragged by after the spy incident. Derek's paranoia and fear tripled with
every passing day. He could barely function. He wandered out with the daybreak,
Laura whispering his eyes shut as he forced himself to keep watch, to patrol
the land, armed from head to toe. He wanted to go away for a while, to see
something other than sand, to rest—so he did. He didn't think he had gone far,
but when he looked back, the house was just a dot on the horizon. He had
staggered so far away he was at the foothills again. He stumbled a few steps,
collapsed into the sand, face twisted in agony as he opened his mouth and
screamed, a terrible noise that woke the coyotes, their howls echoing Derek's
cry. It felt good for half a moment, and then Derek covered his ears, bent at
the waist until someone brushed up against his back—no, not someone-
The wolf was black except for the deep yellows of its eyes, staring back at
Derek without pause. He knew it was a wolf because of the extensive collection
of wolf-related books Erica enjoyed showing him, but also because the prickle
of his skin and the tingle in his spine said, We're the same. So he
kept kneeling there in the dirt, miserable and unable to comprehend what he was
seeing. And then the wolf threw its head back and howled, deep and powerful,
reverberating through Derek's bones.
He thought about being in Stiles' room their first night together—how easy it
was to make him come, then lying with him afterwards, breathing into his hair,
and how small the omega felt tucked against him all night, and his little waist
and his bare feet brushing against Derek's calves-
He couldn't keep it. It wasn't something that he was ever meant to have. And
yet, he'd never wanted anything more than to wake up to that every morning for
the rest of his miserable fucking life. Derek was going to love Stiles so good
and warm and right that he'd forget his conditioned response of flinching away
because of a lifetime of battered nerves. Derek would erase the way the world
hurt him, all the ways that it first held him by the throat and shook
him. Derek couldn't fathom how the omega could still ask him to wrap Stiles
into his arms when so many others had been cages.
Still want a life with me, angel?
A sudden flash of something in his brain, the image of what their life could
be—a house by the ocean, the kids running around, a baby with Stiles'
constellations and Derek's dark complexion. I do, Stiles' voice echoed through
his mind, snapping Derek back to the moment.
In the distance, the sun peeked out over the Ridge, and from over the horizon,
a cloud of dust rose.
 
                                     ❀❀❀ 
 
The sky was orange and pink where the sun was rising. Stiles paused by the
porch, on his way back from collecting the dry clothes from the line. His eyes
fell in front of him. There were words there, written in the sand. He stood at
the bottom and read.
gone to town.
x
Stiles knelt down beside it, a faint smile tugging at his lips, despite
himself. Derek was a quick learner. He traced his fingers through the 'x',
rubbed it out, then drew it again. He wondered if one of the children had
taught the alpha what it meant. Derek didn't seem like the kind of man to write
an 'x' in the sand, a kiss, especially so soon after their fight, stubborn as
he was, and Stiles felt his stomach flip a bit when he thought about it, though
he wasn't sure if it was because it made him feel uneasy so much as relieved.
A part of him felt glad that Derek was finally letting up about Stiles being at
the house by himself. People tried to protect Stiles because they didn't think
he was capable of being sneaky or strong, but he was. He'd proved that to
Deaton and Marin over the years, he'd managed it by making a deal with the
Colonel. He had to be strong to survive this long. And Derek did believe he was
strong, but Stiles was tired of living in constant fear.
A sudden creak out on the porch. Stiles frowned. Derek would march up those
steps with purpose, even when he was feeling down or surly. Another drawn out
creak. His breath caught somewhere in his throat. "Boyd," he said heavily,
"lock the hatch." The hole to the bunk slammed shut with a loud, metal thud,
and in the same moment, the front door burst through on its hinges.
Stiles dropped his book on the floor.
The Colonel walked through the hole of broken wood. "Hello, dove." Stiles
backed up slowly as the Colonel advanced, stepping through the mess of dust and
wood chips scattered across the floor, eyes like dirty hands, touching Stiles
all wrong, raking over him. He groped for the gun on the counter behind him,
but the Jackals were already there, yanking it out of his hands, gripping him
by the arms, forcing him still as the Colonel walked up and yanked the linen
away from his neck, baring his shoulders and pale neck and the mark of his
mating to Derek, finally exposed.
A heartbeat of dead silence, and then the Colonel began to laugh. He gathered
himself enough to mock Stiles: "You think you could escape me? The Jackal, the
Colonel of the Ridge, the King of the Desert?" His Jackals smirked all around
him, and Stiles thought the jackrabbit pace of his heart would surely kill him
if the Colonel didn't. "Where's your precious alpha to save you now?"
Stiles jerked forward, snarling, and the Colonel backhanded him without
hesitation. He gripped Stiles by the chin, yanking him forward. "Where's your
rain?" he sneered, hungrily staring down at Stiles' mouth. "Not that it matters
anymore. All bets are off when you're a rule breaker." He nodded towards the
door.
The Jackals hauled Stiles forward, dragging him out as he kicked and screamed,
biting at their dirty fingers. The Colonel sighed once they were out on the
porch. "Forgot what a little brat you could be," he groused, as if commenting
on the weather. "Quite unattractive." He took the steps two at a time, striding
forward to the tanks and rigs waiting in the short distance. The Jackals were
still struggling with Stiles as the vehicles pulled up, and the Colonel turned
back to him once more. "This ends one way: with me getting what I want." They
shoved Stiles into one of the trucks. He immediately began throwing himself
against the sides of the vehicle, smashing his hands against the windows,
screaming bloody murder.
"Great One, what of the alpha?"
"And the children, Great One?"
Stiles stopped, pressing up against the the glass to better hear over the roars
of the thundering engines. The Colonel stroked his chin, turning to face
Stiles. He smiled.
"Kill them all."
Chapter End Notes
     Goodness, things got dark supa fast. Also, I know I sneaked an
     extremely overused joke into this chapter, but the setup was perfect,
     dude, I couldn't not. There will be no apologies today, my friends.
***** Chapter 11 *****
Chapter Notes
                   ❀ Who_knew_loving_you_would_be_a_crime? ❀
See the end of the chapter for more notes
There was a hand on his cheek, brushing his tears away.
"Don't be upset, my love," a voice murmured, and Stiles blinked against the
haziness to see his mother better. He was little, and she was beautiful, and
they sat cross-legged across from each other in the Sunken City as the Long
Winter consumed the earth above the surface, or—according to some of the road
warriors—died off, coming to an end. "Daddy will return soon. Aren't you happy
we can go home?"
Stiles' lip wobbled."Scared," he whispered shakily.
His mother smiled, and she cuddled him close. "When we go home, you'll see that
there's nothing to be scared of. You'll love it."
Stiles had been born in darkness, in a vault beneath the fallen world. He did
not see the sun, the moon, the mountains, not even a grain of sand, until he
was already a grown boy. He had never seen anything that was beautiful. Until,
one day, everyone was allowed onto the surface. They had stepped out together,
as a family, his mother and father joined at the hands, him riding on his
father's shoulders, and the first thing he saw was the sky, the biggest, bluest
thing he had ever laid his eyes on. 
"It's beautiful, isn't it?" his mother had asked him, just as the sun peeked
out over the horizon. It hit Stiles' face, warm and bright and so, so right. He
could do nothing other than nod, eyes wide, taking the world in.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
When Stiles woke, he thought maybe it had all just been a bad dream because he
was in his bed, spooned against the solid line of heat that was Derek. His
vision swam for a second as he blinked his eyes open, but when it sharpened, he
realized—no, not hisbed—he was in a different bed, one with a large mattress
and plush pillows and silky blankets thrown all over it. The last thing he
remembered was opening up a book. Then the Colonel dragging him out of his
home, shoving him into a truck, followed by a sharp pain at the back of his
skull, and then darkness. The details came flooding back to him. He'd been
taken—abducted—by the Colonel. The warmth at his back shifted and Stiles jerked
away, scrambled backward, falling over the side of the bed in his haste. He was
still wearing his linens, and he wasn't in pain—he hadn't been violated yet.
The Colonel sighed, unimpressed, looking up at him from the bed. 
"What have you done?" Stiles demanded, wishing his voice wasn't so weak and
frightened.
Of course, he already knew the answer. The Colonel sighed again and sat up.
"I've taken what's mine, little dove."
"I am not yours-"
He barely got the words out before the Colonel sprung to his feet and rushed
forward. "Quiet," he thundered. By the time Stiles registered the sting of the
slap, he was already crumbled on the floor, hand cupping his cheek—habit, more
than anything else. He gingerly touched his lip. His fingertips came back red.
He tasted the blood as the pain manifested. "My spy saw you with the alpha
drifter," the Colonel said. Stiles didn't dare to look up. The man shared
height with Derek, even if he wasn't as huge—as tall as a doorway, yet not
nearly as wide as its entrance—but Stiles knew the Colonel could snap his neck
in a second, no questions asked. "I didn't believe it at first," the Colonel
muttered darkly. "My little dove, mated and bearing the mark of another upon
his neck?" He grabbed Stiles' by his hair, yanking his head up, and Stiles saw
the disgust and fury in the alpha' eyes as he laid them upon the mating mark.
"And that of a fucking road warrior? You let a feral wolf between your legs,
you little whore!" The Colonel threw Stiles back onto the bed. "You are
mine!" Stiles shrunk away in the corner of the bedding, tugging his torn linens
down over his legs. The Colonel sighed again. "Why must you resist me? If you
were my mate, I would spoil you with furs and jewels. I wouldn't let you live
out there in the sand, in a shack."
"It's my home!"
"It's nothing!"
Stiles whipped his head up. "I will never be yours," he spat, and braced
himself for another blow.
It never came.
"You violated the rules of our deal," the Colonel said simply, and the calm in
his voice sent chills down Stiles' spine. Perhaps this was really it, and the
Colonel knew it. Stiles had nowhere to run to, no deals to keep him safe.
"You have to let me go," he pleaded brokenly. "My kids, they need me-"
"Not for long," the Colonel quipped.
Stiles furrowed his brows, then remembered the Colonel's last words before he
was knocked out. He gritted his teeth, fists clenching. "Derek will protect
them. Derek will come for me."
The Colonel shrugged, chuckling to himself like it was comical. "Then we'll
wait for him, hm? And when he comes, I will make him watch as I split you on my
cock." He smiled viciously. "And then I will kill him."
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
Derek didn't remember the short journey back to the house except that when he
came upon it and saw the door broken in, all his fears washed over him like a
wave, choking him, making him sink to his knees. He was surrounded in seconds,
guns pointed at his head, the Jackals yipping and laughing manically as they
unarmed him, impressed with themselves for catching the desert wolf.
"He's a big one, ain't he?"
"Not so tough, though."
"Where're your claws, puppy?"
"The Colonel's dove was a sneaky one, that one."
"Maybe he'll let us have a taste-"
Derek had the beta's gun held to his own head in an instant, pulling the
trigger, blood splattering the side of his face as the man went limp, brains
blown out. He took advantage of the Jackals' moment of shock to take down two
others before they reacted properly. Derek used the dead body as a shield—the
risk of finding out if these bullets were laced with wolfsbane was too high—and
took down three more before he stumbled behind one of the rigs to take cover.
He yanked the guy behind the wheel out and added him to the body count,
throwing him atop the other beta's limp form. He made the mistake of glancing
to the lifeless bodies and froze. They were young, boys no older than Stiles,
and Derek momentarily fought against his guilt, swore beneath his breath, and
forced himself to pelt the last of the Jackals left out in the open before his
clip ran out.
One of the Jackals turned and sprinted back to the house, but Derek was already
striding out from behind the truck and aiming. The Jackal jerked as the bullet
connected, and he fell face forward into the sand. Derek picked his confiscated
gun off one of the dead bodies and ran for the porch. A Jackal met him out at
the entrance, and Derek knocked him back before putting a bullet in him, too.
Another Jackal fired off from inside the house, nicking his arm, and Derek
jumped back from the splintered doorway. Blood trickled down his elbow.
Shit. He sucked in a sharp breath, hurled himself sideways, and fired inside.
The Jackal yelped, and Derek waited for the sound of his body hitting the floor
before he picked himself up and entered.
The place was ransacked, books fallen everywhere, chairs overturned, the blood
of the Jackal Derek just killed splattered across the wall. He ignored the
beta's wheezing breaths and kicked his gun away.
Derek immediately checked on the kids, shouting out each of their names. The
hatch was still shut tight despite the visible signs of struggle for
entry—dozens of bullet dents in the thick metal—and Derek turned his head,
meeting the eyes of the man who tried to break in, and shot him again, right
between his eyes.
The hatch creaked open a minute later, and Boyd peeked out, shotgun aimed at
Derek's head. He visibly relaxed when he saw who it was, and looked like he was
about to help the children down, when Derek held up a hand, saying, "Not yet."
He glanced at the array of dead bodies everywhere. "They don't need to see
this." Boyd nodded once, understanding, and began climbing down himself. "No,
you, too. Stay," Derek said, stepping forward, and Boyd rolled his eyes, Lydia
following down after him.
Erica's head hovered over the edge, her face lined with worry. "What's
happening?"
Derek swallowed. He needed to be strong, keep it together for the kids. "I'm
going to get Stiles back."
"We are," Lydia corrected.
Derek shook his head, ears ringing. "You two can't come," he said, hoping his
voice was commanding enough to deter them.
Lydia huffed. "You're not the boss of us." She crossed her arms. "We're helping
you." Boyd nodded beside her.
Derek ran a tired hand over his face. "You're-"
"We're not kids anymore, Rain Man," Lydia said. "We haven't been in a long
time." Her eyes were sharp and fierce, and Derek knew there was not a thing he
could say to change her mind.
"Stiles would have my head."
"We'll deal with that later," she said, already stepping over the Jackal's body
and striding out the door. Boyd followed his sister outside.
Derek glanced up at Erica. "Stay up there. Be safe. Take care of your siblings.
Everything's gonna be okay."
She didn't look too sure, but she was just as stubborn and brave as Stiles, so
she just nodded, biting her lip, and shut the hatch once more.
Lydia was seating herself in the Jeep and Boyd was starting up the bike when
Derek approached them. "So what's the plan?" Boyd asked.
Derek sighed, mind wandering to Stiles for a moment. I swear on my life, if
that monster has laid a single hand on-
"I've got one," Lydia said, cradling a matchbox in her hand.
Derek and Boyd shared a look.
"Let's hear it."
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
They approached the Ridge on foot so as not to alert anyone. The three of them
crouched behind a large, jagged boulder before the Pass, peeking out to wage
the quiet and still of Town in the not-yet morning. All was peaceful, but that
would change soon.
"Hope you're good sneaks," Derek mumbled, the load of fuel on his back weighing
him down.
"We're not the ones who stumble our way into disastrous situations all the
time," Lydia lightly shot back, but Derek went rigid. His poor hearing was a
bit of a sore spot, and right now it truly meant life or deaf.
He grunted and handed two of the vessels of gasoline off to her and Boyd. He
looked upon both of them for a moment, jolted by the sudden pang of affection
that ran through him. Without giving it another thought, he pulled them close
one by one, cupping their faces in his large hands, and hugged them. Then he
pointed to the east and west. "You know what to do," he said. Derek crouched
there in the sand and closed his eyes for a moment, Stiles' face flashing
beneath his lids, laughing and bright. He took off first, straight for the
Ridge.
His footfalls sounded deafening to his own ears, along with the pounding of his
heart, but Derek was already half-deaf, so he imagined that they were actually
much louder than what he was hearing. He darted between the huts and tents,
invisible under cover of the half-darkness. Once he came to the end of the row
of shops, he sucked in a sharp breath and launched up against the side of the
Ridge, immediately taking cover behind a barrier of rubble. The lower
extensions of the Ridge were still bathed in the night, but the slowly rising
sun cast the upper tiers in dim morning light, and Derek searched for movement-
Nothing. Just darkness.
He began climbing and dousing the Ridge in fuel.
The first Jackal he came across was squatted behind a rock as he carefully
aimed his rifle down at the base of the canyon, where Derek saw Lydia pouring
out the gasoline along the foot of the Ridge. Derek didn't want to shoot—it
would alert the rest of the Colonel's goons right away—so instead he snapped
the Jackal's neck, and the beta emitted a short, low whine before falling
slack. Derek removed his keffiyeh and tied it up around his own face. Disguised
as a Jackal, he moved a bit more freely, darting between boulders, pouring out
gasoline. No one had shouted a warning of their intrusion yet. Suddenly,
something shifted in his peripheral, and Derek's eyes darted up, instinctively
aiming his gun, before he recognized Boyd's dark face hovering above a big, red
rock, nodding towards the largest ledge of the Ridge, a little ways down from
where he was, tankard of gasoline raised above his head in triumph—empty.
Derek advanced in a crouch, forcing deep, calm breaths through his nose, and
then he saw it: the shape of a large vault nestled between the bedrock. 
The Colonel.
Then, louder, the wind in his ears: Stiles.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
The Colonel snatched his ankle and dragged him along the bedding, pulling
Stiles towards his towering form. Stiles cried out, desperately kicking and
clawing, heel catching the Colonel square in the gut. The hand of the alpha
whipped down and backhanded him, jerking his face to the side. "Enough," the
Colonel growled, and if there was any confusion, he gripped Stiles by the hair
and tilted his head back, pressing the flat side of a long blade to his throat.
"Come, my little dove," he purred, gliding the knife down across Stiles' skin,
letting it slice through the first layer of his linens. He pressed his lips to
the omega's ear. "It's time to clip your wings."
The knife was haphazardly tossed amongst the bedding as the Colonel bore down
on him, shoving his face against Stiles' neck, tugging at his
linens. Stiles groped blindingly for the knife and whipped it forward, nearly
meeting flesh-
The Colonel immediately snatched his wrist. They tumbled off the bedding in
their struggle, and the Colonel wrestled him onto his back, even as Stiles put
all his weight behind trying to bury the blade into the alpha. The Colonel
slammed Stiles' hand back against the ground, knife thumping against the fur
rug.
"No," Stiles cried out, desperately thrashing.
The Colonel's face had changed, replaced by a mask of utter rage, and beneath
that, something worse—a maniacal light in his eyes—the Colonel's real face, and
he suddenly had Stiles by the throat, shaking him like a rag doll, Stiles'
mouth opening in a soundless cry—choking, choking, choking. He clawed at the
Colonel's hands, but they were like slabs of stone crushing his windpipe. The
world was spinning, the light fading, reducing to a pinpoint.
He felt his mother take his hand, guiding him. Where were they? An endless sea
full of golden wheat set inside one of his books. No one will hurt you anymore,
she said, but Stiles didn't want to go with her. Where's Derek? Where are the
kids? His mother looked very sad for him. I don't want to give up, he told her,
and she cupped his cheek. Like I did? she asked sadly. Stiles reached for
her. I don't think that. She smiled at him and kissed his brow, backing away to
where his father waited further off in the swaying field. Hope is not a
mistake, my love. 
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
They set fire to the Ridge.
The flames licked up the sides of the canyon, forming a ring of wild flames,
and the Jackals were thrown into a flurry of chaos. They threw themselves off
the rocks in panic, stumbled their way down to the base of the gorge, tearing
at their scorched clothes and singed hair, disordered and torn over how to best
extinguish the blaze. They were hesitant over using the water supply, which
Derek had been counting on. He waited in a crouch as the Colonel's guards
abandoned their post and joined the mayhem.
The Colonel shoved open the vault, coming out to see what all the commotion was
about. Derek dropped down onto the ledge.
The Colonel's surprised face greeted him, frozen in a sort of dazed mask, and
Derek glanced to the side, inside the vault, to see Stiles laying on the floor,
unmoving. He met the Colonel's eyes over the heat-haze, mind running back
through all the promises he'd made to erase every trace of this monster's
existence.
He ran to Stiles, and the Colonel escaped.
Seized by a panic deeper than any he'd ever felt, Derek fell to his knees,
cradled the boy to him and shook, begging him to wake, but Stiles' limp body
flailed uselessly in his arms. "No," he gasped out. "No! No! I just got you
back!" He was never yours to keep.All those days, all the nights, all the
little moments they had, the ghosts and heartbreak and hope, the beginning of
their life together—only for it to come to this.
Stiles remained lifeless, finger-shaped imprints starkly standing out against
his pale neck, his beautiful face marred with light bruising, lip split and
swollen, the fan of his dark lashes like ink against snow.
The first time Derek saw Stiles, he thought he was dead—because angels surely
didn't exist on this earth—and when he had woken, and Stiles was there, taking
care of him, watching over him, Derek had looked at him and known, for the
first time, that not everything in the world was ugly. He had realized that, he
had known that, just as he knew the world did not allow such things—beauty and
kindness and love—and still, he had let himself hope. Nothing good could ever
live in this world and survive—that was reality. That was the truth of his
whole life. And now Stiles was ripped away from him, just like Laura had been,
just like his family, and this wasn't happening, it couldn't end this way-
He threw his head back and howled, a mournful song of a wolf, the loss of his
mate burning hotter and brighter than the flames lighting up the world outside.
He didn't realize he was crying until his tears dripped down onto Stiles' pale
cheek. He cried silently, shoulders shaking, dirty palm streaking his mate's
cheek as he cradled it, letting the fire sweep its way into the vault.
He thought about Icarus, suddenly, the story of the boy who flew too close to
the sun, only to fall to his death. Derek had wondered why he did such a thing.
He was told that the sun was something dangerous, something not to get close
to, so why had he ignored all the warnings, all the signs? Why did he do it
anyway, when he knew it'd be the end of him?
But Derek supposed he finally got it now. Because Stiles was his sun. And
despite everything, he had been unimaginably worth it.
It was a long and horrible few seconds before Stiles' eyes finally flew open
and he sucked in a breath with all the mighty force of a raging red storm. He
winced and hacked out a throaty cough, and Derek felt relief rush through him
like a cold bucket of water to the face. He pressed his face into the omega's
neck, drinking in his scent, the warmth and realness of his pulse beating
against his mating mark, and Derek couldn't get enough.
Stiles lifted a weak hand to cradle the back of Derek's neck, nose pressing
into Derek's temple, gasping in the smell of his alpha. Derek scooped him up,
cradling him close, and turned to leave the vault behind.
Out at the edge of the ledge, he looked down over the fire and the people, who
had all emerged from their huts, forming a united mob against the remaining
Jackals. They descended upon each other, but the Jackals were outnumbered. They
were disarmed and dealt with in a handful of seconds, the Colonel standing in
the middle of the masses, looking naked without his rabid dogs to defend him.
The people swarmed him, and the Colonel disappeared beneath the throng of
tearing hands.
Stiles tugged on Derek's collar, urging them to retreat down. Derek obeyed,
jumping from rock to rock, the wolf in him newly broken through, revived—his
strength and speed were already returned to him, even more so than usual, and
Stiles' heartbeat, thumping steadily against his own, was the only thing
grounding Derek as he coldly gazed down upon the Colonel once they stood in
front of his beaten, kneeling form. He still carried Stiles in his arms, the
omega's head resting against his shoulder, arms thrown around Derek's neck.
Stiles hadn't yet looked at the man who'd tortured him all his life, now that
he was bent and yielding, finally defeated.
"Stiles," Derek murmured, his breath puffing against the omega's cheek.
Stiles said nothing at first, the mob growing antsy. Then, with a certain
affliction in his voice, said, "Let us be done with him."
"So you seek revenge," the Colonel managed to crow through his bleeding, teeth
missing, face torn up and swelling all over. He looked like was about to say
something else, but one of the older Town men stepped forward and struck him
hard in the chest, knocking the air out of the Colonel. The men keeping him
still yanked his head back, baring his throat, forcing the Colonel to watch as
his fate was decided.
Stiles tugged on Derek's collar again, and the alpha carefully let him down.
The omega carried himself slowly toward the Colonel. He stopped but a few steps
away. "I seek justice," he said steadily, sincerely, looking down into the face
of the man who had taken everything from him.
The Colonel seemed to stop breathing when Stiles suddenly spat in his face.
The omega leaned forward, the tip of his thumb tracing the scar that bridged
his throat, mimicking the gesture of a promised death. He told the Colonel,
"But I'll take revenge."
The people roared.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
"He seems older than he is, huh?" the Colonel asked casually, as if he wasn't
digging his own grave. Quite literally. He was given a shovel and put to scoop
out a pit in which his dead body would rest by nightfall. Less than a handful
of hours past sunrise, and he was purposely working slow, despite his obvious
array of attained injuries. "Wouldn't you say?" the Colonel repeated.
"He's just a boy," Derek spat, because ignoring scum was clearly a difficult
task for him.
The other alpha's brows rose in an unimpressed arch. "Stiles is no child. He
has heats, wolf. He could have born three of my children by now-"
Derek silenced him with bullet to the foot. "I think it looks deep enough," he
remarked, and unsheathed his claws, ignoring the cries of the pathetic,
doubled-over alpha. "Lay in your grave."
For a split second, the Colonel looked like he was going to risk the slice of
Derek's claws. Derek cocked his gun in answer, and the Colonel haltingly
lowered himself into the pit, foot bleeding all over the dirt.
Thunder in the distance, but no sign of clouds, except for those beginning to
roll in from the north. Figures. Derek glanced up at where Marin and
Deaton were keeping Lydia and Boyd company by their hut, then over at Stiles,
who was looking out from the Pass at the dead world that lay beyond. Derek
called him over.
"Burn him," is all Stiles said, and Derek raised his gun to carry it out, but
Stiles stopped him. His eyes were distant when he explained himself: "Alive."
Derek stared at him. He slowly nodded. His mate needed this.
"You can't be serious," the Colonel objected. Derek handed Stiles a tankard of
gasoline, and Stiles unwaveringly doused the Colonel's body with fuel.
"Stiles," the Colonel spluttered, trying to evade the shower, gawking up at
them as it all finally began to set in. With huge eyes, he watched as Stiles
pulled out a matchbox and lit one up. Now it was the Colonel's turn to gulp for
air, to watch his life be torn away by someone else, unwilling to believe these
were his final moments. He curled into the corner of the pit, clawing at the
walls of his grave, naively believing he could escape. Derek and Stiles watched
the performance in silence until the Colonel grew pale and his thrashing became
deranged.
Before Stiles could toss the matchstick down, Derek placed a hand on his arm.
Stiles looked up at him. "Let me," Derek said. This isn't a weight you should
ever have to bear. He turned to the omega, hand gently circling his hip. "Let
me do this for you." I won't let anyone's blood stain your hands—not even
his. The match kept burning, and then Stiles slowly nodded, blowing it out.
The Colonel had given up, chest heaving in resignation, sobs and wails quieted
into panicky breaths. Stiles stared down into the pit. His face would be the
last thing the Colonel saw. "I was never yours," Stiles told him. "I could
never be yours." He watched the Colonel for a moment. "The desert will go back
to belonging to the people. You're no Colonel, no king, no god. You're just a
man, Rafael." Stiles cocked his head slightly, gaze lingering on the alpha's
grasping hands—the hands that had brought him so much pain—which now betrayed
the Colonel in his moment of desperation and despair. "And soon you won't even
be that." The resignation vanished, replaced by fear once more, filling the
Colonel's eyes. "Your Jackals are either dead or happy to see you die. Your
grave will be left unmarked. It'll be like you never even existed." The Colonel
began struggling again, snarling, reaching up for Stiles as if he thought he
could haul the omega close by sheer force of will.
"I love Derek," Stiles said, and Derek looked at his mate. "He's a good man."
Stiles met his gaze, nodding once.
The Colonel vehemently cursed as Derek lit a match, yelping as it was tossed
down into the pit. Flame smoked against skin, melting flesh, and the Colonel
screamed.
It was music to Derek's ears.
The fire quickly attracted the attention of the people, who crept back out from
their huts to admire the tall column of flame and smoke.
Derek and Stiles joined Boyd and Lydia up by the hut, Deaton and Marin sitting
and watching the Colonel turn to dust with tired, relieved eyes. They hugged
the children close, and a few more tears were shed. They watched from there as
the clouds turned all different shades of white and purple, half-shadows
painting the land, sparks of electricity striking down in the distance, all
over the earth below. The sky poured down, drenching everything. The Colonel's
grave sizzled out, steam rising from the Ridge as every last trace of the fire
was completely smothered. A few of the Town youth climbed up several levels of
the Ridge and began rolling rocks, filling the pit. The haggard people turned,
returning to their dwellings.
The Colonel was no more.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
"He lied," Stiles said.
Derek's hand paused where he was dragging a washcloth over Stiles' knee. "Who?"
"The Colonel." Stiles' brows furrowed in distress. "About the west." Derek
grunted, continuing to wipe the grime from his skin. "Derek," Stiles pressed,
seizing Derek's hands. "Beacon Hills could still be out there. Your sister-
" his words broke off, pulling away suddenly, shoulders shaking.
"I know."
Stiles looked at Derek, not understanding, eyes brimming with tears. "Then why
didn't you go? Why did you stay, Derek? There was-" his lip trembled, voice
breaking. "There's nothing here for you."
Derek tossed the rag aside and gingerly cupped Stiles' raw, bruised face, their
foreheads brushing, and he told his mate, because it was the only right answer
in the world, "You're here."
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
"You were right," Stiles whispered that night as they lay in bed, exhausted,
tucked up against Derek's warmth as the rain poured outside. "What has God
touched that he doesn't spoil?"
Derek turned his head, pressed his lips to Stiles' temple.
"You."
Chapter End Notes
     cha cha real smooth
***** Chapter 12 *****
Chapter Notes
                        ❀ this_was_always_your_dream ❀
See the end of the chapter for more notes
Derek figured that the stress and trauma of what went down with the Colonel
would most probably show itself in certain forms, and they did, for the most
part—the first sign being Stiles' early heat, and the second being the omega's
new fear of being taken from behind, of not being able to see Derek's face.
They were only five minutes in, Derek gripping his wrists and biting the back
of his neck, realizing too late that Stiles wasn't moaning, but rather
whimpering—crying. "What-" Derek never finished the thought because suddenly
Stiles whipped around and slapped him.
Derek was so surprised that he continued to stare down at the omega for a
moment, disbelieving, as Stiles began to thrash, swinging his arms, and Derek
didn't know what to do, so he just wrapped his arms around the boy, pinning
them together with all his strength while Stiles sobbed against his neck,
helplessly writhing against Derek's hold. "It's me," Derek whispered urgently,
"It's just me."
When Stiles calmed down, his eyes were far away. He slowly covered his face,
attempting to hide this part of himself from Derek. "No," he murmured into his
hands, voice trembling as the alpha held him close, "No, no, no-"
The panic rushed out of Derek, replaced by a nauseating anger he thought he'd
never have to feel again. He pried away Stiles' hands and cupped his mate's
flushed face. "What devil got you?"
Stiles just shook his head, shoulders shaking, and Derek knew. He gritted his
teeth, made sure to kiss Stiles' brow and cradle him close. How could he still
feel so much hatred towards a fallen warlord? The Colonel rested in a pit below
the world, nothing but a handful of dust, and still Derek hated him. Derek
thought he might hate him forever.
"The only one that existed," Stiles whispered after the rain picked up outside,
finally answering him. "And now he's dead."
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
The kids were taking turns riding on the back of the motorbike with Derek,
yelling and laughing a little ways off from the house. Stiles no longer feared
them being taken while out in the open. They could finally be children, running
freely without worry of a preying tyrant who'd come and snatch them away. The
world was a dangerous place in itself, but the Colonel was dead, and that gave
Stiles endless comfort where it mattered.
He pinned up the last row of linens to the line, glancing over occasionally to
the bright, smiling faces of the kids, to the encouraging grin of his mate.
Stiles felt his heart flutter when their eyes met. This man.
Derek made him a fighter. Derek made him a slayer of tyrants, a wielder of the
truth, a beast of family and friendship—a mate.
He settled his hand over his stomach, absently.
Stiles would make Derek a father.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
The stars were crisp and bright against the inky night sky.
Where are you?
Derek closed his eyes.
Where did you go, brother?
"Shut up," he hissed.
Derek-
"Shut up!"
Stiles stared at him from a few feet away. Derek sat up in the Jeep, breathing
heavy. The omega looked sad for him. "She's here?"
Derek lowered his eyes, humiliated. He nodded.
Stiles climbed up and sat in the passenger side, reclining and looking up. His
hand tangled with Derek's after a moment. Almost instantly, Derek's heart
calmed, and the chill in the air crept into his bones, Stiles' warm hand
grounding him. When he looked over, Stiles was grinning, impressed with
himself.
But you can't save me like that, angel.
Now that he'd allowed it into his head, Derek couldn't push the thought away,
even though it was the honest truth. What Stiles did for Derek all those months
ago wasn't this fateful thing like he thought it was. He took Derek away from
everything—his ghosts, his family, his vow to find Laura. He put Derek in the
sands and the heat, the dirt and the isolation. And he expected Derek to love
him. And that was the hardest part. Because Derek did.
But he loved his sister, too. He couldn't forget that.
Stiles saved Derek's life, and somewhere along the way, he showed Derek one so
different and beautiful that he didn't think he could ever get it out of his
mind. And he couldn't get Stiles out of there, either. Stiles was stuck in
Derek's brain like his own blood vessels.
Which was why he knew telling Stiles what was in his heart this time around
would probably kill them both.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
"I have to talk to you." 
Stiles looked up, surprised. Derek was obviously anxious, and Stiles thought
that maybe his secret was out, that maybe Derek's wolf senses had picked up on
it somehow. "Me, too," he said carefully, and Derek pulled out a chair and sat.
"You first."
Derek looked like he was going to pass out, his head bowed, knee twitching. It
was unlike him. Stiles put a hand on his arm. "Derek, what is it?"
The alpha looked up and said, with all the finesse of a young boy, "I have to
go."
Stiles felt his heart drop. He didn't understand. "Go where?"
Derek let out a breath, and the look he gave Stiles was one that said, You know
where. Stiles didn't say anything, and Derek told him, "I have to find Laura."
Stiles pulled his hand away. He couldn't listen to this.
"Stiles-"
"Why are you doing this?" His chest felt heavy, breaths coming shallowly. Maybe
he was having a panic attack.
Derek reached for him, and Stiles abruptly stood, chair skidding back. "I have
to," Derek said. "I have to know, Stiles. If she's out there, if there's even a
chance—please, you have to understand-"
Stiles was turning and running. He couldn't bear to hear another word. He
slammed the door shut behind him, falling back and sliding down in a heap on
the floor.
Derek couldn't do this, not now, not after everything. He loved Derek. The
children loved Derek. Even Jackson, who found it hard to love anyone. Even
Boyd, who hadn't even known how to love someone.
Stiles didn't know how long he stayed like that, lost in his head, his world
coming undone, but the sun had begun to peek out, early morning light pouring
into the room, and before it had even fully risen over the horizon, he felt his
frame begin to rack with sobs, hot, stinging tears sliding down his face, and
he curled up right there on the floor, fingers gripping the linen over his
stomach, the flutter inside, like him, dying down into a sickening puddle of
despair.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
Derek ran a tired hand over his face. "Talk to me, Stiles." He sighed when
Stiles continued his silence. "We can't leave things like this."
"You've made your decision, then."
Derek stared down at the floor. "We need to fix this before I go."
Stiles squeezed his eyes shut against the onslaught of tears. "Then I'll keep
it broken so you stay."
When Derek looked up, there was fondness in his gaze, but also a quiet sadness.
Stiles knew there was nothing he could say to change the alpha's mind.
"How long?" Stiles whispered.
"I don't know."
"How long?"
"Idon't know,Stiles."
A few heartbeats of silence.
"Maybe ten days, maybe a hundred, maybe a thousand—I don't fucking know."
"A year."
Derek paused. "A year?"
"A year."
"Stiles-"
"You come back to me, and if not-"
"You want me to be here in a year?"
Stiles looked at his mate, really looked at him. "I want you to stay forever,
Derek. But I want you to be happy."
Derek's face crumbled, and he buried it into his hands. 
"So a year from now," Stiles said, voice shaking. "You come back to me, and
I'll know. Or you don't." He swallowed. "And I'll know." He reached out and
pulled Derek in to him. "Deal?"
Derek held him fast, like he was afraid Stiles would slip away right then and
there.
He whispered, "Deal."
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
The kids had a harder time accepting it.
Boyd just straight up stopped talking to Derek. The little ones were tearful
and confused, the girls heartbroken, and Jackson—well. Jackson was more bitter
than usual.
"Why's he gotta go?" Scott asked, and Derek held his breath as Erica set down
her book. "The Waiting Ones bother him a lot," she told the boy. The
ghosts. "They won't leave him alone. One of them is his sister. She could be
alive. She could be looking for him." Kira crawled around the corner to the
hall, where Derek stood silently, listening. She looked up at him, eyes
shining, and placed a little paper boat on his foot. She turned and crawled
back the way she came. "She could be waiting," Erica continued. Derek bent to
pick up the boat, turning it over in his hands. "That's why they're called the
Waiting Ones. They could be alive or they could be dead. Either way, they're
always waiting."
The sound of the book abruptly shutting.
"The Rain Man doesn't want her to wait anymore."
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
The thought of leaving Stiles alone with the kids made him feel sick. There
were no more Jackals, no Colonel, but there could be others. There were always
others, in this world. Deaton and Marin had secured peace so far, but how long
would it last? Tyrants weren't born tyrants. The Colonel himself had just been
a man. Who'd be next? Power-hungry, dangerous, and destructive? Who would be
the next Colonel? Derek would ride out, and Stiles would wait, and anything
could happen to either of them while they were apart.
But he couldn't abandon his sister. Funny thing, the heart. One second, he
couldn't wait to run away from commitment, and the next, he was mated to an
omega out in the middle of the desert. He couldn't stomach the idea of letting
Stiles feel anything but loved for the rest of his life, and now here he was,
abandoning his mate and the kids for a promise that may very well be his end.  
Derek couldn't think about that now. He made a few last adjustments to the
motorbike before he was ready to set out.
Erica sniffled. "I'm gonna make you real proud-like," she whispered, and Derek
bent to press a kiss to her forehead. The rest of the kids were as equally
miserable, quietly watching Derek as he said goodbye to each of them.
"Don't die," Boyd said, stepped forward, and hugged him. Derek was too
overwhelmed by the display to do anything other than hug him back. The boy was
taller than the day they had met. He'd grown in the time Derek had been here,
and he'd probably be taller than Derek the next time they saw each other. The
alpha gave them all a last once-over before turning to his mate.
He walked over to Stiles. The omega was standing next to the bike, facing the
Ridge, linens gently lifting in the breeze. He was holding something, his
father's satchel. He thrust it out towards Derek when he approached. "A parting
gift," he explained. When Derek opened it and saw what was still inside, he
promptly began to refuse. Stiles ignored him, slung it over Derek's bike with
the rest of his shit—water, food, bedding—everything he'd need for the journey.
"It's useless here," the omega said. "If there's anything out there-" he stared
off into the distance again "-at least I'll know you have a piece of me." Derek
gazed down at him. "Also," Stiles added, pulling the camera from his linens.
"This." Derek took it without putting up a fight this time. "To show us what's
out there when you return." The omega's voice had a slight tremor in it now.
Derek could see how hard he was trying to hold it together. He didn't wait to
pull Stiles into his arms. He held his mate there, breathing him in. Stiles
sighed into the crook of his neck, shuddering into the embrace. He pulled back
after a moment, fingers fidgeting against Derek's shoulders. Derek pressed
their foreheads together.
"What if you forget you love me?" Stiles whispered.
"I won't."
"But what if you do?"
He quieted Stiles with a kiss."I won't." Derek held his lovely face, brushed
the tears away with his thumbs. "I will never not miss you. I will never not
love you." I'll remember this, all of this, everything you are.
"Go," Stiles said. "Go so that you can come back."
They kissed, Stiles gripping Derek's jacket like a lifeline, Derek's big hands
framing his face, and then Derek made himself go.
He revved the engine, and the kids began shouting out to him, running down from
the porch. Stiles backed up, arms still outstretched, hands reaching towards
him. Derek forced his eyes ahead. He knew if he looked at Stiles standing there
and saw the children chasing after the bike, watching him leave, that he'd call
the whole thing off.
He sped forward without looking back. 
As he raced under the Pass, out into the vast, dead nothing, he tried to
imagine Stiles' face. I'm sorry, angel. Try not to hate me too much.His brain
drew up the image of their wedding—their first kiss as mates, the kids laughing
and cheering, the rain pouring down.
A wolf howled in the distance.
I love you.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
He pitched a sand-colored tent that blended seamlessly into the surrounding
wasteland so that even if anyone drove by, they probably wouldn't see him.
Halfway through the night, he pulled back the flap, letting the frigid air in.
He gazed up at the stars as he fell asleep.
In the morning, as he slid on his jacket, something fluttered out from one of
its pockets into the dirt. Derek picked it up, shaking the sand away. At first
he thought it was the photo he kept of his sister and himself.
It wasn't.
The kids were making goofy faces, all of them posed around Stiles, who wore one
of his secret smiles, eyes bright and knowing, gazing into the camera. Derek
sat back in his bedding, tent still pitched, a sharp pain flooding his chest.
He laughed, the silent world around him deafening despite his wretched hearing.
"Fuck." His eyes stung. "Fuck!" he screamed, voice lost to the vast emptiness
of the land.
He stared down at the picture, heart aching, giving himself a moment, and then
he was picking himself up, tucking the photograph safely away, and heading
west.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
He'd forgotten what survival was truly like, what it meant to be exposed to the
elements and starving and exhausted and wary of anything the land offered that
seemed too good to be true. To make matters worse, the bike died on him after
the first month. All the fixing and screwing and tightening and adjusting and
replacing, all that time in the desert, all of it gone to waste. Food supply
ran short after another eight days, water tiding him over until he happened
upon the first people he had seen since Paradise, a caravan of barterers. He
exchanged a week's labor for any information about Beacon Hills and a restock
of food and water, then headed out once more. He ran out of that supply before
the second month had gone by. The heat was agonizing, the terrain brutal, the
trekking a nightmare in itself, even when the ghosts were most relentless.
Sometimes he'd realize his lips were moving, that he'd been talking to Laura
for hours. Imaginary conversations. Cursing her for not being here, for not
knowing whether this was all in vain, if the hope Stiles had revived in him
would only break his heart in the end, like it always had. Weeks passed, still
no sign of Beacon Hills. He knew he'd probably die soon. The world was big,
with plenty of room for more nothingness and death.
He thought he'd finally lost his mind to the madness when he was trudging
through the miles of dirt as usual, northbound, and Laura strode up next to
him. So accustomed was he to his brain playing tricks that he didn't realize it
wasn't his sister until the creature was blocking his path, head cocked, deep,
yellow eyes staring up at him. Derek jerked back.
A wolf.
The wolf.
Dark and sleek and looking like the epitome of health. His coat was clean, ribs
covered by toned muscle, tongue lolling slightly out of its mouth, though Derek
imagined that however thirsty he was, Derek was a thousand times more so. He
looked around, but all that stared back was endless wasteland. The wolf stepped
into Derek's space before he could react, rubbing his head into Derek's leg. He
bounced away, trotting back the way Derek had come. He cocked his head again
when Derek didn't immediately understand. Something in Derek gave a tug.
Whether he was thinking straight or not didn't matter anymore.
He followed the wolf west.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
There was a river.
Derek's initial instinct told him it was contaminated. No body of water this
large could survive the death of the world and remain touchable.
But then he watched the wolf trot up and drink steadily from the stream. When
he'd had his fill, he charged into the water, splashing around, water flying
everywhere. If Derek had been less than convinced, he certainly was now. He
cupped his hands in the river and brought the water to his lips.
Nothing had ever tasted so good. Wolf was still splashing about, getting Derek
wet. Derek couldn't get mad. It felt like it'd been ages since he last saw or
drank a drop of water. He guessed he had the rains to thank for that, and
inhaled it until he felt like throwing up.
Afterward, he stared down at his own reflection in the water. Last time he'd
seen himself was in the mirror of Stiles' Jeep, knowing he'd be leaving, trying
to find the courage to break the subject before he headed inside. Nothing could
make something like that easy.
Wolf yipped at him from further up the bank.
Derek picked himself up and started moving again.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
With each passing day, Laura grew more and more real. Derek saw her all the
time: running on the horizon, hidden beneath the surface of the river, perched
up on a ledge of a mountain, facing Derek, smiling, waiting.
She was there, right next to him, when he came upon a treeline.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
  
The community was small. Their representative was a woman named Melissa. Derek
told her these were the first trees he'd seen since he was a boy. She was only
slightly less suspicious of him after he said this. Derek couldn't blame her.
"We never received a direct hit," she told him. "But we might as well have."
She gestured for him to follow after her. "The aftershocks took out most of
what was standing. Majority of people had already evacuated, thinking they had
time to get to the vaults." Her eyes were distant as she walked Derek up a dirt
path from the main settlement. "Few were lucky." Derek clenched his jaw.
"Somehow, some of it survived." She stopped. "Through there," she said,
pointing into the woods. "The Hale House." Derek's head snapped towards her.
She looked evenly back at him. "Go and see, Derek." His spine went stiff. "She
left something for you."
He was running.
Wolf was on his heels, darting after him through the sea of trees.
A tire swing.
A familiar deck.
A burnt house.
He stood in front of it, chest heaving.
It was exactly what he'd feared all these years: his childhood home, empty,
scorched, crumbling and broken. He fell to his knees, squeezing his eyes shut
against the nightmare.
Hands touched his face and when Derek opened his eyes, a girl stood in front of
him.
"You look crazy," his sister said.
Derek said nothing, heart racing, quietly regarding the hallucination. This was
the most realistic one yet. She looked so real. Exactly as she looked before
Derek had gone off to be a road warrior. Long, auburn locks, wide, pale eyes.
She was his sister, before the world took her.
"Why are you here?"
"I kept my promise," Derek murmured, shaking his head until little hands
steadied his face.
"You didn't have to," Laura told him, grinning like the world hadn't ended.
"I'd understand."
"No," Derek said. "No, you said you'd be waiting. You were waiting for me. You
said we'd see each other again." His shoulders began to shake with the effort
it took to keep himself still, to not crush her to him and keep her here
forever. "I'm here now."
Laura stroked his beard. "Can't stay," she said, tilting her head as she
considered him, hair spilling over her shoulder. "You gotta let me go."
Derek trembled. He didn't know how to let her go. His family's memory was
tucked away in his heart, but for some reason his mind kept tormenting him with
memories of his sister. "How?" he whispered. "How? How?" I only went into that
desert to forget about you. But the land was the color of your hair. The sky
was the color of your eyes. There was nowhere I could go that wouldn't be you-
Derek felt himself smile, suddenly, and the tears fell easily, one from each
eye, salty and heavy and running down his cheeks in tandem.
But then I saw something.Laura raised her brows, curious. Him. Derek laughed,
despite the aching rhythm of his heart and the tightness in his throat. I saw
him. And I knew.
"What?" Laura beamed. "You knew what?"
"He was home," Derek whispered. "He was what I was running toward."
All at once, Derek felt a wave of peace wash over him, something he had not
felt in a lifetime. Laura grinned, playful and bright. She ran off,
disappearing into the tall grass, and Derek watched her go. He turned to climb
up the creaking porch.
Inside, placed upon a charred table, lay Laura's badge and an outline of a
house—a new house. Outside, Wolf began barking. Derek joined him, glancing up
to take in what remained of the Hales, and he thought of his mate, because
then, miraculously, it began to snow.
Chapter End Notes
     pls don't hate me:(
***** Chapter 13 *****
Chapter Notes
               ❀ we_are_the_only_ones_who_know_where_we_belong ❀
See the end of the chapter for more notes
There was a black wolf lazily sprawled out in the middle of the clearing which
made Stiles stop and consider it. Around him, trees grew tall as the sky. The
wind rustled the leaves, fluffy clouds drifting overhead. When he looked back
at the wolf, it was now a man.
"Derek?"
His voice was distant, like an echo or a whisper. His mate was faintly smiling
at him, arms spread out. "What do you think?"
Stiles looked around again, brows furrowing. "About what?"
Derek chuckled, and Stiles felt the rumble of his mate's laugh burrow down into
the deepest parts of him. This wasn't real. None of this was real. He dreamt
about his mate when Derek was not yet with him, and now he dreamed about Derek
because he was gone.
"I'm gonna put the porch right up here," Derek began, gesturing in front of
him. "The kitchen'll go back here-" he took a  step to the side, pointing at
the tall grass. "And a library, for your books." He looked up, squinting
against the sunlight. "You think you'll want an upstairs?"
"Derek," Stiles said. "What are you saying?"
Derek looked at him. "It's ours. This land." He stepped forward. "This life."
His hands were warm on Stiles' waist as he held him. "I'm gonna build you a
house," he murmured. "Right here. Our house." He wrapped his arms around the
omega and kissed him. "Stiles," he breathed against the boy's lips. The sound
of children's laughter in the background, the bark of a wolf, the shadow of a
house against the pink sky.
Stiles shuddered. "Yes?"
Derek smiled, and Stiles felt himself fall in love all over again.
"Would you marry me?"
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
The snow delayed the rebuilding process for three months.
Derek settled well as the winter passed. Wolf kept him company on the lonely
days but was always wandering. Melissa pulled him out of his shell
occasionally, inviting—summoning—him down to the town for a drink or to assist
her with something. Spring rolled around and melted the snow, though the
showers took some getting used to. Seasonal change was still a foreign concept
to Derek. But the wet soil allowed for easier deconstruction of what remained
of the old house, so it was a blessing in disguise, to a certain extent.
He worked by day and dreamt of his mate by night. The dreams were both
beautiful and terrible at once. Some of them he wasn't sure how to even
interpret. Halfway to summer, Derek had the oddest one yet. Stiles had his
hands resting on the swell of his rounded middle.
He was pregnant.
The dream revisited Derek every night from then on. Derek would rest his head
against his mate's bump while they laid together in bed, Stiles running his
fingers through Derek's thick locks and smiling. "Come back to me soon," Stiles
would tell him, kissing his brow, and then Derek would wake, the space beside
him cold and empty, still missing his family with every atom that he was made
of.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
Stiles gave birth to a little baby girl on an early rainy morning.
Marin and Deaton were called to the house and stayed the whole day and an extra
night, just to make sure all was well.
The kids read their new sister to sleep every chance they got.
When she was a month old, Derek returned.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
"Someone's coming," Erica announced, perched on the sofa, book in her lap.
Lydia, sitting across from her, looked up.
Stiles put his daughter down in her bedding and joined them by the window. They
all froze when the man's face grew clearer.
"It's the Rain Man," Lydia gasped, and all the kids were bolting out the door.
Stiles stood motionless, watching from the window as they raced towards Derek,
who dropped his bags and went down like a collapsing mountain as the children
tackled him. His hair was long and wild again, his skin covered in grime, dirt-
streaked from head to toe, just like the first time Stiles saw him.
Stiles walked out onto the porch. Derek didn't see him at first, but when he
finally glanced up, Stiles could see him take a breath, sighing as he looked
upon his mate, an invisible weight being lifted off his shoulders. The children
chattered excitedly, parting when Stiles approached. With him came a certain
tension and they wandered off a bit, digging through Derek's
bags, sensing that Stiles wanted a moment alone with the alpha.
"You came back," Stiles said, fidgeting with his linens.
Derek nodded, looking like he wasn't sure if he was allowed to draw closer, to
hug his mate, to kiss him. "Of course I came back." His voice was thick and
rough.
"You were gone a long time."
"Not yet a year."
Stiles bit his lip. "Your sister?"
"With the stars," Derek said softly, fondly, the hint of a smile in his words.
He stepped forward, and Stiles pulled away, keeping his distance. Derek's brows
furrowed.
"You did what you needed to do," Stiles said, voice hardening. "And now that I
see you're okay, I never want to see you again."
Derek looked like Stiles had shot him. Stiles turned away.
"Wh–Stiles-"
Stiles whipped around. "You left me!"
"No, I never wanted to hurt you!"
"You left me! I would've done anything for you, and you chose death over me!"
"I chose life!"
Stiles paused, chest aching, breathing heavy. Derek held a hand up, and with
the other, reached into his jacket and pulled out a photograph. He held it up.
It was the house in the woods. The one from Stiles' dream. It was beautiful,
with lots of windows and a porch and a swing and trees everywhere, and out
front, in the clearing, where the tall grass had once been, now was a garden
full of green, grown from the seeds Stiles had gifted Derek.
The alpha kept pulling out photographs, holding them up, showing Stiles.
"These are what my dreams look like," Stiles murmured, his guard dropping.
"I chose you, Stiles," Derek said, and he didn't let the omega pull away this
time when he reached for him. "I chose us."
A hearty cry rose up from inside the house. They both stilled. Derek took a
moment, but then he seemed to piece it all together, the magnitude of what
Stiles had been through all these months slamming into him.
Stiles was pregnant and he left him.
"I'm scared," Derek whispered finally, and Stiles felt the cold shell around
his heart crack and crumble, every trace of anger that had built up inside him
falling away.
"Me, too," Stiles replied, and pulled Derek close, breathing his mate in.
"Filthy, tsk, tsk," he muttered after a moment, pulling away, wrinkling his
nose, and Derek's worried expression melted away. And he did wear every color
of earth—in his clothes, on his skin, matted in his hair. His hair. The déjà vu
of their reunion was too real. "Gotta clean you up real right, Rain Man."
Stiles ran his fingers through Derek's thick beard. "Think it's time we do
something about this, hm? For your daughter."
Derek sucked in a breath. "I have a daughter."
Stiles cupped his face and kissed Derek, lips soft and warm against his mate's.
He took Derek's hand, leading him back to the house. He replied, "She wants to
meet you," and pulled Derek up the porch to wash the evidence of his long
journey away.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
"I called him Rain Man," he heard Stiles' voice in their room, soft and
comforting, telling their child their story. "There was no rain in the desert,
where we live, but he was here. A very rare creature indeed." He looked up when
Derek stood in the doorway. The alpha hesitated, glancing down at the soft
bundle in Stiles' arms. The omega smiled, reassuring him, and Derek stepped
inside.
They sat on the edge of the bed together for a minute, neither of them
speaking. The child was calm and curious, eyes wandering around, locking on
Derek.
"What's her name?" he asked.
Stiles smiled. "Tallulah."
Derek felt the knot in his throat triple in size.
"The first people of this land, before it was a desert, before it was a
country, bordered and raped, a land to be possessed and owned, before anyone
could hurt it—they created this name," Stiles said. "It means 'laughing
water'." He looked at Derek. "And it sounds like your mother's name."
When the tears dripped down, Derek didn't hide them. He let Stiles see. He
cried, and Stiles sat with him as he did, holding their daughter in his arms,
rocking her back and forth, his warm side flush with Derek's, hip to shoulder.
And when Derek was all cried out, throat tight and dry, lips chapped, two
streaks of wetness running parallel down his freshly-shaven face, he looked at
her—at his daughter—and he smiled, despite himself, something he hadn't done
fully—not even for Stiles—in a long, long time.
It felt good. It felt right.
Stiles placed their daughter in his shaking hands, and helped Derek hold her
until he had the gentle strength to do so himself, cradling her little, linen-
clad body in one large palm, her small, pale head in the other, staring down at
her, too afraid to blink in case he missed even a second of her cuteness.
"She's-" his voice cracked "-beautiful." There are no words. None lovely enough
to describe what you are."She's-" his brows furrowed as he saw that she had
already inherited a few of Stiles' constellations "-yours."
Stiles cupped the side of Derek's face, stroked his cheek. Their eyes met. "And
yours." He covered the hand that held their daughter's head. "She's ours,
Derek." He smiled down at her once more, but Derek couldn't look away from him.
This boy, this beautiful boy, who had carried their child, brought her into
this world, safe and healthy and the most precious thing that time would ever
know—Stiles, a desert flower, a rose in this wasteland, Derek's very own
guardian angel—he had done this. He was to the earth as water was, not designed
to hold himself together, running freely like a river, bending and curling for
the moon like a flame dancing across fuel. He was like air, everywhere and
nowhere. He was everything Derek needed to live, to breathe. He had granted
Derek a second life, had breathed hope and faith and kindness and bravery and
love into Derek, had shown Derek a world he did not think he deserved.
And now he gave Derek a daughter.
"I love you," Derek said.
Stiles looked up at him once more, and he laughed, and he kissed Derek, and
Derek kissed him, and then they were both smiling, and their teeth knocked, and
it made them smile even more, and it was beautiful, and Derek knew he couldn't
live without this.
"You remembered," Stiles sighed against his lips.
"Of course I remember," Derek said, and kissed him again, because he could, and
he would, and, "I'd die before I forget something like that," and they couldn't
stop kissing, and Derek's ghosts never showed their faces ever again.
 
                                      ❀❀❀
 
Derek loaded up the Jeep with the last of the seeds, an ample supply that
Deaton and Marin had kept hidden for a moment like this, crates upon crates
of all the ingredients to begin the world again. "There's a halo around you,
child," Marin said to Stiles. "I dreamt this day would come. You were never
meant to stay."
Stiles sniffled, and he hugged her, burying his face in her dark hair. "I'll
come back," he assured. "I'll visit."
Deaton softly chuckled, gently patting his back. He cupped Stiles' face in his
wrinkled hands, and pressed his lips to the boy's forehead. He shook his head
and said wistfully, frankly, "Don't."
He helped Stiles into the Jeep, placing Tallulah in the boy's arms. He stroked
the child's cheek. "There is a whole world out there. You'll see." Stiles
thought he was talking to the baby, but when he looked up, Deaton was looking
at him, fond, proud, and Stiles gripped the man's hand, kissed his knuckles.
"I'll never forget," he promised. "Not any of it."
The house his father built shrunk into the dry landscape as they drove away,
Marin and Deaton arm in arm, waving, disappearing in the rearview mirrors. The
kids were subdued in the back of the Jeep, and Stiles couldn't really blame
them. This had been their whole life. Tallulah snuffled inside her linens,
gummy smile lighting up, chubby little hands trying to catch the wind.
Before they reached the Pass, Derek casually reached into the pocket of his
jacket and pulled something out. "A gift," he told Stiles, motioning for the
omega to hold out his hand. Stiles obeyed, slipping Tallulah into the crook of
his right arm, cradling her while he held out his left hand. Derek slid a ring
onto his fourth finger. When he looked at where Derek was gripping the wheel,
he saw that the alpha was also wearing one.
"Smooth," Stiles said, grinning, and Derek simply laughed, pulling back the
hood, and the children yelped and cheered, the wind carrying them across the
desert.
Stiles couldn't stop looking at his mate. His mate. Derek did things for Stiles
that the Colonel—or any man—never could. The Colonel had come for Stiles like a
king demanding his due—he had commanded and taken. But Derek—Derek had desired
Stiles, not for youthful dalliance, as the Colonel had, but for permanent
things—companionship, the creation of a life, a family. Love.
Stiles bit his lip, contemplating telling Derek what was on his tongue. The
alpha watched him, amused. Maybe he knew Stiles was falling in love the whole
time. He probably knew from the first moment they laid eyes on each other.
"I dreamed about this," Stiles said a moment later.
Derek looked over at him. "Me, too," he replied, reaching over to brush a large
hand over Tallulah's soft head. "The house, the kids-" he glanced down at his
daughter "-her."
Stiles gazed back at him. "I remember. And there was a wolf-"
A howl rose up in the distance, and Derek smirked.
Stiles laughed. He wasn't sure what to make of their connection, their
dreams—of anything that had happened. All he knew was that it brought them
together, time and time again.
He glanced back at the kids, cuddled close together, talking away, hair
whipping around, smiling from ear to ear. He settled back into his seat,
sighing, hand reaching out to tangle with Derek's. 
They sped through the Pass, leaving Paradise.
Chapter End Notes
     Trust me when I say I made myself cry.
     Thank you to everyone who showed this fic some love, you are all the
     absolute greatest! I've got another project lined up that I'm hoping
     to put out real soon, so keep an eye out! Also, those of you that are
     disappointed by the lack of fluffy pregnancy moments, I do apologize.
     I was trying to squeeze a lot into this fic, and I really had to wrap
     things up.
     Side note: I am the type of person to post something and furiously
     edit it afterwards, so to those of you who have ever downloaded my
     previous works, if you want to hit the refresh on those, they are now
     completely typo-free, etc.
     Shameless self-promotion: my_Tumblr
                                      ♥,
                                     Nark
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